Your Heart of Cosmic Foliage

by GermanBrony_12

Meeting

All had gathered in the great canteen of the starship. Creatures all in a panic looked toward Treehugger, who, as the leader of the meeting, was expected to hold the answers to their questions. Bloomberg sat next to her, gazing on with the utmost serenity as she called the meeting to order.

“This is like, not groovy, but I can’t feel her vibes anymore. Applejack is dead.”

Every creature gasped, even Bloomberg, despite knowing the situation already. Treehugger raised a hoof to request their silence as she continued.

“Somepony has stolen one of Limestone Pie’s crystals, which is totally ungroovy. We need to chill out a bit and figure out who’s taken it. So, like, has anycreature here checked out Limestone Pie’s cabin lately?”

After a moment of uncertainty, three ponies raised their hooves: Sugar Belle, Surprise, and Stygian. It was, of course, acknowledged that Applejack, too, had visited Limestone Pie’s cabin, however it was so implausible that she had killed and disposed of herself that the idea was entirely disregarded. Bloomberg agreed; it was time to interrogate them.

Sugar Belle was the first to be pulled aside, solely due to the fact that she had sat closest to them during the meeting. She, accompanied by Treehugger and Bloomberg, was brought to the small storage room to the right of the airlock, where they sat her down at one of the many large storage crates which filled the room.

This meeting, though it could hardly be called such, as it consisted only of a relaxing chat over a cup of herbal tea, proved to be quite useful in finding who didn’t do it: Sugar Belle. In this, more accurately, “evening tea,” it was revealed that Sugar Belle had spent the entire period in which Applejack was suspected to have gone missing, in the cabin of Auntie Holiday, and in fact, it had not been since several hours earlier that she had witnessed the rocks of Limestone Pie.

In their moment of rest after the meeting, Bloomberg and Treehugger thought over the new information and came to the conclusion that there was nothing that would lead one to believe that Sugar Belle had been the murderer. Bloomberg, however, brought up an important point: the murderer might never have entered Limestone Pie’s cabin in the first place; an accomplice could have stolen the rock for them. Not only that, but it occurred to them that a creature could have stolen the rock without their knowledge, sneaking in while no creature was looking. Knowing this, their interrogations were pointless. Still, they thought, a thorough questioning of every creature aboard the ship might reveal some useful information.

Having finished the interrogation, the two left the room, sending off their guest. Just as Treehugger was about to retrieve the next cosmonaut, however, Bloomberg violently shook his boughs, catching her attention. She turned to him and listened closely, for he was normally a quiet fellow, yet now he seemed to scream at her. Just across from them, the airlock was left open to the outside. Somepony must have used it. It didn’t appear to her at first, but as Bloomberg then pointed out, the killer must have used it to eject the body.

At last, a solid lead! She looked to her partner. This could be it: the final piece of evidence to find who had slain Applejack. Bloomberg’s foliage seemed to her to gleam against the endless void of space behind him, mesmerising her with his radical aura. She thought to herself that she must have been blessed by Nature herself to find such a perfect partner.

Much as she wanted to perform the final check and find the final clue, she could not… not before this.

At last, she succumbed to her yearning; she leapt at the tree, her delicate lips clasping tightly around his rough, weather-worn bark. It was the perfect moment, his boughs wrapping around her as they held each other just outside the storage room.

Bloomberg rustled his leaves in a sign of mutual attraction, his gentle aura seeming to communicate the very message which treehugger had longed to convey from the very beginning.

“Bloomberg… I, like, totally dig you,” she whispered into his leafy aural cavity, stroking his foliage as their auras seemed to blend into a perfect, harmonious mix.

But now, Bloomberg pushed back - not in a conflict of emotions, but out of necessity. As now was the time for them to finish their task - the very incident which had brought them together in the first place. Now was the time to finally check the airlock.

Hoof in bough, the two approached the door and pulled the lever to the door. With a faint hiss, the doors drifted apart like two lovers destined to follow separate paths; a fate which none but the closest of creatures could overcome.

They marched inside and settled on the floor where Treehugger began her meditation. This time, nothing could get in their way. The white chalcedony would have been sentenced to the abyss before it could eradicate the energy of the murderer. With the assistance of the handsome tree at her side, Treehugger could finally discover the culprit.

Opening all of her chakras, she picked up the traces of every creature that had ever come to that room, but one frequency, so vile and so repulsive, shone above the rest.

Limestone Pie.

The very pony who so boldly declared her crystal to be pilfered had been the culprit all along. Bloomberg and Treehugger turned to each other, nodding in a reciprocal understanding before finally taking off to return to the canteen for a final meeting.

Comments

[Bicyclette]

well, a solving-a-murder-mystery-together romance plot between Treehugger and a tree was somehow not on my list of things i expected for this contest. but it should have been, since Treehugger's name is right there! some very nice horse-on-tree action here, too.