Confidential Cases: Winggarden

by Anneal

1-4: Clock Out

Azerda glanced up at the Central Police Station as they crossed Pearl Street onto a brick plaza. Blooming trees dotted the perimeter, and near the corner of the eight story concrete structure was a tunnel leading to an underground parking lot. The side of the boxy building was covered in steel scaffolding and tinted windows with thin louvers wrapped around each floor. The flag of Hippogriffia and the city of Winggarden sagged along the poles near the front entrance.

The Glass House. You can see out, but you can't see in.

"Hopefully they finish the station by the end of this year," Trace commented, taking a short glimpse at the building exterior and pushing the glass doors open. "Would prefer not to stare at a bunch of tubes while working in the office."

The interior was almost entirely a flat gray, with reinforced steel doors around the lobby. Just across from the front doors was an enclosed counter, reading "RECORDS AND ENQUIRIES" – below that was the Winggarden PD star with a simple "Service and Integrity" written above the logo. A cerulean-coated hippogriff officer stood behind the counter, pouring a small amount of milk and stirring a mug of coffee.

"Sergeant Wave Shoals," Trace greeted. Shoals stopped stirring and looked up. "Where's Izavel Zatyeb locked up?"

"He's in Interview 4-1. Fourth floor," Shoals pointed to the elevators to the left, flicking the stick into the trash bin. "Who's the zebra? Seems like the thuggish type if she's all beat up like that."

Azerda opened her mouth to respond before Trace bumped her shoulder with his claw. "She's an Zumidian interpreter," he interrupted evenly. "Zatyeb may be more comfortable being interrogated in his native tongue."

Shoals took a short sip. "Just don't get into trouble. Tiamat knows how much the Hills on the west side contribute to urban crime nowadays," he grumbled, glancing at Azerda.

Not the first time I've been treated like a thug, and it won't be the last. She huffed and trotted towards the stainless steel elevator, already open on the first floor. It was one of these new attendant-free elevators that were being advertised by developers in recent years. Azerda pressed one of the numbered buttons after Trace followed her in. "Don't you hippogriffs normally fly to the floors?" she asked as the doors closed.

"Security reasons," Trace explained, his eyes idly wandering up to the row of numbers – the light gradually climbed its way up to 4. "It's to prevent trespassers from entering and prisoners from escaping. The windows can't open wide enough to fly through, either."

"Every creature is building glass boxes these days," Azerda mumbled. With a ding, the elevator doors opened up to a beige-carpeted hallway. Trace trotted forward, gesturing to a closed door on the right, labeled 4-1. A familiar gray patrolgriff stood next to the door, chewing on a granola bar.

Water Spout hastily gave Trace a quick salute. "Izavel's in the interview room, Detective," he said.

Azerda pointed to Spout's granola bar. "Where did you get that? I've barely eaten anything today."

"There's a vending machine in the break room-"

The zebra dropped two Seashells onto his claw. "Good. Help me get a bar, too. I'll talk to Izavel."

Water Spout blinked in confusion and accepted the coins, walking awkwardly down the hall. Trace eyed Azerda with uncertainty. "Are you sure Izavel will agree to this? If he doesn't, we're back on a wild goose chase for more leads."

"Zumidians have a history of cooperating with each other," Azerda deflected, opening the interview room door.

"I see. Is that why you were bucking each other a few hours earlier?"

The zebra hesitated. "Usually, they do."

The interview room was a simple square room with a one-way mirror on the white brick wall opposite to the door – below the mirror was a wooden table with metal chairs. A security camera hung against one of the ceiling corners, adjusted in such a way to cover the entire room. Izavel sat uncomfortably on one of the chairs, pressing the ice pack against his bandage-wrapped left shoulder and neck. He frowned and put his ice pack down as Azerda entered the room. "What do you want, mare? I already told you everything you wanted back at home."

"I'm not here to interrogate you, Izavel," Azerda answered. "My name is Azerda. Are you willing to strike a deal?"

Izavel sat up. Trace silently leaned near the entrance, closing the door behind them. "What kind of deal? I barely have any money. I was going to get my pay from those gun runners before you two showed up."

Azerda smirked. "So that means those gun runners are still expecting you to show up tonight at Barracuda Drive," she reasoned, sitting down on the chair opposite to Izavel. Suddenly, she changed to her Zumidian tongue. "Mani g tzdyd, Izwel – where are you from, Izavel?"

"Aïn Oulmene. Right along the Warzenan border. At least, where it used to be."

"Zirta," Azerda replied. Trace gazed at the two; he couldn't understand Zumidian, but the city names stuck out. "I'm from Zirta. Perhaps we've fought in the same war against the Nightmarists, then."

"I fought under the Zumidian Auxiliary Corps. 15th Engineer Battalion. But none of that matters anymore. My hometown is lost and some of my family is still there, the Nightmarists doing Za'al knows what to them. Even if I go back, I don't think I'll be able to see them again. Now? I'm just trying to make enough shells to make ends meet. So what are you going on about?"

Azerda leaned forward. I was never that great at convincing others. "Look, I'm the last zebra you want to hear moralistic junk from. The Storm King took everything from us – friends, family, homes. We all have to do what we need to in order to survive," she reasoned. "Trace and I will get you released so we can lure the gun runners out and capture them."

Izavel smacked his hoof on the table. "Are you crazy? You're asking me to risk my life so you can capture a smuggling ring? What will I get out of this?" he hissed indignantly.

Azerda pulled out a small paper slip – it was the payment note that she had taken from the apartment. "I'm not with the Winggarden police. I'm a private detective. I haven't given this piece of evidence to the police department yet," she continued. "If you agree to the plan, I'll destroy this. You would just be a zebra driver threatened into transporting smuggled weapons, not one complicit in a smuggling ring. I just don't want to see another Zumidian rotting in prison. How does that sound?"

Izavel mumbled something inaudible and sighed. "Can I trust you?"

"I hope you can. We were even when I bucked you in the face. That makes us aytma – kinfolk."

The door opened once again. Trace raised his ears and turned back, seeing Spout with two granola bars in his claws. "I've got your food!" Spout declared, walking in his awkward gait and handing the bars to Azerda. He paused and glanced at the two. "Erm...am I interrupting something?"

Azerda shook her head and grabbed the bars, promptly opening one by tearing the wrapping with her mouth. "No, you're not. By Za'al, I could use a meal," she replied, hurriedly scarfing down the granola bar.

"I'll do it." Izavel interjected. Azerda stopped chewing the bar "I'll be a part of your plan."

---

Azerda squinted her eyes at the Buck Super's center console clock, barely making out her hooves in the darkness. It was five minutes before eight in the evening. Trace's vehicle was parked on the driveway a few houses down from 325 Barracuda Drive, inconspicuously located in front of a garage shed. The house's lights were off, and the mailbox was filled with junk mail – she assumed that the homeowners were away on vacation this time of year.

"If we're going to be catching Brack Marsh and his gun-running gang, they're going to be packing plenty of heat," Azerda said, swinging the cylinder of her Littlehoof Model 1021 revolver open and inserting a moon clip in. She glanced at Trace. "You've ever fired a gun on duty?"

Trace tapped the wheel, one of his claws combing through his mane. His revolver was still holstered behind his waistcoat. "Not outside the shooting range, no," he responded after a brief hesitation, his eyes fixated at the empty ranch-style house down the road.

"Then it would be a trial by fire," Azerda answered bluntly, strapping the revolver to her hoof and tugging firmly on the handle to make sure the weapon was fixed in place just behind the fetlock.

"You could at least give some words of encouragement before we get into a potential gunfight," Trace grumbled and leaned back against the seat.

"What do you want me to say? I learned how to shoot at creatures the hard way during the war."

"I would prefer if we can talk them into giving themselves up first," he argued before detecting a bright red Lightmotor 88 station wagon driving down the road. Trace's eyes followed the car as it pulled over onto the empty ranch house's driveway; the Lightmotor was totally occupied in every seat, and he could spot a beige hippogriff sitting on the front passenger side. "Brack Marsh is here. Let's wait for Izavel to show up before we give the signal."

A few minutes later, Izavel trotted down Barracuda Drive from the left, approaching the empty house and surveyed his surroundings uneasily. The zebra had been dropped a few blocks from Barracuda Drive onto an arterial road by Water Spout. "Izavel's stuck to his part of the plan," Trace added. "At least he didn't try to make a run for it."

Brack Marsh exited the vehicle, raising a claw to get Izavel's attention. He was dressed quite plainly in a khaki bush jacket, and while it was too far away for the zebra mare to spot, she could notice something black holstered on Brack's side. "Something doesn't feel right here," Azerda said.

Trace turned to Azerda. "What's wrong?"

She pointed to the car. "If this is just a normal meeting, Brack Marsh doesn't need to bring so many grunts with him. You don't bring a full team out, unless..." she paused and sat up straight. "Damn it, we're sending Izavel straight into a death-trap!"

Trace bit his lip. "I don't want to get civilians killed. But if Izavel doesn't get closer, we can't catch their guard down. There's a chance they could get away," he retorted.

Azerda took another glance at Brack's vehicle, which was aligned just behind Trace’s Buck. It’s unorthodox, but it could work… "If you don't mind the police department having one wrecked car, I might have an idea."

Further down Barracuda Drive, Izavel trotted towards the red car, pulling the straps around his saddlebags. A beige hippogriff beckoned one of his passengers, a pale green hippogriff mare, to trot out of the vehicle. "Zargon be damned, I can’t believe I’m doing this," he murmured under his breath.

“Izavel! Nice to meet you again,” Brack greeted, idly tossing and catching a thick roll of shell bills with his claw. The grunt stood next to him, carrying a familiar Thundersplash submachine gun – the same kind that had been used in the North Zebrican War.

Izavel halted some distance from the two, briefly glancing around at the nearby houses. He estimated that he was a good five meters from one of the house's walls. "Looks like you've got my pay," the zebra remarked, his tone barely hiding his suspicion, "but I'm confused. What's the armed backup for?"

"Well, how do I put this...this might be the last shipment we're getting from here in a while. The defense corpos are catching up to our antics," Brack explained, pacing a few steps forward towards Izavel. "Fortunately, I know a couple of griffon associates in Talcara where we can continue our operations once we get the equipment onto the next ship north."

Brack beckoned with his claw to the grunt next to him – on command, she leveled her submachine gun at Izavel's chest. "Oh! I nearly forgot to mention," he added as he unholstered his M981 pistol, flicking off the safety and pointing it at the zebra. "You're not coming with us."

Izavel inched back and glared defiantly at the two. He had that nagging feeling that the arms dealer was going to backstab him, but the area was too open for him to plan out his escape. Even if he did escape, Izavel had doubts on whether he could outrun a flying hippogriff.

The sound of a police siren pulled him away from his thoughts as the zebra noticed a roaring car barreling its way down and towards the Lightmotor, leaving behind a blur of red and blue from its rotating lights. "What in Tartarus?" the green hippogriff shouted, reflexively spreading her wings and jumping back to get away from the police vehicle's path.

The other two henchgriffs in the vehicle were less fortunate; a rosy red hippogriff frantically opened the right car door to jump out, but was much too late; the speeding car smashed into the Lightmotor's left broadside in a flurry of glass and scrap, the front crumpling into the driver's side of the Lightmotor. The red hippogriff was slammed out of the vehicle, scraping himself on the ground as the impacted vehicle skidded several meters onto the road. The other peach-colored passenger had much less time to react, taking the brunt of the impact and slamming his head onto the seat with an unnatural crack.

"An be damned, what's going on?" Brack Marsh exclaimed, his head darting around as three other police vehicles rushed down the road with their sirens blaring. He noticed Izavel galloping off behind the wall of a nearby house. With an angered growl, he fired his pistol twice at Izavel's direction, missing both shots before the zebra managed to reach cover.

Down the road, the green mare fired her submachine gun wildly at the wrecked Buck, peppering the cracked rear windshield until the pane finally shattered into pieces. She stopped firing and chuckled, the leather seats now riddled with bullet holes. But her face turned to suspicion and then shock when she flew closer to the vehicle, noticing a complete lack of blood coating the interior, much less a lifeless body lying on the driver's wheel.

She was only able to catch sight of a satchel wedged against the gas pedal when she heard three gunshots behind her. The gun jerked out of her claw as if it had been kicked, and after a sharp, agonizing pain, the mercenary subconsciously raised her claw to feel the fresh wounds on her chest. Her wings ceased flapping, and she fell face down onto the pavement.

"I was wondering when you would finish," Azerda muttered, quickly popping her head back up from the stone fence to see a red hippogriff crawling out of the vehicle, while Brack Marsh had retreated back behind the Lightmotor for cover, grabbing an automatic rifle from the car trunk.

"WPD! Get on the ground and put your claws behind your neck!" Trace shouted from the rooftop of a house, armed with a semi-automatic rifle. "You're surrounded, Brack Marsh! How long do you think you can hold out?"

The red hippogriff lying on the road was quick to comply, but Brack Marsh responded back with a barrage of bullets from his Breeze automatic rifle towards Trace’s general direction. “You come any closer and you’re dead!”

Trace shot back in retaliation, one of the bullets nicking Brack Marsh on the right claw. He heard a sharp groan of pain from Brack, who retreated back behind the car. The red hippogriff nearby desperately covered his body, trying his best to be as small of a target as possible. "Watch your fire! We've got civilians around here!" Trace added.

"I overheard your entire conversation," Azerda snorted, crawling behind the stone fence to get closer to Lightmotor. She swiftly unloaded the half-used moonclip, replacing it with a new one. It's definitely a Breeze automatic. I know that report from anywhere. "You think those Wingbardian gangsters would harbor you? You have nowhere to run!"

Brack fired back again, this time at the zebra mare, though it didn't take long for the automatic rifle to run out of bullets with an audible click. And I know they had a tendency to run out of bullets fast, Azerda thought, shooting back twice at the hippogriff – however, both shots were unable to find their mark.

Brack grumbled while attempting to inspect the rifle – he had only managed to grab one magazine from the trunk, and exposing himself to grab another was not an option. With little choice, he pulled out his pistol and awkwardly reloaded with his non-dominant claw.

"How many bullets do you think you have in that?" Azerda added with a snort. "You're outnumbered, what, eight to one? There's more of us than you can possibly shoot down. Let's try being reasonable here!"

The zebra mare held her revolver at the Lightmotor until she saw a pistol and rifle being thrown out from the side of the car. "Fine, fine! I surrender!" Brack yelled back. Azerda huffed and kept her revolver trained at the car as the officers carefully approached the vehicle. At least the fool had a sense of self-preservation.

---

Azerda sat idly on the sidewalk as she saw an ambulance pick up the injured hippogriffs in front of the collided vehicles. She opened the satchel which had a bullet hole punctured through it – fortunately, the two healing potions inside were undamaged. She had contemplated using one on the hippogriff mare she just shot, but if the arrival of a coroner’s van a few minutes later was any indication, it was much too late for her unfortunate victim to be saved.

She snapped the last 11mm round onto her moonclip and slung her satchel – which had a bullet hole punctured through it – on her back. Trace flew toward her, landing with a deep sigh. "Medical Examiner Clear Cut's at the scene. Two injured, one severely injured, and one dead," Trace stated. "Does killing creatures ever get to you?"

Azerda closed her eyes momentarily and put the moon clip back into her pocket. "I don't do it unless I have to. I stopped feeling shocked about it after the first one," she returned. "Plus, she was dead before I can use a potion on her. Where's Izavel?"

Trace turned his head, spotting a puddle of blood near the crashed cars with a grimace. A zebra stallion stood near the driveway. "Izavel's fine. He's near the wreck and Spout is keeping an eye on him. Their articles are in the police van's trunk."

"Good. Check their belongings first," Azerda stood up and extended a hoof. "Gloves please."

After putting on their gloves, the two approached the back of the police van. The trunk was already open, with an assortment of items bagged and clipped with a yellow numbered tag. She could spot four wallets, two pistol holsters, and a small stack of shell bills tied with a rubber band. "Damn. I could use the extra money right about now," Azerda commented, her eyes fixed on the wad of cash. "For safekeeping, of course."

"Azerda, focus," Trace snapped, pulling out a wallet and opening it up. Inside were two S1 bills, a Crystalstar employee card, and a driver's license. He scanned with his claw over Brack's license:

License #: M602682. Expires: 17-09-1026. Full Name: Brack Marsh. VETERAN
Street #: 416 Driftwood St. City: Winggarden.
Gender: M. Height: 188cm. Eyes: Green. Mane: Yellow. DoB: 12-06-989.

"He's a hired gun for Crystalstar. Mr. Brack had been backstabbing the company for a while now," Trace observed, tapping his claw on the address. "It's in Tidewater, one of the new suburban housing developments they're building near the airport. We can get some officers to check out his address. He could be stashing some weapons in there."

"Likely a lone operation if he's targeting convoys. If he was being helped by a higher-up, he would be targeting Crystalstar armories. Subtler that way," Azerda replied, her hoof stopping at a wallet with a drop of blood on it. She opened it up to see a picture of the green hippogriff she had just killed, with her ID on the left reading her name: Kelp Meadow. She was twenty-eight, only a few years younger than Azerda.

The zebra mare hurriedly closed the wallet and put it back in the bag, her eyes becoming distant for a moment. Best not to dwell on the dead. I've made that mistake before one too many times.

Her attention focused on the holsters, which still had two pistols in them. One of them was Brack Marsh's M981, and Azerda surmised that the other one was from one of his henchgriffs. She picked up Brack's pistol to inspect it closely; the gun was unloaded, and she racked the slide to make sure. "K8512. It's not part of Crystalstar's weapon stock. Must be his own gun."

"You can tell by the serial number?"

Azerda nodded and put the pistol back in the bag. "Firearms produced specifically for Crystalstar use start with CR. Makes it easier to keep track of stock," she explained, closing the trunk back up. "We still need to figure out where they're stashing their weapons. Brack Marsh was with his gang – they had to be going somewhere."

Trace moved towards the crashed vehicles and rubbed his forehead. The police Buck had collided against the Lightmotor's left side with such force that the front hood had folded into the car doors. "By An's name, I'm either going to get a pay raise or a disciplinary citation after all this..."

Azerda trotted behind him, waving her hoof at Izavel and Water Spout along the way. Izavel returned with a scowl. "Thanks for almost getting me killed, 'aytma'," he deadpanned.

She put down her hoof. "We didn't know they came armed. I had to think of something fast," Azerda defended before taking off her hat; her tone was more sincere than normal. "Samhi, Izwel – sorry. I don't want civilians getting killed."

Izavel huffed. "What about the payment slip?"

"Consider it gone," Azerda responded. "Only Trace and I know about the truth, and we promised to stay quiet. I can't guarantee that you won't get punished, but the Crown Attorney could give you a much lighter sentence for helping us."

"Thanks, I suppose," Izavel said less severely. "Anyways, Miss Azerda, I saw a paper note on the front passenger seat. Must have been knocked out when you crashed into it. Be careful with the glass."

"Good eye, Izavel," Azerda commended, trotting to the right side of the Lightmotor. A cursory look at the back showed a bloodied spot where one of the unlucky grunts had taken the brunt of the crash.

Trace was already at the trunk, packed with several firearms from light machine guns to shotguns and most disturbingly a white body bag. "Military-grade equipment. Imagine if some thugs got their claws on that kind of firepower," he muttered, picking up a Cloudfall rifle to examine the top of the chamber. "CR8746. It's one of Crystalstar's guns, Azerda."

"It's only a small fraction of what they stole," Azerda stated, opening the relatively intact front right door. The paper note Izavel had mentioned before lay on the seat with a few shards of glass scattered around. She cautiously picked up and read the note.

48 Winggarden Airport, Terminal A
292 Spring Plaza Hotel
△ ADJUST -2

"They don't appear to be addresses...they're POIs. Too busy to stash any weapons without getting noticed. What do the numbers mean, then?" Azerda murmured to herself. Her hoof extended into the vehicle to pull the glove box latch; a map and a protractor were inside.

"What did you find, Azerda?" Trace asked as she exited the vehicle.

"A paper note, map, and a protractor. The last one doesn't seem like something gun runners would usually carry," Azerda answered, unfolding the map open and placing it on the ground. It was a map of Winggarden, colored in shades of yellow and white with lines drawn almost parallel to each other. “Not something you would usually find in a travel guide.”

Finding both locations was easy enough for Azerda. Winggarden Municipal Airport was northeast of the city, located on undeveloped land. It was formerly a Royal Arisian Air Force base up until Legation occupation, and once the foreign occupiers had left it was repurposed into a civilian airport. Spring Plaza was located just west of downtown – it was an imposing, 20-floor luxury Art Deco hotel with Karthinian Revivalist elements, seen in its clay-tiled exterior and flat roofs covered by cornices. The hotel had a rooftop sign that was lit at night and visible from almost anywhere in the city.

"It's some kind of coded message, I'm sure of it," Azerda continued, pulling out a pencil from her satchel and marking both locations with a dot. "Brack wanted to make sure whoever got their claws on the note wouldn't be able to decipher it easily."

"They aren't addresses, so perhaps the numbers refer to the distance in some kind of unit?" Trace suggested. "We can always go to Seashore Medical Center to question Brack Marsh."

Azerda shook her head. "No, the locations are too far away to be in meters, or yards as those Equestrians love using so much. We can argue about less common units, but it doesn't seem likely," she reasoned. "And if we go to the hospital, that gives the remainder of Brack's lackeys too many hours to move the guns around. They'll start getting suspicious if Brack doesn't show up."

"I've seen these kinds of maps before," Izavel interrupted behind them. Azerda looked back. "It's a topographic map. I've used those when I worked as a military engineer for surveying. First thing you learn is how to read them."

Azerda showed the paper note to Izavel. "You have any clue what this says, then?"

Izavel grabbed the note, briefly scanned it, then gazed at the map afterwards. "I can make a fair guess. The numbers look like bearings. On the field, you only need a compass and two landmarks to figure out where you are."

"Triangulation," Trace summarized, snapping his claw as if he had made a revelation. "That explains the triangle symbol we found on the note."

Azerda gave Trace a befuddled stare. "I'm sorry, what did you say?"

"You form a triangle with three points: your current location and two other locations in the distance," Trace clarified. "The two angles from those measured points always converge onto one unique point."

"Great, I feel like I'm back in high school again," Azerda groaned, planting a hoof on her face in exasperation. Maybe that's why I skipped classes. "What's the 'adjust' line at the bottom, then?"

Izavel tapped his hoof where the two arrows were at the bottom, with the arrow on the left written "2°03' W". "That would be declination. We'll have to subtract two degrees from both angles to account for true north. That's 46° and 290°. Make sure to align the angles with the northern arrow."

Azerda grumbled as she measured the angles with the protractor and drew the lines. The two lines converged onto a building indicated by a black rectangle along Reed Street. "That's near the industrial rail yards east of downtown," she pointed out. "Next time we get one of these maps, you draw the lines, Trace. I just remembered why I hated math again."

"I know that place," Izavel added. "That's Midtown, a few blocks down from where I work. Lots of warehouses and factories there."

"So now we have two addresses to investigate: Brack's home and the industrial building," Trace recalled. "Both seem like plausible places to hide weapons, especially if Brack was trying to hide the second address. Which one should we go to first?"

"Both," Azerda replied, folding the map back up. "They might have comms with each other. If we target one location, that gives them time to react in the other. We'll split up and target both. I'll go to the Reed Street building."

"So you're calling the shots now?" Trace questioned.

Azerda waved her hoof dismissively. "Screw you. Tidewater's several kilometers outside the city limits and I can't drive a car. At least there's a tram to Midtown that I can catch in about ten minutes."

Izavel looked at the two. "Do both of you normally argue this much?"

"I just met her, Izavel. She takes a little getting used to," Trace rolled his eyes. He was going to need a new ride.