Maretropolis

by Commissioner-Y

Rating: mature
Tags: Adventure, Prince Blueblood, Coloratura, Profanity, Violence, Alternate Universe, Human, Iron Will, Applejack, Drama, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Mystery, Spike
Length: 35931

When citizens start mysteriously disappearing from the city of Maretropolis, a police officer teams up with a smooth-talking criminal to set things right.

Applejack Smith is an upstanding police officer fresh out of the academy. Spike Drake is a smooth-talking criminal who lives by his wits in the city of Maretropolis. Against all odds, these two team up on a case that turns out to be a bigger mystery than either one could ever have guessed.

Story edited by CartoonNerd12 and cover art by TheBrokenCOG.

Published 2018-02-28 15:20:07 UTC
Last updated 2018-02-28 15:20:07 UTC

Dreams and Bullies

Author's Note

Before you begin reading, I can not stress enough that this story is a parody. There will be some hits and misses like characters acting OOC and some of the chapters being pretty cut and dry, but I tried to make this as different from the original as possible.

Dreams and Bullies

The ancient sounds of wild animals echoed through the large barn at Sweet Apple Acres. A little blonde, human girl in a faded dress, named Applejack Smith, appeared on a makeshift stage, trying to find her way through a papier-mâché and cardboard jungle. Her voice rang out loud and clear.

“Fear. Treachery. Bloodlust.”

“Thousands of years ago, these were the forces that ruled the world. A dangerous world. A world where humans were scared of mythical creatures. And those creatures had an uncontrollable biological urge to maim and maul.”

Suddenly, a boy in a Manticore costume leapt from the shadows and “mauled” Applejack.

“Blood! Blood! Blood!” she screamed as she crumpled under the “attack.”

The audience gasped as the gyrating girl reached for a hidden bottle which squirted out red liquid seemingly from her stomach.

“And death,” she groaned.

As Applejack pretended to expire, her parents, Bright Mac and Buttercup, who were watching from the audience, looked concerned.

After a long and drawn-out moment of terrible silence, followed by some dramatic drumming, Applejack stood up, faced the audience, and smiled as she continued her monologue. A banner reading Smith Family Reunion Talent Show hung over the stunned crowd.

“Back then, the world was divided in two. Mythical creatures and humans,”

Two cardboard boxes dropped down from the ceiling. The first, labeled Mythical Creatures in red crayon, landed on top of the boy in the Manticore costume, and the second, labeled Humans in blue crayon, landed on Applejack.

“But over time, they evolved. And moved beyond their primitive, savage ways,” she went on.

A young human boy wearing a white robe did an improvisational dance across the stage. The boxes were raised, and Applejack and the other boy reappeared wearing white robes too.

“Now, mythical creatures, their hybrid descendants, and humans live in harmony,”

Applejack and the hybrid boy shook hands as the human boy sprinkled them with glitter.

“And every child, human and hybrid, has infinite opportunities,” she said.

“I don’t have to run and hide anymore,” said the human boy. He ripped off his robe, revealing a homemade spacesuit. “Instead, I can be an astronaut.”

“I don’t have to be a lonely hunter like my ancestors,” said the hybrid boy, showing a business suit under his robe. “Today, I can hunt for tax exemptions. I am going to be actuary!”

Applejack’s grandmother, Granny Smith, played a patriotic tune on the piano.

“And no longer do I have to blindly serve the almighty apple!” Applejack declared. “I can make the world a better place—saving lives and defending the defenseless! I am going to be...” She ripped off her robe and stood in a blue uniform. “A police officer!”

A nasty teenager snickered and mocked her from the audience.

“That is the stupidest thing I ever heard,” he laughed.

Applejack heard his remark.

“It may seem impossible to small minds,” she replied. “I’m looking at you, Garble.”

The audience chuckled as a backdrop showing a bright city skyline unrolled behind Applejack.

“But, just 211 miles away stands the great city of Maretropolis! Where our ancestors first joined together in peace and declared that, ‘Anyone Can Be Anything!’”

Granny Smith finished off with a bit of organ music and Applejack proudly bowed, as if she had just given the performance of her life. Dutiful applause came from the audience, including her parents.

“Thank you and good night!” Applejack declared.

Later, Applejack, still wearing her police costume, excitedly exited the barn with her parents.

Outside, the Smith Family Reunion and Cider Festival was in full swing as everyone enjoyed food, games and dancing.

The Smith family were the finest seed collectors in all Equestria. They settled on the edge of the Everfree Forest and planted an apple orchard. And as the fruits of their labor multiplied, people from all over came just to get a taste of those apples, until finally, a little town began to take form.

A little town called Ponyville.

The Smiths’ house and barn were at least a hundred years old, but they were both well maintained despite surviving numerous blazing summers and harsh winters. Now before we go any further, another little history lesson.

After fighting to a standstill following years of conflict, a human tribe and a dragon horde joined together, creating a larger horde to the terror of the other tribes. When this alliance was officially sealed via marriages, the dragons polymorphed into humanoid form, mated with the humans, and the first generation of half-dragon offspring were born.

It was often told that those humans’ bravery saved humanity: if it hadn’t been for them, the dragons would have wiped out the humans.

Human ancestry was no blemish against the half-dragons—provided they were every bit as tough and strong as their full-blooded kin. Half-dragons who were weaker than their full-blooded comrades didn’t last long among the tribes. But it was often true that a bit of human blood gave a warrior just the right mix of cunning, ambition and self-discipline to go far.

Some of those half-dragons rose to become the leaders of the surrounding dragon tribes, their human blood giving them an edge over their full-blooded rivals. Others ventured into the world to prove their worth among the humans. Many of these became adventurers, achieving greatness for their mighty deeds and notoriety for their barbaric customs and savage fury.

But Applejack wasn’t thinking about how her hometown was founded or about some ancient folk tale. Her mind was filled with her dream of becoming police officer.

“Applejack,” her grandfather, Grand Pear, said, “you ever wonder how your mom and dad got to be so happy?”

“Nnnope,” Applejack answered.

“Well, they gave up on their dreams and they settled. Right, Pear Butter?”

“Oh, yes, that’s right, Dad,” Applejack’s mother replied. “We settled hard.”

“See, that’s the beauty of complacency, AJ,” Grand Pear said. “If you don’t try anything new, you’ll never fail.”

“I like tryin’,” AJ said.

“What your grandpa means, Sugarcube, is it’s gonna be difficult, hard for you to become a police officer,” Buttercup told her daughter.

“There’s never been a cop in our family,” said Bright Mac.

“Never,” Buttercup said.

“Never,” Bright Mac repeated. “Smiths don’t do that.”

“Oh. Then, I guess I’ll have to be the first one!” AJ said brightly as she parkoured against a fence. “Because I am gonna make the world a better place.”

“You want to talk about making the world a better place, no better way to do it than becoming an apple farmer,” said Bright Mac.

“Yes!” Buttercup exclaimed. “Your dad, me, your brother, your two dozen cousins—we’re changing the world one apple at a time.”

“Amen to that,” Bright Mac said. “Apple farming is a noble profession.”

“Mm-hmm,” Buttercup added.

But Applejack had stopped paying attention to her parents. She had heard this kind of talk many times before. Ever since she was little, Applejack knew she was different from the rest of her family. She didn’t want to grow apples. She wanted to make the world a better place for people to live in. And she couldn’t do that if she followed the family tradition and became an apple farmer.

Suddenly, she spotted Garble out of the corner of her eye... and he was following Braeburn, Sunflower, and Sunflower’s younger sister, Babs.

Trouble.

And so, she went after him.

“It’s great to have dreams,” Buttercup admitted.

“Yeah. Just as long as you don’t believe in them too much,” Grand Pear continued as he looked around for his granddaughter, who had vanished.

“Where did she go?” Bright Mac asked.

Applejack got closer and saw Garble and his pals, Fume and Clump, doing what they did best—bullying.

“Give me your tickets right now, or I’m gonna kick your butt!” Garble said, giving Sunflower a shove.

“Ow!” Sunflower yelped. “Cut it out, Garble!”

Garble took Sunflower’s tickets and smacked her with them before stuffing them into his pocket.

“What are you gonna do? Cry?” he mocked.

“Hey!” Applejack shouted. “You heard her. Cut it out.”

“Nice costume, loser,” Garble said with a laugh. “What kind of crazy world are you living in where you think a farmer could be a cop?”

“Give my cousins their tickets back,” Applejack said firmly.

“Come and get ‘em,” he dared her. “But watch out, because I’m part Dragon, and like you said in your dumb little play, my ancestors used to eat yours. And that killer instinct is still in our ‘Dunnahh.’”

“I’m pretty sure that’s pronounced, ‘DNA,’” whispered one of Garble’s pals.

“Don’t tell me what I clearly already know, Fume!” Garble replied, irritated.

“You don’t scare me, Garble,” Applejack said.

Garble shoved Applejack so hard that she fell to the ground, knocking her hat off her head.

“You scared now?” he asked cruelly.

“Look at her,” Fume said mockingly, noticing Applejack’s watery eyes. “She is scared!”

“Cry little girl. Cry--” Garble taunted.

Before Garble could say another word, Applejack kicked him in the face, making his nose bleed. AJ’s three cousins gasped and cowered behind a tree.

“Oh, you don’t know when to quit, do you?” Garble asked as he pulled out his switchblade.

Applejack gasped as the blade popped out and she screamed as it dug into her skin.

She felt her slashed cheek (thankfully, the blade hadn’t gone deep) and Garble pinned her down with his hand.

“I want you to remember this moment the next time you think you will ever be anything more than just a stupid apple-farming, dumb girl!”

Garble high-fived his sidekicks and walked away, laughing, leaving Applejack in the dirt. She got up, wiped the blood off her cheek with the back of her hand, and glared at the bullies’ backs as her cousins hurried up to her.

“That looks bad,” said Braeburn.

“Are you okay, Applejack?” asked Sunflower.

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m okay,” she said as she pulled something out of her pocket. “Here ya go.”

It was the tickets that Garble had stolen.

“Wow! You got our tickets!” Sunflower exclaimed.

“You’re awesome, cuz!” Braeburn said.

“Yeah, that Garble doesn’t know what he’s talkin’ about!” Babs added.

“Well, he was right about one thing,” Applejack said as she slapped her cowboy hat on top of her head. “I don’t know when to quit!”

The Police Academy

Fifteen years later...

Applejack was a cadet at the Maretropolis Police Academy.

“Listen up, cadets!” the drill sergeant shouted. “Maretropolis has 12 unique boroughs within its city limits. Dragontown, Celestia Square, Everfree District, to name a few. You are going to have to master all of them before you hit the streets, or guess what? You’ll be dead!”

Applejack worked her tail off at the Academy. Yet despite years of working on her family’s farm, the physical training was the toughest part. She had to get through obstacle courses and simulators that mimicked all the boroughs that made up the city, each with its own set of unique challenges.

And while she may not have been as big, as strong, or as fast as some of the other cadets, she was strong-willed.

“Scorching heat!”

Applejack grunted as she was buried under the sand.

“You’re dead, Blondie Bumpkin!” the drill sergeant shouted. “One thousand-foot drops!”

“Whoa!” AJ exclaimed as she fell, face first, into the mud below.

“You’re dead, Freckle Face!” the sergeant shouted. “Frigid ice walls!”

Applejack tried to scale the wall, but she slipped and fell into the icy water.

“You’re dead, Farm Girl!”

Applejack put on a pair of gloves and started sparring in the boxing ring.

“Enormous criminals!”

She ran at her opponent, a fellow cadet named Bulk Biceps, and he knocked her clear across the ring with one punch.

“You’re dead!”

Everything from tripping on the tire drill, to getting her ponytail caught in a car door, losing her grip on the cross bars, and plummeting after climbing up the rope, Applejack fell more than anyone else.

“Dead, dead, dead!”

At the end of the day, Applejack trudged into the bathroom and walked over to the sink.

She turned on the faucet and splashed cold water on her face, then she felt someone yank her ponytail from behind and hold a knife to her throat. She looked in the mirror and saw that it was her drill sergeant.

“Assault in a public restroom,” she said, letting her go. “You’re dead, Apple-Butt!”

Day after day, for four weeks, Applejack could hear the voices of her drill sergeant, her family, and Garble all in her mind, doubting that she could succeed.

“Just give up and go home, Smith!”

“There’s never been a cop in our family,”

“Never,”

“Never,”

“Just a stupid, apple-farming, dumb girl!”

And it was those voices that made Applejack work harder and harder.

At night, after everyone else had gone to sleep, Applejack worked out while she read her course work. Through persistence and perseverance, she managed to not only keep up with but surpass her fellow cadets.

In the final weeks of training, Applejack proved her worth. She sprinted past everyone on the obstacle course, and her drill sergeant grinned admiringly as she watched Applejack hop onto the ice wall and vault over the top with ease.

Finally, Applejack took Bulk Biceps on for their final sparring session. And this time, after dodging his wild swings, she punched him in the mouth, knocking his mouth guard across the ring. He spun around in a daze and thudded to the floor.

She had knocked him out!

On graduation day, Applejack took her place among the other graduates during the ceremony. She looked over at her drill sergeant, who was sporting a fat lip and a black eye from when she tried her “bathroom assault” test on Applejack a second time.

Vladimir Blueblood stepped up to the podium. He was a man of about forty, lean and fit, with long blond hair. He was maybe an inch over six feet and a pound under two hundred. He was dressed in a dark blue suit with a white shirt and a blue tie, and his eyes were also blue.

Blue was his color, no doubt about it.

“As Mayor of Maretropolis,” he began, “I am proud to announce that my Mortal Inclusion Initiative has produced its first police academy graduate. The valedictorian of her class, MPD Officer Applejack Smith.”

As Applejack strode across the stage, her huge family clapped proudly. The loudest applause came from her parents. Even her father sobbed.

“Assistant Mayor Inkwell,” Blueblood said to a pale, raven-haired woman in a black pants suit and glasses after he handed Applejack her diploma, “her badge.”

“Oh, yes. Right!” she said as she stepped forward and pinned a badge onto Applejack’s uniform.

“Thank you,” Blueblood said. “Applejack, it is my great privilege to officially assign you to the heart of Maretropolis: Precinct One. City Center.”

As the audience cheered, Applejack’s parents, her grandfather, and some of her cousins looked worried.

“Congratulations, Officer Smith,” Assistant Mayor Raven Inkwell said.

“I won’t let you down, Ma’am,” Applejack stated. “This has been my dream since I was a kid,” she added in a whisper.

“Well, it’s a real proud day for all of us,” Inkwell whispered in reply.

“Come on, Inkwell, make room, will you?” Mayor Blueblood asked, smiling broadly. “Okay, Officer Smith. Let’s see those teeth!”

“Officer Smith, right here!”

“Look this way, please!”

“Hold still. Smile!”

As Applejack and Blueblood posed for the cameras, Inkwell snuck into the photo next to Applejack.

Days later, Applejack’s parents, grandparents and siblings, along with several of her cousins, accompanied her to the train station.

“We’re real proud of you, Applejack,” Bright Mac said.

“Yeah. Scared, too,” Grand Pear chuckled nervously.

“Yes,” Buttercup added.

“It’s kind of a combination of the two,” Granny Smith said. “I mean, Maretropolis is such a big city and it’s so far away.”

“Guys, I’ve been working for this my whole life,” Applejack told them, trying to hide how thrilled she really was.

“We know,” Buttercup said. “And we’re excited for you, but terrified.”

“‘The only thing we have to fear is fear itself,’” Applejack quoted.

Granny Smith nodded in agreement.

“And Ursas,” Grand Pear said. “We have Ursas to fear. To say nothing of Manticores, Chimeras, Timberwolves...”

“Timberwolves?” Buttercup repeated, perplexed.

“Draconequuses,” Big Macintosh added. “Draconequai?”

“You play Ogres and Oubliettes with a Draconequus,” Buttercup reminded her son.

“Eeyup, and he cheats like there’s no tomorrow,” Big Macintosh told her.

Applejack sighed.

“You know what, pretty much all hybrids descended from mythical creatures,” Grand Pear said. “And Maretropolis is full of ‘em!”

“Oh, Dad!” Buttercup exclaimed.

“And Dragons are the worst!” he stated.

Buttercup wanted to argue with her father, but after hearing the world “Dragons,” she winced.

“Actually, your grandpa does have a point there,” she agreed. “It’s in their DNA. You remember what happened with Garble.”

“When I was nine. Garble was a jerk who just happens to be a Dragon. I know plenty of humans who are jerks,”

“Sure, we all do,” her father agreed. “Absolutely.”

“But just in case...” Grand Pear said as he held up a bag. “We made ya a little care package to take with ya.”

“Mmm-hmm,” Granny nodded. “Your ma and I put a pie in there.”

Grand Pear reached into the bag and pulled out a pink canister that looked like an air horn.

“This is Dragon Deterrent,” he explained, holding it up.

“Yeah, that’s safe to have,” Bright Mac mumbled sarcastically.

“This is Dragon Repellent,” Grand Pear went on, holding up a canister of what looked like pepper spray.

“Okay, the deterrent and the repellent. That’s all she needs,” Buttercup said, trying to stop her father from going overboard.

“Check this out!” he said as he pulled out a Taser and turned it on, causing it to sizzle.

Applejack gasped.

“Oh, for goodness sake, Dad!” Buttercup exclaimed. “She knows five different forms of martial arts; she has no need for a Taser!”

“Oh, come on. When is there ever not a need for a Taser?” he asked.

“Okay,” Applejack said as she grabbed the can of repellant. “I will take this, to make you stop talking!”

“Great!” Grand Pear said. “Everybody wins!”

“Oh, and this,” Bright Mac added.

He held up an ordinary-looking pen and clicked a button on the side of it.

“We love you, honey,” he said.

He clicked another button on the pen and a recording of his voice played from a speaker inside.

“We love you, honey,”

“It’s not much,” he admitted. “Just a little something for quick reminders.”

“Thanks, Dad,” Applejack said.

“Arriving, Maretropolis Express!” the stationmaster announced as the train approached.

“Okay, gotta go! Bye!” Applejack said as she headed for the train.

“Bye, Applejack!” her cousins called after her.

Bright Mac and Buttercup held back tears as they watched their daughter race onboard. Applejack sighed to herself before jumping back out to give her parents, grandparents, and siblings a hug. They all wrapped their arms around her.

“I love you guys,” she sighed before kissing her parents on the cheek.

After one last hug, AJ jumped back onto the train.

“Love you, too,” Buttercup breathed as Bright Mac sniffled. “Oh, Mac, pull it together.”

Applejack stood close to the door window as her family watched her go. As the train pulled out of the station, Apple Bloom ran alongside it, waving and shouting goodbye.

“Bye, everybody!” Applejack shouted.

“Bye-bye, AJ!” Apple Bloom called. “I love you!”

Apple Bloom ran, keeping her big sister in her sights for as long as she could, until she reached the end of the platform. When the faces of her family faded into the distance, Applejack climbed to the observation deck and took a deep breath, feeling like her life was about to begin.

First Day on the Force

At the sound of her morning alarm, Applejack silenced it. Then she sprang out of bed and whipped on her uniform. She washed, brushed, and rinsed. Then she put on her bulletproof vest, pinned on her badge (briefly shining it one more time after she did so), and strapped on her belt. She was ready to protect and serve! She grabbed her keys and glanced at the spray can of Dragon Repellant sitting on the table, then walked out, leaving it behind.

But after a moment, she reopened the door, reached back into the room, and grabbed it—just in case.

Applejack left her apartment and headed toward the Maretropolis Police Department for her first day on the job. The MPD had a whole city block to itself. The building occupied most of it and there was a C-shaped parking lot on the rest of it for their vehicles. There were black-and-white squad cars, practically brand new, as well as unmarked detective cars of various colors, a crime scene van, and a SWAT truck, all slotted in at angles. The building itself was made of glazed tan brick. It had a flat roof and a massive badge hung above the front entrance, with a long marble lintel crisply engraved: City of Maretropolis Police Headquarters.

Applejack walked up to the revolving door of the big and tall building. She pushed on it and it sucked against the rubber seals.

Her eyes widened as she entered the chaotic lobby. Big burly cops pushed criminals through, to the holding cells, as people rushed around in every direction.

“Come on!” one of the perpetrators shouted. “He pulled his knife first!”

Applejack dodged a few husky officers before finally making her way to the reception desk. A giggly, friendly-looking girl in uniform with raspberry hair and blue eyes sat behind it, munching on a piece of cake.

“Mmm, mmm, mmm, mmm, mmm!” she moaned.

Applejack smiled at her as she approached.

“Excuse me. Hi,” she interrupted the friendly officer’s eating.

“O-M-Goodness! They really did hire you!” she said as she put down her cake and held out her hand for Applejack to shake.

She smiled as she spoke, not just with her mouth, but her eyes too. And her eyes, even though they were blue, were like a welcome blast of sunshine on a rotten afternoon.

“Welcome to the MPD. I’m Officer Pie. What’s buzzin’, cousin?”

Applejack winced.

“You probably didn’t know this, but if we were family, close family, we could call each other ‘cousin’, but if you do it, and we’re not, it’s a little...”

The pink-haired officer gasped.

“I am so sorry! Me, Pinkamena Diane Pie, the girl everyone writes off as a hyperactive, cake-loving airhead stereotyping you. Oh...”

“Oh, it’s okay. Uh, you’ve got a little something in your hair,”

Pinkie reached up and removed a small cupcake from one of her curly locks.

“Oh! There you went, you little dickens!” she said to the cupcake before she joyfully crammed it into her mouth. “Mmm.”

“I should get to roll call,” Applejack said. “Which way...?”

“Oh, Bullpen’s over there to the left,” Pinkie said, her mouth still full of cupcake.

“Great. Thank you!” Applejack said as she hurried off.

“Aw, that poor girl’s gonna get eaten alive,” Pinkie said, watching her go.

Applejack walked down a corridor and into a large open-plan squad room. It was full of noise and men and women in uniform. Most had mugs of coffee, and many were reading the bulletins, making notes, and/or cleaning their weapons.

Some were young, some were old, some were neat, some were a mess. It was easy enough to pick out the new hires from the veterans. A real mixed bunch. But most of them were human, and it was easy to see the friction between them and the hybrids.

Applejack was well aware of the commotion that Mayor Blueblood’s Inclusion Initiative had caused... particularly in the MPD. Unit cohesion had been disrupted, and professionalism had been compromised. Us and them. But old or new, human or hybrid, they were all punctual.

She passed two hybrid officers that were arm wrestling while the others were getting ready to head out for the day. Many of them towered over her, but she didn’t mind.

She took her seat and extended her hand to a gigantic officer whose name badge read McHale. He was big as well as tall, not fat, but athletic, with only a little stubble on his chin, arms like those of a longshoreman (not as big as Bulk Biceps’, but close), and the tiny metal stripes that stuck through the fabric on both peaks of his shirt collar indicated that he was a Sergeant.

One of the veterans.

“Howdy. Officer Smith,” she introduced herself. “Ya ready to make the world a better place?”

McHale snorted and reluctantly gave her fist a bump, nearly knocking her off her chair.

“Ten-hut!” one of the officers, whose name badge read McRae, shouted.

The Police Chief, a gruff Minotaur hybrid named Iron Will, entered the room. He was wearing blue flannel pants and a blue short-sleeve shirt, open neck, no tie. He looked like he had been a cop since birth. Maybe even since the moment of his conception. Like it was in his blood, his DNA.

Everyone instantly fell in line and started stomping on the floor.

“Hut! Hut! Hut!” they all chanted.

“All right. All right! Everybody sit,” said Iron Will.

They stopped chanting and sat down.

“I’ve got three items on the docket,” he began. “First... we need to acknowledge the Buffalo in the room.”

He nodded toward one of the lady officers. She was short, thin, dark, and lovely. Just like her ancestors who had roamed the Plains before her.

“Little Strongheart,” the Chief said. “Happy birthday.”

She blushed as the other officers clapped and hooted, congratulating her.

“Number two. There are some new recruits with us that I should probably introduce, but I’m not going to because, like Clark Stable in Gone with the Wind, ‘frankly, I don’t give a damn,’”

All the officers, even Applejack, snickered as Iron Will moved toward a map on the wall behind him.

“Finally,” he said, gesturing to the pushpin-covered map, “we have fourteen Missing Persons cases, people. Fourteen! Most of them hybrids, ranging from two known members of the Dragon Mafia to a 52-year-old retired factory worker. This is more than we’ve ever had, and City Hall is right up my butt to find every single one of them. This is priority number one. So, assignments!”

Iron Will started barking out names as he handed out case files.

“Officers Hayes, Flankmeyer, Delgado: your teams take missing persons from the Everfree District. Sergeant McHale, Sergeant O’Hara, Officers Lopes and Wolfram: your teams take Celestia Square. Officers McRae, Davidson, Strongheart: Dragontown. And finally... Officer Smith.”

Applejack sat up straight. She’d been waiting anxiously for this moment.

Her very first case.

“Parking Duty,” he said. “Dismissed!”

“Parking duty?” she repeated quietly.

She hurried after Iron Will.

“Chief!”

Iron Will turned around.

“Chief Iron Will? Sir, you said there were 14 Missing Person cases,”

“So?”

“So, I can handle one. You probably forgot, but I was top of my class at the Academy,”

“Didn’t forget. Just don’t care,”

“Sir, I’m not just some token officer,”

“Well, then writing a hundred tickets in a day should be no trouble for you,” he said as he walked out, slamming the door behind him.

Applejack stamped her foot in anger.

“A hundred tickets. I’m not gonna write 100 tickets. I’m gonna write 200 tickets!” She turned toward the closed door and added, “Before noon!”

Meter Maid Duty and Popsicles

Applejack slipped on her meter maid uniform, which was a traffic-enforcement hat and a bright orange vest, and went out to her parking cart.

It was a small, three-wheeled vehicle, painted black and white, with “Frequent Stops” printed on the back and a little red and blue light on the roof.

She climbed in, buckled up, turned the key in the ignition, moved the shifter to Drive, pressed the gas pedal down and took off... very slowly.

Applejack’s wide eyes searched everywhere as she drove down the street. Her face lit up as she slammed on the brake after spotting a parking meter that had just expired.

She parked in front of the car and slipped a ticket the under the windshield wiper just as another meter beeped and the “Expired” tab popped up.

Each time one dinged, Applejack dashed over and wrote a ticket. Her eyes and ears on full alert, she worked nonstop, ticketing vehicles of every kind.

She checked a nearby clock and stopped her ticket machine.

“Two hundred tickets before noon!” she said proudly.

She sighed as she turned to see her own vehicle parked at an expired meter, having incurred a penalty.

“Two hundred and one,” she said with a self-satisfied smile as she wrote herself a ticket.

Suddenly, the sound of a car horn and a very angry driver yelling interrupted her moment.

Applejack turned and looked across the street to see a van pull out of a garage just as a young man was crossing in front of the garage door.

“Watch where you’re going, Dragon!” the driver yelled out her window.

Applejack gasped at the sight of a young man roughly her own age, with spiked green hair, and eyed him suspiciously. The first thing she noticed was how good-looking he was. He was not handsome like a movie star, but he wasn’t ugly either. He was about six-two, maybe one-ninety, and he was fashionably dressed. He was wearing a white collared shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, under a mulberry vest, with black slacks, a black tie, and black leather shoes.

She remembered that the very first half-dragon hybrids had scales of vibrant colors that matched the colors of their dragon kin. But after looking this guy over, it seemed that generations of interbreeding had phased out most of the distinct, outward characteristics. At least to the untrained eye.

Then Applejack shook her head and scolded herself for being suspicious without reason.

But when she saw the young man glance left, then glance right, she watched as he slinked into the Crystal Empire Ice Cream Parlor.

Suspicious again, and this time with reason, Applejack scampered across the street and peeked through the window of the shop. But the young man with the green hair was nowhere to be seen.

“Where’d he go?” she whispered.

Applejack opened the door and walked into the café as one of the servers scooped ice cream and dumped it into a small sundae glass. He scooped into a pile of peanuts and slapped them on top of the ice cream, skipping the whipped cream, ending with a cherry on top.

Applejack looked around the ice cream parlor. It was small, but bright and clean. Brand-new, built to resemble a typical dwelling in the Crystal Empire (the kingdom it was named after). The ceiling was high, the floor was tiled, and the leather seats of the booths were maroon.

There were eleven customers already eating: three couples, a mom and a dad with their daughter, and two singles (one man and one woman). Two servers were working behind the counter and the owner was working the register.

Applejack spotted the young man with green hair at the front of the line and the owner, Mustafa Combe, was speaking to him.

Mustafa looked particularly perturbed.

“Listen, I don’t know what you’re doing skulking around during daylight hours,” he said, “but I don’t want any trouble in here. So, hit the road!”

Applejack unsnapped the holster on her belt containing the can of Dragon Repellant as she peered at the young man with the green hair.

He was a tall guy, that was for sure. Not as big as her brother Macintosh, but if he was a Dragon hybrid, he would probably be just as strong. And able to breathe fire, as most Dragon hybrids could.

“I’m not looking for trouble either, sir. I just want to buy a Jumbo Pop,” the young man replied, reaching behind himself, “for my sons.”

Applejack stopped and noticed a pair of adorable little boys clinging to the young man’s legs. One had opal eyes and wavy dark blue hair, and was wearing a light blue Greek-like toga and sandals. The other looked almost the same, except his eyes, hair and toga were different shades of violet.

“You want the red or the blue, boys?” the green-haired man asked his sons.

The boys waddled up to the counter and both pointed to the red popsicle while Applejack, feeling awful for jumping to conclusions, clipped her Dragon Repellant holster shut.

“Aw... I’m such a...” she whispered to herself as she turned to leave.

“Back up,” Mustafa Combe said to the boys. He turned to the green-haired young man again and asked, “What? There aren’t any Dragon ice cream joints in your part of town?”

Applejack stopped and turned to look at the men again. Some of the customers turned to look at them, too.

“Oh, no, there are. It’s just, my boys,” the young man tousled their hair. “These adorable little guys, they’re Crystals, like you. Now, could we go somewhere else? Sure. But we have come here because I want to help them learn about their heritage. And I am not going to crush their dreams. Do you want to be the one to crush their dreams, huh?”

“Look, you obviously can’t read, Dragon, so allow me the pleasure,” Mustafa Combe said, as he picked up a little sign that had been sitting on the counter next to the cash register. “‘We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone!’ So, beat it!”

“You’re holding up the line!” said an elderly woman, waiting behind them.

The little boy in blue looked as if he was about to cry.

“Uh, excuse me,” Applejack interrupted as she marched up to the counter. “Howdy.”

Spike turned and looked at her.

He had seen her across the street as soon as he stepped out of the way of the open garage door. It would have been hard not to. His glance had flicked to his right and he had seen her quite clearly. Seen her react. Seen her stop, thereby identify herself as an opponent. Maybe even a threat. But what kind?

She was a fine-looking woman. Tall and lean and young, with blonde hair pulled back in an athletic ponytail, freckles, beautiful green eyes, a face that had seen plenty of summer sun and winter wind, and she was in full uniform. A cop. But her tan, slightly Southern accent and country drawl gave her away.

A farmgirl.

Spike wanted to look at her nameplate over her bulletproof vest, but he didn’t want her to think he was looking at her breasts. And as he was watching her, and those beautiful eyes of hers, he thought that it was all a false front.

His impression was reinforced when Mustafa Combe spoke to her.

“Hey, you’re gonna have to wait your turn like everyone else, meter maid!” Mustafa told her.

“Actually, I’m an officer,” she said as she flashed her badge. “Just a quick question for ya. Are yer customers aware that they’re getting viruses, bacteria, and who know what else with their cookies and cream?”

A customer at one of the tables spat out his ice cream.

“What are you talking about?” Mustafa asked, annoyed.

“Well, correct me if I’m wrong, but unless I’m mistaken, I believe scooping ice cream with ungloved hands is a class-three health-code violation. No matter how many times you may wash and sanitize them,”

Mustafa looked back at his servers, who were wiping their hands on their aprons and looking guilty.

“Which I’d say is kind of a big deal,” AJ went on. “Now, I’d be more than happy to let ya off with a warning if ya would just glove up yer hands and finish selling this nice gentleman and his sons a... What was it?”

“A Jumbo Pop,” Spike said, smiling. “Please.”

“A Jumbo Pop. Please,” Applejack repeated firmly.

Mustafa sighed loudly and said, “Fifteen dollars.”

“Thank you so much,” the young father said. “And thank you,” he told Applejack. “Fifteen big ones coming right up.”

He dug through his pockets before stopping in disbelief.

“Oh, no. Are you kidding me? I don’t have my wallet. I’d lose my head if it wasn’t attached to me,”

He got to one knee to look his sons in the eye.

“I’m sorry, guys. Got to be about the worst birthday ever. Please don’t be mad at me,”

He leaned down to give his sons each a kiss on the forehead before he got to his feet. He took their hands, looked at Applejack and said, “Thanks for trying.”

As the young man led his sons to the door of the shop, Applejack was reminded of her father and older brother.

On hot summer days, Big Mac and Bright Mac would go to the ice cream shop in the poor part of town and buy every child they saw an ice cream cone. The way they went through life inspired Applejack to think of others and how much she could help them; even if it was just holding the door open for them.

Applejack reached into her pocket, slapped some cash on the counter and said to Mustafa, “Keep the change.”

After Mustafa gave them the Jumbo Pops, Applejack held the door as the young father and his sons exited the ice cream parlor.

“Officer, I don’t know what to say. Can I pay you back?”

“Oh, no, my treat. It just... it burns my butt to see people with such backwards attitudes toward Dragons. I just want to say you’re a great dad and a really great guy,”

“Well, that is very high praise,” he replied modestly. “It is rare that I meet a human being who is so non-patronizing. Officer...?”

“Smith,” she said, tipping her hat, not catching the sarcasm that was evident in the hybrid’s tone. “Applejack Smith. Mister...”

“Drake. Spike Drake,” he replied, shaking her hand.

Applejack bent down toward the little boys.

“And you, little guys,” she said. “You want to be Crystals when you grow up? You be Crystals. Or, if you want to be Dragons like your pa here, then be Dragons, because this is Maretropolis. Anyone can be anything.”

She placed MPD badge stickers on their chests and they smiled up at her.

“Ah, I tell them that every day,” Spike said, handing them the huge Jumbo Pops. “All right, here you go. Both hands. Both hands. Oh, look at those smiles. Those are ‘happy birthday’ smiles. Now, what do we say to the nice lady?”

“Thank you!” they both said in sweet, little voices.

“Bye, now!” Spike added.

“Goodbye!” Applejack said happily.

The three left and Applejack returned to her job with a spring in her step.

A little while later, as Applejack was writing her 262nd ticket in Celestia Square, she spotted the two Crystal boys a few blocks away. She started toward them but stopped when she realized what they were doing.

They were standing under a rain gutter, collecting red liquid into a series of jars. Meanwhile, up on the roof above them, the young man with green hair, Spike Drake, was letting Popsicle liquid drip down the gutter.

They were melting the giant Jumbo Pops she had bought for them!

Applejack furrowed her brow as she watched Spike discard the empty sticks, slide down the pipe, and carry the full jugs into the back of a waiting van.

Her eyes nearly fell out of her head when she watched them drive away. The boy in violet was in the driver’s seat, behind the wheel!

Shocked, confused and suspicious, Applejack followed the van North, into the coldest section of Maretropolis—snowy uptown. Taking cover behind a snow bank, Applejack saw the little boy in blue transform into a wolf pup and started laying pawmarks in the snow with his little paws. The other boy laid a Popsicle stick down into each mold, and then Spike filled each one with the juice from the melted Jumbo Pops to create dozens of smaller popsicles.

Applejack followed them again, this time to downtown. She watched from a road bridge and saw Spike wheel a cart of the paw-shaped popsicles for sale at marked-up prices.

As the clock struck five, the suited employees of the Maretropolis Bank filed out of the building in a single straight line.

“Popsicles!” Spike called. “Get your popsicles!”

One employee spotted Spike, and the others followed him. In an instant, the frozen treats were completely sold out!

The bankers gnawed at their popsicles and tossed the sticks into the nearby recycling bins. After they had all gone, the small door from the first bin opened, and the two curly-haired boys—who, Applejack realized, were not a pair of adorable Crystal toddlers but a pair of Changeling shapeshifters named Thorax and Pharynx—stepped out, pulling three trolleys behind them, laden with the used, pink stained sticks, which they and Spike loaded into their van. Applejack scowled as she observed their operation.

She continued to follow Spike, Thorax and Pharynx to Little Breeziea, where the three men stopped at a construction site and plopped bundles of used sticks in front of a Breezie construction worker.

“Lumber delivery,” Spike said.

“What’s with the color?” the foreman asked.

“The color? Can’t you tell? That’s red wood,” Spike answered.

Applejack growled as the construction workers hauled the sticks away and Spike accepted his payment. Later, Spike handed Thorax and Pharynx their share of the profit for their work.

“Thirty-nine and forty. There you go. Good work today, buddies,” Spike said. “What? No kiss bye-bye for daddy?” he asked jokingly as Pharynx hopped into his van, slamming the door behind him.

“You kiss me tomorrow, and I will bite your face off!” He whipped on a pair of shades and drove off. “Ciao!”

As Pharynx and Thorax drove away, Applejack appeared in front of Spike, her face burning with anger.

“Well, I stood up for you, and you lied to me. You liar!”

“It’s call a hustle, Sugar,” the Dragon replied coolly. “And I’m not the liar, here. He is,” he said, pointing her gaze down the street.

Applejack turned but saw no one there. When she turned back around, Spike was gone. Then she spotted him as he disappeared around a corner at the other end of the street.

“Hey!” she exclaimed, running to catch up to Spike as he strolled along. “All right, Slick, you’re under arrest.”

“For what, dare I ask?”

“Oh, I don’t know. How about selling food without a permit, transporting undeclared commerce across borough lines, and false advertising?”

“Permit, receipt of declared commerce,” Spike said as he showed her his documentation, “and I did not falsely advertise a thing. Have a nice day.”

“You told that Breezie the Popsicle sticks were redwood!”

“Why, yes, I did,” Spike said smugly. “‘Red wood,’ with a space in between, implying, if not stating the fact, ‘that the wood is red.’ You can’t touch me, Sugar. I’ve been doing this sort of thing since I could walk.”

“You better stop calling me Sugah,”

“I’m sorry, really I am. I just naturally assumed that you came from some little apple-choked Podunk, am I wrong?”

“Uh, no!” she replied, as if to say, ‘obviously not.’ “I grew up in Ponyville.”

“All right, stop me if this story doesn’t sound familiar,” Spike told her. “A naïve little hick from the sticks with good grades and big ideas decides one day, ‘Hey, look at me everybody, I’m gonna move to the big city where humans and hybrids live in harmony and sing “Kumbaya”!’ Only to find out, after she gets there, oh, that’s right, we still don’t get along. Boom. And that dream of becoming a big city cop? Second boom. She’s a meter maid. And boom number three, no one cares about her or her dreams. And sooner or later, those dreams die and our heroine sinks into an emotional and literal squalor living in a box under a bridge until finally she has no choice but to go back home with her cute little ponytail between her legs to become... You’re from Ponyville, is that what you said? And you have the word ‘apple’ in your name... So how about an apple farmer? That sound about right?”

Applejack stood speechless for a moment, surprised that he had figured her out so quickly. Then she scowled at being outfoxed.

“Careful,” Spike warned as a passing pedestrian almost knocked her down. “Or it won’t be just your dreams that’ll be getting crushed!”

“Hey! Hey!” Applejack shouted as she ran in front of him. “No one tells me what I can or can’t be! Especially not some jerk who never had the gumption to try to be anything more than a Popsicle hustler!”

“Look. Everyone came to Maretropolis believing that after they did, they could do whatever the Tartarus they wanted. Well, newsflash: you. Can’t!” he stated. “You can only be what everyone else sees you as: evil Dragon,” he said, pointing to himself. Then he pointed to her. “Dumb, blonde bimbo.”

“I am not a dumb. Blonde. Bimbo,” she stated.

“Yeah, and that’s not wet cement you just stepped in,” he said, pointing to the ground before walking away.

Applejack looked down to see that she was ankle-deep in freshly poured concrete.

“You will never be a real cop,” Spike said softly. “You make a great meter maid, though. Maybe a supervisor one day. Just hang in there...”

Applejack sighed in dismay. Frustrated, she watched Spike walk off. Then she set about pulling her boots out of the cement.

Applejack returned her vehicle to the MPD, fed up at being hustled by Spike. Forty-five minutes later, she was home. A long, slow trip. She dragged her feet across the welcome mat outside her apartment, the soles of her boots still rock-hard. Then she unlocked the door, opened it, and looked in to the gloomy little room, her ponytail tucked behind her back.

She closed the door behind her, tossed her ticket pad and cellphone onto her desk, and turned on the radio. Sad songs filled the air as she changed stations until she stopped on some soft piano music.

After that, she dragged herself over to the kitchen, popped a Dinner for One into the microwave and watched it heat up. Once it was done, she peeled open the cover, revealing a tiny steak, some mashed potatoes, and a mix of vegetables.

Just one of the many things she hated: portions that were too small. Especially for a young woman who had the appetite of a full-grown stallion.

She sat down and groaned as she dropped it into the trashcan. Then her cellphone started ringing.

She picked up the phone and saw that it was her parents calling for a video chat. She shook her head and sighed before she tapped the answer button and put on a wide smile.

“Oh, hey, it’s my family,” she said, trying to sound upbeat.

“Oh, there she is!” said Buttercup. “Hi, sweetheart!”

Big Macintosh’s head popped into the screen.

“Hey there, AJ,” he said.

“How was your first day on the force?” Bright Mac asked.

“Great. It was great,” said AJ, knowing that was a complete lie.

“Use the Dragon Repellant?” Grand Pear asked.

“No, Grandpa,” she replied.

“Although I came close,” she added in thought, thinking back to the events in the ice cream parlor earlier that day.

“Everything you ever hoped?” Buttercup asked. “You really feel like you’re making the world a better place?”

“Eeyup. Absolutely. And more. Everyone’s so nice and I feel like I’m really making a difference,”

Her father saw right through her.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“I’m fine,”

“You are not fine. You’re lying to me,”

Applejack had inherited her father’s honesty. He could read her like a book.

“I’m good, it’s just--I’m just tired,”

“Wait a second,” Apple Bloom interrupted, peering into the screen. “Applejack, are you a meter maid?”

Applejack had forgotten she was still wearing her vest and her uniform’s hat was hanging on the back of the chair.

“What? Oh, this? No! No. This is just a temporary thing,”

“It’s the safest job on the force!” Buttercup exclaimed happily.

“Oh, she’s not a real cop!” Grand Pear sighed in relief. “Our prayers have been answered! Oh, meter maid! Meter maid! Meter maid! Meter maid!” he chanted, overjoyed.

“Grandpa. Grandpa. Grandpa!” Applejack shouted, feeling uncomfortable and wanting the conversation to end. “It’s been great, guys, but it’s been a really long day. I should--”

“That’s right, you get some rest,” Buttercup said.

“Those meters aren’t gonna maid themselves,” Bright Mac added.

“Bye-bye,” they all said.

“Buh-bye,” AJ said as she hung up, feeling even sadder than she had before.

She flopped back into her chair as she took off her vest. Then she heard her phone vibrate.

It was a text message from Granny Smith.

“We all love you, honey,” it read. “Don’t think that we didn’t think you’d make it. You’re just doing something I never thought one of my grandkids could do. I guess all you needed was a chance to prove yourself. We’re so proud of you.”

Applejack smiled. Her Granny always knew what to say.

Suddenly, through the wall, Lyra yelled, “Hey, will you turn down that depressing music?”

Forgetting that she had left her radio on, Applejack turned it off.

“Hey, leave the meter maid alone!” Bon Bon shouted. “Didn’t you just hear her conversation? She’s had a horrible day!”

“Oh, shut up!” Lyra shouted.

“You shut up!” Bon Bon shouted back.

“You shut up!”

“You shut up!”

“Tomorrow’s another day,” Applejack groaned quietly to herself.

“Yeah, but it might be worse!” Lyra shouted through the wall.

Exhausted, Applejack settled in for the night, wondering what tomorrow would bring.

Second Day on the Force

The next day, Applejack was back on the street. Ticketing cars parked at expired meters. And every time she placed a citation on a windshield, she received a heaping helping of yelling from everyone she ticketed.

“I was thirty seconds over!”

“Ugh! Yeah, you’re a real hero, lady!”

“My mommy says she wishes you were dead,”

“Uncool! My tax dollars pay your salary!”

Applejack got to her cart and turned the key, but the engine wouldn’t start. Then she banged her head against the steering wheel.

“I am a real cop,” she mumbled weakly. “I am a real cop. I am a real cop.”

“Hey, hey, hey!” called a frantic woman running toward her. She pounded on the cart window. “You, officer!”

“Ma’am, if you have a complaint--” Applejack responded mechanically.

“Are you kidding me?” the woman shouted. “My shop! It was just robbed! Look! He’s getting away!”

Applejack turned and spotted a man in a colorful mishmash outfit—a brown suit coat, leather gloves (the left one white, the right one brown), slacks (the left leg tan, the right leg green), and leather shoes (the left one brown, and the right one white)—running down the street, carrying a duffel bag of stolen goods.

“Well, are you a cop or not?” the florist asked.

“Oh, yes! Yes! Don’t worry, ma’am! I’ve got this!”

Applejack jumped out of her cart and chased after the thief, ripping off her meter maid vest.

“Stop!” she shouted. “Stop in the name of the law!”

“Catch me if you can, cowgirl!” shouted the thief.

The thief led her into the crowded Central Plaza, dodging citizens and vehicles along the way.

McHale screeched up in his patrol car.

“Coming through!” the thief shouted.

“This is Sergeant McHale,” he said into his radio. “O’Hara and I have got a 10-31 in progress.”

“I got dibs!” Applejack shouted as she slid across the hood of McHale’s car. “Officer Smith. I am in pursuit! Yee-haw!”

She chased after the thief in the mismatched suit, heading for the giant borough of Dragontown. He lobbed the bag over the gate, swooped through the entrance, and caught the bag as it landed on the other side.

“Freeze!” Applejack yelled forcefully as she continued to follow him.

McHale and O’Hara, who had joined in the chase, stopped at the gate.

“Hey, meter maid!” McHale shouted. “Wait for the real cops!”

Ignoring him, Applejack continued down the street.

Dragontown was packed with giant citizens. Applejack felt like an ant compared to them.

“This must be how the Breezies feel,” she thought.

Down the street, a bus swerved to avoid hitting the thief. Applejack watched as he scaled up the side of a building and leapt onto the roof of a moving train!

“Bon voyage-e, flat foot!” he called behind him.

But Applejack wasn’t about to give up. She ran even faster, until she caught up with him and pushed him off the train. Dragons and other hybrids stopped and stared as Applejack and the thief barreled through their midst.

“Stop right there!”

“Have a donut, copper!” the thief yelled as he yanked a huge donut sign from the front of a shop.

He flung it at Applejack, but it missed and bounced toward some lady Dragon hybrids coming out of a department store.

“Oh, my gosh. Did you see those leopard print panties?” said a fashionable she-dragon to her blue-haired friend.

They saw the donut bouncing toward them and screamed in terror.

A second before it hit them, Applejack moved in front of the donut and stopped it. She turned to the one she-dragon that hadn’t fled. The one with the blue hair. She was wearing khaki chino pants, a white T-shirt and a blue oxford shirt open over it.

“I love your hair,” Applejack said.

“Uh... thanks? I think,” the she-dragon replied, not sure how to react.

Out of the corner of her eye, Applejack noticed that the thief was about to get away. As he went to retrieve his bag, she threw the giant donut over his head and around his body, trapping him inside.

Later, in the MPD lobby, Pinkie Pie was talking to a worried mother.

“I’m sorry, but you and your daughter are going to have to be patient and wait in line just like everyone else, Mrs. Shy. Okay?”

Suddenly, a thief-carrying donut bounced through the front door of the building and rolled through the lobby until it hit the dispatcher’s desk, Pinkie Pie’s desk, where it landed like a spinning top.

“Book him on shoplifting!” Applejack exclaimed.

“Smith!” Chief Iron Will shouted, pointing to his office.

Iron Will’s office was plain, with a veneered desk, six old file cabinets in an imperfect line against the wall under an analog clock, and sloppy gloss paint all over the place.

Basic but neat.

The only thing that remotely stood out was a framed photograph on the corner of the desk. It showed Iron Will as a stronger, younger man, standing, smiling and shaking hands with another young man. An old picture, maybe ten or more years old. The other man was attractive in a pale, blond-haired, strong-featured way.

Vladimir Blueblood.

The day he appointed Iron Will the Chief of Police.

Iron Will sat down behind his desk. And like a kid in the principal’s office, Applejack sat in the visitor chair across from him as he reviewed the report in front of him.

“Abandoning your post, inciting a panic, reckless endangerment of the public, and complete and total disregard for their safety... However, to be fair, you did manage to stop a known criminal from stealing two dozen moldy onions,” he said, holding up the bag that Applejack had confiscated from the crook she had stopped—John Q. “Discord” de Prancie.

“I hate to disagree with ya, sir, but those aren’t onions. Those are a Scrophulariaceae varietal called Antirrhinum majus. They’re a Class-C botanical, sir. I grew up in a family where plant husbandry was kind of--”

“Shut your face or I will erase!” Iron Will shouted.

“Sir, I got the bad guy. That’s my job,”

“No,” Iron Will stated. “Your job description, as a meter maid, is to put tickets on illegally parked vehicles.”

The phone on Iron Will’s desk beeped and Pinkie Pie’s voice came over the intercom.

“Chief, Mrs. Shy and her daughter are here to see you again,”

“Not now,” Iron Will answered.

“Okay, I didn’t know if you wanted to take it this time because they seem really upset--”

“Not! Now!”

“Sir,” Applejack began again. “I don’t want to be a meter maid. I want to be a real cop.”

“Do you think anyone at City Hall, the Mayor, the District Attorney, or even my boss, the Commissioner, do you think any of them asked what I wanted when they assigned you to me?” he retorted. “Life is not some cartoon musical where you sing a song or two and your insipid dreams magically come true! Now, I am going to say this only once, and as nice as I possibly can... Please. Drop. It!”

Just then, the door to his office opened and two women barged in with Pinkie Pie trailing behind.

The first one was of medium height, slim, and timid. She wore eyeglasses with large frames so that her eyes could be clearly seen. Her eyes looked kind, but worried. Her hands were small, and her red hair was high and curled. She wore a white collared shirt under a blue sweater vest, with white pants and heeled shoes, a necklace of yellow pearls with matching earrings, and a diamond wedding ring.

The other woman was extremely petite in comparison. She was about three inches shorter, perhaps fifteen pounds lighter, and twenty-four or twenty-five years old. She had longer, straight, almost pink hair that framed her face and her skin was very pale. She had a high forehead and enormous eyes. Her eyes were moderate cyan and looked like twin pools of terror and tragedy, and under them was a small nose and a small mouth. She was wearing a white tank top with a green pleated skirt. She had no rings on her fingers or polish on her nails. No makeup and no jewelry, except for a butterfly barrette in her hair. There was nothing in her face. Just fear, shyness, and loneliness.

As a pair, both were well groomed, well endowed, fragrant, and feminine as Tartarus.

“Chief Iron Will,” the younger woman begged, “just five minutes of your time. Please!”

Her voice matched her physique: small and delicate.

“I’m sorry, sir,” Pinkie panted. “I tried to stop them. They’re surprisingly quick... I really need to go sit down.”

Pinkie closed the door behind her as she left.

“Ladies, I’ve already told you, we’re doing everything we can,” Iron Will said as he got up from his chair.

“My husband has been missing for ten days!” the older woman said. She reached into her purse, pulled out a photograph and held it up for him to see. “His name is Stratus Shy.”

“Yes, I know,”

“He’s a retired factory worker. This is one of our two beautiful children,” she said, motioning to the younger woman. “He wouldn’t just disappear.”

“Mrs. Shy, our detectives are very busy,”

“There’s got to be somebody, anybody, to find my papa,” the younger woman pleaded.

Iron Will tried to calm Mrs. Shy and her daughter down, but nothing worked. They kept going on about their concern over their husband/father’s disappearance.

“Fluttershy--” the Chief began.

“I will find him,” Applejack volunteered.

“Oh, thank you!” Mrs. Shy sighed as she and her daughter wrapped their arms tightly around Applejack. “Bless you, Officer.”

Applejack looked at Chief Iron Will, who growled.

“Take this,” Fluttershy said, giving Applejack the photograph. “Find my papa. Bring him home to us.”

Applejack nodded and Chief Iron Will cleared his throat.

“Mrs. Shy, if you and your daughter could please step outside for a minute,” he said, ushering them out.

“Of course,” Mrs. Shy said. “Thank you both so much.”

“One minute,”

Iron Will closed the door and turned to Applejack. He looked like he was about to explode.

“You. Are. Fired!”

“What? Why?”

“Insubordination! On top of everything else that I’ve already mentioned!” he replied. “Now, I am going to open this door and you are going to tell those two women that you are a former officer, a former meter maid, with delusions of grandeur, who will not be taking this case!”

Iron Will opened the door and there was Assistant Mayor Inkwell, hugging Mrs. Shy and Fluttershy.

“I’ve just heard that Officer Smith has taken these ladies’ case,” she said.

“Assistant Mayor Inkwell, what’re you doing here?” Iron Will asked, quite shocked, as he forced a smile.

“The Mortal Inclusion Initiative is really starting to pay off,” Inkwell chuckled as she pulled out her phone and started texting. “Mayor Blueblood is gonna be so jazzed!”

“No, no, don’t tell the Mayor just yet,” Iron Will protested.

“And sent. And that’s done. Well, I’d say the case is in good hands,” Inkwell said as she approached Applejack. “We really need to watch out for each other, don’t we? Just call me if you ever need anything, okay? You’ve always got a friend at City Hall, AJ. All right, bye-bye.”

“Thank you,” Applejack called after her.

Iron Will closed the door again. He sighed and slumped in exasperation.

“I will give you 48 hours,” he said softly. “That’s two days to find Stratus Shy. But! If you strike out, you resign.”

Applejack thought for a moment and then nodded.

“Okay. Deal!”

“Splendid. Pie will give you the complete case file,”

Excited, Applejack rushed to the front desk.

“Pinkie! Chief Iron Will said you got a file for me,”

“Yes! Good for you, by the way,”

Pinkie opened a drawer in the file cabinet behind her desk, reached in, and pulled out a folder.

“There you go. One missing 52-year-old retired factory worker, husband, and father of two,” she stated.

Applejack opened the file folder and her mouth fell open. All it consisted of was a single sheet of paper with a basic description of Mr. Shy: his name, height, weight, hair color, eye color, address, and occupation.

“That’s it?” she asked in disbelief.

“Yikes!” Pinkie exclaimed. “That is the single, smallest case file I have ever seen! No leads, no witnesses, and you’re not in the computer system yet, so no resources! Oh, I hope you didn’t stake your career on solving this one... You didn’t, did you?”

Applejack didn’t respond.

“You did,” Pinkie groaned as she took a bite of her cupcake and sprinkles landed on the picture inside the file.

“Last known sighting,” Applejack said, looking at the photo after brushing the sprinkles off.

The picture was from a traffic camera and showed Mr. Shy on the street.

As AJ looked at the photo, Pinkie Pie stood beside her, slurping a bottle of soda through a straw.

“Can I borrow that?” Applejack asked as she grabbed the empty bottle. “Thanks.”

Using the bottle like a microscope, Applejack looked through it and saw Mr. Shy holding a familiar-looking object.

“A popsicle,” Applejack said.

“The murder weapon,” Pinkie breathed.

“Get your popsicle,”

“Yeah! I’m sorry... What does, what does that mean?”

“It means... I have a lead,”

"It's called a hustle, Sugah."

Applejack drove around in her traffic cart, sick with frustration, until she found Spike pushing Thorax and Pharynx (who were in their Crystal toddler disguises), in a baby stroller built for two, down the street.

That morning she had nothing. She had no witnesses, no resources, no help. She couldn’t even rely on Pinkie Pie after she saw Mr. Shy’s case file. Then, her situation suddenly turned sour.

When she looked at the right edge of the photograph and saw a familiar-looking black pants leg and a black leather shoe walking away.

Spike Drake.

Her only lead was the Dragon hybrid who had hustled her.

But before she went out to look for him, she decided to do a little background check on him to see if there was anything she could use against him.

Not much, just a little leverage she could use to coerce him into helping her with her case. Well, she had found it. And when she left, she was ready for him.

She smiled when she pulled up alongside them.

“Howdy! Remember me?”

It was clear that Spike was supposed to be impressed by how easily she had found him.

“Oh, yeah, Officer Apple-Butt,” he replied with a smirk.

She gave a fake laugh before saying, “No. It’s Officer Smith and I’m here to ask you some questions about a case.”

“What happened, meter maid?” he asked. “Did someone steal a traffic cone? Because it wasn’t me.”

Spike walked on, pushing the stroller, and Applejack pulled her cart in front of him, blocking his path.

“Hey, Blondie, you’re gonna wake the boys. And I gotta get to work,”

“This is important, sir,” she said as she got out of her vehicle. “I think your ten dollars’ worth of popsicles can wait.”

He scoffed and said, “I make 200 bucks a day, Hon! Three hundred of the 365, since I was eighteen. And time is money. Move along.”

“Please, just look at the picture. You sold Stratus Shy that Popsicle, right? Do you know him?”

“I know everybody. I also know that, somewhere, there’s an episode of ‘Hee Haw’ missing one of its fanservice extras, so why don’t you get back to the funny farm, Honey?”

“Fine. I didn’t want to have to do it this way, but you leave me no choice,”

She slapped a parking boot onto the wheel of the stroller, locking it in place.

“Did you just boot my stroller?”

“Spike Drake, you are under arrest,”

“For what?” he asked, smiling and amused. “Hurting your feelings?”

“How does ‘Suspected of Selling Products Not Up to Standards’ sound?” she told him.

“Excuse me?” he asked.

“Do your popsicles follow the sanitary regulations for producing, selling and consuming?” she inquired. “I saw you melting the juice of those Jumbo Pops down a rain gutter. You can say what you want, but I don’t think it can be used for that purpose. Also, in uptown, your Changeling ‘son’ was creating molds for your popsicles with his bare paws. Did you or he sanitize them before doing so? And even if you did, I know that snow was not clean. And as for the ‘red wood’... I wonder if it’s earthquake-proof. Maybe later I’ll ask an engineer to do a check. They should also have data about your sale. If there was only one of those issues, I would have given you just a verbal warning. But since there are all of them together, I’m afraid I’ll have to do some further investigations.”

Spike was at a loss for words. This rookie was smarter than she looked.

“And if that doesn’t work, I’ve also got you for Felony Tax Evasion,”

His eyes widened.

“Yeah, let me just do some quick math,” she continued, as she wrote numbers down on her notepad. “You claim to make, at the very least, two hundred dollars a day, right? So, two hundred times three hundred out of the three hundred and sixty-five days of the year, that’s sixty thousand. And since you were eighteen, you’re twenty-five now, that’s seven years of time, so sixty thousand times seven, which is four hundred twenty thousand, I think. But then again, I am just a dumb blonde hick from the sticks who never really was good at mathematics. Anyway, according to your tax forms, you reported... none of it! Nothing! Zilch! Zero! And lying on a federal form is a punishable offense. The absolute minimum: five years in the big house.”

“Yeah, and it’s my word against yours,” he replied, crossing his arms in front of his chest.

Applejack held up her recording pen (which she had been using to write with) and clicked a button on the side of it. Suddenly, a recording of Spike’s voice played from the speaker:

“I make 200 bucks a day, Hon! Three hundred of the 365, since I was 18,”

“Actually, it’s your word against yours,” Applejack said. “And if you want this recording, you will help me find this missing man, or the only place you’ll be allowed to serve, not sell, serve popsicles will be the prison cafeteria.”

She grinned.

“It’s called a hustle, Sugah,”

Spike said nothing.

He only scowled at her.

A part of him wanted to smile, or at least half-smile, because she was using his own line from the day before. But she was using it against him.

“She hustled you,” Pharynx laughed hysterically from the baby stroller. “She hustled you good! You’re a cop now, Spike! You’re gonna need one of these.”

He slapped his MPD badge sticker onto Spike’s chest.

“Have fun working with the fuzz!” Pharynx said as he and Thorax jumped out of the stroller, sprouted insectile wings from their upper backs, and flew away.

“Start talking,” Applejack said.

Spike stopped scowling and sighed.

“I don’t know where he is, I only saw where he went,”

“Great,” Applejack said as she walked back to her vehicle. “Let’s go.”

Finally, a smile crept across Spike’s face.

“It’s not exactly the place for a cute little farmgirl,” he said.

“Don’t call me cute, now get in the car!”

“You da boss,” Spike replied.

He crammed himself into the passenger seat as Applejack craned her neck to look behind her. She K-turned across the street and they were off.

The Nudist Club

An hour later, Spike and Applejack arrived at the Maretropolis Lodge and Spa. The front of the building was like a Haeienda, but with large pillars on either side of the main entrance.

Applejack slowed and pulled in at the curb. She put the transmission in Park, then turned the key, shutting the engine down, and exited the vehicle. Then she followed Spike to the entrance. Through the tall, wooden doors.

Once inside, they peered through a beaded curtain and entered a chamber full of water pumps, with a tile floor and latticed walls. The scent of incense wafted through the air as they approached the candle-lit counter.

A pale, young man of about twenty named Sandalwood stood behind it in meditation, chanting with his arms outstretched, forefingers and thumbs pressed together. He had long, grayish-green dreadlocks, and he wore a red T-shirt and faded blue jeans.

“Oooooooohmmmmm!” he chanted.

Applejack cleared her throat and said, “Hello?”

The boy continued chanting.

“Hello!”

Shaken out of his meditation, the chanter parted his dreadlocks.

“Hmm?”

“Howdy. My name is--” Applejack began.

“Oh, I’m going to stop you there,” the boy, Sandalwood, cut her off, “because we’re good on Filly Scout Cookies.”

Spike coughed to cover up a chuckle, but it still came out... as a snort.

“I am definitely going to remember that one from now on,” he said.

“Uh... no. I’m Officer Smith, MPD,” Applejack went on. “I’m looking for Stratus Shy, a gentleman who may have frequented this establishment.”

Applejack produced the Shy Family photo and Sandalwood looked at it. He gasped and his eyes widened.

“Yeah, Fluttershy’s dad! I know him, sure,” he said with a chuckle as he handed back the picture. “But I haven’t seen him around for almost two weeks. You should talk to their yoga instructor! I’d be happy to take you back.”

Sandalwood came around from behind the counter and led them toward a different area of the club.

As she saw dozens of women walk by wearing nothing but towels, Applejack couldn’t help but ask, “Uh, what kind of club is this, exactly?”

“Oh, this is a nudist club,” Sandalwood replied nonchalantly.

Applejack’s eyes nearly popped out of her head.

“A nudist club?” she asked.

“Yeah,” Spike whispered to Applejack with a grin. “In Maretropolis, anyone can be anything. These guys, they be naked.”

“Tree Hugger’s just on the other side of the pool,” Sandalwood said as he opened the doors to the courtyard after typing the combination into the keypad.

Applejack gaped at the sight before her. Many naked men and women were frolicking in the pool while others were weaving baskets, sunning themselves, and lounging around.

Spike leaned over to her.

“Does any and/or all of this make you uncomfortable?” he asked her. “Because if it does, there is no shame in wanting to call it quits. We could end our deal right now.”

“Nnnope,” she replied. “They’re as naked as the day they were born.”

“Wow, that was unexpected,” Spike said to himself.

Applejack acted perfectly normal as they walked through the recreation area. She glanced over at a very beautiful, voluptuous woman with long brown hair and blue eyes, who had the whole hourglass thing going. Big time. Open the encyclopedia to M for MILF and her picture would be staring right back at you.

“I know what you’re thinking,” Sandalwood said as they passed by a game of naked volleyball. “Most people think the nudist lifestyle is weird. But you know what we think is weird? Clothes! I mean, we all came into the world naked. The only reason I wear mine at the front desk is so I don’t scare off the delivery guys.”

As they walked, Sandalwood explained the interview process for potential club members. The owners and staff liked to ask perspective members a few questions to get to know them better. Questions like, “Are you sure you want to become a member?” and “Why?”

He also said that it was necessary for the owners to conduct a certain amount of background checking before they could accept anyone. They were very selective about who they submitted for membership.

As well as naked volleyball, there was naked shuffleboard, naked yoga, and many other activities. Spike was ogling a pair of young human masseuses, both a little over 20-years-old and both naked, giving a hybrid gentleman a full body massage, while Applejack’s gaze shifted to the pool. As she looked at the pool, she couldn’t help but find it inviting.

She imagined stepping into the cool water, feeling it run over her body. Then hanging onto the edge of the pool, smiling contentedly, lost in a world all her own. But just as she began to dream, she was shaken out of her thoughts by the giggling of young women.

She turned her head and saw a gardener (who was also naked) watering the plants and he sprayed some of the women with the hose. They didn’t mind. In fact, they enjoyed it.

And there weren’t just grown men and women in the outdoor haven, but also families with teenagers and even young children, all having a good time, completely uninhibited by their surroundings.

“Here we go,” said Sandalwood.

Tree Hugger wasn’t teaching yoga that day. Instead, she was posing as a group of people drew her as part of an art class.

She was tall, well endowed, and her pubic bush, like her red dreadlocks, was very unruly. And she wasn’t the least bit embarrassed about standing naked in front of the group.

“Hey, Tree Hugger!” Sandalwood said. “These guys have some questions about Stratus Shy.”

“Who?” the bare hippie asked.

“Uh... Fluttershy’s dad?” Sandalwood prompted. “Her whole family’s been coming to your yoga class for, like, six years now?”

“I meet a lot of different people,” Tree Hugger said. “Each one of them perfect and unique. And I have no memory of this florist.”

“He’s a retired factory worker, actually,” Applejack corrected her.

“He and Fluttershy were here a couple of Wednesdays ago, remember?” Sandalwood asked her.

The naked hipster shook her head and said, “No.”

“Yeah, she was wearing a virgin white tank top with a frilly green miniskirt and matching shoes,” Sandalwood continued. “And he was wearing a blue cable-knit sweater vest with a brand-new pair of black corduroy slacks, and a pale green tie, sweet Windsor knot. Real tight. Remember that, Tree Hugger?”

“No,” Tree Hugger said again.

“Yeah, we walked them out ourselves. I escorted Fluttershy home while her dad got into this big old white car with a silver trim. The engine needed a tune-up. The third cylinder wasn’t firing. Do you really not remember any of that?” he asked Tree Hugger.

“You are really harshing my mellow,” she told Sandalwood. “If I tell you I don’t remember, I don’t remember.”

Applejack couldn’t believe her luck. Tree Hugger may not have been helpful, but Sandalwood was a gold mine of information.

She scrambled to write everything down.

“Uh, this white car,” Applejack interrupted, “you didn’t happen to catch the license plate number, did you?”

“Oh, yeah!” Sandalwood exclaimed. “It was 2-9-T-H-D-0-3.”

“Wow. This is a lot of great info,” Applejack said. “Thank you.”

“See? I told you Tree Hugger’s got a mind like a steel trap,” Sandalwood replied with a smile. “I wish I had that kind of memory.”

Applejack thanked Sandalwood again after he escorted her and Spike back to the entrance hall. Eager to leave the nudist colony, Applejack walked to the door and headed for her cart. Spike leaned against the counter while Applejack kept on going. He waited until she reached to open the door and he turned to Sandalwood, who had returned to his original post behind the counter.

“So, that’ll be one membership renewal, Spike?” Sandalwood asked.

“Actually,” Spike corrected him, “one renewal and one new membership. For her,” he said, pointing through the front door.

“Ooooohhh!” Sandalwood smiled.

Sandalwood typed a few commands into the computer and the memberships (old and new) were both taken care of.

“Thanks,” Spike said as he handed Sandalwood some cash before heading for the exit.

Spike walked out the door and caught up with Applejack.

“Well, I don’t know about you, but I had an absolute ball,” he said. “You are more than welcome for the clue. And seeing as how any moron can run a plate, I shall take that recording and bid you a civil adieu.”

“The plate,” Applejack groaned. “I can’t run a plate; I’m not in the system yet.”

“Give me the pen, please,” Spike growled.

“What did you just say? ‘Any moron can run a plate’? Gee, if only there were a moron around who could do it,”

“Blondie, I did what you asked. You can’t keep me on the hook forever,”

“Not forever. I only have another 36 hours to solve this case. So, can you run the plate or not?”

Spike glared at Applejack, but then slowly grinned.

“You know what you just made me remember? I actually have a friend who works down at the DMV,”

The DMV

They hit the Department of Motor Vehicles at four in the afternoon. The sun was low. Applejack pulled off the road and into the parking lot.

“Maud is the fasted one in there,” Spike said. “You need something done, she’s your woman.”

“I hope so,” Applejack said.

She didn’t think she needed to remind him that they were fighting the clock.

When they went inside, there was a huge line of people waiting to be helped.

“Wait. They’re all gray?” Applejack exclaimed, noticing the employees.

All the desks were manned by unhappy men and women, all a different shade of gray, who moved very, very slowly. One took an age to stamp a piece of paper, then move the paper to one side to stamp a second sheet, while the customer held his head in his hand in exasperation.

At another desk, a bespectacled woman took her time to staple a document for another customer. Another took a smiling lady’s picture for her driver’s license very, very slowly.

Then, when Applejack looked at the room, she noticed that it was just as ashy as the employees who worked in it. The walls were gray, the floor was gray, even the desks. All a different shade of gray. It was like they had stepped into a black-and-white movie. And, aside from the line of customers, they were the only things in color.

“You said this was going to be fast!” Applejack growled at Spike.

“Are you judging a fellow human being based solely on one external characteristic?” Spike asked. “Last time I checked, that’s racism. And I do not associate myself with racists. Besides, aren’t you the one who said that ‘in Maretropolis, anyone can be anything’?”

Spike led Applejack over to an ashy woman who was sitting behind the counter at one of the windows. She had turquoise eyes, blue violet hair, a Persian bluish gray complexion, and she was wearing a gray frock dress.

“It’s a Maud, Maud, Maud, Maud World,” Spike said. “How you doing, Honey? It’s nice to see you.”

The woman looked up at them with half-closed eyes and a blank, almost neutral expression on her face.

She blinked.

“It’s nice to see you too, Spike,” she replied in a drab monotone.

“Maud, I’ve got someone I’d like you to meet,” Spike said. “Uh, sorry, darling, I’ve already forgot your name.”

“Hmm,” AJ said as she shot him a sarcastic smile. “Officer Applejack Smith, MPD, how are you?”

Maud looked at Applejack and didn’t respond for a good five seconds.

“I am doing just as well as I can,” she replied, still flat. “What can I do for you today?”

“Well, I was hoping you could run a plate for us,” Applejack said. “We are in a really big hurry.”

“Sure. What’s the plate number?”

Applejack took a deep breath and said, “2-9-T-H-D-0-3.”

The frowning woman, Maud, slowly typed the number onto her computer.

“Two... nine...”

“T-H-D-0-3,”

“... T...”

“H-D-0-3,”

“... H...”

“D-0-3,”

“... D...”

“Mmm-hmm. 0-3,”

“... Zero...”

“Three,” Applejack whimpered softly.

Just as Maud was about to punch in the last digit, Spike interrupted her.

“Maud, you look like you could use a laugh. Would you like to hear a joke?”

“No!” Applejack cried.

“Sure,” Maud replied dryly. “I would love to hear a joke from you, Spike.”

Applejack growled.

“Okay. A Princess, a magician and an exile walk into a bar... Are you with me so far?”

“Yes. ‘A Princess, a magician and an exile walk into a bar.’ What happens next?”

“The bartender looks up. He looks at them. And what do you think he says?”

Maud thought for a moment and replied, “I don’t know. What does the bartender say?”

“‘What is this, a joke?’” Spike laughed.

At first, Maud showed no reaction. But then, her eyes widened extremely slowly and a broad smile crept across her face.

“Ha... ha... ha... ha...” she laughed.

Applejack’s impatience grew.

“Ha-ha! Yes, very funny,” she said.

Maud turned toward the woman who was sitting next to her.

“Hey, Marble!” she called.

A bashful young woman with turquoise gray skin peeked through her dark gray hair with big, grayish violet eyes.

“Mm-hmm?” Marble asked softly.

“A Princess, a magician, and an exile walk into a bar...”

Applejack groaned and banged her head onto the counter, but eventually, Maud produced the printout with the address for the license plate number.

“Here you go,” Maud said, handing it to Applejack.

“It’s registered to Dragontown Limo Service. A limo took Stratus Shy and the limo’s in Dragontown! It’s in Dragontown!”

“Way to hustle, Maud,” Spike said. “I love you. I owe you.”

“Hurry! We’ve got to beat the rush hour,” Applejack said as she hurried through the door to get outside, “and... It’s night?”

She looked at the sky in awe. It was completely dark.

They had been there for hours!

Applejack was running out of time.

Applejack hadn’t gotten a good look at Dragontown the first time around (when she was chasing Discord through the streets), but now, as she drove Spike to the limo service depot, she did.

It began at the gate, which was a white counterbalanced pole with a guard shack next to it and a tall brick wall, eight feet tall and topped with coils of razor-wire, which divided Dragontown from the Central Plaza. It was followed by a dark, cube-shaped, brick building, three stories high. Next to it was an identical building, then another, and another. Applejack was no expert in architecture, but the whole borough seemed to give off the feel of an old factory town, or the riverfront of Manehattan when she went to live with her Aunt and Uncle Orange for a while.

It was plain, simple, and out of date.

Except for the gate at the entrance, which looked more like an entry into a military base.

Dragontown was dark, but warm, and the still air smelled of sulfur and brimstone. There was no traffic on the streets, and there were no pedestrians on the sidewalks like there had been during the day. There was no activity anywhere. No traffic. Not even dogs barking.

No activity at all.

It was still, silent, and lonely.

Finally, after twelve blocks of nothing but brick buildings, they passed a vacant lot where something had been planned maybe twenty years before but was never built. Then came a faded old grocery store, shuttered and permanently abandoned. Next to it was a barbershop and a bar.

Finally, they arrived at the limo service depot... and a padlocked gate.

“Closed,” Applejack said after she’d exited her vehicle. “Great!”

“And you don’t have a warrant, do you?” Spike guessed.

“You wasted the day on purpose!” she accused him.

“Ma’am, I am wearing a fake badge,” he said, gesturing to the sticker on his vest. “I would never impede your pretend investigation.”

“What is your problem?” she yelled. “Does seeing other people fail somehow make you feel better about your own sad, miserable life?”

Spike didn’t even have to pause to consider her question before answering.

“Oh, you have no idea,” he replied calmly.

“Do you see this?” she asked, showing him the Shy Family photo. “Do you see this man? He is missing!”

“Well, then they should have gotten a real cop to find him,” Spike replied.

Applejack turned red, and I don’t mean just a little pink in the cheeks. She went full red in the face. She was so angry that steam started to come off her skin.

But she didn’t demand that he apologize for saying that she wasn’t a real police officer.

“Now, since you have no warrant, I guess we’re done here?” Spike asked.

Applejack sighed and her face returned to normal.

“Fine. Here’s your pen,”

He reached out to take it from her, but she threw it over her shoulder and over the wire fence, and it landed in the lot on the other side.

“Wow, you are one very sore loser, you know that?” Spike asked. “See you later, Officer Smith,” he said as he started to climb over the fence. “I really wish I could’ve helped more.”

Spike dropped down to the other side and reached for the pen, but Applejack was already there, waiting for him.

“Well, the thing is, ya don’t need a warrant if you’ve got probable cause, and I’m pretty sure I just saw one shifty-looking lowdown varmint climbing the fence,” she told him. “So, you’re helping plenty! Come on.”

Spike followed her, annoyed, but his face showed a morsel of respect for her trick.

In the depot parking lot, white limos were parked close together. Four were facing outward, toward the gate, ready to go. The fifth was facing inward, toward the depot itself. Applejack approached it.

She wiped the dried mud off the back bumper to show the plate.

“This is it!” she whispered.

They tried the passenger doors. Locked. Then they moved up and tried the driver and front passenger doors. Unlocked. And no alarm.

Using the flashlight on her cellphone, Applejack found a reptilian scale on the floor in front of the driver’s seat.

She pulled out an evidence bag and a pair of tweezers, and Spike rolled his eyes as he opened the glove box compartment.

“Oh, my gosh!” he exclaimed.

“What? What?” Applejack asked.

“The Golden Voice of Flank Sinatra!” he said, showing her the source of his excitement.

Applejack sighed as she went back to collecting the scale with the tweezers.

“They bought ‘em on CD,” Spike observed. “Seriously, who still buys CDs anymore? Just download the crap illegally off the internet like the rest of the planet.”

Spike put the CDs away and closed the glove box. Then he glanced up at the screen between the seats. He slid back the cover and his eyes widened.

“Officer, if your missing guy was here, he had one very bad day,”

Applejack shined her flashlight into the back seat. It had been shredded!

“Those are claw marks,” she breathed. “Have you ever seen anything like this?” she asked Spike.

Spike shook his head, actually concerned.

Applejack spotted a wallet on the floor. She wiggled through the screen and Spike climbed through after her. She picked up the wallet, opened it, and found Mr. Shy’s driver’s license, his Marestercard credit card, and business cards for his wife’s floral shop.

“This is him, Stratus Shy,” she said. “He was definitely here. What do you think happened?”

Spike’s eyes shifted to a glass cup at the bar inside the limo. It was engraved with the letter “T” on the side.

“Oh, no,” he said. “Reptilian scales, Sinatra music, fancy monogrammed glass--I know whose car this is! We’ve got to get out of here!”

“Why? Whose car is it?” Applejack asked.

Spike rushed around the limo, nervously trying to put everything back the way they found it.

“The most feared crime boss in the country, Torch Drago, they call him the Dragon Lord, and he hates me. So, we gotta go, right now!”

“We’re not leaving. This is a crime scene!”

“You think it’s bad now? It’s going to be much worse if we stay here, so with or without you, I am leaving!”

Spike made a break for the limo door. He opened it and stopped when he saw two big and mean-looking Dragon gangsters looking down at him. Both were dressed in black track suits and they looked exactly like what they were: a pair of second-rate hoodlums.

“Rex!” Spike gasped. “And is that Amarant? Long time, no see. And, speaking of ‘no see,’ how about you forget that you just saw me, huh? For old times’ sake?”

The two Dragons grabbed Spike and Applejack by their throats and yanked them out of the limo.

“Of course not,” Spike grunted.

Without saying a word, the two hulking thugs shoved Spike and Applejack into the back seat of another limo and they were driven away, sandwiched between their captors, to the house of the Dragon Lord.

The limo had soft seats, a quiet motor, a gentle ride, and a nice radio. Very different from the one that was used to pick up Stratus Shy.

Amarant used his cell phone and called the Dragon Lord.

The man he worked for.

And it wasn’t just a Dragon Lord. It was the Dragon Lord.

“We have a problem,” Amarant said. “We had a few unwelcome visitors at the limo depot earlier tonight. They’re here with us now.”

He paused.

If there was a reply, Applejack didn’t hear it.

“What do you want us to do?”

There was another pause.

“Yes, sir,” Amarant said. “We’re on our way back.”

He hung up and looked out the window at the lines of trees and yards with high fences and large houses.

A nice place to live, Applejack thought.

She leaned over to Spike and whispered to him.

“What did you do to make this Torch guy so mad at you?”

“I may have been engaged to his daughter and, due to a series of very unfortunate circumstances way beyond my control, left her at the altar... twice,”

Applejack stared at him in stunned silence.

Then she exhaled and said, “Oh, sweet sassy molasses!”

A short time later, the limo drove through a set of high iron gates manned by another Dragon in a black suit and burgundy tie.

The iron bars were bent and twisted into fancy shapes and the gate had a giant iron “T” mounted near the top (the same style as the one on the monogrammed glass from the limo at the depot) and it was shiny black.

The driveway was long and the house at the end of it was big and ornate. It could have been airlifted straight from the Dragon Lands. It was a massive, four-story stone fortress a hundred years old. It had turrets, multiple chimneys, and just as much stained glass as Canterlot Castle. It was aristocratic and affected in every way, but it was a comfortable house in the same way that the limo was a comfortable car. At the left-hand end was a three-car garage and at the right was a wing that maybe housed the bedrooms. And best of all, it stood alone in the center of many acres of flat land.

The giant residential compound that was the home of Dragon Lord Torch.

The Dragon Lord

Torch ruled over a dozen different regions, and he displayed the vast wealth of his empire in all its splendor and glory.

Once there had been beautiful gardens around the palace, but the Dragon Lord had razed the trees and leveled most of the shrubberies to create a flat and open vista all around. The openness was the Dragon Lord’s gift to himself. And it provided excellent security as well as the surveillance cameras. Nobody could approach the house undetected. By day visitors were clearly visible at least two hundred yards away, and after dark night-vision and thermal enhancements picked them up only a little closer.

The ground floor had a kitchen, a dining hall, a lounge, a ballroom, a library, a throne room, and a study. The second and third floors had a combined 26 bedrooms and 34 full bathrooms. The top floor was used for nothing except surveillance. All those rooms were completely empty, except one that had four TV screens on a long table, showing wide-angle views North, South, East and West.

The yard had no lawn. It was covered with gold coins, with neatly pruned shrubs and bushes pushing up through them. The front doors were carved multi-paneled things. They had giant iron knockers shaped like dragons’ heads that had the rings hanging from their mouths. The doors opened before they got near them and Spike and Applejack were led inside the house.

It was a fabulous home. Huge and beautifully furnished. The hallway was dark but warm and magnificent. There were oil paintings on the walls, and ahead was a substantial staircase that rose out of sight. There were closed doors all around, each one polished to a shine by a century of labor.

The henchmen, Rex and Amarant, pushed open the heavy doors at the end of the hallway, to the lavishly decorated throne room.

It was a large room with a high ceiling. It had a fireplace and a pair of French doors that led out to the terrace. But the drapes and curtains were all drawn. Very little light inside, except for the roaring fire in the hearth, probably to be reminiscent of the mountain caves the Dragons’ ancestors were accustomed to.

Dark and silent.

There were couches and sofas of silver and gold with red velvet cushions on a mosaic floor of marble, mother-of-pearl, and other costly stones. There was a large Saddle Arabian rug, a massive oak desk. And behind the desk was a colossal royal throne with a tall back, which was facing away from the doors.

But the thing that caught Applejack’s attention was a portrait of a woman, which hung close behind the throne. The woman was beautiful, with long raven hair and sapphire eyes, and she wore a lavish gown. She looked like a fairytale princess. Maybe even a queen.

Spike and Applejack were shoved into the throne room as a big and tall Dragon named Billy entered from a side door. He wore a gamboge suit and had coarse, grayish violet hair that stuck up in all directions even though he kept it cropped short.

“Is that Torch Drago?” Applejack whispered to Spike.

“No,” he whispered back.

A tall, stocky Dragon in a vermilion suit, Barry, lumbered in behind.

“What about him? Is that him?”

“No!” Spike said, frustrated.

A pair of even bigger, taller, and sharper-looking Dragons (one in a scarlet suit, the other in spring green, named Basil and Reginald respectively) showed up, following the others. They had to lower their heads to enter the room.

“Okay, one of those two has got to be him,” Applejack whispered.

“Shut up, shut up, just shut up!” Spike told her.

The red and green-suited Dragons stood on both sides of the throne. Then the throne turned, revealing an even huger Dragon seated upon it. He was wearing an arctic blue three-piece suit made of the finest fabric that money could buy, and holding a cigar between the hulking index and middle fingers of his left hand while holding a scepter in his right.

Applejack stared at the giant hybrid in wide-eyed surprise.

This was the Dragon Lord.

The Dragon Lord was fifty years old, but he still broke arms if he smelled disrespect. He was like an old soldier. He still had all his muscle, his strength and his attitude. He was fifty years old because of his strength and his attitude. Without them he would have died decades ago. And he almost did, too.

There had been an assassination attempt on him ten years before. The assassin’s bullet was meant for him. But it hit his wife instead.

That was the kind of man that he was. The kind of man who made a fortress out of his own home. The kind of man whose wife was killed just because she stood next to him. The kind of man who spread misery to everything he touched.

A bad man made worse by his own life experiences. Whose suffering had conferred very little grace and nobility. But the Dragon Lord had survived. He survived by fighting and clawing his way to the top, by betraying those stronger than himself and dominating those weaker. And he had learned what worked once always worked.

Spike opened his mouth to speak and the giant Dragon Lord growled as he held out his scepter. Spike approached and touched the tip of the bloodstone, then quickly stepped back.

“Is it too late to apologize and beg for my life?” Spike asked.

Torch growled again.

“You come here, unannounced on the day my daughter is to take my place as the new Dragon Lord,”

Torch’s deep, guttural voice had an authoritative tone to it, and it sounded like one would expect from a man of his muscular stature: very, very intimidating.

“Well, technically, we were brought here against our will, so...” Spike began.

Torch frowned as he stared at Spike with cold red eyes.

He was not amused.

“Look, the point is, I didn’t know that it was your car, and I swear I didn’t know that Ember was going to take your place,”

“I can’t believe I ever trusted you, Spike,” Torch said. “I was there the day you were born. When your mother died, my beloved continued to nurse you.”

The Dragon in the scarlet suit, Basil, crossed himself as the Dragon Lord motioned to the portrait Applejack had noticed earlier.

The woman was Torch’s late wife.

“I welcomed you into my home,” said Torch. “I gave you the food of my table. I loved you like the son I never had. Even before your father died, I loved you as if you were my own. I watched you grow. I even gave you my blessing to marry my daughter. My only child.”

Spike held his head in shame.

“And how do you repay my kindness and generosity? By breaking my daughter’s heart, by leaving her at the altar... twice. You disrespected me... and you hurt her,”

Spike remained silent.

“I ordered you to never show your face around here again, and yet here you stand, skulking around my property with this... I’m sorry, but what are you, some kind of performer?” Torch asked Applejack. “What’s with the stupid costume?”

“Sir,” Applejack stated, “I am--”

“No one!” Spike said quickly. “She’s no one!”

Applejack had had enough. She marched up to Torch’s desk and glared him right in the eye. Basil and Reginald moved to restrain her and protect their employer, but Torch motioned for them to stand down.

“I am an officer of the law! I am on the Stratus Shy case, and my evidence puts him in your car!” she shouted at the Dragon Lord. “And so help me, I will find out what you did to that man if it is the last thing I do!”

The Dragon Lord grunted.

“Then I have only one request,” he replied calmly. “Say hello to my beloved for me. Ice ‘em!” he shouted to his men.

Basil and Reginald grabbed Applejack while Rex and Amarant restrained Spike.

“Whoa!” Spike exclaimed. “I didn’t say anything! I’m not saying anything!”

“And you never will,” Torch replied.

Billy and Barry opened a hatch to a pit in the floor in front of Torch’s desk. Basil and Reginald held Spike and Applejack over the pit, ready to throw them down into the freezing ice and water below.

“Please! No, no, no!” Spike cried, pleading for his life. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry!”

Just then Torch’s daughter, Ember, entered the throne room. She was tiny compared to her father, and she was wearing a beautiful gown made of gold thread.

“Dad!” she called.

Torch growled and rolled his eyes.

Applejack recognized Ember immediately. She was the blue-haired she-dragon that she had saved from being crushed.

Ember noticed Spike and Applejack and sighed, clearly annoyed.

“What did we say? No icing anyone on my coronation day!”

“I have to, Ember,” Torch told her. “Your Father has to.” He returned his attention to Spike and Applejack. “Ice them!”

Spike started screaming again.

“Wait! Wait!” Ember shouted. “I know her. She’s the officer that saved my life yesterday! From that giant donut!”

“This human?” Torch asked.

“Yes!” She turned to Applejack. “Hi.”

“Hi,” she replied. “I love your dress.”

“Uh... thanks?”

“This changes things,” Torch thought.

“Put them down,” he said.

Billy and Barry covered the hole in the floor as Basil and Reginald gently released Spike and Applejack.

“You have done me a great service,” Torch said to Applejack as he rose from his throne and walked around his desk. “I will help you find our mutual friend. I will take your honesty and kindness and pay it forward.”

Torch kissed Applejack on both cheeks as Spike’s mouth fell open in astonishment.

Photo Finish took pictures of the Dragon Lord and his daughter while their subjects danced, watched in dutiful reverence by their black-suited bodyguards.

Wine was served in goblets of gold, each one different from the other, and the wine was abundant. By the Dragon Lord’s command, each guest was allowed to drink with no restrictions, for the Dragon Lord instructed all of the wine stewards to serve each Dragon what he, or she, wished.

Spike and Applejack sat at the head table, next to Torch, and a waiter in a pink vest and dapper bowtie served them pieces of iced cake.

Spike picked up his fork and took a bite.

It was perfect.

Torch turned to Applejack and said, “Mr. and Mrs. Shy are my florists. They’re like family to me. Stratus said he had something important he wanted to discuss. Something that couldn’t be talked about over the phone. That’s why I sent that car to pick him up. But it never arrived.”

“Because he was attacked,” Applejack assumed.

“No,” Torch corrected her. “He attacked.”

“Shy?”

“Shy,” Torch stated. “He just went crazy. He tore up the inside of the car, scared the driver half to death... and then disappeared into the night.”

“But he’s over 50-years-old. He’s a husband, a father...”

Torch sighed.

“My dear, we may be evolved, but deep down... we are still animals,”

Spike and Applejack exchanged a worried look.

“You want to find Stratus Shy, talk to the driver of the car. His name is Magnet, Steven Magnet, lives in the Everfree District. Only he can tell you more about what happened that night. Here is his address,” he said as he handed them a business card with Magnet’s information on it.

Spike and Applejack thanked Torch for his hospitality and left the party, happy not to have been thrown into an icy grave. After retrieving the police cart from the limo depot, they headed straight for the lush, dark Everfree District in search of their next clue.

Everfree District

A misty fog hung in the air as Spike and Applejack crossed a rope-bridge to a garden apartment high up in the canopy. Once the fog cleared, they could see the moss-covered door to Steven Magnet’s home.

Applejack rang the doorbell. There was no response, which wasn’t completely unexpected. It was late, and Magnet was probably already in bed.

“Mr. Magnet? Officer Smith, MPD!” she called out. “You’re not in trouble. We just want to know what happened to Stratus Shy.”

The door unlocked and slowly creaked open, just a crack. The chain lock prevented the door from opening all the way. Through the space, they could see that Magnet was a sea dragon hybrid and he was wearing a sleeveless vest.

“You should be asking what happened to me!” he said.

He had been badly beaten, covered with bruises, scratches, and a black eye.

“Whoa!” Spike said. “A fifty-two-year-old florist did that?”

“What happened?” Applejack asked.

“He was an animal!Down on all fours and growling...He wasa savage!”

Magnet described the scene, sounding haunted, like he was reliving it.

He adjusted the rearview mirror and saw Mr. Shy tearing up the cushions of the seat. Then he turned his head and looked at the empty back seat.

Suddenly, Stratus Shy attacked Magnet. The limo swerved off the road and Magnet was thrown from the driver’s seat. He looked up in horror at the snarling elderly man as he ran away.

“There was no warning. He just kept yelling about the Snapdragons. Over and over. The Snapdragons!”

“So, you know about the Snapdragons too?” Spike asked. “That’s good, because that is what we are here to talk about. So, if you just open the door and tell us what you know, we’ll tell you what we know. Okay?”

Magnet considered a moment.

“Okay,” he said before he shut the door.

As he unlocked each of the locks from inside, Applejack glanced at Spike, impressed.

“Clever boy,” she said with a smile.

Suddenly, they heard a clattering inside the apartment and Magnet scream.

“Mr. Magnet?” Applejack asked. “Are you okay?”

A loud thud sounded, then the door creaked an inch.

Applejack slowly pushed it open and saw Magnet hunched over, on all fours, in the middle of the room.

With a low growl, Magnet turned to them. His eyes were huge and his teeth were bared. Then he raced at them like a primal predator.

“Run,” Applejack told Spike. “Run!”

They turned and ran for their lives and Magnet chased after them.

“What is wrong with him?” Spike shouted.

“I don’t know!” Applejack replied.

They ran across the slippery suspension bridge with Magnet close behind.

“We’re not gonna make it!” Spike shouted.

“Jump!” Applejack yelled.

They leapt off the rope bridge and landed on a low branch. Then they ducked into a hollow log, trying to hide, but Magnet continued to stalk them.

Applejack frantically picked up her police radio.

“Officer Smith to Dispatch! Pie, can you hear me?”

Inside the Precinct One police station, Pinkie Pie was casually chatting with a convict as she showed him a video on her cell phone.

“Are you familiar with Countess Coloratura, the biggest popstar in the world, greatest singer of our lifetime, angel without wings?” Pinkie asked, not seeing the red light blinking on the dispatch phone. “Okay, hold on. Keep watching. Who’s that beside her? Who is it?”

She pointed to the screen, where she was dancing on stage with Coloratura.

“Wow, you are one hot dancer,” Coloratura’s voice started, finishing with a more robotic tone. “Pinkamena Diane Pie.”

“It’s me!” Pinkie exclaimed. “Did you think it was real? It looks so real. It’s not, it’s just a new app.” She chuckled. Then she finally noticed the dispatch phone and clicked the speaker button. “Hold on a sec. Hello?”

“PINKIE PIE!!!!” Applejack yelled.

Magnet, trying to get inside the log, took a swipe at her.

“Pie, this is Smith, I’ve got a 10-91! Hybrid gone crazy! Everfree District! Vine and Tuh-junja!”

“It’s pronounced ‘Tuh-hunga!’” Spike shouted, correcting her.

“Okay, we’re sending backup!” said Pinkie, hearing the racket on the other end. “Smith? SMITH?!”

Magnet took another swipe at Applejack and she dropped her radio as she and Spike scrambled out of the log and continued to run with the driver still in pursuit.

“There!” Applejack shouted when she spotted the gondola station up ahead. “Head for the sky tram!”

They ran toward the gondolas and Applejack darted out of Magnet’s way, but she slipped and almost slid off the platform.

“Blondie!” Spike cried, trying to hold on to the gondola.

“Go!” she shouted, struggling to regain her footing on the slippery surface of the bridge.

Spike hesitated as he held on to the door of the gondola. But it pulled away.

Spike froze as Magnet moved toward him. Then he screamed as Magnet lunged at him full speed. A split second before he reached Spike—clank! Magnet was yanked back by a handcuff on his left foot.

Applejack had cuffed him to the lamppost!

Magnet struggled angrily, knocking Spike and Applejack over the edge of the walkway. Applejack grabbed a vine with one hand and struggled to hold Spike with the other. As the two swung over the canopy, Spike looked at the bottomless abyss below.

“Applejack, don’t let me go!” he shouted.

Applejack’s mind raced as she tried to figure out what to do next.

“I’m gonna let go!”

“No, you, what?”

Applejack let go of the vine and they flew through the air, into a net of vines. Spike couldn’t believe it.

“Applejack. You saved my life,”

“Well, that’s what we do at the MPD,”

Snap!

The vines broke and they plummeted like a pair of bungee-jumpers toward the ground! Luckily, a cluster of vines wrapped around their bodies and stopped them right before they hit the forest floor.

Sirens wailed and converged on their position. Then, faint white lights, then red, and blue. Pale luminous spheres snapping and popping through the gloom. A convoy of police squad cars screeched to a halt.

Out of one stepped Chief Iron Will. He stared at Spike and Applejack, who hung upside down, tangled in the vines, suspended in midair, in front of him.

Applejack smiled.

“Well, this should be good,” Iron Will sighed with a snort.

Applejack led Chief Iron Will and the other officers to the wooden walkway up in the canopy.

“I thought this was just a missing person case, but it’s much bigger. Mr. Shy did not just disappear. I believe he and this hybrid, they went insane, sir,”

“Insane?” Chief Iron Will scoffed. “This isn’t the Nineteenth Century, Smith. People don’t just go crazy. Especially not for no reason.”

“That’s what I thought, too,” Applejack replied, “until I saw this.”

They turned a corner to where she had handcuffed Magnet—but he was gone! Even the handcuffs had vanished.

“What? He was right here!” she said, confused.

“The ‘insane’ hybrid?” Iron Will asked.

“Sir, I know what I saw! He almost killed us!”

“Or, maybe any aggressive hybrid looks dangerous to you humans. Let’s go!” he told his men.

“Sir, I’m not the only one who saw him. Spike!”

Chief Iron Will scoffed again.

“You think I’m going to believe a known felon?”

“He’s a key witness,” Applejack said. “And I enlisted his services.”

“Two days to find Stratus Shy or you quit. That was the deal. Badge,” Iron Will said as he held out his giant, muscular hand.

Spike, flanked by two officers, looked at Applejack in dismay as she stared at Iron Will’s outstretched hand.

He felt terrible. He had wasted her time, not knowing that she had only 48 hours to solve a missing persons case, or that her career was on the line, and he could have cared less.

And it was all his fault. He had never felt so guilty.

“But, sir--” she began again.

“Badge!” he repeated firmly, waiting for her to hand it over.

As Applejack slowly reached up to unpin her badge, Spike spoke up.

“No,”

Iron Will glared at Spike.

“What did you say, Dragon?” he asked.

“I said ‘no.’ She will not be giving you that badge,” Spike stated firmly. “First of all, you gave her a clown vest, a three-wheeled joke-mobile and two days to solve a case that you and your whole department haven’t been able to solve in two weeks? Well, now it’s no wonder why she had to get help from someone like me. None of you were obviously going help her! Were you?”

Iron Will opened his mouth to say something.

“And another thing, Chief!” Spike added. “You gave her forty-eight hours? So, technically, we still have ten left to find Mr. Shy, and that is exactly what we are going to do. So, if you will kindly excuse us, we have one very big lead to follow and a case to crack. Good day, sir.”

Applejack followed Spike while Chief Iron Will watched in stunned silence as they climbed aboard the sky tram.

“After you, Officer Smith,” Spike said as he held the door open for her.

The bell clanged and the gondola glided up into the night sky like a firefly, leaving the Chief and the rest of the officers far below.

The Gondola/Spike's Story

Applejack glanced over at Spike.

She still couldn’t believe that he stood up for her.

“Thank you,” she said.

“Never let them see that they get to you,” he replied.

“So... things do get to you?” she asked.

“Well, not anymore, but I will admit I was young and emotionally volatile like you once,”

“Ha-ha,” she said sarcastically.

“I’m serious,” he stated.

Applejack looked at her companion again. He looked like he had plenty more to say.

“I was nine-years-old, and I remember it like it was yesterday...”

The gondola was moving slowly, about five miles an hour. Applejack wondered what he had to tell her, and how long this ride would take.

So, Spike decided to tell her his life story.

Ever since he was a child, Spike had always had an entrepreneurial mind. He explained to her how badly hybrids were treated by the humans, and all he ever wanted to do was help those, like him, who had suffered so much.

“It was at a doctor’s appointment that I got my inspiration,” he began. “I had gone in for a checkup and must have dozed off because I had a dream that I was running through a field with my friends until we came upon a rollercoaster that took us high into the clouds.”

Sadly, his dream was cut short by his father waking him up.

Spike told his father about the dream, but also reminded his father about how the divide between humans and hybrids was still a problem. And he wanted to be the one to solve that problem.

Then the doctor said, “If I had a dollar for every time I heard that...”

“You’d be the richest man in Maretropolis,” Spike and his father both said.

“And in that moment,” Spike narrated, “my dad and I realized that if we could find a way, no! A place! A place where hybrids could be themselves, and be happy, without fear of reprisal, we would find a big audience for that. And my dad realized there was some money to be made.”

And thus, the idea for an amusement park began to take root.

Spike and his father went to pitch a business idea for a loan so they could start an indoor amusement park called The Dragon’s Lair, where hybrids, like the Dragonborn, could let their instincts loose a little. And it would feature a huge range of games and rides, including a rollercoaster that they could roar on and just be themselves.

“What does every hybrid in this town want?” his father began. “An escape from everyday life! A place where the only rule is to have fun and not get hurt. A place for them, a place called... The Dragon’s Lair!”

He motioned to his son and Spike dramatically unveiled plans for the amusement park, complete with a scale model.

“A fun-zone amusement park exclusively for Maretropolis’s largest untapped market!” his father continued. “They say you can’t put a price on happiness, well I say you can! And there it is! Nineteen-ninety-five a ticket! Me and my boy have a plan: we already have a location with a building lined up, we have the blueprints, we have the staff, we have the tools, we have a dream! The only thing we don’t have is the money to make it happen! Will you help us make it happen?”

There was a moment of uncomfortable silence before the bank’s president finally spoke.

“Look, it’s not that it’s a bad idea, there’s just too much risk in loaning to someone without credit,” he said. “We would be happy to loan to you if you did have the credit...”

Spike’s father’s smile faded, and his words shifted from persuasive and friendly to tactless and rude.

“Okay. Let me put it in words that maybe you’ll understand,” he growled. “I am desperate. And I can tell by that look in your eyes that you don’t like me. You don’t like me, and I don’t like you. But we both like money. You have it, I want to borrow it, and together, we’ll both make a lot of it. So, I will ask again, will you help us make it happen?”

Spike winced at his father’s words, and the bankers rejected his proposal, but Spike’s father was not about to give up.

They went to all the banks: the Maretropolis Bank, the Small Business Administration, Breezie Borrows, Crystal Savings and Loan, Pie Sisters, Flimflam Brothers, even the great businesswoman J. P. Maregan herself, and explained their idea to all of them. Unfortunately for them, almost all the city’s bankers and loaners just happened to be human, and their proposal was still rejected. They even tried to appeal to the bankers’ and loan sharks’ greed, and they were shot down every single time!

Years went by, and every year they would apply for a loan. And every year, they were still shot down, until Spike’s father grew ill and died, and Spike ended up approaching an “old friend” of his father’s.

Crime boss Torch Drago.

And Torch, being the Dragon Lord and a hybrid who had made his business lending money to other hybrids like himself, loaned Spike the money to finance the amusement park.

Spike approached the house, made it up the steps, to the door, and stamped the dirt off his shoes. The heavy iron gates were still being built and hadn’t been completed yet, so it had been easy for him to do so. He grabbed the ring of the knocker, lifted it, used it to thump on the door. Then he waited.

Warm light spilled out as the door opened and he saw that both Basil and Reginald had come to let him in. The bodyguards.

They stood still and said nothing for a moment.

Then they both said, “May we help you?”

“I have an appointment with Torch Drago,” Spike replied.

The two men stepped back, and motioned for Spike to enter. Spike stepped inside and heard the door shut behind him. Then Reginald threw Spike against the wall and frisked him.

“Let me go!” Spike exclaimed.

“You say you have an appointment?” Basil asked.

“When I say, ‘I have an appointment’, I have an appointment!” Spike replied.

Reginald patted Spike’s arms, waist, chest, back, and his legs. He was very thorough, and not gentle.

Once Reginald made sure that Spike wasn’t carrying any weapons, Basil led the way and Spike followed him down the hall, to the throne room, with Reginald close behind.

A second later, Spike heard shouting.

One-sided shouting. A phone call.

The voice was one he had heard a few times before. Deep, gruff, and laced with a kind of animal menace. A voice that seemed to come from another world entirely.

The voice of Dragon Lord Torch.

Reginald went straight in without knocking. The door closed behind him.

“Look, I’m really busy and--What?”

“Someone’s here to see you,”

“What does he want?”

“I don’t know,”

“You didn’t ask him?”

“He just told me he has an appointment,”

“Oh, well, that makes everything better, doesn’t it?”

The doors to the throne room reopened and Torch stepped into the hallway.

The Dragon Lord was dressed in blue suit pants and a matching vest, but his suit coat was off and his tie was loose.

He looked at Spike and stood still for a moment.

Then he smiled politely.

“Spike,” he said.

It was friendly enough, like he had somehow been taken by surprise, but it also had a cruel overtone to it, as if he was enjoying his absolute power and control and Spike’s own fear and discomfort.

“What do you want?” he asked.

Spike swallowed and said, “I want to talk.”

Torch sighed through his nose, turned around, and led the way into the throne room. Inside, Billy was sprawled on one of the sofas while Barry was in an armchair with a glass of iced water.

Torch walked around his desk and sat upon his throne.

“Sit down,” he told Spike.

Spike paused for a moment, then nodded and sat down in an armchair, a little closer to Torch than Barry was. Another moment later, a maid came in with a single glass of Scotch on a silver platter. She placed it carefully on the desk in front of Torch and then backed away. She stood for a moment longer and then headed out of the room.

“You’ve got five minutes. My wife’s waiting in the Jacuzzi,” Torch said, as if he had been planning to join her. “Can I get you a drink? A cigar?” he offered.

Spike glanced behind Torch when he heard the French doors open. A beautiful woman came in. She was a little younger than Torch, but not by much. She was tall, with long raven hair, very slender and very pale. She was so pale she was almost luminous.

She walked up to Torch, giggled and kissed him on the cheek. Her back arched as she stood next to him, pushing her breasts against the material of the risqué, navy blue two-piece bikini she was wearing.

Her hair was still wet (obviously from swimming) and her eyes were blue and full of intelligence and mischief.

Spike knew Torch had a daughter, but this woman was not her.

This was his wife.

Spike stopped looking at her and faced Torch again. He started to speak a couple of times but couldn’t get any words out.

“Don’t beat around the bush,” said Torch. “Just tear it out by the roots and tell me what you want.”

“I want you to loan me two hundred thousand dollars in cash,”

There was silence for a moment.

Then the Dragon Lord said, “No.”

Spike took a deep breath and glared at Torch. Then he stood up, planted his feet wide, and made himself as tall as he could get, which was six feet two inches.

“Torch!” he shouted.

Torch saw Basil move out of the corner of his eye and he motioned to Basil to stand down, which he did.

“Did you just shout at me?” Torch asked, rather calmly.

“Yes, I shout at you!” Spike continued to shout. “I need that money and you’re gonna loan it to me!”

“Why should I?” he asked.

“Torch, if you don’t loan me that money, I’ll--”

“You’ll what?”

“I will not agree with you anymore! Even when you order me to!”

The room went silent.

It went so quiet they could have heard a pin drop.

Spike’s glare subsided to a gaze as his temper cooled. Back under control.

“But if you do, I will not only pay you back with interest...” he added, “but I will make an honest woman out of your daughter.”

Spike knew full well what he was saying. He had met Torch’s daughter Ember a few years ago at one of her birthdays. It was something of a Quinceañera meets Bat Mitzvah. In other words, the day she was no longer a girl and became a woman. And she had grown into a beautiful one at that, Spike recalled.

Spike also knew that Torch was a dangerous man, capable of causing him great harm. He could harm Spike in ways that Spike didn’t want to be hurt. He could kill Spike with just his little finger if he wanted to. But Spike was a young man who had next to nothing to lose and almost everything to gain.

Torch’s men all looked at each other in stunned silence. Then all eyes shifted and fell upon the Dragon Lord. He sat quietly for what felt like an eternity. They all saw Torch thinking about his answer. There was debate in his face. Like the Dragon Lord was playing a long game and thinking eight moves ahead.

The Dragon Lord looked up at his wife, the woman in the blue bikini, and she only smiled in reply.

Then, Torch faced Spike again and said, “All right.”

He nodded to his beloved and she strode over to the fireplace. Next to it was a bag made of shiny, expensive leather, which was packed with thick wads of crisp, green bills.

She reached down and picked up. Then she walked over to Spike, her hips swaying and her breasts jiggling with every step, and handed it to him. Spike kept his eyes locked with hers, for fear that the Dragon Lord would snap his neck for looking at his wife’s breasts (the very same breasts that had nursed Spike after his mother died), and took the bag from her.

Spike turned to face Torch again and said quietly, “Thank you.”

Then, Spike turned and walked out the throne room door and into the hallway. Nobody was there. He walked out the front doors, all the way to the edge of the property, and smiled triumphantly.

With the financing in place, Spike broke ground on his (and his late father’s) theme park. He bought a huge vacant building that was next to a factory down by the docks and a small medical clinic surrounded by a huge parking lot, which would serve as the entrance to the park.

If hybrids wanted to know how to get to The Dragon’s Lair, it had to be word of mouth because it was a secret place. And even if they found it, the only way they could get in was through a secret passageway in the back room of the clinic. Spike, disguised as a doctor in a white lab coat, would personally usher them in through the clinic to a panel in the back wall, which led right into the warehouse behind the clinic, and into The Dragon’s Lair.

Repairing the clinic was the easy part, but when they got to the warehouse, Spike, Thorax and Pharynx hit several snags. Thorax tried to get the plumbing going, but when he saw a murky black liquid pump out of one of the pipes, he screamed. He quickly shut off the flow as Spike came running to him.

“What the Tartarus was that?” Spike asked.

“All I did was turn on the water,” Thorax said.

“That’s all?” Spike asked.

Spike’s gaze shifted to the ceiling as he heard the pipes squeaking, banging and clanging overhead.

“That doesn’t sound good,” he commented.

“Nope,” Thorax said. “You should see the--I guess it’s the water. I don’t know. It’s revolting.”

“So, the plumbing’s not perfect, we’ll get it fixed,” Spike said. “It’s not the end of the world. Look, this is gonna need some work. You’ve gotta expect that. It’s only the first day. You’re not gonna give up on me. And I’m not gonna let you! You’ll see! A little work, a little tender love and care, and a little imagination, and it’s gonna be great! You’ll see!”

“Okay,”

“That’s the spirit!”

And so, the three friends set to work. After fixing the plumbing, patching all the leaks in the roof, replacing all the rotted wood, blacking out all the windows (so nobody outside would be able to see what was going on inside), repainting, sweeping, soundproofing, and driving off the family of raccoons that had been living there, they recruited several members of the Changeling community and started construction on the rides.

As well as a roller coaster, there was a high striker (also known as the “strength tester” or the “strongman game”), a ball pit (full to the brim with empty plastic balls of many colors), a laser tag arena, a photo booth, bumper cars, a carousel, and an arcade featuring many different dancing, video and karaoke machines.

Spike had thought about putting in a Ferris Wheel, but he thought that might have been over the top (as if a roller coaster wasn't already over the top).

The grand opening had gone better than Spike had expected. Thorax and Pharynx put the word out to the hybrid community, and one hundred and forty-four hybrids showed up... and had the time of their lives.

Day after day, hybrids came pouring in. But at the end of the first week, as Spike sat in his office, going over the numbers, he tried to figure out how he was going to pay Torch back. It had taken every bit of the money to build the park, and two hundred thousand dollars with interest was not going to be easy to pay off.

Even with admission at almost twenty dollars apiece, and an average attendance of 150 customers a day, Spike had to take every single one of his profits and expenses into account: coins from the game machines at the arcade, bills from the water and power companies, food to feed the customers, prizes for contest winners... It would take years for Spike to even begin to show a profit!

But he vowed that he would do it!

Despite all the problems, and the prospect of indentured servitude to Torch for the rest of his life, Spike loved the amusement park. And while he dedicated most of his time and energy to The Dragon’s Lair, he always made time for his friends. Eventually, he and Ember started dating.

Spike already knew a lot about Ember. He knew that she was an only child and that she wasn’t good at relationships. There was a lot of ambivalence about her family. They were a close-knit clan but half of her wanted out while the other half felt like she needed to be in.

“I wonder what it’s like to come from a respectable family,” she once told him when they went strolling down by the pier together. “Where there’s no violence, no vendettas... no victims. What must that feel like?”

“I wish I could tell you,” he replied.

Ember jumped onto the railing and started walking it like a balance beam.

“It must feel like... freedom!”

“Ember, be careful!”

“You sound just like my mother. ‘Be careful, Ember. Don’t go scaring me, girl,’” She looked out over the water. “This was our favorite spot. We used to come out here to surf. She was a great surfer. She said I had the gift.”

“What happened?” Spike asked.

He hadn’t seen her since that day when Torch loaned him the money.

“She died. Isn’t that what always happens?”

“I’m sorry,”

“Everyone’s sorry. It doesn’t make any difference,”

Her mother’s death had clearly had a profound emotional effect on Ember. It made Spike wonder whether something had been done to her. Maybe something much worse.

Spike knew that he had made a promise to Torch about repaying his debt, but he didn’t see this coming. He didn’t count on being happy. And he certainly didn’t count on falling in love with Torch’s daughter.

But after Ember jumped off the railing and into Spike’s arms, and he held her close, it didn’t really matter. All that mattered was that they were together.

Spike brought himself out of his flashback and returned his attention to Applejack.

“Look at me,” he told her. “What do you see?”

Applejack had been listening so closely to Spike’s story that she was taken aback by this question.

There was a lot of intelligence in his eyes, but there was also some kind of eerie light burning inside them as well.

He probably wasn’t the most rational person she had met in her life up to that point, but he wasn’t an idiot. When she attempted to arrest him shortly after they first met, he displayed brilliant uses of distraction as well as being crazy-prepared by having his documentation on his person (complete with loophole abuse), just in case some rookie cop happened to come along.

Truth be told, what she saw was a handsome man. Well, a charismatic, charming, self-centered, cunning, and highly intelligent con artist. So, she chose her words carefully.

“I see a guy in a nice almost-suit, fit, strong and healthy,”

“Exactly,”

“What?”

“I’m a threat,”

“How?”

“You saw Dragontown. You saw Torch’s home. He may be a crime lord, but he and his ability to loan money to other hybrids is the only game in town. There is nothing else in the hybrids’ economic system. The money he loans or pays out in wages always comes back to him. One way or another. He may not own anything outside of Dragontown, or have someone in City Hall, but he owns every brick of every building in Dragontown. Half of the Dragon population works for him full time. The other half works for him part time. The full-timers are happy enough, but the part-timers are insecure. And they don’t like competition from outsiders. They don’t like humans showing up, looking for casual labor, willing to work for less,”

Spike never imagined, even in his wildest dreams, that his amusement park would be so successful... even if it was just a temporary solution to Maretropolis’s biggest problem. Just to give the hybrids a little relief, even if it didn’t really fix anything. Like a patch job on a shredded tire.

Never at a loss, Spike’s theme park empire prospered and became the city’s most prominent verboten operation.

Life was good.

But as time went by and business grew, formidable rivals began to emerge. And the competition was anything but friendly.

And, as if that weren’t bad enough, Spike’s preoccupancy with his business distracted him from Ember. Even after he proposed to her. He had missed their first wedding because of this, much to the anger of Ember and her father. And the day of the second wedding attempt, Spike decided to make a quick stop at The Dragon’s Lair before going to the ceremony.

That evening, Torch came to collect, and Spike met him outside the clinic. He approached the black limousine and Torch rolled down the window. Spike reached into his lab coat pocket, produced a thick wad of crisp bills and handed it to the Dragon Lord with a smile.

“I believe we are even,” he said.

“I did not give you a loan so that you could prance around, showing off, like a peacock. Be careful! Maretropolis is like a baby: it doesn’t like to be changed,”

“I am one hybrid in a city full of humans,” Spike told him. “I couldn’t change this town even if I wanted to!”

Spike turned to head back to the clinic, but Rex and Amarant blocked his way. Torch reached into his coat pocket and produced a business card.

“Friends need to stick together, yes?” he asked Spike. “If you ever have a problem, or need anything like advice, help with your taxes or a body that needs to disappear... I am here.”

“Thank you,” Spike said as he took it.

Rex and Amarant walked to the front of the limo and got in as Torch asked, “You know what today is, right?”

“What?” Spike asked.

“Your wedding is today. At six-thirty. And I want you to promise me, on everything between you and my daughter, that you will be there this time,”

“I would rather die than disappoint you or her,”

“Well, this is going to be the very last time,” Torch stated. “The first time was understandable. But if you miss this time, that is it!”

“I understand,”

“She loves you. I know she loves you. But she and I are not sure that you love her,” Torch said. “If you do love her, then prove it tonight.”

Spike nodded.

“But,” Torch added, “if you do not show up there, then I do not want to see, hear, or even smell you around my home, around me, or her, ever again!”

Torch rolled up the window and the limo drove off. Spike glanced at his watch and saw that it was already five-thirty. He had to get changed and get to the ceremony.

“Plenty of time,” he told himself. “Plenty of time.”

When Spike finally turned around, he spotted a group of five people enter the clinic.

They were all tall, in all black: black boots, black jeans, black denim shirts, black leather jackets, belts, fingerless gloves, and black bandanas.

And they were carrying crates marked with the letters “TNT” in white paint.

“Oh, no!” Spike breathed.

He ran back to the clinic and stumbled through the secret passage just in time to see one of them holding a gun to Thorax’s head while the rest started setting explosives all around the park.

“Let him go!” Spike shouted.

“And what if I don’t?” the gunman taunted.

“I’ll crush every bone in your body,” Spike growled. “Starting with that trigger finger.”

The gunman cast Thorax aside and turned the gun on Spike.

Spike spun around and threw a fistful of pocket change at him. Then he tackled the shooter and started punching him in the face. Spike quickly got to his feet and shouted to Thorax to get everyone out of there.

Spike looked to the roller coaster (thankfully, no one was on it) and watched in horror as one of the gunman’s accomplices lit the fuse on a pile of dynamite at the base of the ride; and it erupted, blasting the tallest ramp of the ride through the roof of the warehouse.

Within a matter of seconds, Spike became surrounded by the blazing inferno. Then he was shot in the arm.

He grunted in pain as one of the attackers swung a big fist at his face. Spike saw it late, dodged left and it caught him on the shoulder. Spike was spun around by the blow, then grabbed from behind.

“Get him!” they yelled. “Get the freak! Muzzle him!”

Two of them held Spike’s arms behind his back while two more snapped a muzzle over his mouth and a shock collar around his neck, and they continued to mock him.

“Did you really think you were going to get away with this, Dragon?” one of them asked.

Spike had barely a second to consider his options as the big guy lined up for another shot at Spike’s gut. Spike knew that if it landed, he would be dead.

There was a guy about three feet in front of him, two about eight feet to his left and right, and two more holding his arms behind his back.

They were ready to kill him. And they would have, except for two fatal mistakes: the two guys that were restraining Spike’s arms were holding him from behind.

And Spike wasn’t handcuffed.

In wild desperation, Spike reared back and kicked out like he was punting a football, smashing the big guy’s crotch. Spike’s shoe crunched under the blow and the welt hit the guy like a blunt ax.

Then, Spike ran backwards at full speed, smashing the second and third guys into the wall behind him. When they finally let go of his arms, he turned around, headbutted one of them, then started breaking the fingers of the other. Spike could hear the knuckles splinter over the roaring in his ears.

Spike spun around again as the fourth man waded in and started pounding Spike with short jabs to the arms and chest. Nowhere to hit him. Except his eyes.

Spike jammed one of his thumbs into the guy’s eye. He quickly went down, and Spike returned his attention to the big guy (the one Spike had kicked in the crotch).

He was up on one knee and Spike kicked hard at his face. He missed, but caught the guy in the throat, crushing his larynx. He went back down, choking.

Spike tore the muzzle from his face and the shock collar from his neck before he ran to the emergency door and rushed out.

Limping, his lungs giving out, and his suit and lab coat torn to pieces, Spike barely managed to escape. With the faces of all the men in black etched into his memory. All except their leader. He never saw her face. At least not clearly. All he could remember about her was a shadow looking at him. With cold, dark eyes behind a pair of glasses, and that darker, condescending laugh.

Spike collapsed on a grassy knoll in the nearby park, and crammed his lab coat under his head. Not only was he sad, he was pissed off. His hopes, his dream, his amusement park, it had all been taken away from him.

He lay angrily, listening to the sounds of The Dragon’s Lair burning. It had been almost half an hour since it initially happened, but Spike could still hear the explosion. And little hybrid children crying, screaming in fear as the structure cracked and collapsed.

It was like someone had torn open a hole to the deepest level of Tartarus.

When Spike opened his eyes again, it was morning and he was still on the grassy knoll. All was calm and quiet. Like the events of the night before hadn’t even happened.

But Spike knew the truth. Those people, whoever they were, had tried to kill him. They came in, started destroying everything in sight, and tried to kill him.

Spike snuck around town and eventually found a discarded newspaper in a trashcan with the story of the fire at The Dragon’s Lair. Thankfully, everyone had managed to escape the flames. His would-be captors’ mistakes had saved his life, and everyone else’s.

But on top of his clandestine activities, and “encouraging illegal behavior”, he was now a wanted man. A felon. A fugitive. And they wouldn’t stop hunting him until they were sure he was dead.

Spike went into hiding after that. And his past, combined with his status as a crossbreed left him belonging to neither race. And so, he began to live up to the worst stereotype: making a living as a criminal.

“I learned two things that day,” Spike told Applejack. “One, I was never going to let anyone see that they got to me.”

“And?” she prodded.

“If the world is only going to see Dragons, or any hybrid, as evil and untrustworthy, there is no point in trying to be anything but,”

And in that moment, Applejack understood.

This boy, this young man, who was half human and half dragon, had endured a lifetime of discrimination and prejudice laced with physical and mental pain, and had to endure the taunts of humans just to survive.

That’s what his life was, it wasn’t living, it was an ongoing battle for survival. Plenty of people smarter than Spike hadn’t survived the things he had, and if they had, they were never the same. That made Spike a survivor, which was the quality that meant more than any other to Dragons.

Even more so than their strength and their hoards and stockpiles of wealth.

And it was probably the reason why Torch didn’t hunt Spike down himself, or at least have him killed for not showing up at his wedding to Ember.

Spike had thought about going to the Dragon Lord, or at least to Ember, to explain to them what had happened. But he remembered Torch’s threat and decided against it.

Applejack also saw that he was a lot like her. He was a dreamer. Someone who wanted to make the world a better place.

Until his dreams were broken and burned.

He had seen how dark the world could be, how dark it had been to him, and how he had learned how to deal with it, namely through sarcasm and humor. And in doing so, it left him cynical and bitter.

He was arrogant and very confident in his skills as a con artist, but deep down he was hiding many pains and insecurities from the rejection he suffered at the hands of others.

He may have been cynical, smug, charismatic, self-centered and suave, but he was also brave, loyal, helpful, highly intelligent and trustworthy.

She touched his arm as the gondola pierced through the clouds.

“Spike, you are so much more than that,” she said gently. “I’m glad you told me.”

He pulled away and continued looking over the side at the traffic jam below.

That’s when he noticed something.

“Traffic cameras,” he breathed. “There are traffic cameras everywhere! All over the city! Whatever happened to Magnet...”

“The traffic cameras would have caught it!” Applejack said excitedly.

“Although, if you didn’t have access to the system before, I doubt Chief Minotaur Butt is gonna let you into it now,” he added.

“No. But I have a friend at City Hall who might,” Applejack smiled, feeling hopeful again.

The Assistant Mayor.

Help from Inkwell

The Maretropolis City Hall was a big building, with a brave stab at decoration, but it still had the glum atmosphere government buildings have.

It didn’t take long for Spike and Applejack to find Assistant Mayor Inkwell. She was struggling to hold a stack of files while keeping up with Mayor Blueblood.

“Sir?” she said. “If we could just review these very important—”

As Inkwell continued to struggle and dodge out of the way inside the busy lobby, she almost stepped on a little Breezie.

“Oh, I’m sorry... sir!”

“I heard you the first time, Inkwell!” Blueblood shouted as he set a folder on top of her already huge stack. “Please, just take care of it! And clear my afternoon. I’m going out.”

“No, no! But, sir, you have a meeting with—Sir, if I could just—”

Blueblood continued through the door to his office, letting it slam right in Inkwell’s face, and all the files she was carrying were knocked to the floor.

“Oh, pony feathers,” she sighed as she tried to collect the scattered pieces of paper.

Applejack approached and helped pick up one of her files.

“Assistant Mayor Inkwell,” she said. “We need your help.”

They saw a flash of surprise in Inkwell’s eyes as she looked up at Spike. They didn’t know why. Maybe it was his status as a hybrid. It just had that effect on people.

After Spike and Applejack helped Inkwell pick up her files, she led them to her tiny, cramped office. Spike and Applejack looked around, surprised. Her office was a janitor’s closet cluttered with boxes marked, “Urgent.”

Inkwell led them to the far corner where she had set up a little work space like an office cubicle.

“We just need to get into the traffic camera database,” Applejack said.

As Inkwell typed on the keyboard of her computer, Spike snuck a feel of her hair and whispered, “Sooo soft!”

He was mesmerized.

“You can’t just touch a woman’s hair!” Applejack whispered back.

“It’s like silk!”

“Stop it!” AJ scolded, swatting his hand away as she tried to keep Inkwell from seeing Spike.

“So, where to?” Inkwell asked as she looked up at Applejack, catching her in mid-swat.

“Everfree District, Vine and Tujunga,”

Spike and AJ shared a smile. This time, she had pronounced Tujunga correctly.

“There! Traffic cams for the whole city,” said Inkwell. “This is so exciting! I mean, I never get to do anything this important.”

“But you’re the Assistant Mayor of Maretropolis,” Applejack said.

“Oh, I’m more of a glorified secretary than anything,” Inkwell replied.

“What were you before?” Applejack asked.

“I was the District Attorney, actually,” Inkwell replied. “I think Blueblood just wanted the female vote... But he did give me that nice mug.”

She proudly pointed to a secondhand mug that read “World’s Greatest ~~Aunt~~ Assistant Mayor.”

“It feels good to be appreciated,” she said.

“Stinkwell!” shouted Mayor Blueblood through the intercom.

Inkwell cringed and groaned.

“Ugh. That’s a fun little name he likes to use. I called him Blueballs once. He did not like that at all. Let me tell you, it was not a good day for me.” She pressed a button on the intercom. “Yes, sir?”

“I thought I told you to cancel my afternoon!” he yelled.

“I gotta go,” she told Spike and Applejack. “Let me know what you find.”

“While I’m still young, Stinkwell!” Blueblood’s voice boomed again as she opened the door and hurried out.

“Do you think when she goes to sleep she listens to a recording of herself?” Spike asked.

“Shut up,” Applejack told him as she took a seat in Inkwell’s chair. “Okay. We’re in.”

Spike bent so that he was shoulder to shoulder with her. No more animosity. Just the thrill of pursuit.

They found the footage showing Magnet acting wild on the walkway, creeping towards Spike. And then, after he and Applejack fell, a black van pulled up. It skidded to a stop and two male hybrids jumped out of the back of it.

Shoulder to shoulder, the two men were tall, athletic and well-groomed. Fair skin, in black boots, black jeans and black T-shirts.

They looked almost exactly like the men that had attacked Spike and destroyed his theme park all those years ago.

Except on the back of their shirts, was a very distinct symbol... of a wolf.

“Timberwolves,” Spike and Applejack growled.

“Look at these dumb-dumbs,” Spike added.

They watched as the two hybrids caught Magnet via a net-launcher.

Applejack gasped while Spike just shook his head.

“Bet you an emerald one of ‘em’s gonna snap his jaws and then start howling,” Spike told her. “And there it is. What is it with the wolves and the jaw-snapping? The howling, I can understand, but the snapping?”

“Snapping? Snap. Dragons. Snapdragons,” Applejack said. “That’s what Magnet was afraid of! Timberwolves! ‘Snapdragons’ must be a codeword for ‘Timberwolves’! If they took Magnet—”

“You think they took Stratus Shy, too?” Spike asked.

“Only one way to find out: find out where they went,”

Spike and Applejack continued to examine the footage onscreen. As the black van drove off towards the tunnel leading to Dragontown, it disappeared into the tunnel... but it didn’t come out on the other side.

“Wait, where did they go?” Applejack asked.

Spike squinted at the screen.

“You know, if I wanted to avoid surveillance because I was doing something illegal, which I’ve never done, I would use the old maintenance tunnel 6B. Which would put them out... right there,”

He clicked over to another camera’s footage, then another, and another, and then the van emerged.

“Well, look at you, Junior Detective,” said one very impressed Applejack. “You know, I think you’d make a pretty good cop.”

Spike clicked through some more surveillance videos, tracking the van through back roads.

“Eeyup. They’re headin’ out of town,” Applejack said. “Wait. Where does that road lead to?”

“Oh, no,” Spike breathed.

The Asylum

Spike and Applejack found the mysterious road and followed it. They stopped and peered over a rock as a black van drove past a gated checkpoint. And beyond the gate was an abandoned building built on top of an industrial dam overlooking the waterfall.

Only the building wasn’t abandoned.

Her senses on high alert, Applejack signaled to Spike to follow her and they slowly snuck to the guarded gate. There were two Timberwolves on sentry duty. They were bulky figures, unarmed, dressed in black trench coats and pants.

The gate control shack was a metal structure with tall, wide windows on all sides. One of the Timberwolves was in it. Spike and Applejack scurried behind the outside guard, who stood watching the building on the dam, then past the gate control shack, where the other guard got off the phone.

Spike used sign language to tell Applejack that he was going to try and tiptoe past. She watched in alarm as he sneaked behind the second guard, whose wolfish nose started to sniff, picking up on his scent.

Spike tried to control his breathing as the guard began searching for the source of the scent. But before the guard could find Spike, Applejack, who was still hiding, impersonated a howling animal, grabbing the wolf hybrid’s attention.

“Ooooooooo!”

Hearing the sound, the Timberwolf hybrid couldn’t help but howl back.

The other guard approached and said sharply, “Quit it! You’re gonna start a howl!”

“I didn’t start it!”

“Ooooooooo!” Applejack howled again.

Unable to control themselves, the two guards howled back. Soon more and more Timberwolf hybrids joined in.

“Come on,” Applejack whispered as she grabbed Spike by the arm and they jumped the fence and hurried across the bridge above the waterfall.

“Clever girl,” Spike said, impressed.

As they scrambled over the slippery rocks, they spotted water pouring out of a large drainpipe overhead. Climbing inside, they walked until they removed a manhole cover above their heads, and climbed up into a dark, cavernous room.

Applejack shined her flashlight around the room and it picked out rusty, upturned iron beds.

“I think this was a mental hospital,” she said.

She saw a metal door at the far side of the room and walked toward it.

Spike moved forward and reached for the door handle. Then he stepped back saying, “You’re the officer. You go first.”

Applejack slowly pushed the door open and peered through it.

“All clear,” she said.

They cautiously walked in and Applejack took in the sight of a stylish desk, a pedestal stool and large, modern medical devices.

“This equipment looks brand new,” she said.

“Blondie,” Spike whispered.

He pointed to a collection of huge, deep grooves crisscrossing on the floor in front of him.

“More claw marks,” Applejack said.

Feeling scared, and a little intimidated, Spike started to back up.

“What do you think--?” he began.

He was suddenly interrupted by the growl of a hybrid that was locked up in a glass-fronted cell just a few feet away from him.

Applejack held up her flashlight and swiveled it around the room to reveal... dozens of eyes!

They walked along a long corridor lined with identical cells on both sides, until they reached the end. Each cell contained a snarling being pacing back and forth on all fours, including Steven Magnet.

Applejack shined her flashlight on the floor of the final cell, and a feral, elderly man with a mustache scuttled against the back wall of his cell, out of view.

It was Stratus Shy!

“It’s him,” Applejack breathed. “We found our missing man.” She spoke to him gently. “Mr. Shy, my name is Officer Applejack Smith. Your wife and daughter sent me to find you. We’re gonna get you out of here.”

Mr. Shy screeched and lunged toward the glass wall, as if trying to attack.

“I guess he’s in no rush to get home,” Spike commented.

Applejack looked back down the way they had come and counted out loud.

“Eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen... excluding Magnet, that makes fourteen. Chief Iron Will handed out 14 Missing Person files. They’re all here. All of them are right here,”

Suddenly, the door to the containment area started to open, and Spike and Applejack quickly scampered out of sight, next to an empty cell.

They heard footsteps approaching.

Short strides, light, almost airy. A young woman.

Then more footsteps.

Faster, but a longer stride, with a heavier tread. A tall man, with good shoes, hustling.

Then they heard shouting.

It was Mayor Blueblood!

“Enough!” he shouted. “I don’t want excuses, Doctor! I’m demanding answers! Why can’t you give them to me?”

Applejack whipped out her cell phone and started recording Blueblood as he talked to a doctor.

He looked deathly serious, intense and tired.

“Mayor Blueblood, please,” the doctor said. “We’re doing everything we can.”

“I don’t think you are,” Blueblood said. “Because I have over a dozen of my citizens in here who have all gone off-the-walls crazy, and you can’t tell me why! I would call that very far from ‘doing everything!’”

“Sir, it may be time to consider their biology,”

“Just what are you implying?”

“Wake up and smell the reality! We both know what they all have in common! We can’t keep this a secret forever. We need to come forward,”

“Hmm. Tell the public. Good idea,” Blueblood said before he turned on the doctor again. “And what do you think will happen if we do? How do you think they are going to feel about me, their very own Mayor, who is a white male!? I’ll be ruined!” he yelled.

“Well, what does Chief Iron Will think?”

“Chief Iron Will doesn’t know a thing about this!” Blueblood snarled. “And we are going to keep it that way!”

Suddenly, Applejack’s phone broke the silence.

It was her parents calling.

“Oh, no, no, no!” she whispered, trying to stop the ringing.

Blueblood looked up, startled.

“Someone’s here!”

“Sir, you have to leave, now!” said the doctor. “Security, full lockdown! No one else gets in or out of the building!”

Spike and Applejack ran as alarms blared throughout the asylum and guards swarmed the halls. They ducked through the door to the dark room they had climbed into and Applejack barred the door with one of the iron beds.

“Great, we’re dead! We’re dead!” Spike declared. “That’s it. I’m dead, you’re dead. Everybody’s dead!”

“Can you swim?” Applejack asked Spike as she put her phone into an evidence bag.

“Yes, I can swim. Why?”

Spike watched Applejack jumped down the manhole. He closed his eyes and jumped down after her.

Three guards burst through the door, sweeping the area with their laser targets. One shined a beam on the manhole cover as Spike and Applejack slid through the pipe, twisting this way and that until they finally shot out, tumbling through the air and over the waterfall.

After a gasp of air, Spike swam to the riverbank. But Applejack was nowhere to be seen.

“Blondie? Smith! Applejack!” he shouted.

He sighed when he saw her emerge from the water, holding her bagged phone over her head.

“We gotta call Iron Will!”

In his office, Chief Iron Will was watching his simulated-self dancing with Countess Coloratura on his phone.

“Wow! You are one hot dancer, Chief Iron Will!”

Suddenly, Pinkie Pie burst through the door.

“Chief Iron Will!”

“Not now!” Iron Will said quickly, putting his phone down.

“Wait! Is that... Countess Coloratura?” she asked.

“No!”

“I’m Countess Coloratura, and you are one hot dancer!”

“You have the app, too?” Pinkie squealed. “Oh... Chief!”

“Pie, can’t you see I’m working on the missing persons’ cases?”

“Oh, about that! Officer Smith just called. She found all of them!”

Iron Will’s eyes went wide and his jaw dropped.

“Wow! I’m impressed!”

An hour later, half of the MPD surrounded the asylum while the other half surrounded City Hall. At City Hall, Iron Will led Blueblood away in handcuffs as Applejack read him his rights.

“Mayor Vladimir Blueblood, you are under arrest for the kidnapping and false imprisonment of innocent citizens,” Applejack said.

“You don’t understand!” Blueblood shouted. “I had to do it! I was trying to protect the city!”

“You were just trying to protect your job!” Applejack replied.

“No. Listen, we still don’t know why this is happening. It could destroy Maretropolis!”

“You have the right to remain silent,” she said. “Anything you say can and will be used against you...”

Case Closed

Later, at the MPD, Iron Will addressed the press. Behind him were screens displaying images of the savage citizens—each one of them sporting a shock collar and/or a muzzle.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” he began. “Fourteen people went missing, and all fourteen have been found by our newest recruit, who will speak to you in a moment. But first, let me remind you...”

“I’m so nervous,” Applejack said as she and Spike stood off to the side.

“Okay, Press Conference 101,” said Spike. “You want to look smart, answer their question with your own question, and then answer that question. Like this, ‘Officer Smith, what can you tell us about the case?’ ‘Well, was this a tough case? Yes. Yes, it was.’ You see?”

“You should be up there with me,” she told him. “We did this together.”

“Well, am I a cop? No. No, I am not,” he answered.

“Funny you should say that... because I’ve been thinking. It would be nice to have a partner,” she said as she handed Spike an application to the MPD. “Here.” She gave him the incriminating pen. “In case you need something to write with.”

Inkwell gestured to Applejack to come up to the podium.

“Officer Smith, it’s time,” she whispered.

“So, now, I’ll turn things over to the officer who cracked the case. Officer Applejack Smith,”

As Applejack stepped up, Iron Will saluted her. She saluted back, and then the reporters started shouting out her name and asking questions.

Applejack pointed to one of them.

“Officer Smith, what can you tell us about the people that went crazy?” the reporter asked.

“Well, the people in question...”

She looked to Spike for help, who nodded in encouragement.

“Are they all different? Yes. Yes, they are,”

Spike smiled.

“Okay, so what is the connection?” shouted another reporter.

“All we know is that most of them are hybrids,” said Applejack.

“So, hybrids are the ones going savage?” demanded one reporter.

“Yes, that is accurate,” said Applejack, hesitating before she spoke. “Yes.”

“Why is this happening?” they clamored.

“We still don’t know,”

The crowd rumbled with disappointment.

“But... it may have something to do with biology,” she said. “A biological component. Something in their DNA.”

Spike frowned.

Murmurs rippled across the press as one reporter asked, “In their DNA? Can you elaborate on that, please?”

“Yes. What I mean is, thousands of years ago, the hybrids’ ancestors survived through their aggressive hunting instincts. For whatever reason, their descendants seem to be reverting to their primitive, savage ways,”

Spike didn’t like what he was hearing. And neither did Pinkie Pie. She may have been human, but she was feeling uncomfortable too.

Looking at the photos of the collared and muzzled hybrids, Spike’s nightmares started to come back to him.

“Officer Smith, could it happen again?” asked another reporter.

“It is possible,” said Applejack, surprised by the escalating tension in the room. “So, we must be vigilant. And we at the MPD are prepared and are here to protect you.”

The press suddenly went into an absolute frenzy. Again, they yelled questions all at once. Questions like, “Will more people go savage?”, “What is being done to protect us?” and “Have you considered a mandatory quarantine on hybrids?”

Inkwell stepped up, eager to put an end to the interview.

“Thank you, Officer Smith,” she said. “That’s all the time that we have. No more questions.”

Before Applejack could say another word, Inkwell ushered her away.

“Was I okay?” she whispered to Inkwell, unsure of how she had done.

“Oh, you did fine,” she replied.

Applejack walked across the lobby to Spike.

“That went so fast. I didn’t get a chance to mention you or say anything about how we—”

“I think you said more than enough,” Spike stated, interrupting her.

“What do you mean?” she asked, confused.

“‘Apparently there is a biological component?’” he repeated her words. “‘The hybrids may be reverting to their ancestors’ primitive, savage ways?’” He looked at her incredulously. “Are you serious right now?”

“I just stated the facts of the case. I mean, it’s not like I could go savage,”

“But someone like me obviously could?” he shot back.

“Spike, stop it! You’re not like them,”

“There’s a ‘them’ now?” he challenged.

“You know what I mean. You’re not that kind of guy,”

“The kind that needs to be collared and muzzled?” he asked, gesturing to the video footage. “The kind that makes you believe that you need to carry around Dragon Repellant? Don’t think I didn’t notice that the very first time I saw you,” he said, getting angrier and angrier. “Tell me the truth. Are you afraid of me?”

Applejack looked at him with wide eyes.

“I’m legitimately asking. Are you scared of me, right now? Do you think that I might go nuts? That I might go crazy? That I might want to try to hurt you!”

Spike lunged, like he was going to bite her.

Applejack gasped as she held up a defensive hand and automatically unclipped the holster containing the Dragon Repellant.

“Why am I not surprised?” Spike scoffed as he blew a green ember and burnt up the application form before crumpling it into a ball with his hand. “It’s probably for the best if you don’t have someone like me as an acquaintance, much less a partner!”

As he walked away, he tore the sticker badge from his vest, crumpled it up too, and tossed it into the trashcan, along with the smoldering remains of the form.

Applejack stood speechless for a moment. She had broken their friendship, and she didn’t know how to fix it.

“No. Spike. Spike!” she called after him, but was cut off by the reporters.

“Officer Smith, were you just threatened by that hybrid?” one of them asked.

“What? No! He’s my friend!”

“We can’t even trust our own friends now?” asked another.

“That’s not what I said!”

“Are we safe?” they demanded.

Applejack Gives Up

After the press conference, a wedge was driven between the citizens of Maretropolis, and everyone was talking about it. There were conflicts and protests, and people began to treat one another differently.

As the divide between the humans and the hybrids grew, it was on every news station.

“More bad news in a city gripped by fear. A human is in critical condition, the victim of a mauling by a savage Dragon. This, the twenty-seventh such attack, comes just one week after MPD Officer Applejack Smith connected the violence to hybrid citizens,”

“Meanwhile, a peace rally organized by pop star Countess Coloratura was marred by protest,”

At the protest, MPD officers stood in the middle of the two opposing sides as they argued while the Countess rallied for peace.

Applejack was exhausted by all the fighting—and she felt responsible.

When she rode the subway after work, she watched a young mother pull her child close to her as a hybrid gentleman in a suit boarded the train and sat on the bench to read his book, and Applejack shook her head.

Applejack got off at the next stop and went to the hospital. Fluttershy and her mother watched Mr. Shy flail around like a madman while he was shackled to the floor of his secured room.

“That’s not my papa,” Fluttershy said.

“That’s not my husband,” Mrs. Shy added sadly.

Applejack sighed, her face full of worry.

There was nothing she could do, except remember what Coloratura had said over the news.

“Maretropolis is a unique place. It’s a beautiful, diverse city where we celebrate our differences. This is not the Maretropolis I know. The Maretropolis I know is better than this. We don’t just blindly assign blame. We don’t know why these attacks keep happening, but it is irresponsible to label all hybrids as savages. We can’t let fear divide us. Please... give me back the Maretropolis I love.”

Even inside the MPD, the news could not be ignored.

The tension between the human and hybrid officers was at an all-time high. It was so high that they wouldn’t even sit together when they ate and each side kept to their own. Thankfully, they didn’t paint a giant line down the middle of the station to mark their territory.

Chief Iron Will approached Applejack at her desk.

“Come on, Smith. The new mayor wants to see us.”

“The mayor? Why?”

“It would seem you’ve arrived,” Iron Will smiled.

As Applejack followed Iron Will to the front entrance, she saw Pinkie Pie, her usually happy self now mournfully sad, her hair now flat and some of the color gone from her face, packing up her things.

“Pinkie? What are you doing?”

“Um... everyone thinks that, even though I’m human, it would be best if someone such as I, with my mental instabilities, wasn’t the very first face you see when you walk in through that door,” she said, pointing behind Applejack.

“What?” AJ asked in shock.

“They’ve decided to move me to Records. At least until the results of my psyche evaluation come back. It’s down in the basement. By the boiler...”

Applejack’s disappointment was evident on her face.

“Smith!” Iron Will called.

Applejack tried hard to keep her head up high as she followed Iron Will out to his squad car.

Later, at City Hall, Mayor Inkwell sat behind her desk in her big new fancy office as Iron Will and Applejack sat down across from her.

In front of them was a pamphlet with a picture of Applejack smiling that read, “MPD, Integrity, Honesty, Bravery.”

Applejack looked at it, confused.

“I don’t understand,” she said.

“Our city is ninety percent human, Applejack,” Inkwell explained. “And right now, they’re just really scared. You’re a hero to them. They trust you. And so that is why Chief Iron Will and I want you to be the public face of the MPD.”

Applejack looked down at the flyer again.

“I’m not a hero,” she said sadly. “I came here to make the world a better place, but I think I broke it.”

“Don’t give yourself so much credit, Smith,” said Iron Will. “The world has always been broken. That’s why we need good people in it. People like you.”

Applejack looked Iron Will in the face, and saw that he was very sincere.

He could have begrudgingly accepted or even tried to weasel his way out of what happened, but he didn’t. Instead, he gracefully and respectfully gave Applejack all the credit for her accomplishments.

And now, he had the courage to admit that he was wrong.

“With all due respect, sir, a good cop is supposed to serve and protect. Help the city, not tear it apart,” she said. She took off her badge and handed it to Iron Will. “I don’t deserve this.”

“Smith...” Iron Will said sadly.

“Applejack, you’ve worked so hard to get here,” said Inkwell. “It’s what you always wanted ever since you were a kid. You can’t quit.”

Applejack placed her badge onto the flyer, stood up, and said, “Thank you for the opportunity.”

Then she walked out of the office.

Three months later, on a sunny day in Ponyville, at her family’s fruit stand, Applejack packed up some apples for a customer.

“A dozen Red Delicious,” she said robotically. “Have a nice day.”

Applejack was dressed in her brown cowboy hat, an orange plaid shirt worn open with the sleeves rolled to her elbows, a soft white cotton shirt underneath, faded blue jeans and brown boots.

She felt different out of uniform.

She slumped down, resting her chin on her hand as she glanced at the front page of the Maretropolis Times and the headline, “Growing Unrest Divides City.”

Her family, who had been watching her, finally approached her.

“How ya doin’, sis?” Big Macintosh asked.

“I’m fine,” she replied.

“You are not fine,” Buttercup said. “You’re lying again.”

“Why did I think I could make a difference?” she sighed.

“Because you’re a trier, that’s why,” Bright Mac said.

“You’ve always been a trier,” Granny Smith added.

“Oh, I tried, all right,” she said. “I tried and I made life so much worse for so many innocent people.”

“Not all of them,” Grand Pear said as Mr. and Mrs. Cake walked up to the stand. “Speak of the devil. Right on time.”

Applejack’s eyes widened when she saw that the Cakes were accompanied by a hybrid man in a red shirt, black jeans and an apron, who was carrying a sign that read “Baked delights made with fresh produce from the Smith Family Farm.”

“Is that... Garble?” she asked.

“Eeyup,” Big Macintosh confirmed.

“It sure is,” Bright Mac nodded.

“He works for them now,” said Buttercup.

“And I don’t think they ever would have considered it had you not opened our minds,” Grand Pear admitted.

“The boy’s turned into one of the top chefs this side of the Dragon Lands,” Granny Smith added.

Applejack looked genuinely surprised.

“That’s... that’s really cool, you guys,” she said.

The man in question climbed a ladder with a hammer and nails and bolted the sign to the top of the Cakes’ display stand.

After learning that Garble had slashed his granddaughter’s cheek, Grand Pear had the teenage hybrid arrested. After his arrest, Garble turned to drugs and his life fell into chaos until he finally ended up in juvenile hall and eventually prison. And while he was in prison, Garble took up boxing and quickly learned how to fight. Otherwise he would have been beaten up on an almost daily basis.

When he got out of prison ten years later, he decided to make some changes. He dedicated his life to helping people instead of hurting them and became a drug counselor. He started visiting juvenile halls and other correctional facilities, and started talking to young people, humans and hybrids, who wanted to stay out of trouble and help them do right.

During that time, Garble found a passion for cooking. He got into the culinary arts business, found a job with the Cakes, and he’d been working for them ever since.

Five years clean and five years sober.

“Garble,” said Applejack as she approached him after he got off the ladder. “I’ll be darned.”

“Applejack,” Garble said softly. “I am so sorry for what I did to you. I had a lot of self-doubt, and it manifested itself in the form of unchecked rage and aggression. I’m sorry I was a such a jerk.”

“Well, I know a thing or two about being a jerk,” she replied.

Garble smiled.

“Anyway, we just brought you all these cakes,” he said.

Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, Scootaloo and Babs Seed ran across the square, beelining for the cakes.

“Hey, kids!” Bright Mac shouted. “Don’t run through the Antirrhinum majus!”

The girls stopped just short of a flowerbed in front of Roseluck, Lily Valley, and Daisy’s flower shop. They carefully walked around it and moved on.

“Now, there’s a four-dollar word, Mr. Smith,” Garble said. “Us hybrids just call them Snapdragons.”

Applejack’s eyes widened.

“What did you say?” she asked.

“Oh, Garble’s talking about those flowers, AJ,” Bright Mac said as he gestured to a patch of red flowers growing in front of the store. “We use ‘em to keep the Parasprites off the produce, but I don’t like Apple Bloom or any of her friends going near ‘em because of what happened to your Uncle Pearce.”

“Yeah, Pearce ate one on a dare when he and I were kids and he went completely nuts,” Buttercup said.

“He bit the dickens out of your grandpa,” Bright Mac added.

Applejack started putting the pieces together.

“That’s why Stratus Shy went savage,” she thought. “Just like the hybrids.”

“A human can go savage,” she breathed.

“Savage?” Grand Pear asked. “That’s a strong word. But it did hurt.”

“Well, sure it did! There’s a sizable divot in your arm from where he bit ya, I’d call that savage!” Granny Smith replied.

Applejack stood still as thoughts raced through her head.

“Snapdragons isn’t a codeword for Timberwolves, they’re flowers! The flowers are making the hybrids go savage!” she gasped. “That’s it! That’s what I’ve been missing!”

She raced away, and then turned back.

“Oh, keys! Keys, keys, keys! Come on! Hurry!”

Her father tossed her the keys to his pickup and Applejack climbed in. She spun the wheel and blasted off down the dusty road.

“Thank you, I love you, bye!” she called back.

“Did any of you catch any of that?” Bright Mac asked.

“Nnnope,” Big Macintosh told his father.

“Not a word,” Buttercup added.

“Well, that makes me feel a little better,” Grand Pear said.

“I thought she was talking in tongues or something,” Garble added.

Applejack raced towards Maretropolis. Driving up and down the backstreets, she spotted the van of Spike’s accomplices parked in an alley. She knocked on the back door and Pharynx opened it.

“Who is it?” he demanded.

They were both taller than the last time Applejack saw them (although, Pharynx was slightly shorter than Thorax), with brilliant colored hair and wearing custom tailored suits.

They both looked at her with wide eyes.

“I have to find Spike,” she told him. “It’s very important. Please.”

Thorax nodded.

Applejack's Apology

Applejack followed Thorax’s instructions and made her way to the abandoned amusement park down by the docks.

The Dragon’s Lair.

Spike’s dream.

The warehouse itself had burnt to the ground, but the rides (though broken-down, burnt and decrepit) still stood.

Applejack exited her dad’s truck and the first thing she saw was a burnt sign featuring Spike’s happy young face. The “Welcome” sign to the once illustrious adventure playground, now laid broken in two.

Applejack entered the empty park and walked past the high striker, the ball pit, the laser tag arena, the photo booth and the video arcade.

It was all calm and quiet.

She found Spike standing in the middle of the ruins, looking at the roller coaster. The crown jewel of his park. His dream. Now, just another bad memory. One that would forever haunt him.

He was dressed in the same mulberry vest, black slacks and shoes he had worn since she first saw him.

And just like the park, he looked still, calm, and composed.

“Spike. Snapdragons isn’t code for ‘wolves’, they’re toxic flowers. I think someone is targeting hybrids on purpose and making them go savage!”

“Wow,” he said passively. “Isn’t that interesting.”

She followed him as he walked further into the rundown theme park.

“Wait... Wait! I don’t blame you. And I don’t expect you to forgive me! I don’t think I’ll ever be able forgive myself, either,”

Spike stopped and stood with his back to her, refusing to look at her.

“I was ignorant, irresponsible, and small-minded. But no one should have to suffer because of me or my mistakes. I have to fix this. And I will fix this! But I can’t do it without you,”

Spike said nothing.

“And... And after we’re done, you can hate me all you want,” she sobbed. “And... and I’ll be happy about it, because I was a rotten apple, and a horrible friend to you, if I was ever a friend at all, and I hurt you... and you--and you can walk away knowing that you were right. That you were right all along. You were always right... I really am just a dumb, blonde bimbo.”

Spike still didn’t respond.

It was unbearably quiet until, suddenly, Applejack heard her voice play back on a recorder.

“I really am just a dumb, blonde bimbo,”

She heard it again.

“I really am just a dumb, blonde bimbo,”

Spike finally turned around to face her, holding up her recording pen.

“I really am just a dumb, blonde bimbo,”

“Don’t worry, AJ,” he said with a smile. “I’ll let you erase it... In 48 hours.”

She sniffled as she wiped her tears away.

“All right. Get in here,” he said.

She buried her face into his chest and hugged him tightly.

“Oh, you’re so emotional,” he said. “There we go. Are you just trying to get the pen? Is that what this is? You are standing on my foot, though. Off, off, off.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she said softly.

They left the amusement park, and AJ climbed into the driver’s seat of the truck as Spike walked around the hood and slid in beside her.

As Applejack drove, Spike sat comfortably, enjoying the extra legroom.

“You’ve changed,” he said.

“In what way?” she asked.

“Your clothes. They look nice,”

“Don’t get used to them,”

Spike reached into the basket that was sitting in between them, grabbed a handful of grapes, and popped a few into his mouth.

“Oh! I thought you guys only grew apples! Mmm. So, what’s the plan?”

“We are gonna follow the Snapdragons,” she said.

“Okay. How?”

“First, I need you to call someone for me,” she said, handing him her cell phone. “A girl named Fluttershy. Give her my name. Tell her to go to Torch’s house. And tell her, that when she gets there, to tell them it’s about her father. They’ll let her in and we’ll meet her there.”

Spike made the call and relayed the message as Applejack had said.

“She’s on her way there now. What else?”

“You know this guy?” Applejack asked, holding up a picture of Discord, the crook she had busted in Dragontown for stealing flower bulbs.

“I told you, I know everybody,”

“Good,”

Spike and Applejack cruised through town and found Discord standing on a street corner, wearing the same mismatched suit, selling bootleg books.

“Well, hello. Step right up. Anything you need, I got it!” he called. “All your favorite stories! I got ones that haven’t even been released yet! Hey, fifteen percent off! Twenty! Make me an offer! Come on!”

“Well, well, if it isn’t the Lord of Chaos,” Spike said, walking up to him.

“And what do you want, Drake?” Discord asked. “Shouldn’t you be melting down a popsicle someplace? Oh, and look who you brought with you,” He recognized Applejack. “Blondie the Copper.”

“We both know those weren’t moldy onions I caught you stealing,” said Applejack as she crossed her arms in front of her chest. “What were going to do with those Snapdragons, de Prancie?”

“That’s Discord, Lord and Master of Chaos, to you!” he stated. “And I ain’t telling you jack, sweetheart. And there is nothing that you can say, or do, that is going to make me.”

He flicked his toothpick in her face. Applejack turned to Spike and they shared a smile. She knew they had the exact same idea.

“Pay it forward.”

For those of you who don’t know what that means, it means in the future, whether it’s years, months, weeks, days, or even seconds into the future, you’ll meet someone who needs help. So, you help them out.

“Pay it forward.”

That is what Torch, the Dragon Lord, had told Applejack. She had done him a service, he had said. She had saved his daughter’s life, so he was indebted to her.

After Spike and Applejack had found Discord, their argument turned into a fight that resulted in Spike knocking Discord out and Applejack hogtying him.

A minute later, they were back in the truck, with Discord tied up and unconscious in the back seat, and driving to Dragontown, all the way to the place where Spike and Applejack decided to collect their favor.

When Applejack pulled up to the gate, two Dragons came up to the truck. One came up on the right and stood ten feet away, the other stayed on the driveway and checked the truck’s load bed, and then came back and stood off six feet from Applejack’s door and called out in a loud, clear voice.

“Lower your window,” he said.

Applejack wound the window all the way down, then she put her hands high on the wheel, and glanced left.

“Tell Dragon Lord Ember that the officer who saved her life is here to see her,” she said.

The Dragon’s eyes went wide for a moment, then he nodded.

He turned to his associate and ordered him to open the gate. He did.

Not long after, Discord awoke, inside Torch’s (or rather, Ember’s) throne room, and he saw Spike and Applejack standing in front of him with Torch and Ember.

Spike was holding a teacup in one hand, sipping, enjoying his beverage, while holding a saucer in the other. Applejack was standing next to him, with her arms across her chest, and Ember was seated at her father’s throne behind his desk while Torch stood between Ember and Applejack.

“Ice him!” Ember shouted.

Basil and Reginald held Discord over the icy death pit, and he screamed and struggled, trying to break free of their grip.

“You dirty Dragons! Why are you helping her? She’s a cop!”

“And the godmother to my future children,” Ember said as she motioned Basil and Reginald to wait as they dangled Discord over the pit. “If my first child’s a girl, I’m going to name her after you,” she told Applejack.

“Aw,” Applejack said, feeling very honored.

“Ice this weasel,” Ember ordered.

“I already told you, you can’t make me talk!” Discord shouted.

“We might not,” Applejack said. “But we know someone who can.”

She nodded to Torch and Torch nodded back.

“I’ll bring her in,” he said.

“Her?” Discord asked. “‘Her’ who?”

Torch left the throne room through the side entrance. He returned a minute later with a young woman. She was petite and dressed in blue jeans and a turtleneck sweater the same shade of green as the skirt she usually wore.

“Fluttershy?” Discord asked.

“Discord?” Fluttershy gasped.

“So, you two do know each other,” Applejack said.

“He's my friend,” Fluttershy said.

“Friend?!” Spike, Applejack, Torch and Ember exclaimed.

Discord sighed heavily.

“It’s true,” he confirmed.

Discord was standing outside the factory that Fluttershy's father was working at the day he retired. After his retirement party, he and his family came across Discord in the parking lot. Fluttershy's parents were reluctant to approach Discord, but Fluttershy did. She thought he was homeless, so she offered him a place to stay until he got back on his feet... and he graciously accepted.

It took some time getting used to, but Discord enjoyed having Fluttershy in his life. She sensed there was good in him and what's more, she gave him something nobody else had. She gave him a chance. A chance at friendship. Discord had never had a friend before, and now that he did, he didn't want to give that up.

One day, Discord went out for a walk. It was not so much a walk as it was scouting a location for he and Fluttershy to have a picnic, and he ran into a group of individuals who made him an offer he couldn't refuse. It appealed to his chaotic nature, and if he agreed they promised that they would reward him for his assistance. At first, he wanted to accept, but he realized that if he did, he would lose his first and only friend.

Fluttershy had told Discord that he could stay with her as long as he needed, but he knew that as long as he stayed with her he only put her at risk. At risk of learning the truth about him and his criminal activities as well as risk her very life. He didn't want to lose the one person who had shown him any kindness, but he certainly didn't want to risk putting her, or her family, in danger.

Discord had to choose.

So, he left the Shy family and returned to his life on the streets. But at least he knew they would be safe.

“But what are you doing here?” he asked Fluttershy. “What is she doing here? I thought this was about the Snapdragons!”

“Snapdragons?” Fluttershy asked. “You told me this was about my papa,” she said to Spike and Applejack.

“We believe there is a connection,” Applejack explained, “between Discord and what happened to your father.”

“What?!” Discord and Fluttershy shouted.

“We believe that your father was targeted because he knew something about the other people that went missing,” Spike told Fluttershy. “And that was that they had all gone insane from ingesting Snapdragon flowers. This was a day before he went missing. Isn’t that right, Torch?”

“Yes,” the former Dragon Lord said.

“Something that couldn’t be talked about over the phone,” Spike recalled. “And right now, the police seem satisfied with what they believe to be some kind of outbreak that seems to predominantly affect hybrids. That’s why Stratus Shy called you. He found out what was going on and he wanted you to know about it. That’s why he wanted to meet with you in person. He probably figured you would take him more seriously face-to-face... but then he went missing.”

Nobody spoke for several seconds.

Then Applejack asked Fluttershy, “Your mom is a florist, right? And your dad helped her out in her shop after he retired, right?”

“Yes,” Fluttershy replied.

“Your mom is in the floral business and she found out that some of her competitors had started dealing under-the-table with some of their customers,” Spike said. “Offering kickbacks, maybe even bribes. Your dad eventually found out and pieced together enough to make some sense of it. And when he went to tell Torch about it, someone went after him, to keep him from talking. It was you, wasn’t it, Discord?”

“No! I swear, I never laid a finger on him!”

“No, but you have been stealing Snapdragon bulbs from floral shops all over town,” Applejack said. “Why?”

Discord said nothing.

“You understand that serious crimes have been committed,” Applejack told him. “Not just by you, but by others. And you need to choose sides. Now.”

Discord still said nothing.

“You want to go down with them?” she asked. “An accessory to what happened to Fluttershy’s father and fourteen other people? It’s your choice. You can either talk and we can see that the D.A. goes easy on you... Or you can keep silent, which gives you two new options: Being dumped into an icy grave, or these guys can take you apart, one piece at a time.”

Basil and Reginald looked more than happy to oblige.

“All right, all right, I’ll talk!” Discord shouted. “I admit I stole those Snapdragons,” he confessed. “But I only stole them so I could resell ‘em at jacked up prices. They offered me what I can never refuse... chaos! But Fluttershy, believe me when I say this; if I had known what they were going to do with them, if I had known they were going to go after your father, I never would have done it in the first place!”

“Who’s your buyer?” Applejack asked him.

“A tartlet named Strawberry Sunrise. We got a drop spot underground. It’s an abandoned subway car with a fancy lock on the door. Maybe a lab, maybe a storeroom. She spends a lot of time there. That’s all I know. I swear. And watch yourselves. Strawberry isn’t exactly friendly. In fact, she’s the exact opposite of friendly. She’s unfriendly!”

Underground Laboratory

Spike and Applejack followed Discord’s instructions and found the drop: a shuttered subway entrance in the bad part of the city.

On the way there, Spike and Applejack tried to think from Discord’s point of view. He was doing something for somebody. Park work, part favor. Worth “complete and utter chaos”, but not worth losing his friendship with the one person who had shown him any kindness: Fluttershy. It had to be someone higher up on one of the dangerous food chains. And it wasn’t Torch or Ember.

So, what was Discord involved in and with whom? And he may not have volunteered, but he could have been coerced into it by someone for some reason. And that raised the stakes.

Spike, using his Dragon strength, pried back the iron gates and they entered the abandoned station. The concrete was painted dirty white and there were pools of light and pools of darkness. The ceiling was high and there were fat square pillars holding it up.

Down in the tunnel, a train thundered past.

“Come on,” Applejack whispered as they scampered toward an old, stationary carriage.

Spike lifted Applejack and she pushed open the window. She peered inside and then climbed in with Spike close behind. The interior of the car had been transformed into a greenhouse. Rows and rows of red-violet flowers were incubating in very dry soil under indirect lights.

“Discord wasn’t lying,” Applejack whispered.

“Yeah, I’d say our ‘friend’ Strawberry Sunrise has cornered the market on Snapdragons,” said Spike.

Suddenly, a door opened at the far end of the car, and Spike and Applejack quickly hid under a table as a green-eyed woman with curly, red hair entered the room. They watched from under the table as she picked up a bucket and poured the contents into a compost tub.

She shut the lid and turned a dial on the side of the tub. As the machine whirred, red-violet liquid snaked along a system of interconnected tubes, rigged up to several glass beakers and flasks. The liquid in the last flask receded, passing into a small paint ball-like pellet the size of a small marble, which Strawberry placed onto the apparatus.

Once the harvesting process was complete, she held up the red-violet marble and examined it. Then, she walked over to her ringing cell phone.

Spike and Applejack snuck over to get a closer look at Strawberry Sunrise, who was standing in front of a subway map that was covered with pictures of various people.

“You’ve got Strawberry, what’s the mark?” she answered as she held her phone to her ear. “Uh-huh. Changeling in Celestia Square. Got it.”

She loaded the pellet into her gun and cocked it.

“Are you serious?” Strawberry Sunrise asked. “Yeah, I know they’re small and fast. I can hit ‘em. I hit a little old man through the open window of a moving car, didn’t I?”

Spike and Applejack shared a look. It was all becoming clear.

Looking at the map, they noticed that it was covered with pictures of all the people that had gone missing, including Stratus Shy and Steven Magnet.

Strawberry Sunrise had darted them with the serum from the Snapdragons, turning them into savage monsters.

Suddenly, there was a knock at the entrance of the car.

“Hey, Strawberry, open up! We’ve got your fruit salad!”

“All right. Plum and Raspberry are back, so I’m leaving now. Yeah, I’ll call you when it’s done. Or you’ll see it on the news. You know, whichever comes first. Out,” She finished the call. “Bitch,” she added to herself.

Strawberry put down her phone and went over to let her cohorts in. Applejack quietly got up from under the table and crept up behind her.

“What are you doing?” Spike whispered. “Get back here! She’s gonna see you! Whatever you’re thinking, stop! Applejack!”

Strawberry Sunrise opened the door.

“It better have the extra strawberries and no apples this time,” she said.

Upon hearing that, Applejack gritted her teeth and kicked Strawberry hard, in her ass (right between both cheeks) and out the door, knocking her into the other women. With them on the other side of the door, AJ locked it, shutting them out.

“What are you doing?” Spike shouted. “You just trapped us in here!”

“We need to get this evidence to the MPD!” Applejack told him.

“Okay. I got it!” Spike said, picking up the case with the gun and serum pellet inside.

“No. All of it!”

“What?”

Applejack ran into the driver’s compartment and started pressing all the buttons on the control desk.

“You’re a conductor now?” Spike asked. “It would take a miracle to get this rust-bucket moving!”

The engine fired up and the wheels of the disused train carriage creaked as it jerked and started to come alive.

“Well. Hallelujah,” Spike said.

Outside, Raspberry, one of Strawberry Sunrise’s accomplices, made a phone call.

“We’ve got a situation at the lab,” She saw the train move. “And it just got worse!”

She put her phone in her pocket and she and Plum chased after the train.

As the train sped up and began to race down the tracks, Spike finally allowed himself to smile.

Strawberry’s cronies jumped onto the carriage and Spike and Applejack heard their footsteps on the roof. Suddenly, Plum burst in through a hatch on the roof. Spike managed to close and lock the door between the lab and the driver’s compartment, but Plum continued to bang up against it.

Spike and AJ looked up to the ceiling and the other woman, Raspberry, appeared on the front window. She smashed the glass and tried to grab Applejack, and the train slowed down as Spike and Applejack tried to push her out.

Spike turned and saw Plum charging toward the door. He opened the door and she barreled through, knocking Raspberry and Applejack out the window. Applejack grabbed onto and pulled Plum’s hair as the subway car continued chugging down the track... after Raspberry.

“Applejack!” Spike cried.

“Don’t stop!” she shouted. “Keep going!”

“No, no! Please, stop!” Raspberry cried.

“Do not stop this car!” Applejack ordered.

Raspberry ran off the tracks and Plum tossed Applejack onto the roof of the carriage. With Spike at the controls, Plum punched through another window.

Still on the roof, Applejack saw an oncoming train. She spotted the track-switch lever below and shouted, “Speed up, Spike! Speed up!”

“There’s another train coming!”

“Trust me! Speed up!”

Spike groaned as he cranked the carriage to full speed.

A split second before the trains crashed into each other, Applejack kicked Plum off the front of the train, onto the track-switcher, and the subway car Spike and Applejack were riding in changed tracks!

Then the subway car derailed and fell onto its side, throwing up sparks.

Spike and Applejack saw the end of the line up ahead and dove off the subway car, and onto the platform, before it hit the wall.

“Okay, maybe some of the evidence survived,” Applejack said.

Flaming debris flew past their heads as the car exploded and all its contents, including the Snapdragons, burned to a crisp.

“It’s all gone. We’ve lost it all,” she said.

“Not all of it,” Spike said, holding up the gun case.

“Spike, you did it!” AJ exclaimed as she gave him a big hug. “Come on! We gotta get to the MPD! We’ll cut through the Natural History Museum!”

The Museum

Spike and Applejack dashed up the stairs from the subway, past a giant statue of Star Swirl the Bearded. Then past the exhibits about the heroes and history of Equestria. They raced across the vast central hallway of the museum on their way to the MPD.

“There it is!” Applejack panted.

She could see the MPD offices through the exit doors of the museum.

“Applejack!” a voice called. “Applejack!”

They stopped and turned to see Mayor Inkwell standing a few yards behind them, flanked by two female police officers.

“Mayor Inkwell!” said Applejack. “We found out what’s been happening. Someone’s darting the hybrids with a serum. That’s what’s making them go savage.”

“I’m so proud of you, AJ,” said Inkwell. “You’ve done such a good job!”

“Wait... What are you doing here?” Applejack asked as her face clouded over. “And how did you know where to find us?”

Something about the way Inkwell was acting made her suspicious.

Applejack turned to go, but Strawberry Sunrise, who had somehow caught up with them and was now in a police officer’s uniform, blocked the exit. She cracked her neck.

Suddenly, it became clear as crystal.

Spike thought back to when he saw Inkwell at City Hall.

A flash of surprise in her eyes. He didn’t know why.

She didn’t ask for his name, but he wasn’t a stranger to her. She knew who he was. And now, he knew the reason why.

Seeing him there, at City Hall, alive, had knocked her off balance for a second. She was definitely surprised. She paused, and then she recovered. Then Spike remembered a note that was taped to the phone on her desk when she answered Mayor Blueblood’s page. The name.

Strawberry Sunrise.

The woman in the underground lab. The one Applejack kicked in the butt. The woman who was now blocking their way.

Then Applejack remembered what Spike had told her.

“I know everyone.”

And because he was a known felon, everyone knew him. Everyone from City Hall to the Police Department to the D.A.’s Office.

“What were you before?” Applejack asked.

“I was the District Attorney, actually,” Inkwell replied.

It was Inkwell! She had set this all up! She was the one who led that attack on Spike’s amusement park all those years ago. She had employed those men to kill him and she was behind the hybrids going savage!

Inkwell had tried to kill Spike then, and was surprised to see that he had not died from his injuries. Granted, a simple bullet graze to the arm would not have been enough to do the job (at least not on its own), but without proper treatment, an infection would have finished him off.

But her plan had backfired. Spike wasn’t killed and he didn’t die. Her thugs were beaten off.

These women were all cops, and they were all part of Inkwell’s faction.

That is why she had known where they would be.

“Run,” Spike and AJ told each other.

And they dashed off down a corridor.

“Get them,” Inkwell told her bodyguards.

While she and Spike were running, Applejack glanced over her shoulder. She didn’t see the shovel from the statue of Rockhoof sticking out in front of her, and she ran right into it. Applejack screamed in pain as the shovel slashed her leg and knocked her off her feet.

“AJ!” Spike cried.

He rushed to her as she groaned in pain. Her leg was bleeding badly.

“I got you!” he said as he carried her behind a pillar and out of sight.

“Just remember to breathe,” he said as he bound her leg with a handkerchief.

“Come on out, Applejack!” called Inkwell.

“Take the case,” Applejack whispered to Spike. “Get it to Iron Will.”

“No!” he whispered back.

“Go!”

“I am not going to leave you!”

“I can’t walk!”

“I’ll carry you!”

“We’re on the same side, Applejack,” Inkwell said, trying to get her to surrender. “We’re both underestimated, we’re both underappreciated... Aren’t you sick of it?”

Her henchwomen fanned out.

“Hybrids. They may have the strength and powers of their ancestors, but we still outnumber them ten to one!”

Inkwell spotted a woman’s shadow on the wall, snapped her fingers and pointed to it. One of her guards noticed, killed her flashlight, and silently crept toward the shadow.

“Think about it,” Inkwell said. “Ninety percent of the population united against a common enemy. We would be unstoppable!”

The guard pounced, but it was just a wax figure.

Inkwell heard a metallic clang off to the right and saw Spike and AJ making a run for it.

“Over there!” Inkwell shouted. “Don’t let them get away!”

Spike carried Applejack bridal style while Inkwell’s guards chased after them. Strawberry Sunrise lunged, knocking the case out of Applejack’s grasp and sending AJ and Spike down into a sunken diorama exhibit in the floor, while the gun case stayed above.

Inkwell looked over the edge, down at them.

“You really should have stayed on the farm,” she told Applejack as she picked up the gun. “It is too bad. I really did like you.”

“What’re ya gonna do?” Applejack shouted. “Kill me?”

“Oh, don’t be so dramatic!” Inkwell replied. “I’m not going to. He is!”

She aimed at Spike, who had propelled himself between Applejack and the shot. The pellet hit him in the neck and he fell to the ground.

“No! Oh, Spike!” Applejack cried.

Spike started to shake and crouch over as Inkwell dialed her phone.

“Yes, police!” she yelled. “There’s a Dragon loose in the Natural History Museum! Officer Smith is down! Repeat, officer down! Send back-up!”

She hung up and watched as Spike, now on all fours, started to grunt and growl like a wild animal.

“No. Spike,” said Applejack. “Don’t do this. Fight it!”

“Oh, but he can’t help it, can he?” Inkwell asked. “Since hybrids, like their ancestors, are just biologically predisposed to be savages.”

Spike turned to Applejack, growling, his eyes wide and bloodshot.

Applejack whimpered as she helplessly tried to limp away and he stalked her like a predator about to attack.

“I can see the headlines now!” Inkwell declared, pleased with herself. “‘Hero Cop Killed by Dragon Gangster!’”

“So that’s it?” Applejack inquired. “The humans fear the hybrids and you stay in power?”

“Pretty much, yeah,”

“It’ll never work!”

“Oh, no? Fear, anger, and hatred have always worked! And I will happily dart every single hybrid in this city if it just means keeping it that way!”

Spike crept toward Applejack, snarling and gnashing his teeth.

“Oh, Spike,” she breathed as a tear streamed down her cheek.

Inkwell laughed one last time and said, “Goodbye, Applejack.”

Spike lunged and his teeth sank into Applejack’s neck as she shrieked.

“Bleh... Blood! Blood! Blood!” AJ shouted dramatically. “And death!”

“And now, you’re just milking it,” Spike told her as he helped her to her feet. “I think we got it up there! You laid it out beautifully. Thank you!”

“What?” Inkwell gasped, trying to figure out what had just happened.

“Oh, are you looking for this?” Spike asked as he held up the tiny ball of serum.

“What you’ve got in the weapon there?” Applejack added. “Those are grapes from my family’s farm.”

Inkwell opened the chamber of the dart gun, expecting to see serum pellets, only to find red grapes.

“Mwah!” Spike blew a kiss. “They are delicious. You should try one.”

“I framed Blueblood, I can frame you too!” Inkwell shouted. “It’s my word against yours!”

“Oh, really?” Applejack countered.

She held up her recording pen, pressed the button, and Inkwell’s voice played back: “And I will happily dart every single hybrid in this city if it just means keeping it that way!”

“Actually, it’s your word against yours,” Applejack corrected her. “It’s called a hustle, Sugah. Boom.”

AJ and Spike both smiled smugly. She had used his line again, and this time it wasn’t against him.

Inkwell and Strawberry Sunrise tried to turn and run, but found themselves surrounded by Chief Iron Will and his men.

Epilogue

The next day, all the news channels aired footage of Inkwell in an orange jumpsuit, being led to prison.

“Former Mayor Raven Inkwell is behind bars today, guilty of masterminding the attacks that have plagued Maretropolis of late,” said one newscaster.

The footage showed Blueblood being led out of prison.

“Her predecessor, Vladimir Blueblood, denies all knowledge of her plot, claiming he was just trying to protect the city,” another newscaster said.

“Did I falsely imprison those people?” Blueblood asked. “Yes. Yes, I did. If anything, I was just doing the wrong thing for the right reason.”

Back in the studio, the newscaster continued.

“In related news, doctors say the ‘Snapdragon’ antidote is proving effective in rehabilitating the afflicted victims.”

In the hospital, when Mr. Shy awoke, his wife and children wrapped their arms around him, with Applejack watching and smiling.

“Papa?” Fluttershy gasped. “Oh, papa!”

They all gave Applejack grateful smiles and said, “Thank you.”

After Applejack’s leg healed, she returned to the MPD and saw Pinkie Pie at the front desk again, and her fellow officers welcoming her back with two big boxes of cupcakes.

Months later, Applejack stood proudly at a lectern giving the commencement address to graduates of the Maretropolis Police Academy.

“When I was a kid, I thought Maretropolis was a perfect place, where everyone got along and anyone could be anything. Turns out, real life’s a bit more complicated than a slogan on a bumper sticker. Real life is messy. We all have limits. We all make mistakes. Which means, glass half-full, we all have a lot in common. And the more we try to understand one another, the more exceptional each of us will be. But we have to try. So, no matter who you are, whether you’re the strongest, or the fastest, the smartest, the most magical, or our very first Dragon... I implore you... Try! Try to make the world a better place. Look inside yourself and recognize that change starts with you. It starts with me. It starts with all of us!”

Spike approached the stage. He stood tall in front of Applejack, his chest out as she pinned his badge to his chest. They saluted each other, and he gave her a smile full of joy and pride.

The audience went wild with applause as the police academy graduates tossed their hats into the air and cheered.

Spike and Applejack took their seats among the other cops in the Bullpen. Iron Will stood up at the front, calling order.

“All right. All right, enough! Shut it! We have some new recruits this morning, including our first Dragon. Who cares?”

“Ha! You should write your own line of inspirational greeting cards, sir,” said Spike sarcastically.

“Shut your face, Drake!” said Iron Will.

The officers laughed heartily.

“Assignments. Officers McRae, Flankmeyer, Delgado... Dragontown SWAT. Strongheart, Hayes, Wolfram... Undercover. Smith, Drake. Parking Duty. Dismissed,”

When Spike and Applejack shot him frustrated looks, Iron Will smiled.

“Just kidding! We have reports of a street racer tearing up Central. Find him! Shut him down!”

Later, in their police cruiser...

“So, are all blondes bad drivers, or just you?” Spike asked.

Applejack slammed on the brakes, causing Spike to lurch forward. Thankfully, he’d been wearing his seatbelt.

“Oops. Sorry,” she said.

“Sly girl,” he chuckled.

“Dumb boy,” she replied.

“You know you love me,”

“Do I know that? Yes. Yes, I do,”

Spike and Applejack smiled at each other.

The light turned green and a tricked-out, bright red 1975 Torino raced past them. Their smiles even wider, Spike put on his sunglasses, hit the siren button, and Applejack stomped on the gas pedal.

Their cruiser sped down the street in pursuit of the car, whose vanity plate read “ROXROCK”.

The chase quickly ended and Spike and AJ exited the cruiser.

“Sir, you were going 115 in a 30 zone,” Applejack said as she walked up to the driver’s window. “I hope you have a good explanation.”

The window rolled down and Spike removed his sunglasses.

“It’s a Maud, Maud, Maud, Maud World?”

The woman’s face slowly broke into a smile.

“Spiiike...”

Welcome to Maretropolis

Applejack scrolled through the playlist on her iPod until she found Countess Coloratura. She clicked on a track and listened as the train raced across arid desert, cool blue waters, through verdant forests, and snowy terrain.

She beamed as the train passed a waterfall, through a mountain tunnel and into lush vegetation.

The train came around a bend and she looked up at the incredible sight in the distance: huge skyscrapers that loomed into the sky.

Maretropolis.

She gazed out of the glass ceiling of the observation car and watched each borough of the city pass by. Her mouth dropped as the train travelled towards the heart of the city, slowing down as it arrived at the grand entrance of Central Station, which served downtown Maretropolis.

With a broad grin, Applejack hopped off the train, walked through the station, and out into the sunshine of the city’s Central Plaza.

She took out her earphones and let the sounds of the city wash over her as she looked around, awestruck. People of all kinds rushed by, hurrying this way and that. It was a far cry from Ponyville.

She looked up at a jumbotron on the side of the tallest skyscraper, and Coloratura appeared on the screen.

“I’m the Countess. Welcome to Maretropolis!”

Applejack looked down at her phone and checked her maps app to figure out which way to go. When she found her apartment building, the landlady led her to a little studio.

“Welcome to the Maretropolitan Arms,” she said, stepping aside to let Applejack in. “Luxury apartments with charm. Complimentary bug spraying once a month, except during the winter. Don’t lose your key.”

“Thank you,”

Applejack’s neighbors, Lyra and Bon Bon, passed in the hallway.

“Oh, hi! I’m Applejack, your new neighbor,” she greeted them warmly.

“Yeah? Well, we’re loud,” said Lyra.

“Don’t expect us to apologize or it,” Bon Bon added.

The two hurried off, slamming the door of their apartment behind them. The landlady had left as well; leaving Applejack alone for the first time since she’d arrived. She picked up her suitcase, walked into her apartment and looked around. The room was tiny, even for a studio. There was a heater under the window and, thankfully, it had a bed. And not one of those kind that folded up into the wall.

“Greasy walls. Rickety bed...”

She could hear Lyra and Bon Bon shouting from the other side of the wall.

“Oh, yeah!”

“Oh, yeah!”

“Oh yeah!”

“Oh, yeah, right there!”

“Oh, yes! Yes! Yes!!”

“Right there! Oh, right there!”

“Oh, yeah!”

“Crazy neighbors... I love it!” she declared as she flopped onto her bed with a big smile.

Applejack unzipped her bag, pulled out a digital clock, set it on the nightstand, and plugged it in. She set the time, then an alarm for five-thirty.