Cutie Mark Crusader Investigators

by Mod On Death

A Morbid Taste for Sweets

A Morbid Taste for Sweets

The next day came soon, and the Cutie Mark Crusaders felt ready to investigate the whole world if needed. They went to school early that morning, hoping to see if there was any evidence that had been overlooked. When they arrived there, they found Silent Study preparing the classroom by getting all the desks straightened and making sure there were enough supplies for the teacher to teach and not have to worry about resupplying in the middle of class.

“Hey there girls!” he asked. “What brings you here so early?”

“Hey Mr. Study. We have some questions to ask you. Please, have a seat.” Apple Bloom motioned to the nearest desk set up and Silent, pretty unaware of what was happening, decided to comply. The desk, designed for foals, was a bit small on him. “Mr. Study, when cleaning up the night before the incident with the diorama, how thoroughly did you clean?”

“Why, I did my usual cleanup of the classroom: washing the chalkboard, sweeping the floor, making sure there wasn’t gum underneath the desks, and dusting the books. I made certain however to clean around the dioramas as well. I wanted them to look really special for the judging.”

“Alright. Did you clean the dioramas themselves?” the earth filly asked the Aide.

“Of course not. If I did that, then I might have messed up the dioramas, and that would have been pretty bad for me to do.”

“So, is it a possibility that the hair found at the diorama’s destruction was merely hair that was already there, and not hair that points to Sweetie Belle not doing the deed?” Apple Bloom asked, hoping that if they couldn’t find out who the pony was at that moment that they could at least prove their friend innocent.

“Actually, the hair was found far outside the dioramas, so it actually seems more likely that it was something done after I had cleaned up, and the location of the hair itself I clearly remember, seeing as I had spent five minutes trying to get gum out of that exact spot and didn’t see any hair there originally. Most likely it was somepony who came in after I had left at 5PM.”

“Oh! So that’s why I didn’t see you there!” Sweetie Belle yelled, surprising everypony.

“Sweetie Belle, what do you mean ‘didn’t see me here’?” asked the perplexed unicorn.

“Oh, I came back here at about 6PM that night because I had forgotten to pick up a piece I worked on in class for my diorama.” As the little filly said this, silence fell over them. “What?”

“Sweetie Belle! That makes you even more of a suspect!” yelled Scootaloo, not able to believe her friend’s goof up.

“But it wasn’t me! I came in through the door because it was unlocked and thought somepony was still here! I just got my piece and then left. The diorama was still there when I left.” Nothing Sweetie Belle said was helping her out.

“Actually, that reminds me,” Silent Study said as he left the desk and went outside. In a minute, he came back, out of breath from galloping. “Sweetie Belle! Did you use that key I gave you?”

“No. Why?” she said, scared of her situation.

“It’s gone! You’re the only other pony who knows where the additional key is! Please, be honest with me about this. I need that key to go back where it is,” Silent said, almost as scared as Sweetie was about this missing key.

“I don’t know! Honest!” Sweetie’s voice was starting to crack again, annoyed and scared that all of this was happening to her. Silent didn’t say anything, but just stood there, a disappointed look in his eye.

“Alright. I believe you. I won’t ask for anything from any of you. However, if any of you do happen to spot the key, please put it on the front desk whenever you find it. Now, if you excuse me, I need to get some paper from the market. Please exit the school barn while I’m out.” The three ponies were about to exit when Cheerilee came along and entered the school barn. “Miss Cheerilee! I was just about to get some more paper for today’s class.”

“Oh don’t worry about that! I actually went to the market this morning and got some paper for today. Hey girls! If you want you can come inside now and help me set up for class. It’s Silent Study’s day off, so it’d be a pleasure if you helped out,” the pink mare said gleefully.

“Wait a moment,” Scootaloo interrupted. “Why is he here cleaning up the school if he has the day off?”

“Oh, I just do that to help out every morning. Get some experience in cleaning things up and all. Ever since Miss Cheerilee gave me my own key I’ve been able to help out every morning, so I do. Now that I think of it, that secret key probably isn’t needed anymore, seeing as I have a key as well. Oh well! See you later!” As Silent left the school barn, he gave the group an expression that seemed to beg for them not to tell the teacher about the missing key.

Five minutes before class had started, and everypony was ready for their lessons. While the three girls were getting set up, what looked like a flame came across the room. All of a sudden the flame turned into a letter. Luckily nopony in the room saw this, and the Cutie Mark Investigators read the letter in secret.

Hey girls!

Spike here, giving you a message with my fire breathe. Wanting to let you know that I did some investigating this morning while in the marketplace and came across Cheerilee. We chatted for a while, me not giving away the fact that I was helping you out in your investigation, and I found out what the grand prize was. It’s a Fifty bit gift card for Sugarcube Corner! Pretty big prize. Apparently she won it in a raffle and decided to include it as the prize. Hope that helps you narrow down the suspects.

The three fillies gasped at this new information, surprised that they had finally gotten some real evidence. Whoever this culprit was, they must have been desperate to get this gift card. Who would want to get sweets that badly?

“Mare, am I hungry or what.” Truffle Shuffle’s words became the answer to their prayers as the chubby colt ate a whole bagel in a bite. The three of them just looked at each other, as if to confirm their beliefs.

“But Truffle’s not even a unicorn. How could he have done it?” Sweetie Belle asked.

“Hey Truffle! Wanna try out this new donut I got from Sugarcube Corner? Snips and I think it’s really good!” As Snips took out the donut and Truffle grabbed it, the Cutie Mark Investigators did another gasp, feeling as if they’d found their culprits.

“That’s it!” they yelled triumphantly, right before being hushed as class began.

---

It was recess time, and the three mares were gathered around the oak tree.

“Alright girls, I assume we’ve all got the same idea of what’s happening right now, am I right?” Apple Bloom started. Her two friends started nodding their heads, slowing down, and then started shaking their heads. “Really? I thought that you got it as well. Well, I guess I’ll need to explain it to you guys then. See, it appears that either Snips or Snails was the one to commit the crime. It’s possible that they both did it. They destroyed the diorama after everypony had left by using the key had picked up outside to enter the school barn. It appears one of them had forgotten to lock the door on the way out though.” Sweetie Belle raised her hoof to ask a question. “Yes, Sweetie Belle?”

“Why would they do it still?” she asked.

“That’s a simple answer,” Apple Bloom retorted. “The reason they destroyed Archer’s diorama was to help get rid of the competition and win the prize of the gift card for Sugarcube Corner. Yes, Scoots?” she said to Scootaloo now raising her hoof.

“But their dioramas were TERRIBLE. Snips tried to enter in his diorama about how foals are made and ended up including storks into it, and Snails was worse in that he actually showed the mating tactics of storks for his project. None of them would win.” Scoots pointed out.

“Exactly. Neither of them would have won the prize with those entries. However, there was one other entry that could win because of how detailed it was, and that diorama belonged to Truffle Shuffle. He spent weeks investigating how a cookie would be digested. He even did tests on himself to see how much weight he gained and lost during the time he had eaten the cookie. If any other pony was gonna win, it would be him. He had either or both of those colts use their magic to get rid of the competition and gain the prize. He probably would have then shared the gift card with them when he had won. Now, all we have to do is find out how he figured out the prize and we can tell the teacher what we’ve found out.” Apple Bloom was excited at the possibility that they had found the culprits, and she was prepared to help free Sweetie Belle from her conviction. “Now, let’s start investigating!”

The three of them cheered, and the first thing they did was to start investigating (or stalk, whichever is the more appropriate term) Truffle Shuffle around the playground. He was playing around on the teeter totter with five other ponies. Truffle Shuffle was always fun to play with on the teeter totter since it always took five other ponies to get their side of it down. Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo were using binoculars to view him, hoping that something would give him away. While they were looking at him, Silver Spoon popped up right in front of their vision, surprising the three of them.

“GAH!” they all yelled, falling back as they did.

“What are you doing?” Silver Spoon asked.

“We’re investigating right now, that’s what!” Apple Bloom replied. “We think that Truffle Shuffle is related to the case, so we’re seeing if our theory is correct. We need to know how he knew about what the secret grand prize was.”

“You mean you didn’t know that it was a gift card to Sugarcube Corner?” Silver Spoon’s words seemed to shock the investigators. “She was hinting to it pretty aggressively. She said how ‘sweet’ the prize was and how we’d like it ‘a bit, or maybe fifty’. At one point I think she just said that it was a gift card for the place. I don’t think teacher is very good at subtlety.”

“Oh, um, thanks Silver Spoon. Why would you help us?” Sweetie Belle asked. The small unicorn did not usually get along with Silver Spoon or her friend, so this was a surprise.

“I’m not a complete jerk, so if you are innocent I’d help. But yeah, I’m fairly certain that Snips or Snails had a role in this. After all, those guys wouldn’t mind doing something like that for sweets. I’d never understand how anypony could do that though. Personally, I hate sugary stuff, so I’d probably throw out that card even if I won it. Good luck.” The three fillies were surprised at Silver Spoon. She’d actually given them help, and didn’t even try to be rude about it. They were lucky though, as that was just the information they needed to confirm their suspicions of motive.

“So, now we just need some physical evidence on proving that it was him. Where do you think we should go for that?” Scoots asked the group.

“I’m really stumped on that one. I mean, if they did use magic, then there really isn’t any physical proof. I mean, what can we do to prove my innocence if we can’t actually find proof?” Sweetie Belle’s question was a good one. After all, what could they do other than speculate? They didn’t have any idea to this, and were left quiet.

“I’ve got it!” the pegasus of the group yelled out. “All we have to do is confront Truffle Shuffle with our theory in the most intimidating way possible and hope that he feels guilty about it enough that he confesses!” The two friends looked incredulously at her when she had said this. “Look, it’s all we’ve got, and if anything it would put us on the right track if we could manage to see his reactions to this. So, what do you say?” The two nodded their heads and went up to Truffle Shuffle, who had just gotten off of the teeter totter, causing the other ponies to plop down.

“Hey, Truffle, can we talk to you for a moment?” Apple Bloom asked.

“Sure!” he responded. “What can I do for you?”

“Well, there’s something I’d like to talk to you about,” the earth filly said, blushing and crossing her legs. She was trying to make Truffle interested in what she had to say, and she was certainly good at it.

“Uh, sure, Apple Bloom, go ahead and say it.” He was starting to blush now. He was emotionally vulnerable right at that moment. Right where they wanted him.

“WHY DID YOU DO IT?!” she yelled.

“YEAH, WHY?!” chimed in Scootaloo.

“HOW COULD YOU?!” added Sweetie Belle. The tri-force emotion attack obviously having an effect on Truffle Shuffle. It looked like he would break soon.

“Alright! I’ll admit it! It was me!” He started to cry and break down at this. This had worked better than expected.

“So you admit to working with Snips or Snails to destroy the diorama so you’d stand a better chance at winning the grand prize?” Sweetie Belle said excitedly, glad at the idea of this investigation being finished.

“What? No! Why’d I ever do something like that? That’s horrible! I was talking about the donut this morning.” The large colt’s statement was more confusing than, well, it’d been a rough time lately and they couldn’t figure out anything to compare this confusion to.

“Wait, what are you talking about?” Sweetie Belle asked. Her hopes had suddenly crashed his that statement.

“I’m supposed to be on a diet and my parents can’t know about that! They say I’ve gotten too big and it’s not healthy. I was just too hungry!” he started crying again, causing the accusing ponies to feel just a bit more awkward.

“So, you aren’t interested in the prize of a gift card to Sugarcube Corner then?” Scoots managed to say, trying to get past the awkwardness of the situation.

“BWAHAHA!” he started bawling at that statement. “My…my parents knew about the prize and…and were let known that if I won,” he stopped for a moment, blew her nose, and continued, “That I’d receive a HEALTHY EATING & NUTRITION BOOK!” He stopped, plopped on the ground, and stopped moving. It took a full moment, but the surrounding ponies started laughing at that fact. “Why are you laughing?” he managed to eke out.

“Well, you’re a pony who likes to eat and knows a lot about foods, and your project deals with cookies, which you can’t eat now. If you win the prize, instead of being able to eat cookies, you’ll have to eat foods you don’t like using that book. Kinda funny in a roundabout way,” Apple Bloom explained. Truffle chuckled at the coincidence at all of this (It wasn’t irony, since Truffle knew that the meaning of ‘irony’ was ‘incongruity between the actual result of a sequence of events and the normal or expected result’ and since his fate was related to food, eating healthy would be related. True irony would be his prize being a book on engineering). Apple Bloom laughed, but then soon realized that they had just lost their leading suspect. He wasn’t going to get any card, so it looked like there was no motive for him to employ the two troublesome colts. She went away with her friends, trying to figure out what their next move was.

“Well, it doesn’t look like Truffle did it. He didn’t have any reason to do this, so looks like we won’t have him to worry about. Bad news though is that we don’t have any more suspects.” Apple Bloom looked at the two despondent faces before asking, “Does anypony have a clue of how we move on now?” The two other ponies looked at each other and tried to figure out what was going to happen now. They thought about it until the bell rang, forcing the two of them to go inside.

Class was going on, but nopony was focusing much on the reading lesson and thought more about how they’d be able to find their next suspect. The only other possible pony who was close to winning wasn’t responsible, and there didn’t look like many other who would do it. The lesson finished and the school day had ended, leaving the suspected ponies to feel the pressure. As they left the school, they noticed several books that were left behind by sompony and let Miss Cheerilee know.

“Hey, Miss Cheerilee!” called out Sweetie Belle. “Somepony left their books behind.”

“Thanks for letting me know, Sweetie Belle.”

She went over to the book pile and looked through the covers of them. There were three books there, none of which were school books. “Huh, never seen these before. ‘High Level Alchemy: Potions, Herbs, and Pestles’, ‘’Supernaturals’, and ‘Elemental Theories of the New Century’. Looks like somepony likes to read about potions and things that I’d probably never figure out. I can’t find any name in these books, so I guess we’ll just have to do the only other thing.”

“What other thing could you do to find whose book it is?” asked Scootaloo. “I mean, if the books don’t have a name in them, how else could you find out?”

“Simple; we ask everypony whose books these are tomorrow when they come in. That’s the simplest solution. Most ponies these days don’t realize that most problems can be solved simply and think that there must be some insane solution to their problems. Why, most problems could be solved if you thought of the problem in reverse. That’s a little life lesson for each of you.” Cheerilee’s words echoed into the mares’ minds as they thought of their situation and how her words related.

“You thinking what I’m thinking?” Scootaloo asked.

“Yeah!” her two friends yelled in agreement. They definitely had their motivation back now and knew what they’d have to do. With their new idea in mind, they went off to see Spike and reveal their new information.

---

The rush to meet Spike with their new theory was even faster with Scootaloo being powered not only by motivation but by the adrenaline of having an awesome idea. They reached the library and burst through the door.

“Hey Spike! We’ve got an awesome idea for who did it!” the excited pegasus yelled out. Her friends decided to let her do the talking since she was so pumped about being the one to come up with the idea in the first place.

“Great to hear, Scoots! What’s your big idea?” Spike was pretty excited to hear what she had to say.

“Well, it’s less of an idea and more of a realization. See, we used that info you got about the grand prize to come up with a suspect for who committed it. We thought that Truffle Shuffle would be the one who did it since he loved that food so much and also made a really good diorama. He’s not a unicorn and we thought that what he did was have Snips or Snails do the deed and would have split the gift card. We learned however that Truffle wouldn’t have been able to win the prize and he knew it as well, so there wasn’t any motivation for it. It took a while, but then we came across a big realization and now have our best suspects!” The orange filly couldn’t help but smile at her intelligence.

“Who’re your new suspects?” the inquisitive dragon asked.

“Snips or Snails!” she yelled triumphantly. “See, we realized that the entire case might not be as complex as we think and that one of them still tried to get rid of the competition, even though they didn’t make really good dioramas. The reason is simple: they aren’t that smart! They could have thought they’d stand a chance at winning if they got rid of everypony else’s projects, or at least the one they thought was better. They didn’t need a mastermind for them to do it if they thought they could win the prize on their own.”

“Wow, that’s some good thinking!” the dragon said enthusiastically. “But do any of you have physical evidence that’d help you out? It’s pretty much guessing if you don’t find anything to pin on them.”

“Actually,” Sweetie Belle interrupted, saying, “There is some evidence that one of them did it. See, about a month back we were working on a project dealing with colors and trying to find different objects that could cover the color spectrum. Snips and Snails were working together on their project and what they did is ask ponies around town for a bit of their hair for their project. Most ponies were a bit creeped out, but I lent them some of my hair. I think they could have used my hair from their project to make it seem like it was me!” This bit of info caused Spike to rub and chin and think this new revelation over.

“It seems plausible,” he stated. “However, what makes you sure he’d still have the project?”

“Snips actually told me a week back that he still has the project in the back of the classroom. Apparently the teacher really liked it a lot and wanted to display it later on to the parents.” This explanation by the unicorn was enough for Spike to consider it very possible that at least one of them was the culprit.

“Wow, you girls are doing pretty well then. By the way, did you finish the books I lent you last night? Twilight was actually hoping to read them and was surprised when she learned about ponies actually taking out books. I don’t wanna rush, but it’d be nice for you to finish them quickly.” The three ponies pulled the books out of their sacks and handed them over to Spike. He was surprised that they had finished each of their books in one night and didn’t know what to say.

The three of them left the library, confident in the knowledge they’ve learnt and the idea that they’d actually solve a case.

“I really hope we earn our investigation cutie marks after this,” Sweetie Belle said, echoing the thoughts of everypony in the group.

“Mare, I’d hope so. I mean, with all the pressure we’re dealing with, it’d better come,” added Scootaloo.

“I-“ started Apple Bloom, right before being cut off by a red gleam zooming right past them. It looked as is a laser had just been shot, or possibly a spell. They looked just in time to see the light hit the nearby mailbox, turning it into a pile of dust. The same sort of dust that had been at the scene of the crime. They saw what appeared to be a cloaked figure run by at that very moment.

“Catch him! He’s our guy!” Scoots said. The three of them soon got on Scoots’ scooter and proceeded to chase after the cloaked culprit. The culprit was fast, but not fast enough to outrun the scooter.

“Just a little more,” Apple Bloom whispered to herself as they were just within a yard of grabbing the cloak. All of a sudden a red light seemed to glow around the target’s hooves and his speed suddenly increased at least twice as fast as Scoots was going. “Drat,” she whispered again.

“He’s getting away!” cried out Sweetie Belle, scared that they might lose their target when they were so close.

“Not while I’m here!” roared Scootaloo. “I’ve still got my MAXIMUM OVERDRIVE!” and she started flapping like never before. Sweat rolled down her face as she put all her effort into flapping her tiny wings. They were starting to catch up to the hooded figure now.

Just as they were once again close to grabbing however, the nearby stacked crates started falling down, almost hitting the three fillies if not for Scootaloo’s skills. She swerved left and right, avoiding the crates as they came barreling down on them. One of them nearly flew straight into them. However, Scoots managed to pull up the scooter and wagon, making a jump that got them at least two feet in the air and just over the crate, the bottom of the scooter now riding on it. It was the most awesome thing the small pegasus felt she had done. Soon there were no more crates, and the target was just ahead.

“Alright girls! Looks like we’ve almost got him! We now just need to…uh,” Scoots droned out for a couple seconds before finished her though. “Panic?” The two were about to ask what she was talking about when they both noticed the same thing. The alley that the suspect had run through was getting smaller, as they noticed a red glow enveloping the two buildings, pushing them together to close his escape.

“STOP!” the two passenger ponies yelled, just in time for them to hit whatever brakes they could and to stop their speed. The alley closed, and the three fillies ended up still plowing into the wall. They were lucky they braked though, as one more second and they would have ended up being crushed by that alley.

“What the buck was that?!” Sweetie Belle yelled. They’d never seen anypony their age do magic like that before. Obviously somepony in their classroom was a skilled magic user.

“I have no idea,” Apple Bloom responded woozily, still feeling dizzy from that crash. “I never thought that anypony could pull off something like that.”

“Looks like they did though,” Scoots added, rubbing her sore wings. “Hey, what’s that?” On the ground where they had just chased the shadowy figure, a bottle lay on the ground. It looked like it was on the pony that they were chasing and had fallen off. She approached the bottle and picked it up. In it was what looked like several drops of a blue serum, and on the glass bottle itself was the initials “R.T”.

“Looks like a new piece of evidence,” responded Apple Bloom. “Do any of you know what those initials mean?” Both of the ponies shook their heads. “Huh. I guess this case just got a bit more interesting.”

Author's Note:

Chapter is named after the book "A Morbid Taste for Bones". With the chase now on and suspects being investigated, will the CMC find the true culprit? Find out in the next chapter, "And Then There Were Some"!

Comments

[Bronymind]

Rumble Tumble, it's that simple

[Ellington]

Wow, whoever this R.T. character is sure means business.