Underneath Canterlot

Act I

“So, no word from him yet?”, Celestia queried the stallion that was in full Canterlot knight armour. The green part of her multicoloured mane dropped and covered her left eye while she studied the official report, that the army had written.

“We lost contact three days ago at 2200, around the time he went underground.”, he doubled what the report said, and beyond that point it suggested that he had either been killed around that time or held captive from that point.

“Don't we...”, the voice of the violet mare, Twilight Sparkle, rose through the silence, “Don't we have some sort of vital sign tracker?”. Twilight was a little lost in the situation, this was the first emergency meeting she had to attend to, since Celestia suggested that this threat was growing to a national one, or even, perish the thought, to an international one.

“Of course we do”, that's how the stallion answered to Twilights question, “but it only operates up to twenty feet under the ground, and even then the signal is woolly.”

Twilight answered with a slight understanding nod.

She had read up on the tracking technique the army used, but only to a certain point. She was more interested in the how, less in the boundaries of the technology. She called it technology but it was pure magic. It worked by implanting a metal chip, which would've been charged with magic energy, into the atria, so it sat within the myocardium, the hearth muscle. The surgery was a tricky one, and the army often denied the request to implant an tracker into a pony, but if they authorise it, then there was a problem of national interest, and more often than not, Celestia herself would fill in the official form and authorise it herself right away.

As it was the case in this particular event.

The room stood in total silent for a few minutes, just until Celestia turned the page of the report, and the paper rustled softly as her strong but distaff hoof did it work.

A fourth voice, which was silent until this point, raised and filled the room with new sound waves. “Sister, this can't go on. We need a team of specialists. I am loosing my sleep, you're loosing your sleep, if it continues like this, there will be no one to raise the sun or the moon because we'd be in a deep coma.”, Luna pointed out and then continued, “And I bet Twilight here is just as sleepless about this whole affair, we need specially trained ponies, we need ponies that know how to react to all those events we tried to handle ourself, we tried to bury. Did you read the press lately? Some of those concerns get picked up. 'Full Moon Ponynappings Continue' – 'Another Pony found Without Lungs' – 'Fossilised Pony found in Supermarket'. We can't deal with all of that on our own! This sewer story was our only solid lead. Just because we're burying more than we're examining, and yet, all of those things keep popping up...”

While Luna caught breath, Celestia rose her eyes and faced her Sister, just like Twilight did, but Twilight eyes were filled with a some anxiety, she hadn't know about the other affairs. Till now, she only was briefed on the current case, the case of the underground cult cell, the case of the disappearing scout. She was told that that case was from major importance, since the nation security was at stake. She was told that the cult was linked to several murders and ponynaps, even to some major thefts. But she wasn't briefed about corpses without lungs or fossils that lived a week ago. She didn't know any of this, and the anxiety in her eyes was replaced by a certain hunger for knowledge as she one simple sentence left her muzzle.

“I want to be on the team that handles those things.”

Celestias hoof dropped the report and her head jerked into Twilights direction. “You want what?”

A slight blush filled Twilights cheeks. “Well, look at it like this: this group is dangerous, isn't it? So who is better to examine their work than your prime student, the one that you yourself made a Princess. I can learn from what they did, and I could learn how they think and how to stop them. And I surely can advocate myself, with my magic. I promise to stay out of any unnecessary hazard, but I think if I could examine their work, well... then...”. Twilights explanation ended in a slight stutter as she lowered her head.

Celestias eyes sought Lunas, but Luna was gaping into the air, thinking, then, the voice of the Princess of the Night exclaimed: “I can see your point. I am encouraging this decision.”

In that moment Twilights face lit with slight happiness, however a small look towards Celestia killed that good feeling again, as she was hiding her face underneath her multicoloured mane, the report crinkling below her right hoof. Twilight feared that Celestia would now block her out of any further discussions regarding this topic, that she might even be kicked out right now.

“I...”, Celestias soft voice resonated through the large room, “...I believe you might be right. Twilights on. At least for now. But this can't be it.”

Celestia now faced the guard, the bearer of the report. “Contact Spitfire. I want her most competent students send to the military installation, where you shall test them further. Fighting technique, not flying ones. I want a strong pony to accompany her, a field type of pony.”

Act II

It was the happiest day in her life.

She was Daffodil, and she was about to marry the love of her life. She has waited for this moment to happen since they both where in school. Well, maybe not since they first met, but she fell in love with him soon after. They met in year 6 and fell for each other in year 8.

He was her first, but he would never say if that was mutual. He always just smirked at her and gave her a wink when she asked.

Her heart was pounding like a jack-hammer, it was happening, not quite like she imagined, but a whit better, as it was real, and not just a dream.

They stood facing each other at the altar of the St. Claire church in Manehatten, he was wearing a suit. They had a slight argument about that. He disliked formal clothes, they always were too tight and too unintiminate, but she pointed out that it was part of the tradition, the tradition she was so fond of, because she has dreamed of that since she was a filly

.

In the corner of her eyes she could see the guests, on his side sat his family. Her Soon-To-Be-Mother-in-Law was a bitch, but she didn't mind, his father was nice and approving, at least. Beside her sat her family. Daffodils mother had no hard time approving their relationship, and her father wouldn't have had either, but he died a few years ago. She tried to block out the thoughts of her father right now. It was her happy moment, not her grief one.

And a happy family the three of them would soon be. Yes, she was pregnant, and no one other than her groom knew about it, and boy, had he been happy.

In this very moment she owned the world.

She looked deeply into his eyes as the pastor continued his speech.

“...Through their time together, they have come to realize that their personal dreams, hopes, and goals are more attainable and more meaningful through the combined effort and mutual support provided in love, commitment, and family; and so they have decided to live together as husband and wife...”

It was like music in her ears, she loved every moment of it, and deep in her heart she knew that she would love him forever and ever. And time seemed to skip to the reading and from the readings to the vows.

The bridal veil that was covering her face made her grin, they'd have joked just before the ceremony about that veil, and that it was sort of absurd, but she liked it, liked it very much. Just like the white dress that covered the rest of her body.

“Do you Midnight Shimmer, take Daffodil, to be your wife, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better or for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish; from this day forward until death do you part?”, the pastor asked as part of the ceremony.

“Yes, I will.”, his slight husky voice sounded.

“And you Daffodil, do you take Midnight Shimmer to be your husband, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better or for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish; from this day forward until death do you part?”

Happiness struck her like never before and she grinned widely while she said “Yes, I will.”

She couldn't wait anymore, she wanted to kiss him now, and not when the ceremony said so, that'd take a bit longer still. So she threw up her veil and pulled his soon-to-be husband towards her and kissed him deeply. He returned the kiss and a feeling struck their chests. A feeling so intense it might as well be a sting. Both of them felt this sting deep in their chests.

And a few seconds later. Just a few seconds later they both dropped onto the ground. Eyes wide open, hearts not beating. Both of their hearts stopped the seconds they kissed.

And the families would wonder, then the families would scream, then cry, then run, then panic. Then leave. And the pastor, the pastor was shocked or startled or anxious, and nervously stepped away from the altar, and ran out through the exit he used to enter the church every other Sunday.

A few minutes later their child passed away.

Act III

The struggle Spitfire went through lead to 30 pegasi, which had been send to that Canterlot Central Military Installation, or CCMI. After the first drill, which consisted of some running – not flying, as trained in the Wonderbolt Academy – and some army exercises, like crawling underneath electric wire or running through tires, half of the group had gone home already, part because they failed it, part because they didn't want to go through any of this again.

The second drill was a little more interesting, as they'd get to use crystal shard weapons. Those weapons became a rarity after the Crystal Kingdom disappeared a thousand years ago, and the only ones left and used at that time were forged in the Canterlot catacombs. A few months after the disappearance, the last few prisoners that were hold in that ancient gaol were either brought to different, high-security prisons, or got executed. After that, while Canterlot still was at war with the Griffin Kingdom, the old mines got used as a harvesting plant for those crystals.

The shards were small and in the right hands deadly. But not right after they got mined. The shards themselves were powerless, they'd get charged with magic. To use them you'd have to throw them at your target and in the moment they hit something, they'd discharge their power into the object they hit, kinetically. And so they'd dig themselves into the flesh of the enemy, tearing through blood vessels on the way, and often kill instantly.

Though after the Crystal Kingdom disappeared, the army cut down on the use of them, the manufacturing just was too difficult for the army to do on their own. The production stopped after circa 10000 shards, that was just three years after King Sombra took a whole realm with him.

The Royal Army had to cut down on their technology as well, after they lost one of their more powerful weapons, they started to use spears in a higher quantity, and to constantly remind of the time Equestria became autonomous with their weaponry, the spears were now part of the traditional Royal Army that guarded Canterlot.

After the Kingdom returned, Celestia made sure she would be in direct control of the Kingdom that made a living from selling their weapons, by putting Princess Cadence in power there, and thus sent a discrete message to Equestrias neighbours.

Nowadays there were multiple variations of the energy weapons, there would be exploding ones, shattering ones, and faster ones. But the kind they used in that drill were mostly harmless. The worst thing that could've happened is a broken leg for one of the participants.

Using the weapon was quite simple, you'd have to throw it at your target

The sun was hitting the horizon by the time they got sorted out one by one.

Shadow Blitz was a brilliant student, but he was a little too indiscreet for such a job. He kept on talking about stories that he thought were 'unbelievable', and that could've been a possible concealment danger, so he was kicked out.

Summer Flight would've been a wonderful pick, but seeing that she was pregnant she got rejected because of some safety precautions. Also she got told to try and lay low at the Academy as well, they didn't want to risk the life of precious life of her soon-to-be foal.

And in that manner everypony but three got kicked out.

The trio consisted of two mares and one stallion. The stallion was known as Winged Storm, and he was brilliant. He kept fit, had a top-notch health and surpassing knowledge as well. He lived with his mother, after his father died that summer, and he left for the Academy with a heavy heart. This army-deal would separate him from his mother even further. So therefore he shook his head and said no and left. He knew his mother needed him and thus he declined the offer.

The older one of the two mares, known as Silver Thunder, was engaged and had a rather bad relationship with her parents, but that, of course, was none of the armies business, she told them. She wasn't pregnant, she was fit, she was strong, she was another perfect pick.

Silver Thunder, or Agent Thunder, that was what the guard called her from the moment she signed the contract, was a greyish mare with a dark blue mane. Her eyes were dark brown. Her height was the same as a normal stallion, which had a slight cowing effect on the guard.

And there was another mare who was also perfect for the job. She told them to call her Ruby, and never to call her by her real name. She insisted on it and if they don't comply to her demand, she'd be gone. If she hadn't shown such stunning results – she had a superb score in all the drills and had a black belt in karate. – she would've been kicked out just because she asked for special treatment, but the results spoke their own language, and so she got the contract and a chance to sign it. And so she did. She took the pen tenderly into her muzzle and signed the contract simply as Ruby.

Agent Ruby was eager to start her job. Her lime coat paired lovely with her dark auburn mane and her sparkling light blue eyes made the guard secretly wonder why she was single. She did have her reasons.

Ruby and Thunder were put into a small room with a slide-projector that ran with the help of a small candle burning behind the slides, which would throw their shadow through a lens. The lens could be adjusted for focus.

They were seated in front of the presentation-wall and left alone with a third pony, the stallion in full armour Celestia assigned with getting the perfect 'field kind of pony'.

“Good evening. Thanks for staying so far, Silver Thunder and -” he squeezed his eyes slightly as he tried to remember the name of the second mare, he had been informed about the her name-situation and couldn't understand why she would want to ignore her real name. He thought it was beautiful. “- Ruby, was it?” A slight silence filled the room until the mare he was addressing nodded.

“My name is Agent V, standing for Vine which is part of my original name. If you've read your contract – and I hope you did – you could guess that we have the same employer. Right now, all three of us work for the -”, he went over to the projector and seemed to jab it, resulting in the first slide being shown. It was a symbol, a circle that contained the Canterlot castle under a red moon. The circles line was filled with text that read “Canterlot Emergency Respond Unit”. “- the CERU, you and me, we work for this Unit. That organisation is part of the Equestrian army, this is why you had to go through all those drills. But your job is going to differ from what you'd expect from working with the military.

“This is a TOP-SECRET information briefing. No one without clearance is to know about what I'm about to tell you. The purpose of this briefing is to inform you adequately about our current situation, so that you, hopefully, can start working right away. The briefing will be divided into three segments, the first will tell you more about our current adversary, the second will show you what they've been linked to and other, similar cases we went over, and the third will tell you about what possibly lies in the future – but you got to understand that the last segment is only a prediction, not fact. We can't possibly predict what we're up against in the future.”

So the next two hours the mares spend with V and went through slide and slide, each one worse than the other, and they saw what they could never have dreamt of, they saw that the press only knows so much, and they saw that something has to be done about all of this.

Once the lights went on again and the projector shut off, V raised his voice again: “You'll be working with Princess Twilight Sparkle, she'll be your scientific support and will lead you from now on. You'll have to report to her, she reports directly to Celestia. Thank you for your time. Dismissed.”

The briefing ended and it took a moment for them to leave the room. Thunder was more affected by the information than Ruby was, seeing that she seemed whiter than she already was. Still, both tottering on their legs. They were instructed that they'd soon meet the Princesses and after that work would begin.

Act IV

Two hours ago the police was called that a bride and a groom died at their wedding, seemingly simultaneously. The police send a unit to the wedding along with people from the forensic, but after they took notice of what seemed to have happened – a double myocardial infarct - they were notified to stop their doings. The matter was consigned to CERU. This was the third recorded case of the Wedding-Infarct-Pattern, furthermore referred to WIP.

The first WIP was thought of as an accident, a weird coincident. The forensic team found as much there as at the second WIP-case. There were no signs of a struggle, they just died at the spot. Died from, seemingly, a heart infarct. The autopsy didn't result in anything either, but confirmed the hypothesis of a myocardial infarct.

Now this was the third WIP-case, and seemingly nothing differentiated it from the other two, and yet it got reassigned to CERU.

In the time Silver Thunder and Ruby were briefed, Celestia called Twilight to Canterlot and gave her a makeshift lab in the castle. She made sure the bodies were transferred to the lab and all of this preparation ended concurrent with the briefing.

As Twilight entered the lab, she took notice of the furniture – not much more than a bunch of chairs and a few operation tables – and the machinery, which was, she thought, intriguing. There were a bunch of medical appliances, some of which she had never even read about. The body arrived soon after her analysis of the room, and when they did she could feel herself getting goosebumps.

The medical personnel that brought in the corpses told her what seemed to have happened. She had a short briefing about the WIP-cases, and got instructed to do the autopsy herself – the police got told to keep out of Twilights hair, Celestia didn't want somepony messing with the results of the examination.

Twilight was both thrilled and anxious of starting to work with the bodies. She had read about anatomy on her way to Canterlot and had a book by her side that described an autopsy step-by-step. Levitating a pen and clipboard around with her as she read the first step: Taking down the height, age, gender and so on.

She went on with the step-by-step plan and carefully looked for outer bruises, cuts or signs of struggle, then took photos of the corpses with and without their clothes. Once she got both of them out of their formal attire she folded it neatly – she may have to do some chemical testing on them later.

A thought crossed her mind that all of this could've been done in Ponyville. She had her own castle, she could easily build a lab in there. Her own lab. She fancied that idea and noted it onto her clipboard, she'd start arranging that lab as soon as she'd be back to Ponyville.

She took X-ray imagery of the corpses and she could feel her stomach fighting with its contents once she developed the images. The mare was pregnant, she had three corpses lying where only two should be.

She took a break and changed the topic with another book, a classic: The Invisible Stallion from H.G. Fountain.

After a few chapters she had to return to her work, and swallowed hard at looking at the next step: Taking a blood sample – that wasn't all too bad, was it?

She quickly did as the book said and continued to the next step, things were getting serious now, she were to cut them open.

The scalpel flew through the air in a macabre dance as she levitated it towards the female corpse, and she cut deeply into the cooling flesh, cutting through the thick skin that kept the pony from coming apart while they were still alive. The cold, soon-to-be stale blood dropped from the wound and Twilights stomach turned over, she ran out of the lab and emptied the contents of her stomach into a nearby bin while the scalpel was still stuck deep in the corpse.

When she returned she was a little bit more audacious and went through with cutting them open. With the help of her magic she pulled away the needed sections of the skin and the now macabre coloured coats, and revealed their ribcages. No rib was broken, everything perfectly fine, so she went on and removed the ribcage of both of them with a bone saw. She took another spewing break in the process of sawing through the ribs, thanks to the cracking sound of them giving in.

Once examining the inner organs – and taking another blood sample from the heart – she noticed something strange which made her spread her wings in excitement. The size of their hearts was way off. His heart was too small, hers quite contrary too big. His left a gap all around it, no blood vessel even connecting it properly, and hers, hers squeezed the surrounding tissue. It was a mixture of excitement and disgust she felt as she noted her findings.

That'd mean that the Stallion had internal bleeding that induced the infarct, and the Mares heart hadn't had any space to beat properly. But why did that happen? Or how?

Her thoughts were cut of rapidly, as Celestia and her two new colleagues entered the room without knocking. Twilight almost jumped.

Putting down her tools, she examined her guests, and greeted them friendly. Though, they were the first to introduce themselves. One introduced herself as Silver Thunder, and the other one as Ruby, she shook both of their hooves and told them her name. The introduction was way too formal for her liking, but they were going to work together, not become friends. But she wished they would.

Ruby directly asked to get a look at that clipboard of hers and she agreed to it, while Agent Thunder inspected the corpses with slight disgust.

Time ticked by as Twilight analysed the blood – it was clean – and they did this and that. Taking DNA samples, going through the guests lists of all three WIP-incidents – but that also ended in no lead, even a background check only resulted in righteous ponies – and last but not least, they checked for wedding gifts. But that also didn't grow to any lead.

It was four A.M. and Lunas shift of guarding the sky was soon over. Yawning Silver Thunder ask to leave to get some sleep, and they told her to take care on her way home.

So their force decreased to two and they were just about to wrap things up for the night – or morning – as Twilight jumped and ran around the lab half a minute. “I've – I've got an idea! Why didn't I think about it earlier? How could I have possibly looked over it? I already noticed it but I discharged it.”

Ruby eyed her tiredly as she rested on one of the chairs next to the male corpse, supporting her heavy head with her hooves.

“Look, look, look.”, Twilight levitated the blood samples towards Ruby and let them circulate around her head. “Look, this one -”, she said while she stopped one of the test tubes in front of Rubys muzzle, “- is blood type A positive, taken from the mare. This one is A positive as well.” while she talked the continued to rotate the test tubes in a weird movement, always stopping one in front of Ruby. “This one is O positive, not A, O! Along with this one. But now get this: -”, Twilight stopped to take a deep breath.

Slowly getting more awake Ruby stopped supporting her head and lifted it with her own strength.

“I thought I marked them wrongly, but the first A positive test tube is taken from the mares front leg, whilst the second one is taken from the stallions heart. The same thing about the O ones but vice versa!”

She jumped to her hooves. “So, are you suggesting that -”

“Their hearts were exchanged!”, Twilight cut Ruby off, “and this also explains the size of their hearts, being that her heart should be smaller than his, and not like it is right now.” She grinned from cheek to cheek at her discovery, and even wider once she saw Ruby nodding in agreement.

“So we can be sure that it wasn't an accident. It was an attack?”

“Indeed. And I'd say that it was magic, they had no scar tissue, and especially no recent one.”, Twilight explained to Ruby, “So we're definitely looking for an Unicorn.”

They didn't need anymore sleep. New adrenaline rushed through their veins and they were eager to continue their work.

“But Twilight...”, Ruby bit her lower lip to keep her from giggling at the joke she was going to make, “we made a list and we checked it twice, and we didn't find out whos been bad and whos nice.”

Contrary to Ruby, Twilight lost it and laughed loudly, almost waking the few residents of the castle that lived above the lab. She enjoyed the moment and a spark of hope lit her heart. She thought that they might become friends after all. And she loved her friends.

“So, then tell me Ruby, who did we look over? Who isn't on the guest list but at every wedding – except bride and groom, I think they're out of the deal.”

The sun rose slowly outside, unnoticeable by them in the concealed room they were in, as they threw ideas at each others, some of them jokes, some of them guesses, but none of them leading anywhere.

The clock killed another hour before the scales on Rubys eyes cracked.

She saw now.

She knew now who they were looking for.

And she told Twilight.

Act V

The church was fuller than on a normal Sunday. A normal service was only attended by retired ponies or students which get – more or less – forced to be present. But today there were a few mourning family members and friends, grieving about the couple that died here yesterday.

It was a wonderful example of today's society, it seemed like the older the ponies are, the further they sat near the front, while the young sat in the far back of the church, so they could whisper and slander, properly use the time they, in their eyes, wasted.

Twilight and Ruby sat near the middle, and waited for their prime suspect to arrive: the vicar.

The church was deeply quiescent that morning. Yesterday's fuss, and all signs of it, were cleaned up. The decoration went into the trash, the guests tried to forget the traumatising event. Today's service was probably dedicated to Daffodil and Midnight Shimmer, seeing as they were small pictures of them standing framed on the altar.

The bells rang and the service officially begun. Though, there was no hint of the pastor.

Only five minutes later the old stallion slowly stepped his way towards the altar, towards the desk he'd use for his preach.

“This doesn't make any sense...”, Ruby whispered to Twilight, which looked startled at the pastor, not believing what they saw.

“Dear community. Today's sermon will be hold in the spirit of love and closure, after we lost two loved ponies of our community in a tragedy that seemed unearthly for an observer. But yet, His ways are mysterious...”, the vicar started his preaching.

But what shocked Twilight and confused Ruby wasn't anything about the church, nor anything about that preach.

“If he isn't a Unicorn” - Twilight shook her head heavily, the dark circles around her eyes were deepening by the minute -“he can't be our guy.”

The pastor was a normal earth pony, there was no way he could have cast the spell that killed the marrying couples, not this time, nor the two times before that.

“I- I don't understand.”, Ruby stuttered to her violet colleague, “I have to get outta here.”

So Ruby stumbled outside. Her companion was first looking at how she left, then she got up herself and ran after her, whilst the pastor continued.

“I want to read you from the Gospel of Mark, Chapter 5: 'They came to the other side of the sea, into the country of th-'”

The big church doors closed behind Twilight with a powerful 'THUUMB', and thus cut off the pastor.

The court yard was beautiful. The church entrance had a few pillars that held a canopy. The roofing protected the door as long as the few steps that were in front of it.

And Ruby sat on the last two steps, staring at the ground.

“Are you alright, Ruby?”, the worn out voice of Twilight clang to her.

“This was our only solid lead.”

“I wouldn't say-”

“our ONLY!”, she almost yelled at her whilst she rose her head to revealing her slightly soaking eyes.

Twilight went down the steps and walked from one side to the other in front of Ruby. “This isn't the end, we just have to get back to the lab and revisit the evidence. There ought to be something. There just ought to be a clue!”

“Twilight, Twilight, look at me!”, she tried to pull Twilight out of her trance, and succeeded, Twilights eyes were expectantly fixed on Ruby. “This case is lost. The bodies – probably our only real lead – are rotting right now. All we could do now is wait for the next case to happen. This was our first case, of course we were going to fail at some point! Better now than when it counts.”

The air became completely silent as she spoke, even the birds seemed to keep quiet as Twilights eyes changed her focus from Ruby to something behind her instead. Without a word she walked up the steps sluggishly and went towards the wall where a single wire bin was standing.

Within the bin was a piece of paper that tried to escape with the help of the wind. It sand playfully its song clicking, as it tired to escape the custody of the bin, but was stopped by one filament it wrapped around.

Twilights horn started to glow as a white blanket – used for the decoration of yesterday's event – levitated out of the bin and made way for the small piece of paper. If it would've succeeded to escape, Twilight and Ruby would've head home in that instant, but instead she levitated the slip towards Ruby.

“What is this?”, she grabbed it and Twilights horn stopped glowing, “'Thank you for booking our last minute flower arrangement deal.' You don't think... You do think it was the gardener?”

Twilight silently nodded.

The slip Ruby was examining was a mixture of a business card and a voucher for the dead couple.

“We ought to get there. Now. And at least question them...”

Half an hour later they arrived at a small store, it made a cosy impression from the outside, like any other flower and gardening store.

It's name stood in big white letters above the entrance. “Garden of Gerasenes” Smaller, red letters underneath the stores name read “Seeds of Love”. The store specialist on weddings – Twilight thought.

Ruby went in first, opening the glass door that said “Open” with quite a bit of hope that this hunt would be over any minute now. That somepony would just be caught and confess they did it, and get locked up forever. End of the story. No one else has to die.

But that was only a wish.

A bell rang. Not nearly as powerful as the bell of the church, but still supplying the same feeling of safety as the church did.

A Unicorn came to the counter. He smiled at the two mares as Twilight closed the door. Ruby felt like this smile was phony, an dare that said 'catch me if you can'. But it was only her tiredness wishing it would be.

“How can I help you, ladies?”, the Stallion said like he had said it a thousand times before.

And just for a moment Ruby doubted that this was their guy, because there was no evidence pointing him to the wedding except that voucher, but yet the mocked feeling stayed.

Twilight was just about to raise her voice as they heard steps coming down a flight of stairs, and slightly confused they saw that Silver Thunder came out of the back of the store, and Silver started to smile once she saw them.

“What are you doing here? Boy, did you sleep at all? Found anything yet?”

Questions over questions pierced their tired minds as Ruby finally got herself together and started to talk.

“Is this your establishment?”, she asked the Stallion behind the counter, which nod proud and pulled Silver closer to give her a small pack on her cheek.

But Silvers eyes weren't filled with happiness anymore.

“What is this about, Ruby?”

“Keep out of this”, Twilight hissed.

Silver reacted with a slight jerk backwards and looked at her fiancé.

“Did you have anything to do with those incidents I told you about?”, she had a troubled look on her face, and this look was contagious. It easily jumped to Ruby and Twilight. Silver had told him about their work, she had informed the new prime suspect about the developments to catch him. And that after being briefed on the concealment level.

Once again Twilight was the first to try to break the silence.

“We- We are Canterlot Emergency Respond Unit Agents, and you, sir, are under temporary arrest for being suspected to-”, before Twilight could finish her accusation, the Unicorns horn started to glow as his mimic darkened.

Twilight and Ruby both were sure they'd feel the sting in their chests and die any second now. He would try to kill them. But instead, he and his fiancée felt the sting. He was about to kill himself the way he killed the others, and he was about to take one CERU agent with him.

There was nothing Twilight and Ruby could do about it, and once Silver fell to the ground, once the Stallion painfully emptied his lungs, Ruby jumped over the counter and shook him. “Why, Why did you kill them?”

“-ad to-”, he could push out of his lungs before the pain got the best of him.

“Why?!”, she shouted at him.

He couldn't answer, but he looked at her, his face was full of pain, but his tongue got in place to make an 'L' sound. Then he passed away in her hooves.

This was it.

It was over.

The WIP-cases were wrapped up now, and the killer won't kill anymore.

Twilight and Ruby, both went home and laid down, both of them laid there sleeplessly, both of them rested until the sun went down. And then, both of them would fall asleep, into an unhealthy, light sleep.

Act VI

The morning of the next day came in slowly. Ruby woke up around 5 A.M. while Twilight overslept her sleeping schedule.

Yesterday, after the police arrived at Garden of Gerasenes and they left, the police boxed every document they found and shipped it to Canterlot Castle, whilst forensic bagged to bodies and brought them to the morgue. Celestia told them that there was no need for an autopsy. They knew how they died and it would be a waste of time and resources to prove that further.

The corpses in the Canterlot lab got stitched back together and bagged as well. The funeral was planned for next Saturday.

Around 10 A.M. Twilight and Ruby, both, arrived at the Castle and met at the lab. It seemed so empty to them now. They chatted a bit about this and that, both spoke in rather sad voices, yet they were happy enough that they solved their first case.

Celestia entered the lab, without knocking, and their conversation ended mid-sentence.

"Agent Ruby, Twilight.", the Princess said in an emotionless voice, they couldn't predict if what she was going to say was positive or negative, "Firstly: This could have ended bad for both of you" - her mimic turned serious and slightly mad - " Without any weapons you tried to subdue a suspect, and this way he could've killed both of you! Instead he killed himself and took a fellow Agent along. If you had attacked him, you may could've stopped him."

Rubys glanced at the ground, ashamed of herself.

"But, in the end, you stopped a murderer from continuing his spree. Even though we lost an Agent, your reports suggest that she might been a danger to our operation. I'll accept those mistakes as initial problems. You've done a great job figuring out who did it, even though you had no lead at all. Well done."

As Rubys view detached from the ground, she saw that Celestia was smiling at them, and Twilight seemed happy herself.

"I-", Ruby broke the lofty silence, "I'm gonna get some breakfast. Want to join me, Twilight?"

"I'm gonna catch up. Go ahead."

Looking back over her shoulder Ruby went out of the door and left the princesses alone.

"Celestia", the muzzle of the pony Twilight was addressing became serious again, "I want to move this operation to Ponyville. To my Castle. I want my own lab, my own equipment."

Heading left after she left the lab and running up a flight of stairs, Ruby got to the canteen of the Castle. This was the place where political and honour guests ate. But the breakfast they served here was terrible.

Ruby got a plate of lettuce with a bit of cream dressing. There were tiny bits of carrots underneath the lettuce leaves. She sat down at a bench near the entrance and started to eat.

A few minutes later Twilight joined her, she was smiling brightly as she stole a leave of lettuce from Rubys plate.

"We're going to move. CERU is going to settle in Ponyville. D-do you want to help me move stuff?", Twilight asked her.

"Do I really have to?", Ruby asked mockingly, she'd help, of course.

So they talked and laughed and ate breakfast together. Once they got up and Ruby returned her plate they headed for the exit. Twilight tipped her shoulder and told her to stop a moment.

"I think I know why he didn't try to kill us.", Twilights face became very serious. All the laughter was long gone as it seemed.

"Why?"

"He couldn't. The ponies need to love each other. That was his moral, I guess. Á la 'take my heart, I take yours'. He smiled till the pain got to him. He was happy having her heart inside of him."

Outside of the store "Garden of Gerasenes - Seeds of Love" stood a brown Stallion, he glanced inside of the closed store.

Soft but determined steps lead him towards the door that said "Closed", and he reached for the handle, tried to open the door, without success. He reached for his side bag and got out a key, he unlocked the door and went inside.

Out of the same side bag he took a kind of recording device and hit the round, red button. The device started to rattle quietly as it started to operate.

"I'm at Subjects Five-point-Nines store. It seems cleared up. As far as our intelligence suggests Subject Five-point-Nine had a final body count of 8, including himself. Unfortunately the police figured out his involvement in our operation, yet, their report suggest no further intel."

The Stallion went behind the counter and tapped on it. It answered with a blunt noise as soon as his hoof hit the wood. He repeated the progress on multiple locations on the counter.

"The reports suggest that a yet unknown unit, called CERU, was involved in solving this case. Additional research was ordered."

At last, he found a location where the wood sounded hollow, and he took out a small piece of a crystal and pressed its tip onto that hollow part. A petty flame ignited the wood of the counter, and burned a hole into it, big enough to reach through it. He waited for the hole to widen.

"Right now I am retrieving the last bit of the documents that confirm our involvement, along as with the outcome of the experiments that he supervised."

Once the hole was big enough he reached in an retrieved a brown, unmarked folder. After he did that he stopped the recording and threw the crystal on the ground. He left the shop and walked away calmly. The crystal exploded and the fire spread. Consuming the store, consuming the evidence that remained unseen to that point.

Later, official reports will suggest that the fire originated because of malfunctioning devices in the apartment above the store.

Qbrf fur xabj?