As Fluttershy was dragged away by the prison guards, curiosity began to eat to away at me, craving for some sort of logic behind this whole thing. I set my cigar on the ashtray and straighten myself away from the chair's back rest. "Wait!" I call out.
"No." The guard pony's voice drys out any sense of life this room. So cold and inert. "We have a schedule to follow and Fluttershy's due now."
I couldn't leave a case like this slip right under my snout, so I drop twenty bits on the table in front of me. "Five minutes," I say. The clangor of the bits freeze them and they both give each other a look.
Fluttershy smacks the ground as they detach their hooves off her shoulders and swipe the bits off the table. They strut off to the exit close by and put on their stoic faces which was what most of the guards in this station wore twenty four seven. "Only five minutes," the one on the left grunted, "and I'll be counting."
Slugging her way over, Fluttershy lays her cuffed hooves on the table, and leans on them, struggling to keep her head from dropping. The bags under her eyes hang down to her cheeks, and seem as if they've been shaded in with a black marker. She brushes her long bangs out of her face and raises her head to give me stare that told me that she was fed up with my questions. "Can't you just let them take me already?" she asked. "I've already told you it was me."
She says that as if prison is like an all expense paid vacation to Los Pegasus, but no matter how much she didn't want me here, she's gonna have to deal with it cause I'm going back to the office with a solved case on my desk. "Why did you have to do it?" I ask. "Couldn't you have paid somepony else to simply finish the job? You could've even turned them in after it was all done."
"No," Fluttershy says faintly under her breath, or at least that was what I think she said.
"No?" I lean froward and adjust my ear in her direction. "I don't think I caught that?"
As silence filled the air, Fluttershy shut her eyes and took a deep breathe, pulling her chest upwards slightly, and released it in choppy bursts. "Not with Rainbow... Rainbow Dash." She takes one more quick breath, recollecting herself, before she's able to look at me again.
I raise my eyebrows and watch her reactions close. Perception is the first thing they teach you if you want to get anywhere as a detective, and with years of laying back as an assistant, I think I'm well equipped in squeezing out their emotions. Also, this is the last five minutes I have before I throw this whole thing in the dumps. No time for screwing around. "Go ahead," I encouraged her.
"I killed her. What more do you want?"
Ugh, I thought, she's gonna play this game like she did at the station. I glance over at the guards, who's eyes are fixated on their watches.
Usually the station is fine with just finding the suspect but Fluttershy's case is different. It was too perfect. Nothing gives a hint that Fluttershy was the culprit and I most likely would've never found out it if she didn't turn herself in.
"Look," I say, "we both know that murders don't just happen. Even psychopathic killers have an incentive to kill. It could be due to anger, thrill, financial gain, or even just because they didn't have any attention as a filly." It looks like Fluttershy isn't even listening to me, which I wouldn't surprised if she isn't. Her face is still, almost resembling the complexion of the guards ponies, but drooping further downward. "Do get what I mean?" I move my head to make sure she's actually focusing on me.
Her eyelashes flutter rapidly, and she gives me a nod, understanding my question. "So tell me what was... your desire, so to speak?"
"What happened, happened and I don't regret it." She slugs back into her chair and lowers her eyelids.
I clench my teeth but try not to show it. Remember, I think to myself, only five minutes.
Placing my hooves down into the table, I bring myself closer to her. "That's because you wanted something she had, and the only way you were going to satisfy your need was to kill her. Am I right?
One corner of her mouth curls upward and she closes her eyes. "You're funny." she says. "But if I tell you... I would have failed as a criminal. And what kind of pony would that make me, huh? Weak, that's what. Like all the other ponies in Vanhoover's penitentiary, crumbling in the your grasp." She tilted back. "Guards."
"Ok time's up, detective." The guards yank her out of her seat and make their way to the door.
"No!" I dig into the pockets of my jacket and slam more bits down on the table. "Forty bits!" I call out, but as soon as they land on the table, I am left to admire the chipped paint off the walls that haven't been painted in over a hundred years.
Damn it, I bang my hoof against the table and stick my cigar back in my mouth. As I grab my coat, a weird taste tints my taste buds, reflexively making me cough up my cigar and spit out all my saliva. The cigar's bite size, so toss it towards the trash can in the corner of the room. I've really got to pay attention how long I leave that thing.
The hinges to my office door creak as I open it. I take a good look at the scattered pages of notes, every single one of them with Fluttershy's name written at the top. Why am I back here? I'm going to drive myself crazy if I stay here any longer. The clock read eleven and my limbs are shivering cold, abstaining the desolate vibe of the jail cell. You would've thought being a detective eliminates any sort of fear of prisons but I guess not for me.
I arch my back against the soft leather on my chair and suddenly my shivers have settled. I take a relaxing breath and let the comfort embody me. I've fallen asleep on this chair many times, it's developed more into a habit to retreat the safety of my leather seat. We were made for each other so it's like husband and wife but in a serious matter of work type relationship. What am I even thinking about anymore? as I think that my state of mind breaks when I glance at my filing cabinet.
The filling cabinet held every single piece of information to cases. If I didn't have a place the stash to everything I found, I'd probably go insane, or an even worse, if it just disappeared for the day. There'd go my pay check and the rest of my detective career. Some ponies look at it in a bad way but that's the only way I could even start to comprehend the situations I'm put up against every day. It keeps me organized.
I leave my comfortable spot and slide open my filing cabinet. Fluttershy's in jail now, so that meant I did my job was done but a tiny part of me has grown attached to this flawless crime. Not small by any standards, but enough to get me to this cabinet.
Scrolling through the "F" category, I saw all of my old investigations: Clam Fright, Hue Freud, Cog Fit, all of which weren't the easiest cases to crack especially since for most of them I was on my own. Alone. They were my first cases so that's what I expected and plus, getting promoted to Inspector chief of Ponyville was a really nice perk, so I'm not arguing.
My eyes stopped and there it was, the one file at the very bottom of the list marked as 'Unsolved.' I had other cases just like this one but I solved quick after the first week of the suspects imprisonment but the difference was I actually had evidence to go off of. Wiping my desk clean of the clutter, I open it on my desk and gaze over the single piece of paper with a picture of Fluttershy clipped to it. Her smile radiated through the picture and almost making me smile, but that went away when I saw Rainbow Dash's hoof over her shoulder, embracing her. "She trusted her" and now that's all in the trash. I guess you really can't trust anypony anymore.
The personal information section was no different than any other criminals but the evidence section is what made me cringe. No forensics, no witnesses, no nothing. Only Rainbow Dash's dead body laying on her bedroom floor. That spracks another question in my mind How would she have the slightest clue in killing. From years in the business, I now that it takes more than careful planning to pull off any type of murder, whether it be somepony so insignaifcent the whole town dosen't now she exists or somepony as charismatic and well known as Rainbow Dash.
My eyes scanned the up and down the file, only to see more white space. There was just nothing I could base any of my theories on, except the fact that she wanted to herself to get caught. Could it have been guilt? Guilt is a deadly substance that has ruined some of the minds of other criminals and since Fluttershy didn't talk much, it wasn't far from idea. As least that's what her friends have told me, but for all I know they could have been part of this act, just covering all the evidence as part of their big scheme.
I laid back in the soft leather and rested my eyes for just a second, hoping this would settle the curiosity that surged through my brain like an electric current. My thoughts always returned to the big question; Why? Why she'd even conjure up such a ridiculous plan? Why would she turn herself in? And what kind of deal could she have had with her friends? That is if they even had anything to do with it at all? Why?
The peaceful state captivated me, pulling me further into its trance. It was so relaxing like the gentle whispers of your mom she reads to you a bedtime story and you're half asleep, half paying attention. Something felt wrong though. Goosebumps formed around my body and my ear perked to listen closely.
My eyelids snapped back as I heard the creek of my office door sound. I shot straight for my gun drawer, but in the same second stopped. "Calm Midnight?" I said. "What are you doing here at the station so late?"
He waltzed in and as he stood at the side of my desk. "Cause, you'll never believe what I found"
My eyes catch a glimpse of the pink journal in his hooves. "What you found a new journal for yourself?"
"Funny," he said, "but finding this journal is like a striking gold. I think it'll help you with the Cloudsdale murder."
I raise an eyebrow. "So you mean to tell me this is evidence?"
"Just read the last entries." He tossed the book on my desk.
As I scroll through to the last page, and notice that half of them are impossible to read, not because the writing was sloppy but because there's ink sploshed on every entrie. "One hundred twenty even, right," I ask.
"Yeah," he said.
Clearing my voice, I read it aloud. "Dear Diary, Today is the day I'll never forget for as long as I live, but as tragic as this will be for me, I can't let my emotions get in the way of what must be done. I know that lives will saved in the process but it's going to be difficult letting go of somepony as close to me as Rainbow Dash. She's become more of family than a friend and being there when I had lost lost Angel and had no one to talk to. I asked her today if she was sure that this was the only way but she hadn't changed her mind. Asking something like this is terrible but on the other hoof, it must mean she trust me enough to follow through so that's gotta mean something right? I want to keep this entry short. I just wanted to express my feelings someway..."
"We've done a full search on her house but that's the best we've got."
"Rainbow Dash planned her death?"
Author's Note
I've had this story sitting on my computer for a while now, so I thought I'd upload it let some feedback flow in.
