New Trottland Yard Case 02 - Silver Cross and the Dancing Demons

Silver Cross

and the Dancing Demons

Chapter 2

I was sitting in my office, about to use the Cross I had obtained in Haunchington in for something it wasn't made for. Moaning in anticipation I pressed the silver cross against the small hole. Squealing in delight, as I took in the smell of the sticky juices that began to come forth. It was almost done...

Then my door slammed open, and the shock made me press down on the cross too hard. Juice splattered everywhere as the cross's amplifying magic activated, and the can of peaches I had tried to pry open the est of the way got crushed. It took me a moment to free my face from the sticky juice with a handkerchief. When I was able to open my eyes again, I was almost muzzle to muzzle with my boss, who was leaning over my desk to get a better glaring position. Some of the sweet sticky juice was drying on his face, and I could tell that he was not happy about that. With a sheepish grin, I hoofed over my handkerchief. He didn't take it.

“I won't even ask what this is all about, since I doubt anypony except an Earthpony could make sense of what you were doing! Now get your sorry plot cleaned up and get upstairs to the briefing room. I got another job for you!”, she growled at me after about a minute of intense glaring. I nodded my agreement, and made my way to the little fillies room. He would most likely do something similar...

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After I had cleaned myself up as good as I could, I found myself in the enormous briefing room for the first time. My boss stood behind a projector, while several other stallions sat around the same table as me. I didn't know any of them, but I felt distinctly uncomfortable. Two of them wore military uniforms...

“Everypony here? Good. Let's begin.”, my boss said in his rough voice, and dimmed the lights with his magic. At the same time the projector came to life, and my boss started to narrate each picture that appeared on the far wall.

“Here you see the remains of Dark Horn Manor. It was were the stallion known as “The Professor” lived for the last ten years. His real name was Blade Spin however, and he never was a real Professor. The national academy of magical research expelled him due to his affinity to dark magic. Agent Silver Cross here was sent to Haunchington to investigate several murder cases, and the disappearance of several corpses.”, he said as the picture of a smoking heap of rubble appeared on the wall.

For a moment, I couldn't believe me ears. Had he just called me “Agent” Silver Cross? Did I miss the memo?

“She discovered that Blade Spin was working on some kind of death magic, that brought back the dead. The only problem with that was that the resurrected Ponies came back as insane killers, that killed everypony they met. Agent Silver Cross here burned the Manor down by accident when she stumbled upon an ancient artifact she found there. Said artifact, known as the “Celestia Cross”, is part of a set of four, that many archaeologists had dubbed a myth.”, he continued and the picture on the wall changed to one of the cross around my neck.

“Our scientists have performed a series of tests on the cross, and it only seems to work for her. When others tried it, it didn't react at all. When wielded by agent Cross however...”, the picture changed to a short film, showing me hitting a training dummy with the cross. The result had been, that the training room now had a new window.

“We also determined, that the cross does not work indefinitely. After about five such strikes, or using it's sunlight enchantment once, it will lay dormant for several days. During that time it is nothing more then a fancy, if pretty much indestructible, trinket. No amount of magical dampening however, has been able to block it's abilities. That's why I have chosen Agent Silver Cross for the mission at hoof. The Professor was her case in the first place, and she does not need to rely on magic to do her job.”, he finished and the lights came back on. As soon as he sat down at the table, I raised a hoof like a schoolfilly.

“Yes, Agent?”, my boss asked a little annoyed.

“Two questions, sir. Since when am I an agent, and what kind of mission are you talking about?”, I asked innocently.

“That's pretty easy Miss Cross.”, one of the stallions on military attire said. “You have been promoted for the duration of this investigation. The mission we are about to assign to you is pretty dangerous. An Inspector from the Yards Manehatten branch has already failed at it, and paid with her life. She was found in a forest, with all four hooves nailed to a tree.”

I gulped. This didn't sound good at all. The pay rise for this mission would certainly be nice, and I might even be able to get that plasma TV I had my eyes on for a while now. But was I willing to risk my life for it? I wasn't sure. The only thing I knew was, that they wouldn't give me a chance to decline.

“The thing is, Miss Cross, we have dug out the deeper parts of the mansion you burned down. The catacombs beneath the building were still intact, and we were able to find some of the research material Blade Spin was working on. It was a very disturbing mixture of Unicorn, Changeling, Zebra and Dragon magic. The high council ordered the papers to be brought to the national magical academy of Canterlot. They are to be studied there, in order to find a spell with which a Unicorn can dispel it on a large scale. The more disturbing thing is, that we also found evidence that, that stallion belonged to some kind of deluded Nightmare Moon cult. They seem to believe that she will return to this world shortly, and that they will be in her favor if they conquer as much of it as they can before she arrives. As if that old mares tale was even real... We wouldn't bother with such a thing usually, but Blade Spin has proven that this cult is dangerous.”, he went on.

I on the other hoof was getting a little impatient. I was usually a good listener, but this stallion seemed to beat around the bush. Or he just tried to bore me to death.

“So you are telling me that I am to infiltrate some insane cult and gather information, so we can get rid of them in one go?”, I asked, not leaving any doubt that I would walk out of the room if he didn't answer my question.

“Yes. You see... Inspector Frostmane....”, he began, but I cut him off.

“Frostmane... as in... good looking Unicorn mare with a pale blue coat and a mane with two different shades of blue?”, I asked, the shock evident in my voice.

“You... I... I wasn't aware that you knew her.”, the other uniformed stallion stuttered.

“Knew her? I talked to her just last week! She's my cousin, and was the one who encouraged me to even try and take the entrance exam for the Yard, and you're telling me she's dead?”, I screamed back.

“Please calm down. I can understand how you must feel, and maybe we should consider...”

“Consider nothing! I take the job! I'll beat the snot out of whoever did this to her and drag that son of a mule to you in chains!”, I shouted, tears running down my cheeks at that revelation. Anger and sorrow battled for dominance within me, but my rage eventually won. Whoever had done this, would pay dearly for what they had done to a member of my family!

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An hour later, I had been filled in on my mission. I didn't like it one bit. That cult they wanted me to infiltrate, was running some kind of strip club. They wanted me to go there and ask for a job as a dancer. The biggest problem was, that I didn't know the first thing about erotic dancing. It was a problem, that my superiors took into consideration however. My training would begin the following day and last for two weeks. During that time, I was forbidden to speak to anypony about my upcoming task.

The only thing that irked me about it, was that there was a catch in working in that club. Apparently the guests could “win” one of the mares each night to... have some fun with her. I was against prostitution on every level, but this was something I would have to do in order to find Frostmanes murder. The part about finding evidence against the cult was only second place on my list of priorities.

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I sat in my favorite cafee after work, drinking a cup of dandelion tea and enjoying a donut with extra sprinkles. It might be the last time I would be able to do something like that, so I decided to enjoy it when I saw a glimpse of green out of the corner of my eye. When I turned my gaze towards the seat on the other side of the table, a familiar green Pegasus mare looked back at me. He amber eyes were fixed on my blue ones and we just stared at each other for a long moment.  It was her that finally broke the silence.

“You must be careful, son of light. The chances are against your survival this time.”, she said in her deep, yet feminine voice. This finally snapped me out of it.

“Who are you, and... are you blind? I.AM.A.MARE!”, I tried to clarify, but she just shook her head.

“Destiny does not care for gender. You have found yours I see.”, the mare stated, pointing towards the cross hanging on my neck. Before I could ask her what she meant, she raised one of her wings, revealing a leather strap that was attached to the underside of her wing. On it, dangled a silver cross. If I hadn't been sure that it wasn't mine, I would have assumed that she had stolen it from me. On closer inspection, there was one big difference however. Instead of the sun symbol that was etched into the tip of my cross, there was a heart on the left arm of her cross.

As quickly as she had raised her wing, she folded it back to her side again. So the four crosses were real? I had my suspicions once I had heard that mine was supposed to be one of that set, but I would have never imagined that the other three existed as well... At least one other existed, of that I was sure now.

According to the legends around them, they contained the powers of the three legendary Alicorns and their prophet. Many thought of them as deities, but I had always just seen them as nothing more then myths... But if the crosses were real, then could they have been real too? I remembered the voice that had awoken me shortly before Pain Train had tried to rape me... Did it belong to one of them? And if so, then what happened to them? The book of the Alicorns said that they left this world, since they could not stand the evil in it. But... was that the truth?

I had been lost in my thoughts, and once I looked up again, the green mare was gone once more...