Anterograde

by Archmage Ludicrous

Rating: teen
Tags: Mystery, Twilight Sparkle, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic
Length: 12930

Twilight suffers head wound, causing her to develop anterograde amnesia, a mental condition that prevents the formation of memories. Does she have the ability unveil the truth with evidence and a steel-trap mind in spite of a severe head injury?

Retrograde amnesia is temporary or permanent loss of memory.

Anterograde amnesia is the temporary or permanent loss of the ability to form memories.

Twilight Sparkle now suffers from the latter of the two. Yet nevertheless, her saddlebag continues to increase in weight, filling up with scribbled-down postulations, warnings of the most unsavory kind, trinkets resplendent with lost meaning, and notes detailing a morning that she will never remember. Does she have the ability unveil the truth with evidence and a steel-trap mind in spite of a severe head injury?

If you wish to avoid spoilers and solve the mystery without the assistance of another, I would recommend you avoid the comments section. I would appreciate it if people left untagged spoilers out of the comment section, but since I know that I cannot enforce that, it's better to assume that every single comment is a spoiler.

Published 2014-07-01 21:00:05 UTC
Last updated 2014-10-21 14:34:02 UTC

Chapter 1

Author's Note

For clarification: this story takes place pre-Twilicorn-era.

Chapter 1

My heart thumped in my ears as I jolted into a new state of awareness, reeling out of a silent reverie. I beheld the solitary sight in front of me—my purple hoof in the quill drawer of my library. Even though the library was empty and silent, my blood rushed and pounded as I entered a state of panic. I did not remember walking here, or anything up to this point, truly. The realization that I had no recollection whatsoever of any events leading to this situation compounded with the sheer void of the unknown, leading a true well of terror to spring forth from the deep reservoirs of dread in my body. A powerful shudder traveled down the length of my spine, and though the early spring morning was frigid, the weather was most certainly not the cause of my quaking.

Slowly, I pulled my hoof from the drawer. Taking a deep breath to steel my nerves, I decided that any hoof in the quill drawer was a hoof with purpose. The quill lifted dutifully as I influenced it with my magic, but it was accompanied by a dull and throbbing pain which slowly traversed up my horn. The severity of the pain began to increase exponentially, thudding with the beat of my heart until my vision swam and bile crawled up my throat. Wincing, I halted the flow of magic, causing the pain to ebb away as the quill fell onto its weighted tip.

Reflexively, I reached up to my horn with a hoof to determine the source of the nauseating, mind-consuming pain. My hoof traveled carefully to the top of my horn, and worked down slowly towards the base (as one does when checking for a damaged horn). My cautious prodding revealing no damage, I searched around the base of the horn, and a slight brush revealed a large lump behind it. A crusty material was layered on top of it, and even my accidental prod caused it to flare with electric pain. As I returned the hoof to my line of sight, even that electric agony could not prevent me from realizing the nature of the sticky crust that had tagged along with my hoof. The metallic stench of my own scabbed blood on my hoof made wafted into my nose, revolting me. My swirling and inconsistent thoughts centered themselves around the confusion and nausea, almost so that vomiting sounded appealing. I took another, slow, deep breath as I set my hoof down. As uncertain as I was, I was still plenty intelligent to know that making a deposit of my dinner to the Equestrian National Bank of Twilight's Floor was not the best course of action.

The main question in my mind was 'What am I doing here?' There were other questions, too. They rolled through my head like a dense tropical storm, and each of them availed no answer. The last thing that I could remember was that Rainbow Dash was spending the night—at some point during that event, my recollection simply ceased to be.

I looked about, knowing that surely there must be a clue somewhere. Dim morning light made it difficult to see, a single candle slightly alleviated that issue. It stood on a small table in the center of the room that was nominally the reference section. One of the books was open, though—it was the Royal Equestrian Twenty-Four Character Script Dictionary. A couple steps towards it allowed me to read it. I suppressed the annoyance that began to bubble when I saw writing in the dictionary—in my library of all places. I decided that I had greater priorities at this time than being angry at a book-vandal, though, and examined the writing. It was really only one word that was written, an exclamation of "Here!" with an arrow pointed at an underlined entry.

Anterograde: adj. Effective immediately after a traumatic event such as external shock.

Why is that word important, though? Normally the term anterograde is associated with... amnesia.

"Of course!" I exclaimed. "Anterograde amnesia as a dysfunction of the hippocampus causes the loss of ability to form memories!"

I frowned. If my assumption was correct, then even in the best of cases I could only count on my memories lasting ten minutes. That wasn't very long, and it was only best case. In reality, I would forget about most things very shortly after I did them. I needed to do something, and now, before I forgot what I was doing. I clearly had been making progress and trying to do something at some point before—the underlined entry attested to that. There was something more I needed to be doing, and I had minutes to work it out before my chains of thought rattled to a sluggish halt.

"Spike?" I hoped that his cheerful voice would respond then, ringing through the wooden rooms of my library like a purple and scaly messiah, but my cry garnered no reply aside from a stern silence.

Of course—Spike wasn't here. I actually knew that, assuming it was still the same day that I was injured. This new knowledge was helpful objectively, but it meant that I needed to find a way to more quickly remind myself that I had amnesia, and then get myself to a safe place as soon as possible. I was in no condition to be roaming about on my own, and probably should be in a hospital. The urgency of the situation compounding upon my natural anxiety, and I quickly began surveying the room. I noted a quill on the floor. A-ha! I must have been planning to write something! I was about to grasp it with my magic, when the last wisps of a fading memory reminded me that I had a lump behind my horn—using magic to fetch it would be a bad idea. I retrieved it with my hoof.

I took a second to walk over to the dictionary and remind myself what was written there. "Anterograde." Yes, it is amnesia, isn't it? I had quite nearly forgotten.

I glanced around again. This time, my desk across from the table caught my eye. It was burdened with an impressive sheaf of papyrus, one page separate from the rest, as well as a pot of ink and a large saddlebag. The bag, I recognized immediately. My old mystery-solving bag! My brother and mother were together quite fond of setting puzzles for me when I was young, and this gargantuan saddlebag was my constant companion during those times. I quickly trotted over and retrieved it. It would be perfect for keeping notes and trinkets in, so that I could later decry what happened this morning. I immediately placed it upon my back, lime-green straps sliding into a tight but manageable fit.

I then went to examine the papers on my desk. There was only one with writing on it, separated from the rest. The paper bore the letter 'A' in an odd style. It looked like my hornwriting, but... something was off. I put it in my mystery bag, just in case.

Why would I have written the letter "A?" I think back, trying to remember what I might have been doing. Even the memory of my recent discovery of my amnesia bore the fog of a memory years old, not one of several minutes. I squinting, I attempt to apply the memory. A... that could only have been "Anterograde." I must have been planning to move—that dictionary would be cumbersome to carry. I needed to go to the hospital, so that movement was still necessary. Glancing around for a quill, I spied one and took it to a new sheet of papyrus.

Anterograde Amnesia
*see hospital NO MAGIC

It was sloppy, but it was what I had. I impaled the note on my horn, so that I wouldn't lose it and it would always be nearby to read—even more sloppy, but once again, it was all I had. Swiftly, I set off down the stairs and out the front door. I had to get to the hospital, right away!

Chapter 2

Something has gone wrong. We don't seem to have an archived copy of that chapter.

Chapter 3

An awakening is never complete without recognition—that one moment when one takes stock of where one is, who they are, and feels the rush of memories pour into them as they begin to exist, once more. As I awoke, though, my being did not match my memories. I remembered walking down stairs, about to settle in for the night, Rainbow Dash's fluffy white sleeping bag near my smooth black one. Instead of the velvet interior of a sleeping bag, though, I felt an itchy, rough cushion below me, and my head was rested on its side, on top of a tough headrest quite unlike the feathers-in-silk pillow that accompanied my sleeping bag.

I peeled my eyes open. A tough blanket over me blocked out the bottom of my vision as it lay tucked far up onto me, and a wet cloth of some sort was upon my head, wrapped around my horn. Across the room, a small table with a couple bottles on it partially blocked out my view of a pair of stallions arguing by a door. A golden-furred pegasus with a dirty brown mane was in the hallway, pulling back as if trying to get out. The ashen-grey earth pony inside the room, though, had a hoof around the shorter pegasus' shoulder. The earth pony whispered urgently (and fairly loudly) to the other.

"...I'm tellin' yah! I had nothin' to do with it! I found 'er in the alleyway, she had that hood over there on, she had to be runnin' from somethin' so I took 'er here! No way I'd ever do that to a filly!"

"Bigs, you got a bad reputation, see?" The pegasus seemed to be trying to explain something. "C'mon, don't give me that look... 'snot that I don't trust you... I just... see, I just hear these things... and..."

"You know you can't trust that shit that people say about me!" The stallion called "Bigs" groaned. "Man, I thought I had you on my side, too."

"Fuck, Bigs, way to put a guy on the spot. Fine, fine, I'll keep this on the down-low. But don't expect me to be lying to the Guard!"

A sigh of relief from the larger pony. "Thanks, pal. I'mma figure this out, you watch." He released the pegasus, shaking his hoof as if to get ants off of it.

"Yeah, yeah." The pegasus backed out slowly. "Look buddy, I'm gonna do overtime at work today. If things are still fishy when I get back..."

"Don't sweat it, don't sweat it!" Bigs closed the door, and gave a deep breath outwards. He looked towards me, and his view naturally swung past afterwards. It turned back quickly, though, as he noticed something—probably my consciousness. "Holy shit..." he breathed, "You up?"

"Where... exactly am I?" I asked, slumping up. The rag on my head, the pounding inside it, and the confusion throughout all weighed me down, slowing my process of getting up.

"Careful there!" He trotted towards me at an alarming pace, causing me to shy backwards a bit into the couch. "You gotta nasty whack on your head, lady."

"I guess that would explain the headache, but it does nothing to explain how I got here."

"Well uhh... I found you, in one a' the alleyways outta the train station. You were stumblin' around, like you were runnin' from someone. Turns you got a crack on your head, real bad one too. I took yah here, it's real outta the way, so it's safe." The stallion peered down at me, locking my eyes in his. "Listen. You tell Bigs here who you're runnin' from, and I'll find the Guard to sic on their rear. I can keep you safe and outta the way 'till the thing blows over, too."

"Well... excuse me, Mr. Bigs—if I can call you that... I never entered any alleyway. Nor do I recall ever going to a train station. In fact, Ponyville doesn't have alleyways by the train station. I see no reason to trust you, unless you can give me a better explanation." I met his stare dead on, attempting to interpret his position. Bigs' eyes were cold, but passionate all at once. I decided to answer his stare with a frigid gaze of my own, in the hopes it would aid a more rapid exposition. I was confused and out of my element, which meant I couldn't afford to take chances, and that I couldn't possibly afford to not figure out what was going on.

Bigs squinted at me. "Ponyville? This ain't Ponyville. We're in Canterlot."

"I don't recall coming to Canterlot. Unless you care to explain how I got here..." I decided to lay down my worst-case scenario interpretation of the situation. From what I had seen it probably wasn't true, but irregardless, he deserved to know how I interpreted things. "I can only assume you took me here. I wake up in an unfamiliar place rather than the home where I was about to go to sleep. I can only come to one conclusion. From my point of view, you abducted me."

"Abducted... like, kidnapped, you mean?" Bigs' stare made a transformation into one of doubt and shock. "Wait..."

I watched as his expression changed completely. His eyes buggered out in fear, and his mouth split into a grimace.

"Wait! You don't seriously think that do you? You're pullin' my chain! You... you're tryin' to blackmail me!"

"No, I'm not." I shook my head, doing my best to remain calm. "I'm in exactly the position I described."

"Ah, shit. You were running from somethin', I know it! Look, your stuff is over there." He gestured to a hooded cloak and saddlebag which were both, in fact, mine. "Look, I'll do anything, anything so long as you don't be rash about this and blame me. Anything at all, I tell yah." He looked at me pleadingly.

"I'll trust you, for now. I won't be picky about who helps me figure out what's going on." I said, pulling off the scratchy blanket and coming to a stand. As my blood began to flow, my headache began to pick up a bit. "Ugh," I complained. "My head..."

"Oh, that's it!" Bigs exclaimed, briskly traveling to the head of the sofa. "That's prolly why you can't remember!"

"What is?"

"That massive lump on yer skull! Lemme fetch the mirror, I put the rag on it after I cleaned it, thought it might help." He rummaged through a small bag by the sofa.

I reached to the top of my head, pulling off the rag which I had long since stopped noticing. I winced as if stung when the wet fibers were removed from the area behind my horn. The damp rag was wet mostly with water, though the center had a small spot of blood, which I carefully avoided. The worn edges of the rag showed that it had gone through a significant lifetime of use and abuse, but it was nonetheless white and pristine aside from the red that had been left in the center. As I finished examining the rag, Bigs walked towards me, hoof extending a small hoof-mirror. I lowered my head to observe the source of the slight stinging pain. A swollen gash in my head revealed itself without much searching. Little bits of dried blood clung to the fur around it, but for the most part, the wound was clean, with bits of pink flesh showing where I was bleeding from.

"Head wounds're real bleeders. You had some kinda blood-blister of sorts in there when I got you here. I cleaned it up, so it's actually lookin' a lot better than it was a few hours ago. Anyhow, I thought—"

"Hours?" I interrupted him, looking up to catch his gaze. "How long have I been here? What time is it, when did I show up?" He set down the mirror on the table, and scratched his head, eyes drifting up to the ceiling.

"I'unno, must've been around seven or eight when I found ya... I don't have a clock, I keep track by the Canterlot Bell Tower, y'see? I do know it was before eight, an' after seven. So I suppose it was at least four hours you've been out, the noon bell rang a while ago."

"Have you looked through my stuff at all?" I asked, stepping over towards my equipage.

"No, 'course not!" proclaimed Bigs. "That'd be plain rude!"

I groaned.

"Looking for identification didn't even cross your mind?"

"Well uhmm..." Bigs looked towards the floor. "I guess not." Then he raised an eyebrow, casting a dubious gaze towards me. "Wait, wait, hold on. You ain't sayin' that you can't remember your name, are you? 'Cause I sure haven't heard you tell me it."

"No, I remember everything up to the night of the fourth just fine. It's there where it breaks up. My name's Twilight Sparkle. And yours is?" I extended my hoof in greeting, saying in addendum, "Come to think of it, what day is it today? I hope it's the fifth, if I'm missing even more context than a morning, that wouldn't be at all prime."

The giant stallion continued to stare at me dubiously. His eyes began to widen again, panic dripping into them as if from an invisible eyedropper full of road salt.

"Today is the fifth... Miss Sparkle." He said. "But the thing is, you already know my name."

It was my turn to gaze at him dubiously.

"No I don't! We just met in this apartment, and you talked about how I got here, and then you showed me the mirror and my stuff!" I reflected on what I remembered. The conversations were missing context, in places. "But... something was off."

"Shit!" He yelled. "You can't remember, I know you can't! Who could forget 'Bigs?' That's an easy name! Fuck, your memory's leakin' out like... like water, fucking water through a leaky bucket! Shit! The Guard, they'll think I did it! Fuck, you'll think I did it!" Bigs' eyes darted from side to side. "Everyone will think I did it! Stakes already thinks so! Miss House is a witness! Damnit, I'm screwed, I've been set up!"

"Are you done yet?" I asked, turning to haul my saddlebag onto the table. One of the bottles on the table swayed as the heavy bag landed. I took a deep breath to steady myself. I was already prone to panic in stressful situations, and my host's hyperventilation was not helping me in any description. "It seems pretty clear that I didn't lose memory, but am in the process of losing memory. If you follow, it means we need to stay calm, collected, and find something to write with."

"Yess'um." Bigs gulped out an affirmative after a raggedy sigh. "I, have some, uh, some writing stuff. Maybe. I'll go check." His hooves clapped against the tough planks of the floor, but I stopped him.

"Don't bother," I said, "I'm sure I had something with me. You'll be hard pressed to find me without something to write with, so a quick search of my bag should yield something..." I looked over the bag in question. A bright lime green pang of nostalgia reminded me of the nature of the bag—the "mystery bag" of my childhood, whose seemingly bottomless pockets must have factored into my decision to carry it.

The bag had two primary containers, in addition to a variety of sub-pockets. The first of these containers was the "sleeve" of the saddlebag. It was a large, unbuttoned lining accessible from the front of the saddlebag when worn, perfect for carrying long rectangular objects like writing boards and papers. I tilted the bag to an angle to spill the contents of the sleeve out, yielding three objects: my notebook, my pen (a change from the quills I usually used, but far more useful when traveling), and a piece of torn papyrus.

The papyrus jumped out at me the most, seeing as it was the item I was the least likely to carry with me. It was raggedy, and was torn from the bottom edge up to the center, a wide and messy gouge through it. There was writing on the paper, a thick and sloppy inking that showed resemblances to my own, but as if I were hurried when writing it. Across the top of the paper, the words "Anterograde Amnesia" were written, large and important.

"An-ter-o-grade amnesia?" Bigs sounded out the less familiar of the two words from over my shoulder, as he looked over my search of my equipment.

"Makes sense," I said, nodding. "I must have realized that I acquired it, so I set up a reminder, to reduce confusion for myself."

"Shit, lady, that's good to know, but it doesn't mean anything to me!"

"Anterograde amnesia is a type of amnesia that stops you from forming new memories. It's not more rare than other types of amnesia or anything, just a little less well known." I continued down the rough papyrus. An asterisk, written in my own style, preceded a reminder to "see hospital." The reminder was stricken through, though, with a thick black inking. A check mark followed the reminder, which in turn was followed by a warning: "NO MAGIC!" The warning was further underlined for emphasis. There was a little more written below that note, but I couldn't quite discern that through the torn and marred shreds. The most I could make out was "Do n—" on one end, and "—ol" on the other end.

I turned back to the stallion looking over my shoulder, struggling to recall his name.

"...Bigs."

"Yeah?" he said, attentive. A little silent wave of relief passed through my body. I had difficulty remembering names even on the best of days.

"I need your help. My amnesia will keep me from remembering things, but I can still help. I need you to stay patient, and keep me informed. If you do everything I say, I promise that we'll figure this out. For my sake, if not for yours." My calm demeanor helped his worrying, the clarity of my speech settling down the great grey behemoth, which relaxed me in turn. The pea-soup fog of tension began to give way to the gentle breeze of reason, and I felt as satisfied as any good rationalist should in my position. Bigs hesitated before nodding, but he still seemed much better for it.

"Yeah," he said, "I can do that. Whaddya need now?"

"I need to write down things. Everything, that is. It needs to be on paper, recorded, and I need your help to do it. I need you to tell me everything you know about this situation, from beginning to end."

I uncapped my pen and opened my notebook. Several papers were embedded in the front cover, which I took out to review later. The first page had some notes of some variety, which I tore out of the notebook, so that I would not forget to read them. Then, with a clean new page in front of me, I set the pen to the paper.

"All right, Bigs." I said, writing his name on the top of the page. "Tell me everything."

He took a deep breath before beginning.

Chapter 4 — The Testimony of Big Trouble

From Twilight Sparkle's Notebook:

The following is a statement of the truth as one "Bigs" Big Trouble saw it on the morning of the Fifth of Juniper, Third Year of Equestria's Fifth Recorded Age.

"Okay, so here's what happened. I'm takin' the back alley down to the train station at around, say, somewhere 'round seven thirty or seven forty? The Canterlot Royal Train Station, that is. Train station's where I go sometimes, just for uh, reasons. It's a long story, see, but I like to go down there and do my best to help the Guard out. I kinda want to join them sometime, but it's not lookin' so good on that front. Anyway, I'm on my way there, and this kinda-lavender-colored unicorn is stumblin' down the alley (that's you, by the way). Anyway, she's not lookin' so hot, she's got a pretty brown hood with some design on it, and a giant 'ol lime-green saddlebag. I go ask her what she's doin' in the alley, although that bit's pretty obvious. Nobody sets out with clothes like that unless they're runnin' from somebody, see? I got some street-sense in me, after all, so I know these things.

"Anyway, I don't get much of a response, and I try to get a look at her eyes under her hood, see? And uh... I might have been a bit rough, there, yeah, but you need to get a hold of the eye color for a proper ID. Race, fur color, gender, stature, and eye color are the main things for a good identification, y'see? Gotta have all of 'em to be sure.

"Well, then, she freaks out a bit, and straight barfs on the ground, right in front of me! It's mostly bile, so I can tell she hasn't eaten in a while. I walk around the puddle, tryin' to figure out what's goin' on, and take down her hood. She's got this huge, and I mean huge, straight gargantuan, swollen bump on her head. I take her home, to my place—a room in Miss Bee House's Home for the Busy and the Luckless. We get there a bit past eight, I think. Anyhow, she's gone and passed out by the time I get her home, so I tuck her into my couch and do my best to take care of the wound on 'er head. I cleaned it up real good, turns out there was a blood blister underneath the skin or something, too, 'cause when I was cleanin' it popped! Real messy, lemme tell yah.

Anyway, I did my best to keep quiet: I figured she was runnin' from somethin' earlier, see? And the Guard wouldn't bean someone like that, so I figured she was on the run from somebody real nasty, and wanted to stay low, just in case.

"Anyhow, one o' my buddies shows up pretty much right at noon, by the name of High Stakes. He shows up, sees me tendin' to your—er, her wound, and he freaks out. He thinks that I was the one who beaned yah, so I meet him at the door to keep him from freakin' out. I eventually calm 'im down, but he goes out to work and says he's gonna get the guard if he thinks things are still fishy when he gets back. Anyways, the unicorn wakes up right when he leaves, we talk and she introduces herself as Twilight Sparkle. She's suspicious of me, too, but after talkin' some, she comes to trust me to some degree. Anyways, we talk, and she forgets my name as we're talkin'. In fact, she forgets the first part of our conversation. We dig through her stuff, and she finds a paper that's a note to herself, tellin' her she has some kinda amnesia. Then she tells me to make this testimony. That's what happened, one-hundred-percent."

Chapter 5

I breathed in deeply, then let out the air as a deep sigh, eyes boring straight holes into the ceiling. I had become mesmerized by the sound of the rain, hadn't I? The individual drips all being drowned out by the greater whole of the downpour, just like anything in life. Just like everything in life, perhaps. I glanced around, shifting about on a tough wooden stool, looking for a window. This wasn't my house! But somewhere in me, I already knew that. As I found the window, my eyes were turned away by a paper pinned to the shut curtains: "DON'T OPEN THE CURTAINS. STAY AT THE TABLE. —Twilight."

I looked at the table in question. A number of papers were organized on the table, connected by strings of yarn in a very logical and appealing fashion. I followed the pink threads towards the top, which lead to a piece of paper, torn from a notebook.

Twilight: You have anterograde amnesia due to cranial trauma. Stay calm, you need to figure this out. I've laid down all the evidence. Make connections where possible. Do not use magic. You have a friend, Bigs. He's going to try and get in contact with our other friends. Until then, work out what you can.

—Twilight.

I nodded sagely, agreeing with my past self. I decided to survey the rest of the table before getting started with the evidence, though. Excluding the tightly-wound pinkish ball where the yarn seemed to have been drawn from and a hoof-operated cutter, there wasn't much else in front of me. All there was to be found was one other solitary paper, disconnected from the yarn, a mirror, and a crumbly blueberry muffin, partially eaten. I contemplated taking a bite, but judged that my stomach was feeling too ill to handle anything at that moment. The other paper was a different reminder.

Twilight: You'll probably read this before delving into the main evidence, so I'll put the reminders for stuff we should occasionally do or eventually do here. That way, they won't distract from our main work, but still get done.

Twilight: Remember to check your bandages with the mirror from time to time. Don't use magic. Just lift up the mirror and check behind your horn. If there's blood, put a reminder here to tell Bigs.

Twilight: Tell Bigs to change the bandages when he gets back.

Twilight: You need to translate the Equestrian Binary on the Hospital Report. I barely remembered this paper by the time I got done reading it, it needs to be transcribed to Twenty-Four Character to make it manageable.

Twilight: Seriously, if you're reading this, go transcribe the Hospital Report now.

Twilight: How depressing is it that I can procrastinate with amnesia? Honestly. Twilight, do the report next time you go through.

Twilight: I transcribed the Hospital Report into Twenty-Four Character Equestrian. Twilight, since you won't remember, I'm just going to remind you that it was really aggravating, and all the other Past Twilights should be chastised for their laziness and inability to commit to a task.

Twilight: There probably aren't any irregular reminders to do anymore. I'm going to leave this up here in case I figure out something else I should put down here, but you probably should put this paper back into the Mystery Bag, it's most likely to waste your time as you try and read the crossed-out stuff.

I grumbled. It had been a waste of my time. I tore off everything below my reminder to tell Bigs about my bandages, and then swept it off the table.

I ran over the preliminary message again, just to keep the memory fresh in my mind, and followed the first yarn down. It led to a raggedy sheet of papyrus which bore similar warnings to the prior. It was however, clearly older, and torn from the center down to the bottom edge. Two more pieces of yarn strung off from it. One led to a pair of pages labeled as the testimony of Bigs, which I quickly read through. The other led to a stack of paper covered in lines and dots—Equestrian Binary. I grumbled, not so much at the absurd and obtuse system of written language, but more so at the system which required it to be used in all official government documents. A hoofwritten transcription followed it, though, which was more than a little fortunate. I read through the transcription, which had converted over half a dozen pages of binary value into almost exactly a single page of Twenty-Four Character Equestrian.

Ponyville General Hospital,
Juniper Fifth, 3 5A
Tender-Heart

The patient, a light-purple unicorn with a dark-purple and magenta mane, entered the hospital sporting a significant head injury and a piece of papyrus impaled on her horn at 6h23. The patient identified herself as Twilight Sparkle, and requested "immediate examination." We promptly brought her into the examination room to assess her injury. Several minutes of observation confirmed her self-diagnosis of anterograde amnesia—Miss Sparkle was consistently incapable of remembering any event occurring more than eight minutes previous, and frequently forgot more recent events as well. Given her report of the night before, it is probable that some amount of retrograde amnesia is also present, as she cannot remember acquiring her wound. The retrograde amnesia is a limited factor, however, and not a significant worry of its own merit.

What raised the most concern is her head injury. Any blunt-force trauma that causes bleeding is always a reason for concern, however, careful analysis shows that she has suffered no noticeable damage to her skull. This particular wound is concerning not due to its magnitude, but instead due to its location. Since the impact was on the top of the patient's head, behind her casting horn, damage to her arcane functions was expected. An Arcane Resonance Scan confirmed our fears. Fortunately for our patient, she seems to have escaped any damage to the casting horn, but her arcanokeratin mass has suffered extreme cracking. Any attempts that she makes to use active magic may very well cause sparking below the flesh, within the arcanokeratin mass. This would severely exacerbate her condition, and attempts at sustained casting could worsen the damage to the arcanokeratin mass. In a worst-case scenario, active magic use could lead to an exponential buildup of heat from the cracked mass, to potentially fatal levels. Even in best-case scenarios, any sustained use of active magic would give her a dangerously high fever and a powerful migraine. When compounded with her amnesia the problem becomes worse still, as we cannot forbid her from casting when she won't be able to recall any instructions given to her.

Fortunately, the situation was handily remedied. A friend of the patient arrived, looking for her. After an explanation of the situation, the friend in question assured us that Twilight would not leave her sight, and magic would be strictly prohibited. As an emergency precaution, we gave the patient a passive magic injection, via charged crystalline fragment in a saline drip. Her medical history suggests that she responds better than most unicorns to charged crystalline, and it should accelerate the repair of her arcanokeratin mass as well as to help prevent her from doing permanent damage to herself.

The patient was discharged at 7h05, and requested a copy of the medical report transcript. Her friend has been given instructions to repeatedly give her the following instructions: head straight home, avoid using active magic at all cost, get plenty of rest and sustenance, and avoid all risky behavior.

I reflected over the medical report, grimacing. Not only had the contents of the reports concerned me, but the fact that it was my last piece of evidence troubled me. As a general rule, I disliked puzzles that didn't have all of their pieces. Had I forgotten something crucial? Or perhaps, did I just not have enough to work with? I identified the paper the transcription was written on as notebook paper, from my personal notebook. Good paper was expensive, but it was worth the cost, in my opinion. It was certainly paying off as I used its presence to discern that my notebook was nearby. A quick search found it underneath the table, along with with my lime-green mystery bag. I retrieved it, then turned to the first page, uncapped the writing pen tucked into its spirals, and began to write out my thoughts.

My Postulations Regarding Juniper Fifth:
Time Written: Sometime after noon.
Location: Canterlot, Equestria, Bigs' Room

I suppose I should write this down colloquially, in stream-of-consciousness style. Not a word I think should escape my pen, for the betterment of my own future knowledge. Any discoveries I make are useless if they aren't written down, after all.

I know that I have been to my library. The calligraphic style on the papyrus found in my mystery bag shows me that I was using a quill rather than my pen, which implies that I was in my library. The papyrus itself is telling of my location, as it is identical to the papyrus which I stock there. This makes for a clean-cut conclusion only I (or a close friend) could make.

I know that I have been to the Ponyville General Hospital. A hospital form could only have been retrieved from a hospital. Furthermore, it is on government-issued and sealed paper, written in Equestrian Binary.

I know that when I went to the hospital, it was 6h23, due to the contents of the hospital report.

I know that I went to the hospital from my house, from the contents of the papyrus.

From this I can extrapolate that I was at my house at around 6h00. It's approximately a twenty-minute walk to the hospital, and while my injury might have slowed me some, it is doubtful that I would take much longer than twenty minutes.

I traveled to Canterlot from Ponyville. I know this because I was in Ponyville, but now I am in Canterlot.

I had arrived in Canterlot before 8h00.

I probably took the train. I was found near the Canterlot Royal Train Station, and it is the most logical way in which I might travel from Ponyville to Canterlot is less than an hour.

I have been collecting evidence while suffering anterograde amnesia. Objects to demonstrate my location and status have been carried with me.

According to my previous thread of logic, I should have the ticket stub from the train ride to Canterlot. It is a key piece of evidence that shows my time, location, and activity, all at once.

I capped my pen happily. Writing down what I had to think invariably made me smile, and hum a little. It was liberating, in many ways. That someone later could read what you had written, and perhaps pick up where you had left off was inspiring in its own way. I looked around me, searching for the ticket stub. It wasn't on the table, but the lime-green mystery bag beckoned to me from under the table. I slid my stool along the side of the table so that I could properly search my bag while not disturbing the evidence, and brought the bag onto the table gently.

"Ticket stub," I thought aloud, repeating the word to myself over and over again so that I would not forget it. "Ticket stub, ticket stub, ticket stub, ticket stub."

I searched my bag relentlessly, every pocket opening and yielding its secrets. I thought about the ticket stub until it was my only remaining thought. My results though, were not promising. My search yielded two clumps of pocket lint, a really long black thread, and a sore throat that was still muttering "ticket stub" in between accidental mutterings of "pocket lint" as I gave up my search. I looked to the pile of papers, and scooted the stool over towards them, catching up on what had been written.

After I had swiftly read through what little evidence there was, I shook my head. I had taken far longer than I expected looking for my ticket stub, so long that I had forgotten much of the evidence, yet I still had nothing to show for it. I sat with my hooves supporting my head, thinking of what to do from where I left off. Eventually, I decided it would be better to let my thoughts flow to paper, and see where I went from there.

Despite what could only have been an intensive search, I do not have a ticket stub.

Regardless, I should have a ticket stub.

Three conclusions might be drawn from this contradiction. The first is that I might have lost the ticket stub. I tend towards organization, making this less likely, but under these extraneous circumstances, it is far from impossible. Another conclusion might be that I did not take the train. I might have been taken to Canterlot by flying chariot or an immensely powerful teleportation spell. The only other conclusion that I might come to is that the ticket stub was taken—stolen by a third party.

I shuddered. A less than pleasant line of thought... but perhaps it had merit. I continued writing, postulating, and hypothesizing. The more I wrote, though, the more I became convinced of one central fact. Evidence that I should have had was missing. A quote from a book on investigative theory that I had recently been reading came to mind.

"At times, a lack of evidence can be turned into a piece of evidence in it's own." (Keen Eye 994 4A, 93).

Author's Note

To those who might inquire as to what Equestrian Binary is, it is an alternate alphabet for the Equestrian language that requires only two characters (as opposed to the 24-letter script that Equestrian traditionally uses). The reason for the existence of this language is that typewriters built for pegasi and earth ponies have only two keys.

Most pegasi and earth ponies, however, prefer to use their mouths to write with quills rather than having to type

"010001000110010101100001011100100010000001101101011011110110110100101100" to start off letters to their mother,

"01010111011001010010000001110010011000010110111000100000011011110111010101110100001000000110111101100110001000000111001101110100011100100110100101101110011001110010000001100011011010000110010101100101011100110110010100101110"

to tell her that they've run out of string cheese,

"0101000001101100011001010110000101110011011001010010000001100010011101010111100100100000011100110110111101101101011001010010000001101101011011110111001001100101001000000110111101101110001000000111100101101111011101010111001000100000011101110110000101111001001000000110100001101111011011010110010100100000011001100111001001101111011011010010000001000011011000010110111001110100011001010111001001101100011011110111010000101110"

to tell her that she should buy some more on her way home from Canterlot, and so on.

Most ponies still have not learned Equestrian Binary, and are content being ignorant.

Chapter 6

"Twilight?"

An elegant feminine voice tickled my eardrums as a hoof prodded at the upper part of my left front leg. I gave a tremendous yawn, arching my back as I rose from my contorted position—partway on a table, partway on the floor. I stood up straight, all four hooves eventually finding their way to the ground, and faced the direction of the voice. A snow-white unicorn with a royal purple mane stood in front of me, a concerned expression on her face and a pale yellow vest adorning her front. Drowsy as I was, I could never mistake my dear friend for any other pony.

"...Rarity? What are you doing here?"

"Honestly, darling," Rarity said, adopting a weak smile. "I could have asked the same of you. I'm just glad that you are alright."

I looked about my surroundings after realizing that I was not, in fact, in my home. It was a fairly bare room that I was in, all things considered. A single couch with one headrest was on one end of the room, a pair of curtains above demonstrating the existence of a window. In the opposite direction, there was the table that I had fallen asleep on, and past that a closed door with a peephole in it. The peephole, though, was currently plugged by a cork that was attached to the door with a bit of dirty string. A partially-ajar door on the other end of Rarity most probably led to the rest of the house. The only interesting feature of the home was paper—there were scraps of paper everywhere. Pinned to the curtains, all over the table, on both of the doors, notebook paper was attached to nearly every key feature in the room.

"Actually, Rarity... What are we doing here? Where are we?" I reached a hoof back to itch at the back of my head in thought, but instead found a cloth wrapping. I followed it down to my chin, and up again to the side of my head, finding that almost half of my head had been wrapped in cloth. I added a followup question, asking, "And what's this on my head?"

Rarity opened her mouth to answer, but was interrupted by the door behind her. A massive stallion carrying a bucket of water by one hoof swung it open. He eyed me, then turned to Rarity.

"You got 'er up?" he asked. Rarity looked back with no small amount of distrust in her eyes.

"That should be self-evident at this point."

"Good," the stallion nodded, either ignoring or oblivious to Rarity's disdain. "I brought a rag and some water, so we can change the bandages."

The bucket shimmered a light blue as Rarity snatched the bucket with her magic, spilling a bit of water on the dusty wooden floor as the bucket's contents sloshed back and forth before it settled on the floor.

"You mean, so that I can change the bandages. I'll start cleaning, and you will get the new bandages." Rarity huffed. "Unless you planned on re-using the ones that she's wearing."

The stallion nodded with a slight cough from the back of his throat, and then quickly trotted back into the door from which he came. I reflected on that exchange. Fortunately, it did answer my most recent question, by affirming that the things on my head were bandages. Unfortunately, it did little else to reveal the nature of my current situation, and raised a more ominous question. Namely, why did I have bandages on my head?

"Rarity," I asked, "What's going on?"

"Not right now, Twilight." she said, furrowing her brow in concentration as she levitated a rag from the bucket and wrung it clean. "First things first."

"Rarity, what is going on?" Rarity ignored my plea at first, the aura around her horn growing more intense as cloth bandages peeled loose from my head. As they were set down on the table, I noticed the self-similar spots of dark red on every layer of the otherwise pristine white fabric. It did more than a little to unsettle my already uncertain disposition, and Rarity's response didn't do much to help, either.

"Give me a second, darling."

Rarity seemed too focused on getting that wet rag up to my face to care about my protests. I was far too uncomfortable with my lack of knowledge about the situation to sit with my questions unanswered, though.

"Rarity, just explain to me what's going on, please!"

Rarity paused, and turned her head to the side as she furrowed her brow further. "You know," she said, "I would, truly. If only I knew..."

I reached up a hoof to push the rag out of our way, so that I could properly look Rarity in the eye. She looked at me for a while, gave a sharp exhalation, and dropped the brown fabric into bucket.

"Alright, Rarity. Enough ambiguity. If you can't tell me what's going on, tell me what you know." I spoke quickly, knowing that it wouldn't be long before Rarity took up her original mission of cleaning whatever wound I had on my head.

"Very well. Long story short? I was looking for you all morning, darling! You do remember our appointment, don't you?"

I nodded, seeing as we did have an appointment planned for ten o' clock tomorrow... or, since it was light out, would that be ten o' clock today? In any case, that seemed to satisfy her, so she continued. "In any case, I could not find hide nor hair of you anywhere in town! I asked around, and simply nopony had seen you! Disastrous! And I knew that you were no pony to simply miss an appointment. It would drive you mad! But then, a delivery pony spots me, and gives me a telegram from you! But then—"

"But then I was there, an' you didn't know what to think." The stallion from before re-entered the room, ducking under the door's frame to properly fit into the room. He had a large red medical bag around his neck, hanging down in front of his chest. "Look lady, I know you're in a tizzy, but you best save your story for later. She'll have you tell it again later, anyway. To write it down, see? So let's take this slow."

Rarity thought for a moment, and then turned towards the stallion. Her horn shone as the medical bag floated off from around his chest, and was deposited next to the bucket. I felt a tension rise in the room as Rarity's eyes began to bore holes into his block-like head, her glare seeming to shrink the massive stallion to a foal as he quailed before the baleful vision of my ivory ally. Rarity's voice came out quiet, but I held no doubt as to whether or not the stallion could hear what she had to say.

"Mr... Bigs, is it? I have been looking for Twilight for four hours. Four. Hours. I find her in a back alley boarding house in a completely different city. You just talked over me when I was talking to Twilight Sparkle, my long time friend, and may I remind you, the mare I have been looking for over a period of four hours. You, as the one who brought me here, you, as the one who lives in this suite, and you as the only pony I could possibly imagine as the culprit of all this mess... You are in no place to interrupt me. Do. You. Understand?"

"Bigs" was nodding so fast, I might have sworn he was a life-size bobble-head doll. I pitied the poor stallion—never before had I seen Rarity so angry, not even when Pinkie tried to roast marshmallows using a pair of her scissors. As she turned back towards me, though, Bigs cleared his throat. I winced as Rarity's head pivoted back towards him almost instantaneously.

"...What?" Rarity's steel-cold whisper sent visible tremors through Bigs' knees.

"I um... see I was just thinking that Twilight wrote... uh... all these notes to herself..." Bigs' voice started quiet, but rose slowly as confidence waxed. "Yeah! She should prolly, read them, y'know? She's smart, right? So she uh, she probably wrote something to herself about her amnesia, see?"

Rarity harrumphed, and Bigs deflated as he prepared for what most certainly would have been another browbeating had I not chosen to intervene.

"Rarity," I began, gears in my head turning. "I don't know what's going on here. At this point, I'm prepared to listen to anyone's advice—my own sounding particularly solid. So let me ask a few questions, and let me get a few answers, okay?"

Rarity looked at me, sighed, and then nodded. "I do suppose I'm getting a bit hasty, wouldn't you?"

I silently agreed before turning to the remaining occupant of the room. "I have a gap in my memory, and you said something regarding amnesia. Mr... Bigs? Did I hear Rarity call you that?" He swallowed, and then nodded. "Could you tell me what you know about my amnesia?"

"Well uh, you said somethin' about having A-somethin' Amnesia, and you kept forgetting things I told you. You started to write everything down, see?" Bigs pointed towards the papers on the table. "That's probably all your notes an' such."

"A-something?" I thought out loud. "Did I say... anterograde?"

While Bigs mulled about uncertainly, probably eventually giving me an affirmative answer to that question, I peered over the paper about the table, which had been strung together by bits of yarn. The very first paper warned me that I had anterograde amnesia, and should not use my magic. I waved Bigs silent with my hoof before reading through the notes. Two particular sheets of paper waited at the bottom, the first with extra-large text announcing its importance.

QUESTIONS SHEET: TWILIGHT, YOU NEED MORE INFORMATION, ASK THESE QUESTIONS
WRITE EVERYTHING DOWN

I winced at the obvious over-use of ink, but the importance of the paper was established well enough, so I supposed that it was not in vain. I lowered my examination to the following page, and began to read through a list of questions and missing information.

Bigs should bring a friend. Ask them to give testimony as to everything that happened since last night.

I looked up from my list. Bigs was sitting on the couch, head laying on the headrest as he gazed at the wall without much expression. Rarity was standing in the corner, near the door with the peep-hole in it—presumably the front door. She was glaring at Bigs when I raised my eyes from the paper, but upon noticing my movement, her attention was immediately redirected to me.

"Rarity—"

"Oh, no, no you don't!" Rarity interrupted, walking towards me swiftly with her horn aglow. "Now that you are finished, I will not let you say a word until I get you clean!"

"Ow—Ra—Oww!" As I attempted to lodge further protest, I was accosted by a flying rag, which caused a stinging pain as it landed on the top of my head. It was the best I could do to have Rarity slow down and give me her testimony while she meticulously re-bandaged my head.

Chapter 7 — The Testimony of Rarity

From Twilight Sparkle's Notebook:

The following is a statement of the truth as one Rarity saw it the night of the Fourth of Juniper and and the following day of the Fifth of Juniper, Third Year of Equestria's Fifth Recorded Age.

"Last night, Twilight Sparkle and I met at around half past eight, Juniper Fourth, in my businessplace and home, Carousel Boutique. As Twilight Sparkle does, the meeting's objective was to arrange a different meeting, at ten in the morning the following day—Twilight had requested some clothes from me, and we were arranging a time where she could try them on. She wanted to try them on somewhere less public, and more private—and, seeing as Spike would be out on his educational camp until the eighth, Twilight considered it a fine time to do so. The meeting ended from a business standpoint shortly before around eight forty-five, but Twilight stayed to talk until nearly ten. At that point she left for the east, I assume towards her home, which was slightly upwards of a five minute walk. Normally, I would escort her home as a good lady should do, but I had pressing matters to attend to.

"Which is to say that I had some sketches to draft.

"And some orders to fill, yes. I had some clothes that I felt I should get started on.

"Alright, fine. I still had some deadlines to fulfill. Which I had in my book for several weeks. And were due to be done at ten o' clock the following day.

"Don't you glare at me like that!

"In any case, I was up until midnight working on those orders, at which point Pinkie Pie stopped over due to an... unfortunate Pinkie Promise I had made. The promise in question was... well, just something Pinkie was doing to help regulate me. In any case, I had to turn in for the night, but I woke up sometime around six to finish working on the orders I had been working on last night.

"I finished those orders, and showed up fashionably late to the library, knocking on the door shortly before the quarter-after-ten bell rung. I waited outside the library for several minutes before letting myself in, calling for Twilight. She wasn't there! The library's lobby was exceptionally clean, but upon climbing the stairs, I uncovered an absolute mess on the second floor! Now, I knew that Twilight Sparkle tended to let go a bit when Spike was gone, but what I saw seemed unheard of! There were papers scattered everywhere, and half the books were off of their shelves! Several searches of the house found no sign of Twilight, so I stowed the br— I stowed the clothing in one of Twilight's armoires, up in her room, then set out to look for her.

"Twilight isn't the type to go off schedule at any time, so I really was at a loss. I stopped by the Sugarcube Corner, my boutique, the spa, anywhere that she might have misunderstood us meeting or where she would usually be. I was actually heading towards Sweet Apple Acres, on the vague hope that I might find her there, when I was stopped by a messenger pony. The courier asked slowly (but politely!) if I was familiar with anypony named 'Twilight.' I told him that I did, and he presently produced a letter. A telegram of some variety, actually—In fact, I still have it with me! Allow me to read it for you."

Equestrian Royal Mail Service..........Twelve Hundred Years Serving Our Diarchy!
Long-Form Telegram from Canterlot Royal Post Office to Ponyville Delivery Service.
Juniper Fifth, 2 5A

DELIVER TO PONYVILLE ASAP STOP
DELIVER TO FIRST TO FIT ONE OF FOLLOWING DESCRIPTIONS STOP
WHITE COAT PURPLE MANED UNICORN NAMED RARITY STOP
ORANGE COAT TAN MANED EARTH PONY NAMED APPLEJACK STOP
LIGHT BLUE COAT RAINBOW MANED PEGASUS NAMED RAINBOW DASH STOP
MESSAGE READS STOP
COME TO CANTERLOT QUICKLY STOP
SITUATION URGENT STOP
TWILIGHT

"Obviously, I went directly to the train station after receiving this message. I had been looking for Twilight, and there it was! A telegram from Twilight Sparkle. I took the 1h05 train to Canterlot, which arrived right on schedule at 1h37. When I arrived, though, I was not met by Twilight Sparkle. I wandered around the train station for a while, and was eventually approached by a pony of the most uncouth sort.

"The stallion walked up to me. He smelt like he hadn't taken a bath in weeks, but he caught my attention by asking if I knew Twilight Sparkle. I told him that I indeed did, and after referring to a note he was holding, he asked if my name was Rarity. I told him yes to that, as well.

"Then I asked him 'How do you know my name?'

"He said, 'Twilight asked me to look for you. She's in trouble, and she wanted a friend.' Or something to that effect.

"He told me to call him "Bigs," and he escorted me through some most perturbing back alleys—uck, I think I saw vomit in at least one of them—to a door guarded by an irritatingly loud mare. She let us in, and he took me to his room. I had grown suspicious of him before that point, but I don't know if my suspicion waxed or waned upon finding Twilight, asleep on a table strewn with paper."

Chapter 8

Revised Question Sheet: Some questions have revised priority. Please ask the following questions.

—Twilight

I looked up from my newly-finished work. Rarity was tugging at something on my head—I looked over my notes, checking to make sure I had something on that. A bandage, she was tightening a bandage. I quickly checked my reference card.

Twilight, you need to record the answers to all of our questions. Please ask the questions on our question sheet, and check them after they are answered. If you check them beforehand, there's a chance you'll be interrupted while the question is being asked. All of these questions should be asked, as they are all relevant. Trust me, you'll tie it together later.

Also, DO NOT USE MAGIC.

—Yourself

First things first. I had to make sure I hadn't asked any questions that weren't on my sheet.

"Rarity, have I asked any questions yet?"

"Hush, darling. Really, we need to get you to the hospital."

There was something about the hospital in my notes—I shuffled the pages about to find the transcribed copy of the hospital report.

"No, Rarity, I've already been to the hospital. My report says that I just need rest, and can't use magic."

Rarity stopped tugging at my bandage. A hairbrush retrieved from... somewhere. I wasn't watching, but apparently she had one. I winced as she dug into my tangled mane.

"Rarity?"

"I just don't know about this whole situation, Twilight... really, it's out of my league. I'd truly prefer to just go home. You really do need your rest, too..." she sighed, clearly distracted about something. I scribbled that down in my notes—clearly, she had something on her mind.

"We can go home after I figure this out. Or perhaps, while we're figuring this out. We're going to need to go back to Ponyville: that much is obvious. The crime scene is there, after all."

The hairbrush Rarity was using dropped as it deflected oddly off of a tangle. She cleared her throat, and picked it back up again.

"Crime scene, darling? Surely it would be more reasonable to presume that the bump on your head was the result of an accident, wouldn't you?" I tried to shake my head in response to her question, but I couldn't while Rarity had it held in place to brush me. I could tell that Rarity was trying her best to straighten my mane as she talked—a feat not made easy with the bandages on my head, but I was sure that she was trying her best.

"I don't think so," I replied after giving up on body language. "I know I've been at the library after getting my amnesia, because I have library parchment with me. However, I don't have much else, which tells me that I've either lost evidence of where I've been, or I've been robbed of that evidence."

"Did you ever suppose that you never had that 'evidence' in the first place?" asked Rarity, muttering as she worked over the treacherous tangle that had stolen the hairbrush earlier.

"That's possible..." I admitted. "It's possible, but I don't think that it is the case. I organize things. That's not so much a tendency as it is a fact. I don't think that I'd lose track of a habit like that so easily."

Rarity took a long pause before responding. "I suppose you are right. So then... you suspect Bigs?"

"Bigs?" I asked, the name foreign to me. I referred quickly to my notes—Mr. Big Trouble, "Bigs," a very large Earth Pony (seriously, taller than Big Mac). Ashen grey. Light blue eyes. Cutie mark is a graphic of an explosion, with heavy stylization. Status: minor suspect. Investigate potential motive. Possesses means (sufficient height and strength) and potentially opportunity. Remember, no magic.

I opened my mouth to answer but was interrupted by the stallion in question, who stumbled out of the room adjacent with an awful smell in his company. He held a thick bottle of something in one hoof as he staggered over to the table, and answered Rarity's question for her.

"NO! No, of courshe she doeshn't shush... shish... think it wasche me." He breathed heavily, and an unforgettable scent of a particular liquor wafted across the table. "Sh...shorry for the shmell, ladiesh... it'sh... it'sh all the Tounge-Twishter, shee? Had to shteel my... shteel me... bolshter my conshtitushun."

Tongue-Twister was a type of booze that had just recently become popular, over the last decade or so. It was about as alcoholic as milk and cookies, but instead used a weak enchantment to bring a state of enhanced inebriation to the drinker. While traditional drunkards regarded it as the fare of a pony without the drive to get properly drunk, it rose to common use due to its ease of production, overall low price, highly temporary effects, and comparative healthiness to traditional drink.

"Want shome?" Resting his head on the table with a loud thud, Bigs pushed the bottle towards me. "It'sh shrawberry... shtraw-berry tashte."

After a few seconds of awkward silence, Rarity coughed politely, setting the hairbrush down on the table as she grabbed up the Tongue-Twister instead. "I think that's quite enough of that, don't you?"

"Aw, come on!" Bigs complained, sliding upwards from the table to reach at the bottle that Rarity trotted past him with. "It'sh not shrong! 'Ihsh three er fourish minutesh, ushally... try shome!"

Rarity cocked an eyebrow at him. "You would expect me to drink from the bottle, wouldn't you?"

"Rarity..." I complained. "Now is hardly the time to get drunk."

"I knew that, Twilight!" Rarity said, huffing. "I was just... I was just taking it back to the kitchen! That's all."

I sighed, rubbing at my forehead.

"Have I asked any questions yet?" I asked, glancing over my notes.

"NOOOOOoshurey... no queshtuns!" Bigs grinned, then hiccuped. Rarity clamped her mouth shout, stifling whatever answer she had for me.

"As it so happens, my first questions are for you, Bigs. Mind me asking them after you sober up?"

"Shurrrr... yeah, shure, give me a few minutesh..." He hiccuped again, then grimaced. "Might ash well shtart now. Hiccupsh mean I'm shtartin' to shore up."

"I'll just... deliver this beverage to its point of origin." Rarity said, balancing on the threshold to the next room. I waved her on before she gingerly crossed through the portal.

"Now..." I coughed, uncapping my pen. "Bigs. I have a several questions for you. I'd appreciate your general cooperation as I proceed down my list. Let's start with when you were getting 'my ID' as you testified earlier. You mentioned five things for identifying a pony: race, fur color, gender, stature, and eye color. Is that correct?"

"Ol' Arr-eff-shee gee-seck, that'sh right," Bigs affirmed slurring together the letters of the acronym. I uncapped my pen and started writing. "It'sh the sh- the shtandard method of identificashun the Guard ushes, you know?"

"RFC-GSEC? Do you know about that because of your reported interest of the guard?"

"Yess ma-am, I sure do." Bigs said, his eye screwing up as came under the attack of another hiccup.

"Is this how you learned your method of identification?"

"Yes to that, alsho."

"Why did you not include my cutie mark in your identification process?"

Bigs tapped his hooves together, counting under his breath. "Sh'not on the list."

A silent thrill of triumph leaped through my veins. Any real member of the Guard would know all the reasons that the RFC-GSEC protocol was drafted into use for—or at least that it was to prevent discrimination based on the cutie mark itself. I went for the kill. "You aren't affiliated with the Guard, are you?"

"No, ma'am." Bigs swung his head side to side, then hiccuped.

I paused for a second. I should have seen that coming—interest in the Guard didn't necessarily mean he was implying Guard affiliation. And on contemplation, if I didn't write anything about his claiming or implying Guard affiliation, he probably didn't ever do it. Probably. In either case, I kept my questions rolling.

"My next questions are particularly regarding your actions when I sent you to look for my friends. I gave you a description of all the friends who I knew where available today, and sent you to Ponyville to fetch them. However, Rarity testified that you never went to Ponyville. Is this true?"

"Yes."

"That you instead sent a letter?"

"Yep."

"Why did you choose to do that, rather than take the train?"

Bigs grimaced. "I, uh, I couldn't afford it, see?"

I raised an eyebrow. "Why didn't you tell me that you couldn't afford it?"

"Cuz I uh... damn. Cuz I was afraid of yah askin' why, miss."

"...Mind sharing why you were afraid, Mr. Big Trouble?"

"Mind?" Despite being nearly a full pony taller than me, Bigs managed to look up at me with piteous eyes. "Yeah, lady, I'd mind, but I prefer it to gettin' in trouble. Ask away, if it makes yah feel better."

It was disturbing that such a massive, gruff, slovenly pony could make me feel such guilt. I felt as if I were taking candy from a tiny, grade-school colt. Those eyes were not the eyes of a criminal—but that didn't exclude Big Trouble from the list of suspects. Criminals have ways of stealing new eyes if their old ones aren't innocent enough. "Yes, Mr. Trouble. The full story."

He groaned. "Well, sh'not much to tell. See, it starts with a mare, a tiny and sweet-soundin' unicorn mare, not unlike yourself. She stole my heart, you see, made away with it like a thief. Her fur was a light pink, like the petals of some flowers... or like blood, spilled in the snow. Feh. Shoulda took that as a warnin' rather than a blessing, see? She had her hooves wrapped in my mane like the wires of a puppeteer's dolls, an' took over my life. I lost my friends, my family. I couldn' see nothin' but her. Holidays were for buyin' her gifts. Weekends were for makin' dinner, buyin' gifts, an' makin' love. I can't believe I ever wanted that mare—I first wanted to join the Guard so tha' I could pay for her desires, y'know. But after a couple weeks in the Guard Academy, I noticed something. We were learnin' 'bout domestic violence an' abuse, when somethin' struck me, you follow? I realized how she'd taken over my life. So I decided to end it, 'fore it got worse. Well, she went straigh' to the Guard, and told 'em... she told 'em that I tried to take advantage of her, y'see? I didn't do so good in court... couldn't hire a lawyer, see? An' the public defenders were stretched tight, so when I got representation, it weren't even a real lawyer. She was a paralegal. An intern.

"Miss Blues was a real true soul though, she followed the spirit of the law even if she didn't know all the letters. We got a poundin' from the prosecution, and my reputation was mos'ly ruined, but I had some good references from my instructors in the Guard, and I go' away with a 'probative sentence.' It means tha' the Guard's gotta stay in touch with me, an' it's a temporary criminal sentence. Unfortunately, I can't go back to the Guard, or even go back t' the Academy 'till my sentence is up." Bigs finished his story with a great, heaving sigh, settling his head down on the table. "'M gonna starve, first, though. 'd like that Tongue Twister back, once we finish this questioning business."

"That's quite the story, Mr. Trouble." I said after I had finished writing down my story. I wasn't writing as fast as usual—checking back on my old notes from time to time to keep myself to speed with the situation took time. "And you'll stand by it?"

He grunted. "Me an' anypony else you'd care to ask. I hear too bleedin' much about it."

"Could I get the name of this mare? The..." I quickly checked my notes. "The pink one?"

"Allurin' Beauty was her name. She'll also probably respond to 'Fucking Bitch.'"

I leered briefly at Bigs, but decided that if his story was correct, his use of language was justified. I moved on to the final question for Bigs on my checklist. "For completeness' sake... did you take the train at any point this morning?"

Bigs shook his head. "I did leave to help out the Guard at the train station. I sneak by the Guards posted for me at the front by having Miss House let me in and out through the side door. 'm pretty sure the Guards know, though, since I go to do grunt work for the Guards by the station. There're Guards posted by the trains, so they'd know if I tried to leave Canterlot unsupervised."

I etched yet another check mark into my list of questions. The penultimate check mark, I noted; the only remaining question was a final one for Rarity. I nodded to Big Trouble. "Thanks for your help, Bigs. You've done a lot to help me revise my list of suspects."

He groaned. "Ya do suspect me, don't you? Damnit."

"I did suspect you, Mr. Trouble," I corrected, "Did, as in, past-tense. Your story is easily verified, and should it check out, there's no way that you could have given me this lump on my head."

"'Course I couldn't have! I found ya, helped your head, see? Doesn't that exclude me from the list?"

"No..." I frowned, memory of the questioning already fading. I clung to it by re-reading the events. "No, there are plenty of reasons less savory than first aid for you to have kept me in your room after attacking me."

"But I didn't attack you! And... an' are you implying what I think you are?" Bigs exclaimed, both exasperated and insulted.

"Hypothetically, I mean. However, we know that you couldn't have, since you have no motive, nor any opportunity to attack me. In order to identify a criminal, you need to prove that they had the motivation, the ability, and the opportunity to commit the crime, as well as evidence to support the claim. Just about anypony has the means to have hit me on the head—but you bear no animosity towards me, and you'd have to notify the Guard yourself before even going to Ponyville to attack me. Really, it's ridiculous to think you could be the criminal."

"Huh." Bigs said, slumping back onto the table in a satisfied manner. "Thats, uh, yeah. That's good t' hear. So uh... who do you suspect?"

I had to check my notes for that, but thankfully found that my list was a short one. "Just two ponies, actually. One being the 'Alluring Beauty' mare who you mentioned, and the other being the pony who took me from the hospital. The former definitely has motive, in shaming you, while the latter is the pony who was nearest to the scene of the crime, as it were. I should also go investigate my library, to see if I can find any leads..."

"Much 's I'd like to burst the bubble of Allurin' Bitchy, she skipped town after the Changeling Invasion. I had pals in the Guard keepin' tabs on her, she hasn't been seen since then."

I scratched an "x" next to Alluring Beauty in my my suspects list. If she wasn't even in Canterlot, it wasn't possible to investigate her, though I couldn't rule her out of suspicion. In the end, everything seemed to boil down to one set of facts. According to the report from the hospital, a friend of mine took me from the hospital. Presumably, I went along willingly. Therefor, the pony who took me from the hospital actually was a friend of mine. And by extension, it seemed likely that the criminal was one and the same—that I had been attacked by one of my friends. I shuffled my two pages of questions from the pile. The first was mostly taken up by already-checked questions, but beginning on the bottom and going on to the next, there was clearly some ways for me to go.

"Bigs, could you call in Rarity?" I asked.

He lifted his head and turned to shout, but before he could do so, a white unicorn leaped from the neighboring room with a bottle hovering by her side. She giggled and hiccuped before saying anything, the scent of her breath filling the room most uncomfortably.

"Yesssss, Twilight, darling? D-d... darling, I'm right here, no need to get this... this... this ruffioso up and about!"

The table rose up to hit my face as the stupidity of the situation overwhelmed me. It then very rapidly retreated as an unspeakable migraine rose from the ashes of whatever head-throbbing I once had. It wasn't the most brilliant of my moments, nor the greatest of Rarity's... but in a way, I was glad that any question less frivolous than "where did you get that Tongue-Twister" would have to wait.

"Come on, Rarity. We need to catch a train home. And... put that bottle down."

"Oh darling, it's empty anyways." Rarity tilted it to her lips, miming drinking from the empty bottle... until she hiccuped mid-sip, spraying enchanted booze all about the air. "Ah... mostly empty, dear. Up and away then! Let's go!"

"Ugh... a drunk and an amnesiac. I'm sure nothing could go wrong with us traveling on our own." I rolled my eyes as I began to gather my notes.

"...Nah, it'll be fine." After brief deliberation, the owner of the gruff voice shifted a hoof to stand up, towering over the room. "I'll come with you, lady. In case you run into whoever did this to yah, see?"

I was tempted to note that adding an unemployed and smelly stallion on probation to the situation didn't necessarily make it more stable, but I chose not to for fear that he would change his mind. Safety in numbers, after all.