Chapter 9

Elementary, my dear Scarlett

At first glance, the warehouse district was almost indistinguishable from the rest of the city: a lot of containers. Although the ones here were used closer to their intended purpose. The main differences were a couple of still-intact, pre-war buildings and the increased number of guards patrolling the area. Whoever stole the chems probably had a friend among the guards… or they were just really good. It was hard to say which was worse for us.

I was waiting for Scarlett in front of one of the pre-war buildings, drawing glances from the nearby guards. Thankfully, my newfound companion didn’t make herself wait.

“Are you ready?” I asked her with a nod, as she approached me.

“Yes. Uhm, at least I think I am.” She offered a sheepish smile and nervously looked around.

“Good, now let’s find this Shiv and see what we are dealing with here.” I barely made a few steps towards the building, when I heard a quiet voice behind me.

“Midnight, I assume?” I turned around to find a tall earth pony, whom I almost mistook for Grifter if it weren’t for his much darker shade of coat.

“Yes, and you are…”

“Shiv, I was waiting for you. Follow me.” He quickly trotted towards the small red container that was placed a little bit separately from the others.

I gave Scarlett a quick nod and went after him. When we approached the container, Shiv leaned on it and looked over at us.

“You know you didn’t have to alert every guard about your arrival,” the earth pony shook his head. “Now we have to act quick.”

“I just looked around, I didn't…”

“Right, after a shipment gets stolen, the new pony in town who’s been seen chatting with the owners of said shipment just casually walks around the warehouses. You don’t need to be a genius to put two and two together.” Shiv closed his eyes and took a deep breath before continuing. “Anyway, we can still use this to our advantage.”

“Hold on.” I came closer, lowering my voice. “You think one of the guards did it?”

“I know one of the guards did it.” He looked around, his ears twitching. “Just not sure which one. I narrowed it down to three possible candidates however.”

“But why would guards do something like that?” Scarlett’s shocked voice came from behind.

Shiv sighed, pursing his lips. “Some of the guards aren’t happy with our… partnership with the Stellars, so that’s their way of retaliation. If our hospitals won’t get their chems, the relationships between us will sour. And that’s where we need your help.”

My ears perked as I nodded. “And what do you want us to do exactly?”

Shiv gave me a thoughtful look. “Since they already saw you here, I will pass a few rumors that Stellars are about to make their move, then we’ll follow our suspects and see who will act off. Or, if we get lucky, they might do something stupid and we’ll catch them red-hoofed.”

“Are you suggesting we just follow the guards around, or…”

“I’ll give you information on them and where they live, then we split up and put each of them under surveillance. Then, as soon as one of us learns the identity of our thief, your job is done.” He looked over at myself and Scarlett once again, then nodded. “I need to get back to work, where do I send the info?”

“We’ll be waiting at the hotel.”

“Got it.” He said, starting towards the large containers in the back. “See ya.”

“I nodded in response and turned to Scarlett. “Well… can’t say this was what I expected, but it could’ve gone worse.”

“I don’t like how everyone seems to think they can just order us around.” She pouted, stomping her front hoof on the ground.

“Once we get out and reach some place with caravans to guard, it will get better. For now, we just need to wait and see if those fuckers will decide to attack again.” I nodded and started towards the hotel. “Ideally, we need to find a job that would lead us out of here, so we won’t end up broke in some big city.”

Scarlett’s face slightly lit up, as she looked at me smiling. “We? So you’re accepting my help?”

“About that.” I sighed. “Meet me in my hotel room, I’ll grab us something to drink and we can talk. I’d rather get this over with before we start stalking guards tonight.

***

“Make yourself comfortable, we have a lot to discuss.” We were sitting in my hotel room, with an opened bottle of apple cider on the table. “What exactly are you looking for?”

Scarlett looked at me and took a deep breath. “I have some… problems. The likes that can’t really be solved by conventional means.” She closed her eyes, and took a long sip of cider. “I… don’t know how to properly describe this, but… there are two of me.”

“Huh?” I blinked, in confusion. “You mean you have a twin?”

She pursed her lips, her ears folding. “I… no. Kind of? I guess. See, so far you’ve only talked to me, Scarlett. But, there’s like two ponies who live inside of me. This one is well, me, and the other…” She stopped, noticing the look of sheer confusion on my face. “See, it’s complicated. Basically, in some situations, I black out, and do things that I don’t remember doing, and act like a completely different pony.”

We sat in silence for a minute as I tried to process what she had said. “So, you mean, like battle trance?” I mustered finally.

“No, it’s like, there’s another personality in me. And she has her own mind. And I am scared of her.”

Oh, Goddesses, the last thing I need right now is a crazy pony to babysit. “So what are you looking for exactly?” I asked slowly, “I don’t think there are any working mental asylums at the moment. Ponies are generally too concerned with shooting each other and blowing things up to care about stuff like mental health. Although considering the current living conditions, I think whoever tries to open one would make quite a living.”

“No, that’s not… I think it's a spiritual problem, so I looked for a shaman, or a magic specialist who could examine it.”

“So, you just randomly switch between personalities?” I shook my head. ”I can’t see how this could go well in my line of work. Hell, even tonight’s operation is under a huge risk now.”

“No no no!” She jumped from her seat, flailing. “Not at random. Only when I am under huge stress and in mortal danger, but I’ve been training myself to control that for years. Uhh… The stress, part I mean.”

I stood up and sighed. “Well it’s not like I have a choice tonight, but I need to know more before…” I was interrupted by the sudden knock on the door.

“Miss Midnight? There’s a note for you waiting at the reception.”

“Well, it seems like it’ll have to wait. Prepare yourself and meet me at the entrance, there’s a long night ahead of us.”

Author's Note

What's that new chapter in about a month from previous one? Well, as I've said I begin to figure more stuff out about both the story and writing in general, so hopefully I can pick up the pace.

Thanks again to Dandy for hleping with editing, and making the whole thing more readable. Please don't forget to follow them on twitter for some awesome art.