1- The Sociopath in the Castle
Author's Note
Just a short notice, the Sherlock Holes present in this story is a slight adaptation of the one which appears in BBCs Sherlock series. If you haven't watched it, do not worry. There will not be any spoilers.
1- The Sociopath in the Castle
Bang!
Twilight awoke with a start. What was that? An explosion?
Bang!
Twilight leaped out of bed, quickly throwing on a dressing gown and ran out of her bedroom.
Bang!
It was coming from inside her castle, somewhere. Opening every door, the noise kept growing louder.
Bang!
A sound of something shattering soon followed, one of the countless expensive vases, no doubt.
Bang!
The final door opened.
Standing in the centre of the room was a dark blue earth pony stallion, a head of curled hair. He was wearing a black coat, down to just above his ankles, a plain black t shirt underneath. A light blue scarf was wrapped around his face. A strange device was held in his right hand, outstretched at arm's length.
"Who are you and what are you doing?" Twilight demanded the mysterious figure.
"I'm Bored!" The stallion moaned quite loudly. "Wait, you're not Mrs. Hudson. Definitely not John."
The stallion removed his scarf and glanced over at the door.
"Wait, you're covered in fur. And you're purple. Definitely a librarian, just got out of bed by the look of your hair. Seem to stay around fire a lot, slightly singed fur. Rather rich, judging by the fabric of your dressing gown. Where am I, who are you and what, exactly?"
Twilight could only stand, open mouthed. After a few moments,she managed to ask, "How did you know all that about me?"
"I thought I made my observations quite clear." The stallion stated, looking over Twilight with a curious expression. "I suppose I should introduce myself. Sherlock Holmes, consulting detective."
"Twilight Sparkle, princess of friendship." Twilight replied. She looked over at the wall. "You never did answer what you were doing."
"Princess of friendship. Are you serious?" Sherlock asked, a small grin forming on his face. He then cleared his throat, "Seems I got a few bullets in your wall. I could swear I was in Baker Street a moment ago. Would you mind telling me where I wound up now?"
Twilight raised an eyebrow at how casually he brought up damaging her wall, but decided to answer his questions anyway. "You are in Equestria, more specifically, Ponyville."
"Equestria? Ponyville? Am I in the land of terrible horse-related puns?" Sherlock asked, placing the contraption in his hand into his coat pocket before raising his hands to tie his scarf around his neck, noticing his hands. "Why are my hands blue and covered in fur?"
Twilight cast an inquisitive glare at the stallion. "You mean you weren't originally a pony?"
"A pony? This is not a pony, this is some strange combination of human and horse. If only John were here. He is more savvy in terms of things circulating the internet."
"You're a psychopath, you know that right? Damaging the property of others, claiming to be some other species I've never heard of," Twilight began, but she was cut off by the stallion who moved toward her.
"I'll have you no I am no psychopath. I am a high-functioning sociopath." Sherlock stated, looking towards the door as what appeared to be a young boy rushed in through the door.
"Twilight! Are you okay? I heard a lot of baning and a vase shattering." Spike questioned, almost breathlessly. "I thought something- wait, who's this?"
"This, Spike, is Sherlock Holmes. He seems to be as surprised as we are at his sudden appearance." Twilight replied, looking back over at the self-proclaimed detective was looking over spike.
"Let's see. Young, quite young. Probably only a child though maybe a young teenager. His clothes give off the same impression of being near fire quite a bit, and being rather careless. That letter in your hand seems to be quite important, sealed and everything." Sherlock thought out loud, speaking directly to Spike and raising his voice slightly when referencing the letter.
"Spike, what is that letter?" Twilight asked, only now seeing the envelope clutched in Spike's hand.
Spike looked at the letter, for seemingly no particular reason as the name was on the other side of the envelope. "It's from Ember. I says it's urgent but addressed specifically to you, Twilight."
"Who is this 'Ember'? I gather she is probably another with significant wealth due to the fact the letter is sealed with melted wax. Say, that wax is rather fresh. If they live close enough to deliver the letter with freshly melted wax, why on Earth would you send a letter?" Sherlock questioned.
"You see, Mr. Holmes, we in Equestria and a few other nations have sources of magic. Dragons are, strangely, capable of sending letters rather quickly between each other." Twilight explained.
"Hold on for a moment, did you just say 'dragons'? This is getting more absurd by the minute! This must just be some strange part of my mind palace, or a really strange dream, this surely cannot be real!" Sherlock exclaimed, the other two in the room staring at him, almost worriedly, before Spike passed Twilight the letter and opened it up, reading its content.
A few moments passed in silence, Twilight reading, Sherlock examining different mundane aspects of the room, mundane except for the walls, that is, and Spike watching with curiosity what the detective did.
"Um, Sherlock, if I may call you that, you are a detective right?" Twilight asked after placing down the letter.
"Yes, I'm quite sure both of us have confirmed that already." Sherlock replied, matter-of-factly.
"Well, if you wouldn't mind, we may need your help, there has just been a robbery." Twilight said, her voice having a rather large amount of hope.
"Not my job, I handle proper cases." Sherlock retorted.
"Well, you see, it was the theft of a powerful artefact, a very powerful artefact which gives the user control over dragons."
Sherlock stood still for a moment, staring out of a window at the sky beyond. "Let's go. Fill me in on the details on the way there."
"So let me get this straight," Sherlock began, "These dragons are ruled over by a 'Dragon Lord', who is in charge due to a scepter, and these dragons have a tournament after the reign of the previous 'Dragon Lord' to find the next. The last of these happened only a week ago, and this scepter has already been stolen?" he added.
The group, now consisting of four as Starlight Glimmer had joined them, were sitting in a train carriage, heading towards the nearest station to the dragon lands.
"That's the brief anyways." Twilight responded, watching the detective study his 'gun' as he had explained it to be.
"I'm still surprised that I am expected to understand this world." Sherlock stated plainly.
"Well, we don't know what world you come from, so we can't explain things any better." Starlight interjected.
"Yes, I understand that." Sherlock stated, standing up and aiming his gun out of the window. He then lowered it and began pacing, his hands forming a triangle under his chin.
The train soon came to a halt and the four left the train. What Sherlock wasn't expecting to see was a woman, probably young twenties, with dark blue hair falling down to her back and pale blue skin which looked as strange as some of those scale-like tattoos, except they covered her entire body. Her eyes were a piercing orange, so harsh it made even Sherlock squirm somewhat. She was wearing a golden suit of armour, amplifying her menacing appearance. A pair of wings sprouted out of her back, reminding Sherlock of bat wings.
"Dragon Lord Ember, I presume?" Sherlock asked. "I can make quite a few deductions, but based on what I have recently learned it would make no sense to state them aloud."
"Yes. Spike and Twilight, I assume this is mister Sherlock Holmes?" Ember asked, receiving a nod from Spike. "He is as... strange as you said in your letter."
"I'll need you to recount any and all information about this case and show me where the crime took place." Sherlock stated, taking a notepad out of his pocket as well as a pen.
"Of course." Ember replied.
The case was thus:
The night before, Ember had put the scepter in a secured location, in a place only she, Spike and Twilight knew of. To secure it even more, Twilight had helped Ember by using a magical lock, allowing only a select few to open it with direct contact. Ember then headed off to go to sleep, and awoke a few hours later to find someone had broken in to her place of residence and the scepter was missing.
After arriving, Sherlock examined that there were shards of different materials, scattered about, including bone, glass, gems and paper. The gems and paper made sense, due to revelations to Sherlock that dragons ate gems and the fact that Ember was writing letters to Twilight. Glass could exist as Ember was a dragon, and there were sand deposits nearby, so its possible that she brought some in with her. The bone was not so easily explained, so Sherlock made sure to pocket a few of the shards before continuing his examination.
His next points of interest were possible entrances for outsiders. The main entrance had not been disturbed at the moment Ember had woken up, but now there were scratch marks on the outside wall around the entrance. There was a strange trail of scratch marks, leading directly from the entrance to the hidden location of the scepter, though yet again, Sherlock may have had to discard this as Ember was a dragon/ That one fact was making this case trickier than it actually was.
Twilight and Starlight were sweeping over the area, checking for any recent magical disturbance, which there was not, but there was a faint trail of some magic from near Ember's bed, which seemed to be a bit off as the dragon was unable to wield magic herself.
Once magic was brought into the equation, Sherlock felt completely lost. He decided to pass on the magical side to Twilight while he handled the physical elements.
A few scraps of cloth, a different colour to the garments either of them wore or Ember owned, so he recorded that and pocketed some of the fabric. It was a deep purple in colour and quite thin. Hints of gold could be seen on just one edge. Twilight had mentioned something about a friend of hers who could probably identify a good idea as to where it could have come from, which was a relief.
A mere moment after the discovery of the fabrics, Ember collapsed onto the floor, obviously in quite a large amount of pain. The group removed her armour and Sherlock, being behind her, had his attention drawn to a scar, going most of the distance between her two shoulders. A small section had reopened, new blood beginning to run down her back.
"Don't move." Sherlock commanded. "Spike, I need you to write a letter immediately to the nearest health center. It seems Ember here has suffered quite a large wound. Twilight and Starlight, go. Both of you. Spike, stay here. You're a dragon, you could probably help."
The two unicorns immediately ran off and Spike began consoling the injured dragonness. Sherlock, on the other hand, was discretely gathering a small blood sample onto a handkerchief and pocketed it, without Spike nor Ember noticing.
"This may give us a vital hint. Ember, I know you're in pain right now, but I need you to think. Why did you wake up early this morning, and make sure you remember exactly what you saw." Sherlock commanded, using an emergency set of bandages he kept on his person to help stop the blood flow.
Sherlock then made his way back over to where the scepter was hidden and took a scrap of gem which was hidden inside. The description of the scepter included a gemstone, and this may have chipped off during the theft. All he needed now was to take samples of both Spike and Twilight to rule out those who had easy access. This case was going to be a long one.
