Turn
Trixie’s third show had drawn such a massive crowd that it was impossible to hold it in the town square. Castle Rock had once again been considered, but following the afternoon’s ‘altercation’ -as Amethyst Star was already calling it- the showmare had expressed an understandable reluctance to return. Instead, she’d set up her stage in the grassy fields surrounding the Station, where the great dark bulk of the Everfree Forest provided a fitting backdrop to her hazy projections of a rampaging Ursa Major. Word had gotten around, and nearly every Lunar who was both in town and awake was attending- although to what purpose, nopony was quite willing to say. Despite their laudable efforts, they made up only perhaps one tenth of the crowd in total; the balance was made up of Guardsmares and Ponyville natives. Among them was Rainbow Dash.
The pegasus had wormed her way to near the front of the crowd -although not so near the front that she’d be conspicuously visible from the stage. Nopony paid much attention to the fact that she was attending the performance in full tactical gear. She was, after all, Rainbow Dash, and she sometimes spent an extra hour or two flying reconnaissance for the Expedition after the day’s cloud-pushing was done. She’d pulled no such duty today, but she still needed the clairaudio rune in her helmet to covertly communicate with Rain Chaser- and, as an added bonus, it helped conceal her colorful mane.
The Lunar pegasus was currently perched on an innocuous-looking cloud, one of several that she and Rainbow had pushed into position shortly before the show precisely for that purpose, unseen from below but afforded an excellent view of the stage in turn. Since Chaser had started running shifts on the security crew, one of the Guard armorers had fitted her helmet with the standard suite of enchantments- including a clairaudio spell of her own. The runes were modular by nature, and easy enough to install and pair.
“Chaser. Chaser, come in, can you see anything?” Rainbow whispered, as Trixie fired off another volley of skyrockets.
“She is walking around, talking… and firing rockets near my position…” the Night Guard whispered back in frustration.
“I can see that…” Rainbow shot back, and then muttered even more quietly to herself, “Shit, there’s probably no way to see backstage, is there? I’d be just like her to watch her sightlines on the vertical axis, too…”
“Excuse me, what?” Chaser asked. Rainbow Dash had, briefly, forgotten to consider the Lunars’ more sensitive hearing.
“Never mind.”
Pinkie Pie flitted through the crowd with preternatural speed, still offering a variety of concessions. “Carrot dahgs! Popcorn! Fuh-resh baked goodies! Ya know yer hungry, ya know they’re delicious! Get’cha popcorn, raght here!”
“Pinkie, darling, what is that accent?” Rarity asked as the baker passed her by.
“I’unno, but it sounds good,” Pinkie explained, her pronunciation still wandering somewhere between Trotston and Foaledo.
As the fireworks died down, the mare on stage resumed her usual story- “Trixie still had the bomb, of course, but neither the Ursa-” here, the great starry projection bent down and snuffled at the floor of the stage, then growled in frustration as Trixie nimbly dodged its probing muzzle, “-nor the military would ever even know it was missing!”
“Strange what ponies now consider entertainment,” Rain Chaser mused in Dash’s helmet.
“Hmm? Whaddaya mean?”
Up on stage, Trixie telekinetically wheeled out a long table covered in three sections of shimmering purple cloth.
“’Tis odd, to see a unicorn busking like this. I have seen them in minstrel shows, and as musicians, and storytellers, but nothing as… common as this. Perhaps she has some lack in her wits, or another illness.”
“Uh.” Unsure how to respond, Rainbow Dash shifted awkwardly from hoof to hoof.
Up on stage, Trixie lifted the first tablecloth into a high, tent-like shape, then yanked it away in her teeth to reveal a vase of flowers. She repeated the motion again further along the table, and produced a small golden-wire birdcage, complete with a live dove. Finally, she stopped at the third space, reared up on her hind legs, and threw open her cloak to reveal it as empty- although, just for a moment, Rainbow thought she spotted something the same color as the showmare’s fur strapped around her midsection. She was back on all fours a moment later, though, concealing whatever it was. She pulled away the last cloth to reveal a fishbowl easily two feet across, filled with water and several goldfish.
There was a surge of applause, and more than a few cheers.
“Could you see how she did that?” Asked Rainbow Dash, “Did she, like, teleport it or something?”
“I… I cannot tell,” Chaser said, slowly.
“Can you scoot the cloud any closer?”
“Not without being seen…”
“But, of course, now that I had the crystal, Trixie still needed to get it out of its case,” the showmare explained, as the Ursa projection above her swiped at a few uniformed cartoon pegasi with its claws. As she swept out her foreleg in another dramatic gesture, Rainbow’s keen vision spotted her cloak catch on something not easily visible.
“Look, her cloak’s falling differently now…” the weathermare told Rain Chaser.
“Perhaps… but… I do not know. I would rather see her act as she did at the Station.”
Trixie lifted the birdcage from the table in her telekinesis and floated it in front of her.
“Aww, shit,” said Rainbow Dash, “Fluttershy told me about this. I hope this isn’t one of those tricks where the bird gets killed…”
“Should anypony doubt the skills of the Great and Powerful Trixie, now’s your chance to find out!” the showmare called. “Anypony, anypony at all, please feel free to step up on stage and examine Trixie’s equipment! Then, I’ll need two volunteers!”
Dash briefly considered accepting the invitation and getting a better look at Trixie herself, but then decided it wasn’t worth the risk of being recognized- she probably wouldn’t be able to see anything from the stage that she and Rain Chaser couldn’t pick out from a little further back.
“Why would ponies want to watch birds be killed?” asked Rain Chaser.
“Well, you’re not supposed to know it gets killed, it’s supposed to just disappear. There’s a cage that folds up in a little hidden compartment in a table, but the thing is, the compartment isn’t as big as the bird is tall, so… shkrrk…” Rainbow made a wet crunching noise in the back of her throat.
“Agh, how horrible,” Rain Chaser spat. Dash was silently relieved she wasn't the only one disgusted. Then Chaser continued. “That must be at least two nights of food, wasted! I have seen fillies drown each other in the mud over a meal like that!”
Yikes! “Uh, yeah... a little meat, a little feathers, what's not to like?” the weathermare stammered, unsure what else to say. Poor kid… actually, is she a kid? Rainbow wasn’t actually sure, in between the Night Guard transformation and the fact that the Lunars were universally smaller and wirier than ordinary ponies.
Up on stage, Trixie was instructing Apple Bloom and Corporal Subtle Spark to press their hooves against the sides of the cage. Dash swallowed, hard.
Then she swallowed again and asked Rain Chaser “If you don’t mind answering… how old are you?”
“I’ll turn seventeen come this Sun’s Dusk.” The Lunar paused, again sounding weirdly proud of such a simple fact, and then continued, “There! Look! A unicorn stooping to pickpocketing! Now, that is entertaining!”
"Pickpocketing? What did she pickpocket?” As far as Rainbow Dash could see, Trixie was just holding onto the golden birdcage with Sparky and Apple Bloom, and slowly counting down.
“’Tis the way she moves, the way she makes others move…” explained Rain Chaser.
Rainbow Dash cocked her head. “Really?”
There was a loud snap and the bird cage disappeared from in between Sparky and Apple Bloom’s hooves. The entire crowd gasped, seemingly as one.
“A thief can spot a thief,” the Night Guard continued, “Quick hooves and distractions… her show is built around the skills of a pickpocket. And when the Solars were starving out entire cities, I got to know quite a few pickpockets.”
With her customary flourish, Trixie produced the same dove she’d just made disappear -or at least one that looked similar enough- apparently unharmed. This time, the applause was long and sustained, and Rainbow Dash found herself joining in almost by reflex. At least it wasn’t the table trick.
After that, Trixie released whatever method she was using to keep the bird sitting on her hoof; it flew through the Ursa projection and out of sight. Rainbow wondered if Trixie had somehow trained it to return at a later date, or if she simply bought -or caught- a new one each show. The pegasus peered more closely at Trixie herself, and this time noticed a series of thin, blue wires stretching down her forelegs, all but invisible against her azure coat. Perhaps they had something to do with the cage trick?
“With the Ursa right on my heels, the Great and Powerful Trixie had to act quickly!” the showmare was explaining, as she wheeled a bullseye archery target onto the far side of the stage.
“Aye! There!” Chaser shouted in Dash’s helmet, as the pegasus watched Trixie wave a hoof over a box full of throwing knives and come away with one pressed surreptitiously against the inside of her foreleg. “She just frogged that dagger!”
“Well, what’s she doin’ with it? Do you think she’ll do it again? Crap, I wish we’d brought a camera so we could show Twilight some of this… wait, did they ever teach you how to use a c-”
She was cut off suddenly when Trixie called out “No photography, please, thank you!” looking her right in the eye.
Rainbow Dash froze. She hadn’t meant to speak quite so loudly, although she still wondered how Trixie could possibly have heard her from all the way up on stage.
“Normally I'd ask for a volunteer for this next trick; any old soldier or weatherworker,” the unicorn said, stepping away from her box full of daggers, grinning the whole time, “but since you want to see my skills up close, why don’t you go ahead and come up here?”
“Umm…” Rainbow Dash muttered, shifting from hoof to hoof as the crowd surrounding her began to pull away, leaving her standing alone in the harsh blue-white glare of a spotlight.
“You should do it, it’ll be fun!” suggested Rarity from her left.
“Heeey, I don’t wanna be a showoff,” Rainbow protested, although the words already sounded hollow as soon as they had left her throat.
“You heard it here, folks! The famous Rainbow Dash, not wanting to show off!" Trixie called out to the crowd, before turning back to Dash. "What's the matter? Are you scared?” the showmare asked, her voice positively dripping with fake sympathy. She stepped out to the front center of the stage, and called out again over the whole assembly, “Can’t the Weather Captain show the Wingless and Earthbound Trrrixie how to throw a proper lightning bolt?”
A wave of general shuffling and muttering spread through the crowd. The ponies beside her gave Rainbow Dash curious looks.
“Aye, come, Rainbow Dash, show the braggart what thou canst do!” shouted Sgt Catseye.
“Yes, please, do show her!” shouted Rarity.
“C’mon! You can do it!” added Sassaflash.
“Fine.” Rainbow swallowed hard, took to the air, and glided back down onto the stage. At least she could confirm that Rain Chaser was invisible from this angle, and get a better look at the strange metallic wires running over Trixie’s forelegs- they were held in place by what looked like medical tape, painted with some sort of blue powder. Worryingly, the dagger she must’ve still had on her was nowhere to be seen, though Rainbow supposed that was likely the point.
Trixie stamped her hooves in applause, and for reasons she couldn’t quite articulate Rainbow was convinced there was something mocking about the gesture. Then the showmare’s horn lit once again, and she pulled out a heavy wooden crate from the shadows backstage. She pried it open, and all at once hurled the contents out over the audience- military balloon flares. In her telekinesis, each and every one lit at once with a distinctive snap-hiss, hovering in place against the still evening sky. At some point, she must have switched out the miniature high-powered lighting crystal each carried for a firework star; while the flares put out relatively little illumination, they sparkled in a variety of purples, blues, and pale yellows.
Several ponies in the crowd gasped or applauded, but Trixie paid them no heed. Instead, she turned to Rainbow Dash. “Now, here’s the rules. There were thirty-six flares in that box. Soon there’s going to be thirty-five. You and Trixie are going to fire lightning at them until they’re all gone- whoever hits the most, wins bragging rights. Understood?” She raised a hoof; sizzling arc of blue-white energy arced out from the tip and connected with the closest flare. It burst with a pop and a shower of faintly sparkling dust. As near as Dash could tell, all the debris burned out well before reaching the audience, but the small part of her that was concerned about such things wondered if the whole operation was entirely safe. Their lines of fire would be arcing dangerously close to quite a lot of civilians. That seemed reckless, even for Trixie.
Rainbow looked from the showmare to the crowd and then back again, trying not to let her apprehension show. Of all the subjects covered in Flight Camp and her later Weather Corps training, spellcasting had never been her strong suit. She could technically cast lightning -some magical proficiency was a necessity for the well-rounded warfighter, according to Soldier of Fortune Magazine- but she preferred to resolve potential threats with her hooves, wingblades, and raw speed.
She was about to propose taking off and pitting herself striking the targets physically against Trixie firing from the stage -a contest she was more certain she had a decent chance of winning- when the showmare shouted “Three-two-one go!” and immediately opened fire.
Rainbow Dash swallowed hard. By the time she’d searched her dusty memories of Flight Camp for the proper incantations and hurled a sheet of sizzling energy out into the sky, Trixie had already connected with three flares.
Rainbow slung out sheets of lightning one-after-the-other, not bothering to put any real power behind them. The entire stage was lit a bright blue-white, ponies gasped and murmured to each other in the audience, and flare balloons burst under the onslaught of crackling energy- but all too infrequently. The showmare, on the other hoof, wasn’t particularly fast, and as near as Rainbow could tell didn’t seem particularly powerful either -despite her slogan- but she was methodical and she was accurate. Sometimes Rainbow fell behind in a storm of frantic, ineffective wing motions, and sometimes she surged ahead and caught multiple targets in a single lucky sweep, but she never quite found the position to make up that original three-point lead.
When the sky was clear and both ponies staggered back on their haunches, sweating and breathing heavily, Rainbow Dash had scored sixteen hits to Trixie’s nineteen.
The showmare turned to the crowed and bowed, basking in the their thunderous applause; as she straightened up, a flick of her hoof sent her dagger cartwheeling over her shoulder, effortlessly skewering the half-forgotten bullseye behind her. The crowd only cheered that much louder.
“Hey. Hey!” Rainbow Dash called out, needing to shout just to make herself heard. “How do I know you’re even playing fair?”
The unicorn turned away from the crowd, just for a moment. “Well, if it’s fairness you want, Trixie is more than willing to… simplify things.” She grinned, and this time Rainbow thought she saw something calculating underneath, “You shoot me. I shoot you.” She waved a hoof back and forth between them. “Last mare standing wins.”
The entire crowd fell silent, seeming to shift nervously as a single mass.
“Is this… safe?” Rainbow heard Sgt Catseye ask.
Dash looked down at the well-trodden boards under her hooves, and shook her head. “No. No, it’s not. I think I’ve had enough.”
A few ponies in the crowd gasped. Trixie’s grin grew wider -and, Dash thought, just a tiny bit colder. The pegasus was fairly certain she saw her left eyelid twitch.“That’s a shame… guess you're just another Wannabolt after all…” she said, too quietly for anypony but Dash to catch.
Rainbow’s wings snapped out and she growled “What did you just call me…”
The showmare stepped over right beside Rainbow Dash, almost uncomfortably close, and whispered, “Go ahead and drop out! You’re good at that, aren’t you?”
“How do you ruttin’ know about-” she hissed, hopefully quiet enough that the audience couldn't hear her either.
“Captain Dash,” Rain Chaser cut in over her helmet, “‘Tis nothing worth brawling over. We have what we need. We should leave.”
“Right.” Rainbow turned and took a few steps towards the edge of the stage, when Trixie’s voice echoed once again from behind her.
“Well, if you’re going to be such a stick in the mud, we could always try a rematch with some other targets…” a bolt of lightning sizzled from the showmare’s outstretched hoof, and punched through one of the low-hanging clouds over the audience. Then another shot out, and another- each closer than the last to the cloud concealing Rain Chaser. “Ready to give up on another friend?” the showmare whispered. Rainbow doubted she actually had the power to kill or seriously injure a pony with lightning, even with a direct hit, but she didn’t need to- simply destroying Chaser’s cloud cover would cause trouble enough.
Rainbow turned back, ears pressed flat against the metal of her helmet, heart feeling like it was about to burst its way out of her chest. “You’re on.”
Once again, the entire crowd gasped, seemingly in unison.
There was a long, awkward, strange pause as Trixie looked the weathermare up and down. “Of course, it’s hardly fair for you to be wearing all that armor when the Great and Powerful Trixie is standing here clad in nothing but a cloak…” she flicked one hoof in a vaguely accusing gesture.
Dash's tail flicked in annoyance as she took a deep breath, unclasped her lightweight cuirass, and let it drop to the floor.
“And the helmet,” Trixie purred, as she floated her own hat backstage.
Rainbow Dash obliged, her vision tunneling on the showmare.
“Aww, Tartarus, they’re actually gonna do it,” she heard Sassaflash call out in the crowd.
“Should we… should we call the Watch or something?” asked Rarity.
“I shall find them, just… stay here,” Catseye answered. Dash barely registered her starting to leave, blood ringing in her ears. Trixie was already counting down again, “On three. One… two…”
Rainbow mouthed the incantation of her own sole, rudimentary lightning spell, and braced herself for the coming shock just as they’d taught her at Flight Camp. She rocked back on her hind legs, tail touching the ground, her wings stretched above and in front of her head to direct as much force away from her vitals as possible.
“Three.”
She and Trixie completed their spells at nearly the same instant. Lightning arced from Rainbow’s wings just before a corresponding bolt slammed into her chest from the showmare’s outstretched hoof; both held their arcs as best they could.
Instantly, jarring, vibrating pain tore through the pegasus. Her jaw clenched shut involuntarily and her eyes clouded with tears; her muscles locked in place, and she struggled to maintain her own spell as she felt every hair in her coat stand on end. Seconds seemed to stretch into hours as her mouth filled with the taste of salty iron- she’d bitten through the tip of her own tongue, and hadn’t even noticed.
The entire time, Trixie kept her hoof outstretched, and that same smug smirk on her lips.
Dimly, Dash heard Sassaflash calling out “Somepony’s gonna get seriously hurt if they keep this up!”
Dash’s lips pulled back into a bloody grimace of her own as she fought to keep her footing. She forced herself to concentrate despite the amperage surging through her frame, pouring every ounce of fury into her own spell, and shielded herself as best she could with her trembling wings.
Brilliant arcs raked across Trixie’s chest and looped over her back; she shuddered, but still kept on grinning.
Dash noticed once again the thin blue wires running through the showmare’s coat. They had to be a mana source, Dash realized. Whatever it was, it could output enough power to yank parts of that bird cage out of sight faster than ponies could see, so she had no trouble believing it could contribute to a spell like this. She even had some idea of where the charge cells must’ve been- try as she might, she couldn’t sling her own lightning anywhere but Trixie’s cloak-covered back. The showmare was absorbing Dash’s own lightning and hurling it back at her- Twilight or Derpy might be able to explain how, but all Rainbow Dash needed to do was tell somepony, anypony what she was doing.
Through her bleeding tongue and clenched teeth, her explanation came out as inarticulate grunts and whinnies. Her wings felt weak and immaterial; her barrel and legs completely numb; a cramp was starting to burn in her outstretched neck and her vision was narrowing down to a long, gray tunnel.
“Yoooough… R-r-r-uutrrr…” she finally managed to spit.
“Hey, n-now, no cursing. This is a family performance!” Trixie chided, her voice sounding a long, long way away.
Rainbow pulled in a few quick, gasping breaths and focused, blasting the showmare with surge after surge of bright blue-white lightning. Warmth started to grow in her shuddering chest as she saw Trixie’s own legs start to tremble, and ever so slightly the pace of her casting started to slow- whatever she was using to absorb the power, it evidently had a limit. But the pegasus could still feel each and every bolt thrown at her connect as a surge of stinging, numbing power that twisted through her burning muscles.
Little by little, Rainbow felt her wings starting to drop of their own accord, even as she panted and screwed her eyes shut and howled with the effort of keeping them in casting position. Her world faded into brilliant fog and the faint smell of burning fur- and then she hit the stage, on her barrel and both wings at once in an inglorious heap. The only silver lining was that she’d managed not to piss herself.
Very dimly, she registered Trixie laughing, the confused murmurs of the crowd, and the sounds of more fireworks. Her mouth still tasted like blood, her lungs periodically hitched as she tried to breathe, and her heartbeat echoed off the hollow floor as a dull blur. She pulled herself onto trembling, aching hooves that felt like jelly shot through with thousands of tiny needles. Experimentally she looked to her insensate wings and tried to fold them- they dragged against the flooring, unresponsive and twitching spasmodically, her feathers in disarray. Then she looked up again- Trixie was sitting down in the middle of the stage, breathing heavily; but when she sensed the pegasus’s eyes upon her, she turned and winked. She rocked back on her haunches and held up her forehooves, yelling, “S-seems like- hff anypony with a -heh heh- dash of good sense would think twice b-before tussling with the Great an-hfff T-Trixie!”
Taking a few experimental steps, Rainbow staggered over to the edge of the stage and half-climbed-half-slid down, supported by the outstretched hooves of Sassaflash and Rarity. She couldn't tell if the trembling she felt was her own body shaking, or the audience’s thunderous, mocking applause.
“I’m fine… I’m okay…” Dash rasped once her foggy brain registered their concerned expressions.
She let them start to guide her back out towards the rear of the milling audience, where Amethyst Star, in her official vest, stood alongside Sgt Catseye. “Now just what in Tartarus is going on here?” the Constable demanded.
“I’m… fine…” Rainbow Dash said again, fighting against the ringing building up in her skull and the ever-increasing twitching in her wings and all four legs. Amethyst’s concerned expression became softer and fuzzier, and in spite of herself Rainbow giggled like a schoolfilly. “I just… need… to take’a… nap…”
She didn’t feel the impact when she hit the ground.
“She is the mare I saw in the Station Yard, I do not doubt it,” said Rain Chaser.
She sat at the Golden Oaks’ central table alongside Twilight, Spike, Capt Marigold, Lancepesade Smokey Mirror, Applejack, Rarity, and a somewhat singed Rainbow Dash. Rainbow clutched a ceramic mug in her still-faintly-trembling hooves, filled with something that looked like cider but smelled more like whiskey.
“So…why would she pick a fight with Rainbow, then? I’m just not really sure how ‘A’ relates to ‘B’ here.” The unicorn scholar asked. Only occasionally did she look up from the map covered in Fluttershy’s annotations spread out in front of her.
Rainbow Dash shrugged. “I don’t really know what she could’ve been after.”
“Well, this did all start when 1stSgt Chamomile caught Trixie snooping around at the Castle Rock site,” Marigold added.
“Well, there’s snooping and then there’s just wandering, Plus, didn't Dr. Proper Verse invite her?” Twilight said, “Anyway, she filled out all her paperwork, so I don’t really see the problem.”
“Well, that might be the problem,” the captain replied, “We have been having some artifacts go missing again, after all, and you still haven’t gotten back to me on what to do about it.”
Twilight, for the first time, looked up from her map and didn’t return to it. “Is there any correspondence with Trixie’s movements?”
“Well… no. It’s not any one crew, or any one site,” Marigold answered. “We’ve had missing artifacts all over Castle Rock, and from storage at the Station.”
“I specifically checked the dates,” Spike added, “And the first losses were reported the day before Trixie showed up in town.”
“Although…” Rain Chaser countered, “That doesn’t mean she was not already here. If she was the mare who was helping Shutterfly, she has been here for quite some time.”
“I suppose it’s possible one of the Lunars is taking artifacts…” Twilight mused, then fell silent when she spotted the skeptical looks on both Chaser and Smokey’s faces. “Although, if they want something, they usually just ask for it.”
“Yes, and everything you’ve found here will go to the Night Guard eventually, anyway,” Rarity added.
“Do you think a ghost might be responsible?” The scholar next suggested, then stopped. “No, wait. That’s not remotely consistent with the behavior we’ve seen so far.” They knew what happened when a ghost got into the camp. Sometimes the spectres were destructive, and smashed things to pieces; sometimes they simply hid small items. But in every case, they never moved anything very far- and the idea of a ghost manifesting at the Station was absurd. “Although, there’s been a lot of new workers from Ponyville signing on recently… maybe it’s one or more of them?”
Applejack’s eyes narrowed. “Ya mean new workers like Trixie? Ah dun think anypony from ‘round here’d be greedy enough to do a thing like that, ‘specially after so long. One a’ them Riches maybe… a few bad apples spoil the barrel ‘n all.”
“A while ago, Fluttershy told me the mare -what’s her name, Split? Spoiled?- was a big fan of those Society for Lunar-Equestrian Studies creeps, too.” Marigold added. “That’s the same outfit that stupid reporter was selling her photographs to, or at least one of them.”
“Though, filchin’ things himself ain’t Filthy’s style,” the farmer continued, “If he was gonna do this, he’d hire somepony else to do the dirty work for him. Which takes us right back to Trixie.”
“And I think she did receive a rather sizable amount of bits fairly recently,” Rarity added. “She came back to my shop and asked for that camouflage cloak she’d talked about before. I asked for her permit, of course, but there was something odd about it. It was from someplace in Trailhead, and I think there was another name written on it before. I do wish I’d had the chance to make a copy of it…”
“So, basically, this is still all just your speculation,” said Twilight, although she seemed to have abandoned her map completely now, and pushed it over to one side.
“Well, I did get those records back from Professor Glimmerdust,” Spike fished a sheaf of papers from the messenger bag sitting at his feet. “There doesn't look like there was any followup on that bribery charge... but Trixie’s grades dropped pretty badly right after, and stayed low for another two years.” He blinked, and squinted at the document, “Her whole record's spotty, and full of inconsistencies. Like, uh, one semester she's listed as 'stallion' in her personal information, don’t know what that’s about. She graduated- barely- and then the trail runs cold. She didn't even apply to the Academy.”
“I don’t really think accusations of academic dishonesty over a decade ago have much bearing on her stealing artifacts, though,” Twilight admonished, “It’s not like she’s claiming to have found them herself and publishing papers in a journal or something. And about that other thing- honestly, that’s her business, not ours.”
Applejack raised a hoof. “She was tellin’ mah sister somethin’ ‘bout bandits in the forest. Not sure Ah want her hangin’ 'round Apple Bloom or any of the other kids after that.”
“She nearly blinded me during the fight at the dig site,” Smokey spoke up for the first time that night. “I saw her peering about there as well.”
“I’m pretty sure she attacked you because you were brandishing a sword and screaming at a young filly,” Marigold gave him a particularly disdainful stare.
“That’s true,” Spike countered, “But think about this. She attacked Smokey because he was a clear and obvious threat, maybe even to life and limb. And then she went after Rainbow Dash- who was just watching her show and being suspicious. What’s so threatening about an audience member who’s suspicious?”
Rainbow finally drained her cup of liquor. “Wait, you mean she was actually trying to kill me with all that lightning stuff?”
“Maybe not kill you, but certainly get you into a situation where you’d be laid up for a while,” the dragon amended.
“I… I’m not sure I’d even go that far, and if she wanted to kill Smokey she wouldn’t’ve used a flashbang,” said Twilight, snapping her binder closed. “But putting everything you’ve told me together… it does make for a very suspicious pattern. I think it’s definitely worth looking into.”
Around noon the next day, Twilight strode down the road to the empty lot at the edge of town where Trixie kept her wagon. Applejack and Rainbow Dash took the lead; Spike followed along beside her; and she was flanked on either side by a squad of Royal and Night Guards, with Constable Amethyst Star taking up the rear. Now that they were operating under her instruction, the soldiers finally had legal authority to conduct searches and make arrests. Even disregarding that development, Twilight figured that if one was engaged in criminal activities, seeing a force of veteran combat troops arrayed on one’s front lawn would do a great deal to dissuade thoughts of either escape or violence.
The wagon, initially, seemed unoccupied, and Twilight was briefly hopeful that they’d be able to accomplish their task without any interference. As she approached, though, she could clearly make out the sound of the showmare singing under her breath, “All the waaay to Reino... you've dusted the non-believers... and challenged the laws of chance-buh buh buh buh b- what the-” The back door flung open, and the showmare stepped out onto the dewy grass, looking a little less composed and a little more tired than usual. “Excuse me! Who comes to the retreat of the Great and-” she rubbed her eyes. “Wait, Twilight? What’s going on?”
Spike stepped forward, as the mixed Guard force spread out to secure a perimeter. “We’ve just had some… potentially dangerous Lunar artifacts get misplaced,” he said, sounding serious but not alarmed, just as they’d rehearsed.
“So, if you took something from the dig sites home with you, maybe even just by accident or because you didn’t think it was important,” Twilight continued, “it’s not a big deal, but we really do need to find it, so…” she motioned towards the wagon and raised her eyebrows slightly.
Trixie nodded, briefly and very, very fast, then turned back towards her wagon. “Of course! I’ll look around and see if I can find anything!”
“Actually,” Spike raised a claw, “It’d really be better if we did the searching. You might’ve unknowingly picked up something dangerous.” Twilight watched the showmare’s eyes grow a little wider. That made sense if she knew she’d been caught- and also made just as much sense if she’d just been told she may have been sleeping next to a dangerous Lunar artifact. “I promise we won’t spoil any of your tricks,” the dragon finished with a forced grin.
Trixie seemed entirely unconvinced. “Now, wait here, this is my home, here, and there’s rules to that kind of thing.” She glared as Rain Chaser trotted a close circuit around the wagon, peering in the windows. “Hey, you leave that alone!”
Twilight whispered the incantation to her spell to detect selenitic matter, and squinted at the showmare. She glowed brightly in a somewhat nauseating mixture of false colors- though so did most of the Project staff after a day spent squirming around through the rubble of Lunar battlemages’ safe-houses. Nonetheless, she said “You really should consider letting us handle this. I’m not sure how, but you’ve received a large dose of radion extremely recently. In fact, I’d recommend that you head down to the Station and get yourself checked over to make sure it’s not been internalized.”
“Well, I knew that,” the showmare said, eyes narrowing again, “Trixie spent most of her morning helping dig Lunar artifacts out of the temple district.”
Twilight nodded, then grinned. “Oh, right, that makes sense… except I never told you radion comes from Lunar artifacts… or even what it is.”
Trixie took a step backwards, and blinked a few times. “Oh! Oh, I’m… sorry…” she stared down at Twilight’s hooves. “I… heard Dr. Verse talking about it, a few days ago. I know it’s supposed to be secret, and I-I didn’t want to get her in trouble, so I didn’t mention anything about it before now…” she scanned over the assembled Guardsponies, seemingly unconcerned that their cordon had tightened significantly since she and Twilight had started talking. “Just ask… umm, Corporal Aqua! She was there!”
Twilight nodded, said “Mmm-hmm,” and waved her hoof forward.
“Trixie Lulamoon,” Amethyst Star read off of the document floating in front of her, “I, being a duly sworn officer of the peace, have probable cause to believe, and do indeed believe, that articles, bodies, and substances constituting evidence of the crime of grand larceny may be found within your residence, vehicle, or other belongings, and that such evidence is lawfully seizable pursuant to the Unified Procedures of Criminal Justice Act of 901, Section one-fifty-four-point-two. I have therefore commanded such civilian and military deputies as I deem appropriate to execute a lawful search of these premises. You are hereby made aware that interference with or obstruction of a lawful search constitutes tampering with criminal evidence as outlined in Section one-fifty-eight-point-six…”
The showmare stared, wide-eyed, and reeled backwards, stammering unintelligibly as Amethyst kept on reading. Aqua Regia galloped past her and into the interior of the wagon, followed by Smokey Mirror. A few seconds later, the Guardsmare called out “Clear!”
Duly satisfied that the wagon contained no booby traps or similar nasty surprises, Twilight trotted up to the entrance, Spike following right along beside her. Smokey, obediently, trotted back out- from what Twilight could see through the door, the interior was not large enough to accommodate everypony at once. Rainbow Dash fell back, and stretched a warning wing across Trixie’s chest. The showmare appeared to be practically vibrating with restrained outrage, her left eye twitching slightly, utterly independent of her right, but she still said nothing.
Inside, the wagon looked disappointingly ordinary- cheap wood paneling and a carpeted floor, illuminated by three crystal bulbs set into the arched ceiling, one of which was burnt out. It was scuffed, clearly lived-in, and smelled somewhat musty, and although the early-autumn day outside was still fairly cool, the interior was comfortably warm. A sling hammock hung over and between crates and cauldrons of assorted fireworks and smoke bombs, packed together with little thought for tidiness. A small bookshelf bolted to the wall contained mostly travel guides, atlases, a few popular novels, and manuals on practical topics ranging from wagon repair to stage magic- Scenic Equestria, Shadow Spade: Guest of the Excellent Host, and Colonel Sassacre’s Daunting Text of Magical Frivolity and Practical Japery were among the more visible. A bright orange WagonZone bag sat on the floor, filled with roofing tiles, a can of shellac, and another of bright purple paint. In the back, separated by a privacy curtain, a cassette toilet sat across from an absurdly tiny kitchenette. The latter was stocked mostly with pilfered restaurant saltine crackers, and an economy-size jar of Barnyard Bargains peanut butter, supplanted by over a dozen Guard-issue Operational Ration Packs.
“Y’know, as far as trail food goes, that ain’t actually too bad,” Applejack mused, peering through the door behind Twilight, “It’s got fat, protein, salt, and some carbs to get’cha through the day.” Then she fished around in the trash pail near the door, and extracted a few multicolored candy charms still wrapped securely in twisted wax paper. “Hey, these’re still good-”
“Put those down,” Cpl Aqua growled, her voice deadly serious. “- or better yet, throw ‘em outside. I don’t want ‘em in here while I’m working.”
“It’s a Guard thing,” Twilight explained to the baffled farmer, “Bad luck to get those in a ration pack.”
“Ah… see.” Applejack stuffed the candies in her saddlebag regardless.
Spike loped over to the hammock and gingerly fished out a few olive-drab blankets. “Hey, some of this is military issue...”
“Well, military surplus is great for travel,” Trixie explained through the window, shifting from hoof to hoof behind Rainbow’s outstretched wing. Then she backed off again when the pegasus practically growled in her ear.
“She was able to toss around hundreds of bits for a cloak in her custom colors,” Spike muttered to Twilight, “And that was before she apparently got her cash infusion. She could do better than olive-drab surplus.” He began rifling through the papers on the wagon’s tiny fold-out table; although other than an old collection of apparently misprinted promotional bills for “Trixie: The Magnificant”, Twilight didn’t spot anything that looked particularly incriminating.
“Now, you listen here,” the showmare shouted, struggling towards the wagon door, only to be restrained again by the wing across her chest. Cpl Subtle Spark stepped over to her other side, effectively boxing her in.
“C’mon,” Twilight heard Rainbow Dash mutter, “Try somethin’. Give us a show!”
Twilight ignored their bickering, cast her familiar magesight, and resumed searching. The entire wagon glowed faintly, which was to be expected, although she notably couldn’t see anything beyond- the entire wagon was also shielded. Then, she realized there were a few areas behind the kitchen cabinets which seemed to have no magical signature at all. Twilight peered at the largest one, banished her magesight and its distracting false-color, and noticed an ever-so-slight difference in the grain of the wood around one of the cheap little carved accents. She lit her horn and grasped it in her telekinesis, only to feel Cpl Aqua push a hoof against her side. “You should really let me, Doc.”
The scholar nodded, and stepped backwards. Aqua positioned herself in between Twilight and Spike, pressed a hoof against the fitting, and shouted “Okay, clear!” when a panel inside the cabinet popped open.
Peering over the private’s armored shoulder, Twilight caught sight of the glass ‘diamond’ Trixie had employed in her opening act, along with a few more smoke bombs -or, rather, Equestrian Army L50 smoke grenades- and a few small amulets of unclear but apparently pedestrian function.
“Leave it alone, it’s not what we came for,” Spike scolded Aqua, who was staring at the diamond in abject fascination.
“There’s more of those little decorations, though,” the Guardsmare said.
“And more compartments,” Twilight added. “Although I do have to wonder where she got the materials for this much magical shielding. The whole outside of the wagon’s warded… if we weren’t able to poke around right here, none of those would be remotely detectable.”
Aqua already had her hoof on another ever-so-slightly-out-of-place wood fitting. Twisting it revealed an entire compartment filled with additional fireworks, a storage arrangement Twilight considered dubiously safe at best. Another contained a heavy, high-temperature gas torch with the central vents discreetly sealed off so that flame would only emerge from the edges. Still another contained nothing but throwing knives- some dulled, some rubber, and some strangely weighted- a collapsible wire cage, and decks of cards that presumably had been modified in some way Twilight had neither the time nor energy to discover. In a hollowed-out space underneath the wagon’s only chair was tucked a bulky, saddle-like apparatus outfitted with four magically conductive wires and an outsized pack of mana crystals: a commercial Fair-A-Day harness, with its usual safety-orange finish painted the same blue as Trixie’s coat. Usually, those were used in industrial environments like weather factories, although Twilight had occasionally worn one at the Academy when participating in particularly high-mana lightning experiments. They were too heavy and physically delicate for most military applications, although the Landsknechts swore by their ability to soak hostile lightning strikes back into usable mana. The fact that Trixie was able to flit around on stage while wearing one was thus somewhat impressive.
“Are. You. Quite done pawing through the tools of the Great and Powerful Trixie’s trade?” the showmare demanded, still trying to lean around Sparky and Rainbow Dash, gem-like eyes narrowed. Neither pony seemed inclined to budge. Indeed, Dash responded by giving her a hard smack on the shoulder, and grinned when she jumped.
“Almost…” Twilight muttered, and restored her selenitic matter detection spell. The whole wagon was fairly saturated- which wasn’t at all surprising, given where Trixie had been, for one purpose or another. What was surprising was that most of the more unstable varieties of material seemed to be centered around one area. “Spike, do you see anything else odd about the compartment with the diamond in it?”
“Yeah…” the dragon rapped experimentally against its wooden backplate. “Compared to the others, I don’t think it goes quite as far back.” Before Cpl Aqua could protest, he dug one claw into the corner where the back of the shelf met the divider, and tugged to one side.
The panel slid away, revealing a compartment within the compartment. Inside sat a timberwolf call, a few potion bottles, a pair of wire cutters, and a reusable focus for a basic silencing spell. According to Twilight’s scan, it had been used, recently, sometime in the last three or four days. Also according to her scan, the compartment had its own layer of professional-grade shielding and stealth enchantments, above and beyond the compartments surrounding it. That wasn’t technically illegal, since Trixie owned the wagon and apparently had all the necessary permits for that sort of magic, but it was certainly suspicious.
Twilight extracted a pair of insulated tongs and a shielded jar from her saddlebags -she’d rather not contaminate those delicate magical traces with her own touch or telekinesis- and carefully extracted each item. Then she turned, motioned for Spike and Aqua to follow her, and trotted back out of the wagon. “What are you doing with this?” she asked, levitating the jar in front of Trixie’s muzzle.
“Well, I’m a member of the Trailhead Crossbow and Conservation Club, I spend a lot of time traveling out in the wilderness, and I’d like someday to incorporate more animals into my show,” explained the magician.
“So why’d’ja have all that stashed in a hidden compartment inside another hidden compartment?” demanded Applejack.
“Well, to keep it away from nosy, presumptuous ponies like you and your goons!”
Spike pressed a claw against his scaly chest and dramatically reeled backwards. “Goons? I’m a henchpony, at the very least!”
“Wouldn’t that make you a henchdragon, though?” Asked Applejack.
“Whatever.”
For the very first time, Trixie actually began to look fearful instead of just angry. “And Trixie isn’t even ready to consider how much of that… radion stuff I’ve been exposed to working here. Nopony will even tell me if that’s safe!”
She was interrupted as a roughly pony-sized cloud of purplish-black vapor wound its way out of the wagon, and materialized into the leather-clad form of Capt Vortex, the Shadowbolt. He glided into a gentle landing, and tossed the thin leather satchel in his mouth at the hooves of a grinning Twilight. Inside, dozens of silver and astral steel trinkets glinted in the afternoon sunlight, along with a pile of moon-imprinted coins. “Nay, having such powerful Lunar artifacts so close to one’s person probably is not ‘safe’.”
“Those aren’t mine.” Trixie once again tried to back away, but for some inexplicable reason a vacant smile crept onto her face.
“No.” Smokey Mirror hissed, his ears pulled back in barely-restrained anger. “No, they are not.”
Twilight looked over at Amethyst. Amethyst pulled in a deep breath, swallowed hard, and then trotted over to the showmare. “Trixie Lulamoon. On charges of larceny and interference with public services, I hereby place you under arrest. You have the right to silence: you do not have to say anything, but it may harm your defense if you do not-”
“Fine,” Trixie snapped, cutting the Constable off. Then she seemed to visibly deflate, stared down at the ground for a solid second, and then looked up again. “Can Tri- can I… at least go and grab my cloak? It has my identification and papers and things in it…”
“You’re not in any position to be making demands here,” Twilight began, but then trailed off when she saw the look Amethyst was giving her. She trotted over when the Constable motioned with one hoof.
“That’s a classic jailhouse-lawyer trick, actually,” Amethyst explained, “Somepony says they were deprived of a chance to identify themselves during an arrest, and then somehow at trial that turns into misconduct on our part in making sure we arrested the right pony, and the whole case goes downhill from there.” Then she turned back to Trixie. “Fine. Although you should be aware that any personal possessions you bring into detention with you will be searched and confiscated until such time as you are either granted bail or released.”
Twilight, for her part, turned to Rain Chaser and Smokey Mirror. “I want eyes on her nonstop, you understand? Something about this doesn’t seem right.”
Both soldiers nodded. She’d hoof-picked the Lunars for a very good reason. In their day, and for quite a long time after that, there hadn’t been a Watch on call in every town- the Lunar Army was the law, or at least the closest most ponies outside of the major cities were likely to ever get to it. Indeed, the Equestrian military had only lost its authority to make arrests with the Criminal Justice Act of 789. They were more than up to handling any ‘complications’ Trixie might try to throw at them.
Both followed her back to the wagon, their weapons in easy reach. She climbed up the short flight of steps to the back door, head down, expression unreadable. Then, she absentmindedly flicked out her hind leg and kicked the door shut.
“Hey!” Rain Chaser shouted, and immediately hauled it open again, already in the air, wingblades exposed- to reveal a now rather frightened-looking showmare on the far side, fiddling with the jeweled clasp of her cloak, which was halfway secured around her shoulders.
“Alright, that’s enough of that,” Amethyst snapped, although Twilight wasn’t certain if she was addressing Trixie or the Lunars. “C’mon, now.”
Trixie turned around and climbed back out of the wagon, glaring silently at Smokey and Chaser all the while.
Amethyst stepped up to her and began patting Trixie down, “Where were we… oh, right, you do not have to say anything, but it may harm your defense if you do not mention, when questioned, something which you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence.”
The showmare remained utterly silent.
Amethyst snapped thick metal manacles around each of Trixie’s legs, and slipped a disjunctive ring over her horn, and they started walking. Applejack, Rainbow Dash, and the soldiers maintained a rough perimeter, leaving Twilight and Spike to follow along beside Trixie as Amethyst led her back into town. She kept pace with the Constable easily enough, and still didn’t say a word.
“Huh,” Amethyst muttered, “First time I’ve ever seen somepony actually take the announcement seriously.”
“So.” Twilight waited until they were back in sight of the town before turning to Trixie again, “Are you going to do the sensible thing and just tell us what you were doing with those artifacts?”
The showmare turned to look at her, but said nothing. Her pace behind Amethyst never once varied.
Twilight sighed, and shook her head. “Okay, maybe you’d like to explain how you got those artifacts… how you would’ve gotten away with it if it wasn’t for those meddling fillies… that sort of thing!”
Trixie just smirked, her gem-like eyes narrowing in contempt.
“You know, it’d be very much in your best interest to go ahead and cooperate, seeing as you’re on the hook for pretty serious charges,” the scholar began to explain. Then she trailed off as, once again, Amethyst waved a hoof in her direction.
They slowed to a gradual halt and stepped off the road, into the grass, hopefully out of Trixie’s earshot. “Do you think you could wait until she’s at least properly booked and everything? I wanna make sure we dot all our ‘i’s and cross our ‘t’s here. Besides, you’ll probably make more of an impact on her if she’s been sitting in a cell for a bit, let it start to sink in that she’s gonna be there for a while…” Amethyst shrugged, “At least, that’s how they do it in Manehattan, or Trotston…”
“You know, you have a point,” said Twilight, “I guess the whole silent treatment thing’s starting to freak me out a little, is all. This is Trixie we’re talking about, for Harmony’s sake! You’d think she’d be gloating, or complaining, or spinning some kind of sob-story, or… something. It’s not like her to-”
Back behind her, Twilight heard Spike give a confused little yelp, and Applejack shout “What in TAR-nation?”
She wheeled around, to find the entire rest of her party staring at an empty set of manacles.
“I was… she was… I musta’…” Rainbow Dash was muttering as she flew in ever-widening circles. Rain Chaser and Vortex had taken to the air along with her, and on the ground the other soldiers were starting to fan out and peer into the brush.
“She was right next to me, I could see her shadow, and then…” Spike shook his head and flicked both his claws outward. “She wasn’t able to teleport this whole time… was she?”
“I don’t think so…” Twilight trotted over, pressed the frog of her hoof against the disjunctive ring lying in the grass, and attempted her own teleportation spell- all she got was a jarring, tingling bolt of feedback for her trouble. “And even if she could, her whole body was inside a nullifying mana-sink loop.”
“Okay. Umm… Okay. Rainbow? Get over to the Station and grab Capt Marigold,” Amethyst Star called out, “The rest of you, split up into groups of two, and start circling outward. Whatever she did, she can’t’ve gotten far…”
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Well. Professional prison wardens, these ponies are not.
Regarding RD: She's a pretty consistently terrible pony in the show.
Regarding Trixie: Girl you are digging yourself deeper and deeper. I just hope she can climb her way out of the hole she put herself in.
Excellent work on this latest chapter. Again, very good job on the exchanges, characterizations and future chapter set-ups. Yeah, can appreciate Rainbow TRYING to watch over Trixie's show discreetly but still getting busted before getting roped into that impromptu competition. And now Twilight is taking her friends suspicions about Trixie seriously as she has actual evidence to back it up. Also appreciated Trixie getting annoyed by the search and then getting read her rights. Plus, yeah, I could understand why Twilight might be a bit unnerved by Trixie's silent treatment before the latter got away. And, yeah, also liked the comic relief bits in this chapter (Pinkie acting like an old-timey sports vendor, complete with accent, the banter between Rainbow and Rain Chaser during the stakeout, Spike's "I Take Offense To That Last One" reaction to Trixie's goon comment [as well as Applejack's "correction"]).
At any rate, very certainly looking forward to more of this.
Really Twiggles? You give the magician you're arresting her cloak that you know is heavily enchanted? What have you been smoking?
My theory: When Trixie slammed the door she hid in the wagon and had an illusion wearing the cloak get arrested. That's why she didn't talk or react when walking, until she dropped the spell when they were out of sight.
11171485
That's a very good theory, with one hitch: her good cloak is still in Rarity's shop; she's wearing her plain and serviceable backup cloak.
You kind of feel slightly for Trixie's frustration when she challenges Rainbow and Applejack; contests like that are meant to be no contest because the performer is cheating, but they're both so stubborn and tough that she had to sweat a bit.
Interesting choice on the equestrian legal system being able to hold a suspects silence agaiant them in court.
Any particular reason for this?
Twilight and Amythist were acting gross here. The right thing to do is let the pony talk to her lawyer before pushing them to cooperate. Otherwise you get people who get life imprisonment and abuse after cooperating because the police tricked them.
11326659
The British equivalent of the Miranda statement (which is what we are using here) doesn't actually mention legal representation; but defendants are still entitled to it. Usually that's provided after a suspect is arrested and booked, though- Trixie vanishes before then. Twilight and Amethyst also don't actually interrogate her here, just plan what they might do at a later time. Ultimately, it's a matter of balancing all of the details of the legal process, with expediently telling the story- since we figured the process of booking her and retaining council would be mundane (and also strictly hypothetical), I didn't think they were worth including "in real time".
That reminds me of that one incarnation of the Scooby-Doo franchise that embraced writing with consequences, like FIM.
I wonder if episodes of Mystery Incorporated ever switched up formulas a la this?