The Science of Pony Deduction

"Ugh...note to self...never...ever jump into portals again." Sherlock moaned, his entire body ached, and his head was throbbing especially badly from the fall that obviously left him unconscious.  His entire body felt strange, but he couldn't quite put his finger on why.  Sherlock still had his eyes closed, thus failed to notice the three alicorns standing at the doorway of the room he fell in.  They where whispering to each other, and giving nervous glances, and when Sherlock started to open his eyes drowsily, Twilight started speaking to him.

"Uh..oh!  You're awake!  Hello, and welcome to Equestria, we know that you have come a long way...and we want to welcome you and we are glad to answer any of your questions!"  Twilight fidgeted, and looked to Celestia and Luna, who exchanged nervous glances.  How should they approach this?  This was the first time a human came into the pony world!  Sherlock opened his eyes, and saw the three ponies standing in front of him, they where obviously the ones who spoke, for the volume is just right, and there is nobody else in the room/

. "Why are there talking equines?" he asked, staring wide-eyed at the three, it was impossible that they could speak!  Then again...he just fell through a portal, but this is still crazy!

"Oh!  Well, first of all, we are ponies, and in Equestria, well, ponies are the main sentient creatures, however there are others." answered Celestia, and smiled softly.

Sherlock decided to stand up to meet these "ponies" eye-to-eye, but he wobbled and fell down.  What?  He looked down at himself, and gawked.  He no longer saw Sherlock Holmes, he was a pony!  His...fur...was gray blue, Sherlock used his hooves to pull down is hair(mane?) to his eyes, still black and curly.  He looked to his back, where a curly black tail lay on the ground, and then noticed something even stranger, he had wings!  Sherlock lifted one, then the other, then put them back down to his side, he was surprised he didn't notice the feathers against his body, he touched his pointing ears, it would take a while to get used to this.

"This is...strange."  Sherlock commented, he furrowed his eyebrows, how was this possible?  How was any of this possible?

"You are taking this quite well." said Luna, who looked at him funny, and sifted to the side, her wings airing themselves out.

"Oh!  Where are our manners, I am Princess Luna, this is my sister, Princess Celestia, and this is Princess Twilight Sparkle." Luna gestured to the three when saying their names, and then Twilight stepped forward.

"Who are you?" the purple mare leaned her head towards Sherlock.

"Sherlock Holmes, consulting detective."  Sherlock tilted his head away from Twilight, and then proceeded to stand up with some difficulty, for he had been standing on two legs for his entire life.  He lifted his legs up and down to get used to the feeling, and walked around the brightly-decorated room for a bit.  He then stopped and thought for a second, why wasn't he deducing anything?  He looked at the three alicorns, but failed to deduce anything!  He then mind-slapped himself for not noticing it.  He was experiencing completely foreign bodies, body language, and culture, deducing ponies will be impossible without some research on them.

"Sir, did you happen to bring a friend along?  We found a small-ish earth pony with you, but he was bleeding a bit, so we sent him to the hospital wing for some bandages." asked Luna.

"Ah, yes, I guess he jumped into the portal with me, he always tags along like that." replied Sherlock, he smirked at Johns loyalty.

"Well, then, mind you, while we are heading to the hospital wing, you will attract quite a bit of attention from walking beside princesses, so I hope you don't mind it." Celestia said, she gestured for Sherlock to follow them out of the purple wooden door, Sherlock stepped out and his eyes widened at the sight before him.

There where thousands and thousands of shelves of books surrounding him, he looked up and saw multiple floors similar to the first one.  There where tables and chairs of mahogany, and he could see about 40 ponies, most where...unicorns, which surprised him.  Also, there where pegasi, which apparently he was, and there was the occasional regular pony.  They where all different colors of the rainbow, with a variety of mane styles and exotic eye colors.  He analyzed that most of the unicorns looked very high-class and had their noses in the air, the pegasi where the most casual, and the regular ponies where mostly organizing the books as a job or looking at the many paintings that lined the walls, and only a few actually read.  He concluded that unicorns where most likely to be high class, pagasi are the middle class, and regular ponies are low class.  He saw Twilight fidgeting a bit and her eyes where darting around the expansive room, obviously yearning to read the books.  Sherlock also noticed something very strange, he noticed before that the princesses had marks on their rumps, Celestia a sun, Luna a moon, and Twilight six sparkles, he thought that maybe they where a sign of monarchy, but all of the ponies had them!  All classes had these strange marks, and when he was staring behind him at a purple mare with a piece of paper with notes on it for her mark, he noticed some color behind his wing.  He stopped, thus the princesses did to see what was wrong, and lifted his wing to peer at it...he had one too!  It was simple, a magnifying glass...queer.

"What are these marks?  On everybody's rump?" He asked.

"Oh!  Those are called cutie marks you see, the signify what a ponies special talent is!  It usually appears around the age of 8-12, when you discover what your special talent is, poof!  It appears, quite interesting in fact, there is a whole study on it, called cutiology." answered Twilight, her eyes shimmering with the need to share knowledge.  They just appear?  Thought Sherlock, he looked at his cutie mark.

"Yours looks like it might be in investigating, or something of that sort, analyzing?  Maybe?"  Twilight thought aloud, they had left the library, and where going through a series of corridors, one of which held a hall of paintings of "Ponies That Shaped Equestria" as stated by the plaque at the entrance to the hall.  He ignored them, he was not interested in pony history.

"Well, here we are!"  Luna said, and she opened a white door with a red cross at the center, and some red swirls lining it.  She opened the door, and entered.

The room was mostly white, but had some pastel yellows and blues for the curtains, letting in natural light.  The patients mostly had minor injuries, though some had broken horns and limbs.

"Sherlock!  Oh I am so glad you're alright!" said a cream pony with a short gray-blond mane and tail.  He had a camo cross for his cutie mark, but had some bandages across his head.

"John?  Well then, how are you?"  Sherlock tried to be as nice as he could.

"This place is amazing!  They can cook!  And clean!  And work!  Withhooves!" he exclaimed, a broad smile across his face.

"Yes yes, it's all wonderful, buuut, we need to get back home, so, please, would you show us to the portal thing so we can head back?"  Sherlock turned to the princesses, who gave each other nervous glances, Celestia walked up to him.

"Well, you see, it isn't that simple,  the portal that you entered through...is dormant, we don't even know how you got here through the portal, we have tried to activate it before, but we failed.  You will have to stay here..." she said, her eyes filled with sadness, Sherlocks ears flopped down, and Johns jaw slacked.

"We can't go home?" John asked quietly.

"Don't worry though, we will gather all of the ponies we can to try and find a way to open the gate, however, you will have to stay here for at least a month." said Celestia, she straitened herself up, and then gestured for the two stallions to follow the three alicorns into a room a couple of hallways down, Celestia looked like she was about to say something, but John interrupted,

"Wait, before you say anything, your highness, if we are going to stay so long, where will we stay?" he asked urgently.

"That is exactly what I was a about to say, John, usually we would let guests stay in the castle, but letting complete strangers that nopony has heard of would cause attention from the media and controversy, to avoid that, we are going to have to find somepony who you can stay with."  Celestia said nervously, she looked at the other princesses, and then stepped back to them, the turned their backs to John and Sherlock and started talking, the stallions remained silent, trying to hear what they say.

"You know...we could set them up to stay with Scripture..."

"She is too young to do that...still a student."

"Forte?"

"He's on a tour with Octavia."

"Well...we could always let them stay with V-"

"Woah, no, she is crazy, completely insane, she killed somepony."

"And she was proven not guilty!"

"That's because-"

"Shush, it has already been settled that she is not guilty, socializing her can do nothing but help her, I worry for her, she is my closest ally, you especially Twilight, should agree that getting her to socialize would be good.

"Sigh, I guess so, but if anything goes wrong, they are out of that house."

"Agreed."  the three alicorns turned to face the wide-eyed John and curious Sherlock, still silent.  They followed Celestia, Luna, and Twilight out of the room, and started walking, John and Sherlock walked up beside Celestia as she addressed them.

"You two will be staying with Via, she is a little...unstable, but I believe you can handle her.  There will be a guard to escort you to her house, because a chariot would be a bit suspicious, they should be arriving any minuet."  She stopped, they where in the main hall now, it was decorated very colorfully, as the rest of the castle, which was starting to bother Sherlock.

"Whats with the decoration" he said quietly to John.

"Don't be impolite, it's their choice, maybe it has something to do with their culture." John replied.

"I've tried to be polite this entire day, I am getting sick of it." Sherlock said through gritted teeth.  The princesses exited as a silver stallion with a blue mane and tail, he wore no uniform, and his cutie mark was a golden shield.

"Come with me please." he said plainly, and the two followed him out of the door.

Sherlock and John squinted in the sudden brightness, and then gawked at the view, the city they where in was fabulous!  Exquisite shops and fancy ponies in high-end clothes, fancy hair, gems of all types lined the city streets.

"What city are we in?" asked John.

"Canterlot, the capital of Equestria, isn't it a gem?" replied the stallion, he then turned left, and started to gallop.  John and Sherlock followed, and they noticed that the further they went, the less and less fancy the city became, Sherlock looked up, to see if it where to snow, for it was terribly cold.

"What month is it?" he asked the guard.

"February, Hearts and Hooves day is almost here!" he said with a smile.  Hearts and Hooves day?  Probably the equivalent of Valentines day.  Ugh.  Then he noticed the pegasi moving the clouds around, and that all of the activities suggested it was in the afternoon, but the sun was still high in the sky!

"Why are there pagasi moving the clouds around?  And why is the sun still strait up when it's in the afternoon?" Sherlock asked.

"The pegasi manage all of the weather in Equestria, and Celestia raises the sun, and Luna raises the moon, so the moon and sun don't move until they want them to.  I knew you where from far away, but I am still surprised you don't know this stuff."  The stallion looked at  the two strangely, and then slowed down to a brisk trot.

"Huh." John said, and then continued to look at all of the ponies, shopping, dancing, talking, eating, eating.

"What sort of stuff do you eat here?" he asked, his stomach growled a bit.

"Well, you know, the usual, carrot dogs, dandelion sandwiches, hay fries, the coffee and pankcakes are really good there."  He pointed to a cafe with a brown banner that said "Cocos' Comfort Foods"

"What's the currency you use here?" Sherlock asked, he was staring at the shimmering things the ponies where passing to each other.

"We use bits, they are just little gold coins, but sometimes ponies except jewels for payment instead, man, you have a lot of questions." he said.  The slowed down when the stores and houses grew more and more apart, now each building had about five feet in between them.  The guard stopped at a little brown house with a blue roof, the only windows where on the side, the paint was cracking, and the roof shingles where falling apart.

"Tsk, tsk, she really needs to take care of this place more often." he commented, but then faced the two with a serious look on his face.

"Okay, look, let me give you some advice, I know you will be living with Via, but try not to talk to her, or be near her, avoid her, please, she's dangerous.  In my opinion, the only place she belongs is in a madhouse." he said, his voice shaky.

"I'm considered a psychopath, so I think I can handle her." Sherlock said, his head held high.  Though as the guard went up to knock on her door, John whispered to Sherlock,

"Are you sure we can handle her?"

"I have no idea." he replied.  The guard knocked on the door three times, and stepped sideways as John and Sherlock stepped close to the door.  There was noises of crashing and swearing, and sounds of hoofsteps coming closer, and the door opened.

She was a light cream mare, lighter than Johns coat, and had one yellow and one blue eye.  Her brown, curly mane flew all over the place, and was tangled horribly.  However this was not the most striking feature about her.  All over her face had three bruises, she also some cuts, deep cuts, like she was sliced with a knife kind of cut.  She had bags under her eyes, and her ears had some cuts to.

"Wha do you want?"