Sherlock: The Magical Murders

Nervously trembling in the spot where the bush once stood were three fillies, each one carrying a saddlebag: Applebloom, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo. All three of them were scared stiff because they knew how Twilight got when she was angry, and it was not pretty.

"What the hay are you three doing here?!" snarled Twilight, barely stopping herself from shouting her lungs out. Barely.

The fillies answered her with some more trembling and nervous whimpering. Sweetie Belle was close to tears. Seeing this, John calmly walked between Twilight and the girls.

"Twilight, calm down," said the doctor, keeping his voice in a placid tone. "Yelling at them won't solve anything."

"Calm down? Calm down?!" The force of the mare's voice made John's ears flatten in surprise. "They are risking their lives just standing here, and you are asking me to calm do-?!"

At that point, Sherlock, who was interested in the contents of a bush five feet away during the past 12 seconds, came back and held a purple-dotted leaf under Twilight's nose. A millisecond after breathing in its aroma, she promptly fainted and landed limply on the ground.

John stared at the unconscious librarian in shock. "Sh-Sherlock, what did you do?"

"I calmed her down," he replied, blatantly. "Don't worry, she'll be all right in about three minutes, which will leave us enough time for me to explain why they," he gestured to the Cutie Mark Crusaders, "are all the way out here."

Scootaloo started to open and close her mouth a few times, not finding the courage to actually speak. Once she found it, she managed to squeak out, "....T-th-that... was... AWESOME!"

A smile adorned the child's face as youthful excitement returned to her. "I mean, you only held the leaf under her nose for a second and WHAM! Instant KO!"

"How did ya know 'bout the Fainting Leaf, anyway?" asked Applebloom, encouraged by her hyper friend to speak. "Only experienced botanists know how ta properly use it."

"If you didn't notice, young filly, John and I were staying in a library," Sherlock replied, "and I did a fair share of reading."

"Don't call me 'young filly'," said Applebloom, slightly annoyed. "You know mah name. We jus' met yesterday!"

"He probably deleted it," said John, interrupting the conversation. "Anyway, why are you guys out here at this time of night? It's dangerous out here-"

"The Cutie Mark Crusaders aren't afraid of danger!" squeaked Sweetie Belle.

"Well, this is different. There's-"

"We can handle anythin' together!'" added Applebloom.

"Not this, because-"

"And we'll always stay together!" said Scootaloo.

"Are you even listening to-"

"CUTIE  MARK CRUSADERS-"

"HEY!"

All three of them stopped shouting, shut their mouths, and turned to look at Sherlock.

"SIT!"

The trio obeyed, immediately setting their rumps on the ground. The consulting detective changed his angry, demanding expression to his normal blank one.

"There we go, just like dogs. Now, John, to answer your-"

Sherlock turned to his partner and saw that John had obeyed his orders as well, making the detective burst out in quiet laughter. John, clearly embarrassed, got up from his sitting position on the ground and glared at Sherlock.

"Continue."

The gray stallion stopped chuckling and sighed. "Okay, now let's start with why are they're here. I deleted their names, but I can tell that the white one and the orange one have names that begin with an S. They're on the run from the same thing we were sort of on the run from."

"Pinkie Pie," continued John. "But what doesn't make sense to me is that Pinkie's their friend. I know they've known her for a long time, so why couldn't they trust her?"

"John, isn't it obvious? Be you a human or a brightly colored horse, you still can't solve the apparent-"

"Yeah, I get it," said his companion, deadpanning, "I'm an idiot, now, say why."

"Why are you guys talking about humans?" asked Sweetie Belle.

"What're humans?" asked Apple Bloom.

"You know, those creatures Lyra always talks about."

"Those? I jus' thought she was spoutin' nonsense."

"Sherlock, make them stop again," complained John, as Scootaloo also joined in the conversation.

"I can't, it only works once, and only with life forms with underdeveloped brains. But don't worry, I have an idea."

"Are you sure it can't work again-"

"Quiet."

John shut up, and Sherlock started to get something from his saddlebag. Once the doctor realized what his partner just did, he turned to face him and saw that he had moved towards the trio of fillies. The consulting detective backed away from his handiwork.

"Sherlock! I didn't mean 'make them stop' like that!"

John trotted towards the fillies, whose mouths had been duct-taped shut.

"They're quiet now," he replied, placing the tape back in his bag. "Back to the explanation. They didn't think Pinkie Pie would do any harm to them at first, so they didn't have a reason to run away. But then they saw something that changed their minds. Three grown-ups running away from, what they assumed, a pony out to get them."

"Now this will hurt just a bit." John was only half-listening as he put a hoof on one end of Scootaloo's duct tape. He quickly pulled, making the tape rip off with a painful tearing sound.

"YEOW!"

"I lied."

The orange filly scowled at the ex-army doctor before switching her gaze to Sherlock. "Yeah, you're right! We saw you, Twilight, and your friend sneak out of town with a magic spell. We thought it was pretty suspicious, so we pulled an elaborate espionage mission to see why you escaped."

"OUCH!"

Sweetie Belle rubbed her sore mouth with a hoof before adding, "No, we didn't. We got nervous at seeing grown-ups run away from Pinkie, so we thought that anything she could do to scare them away was definitely bad news to us. So, we made an escape mission and just happened to bump into you guys."

"Well, I treated it like a spy mission," scoffed Scootaloo.

"OW! An' I came along with Sweetie and Scoots to help 'em run away because we're the Cutie Mark Crusaders, and we always stick together."

Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo smiled brightly at Applebloom's words and leaned in for a group hug. The trio stood embracing each other, smiling despite the fact that they were lost, while the two detectives provided different responses to this.

"Awww."

"Ughhh."

I'll leave you to guess who said what.

Sherlock rolled his eyes, then walked up to the three filies with a calm, yet obviously fake smile.

"Now, girls, Mr. Watson, Twilight, and I have some very important business to attend to, and we simply can't have you three in the mess as well. And that's not even including the issue that we have a limited time," the detective spoke the two words through clenched teeth, showing how impatient he was, " to do it as well. So, why don't you get lost or find your way back home or whatever so we can finish what we have to do."

He was answered with bewildered stares and silence. It was soon broken by Sweetie Belle voicing her opinion on the matter.

"....You're kidding. You're kidding, right?"

"My point exactly," said John, walking over to the fillies. "Look, Sherlock, I know you're not the best person with children, and I wouldn't ever trust you to handle one kid, but this is ridiculous. You can't expect them to walk all the way home alone by themselves. Especially not with a murderer around."

"Murderer?" asked Applebloom, before being cut off by the army doctor's hoof ruffling her mane.

"They're too young, and Twilight can't afford to teleport them all the way to Ponyville, so," John stopped and looked like he was considering something, "oh, I know I'm going to regret this-"

Twilight wearily opened her eyes and slowly started to come to.

"...wh-wh-wha-?"

"-but I think they should come with us."

Twilight and Sherlock's eyes opened wide in disbelief, and the former immediately got to her hooves so she could join the consulting detective in running up to John and voicing the thought on both of their minds.

"ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR MIND?!"

"Those kids will get killed!"

"They're just going to get in the way!"

"I don't want to have to deal with Rarity or Applejack if anything happens to them!"

"They'll only slow us down!"

"They're horrible at behaving!"

"They-"

Two hooves, one yellow and the other orange, stopped the two adults from voicing anymore complaints.

"Thanks, Appleboom and Scootaloo," said John, and turned back to Sherlock and Twilight. "I know that bringing them with us isn't the smartest thing to do, but does anybody else have any ideas?"

A gray hoof shot up into the air, like a student with a question.

"Excluding Sherlock."

The hoof lowered back to the ground, its owner scowling.

"That's what I thought. Now, I think it's best we get a move on. Our villian can't repair his machine forever."

"Wait!" said Sweetie Belle. "You mentioned a murderer earlier, Mr. John. What's that about?"

"We'll tell you everything on the way to the pony we want to meet," said Twilight, while John activated their magic detector again. "We have to leave right now, and we're not far off from our destination. Let's move!"

Each adult got a child to carry on their back; Twilight got Sweetie Belle, John got Applebloom, and Sherlock got Scootaloo. The consulting detective glared at the filly he got, while the young pegasus returned the stares full force. Soon, they were running and flying back on the trail, and Twilight began their story.

"It all started with the mysterious deaths happening around Equestria..."