Status Quo

Chapters

Prologue
Chapter 1 – Rainy
Chapter 2 – Outsider
Chapter 3 – To Help the Hateful
Chapter 4 – Objectify

Prologue

The gun fell from my mouth, my eyes staring at ones now bleak and void of life. Enough of her skull had been ruptured to paint my entire face with blood. I had expected to feel something at this point – jubilation or perhaps relief – because it was all finally over. Instead there was nothing, my non-existent emotions matching well with the lifeless corpse I had just created.

A lot of ponies would be happy about this. I wouldn’t be one of them.

“Tell your story. Tell everyone what happened, and truly tear down the shroud.”

At that moment my mentor’s last request felt impossible to uphold. Everything I had gone through, all I had endured, nopony would want to hear of it. They see me as a hero, some shadowy avenger responsible for the downfall of Brayington County’s darkest corners. If they knew who I was, what I am, that illusion and respect would be gone. The moment they saw the mare they called the Shroudbreaker, everything would change.

Then I realized that was the point.

These past few days, following the end of my crusade, I had time to sit and think on his final request. I now understand the importance in letting every one of you know exactly what I went through. If I don’t, you’ll become just like myself, or those I have had to kill. Being your beloved Shroudbreaker is not glamorous, its torture. It is important you all understand that.

Pulse said to tear down the shroud. I’m going to do that now. It’s time you all learned who your beloved Shroudbreaker really is, and how all of you hated her not even one year ago.

Her name, my name, is Rainy Day. I’m a pegasus, and for the longest time, I was the most hated pony in Brayington County.

Chapter 1 – Rainy

“Do you remember that night, Rainy? The one where you and I met, and started our journey together?”

“Tonight is on me. Enjoy the music, try and relax.”

Clear, you wonderful fool of a sister.

I did what she said, of course. Sat myself down at a booth with the stage in clear view, used what caps she gave me to get myself a pint of cider. The drink was her choice too, something strong in hopes that the buzz would be enough to loosen me up. She saw it as her foal-proof plan; a way to relax that absolutely nopony was able to resist.

Now if only it actually worked. Sure, I got a small buzz from what little of the cider I had, but it was way too sweet tasting for my liking. It was nowhere near enough to take my mind off its sole, consistent thought. A thought that had rattled my brain for two full years now.

How the fuck does an ordinary pegasus, too young to be part of Operation Cauterize, get a job down here?

In the Enclave Remnant it would have been an incredibly simple solution. Everypony there was already coming from some manner of military background, Clear Sky and I included. The recruiters took literally anyone with two wings, the required age bumped down from eighteen to fifteen. It made them look desperate, and that was a problem they knew they had to solve quickly.

Their solution? Put a pegasi with high status to the gun and threaten anyone who dares to try and desert that the same would happen to them. We left directly before that, because we were to be the unfortunate family used as an example. At least, Clear and I did. Dad stayed behind, pulling the attention of those responsible for such a decision on him alone. He died for us, just like mom did eight years before that.

The Enclave was no longer an option, and good luck getting your standard wastelander to understand that when your kind were the ponies that nearly killed them all. Nothing the Lightbringer wrote in her book, nothing that the newly formed NCR said, and nothing that we told them changed it. We are pegasi, we might kill them because they don’t have wings, repeat into eternity. Only reason Clear had a job before me was because she had friends who also liked to play instruments. I had the luck of a newborn foal alone in the forest, with nothing but predators surrounding them.

“It’s no big deal,” Clear would say. “We got a home, even if it is pretty small. We got caps, even if it isn’t a lot. We can live, so stop stressing about jobs and whatnot and just enjoy Brayington for once.”

Didn’t matter how beautiful Equestria’s old resort area was, that feeling that I should be doing something for a living never left. My younger sister, only turned eighteen a few months prior and as peppy as a foal, was the one making a living and I didn’t like that. This was supposed to be the other way around, me providing for her. Why was I so unapproachable compared to her? What about me specifically was so wrong?!

I just… don’t get it.

The slow tune they played, a cover on an old Sweetie Belle piece, just made me more frustrated from my musings. It was beautiful, genuinely it was, but my brain couldn’t find it in itself to relax. I found my eyes trailing away from the stage and to the other ponies that were present here. The place was overall more sizable than most, though given this specific space showed signs it had once been even more fancy than it already was, perhaps that was expected. Was a good gig for them, and paid damn well, all things considered.

The money gained was still all hers though. Nothing wrong with that but… I wish I was able to do more than just freeload.

A mare set down what I had ordered, refusing to look me in the eyes or even talk. She headed off as soon as she had arrived, not giving me time to say thanks. Watching her out of the corner of my eye as I feigned to turn my attention back towards the stage, I bore witness to her being significantly more friendly to the griffon couple next to me. I frowned, considering everything I knew about Operation Cauterize from both the remnants and the surface ponies I’ve talked to.

Brayington was not even a minor target for the Enclave, just like how it had been spared the spellfire that came with the end of a world long ago. Manehattan, New Appleloosa, Stalliongrad, San Palomino, all of those places were on the high council’s shitlist. Nopony cared about little, mountainy Brayington though. So why did they care so greatly about us?

“Beautiful isn’t it?”

My eyes turned in the opposite direction of the hostess that had ignored me. It was a bat pony, the faintest sign of blue in his coat underneath a brown suit. His tail was short, well maintained, mostly gray from age, mane and eyes hidden underneath a bowler hat. He was smiling, watching the performance on stage with a fascination that no one else had. The trail of horseshoes he had for a cutie mark didn’t give me much clue as to his name or talent.

“The low, melancholic bass, invisible to the untrained ear yet so incredibly vital. The saxophone with its soulful tone, striking your heart in a way that can only be described as nostalgia,” he took a sip of a deep red wine, almost able to be mistaken for blood from the coloration, “and that voice. Smooth as the fur on her body.”

I blinked, gazing at the bat pony for a couple more seconds before turning back. A small chuckle left my throat, realizing I had been fooled by one stallion’s love for music. Grabbing my cider, I down just a little bit more. It made me want to gag, but this was a public space; not going to draw attention to myself over something as dumb as taste.

“You know, that was meant to be a conversation starter,” he said. I looked back towards him, blinking yet again upon seeing cloudy eyes in my general direction. “A pegasus mare as young as yourself, drinking alone. Seems to me this was a destined encounter.”

A scoffed at the creepy old bastard. “If your intention is to flirt, I’m not interested.”

“Nothing romantic about it. Been there, done that, I am past it.” He got up and trotted over to me, his featherless wing grabbing his drink. They took the seat directly across from me, slightly blocking my view of the stage, much to my chagrin. “That isn’t why I’m here. You came here for this little group, right?”

He placed a foreleg on the back of the chair, turning his body to watch the band. There was something suspicious about the way he said it, as if the question was just the first of more. The bowler hat, along with the way he turned his body, allowed me only his tone of voice to go off of. After checking to see if he was armed, finding nothing, I allowed myself to answer his question.

“My sister is the pony playing the saxophone there,” I said, leaning over the table slightly. “She wanted me to come to this performance, and I don’t really have anything better to do.”

“Got nowhere else to be?” He asked.

“Got no job to keep me occupied during the day,” I replied. “No reason to not come, especially when the pony keeping you under a roof offers a night to relax.”

“I see, I see,” the batpony mumbled. As the song came to a close, and a chorus of applause was sounded by everyone present – including myself – he turned back to me. “Solitary Pulse, freelance detective. You’ve captured my interest, Miss…”

“Rainy Day,” I said. I down a little more cider, barely enough to really be considered a sip. “Let me guess, I’m a subject in a case.”

Mister Pulse frowned. “Where’d you get that impression?”

“Other than your job? Nopony would talk to me otherwise.” I licked my lips, scowling at how the drink seemed to stain them with its flavor. “Got this face that apparently makes me unapproachable. Add that with the venom towards us pegasi, and what do you think?”

“I think… that you are jumping to conclusions,” Pulse replied, taking a second to sip his own wine in the middle of the sentence. “Though if you have anything to admit, I’m all ears.”

I stayed silent, knowing it didn’t matter if I said I was innocent or not. We stared at each other long enough for the next song to start, beginning with the wailing of my sister’s saxophone. My hindleg tapped the floor impatiently, waiting to hear what he was accusing me of. Instead, his expression slowly shifted off the frown and into a smile. One that grew and grew with each passing second until, finally, he leaned back and tilted his hat in such a way as to hide his eyes.

“Lots of folks around here complaining about a ‘turkey’ that refuses to leave. A cold, icy mare who always looks like she is analyzing you. Somepony may have tried to convince me you… shoplifted or some shit. Anything to get you a criminal record.”

“And shoplifting was the best that they could come up with?” I mumbled to myself. My head fell backwards, going over the chair’s backrest as I considered what he had just told me. “Well, I’m not going to fight it, at least not here. If you want to turn me in, go ahead.”

“I approve of your cooperation, but I thought my wording would have made it clear that I don’t agree with them,” Pulse responded. My mind had to do a double take upon hearing his words, my posture straightening out as my brow raised at him. “I don’t think of you as a troublemaker. Down on their luck, unwanted by most around here? I can see it, but you don’t strike me as a criminal. Though, their statement on you having this natural… iciness to you was definitely accurate.”

“You can blame my mom for that. According to my dad, I inherited it from her.” I briefly looked back towards the stage. Clear’s eyes went to me every once and a while, and I saw a smile on her face as I talked to the detective before me. She must have thought I had finally made a friend. “Neither of us knew her, so I’m not really sure how true that is. She died when we were young.”

“Part of Operation Cauterize, I assume?”

My mouth opened to answer, but I halted my words. A ministry mare of a world long gone would have said this was a moment to answer honestly, but it didn’t feel right. Everypony on the surface we had told about my mom – who she was and what she had done before disappearing late one night – had turned simple dissatisfaction at our presence into hatred. Honesty here would just give him a reason to go through with whatever form of revenge he saw fit.

Every surface pony had a reason to hate us, after all. Whether it was due to Operation Cauterize or some manner of interaction beforehoof didn’t matter. Nopony liked the Enclave, and they felt the exact same about the remnants and those who came from it. If you didn’t have Rainbow’s own mark on your flank, then they would just assume you are part of the problem. With that knowledge, the only choice I found comfortable with was a lie.

“Yes. Like many other pegasi, she died because of the high council’s idiocy,” I answered. Pulse’s expression went neutral, leaving me unable to read if he had bought the lie or not.

“I see. Sorry for your loss,” the batpony said.

A sharp exhale escaped my nostrils. “Thanks. My memory of her isn’t the clearest but dad said… he said her last words that day were about her concern for my sister and I. We meant a lot to her, that is clear.”

“Though us on the surface would paint her as some vile, murderous monster, you see her for something more clear,” Mister Pulse said, closing his eyes. He grinned, laughed, and then down the last of his drink before resting both his forelegs and wings on the back of the seat. “Allow me to ease your late mother’s worries. Miss Day, I wish to offer you a job.”

My ears perked up, my body seeming to hear his words before my brain fully registered them. Once it finally did hit me, panic and desperation nearly led me to say ‘yes’ without a single thought. The old stallion had definitely piqued my interest, but a hasty answer might just get me into trouble. Didn’t matter that he called himself a detective, there might be something to his job that he isn’t telling me.

“I’m not interested in merc work, detective.” I said. “Despite coming from a military family, weaponry isn’t my forte. My cutie mark is in weather management, whatever good that does me now.”

Mister Pulse was smart enough to see that it wasn’t a rejection, but rather a warning. He pushed his empty cup in, grin growing as he leaned forward.

“I’m not asking for a pony to kill for me. Already got a bodyguard, you might have just not noticed them,” he said, tilting his head left.

My eyes darted in the general direction, freezing as I saw a hippogriff in the far corner of the establishment, watching me out of the corner of their eye. Light green feathers, with a mane of teal and bleach, probably late twenties. A pistol was holstered on a belt, and upon noticing my eye contact they made a show of falsely reaching to grab it. It was enough to put me on edge, but not too much as to make me believe they were going to kill me.

Not right now, at the very least.

“Aereos would be peeved at me if they found out I did. They’ve been helping me for a long, long time. Far too long to be fired, especially considering how good they are at their job,” Mister Pulse explained. “Besides, you take me as the type who doesn’t want to add more fuel to all the anti-pegasi flames. How would you like to make a case for your folk instead?”

I blinked, and then mimicked him by leaning on the back of my own seat. “Go on.”

“You heard what it is I do, and you also took notice of my age. I have no doubt you understand that, sooner rather than later, I’ll be unable to perform my work,” Mister Pulse said, having a hoof in front of his eyes. His pupils did not follow it. “Yet if I settle down for some manner of retirement, I feel the world reverts just a little bit more. You’d be surprised at the amount of ponies who still live an anarchistic life, or are so inspired by the Lightbringer that they idiotically try to be her.”

He hung his head, letting out a sigh as his smile fell.

“Tell me, have you read her book?”

“No. The less I think of that mare the better,” I replied. “Don’t think I need to, really. She doesn’t take me as some great hero like the rest of the wasteland seems to paint her as.”

“I see, I see.” Any change in his expression evaporated, the grin coming back in full force. “You and I agree on that. After reading it myself, all I was able to take away is that she is a mare who cares not for the consequences of her actions.”

I tilted my head, eyeing the batpony curiously. “Not that this isn’t an interesting topic, but what does any of that have to do with the job proposition?”

“Heh, fair. I guess I’ve kept you guessing long enough,” he replied, shifting on his seat as if it had suddenly become far more comfortable. “I would like to hire you as an apprentice detective.”

There was a silence between us, the music of my sister’s band seeming to choose that moment to let their volume rise. He was hiring me to be his apprentice? Why me? Surely there were several dozen more deserving ponies who would be better than myself for such a position, but that didn’t matter. He asked me! Not some stable dweller or the spattering of others present at that exact moment, but a pegasus he had been sent to arrest for a crime that didn’t happen.

Once again the urge to immediately say yes wormed its way into my mind, but I forced it back down like bile. Sweet Goddesses, it is impossible to explain just how difficult that was at knowing one simple word was all that was standing between me and a possible career. It was only because some deep, cynical piece of me found it too convenient that I had the urge to resist. His choice made far too little sense.

“Why me?” I asked, tone neutral. Continue to not decline the offer, but pursue more information. It felt like the best option available to me. “Aren’t there others more suited for the job?”

“Perhaps, but I never asked any of them,” Mister Pulse explained. He gave me his own little tilt of his head as his grin went lopsided. “Most surface ponies don’t have the education or upbringing required for such work, and if they did I’m certain they’d refuse. Everypony is still getting used to the idea that there is some semblance of law in the world again, except perhaps in the San Palominan Alliance.”

“And you think I’m different from the common surface pony,” I stated.

Mister Pulse gave a firm nod. “Enclave background, which means you are more educated than most around you. You already showed you have a respect for law, being willing to hoof yourself in and turning down possible mercenary work, no offense to Aereo.”

His eyes darted over to the hippogriff, who motioned with their claws as if to say ‘none taken.’

“You also didn’t immediately say yes. You think, even when I may be your only available option for another year or two,” he said, finishing up his list of reasons. He took off his hat and placed it on the table. “The last one is just bonus points, mind you. Honestly, I wouldn't have put it past you to just start bouncing up and down repeating yes over and over again.”

“The urge was strong, trust me,” I said, snorting in amusement. The smile the batpony was putting on my face, buttering me up like this, was possibly the biggest one I had worn in years. “I guess, with that in mind, what would I need to do beforehoof. Any paperwork?”

He shook his head, the end of it coinciding with the finale of the current song. “I take it that is a yes?”

“Can’t exactly say no, can I? As you said, it might be another year or so before I have another chance like this.”

“Well in that case,” He stretched his hoof out to me. “Get a suit tomorrow and meet me at the Celestia Lodge that afternoon. You know where it is, right?”

My smile turned downright cocky as I took his hoof in my own, shaking it casually. The band started their next song, a brighter piece then the previous two, as if they had become aware of what had just happened to me. It was a coincidence I didn’t mind, and one that only made me feel all the more confident in my choice.

Maybe, just maybe, things were looking up.

Chapter 2 – Outsider

“Unity can form from friendship, but it can also form from hate.”

Gotta admit, I look damn good in a suit.

Compared to the colorful coat and mane of my own sister, I was nothing but a deep gray. I had joked to myself on more than one occasion of being a mare version of my dad, and my current attire certainly didn’t help. A pitch black button-up and gray tie contrasted from the tan trilby my sister had chosen out. Mare couldn’t help herself; as soon as I had told her about Mister Pulse’s offer she insisted I wore a hat too.

It had taken quite a lot to convince her that it should not stand out like a sore wing. When Clear saw clothing, she thought bright colors, flair, and standing out in a crowd. I, by contrast, just wanted to be nice, comfortable, and in this case professional. The difference of how the world treated us, and what we desired, all made crystal clear through nothing but clothing. Nothing wrong with it, as long as she is genuinely happy.

Knowing that she has a special somepony, or somegriffon, definitely helps. Can’t personally ask anything better from the creature who will hopefully forever be her second half.

I turned my new hat this way and that, trying to find how it best sat on my head. When I managed to find it, I gave myself one more once over to make sure there were no horrible wrinkles, as well as to check on my mane and tail. This might not have been a first impression, but it was my first day; I was not going to show up to the Celestia Lodge looking even a little unkempt.

“Everything looks… good!” I said after numerous small adjustments. My eyes shifted from the mirror to a rather beat up alarm clock on my sister and I’s end table. “More than enough time to make it there.”

Might have slept in a little bit, partially thanks to the alcohol the night prior. Of the numerous impressions I had picked up from Mister Pulse the night prior, it was that he really liked to drink. Wouldn’t be surprised if we were both dragged out of the establishment, likely by both his bodyguard and my sister’s SO. For my own sake, I hope I didn’t say anything too embarrassing, though.

At the very least my sister and her SO didn’t have to worry about that, mainly because the two had no shame to begin with. It was impossible to not hear the two in the main room, enjoying each intimately. I rolled my eyes at the sound of what was clearly my sister climaxing and turned back towards our mattress. I was going to have to talk with them.

Had to appreciate the two of them for being willing to go shopping with me before that. They understood priorities, despite both being deviants. Besides, I know that anything I said about them could easily be thrown back at me considering the number of times I might have… joined in.

With a deep breath to calm my nerves, I walked away from the mirror and out of Clear and I’s room. Our place was not anything special, considering it was tiny and pre-end of the world. Small bedroom, small bathroom, and kitchen/living room hybrid as the main room. Things had been fixed, replaced, but there were still those hints of age in its walls, cabinets, or otherwise. It wasn’t much, but it was home, and I had grown comfortable with it.

As I stepped into our living area, I was greeted with the all to expected sounds of content from the sole couch we owned. It was impossible to not chuckle at the sight of Clear on top of a much larger griffon, the latter currently not quite as there as the former. The miniscule chances that the noises I heard from my room were actually innocent upon a single look at Clear’s muzzle. A smirk rose onto my face.

“Enjoy yourselves,” I teased.

“Yep,” she answered, letting her head lightly thump on the griff’s lower belly. “Always do.”

I snorted at her, which was apparently enough to wake the griffon under her from their afterglow. She shuffled a bit, her brown wings flapping as she did, having probably sunk into a far less comfortable position compared to when they started. Orange and black paws kicked the air as the stretched, before comfortably laying back down with her head on one side of the coach and legs off the other.

“Damn,” the griffon, and nice hen by the name of Dahlia Blackblood, said as their red eyes looked at mine. “Look at you Rainy. Looking suave and fine.”

“I’m aware,” I replied, tilting my hat forward like a cowpony for an old Equestria movie. “Seems we picked well.”

“Yeah well, I still think you’re missing something,” Clear replied, leaning over the couch in a way where she could fall off at literally any moment. “Something that makes ponies go ‘wow’ when they see you.”

“It’s not happening,” I told her. She pouted but didn’t offer a retort. “So do I have to talk to you two while covered in each other's juices or….”

Dahlia tapped Clear. A brief, hushed discussion about showering took place before me. Clear practically slid onto the floor, allowing her SO to get up. Only Dahlia went to the bathroom, Clear stayed with me. I brought a hoof to my nose, tapping it, and she rolled her eyes.

“Alright, give me a moment.”

She went to the kitchenette part of our living area, turning on the sink and running her muzzle under it. Clear hummed one of her band’s songs, and with her eyes not on me I shook my head and frowned. If the depravity of my younger sister wasn’t enough, how much happier she was irked me deep down. I was grateful she wasn't hated like I was, but at the same time…

“You know, I didn’t really get a chance to meet this Mister Pulse last night,” Clear said after turning the sink off at about the same time our shower turned on. She didn’t bother drying herself, and the moment I saw her turning to look at me I conjured away my frown and replaced it with a smile, “but I got to admit, he impressed me.”

“He did?” I asked.

“Yeah!” She replied. “It took Dahlia forever to learn how to read your face. He figured it out in minutes!”

I groaned. “It’s not that hard.”

“Sis, you got the expression range of a tree.”

“Do not!”

“Do too!”

“Do not!”

“Do too!”

“Do– agh, whatever,” I shouted, temporarily turning to my sister. When I finally did look back at her, she was sitting on the couch again. “I get it, I’m icy, but I’m not a Choripath. Nopony said it before that Cryptid encounter when we arrived in Brayington County. I have no idea what you see but I swear nothing has changed.”

“So you keep saying,” Clear muttered. “Yet you just said that with a completely straight face and no emotion. That’s Choripathia sis, plain and simple.”

I hung my head, knowing even before I started arguing that I wouldn’t win. Choripathia, or ‘Maud Syndrome’ as it was labeled in some older textbooks, was the complete absence of emotions on a visual or vocal level. It was rare, but enough ponies had it back in Equestria for it to apparently be considered a medical term. A medical term that she had shoved onto me, despite being undiagnosed.

Even then I could hear my emotions, I knew I was moving my facial muscles. Maybe I wasn’t as expressive as her, but I was not a Choripath. I was certain of it.

“Anyways, are you excited?” Clear asked as I plopped down on the couch next to her.

“Excited doesn’t begin to describe it,” I replied. “I finally have a job, Clear! I can make my own money, help pay the bills, buy food or clothing.”

“You realize most of that you never had to worry about to begin with, right?” she said, withholding a giggle.

“That’s the problem, Clear. That’s been the problem for me since you got your gig,” I said. With a sigh, I hung my head forward, ears flat against my head. “I like that you can look after yourself, but I want to be able to look after me. Everything I mention? You take care them. It’s just… I….”

“You feel like deadweight,” she responded.

“Have for a long time,” I replied. “It’s the older sibling’s job to protect their young sibling, not the other way around. Yet with every bit of trouble we ever got up to before coming here to Brayington, you were the one who saved me.”

Clear was blushing in embarrassment, a sheepish grin on her face as she laughed awkwardly at what I said. She didn’t deny any of what I said for a second, though. While I wouldn’t call myself useless, Clear was always the one first to act, to jump, to shoot. That last one was especially true; pointing a gun at some creature felt near impossible back then.

“Now you are the pony holding things together. You got money for a house, food, and water. Ponies here accept you on a basic level. Not to mention you got a significant other willing to deal with how much of a deviant you are.”

If her face was red before, it was most certainly red now. “I-I’m not that bad Rainy!”

“Clear, I was in our bedroom for five minutes,” I said, giving her a knowing smile. “In that amount of time, you both managed to paint each others faces with yourself. That's deviant behavior.”

“I, um, okay maybe I am,” Clear replied, pouting as she turned away from me in mock hate. It lasted for about five seconds before her shoulders laxed, and a content sigh left her lips. “Dahlia is amazing.”

“Yes she is,” I said. “Happy that you have her.”

“Thanks, you have no idea how–“ Clear cut herself off, then narrowed her eyes at me. She proceeded to punch my foreleg playfully. “Hold on, this wasn’t supposed to be about me!”

“What, I can’t talk about my sister?” I jokingly asked.

She lightly hit me on the head a few times, groaning in both annoyance and irritation. I simply sat there, allowing her to due to just how silly she was being. Clear was so caught up, in fact, that she did notice the griffon that had sat down right behind. Dahlia was only holding in her laughter so that her marefriend didn’t stop being silly. In any other situation I’m certain she’d be rolling on the floor.

“This is your day! Not mine, yours!” Clear yelled. She tried to sound angry, but even somepony who had never met her would tell in an instant it’s fake. “Just let me hype you up for wind's sake!”

“Okay dear, I think she’s figured it out,” Dahlia said, pulling her marefriend off of me.

Clear didn’t offer any resistance, only letting out a happy gasp as she was pulled into the griffon’s embrace. She looked up, beaming at her special someone, and gave Dahlia’s beak a kiss. She had expected it to be a quick peck, but Dahlia pressed into it. Rolling my eyes, I looked away and waited for them to be done with each other.

At least, that was the plan, until I noticed they were once again sliding into the exact same position they were in when I had entered the room.

“Okay, going to work now,” I said, quickly getting off the couch.

Dahlia and Clear immediately looked at me. Realizing what they had just done, both of them tried to get off the couch at the same time and immediately collapsed into a heap on the floor. I chuckled as the two lovers untangled themselves, my sister managing to stand up before her SO did. She quickly rushed up to my side.

“I’m coming with you this first time,” she said. “Just to make sure you are actually allowed into the Celestia Lodge.”

I blinked, and released a heavy sigh. She was right, the Celestia Lodge was one of the more higher class places on Equinox Mountain. Nopony with my social standing was getting in there. There was even a chance they’d try and have me arrested, given how that is what led me to meet Mister Pulse in the first place. I needed to make sure I actually got to him, and my only hope of that was having somepony accepted by higher society with me.

“Dahlia, you wouldn’t mind coming along as well, right?” I asked. “Just for an insurance policy.”

“Of course. Got to make sure my future sister-in-law gets to her new job fine,” Dahlia said, giving me a thumbs up.

I smiled at them both.

My sister and I lived on Equinox Mountain, one of the three mountains that made up Brayington County. It’s the southernmost one, where most ponies are likely to end up first if coming from San Palomino. To our east is Mount Solstice, and north is Mount Mana, and together the three of them once competed for the minds of many an equestrian who made the county their vacation destination. The exact specifics of that era is not something I ever cared about learning – ask a ghoul if you want to learn more – but it ended up the same as all the others on the Last Day.

At least, it should have. While it received a fair amount of magical radiation thanks to the wind, Brayington County is probably the luckiest place you could have ended up. Little in the terms of mutated monstrosities, no need to hide underground – though some still did – and what effect the lack of monarchs or ministries had left can be counted on a hoof. I’m of course speaking of bandits, or ‘cryptids’ as you’ll hear us locals call them. The culture they’ve created for themselves is as creepy as their name would suggest.

They’d be idiots to target the Equinox Mountain Village, however.

Yes, that’s its name. It was called that even before the end of the old world, and was the actual ski resort area with the main lodge, restaurants, and condos. Place is hardly a village, having a population that likely eclipses most places in Equestria proper nowadays, but nopony plans on changing it. The fact it’s where most of the wealthy live might have something to do with that.

Go far enough north of the mountain village, staying on the roads for safety, and you’d find the Celestia Lodge. Once it had been where tired skiers would rest, maybe grab some cocoa and a bite to eat, before either heading back onto the mountain or going home. The purposes of these lodges have all changed since then, and the Celestia lodge in particular has become a high society favorite.

Approaching the door, opening it, that is all easy. Going inside? Unless you got the ability to fool our ‘nobility’ into thinking you are one of them, the two likely responses would be getting escorted out for ruining the environment or lots of backtalk in hopes that you’ll just leave.

It was for that reason that Clear and Dahlia opened the door, not me. With the reputation I had being the first pony in, I was asking to have the Green Mountain Colts sent to arrest me. At least if I was behind my sister and her SO, the eyes would not immediately be on me. Small blessings, even if it was another reminder of how the entire county felt about us pegasi back then.

The Celestia Lodge, despite its status, was no different than any other lodge you’d see in Brayington County. Wooden walls, wooden floor, wooden tables and chairs, a set of stairs leading to a second floor of the same. Nothing that actually screamed opulence. It was a place as standard and casual as any diner or tavern, and it was being treated like the same exact place Clear and Dahlia had played at the night before. It was the dumbest place for the wealthy to claim as theirs…

But the perfect place for a PI or detective to pick up work.

I scanned the room, noting that more than a few glances had already been thrown our way. Most of them ignored Dahlia, and landed on my peppy younger sister. Barely contained sneers and chuckles of amusement filled the lodge’s first floor, showing the truth my sister buried and ignored deep within her own heart; the truth of her ‘acceptance’ in Brayington. She was nothing more than a shiny new toy for them to place on a pedestal till she one day withered, was forgotten, and brought back into the dirt.

Try and deny it all you want, but I lived that life. Very few creatures in Brayington are innocent in this.

“Good morning ma’ams,” the host, a unicorn, said. He was more than capable of seeing me with where he stood, but refused to acknowledge my existence. “How many of you will there be?”

“Two, at the bar if it is available,” Dahlia said. She motioned with a wing for me to move up, and with as much confidence as I could muster did just that. “Also, this young mare is looking for one Solitary Pulse. He should be here.”

The host tried to remain neutral, but his eyes revealed everything. Hate, fear, disgust, all pointed at me for no other reason than setting hoof in front of him. He would have much rather gone about his day having pretended I was dirt on his horseshoes. Instead I had been thrust in front of him, and he saw me as his problem to deal with.

“Yes, Mister Pulse is here,” he said, quickly scooping up two menus for Clear and Dahlia. He hooved them over, and then stepped around from the pedestal he was behind. “You two go and take a seat. I’ll show the young lady where he is.”

“Why can’t you just tell her? It’s not really that hard to figure out where to go here,” Clear said.

“It’s for her safety. After all, you have no idea what ponies might do with pegasi around,” he answered, unable to keep the animosity out of his voice.

“Well if it’s so dangerous, then I’ll go with her,” Dahlia said, stepping in front of him. She showed her talons to the stallion, leading him to gulp as he took in how sharp they were. The griffon might not have been a talon, but she was still some creature nopony wanted to mess with. “My sweetie and I will head to the bar afterwards. Besides, I think a griffon is a little more immediately threatening than some unicorn host, right?”

The host had no interest in aggravating Dahlia; she and her family were too recognizable for angering her to be considered a good idea. With a sigh, he motioned towards the stairs.

“Second floor. You won’t be able to miss them,” he said.

“Thanks sir,” Dahlia said.

The griffon motioned for us to move, and we did just that. My eyes stayed on the host, who gave me one last harsh look before once again choosing to forget my existence. A sigh of relief left my lungs, but a look to the rest of the lodge told me I was no longer an unknown. Where the majority of the looks my sister got were amusement, everycreature looking at me scowled. They whispered about ‘unwanted turkeys’ and ‘being let out of my cage’, keeping their voices just high enough for me to be able to hear it.

“Bastards. Rest of the wasteland hates your kind and they just mimic it,” Dahlia muttered, “and they say they have class.”

“Nothing we can do about it,” I replied. “Can’t change how a pony thinks.”

“I don’t get it,” Clear said, her head hung in defeat. “After all this time, I figured they’d like us a little.”

I put a wing around her, the only support I felt confident in giving. By the wind did I want to tell her everything would be fine, that they’d come around, but that would be a lie. We probably would have left Brayington quite some time ago if Clear hadn’t found Dahlia and her band. It wasn’t a great home, but it was something. Certainly more than we had before arriving.

My sister and I followed Dahlia up the stairs to the lodge’s second floor, finding it far more void of ponies at this time in the day. That alone would have been enough to pick out Mister Pulse, but the company around him certainly made it easier. They had put two tables together, Aereo sitting at a separate one from his boss just like he had the night before. He noticed me before anyone else did, eyeing the company around me cautiously with his talons ready to grab the gun holstered at their hip.

Granted, with the other individual next to Mister Pulse, the mercenary wasn’t the one who scared me.

I had heard about the former alicorns of the Unity and the Followers of the Apocalypse, of course. In the years between running away from the Enclave Remnants and arriving in Brayington County neither my sister or myself had seen one. All we had were stories of what they had been like before the Goddess’ death, how terrifying they were, and the vaguest sense of what they were trying to become. Never expected to meet one, let alone work alongside one when I had accepted Pulse’s offer.

Yet right next to him, horn aglow as she worked on some paperwork, was exactly that. An alicorn, big, green, and seemingly bored at the mundane work before her. I felt my hindlegs freeze at the sight of her, Clear letting loose a nervous ‘eep’ next to me. The metaphorical ice that had incased my legs only disappeared upon noticing exactly what the alicorn was doing, and how she hadn’t noticed us. If anything she seemed prepared to fall asleep from the mountain of paperwork in front of her.

While Mister Pulse certainly couldn’t see us, the twitching of his ears made it clear he definitely heard us. His head shifted in our general direction, a pleasant, fanged smile immediately taking over his muzzle. I returned it back, the gesture unseen to everycreature around me for reasons I can’t explain. Seeing a pony I barely know greet me with something other than hate or fear, it was nice.

“Got here a little earlier than I expected,” he said. “Perfect. Though I do believe I heard more hoofsteps than just your own.”

“My sister and her marefriend came with me. I wasn’t getting through the front door otherwise,” I explained. It was at that moment the alicorn finally looked up to look at me, and then immediately looked back down a second later. “Did you have any issues?”

“Small one at first, but nothing Mori and Aereo’s presence couldn’t defuse,” Mister Pulse replied.

“I met Aereo last night carrying your new employee back to her,” Dahlia said. She pointed a talon at the alicorn. “That’s Mori I take it?”

“Do you have a problem with our presence?” the alicorn asked. I felt a shiver go through my body at her voice, Clear staying behind Dahlia for her protection. Low, naturally oozing threat without any need to raise her voice.

“Nah. Just making sure I know who is who,” the griffon replied.

The alicorn moved her eyes but not her head, first looking at Dahlia and then at me. “I see. Solitary, that is the new hire you mentioned?”

“It is,” Mister Pulse said, nodding. He opened his mouth slightly, and then closed it before tapping the chair next to him. Didn’t realize at the time the strange action was echolocation. “Right here Rainy, next to me.”

I quickly turned my attention to Dahlia and Clear, giving the two a reassuring nod; I would be alright from here on out. The former simply nodded, my sister moving out from behind her with her wings extended. She wrapped them around me, and I returned the hug without a moment of hesitation. Her muzzle pressed into me protectively.

“Stay safe sis,” she said softly.

“I will,” I replied. “See you at home tonight.”

Our wings returned to our sides, and for the time being we went our separate ways. They went downstairs to get a drink before heading back to my sister’s place (no need to guess what they would be doing there, with the deviant my sister was), and I walked around the table. Mori’s eyes trailed me the entire time, inspecting me in a fashion similar to that of Aereo, but far less trusting. The only unfriendly face of the three around me so far.

“Well you got one part right, Solitary,” she said as I sat down. “She’s got a good poker face.”

“Is that a compliment?” Aereo asked.

It was the first time I had heard his voice; it was high by stallion standards, bordering on androgynous. The accent was thick and unknown to me, from a place in Equestria my sister and I never crossed before reaching Brayington. Stalliongrad maybe? The Hoof? San Palomino? All possible, but I’d have to hear what somepony from there sounded like to know for sure.

“It’s an observation. Come now Aereo, what has she proven so far other than knowing how to be on time?” Mori replied. Her magic lit up, grabbing the stack before her in it and slightly tapping them against the table till they were neat. “Expected, given her background.”

Mister Pulse shook his head. “Don’t mind Mori. She’s the all-business type.”

“Well someone has to take care of the paperwork now, with your fading eyesight,” Mori replied. The papers were floated into a metal box filled with folders placed under the table where most ponies wouldn’t see them. “Besides, who else in this wasteland would you trust to examine a body?”

“You do forensics?” I asked.

“A skill we picked up during our minimal time with the Followers of the Apocalypse,” Mori replied. “Healing ponies isn’t our thing.”

“While the wasteland is becoming a better place, murder is unfortunately still common. Not a lot of raiders, slavers, or want-to-be-heroes are interested in a world with peace officers and rules,” Mister Pulse explained. “Our purpose as freelance detectives is to deal with those ponies as requested by those who do care about the law, whether it be a regular civilian or local peace keeping forces. With any hope, one day those with our profession will only have to worry about cheating wives and the like.”

“Just like they did before megaspells fell,” I said. Pulse smirked, giving me a nod. “Having somepony with forensic knowledge makes sense.”

“Now if only they weren’t a bitch,” Aereo muttered.

Mori glared at the hippogriff, but otherwise did nothing about the insult.

“Now, we do have a client on the way and there is one thing I have to give you beforehoof,” Pulse said, momentarily reaching under the table to pick something up. What he brought up was a simple black box, which he held out to me. “This is for you.”

I took the box, eyes stuck on it with curiosity. My mind couldn’t fathom what was inside, but it did make sense that a decent outfit was not everything required in my new line of work. Placing the box on the table, I opened it up and peered inside. All I was able to do was stare at what was inside.

A snub nose material revolver laid inside, with some .38 bullets and a holster to go along with it. The thing looked new, either well cared for or made by somepony in the current day. It didn’t have a serial number, the mouth-handle was made from some wood I didn’t recognize. Six shots fit inside it’s cylinder. The sight of it made me nervous.

“You’re giving me a gun?” I asked my employer.

“No choice I’m afraid. Our line of work is too dangerous,” he said, placing a hoof on the back of his chair as he motioned towards the hippogriff to the other side of me. “Aereo is a damn good shot but they're only one griff. Mori and I have one ourselves, though I barely touch mine anymore.”

He patted his flank with a wing. He wasn’t carrying it last night, but there was indeed a holster with a pistol. It lacked the shine of mine, its age apparent from both that and the serial number on the back of its receiver. Mori didn’t give any mention to hers, but I was fine not knowing what it was. A gun was a gun, no matter the caliber, size, or shape it took.

“If you don’t like it, that’s good,” Pulse said. The smirk had completely faded from his face, taking on a similar demeanor to that of the alicorn behind him. “The less you want to use it, the more I can trust you with it. Enclave taught you gun safety, right?”

“Yes,” I answered, looking back to the revolver before me.

As much as I didn’t want it, Mister Pulse was right about needing it. As he stated, the idea of law was not common to most creatures in modern day Equestria, and that included here in Brayington. Most wouldn’t allow any sort of law enforcement to arrest them, preferring to die and take as many ponies with them as possible. If I were to be a detective, a means of self-defense was a must.

With a great amount of reluctance, I strapped the holster around where my suit ended. I load the revolver, making sure the safety was on before letting it rest inside its new home. There had been only twelve rounds, more than enough as far as I was concerned. After removing the now empty box from the table, I felt a leathery wing pat my back. It was an odd feeling with how familiar I was with wings having feathers, but it wasn’t unpleasant.

“I know how you feel. I was no different when I first came to the surface,” Mister Pulse said. I blinked, opening my mouth to ask him what he meant, but his attention was pulled away with the flick of his ears. “Seems our client has arrived.”

Author's Note

So... it seems I have gotten people's interest.

I was definitely not expecting to get this sort of response with a Fallout Equestria sidefic, especially considering the other one I'm currently working on did not have the smoothest start. Not complaining though, and I'm happy to know that people are liking it. Hopefully I continue to impress.

Chapter 3 – To Help the Hateful

“The worst part of work: helping those that despise your existence.”

I knew the mare who sat down before us. She recognized me as well, if the sneer on her muzzle at the mere sight of me was anything to go off of. Their name was Ruby Gleam, a unicorn, mid-forties, her mane and tail the same shade of red as her namesake with a sliver of silver down its middle. It was well cared for, as was her darker red coat and the near-black dress that she wore. With looks like those, anypony could tell that she was one of the ponies who viewed the Celestia Lodge as her Celestia-given right.

Ruby may not have been as rich as any one single pony downstairs, but what she lacked in physical currency she made up for elsewhere. Her family had called Brayington County home before the Last Day, and their business had not changed in the centuries since. They were masters in the restoration of anything old, from something as small as a music box or as complex as a grand piano. If you have the caps, then there was nowhere better to go to in all of Equestria.

That only became more true when the world fell, with guns and barding being added to the extensive list of things they were capable of restoring. There was nopony better to go to in all of Equestria… as long as you weren’t a pegasus

The mere idea of seeing me anywhere near the place must have made Ruby want to puke. Ruby would be happy to know I felt the same about her. She had the talent expected from somepony in her family, but she had drank whatever the rest of the County had. I already knew, the moment she sat down, what the first words out of her mouth were going to be.

“Mister Pulse, I believe there is one more pony at this table than when I approached you in my shop yesterday,” Ruby said. She kept her tone of voice neutral, doing a poor job at faking a lack of care for my presence.

“Ah, yes. I assume you aren’t familiar with Miss Day here, Miss Gleam,” Pulse said, motioning politely to me with a hoof.

“I’m more so making sure she is supposed to be here, detective,” Ruby replied. “I know who she is and last I checked she didn’t work for you.”

“She was hired less than twenty-four hours ago. She’s here to watch, learn, and help in your predicament,” Pulse explained. He smiled at me for just a moment before looking back to Ruby, taking on a note of professionalism. “I will not ask about any sort of history you two have, but I am curious as to why you wanted to meet here and not at your place.”

Ruby didn’t answer him right away, her sneer fell away. The corner’s of her lips were tight, stuck in a neutral position. Her ears similarly were limp, not against her head but not as high as a pony’s ears usually were. It made it clear to me that, no matter how Ruby thought about me, whatever she had hired Pulse, Mori, and Aereo for was serious. Serious enough where she didn’t care about my presence.

“My family is well known, Mister Pulse. I’m not some local musician or politician, but we have enough history in the area for the Brayington Chronicle to watch us like hawks,” she explained to him. Mister Pulse nodded, satisfied with the answer given to him by his client. “It is for that same reason that I came to you and not the Green Mountain Colts. Your willingness to work along the lines of lawfulness while not having any links to the law itself makes you the only pony I could ask.”

“I understand,” Pulse said. “Not a word of our work will reach the ears of any reporters.”

“I greatly appreciate it,” Ruby replied, her eyes looking towards me. “A gentlecolt like you might be just what a pegasus like Rainy needs.”

Her words were said in a friendly manner, but the mockery and venom was all too clear. I had no doubt Mister Pulse noticed them too, but he didn’t comment. He didn’t have the liberty of turning down work, just like I myself the night prior.

“As for the reason for my hiring, I have to ponies I need you to track down,” Ruby said. “That being my coltfriend, Snow Powder, and… his other marefriend, Daffodil.”

“Your coltfriend has been cheating on you?” Pulse asked. As many ponies can attest to, it isn’t a simple question.

“No. He and Daffodil approached me about it before making any moves,” Ruby explained. “Daffodil was a friend of mine at the time. She’s more than that now. We don’t live together yet, so sometimes we spend the night at her place instead of mine.”

I remember hearing about that, now that I think about it; the Chronicles had attempted to make it a major thing. They’ll never openly say it, but the papers are not fans of the herding tradition. Saw it as some primitive thing that needed to be stamped out ‘for the safety of our foals’ or something like that. Their attempts to spin Ruby, Snow, and Daffodil’s relationship into something negative had been ineffective, as far as I can tell. Honestly creatures had a bigger problem with the age discrepancy.

Snow Powder was my age, maybe a year or two older. Got his mark thanks to the newly returned winter and the sports it brought with it. Ruby Gleam was in her mid-forties. A stallion in his early twenties dating a mare twice his age put some off, and I won’t deny it certainly felt strange whenever I saw them together. Daffodil was no different, though just a few years younger than Ruby.

There was nothing legally wrong with it – all three of them are adults – but the idea of dating somepony that much older than me…

Granted I can’t imagine dating somepony period.

“Two days ago he decided to spend the night at Daffodil’s place, at the Observator Condominium in the Equinox Mountain Village. Would have gone with him, but I was pulling an all-nighter with getting a load of orders done,” Ruby explained, the concern on her face growing greater the more she spoke. “We promised to have breakfast at this nice diner not far from where she lived the following morning. They never showed up… and Snowy was the one with our pair of keys. Went to the Condominium this morning just to make sure. No sign of them.”

“Which is what leads you to believe that something has happened,” Mister Pulse summarized. Ruby nodded. “The ponies in charge of the condominium couldn’t give you a key to check their room?”

“That’s the really concerning bit,” Ruby replied. “The master key went missing the same night.”

I noticed the scowl on Mister Pulse’s muzzle as he received that bit of news, and failed to match it on my own. Two well known ponies and a master key disappearing at the same time might have been coincidental, but it was too early to write it off.

“They still hadn’t found it this morning?” Pulse asked.

“No,” Ruby answered. “If I were to guess, it was stolen.”

“And nopony found it suspicious and bust down the door?” Mori asked, talking in that same threatening tone that she had with me.

“You think they would… but the condominium in question is home to and owned by a bunch of ponies richer than myself. They care more about property damage than the life of two ponies they think barely qualifies as one of them,” Ruby said. Her ears twitched, her brow rising as she studied first Mori, then Pulse, and then myself. “Th-there is a balcony, though! The door shouldn’t be locked, and I couldn’t care less about the glass being broken if it tells you anything. I’ll take any responsibility for the damages if that happens.”

Mister Pulse stood up, stretching out his wings and looking in my general direction, though his eyes didn’t actually land on me. There was confidence visible in the way he stood, chest and head high. Mori and Aereo got up too, and I took that as a sign to do the same. My eyes briefly flickered to Ruby Gleam, noting the visible tension in her nick and the pleading look on her face.

“I say we check Daffodil’s place out then, if you wouldn’t mind show us the way there,” he said, “with some descriptions for the ponies we need to find, of course.”

“Of course!” Ruby said, shooting up like a bullet. The desperation in those eyes of her, it hurt no matter what she thought of me. “How much will this be? I’m willing to pay whatever it takes but I’m not sure how much a freelance detective expects.”

“Miss Gleam, the safety of your loved ones takes priority,” Mister Pulse replied.

He may not have given a real answer, but he didn’t need to. With a kindhearted smile and a tip of his hat, Mister Pulse had explained everything; payment came when the job was done.

Ruby Gleam did as asked as the five of us made our way from the Celestia Lodge to the Observator Condominium. The walk was more than long enough for a full, detailed background on not just their looks but who they were in general. Mori wrote it all down for the case file.

Snow Powder, age twenty-three, a unicorn stallion three years older than myself and the first true snowboarding prodigy since Lightbringer had brought snow back. Black coat, white mane and tail with two stripes of green going down each, and a cutiemark of a snowboard kicking up snow. Was thin, even by unicorn standards. Poor Mister Pulse had to stop Ruby before she explained how that applied to everywhere but… you know.

The importance some ponies place on sex still makes no sense to me.

Daffodil, age forty-six, earth pony mare and the daughter of the pony in charge of a flower shop called Garden’s Edge; it was a family business, possibly the only place you could find flowers that weren’t grown on the surface. Her appearance was as earthy as her name, brown coat with a yellow and orange mane and tail, a clump of the weed she was named after on her cutie mark. Great shape for her age, with Ruby adding that she would probably buck a building apart if not for her upbringing. She and Daffodil were cut from the same cloth, their lineage having called Brayington home for over two whole centuries.

Mori wrote it all down and even did some rough sketches of Snow Powder and Daffodil. She would lower it to Ruby, allowing her to make corrections where they are needed. Mori is a damn good artist too, likely had the talent to do that instead of being Mister Pulse’s forensic specialist and scribe, for lack of a better word. Yet at the same time anypony who looked at her in the process of doing a sketch was able to tell one simple thing.

The mare was bored out of her mind.

“Trying to figure the big mare out, eh?” Aereo asked. My eyes flicked over to him, a smug hippogriff greeting me as I did. “Good luck with that. She never smiles. Pretty certain she’s only happy around a dead body.”

“Really?” I asked back. Aereo nodded for an answer. “Only ponies I know that like those are cryptids.”

“No idea what that is.”

“Local slang for raider.”

“Ah. Yeah that certainly matches up with our unfriendly alicorn right there,” Aereo replied, motioning with a wing to Mori. “We know she’s not just one pony. We’re pretty certain one of those was a raider, but we could be wrong. Hard to tell with any alicorn.”

“Our origins are not a concern to ourself or to you, Aereo,” Mori replied.

The hippogriff’s pupils shrunk to the size of a pin needle as he looked at the alicorn. The scowl on that mare. It would have been enough to make even the worst cryptid leader squeal like a little filly at a campfire horror story. Thank the winds it wasn’t me on the other side of it.

“Do not distract Solitary’s apprentice. Continue to and we’ll make sure that your beak doesn't open for the next month,” Mori said. “Understand?”

There was no ‘yes’, no nod of affirmation or anything of the sort from Aereo. All he did was turn his head away, avoiding eye contact with the alicorn. If there was ever a better show of their relationship; co-workers, nothing more and nothing less. Mori was simply far too professional and stuck-up for Aereo to have even the slightest chance at being anything more.

“How is this, Miss Gleam?” Mori asked, levitating her latest sketch of Daffodil over to our client.

Ruby took it, eyes dilating in awe. I knew Daffodil’s face well enough to know the answer that was about to leave the mare’s lips, based solely on what I had seen of Mori’s sketch.

“That’s perfect! You're an incredible artist, Miss Mori,” Ruby replied, levitating it over to Pulse. He managed to take it in his wing, holding it incredibly close to his face in order to see it. “Not sure about elsewhere in Equestria, but you’d certainly have no shortage of work here if you ever decided to become an artist in the future.”

“We are flattered, but we do not see that possibility in our future,” Mori replied. “Content has been found in our current place of employment.”

“That is indeed what is important, isn’t it?” Ruby asked, a melancholy smile on her face. “Enjoyable work, good company. Outside of the basic necessities I can’t think of anything more important.”

“We will make sure said company finds their way back to you, don’t worry,” Mister Pulse replied. He carefully folded the sketches and placed them into the front of his suit. He opened his mouth, ears ready as sounds nopony but he could hear bounced off trees and buildings, the latter of which slowly becoming more plentiful. “We are not far from the condominium, I take it?”

Ruby nodded. “Not far at all.”

“Good. Rainy, to my side please,” Mister Pulse said. I jogged up to his side, the first time we had been next to each other since leaving the lodge. “Always stay at your client’s side when with them, for their safety.”

I winced, realizing I had unintentionally fucked up. He patted my withers with a wing, seeming to sense my worry. He didn’t speak further on my mistake, probably considering the presence of our client to not be a good time to start teaching. Instead he turned towards the more important matter.

“Mori, you will question the clerk. If it’s not the one that was on shift two nights ago, get whoever was. Aereo, keep watch at the front door and keep tabs on everyone who comes in,” he explained. The alicorn gave a barely visible nod, and the hippogriff smirked; their own small ways of giving their boss affirmation. “Rainy, you and I will be going through the balcony door and investigating Miss Daffodil’s apartment.”

“Understood,” I replied. “Any rules involving evidence?”

“Don’t pick up anything without my permission,” he replied. “I’m sure you are aware of tampering, Miss Day. We will be handing the pony responsible to the Green Mountain Colts and need to make sure anything important is handled correctly.”

We fell into silence for some time as we made our way through the mountain village, turning through streets that I had never been before. It led us to the richer side of town, with the better view of the rest of Brayington county. Even without wings, if you got close enough to some ledges you could see into the vast forests that many creatures, good and bad, call home. That included the town of Manechester that sat between them all. It was beautiful, especially when the sun set.

Lots of the condos were here, with the chance to look out at that beautiful view every morning. Observator Condominiums was no different. Large, white building that stretched high above anything else in the mountain village. Old, pre-war, but consistently renovated every few decades so that it looks like new. The side facing Equinox Mountain only had windows, but the condos facing towards the rest of the county had balconies and sliding glass doors. The latter was where the front entrance was.

Ruby Gleam attempted to scan the balconies from the ground level, but that was difficult. They all looked the same from down here, to the point where she would have as much hope at it as me even while flying. She turned her head towards me, scowled, and then turned to Mister Pulse.

“I’m going to need a wing, figuring out which one it is,” Ruby said.

“Got it,” Pulse replied. “Mori?”

No instructions were needed. Mori walked up to Ruby and laid down, allowing her to climb on their back. The latter did just that, tightly clutching the alicorn’s neck tightly as Mori stood back up. With just a couple of flaps, Mori was airborn, looking back at me with those cold, calculating eyes of hers.

“In the air,” she ordered. “You’ll need to guide Pulse to the correct one.”

For the first time since accepting Mister Pulse’s job offer, I questioned how good of a detective he was with his eyesight. I kept it in my head, where nopony would find it, and took to the air without question. Mori focused back on the condos above us, the three of us rising into the air as we started to scan balcony after balcony. They were all empty, given the chilly autumn air, but the glass doors allowed us to look inside of them.

I saw different signs of wealth as I went from one to the other. Paintings of ponies, landscapes, and more abstract things hanging on walls, furniture with designs and colors all too fancy or complex for me to ever have the caps to buy, and likely far more out of sight in the condo’s other rooms. The glances weren’t that long on account that some of their owner’s were home at this time of day, but they were long enough for Ruby to give a quick ‘no’ to each of them… before finding the exact one she was looking for.

“Yes, that’s it!” she said at some point. Didn’t know how many we had looked at, but I was more than able to gather a general location of it. “Snowy got her that portrait of Mount Mana a month ago, and I remember fixing up that piano. It’s pre-war!”

Mori and I simply looked at each other, her wings flapping less as she let herself slowly float to the ground. I followed suit, gliding back to Mister Pulse to inform him of which balcony it was while Mori simply let Ruby off her back. My hooves were barely on the ground before the words left my mouth.

“Third row, fourth from the left,” I said.

After a moment of echolocation to figure out exactly which one that was, Pulse nodded and smiled.

“Good work,” He said. Couldn’t help but smile pridefully, hearing myself get complimented by someone other than Clear or Dahlia. Ruby and Mori made their way back to us, the batpony looking at the former first. “Thanks for the assistance, Miss Gleam, we will take it from here.”

“Please keep me updated, Mister Pulse. I can’t bear more silence on their whereabouts,” Ruby said, seeming exceptionally grateful to be back on the ground. “You know where I live if you find anything.”

“Of course, and with any hope we have them both home by the end of the day,” Mister Pulse replied. He clutched his hat in his wing, giving a gentlecoltly bow to the restorationist.

Ruby gave a bow of her own, and started to make her way off. She only stopped when she was at my side. Concern fell away at merely looking at me, and she took a step practically into my body; her foreleg pressed into my ribs, horn aimed between my eyes. Ruby’s hatred of us pegasi was great enough where not even her worry for her missing herd could override it.

“By all means he should have put you behind bars last night, but given the situation consider this your one chance,” Ruby spat at me. “If I hear from Daffodil or Snowy that you did anything to them, Pulse won’t be able to save you. Hear me?”

I took a step away so that she wasn’t directly next to me, heart beating just a little bit faster than I’d like but that was it. I knew better than to panic or show fear, however, deciding to give her a nod instead. Ruby was satisfied with it, thank goodness, and promptly headed off without another harsh word.

“We do not usually judge your choices Solitary,” Mori said, not bothering to lower her voice, “but we must wonder if having Miss Day around is going to make our job harder or easier.”

“You didn’t make it easier either Mori,” Mister Pulse said. The alicorn leered at him, but the batpony didn’t notice. “I believe you have work to do either way.”

Mori’s gaze… well, it didn’t soften so much as it pierced the soul slightly less. She made her way to the complex’s front door, which Aereo was already watching carefully, and made her way inside. With any hope, we would have some idea of where the master key went by the time Pulse and I were done investigating Daffodil’s condo.

“Come on, Rainy. We have things to do as well,” Pulse said, wings spread.

“Right,” I replied, doing the same.

A kick off the ground and some flapping, and both of us were airborne. Mister Pulse found his way to the correct balcony without any help, despite Mori’s earlier claims. Opening the sliding door was easy enough given it had been left unlocked, and I quickly found myself staring down comfort and wealth that I thought would forever be out of my reach. If only it hadn’t been for a possible foalnapping.

Daffodil’s home was marked by a distinct love for things floral and natural. The couch cushions were flower patterned, pictures both recent and old of Brayington County and places in and out of Equestria I would never see in my life. Flowers in vases or windowsill flower boxes, all in need of water. A few had already started wilting due to a lack of ponies able to give them the attention they needed.

All of that, and I hadn’t even looked towards the kitchen which had even more flowers. Then we had the master bedroom and the bathroom, not to mention the second floor with a room of its own. The living room itself was more than twice the size of our living room and kitchen combined. A pinch of jealousy grabbed a hold of my heart, and I quickly had to remind myself to not get distracted. We had a job to do.

“So where do we start?” I asked Mister Pulse.

“With instinct and close observation,” he answered. “Rarely is evidence left with arrows pointing to it, and when it is you can’t be sure of the authenticity. In this case, if it truly is a foalnapping then–”

Bang!

Both of us immediately turned from each other back to the condo we were in. My ears swerved around as much as I could, trying to figure out exactly what I had just heard. For a second I thought it may have been somepony from the condos above or across from Daffodil’s. Another bang was all Pulse needed to know that it was coming from inside this condominium. His head went to the right, towards the entry door and the bathroom.

“We’re not the only ponies in here,” he said.

His delivery was so matter-of-fact it took me a moment to truly understand what he had just said. Once it did hit, Pulse had already sprinted towards the bathroom door, leaving me to pick my jaw up by myself before I could chase after him. Another bang, this time clearly identifiable as the sound of a hoof against a door. Along with it, I managed to make out the sound of a voice.

“Let me out! Let me out!” a mare screamed. The voice was familiar; it belonged to Daffodil. “Please, she broke the handle and I can’t get it open! If you can hear me get me out of here!”

“We hear you, don’t worry!” Pulse shouted. “Will have it open as soon as possible. Would you happen to be one Miss Daffodil.”

“Y-Yes! How did–”

“Your herdmate, Ruby Gleam, sent us here due to your disappearance.”

I heard something muddled from the otherside, along the lines of breath of relief and a ‘thank Celestia’. I tried the door knob, just to be completely sure that it was indeed broken. It proceeded to bend and nearly fall to the floor the moment my wing came into contact with it. A scowl found its way onto my face. With the way Daffodil was speaking about her situation, and the bathroom door broken from our side, foul play was becoming more likely.

“Is Snow Powder in there?” I asked, just to make sure.

“No. That mare took him and….” Daffodil stopped herself, but both Pulse and I could hear how her voice choked up as she tried to talk. “I-I’ll explain once I’m out of here just… please oh please get me out.”

“Lets not keep the mare waiting then, shall we?” Pulse asked, looking at me. I nodded, he smiled, and then turned to feel up the door. “Well made, but a good couple of bucks should be able to knock it free.”

“Got it,” I said. I turned myself around till my hindlegs were lined up with the door. “Miss Daffodil, please stand away from the door.”

I gave the trapped mare a few seconds to move. I didn’t think I’d knock the door completely off its hinges, at least not alone, but I had Mister Pulse at my side. He had readied himself to do the same exact thing, with only minimal correction needed as to exactly where the door was.

“On three,” Pulse told me. “One, two, three!”

BANG!

The wood of the door creaked ever so slightly, but otherwise showed no real damage. That was fine; we now knew the wood was old enough where it could be broken.

“One, two, three!”

BANG!

It creaked a little bit more, but still held up. Another buck, and the creaking increased. No doubt creatures in the condos around us could hear what we were doing, but they didn’t matter. We were saving the life of a pony who, as far as I knew, had been locked in their bathroom for the last two days.

“Three!”

BANG! Crack!

It was barely audible, but we both heard it. The wood was giving way ever so slowly. We had more than fallen into a rhythm at that point, the need to count growing less and less as we simply started to count in our heads instead. With every buck the wood creaked and cracked more, and our hind legs grew just a little bit more sore. Our effort was bearing fruit however, in the form of a slowly forming crack. It grew and grew, splitting the door down its middle more and more until finally…

It gave.

The door broke into two halves. The left side, with the hinges merely slammed into the bathroom wall. The sound was easily louder than any of the bucking we had done to get to that point. It also got a shriek of surprise from Daffodil inside, though perhaps that was from the fact the other part of the door had been slammed into her bathroom countertop. Probably would have cracked or shattered the mirror if it wasn’t there.

Property damage was of little importance in this instance, and both of us knew it. As soon as the right half of the door had rested against the countertop, only slightly scratching the tile floor beneath it, Mister Pulse and I rushed in. We had barely set hoof in it before Pulse nearly had the wind knocked out of him by a blur of brown and yellow. He probably would have hit the floor back first if he didn’t get knocked into me by the sheer force behind Daffodil’s leaping hug.

My right foreleg connected with the right half of the door, but was spared from splinters or the bruising my hip got upon connecting with the floor. I winced, but that was all the attention I gave myself as my eyes locked on the middle-aged mare that we had just saved.

Daffodil’s forelegs were squeezing lightly around Pulse’s neck, her face pressed into its underside as she wept tears of relief. There was a near constant shiver in her form, despite the warmth of the heating talisman placed inside the apartment. Looking past her, I saw a collection of frayed rope on the ground, a knot tied to a broken end. Nothing really caught my eye as sharp enough to cause it, especially if Daffodil had been tied up in it as I was hypothesizing. Did she have the flexibility to chew her way out?

It was the only thing that made sense.

“Thank you,” she said, crying into the batpony before her. “Th-thank you, oh Celestia thank you. I thought that… I thought I wasn’t going to get out.”

“You’re safe now, don’t worry,” Pulse replied, “and with your help we should be able to find your coltfriend as well.”

Her cries lessened slightly, but they didn’t fade. After forty-eight hours stuck in her own apartment, I could hardly blame her for it.

Chapter 4 – Objectify

“No one wants to be treated like an object.”

“Thanks,” Daffodil said, taking a freshly made cup of coffee from my hooves. “Can’t believe I’m saying this, but I owe you one.”

“You owe me nothing,” I replied. “Besides, our job isn’t done yet.”

Daffodil sighed, her sorrow increasing further than I thought possible. When she had stopped crying we had brought her to her table. She hadn’t eaten in two whole days, the shakes and chill from earlier being from both hunger and maybe the start of an illness. For that reason we had put together a small sandwich for some of the stuff she had in her fridge. A light one, just to be sure.

That had taken up five minutes. Wasn’t going to complain about making sure Daffodil was okay, especially given Ruby’s threat. She was also our best source of information concerning Snow Powder’s whereabouts. Throwing to the side the fear both herself and her coltfriend had likely experienced before we broke her out was not going to help her. If I didn’t want to put my job in jeopardy and find Snow Powder, that meant making sure Daffodil was relaxed.

Obvious to most, but with my societal standing it took on an entirely different level of importance.

“I guess you are right,” Daffodil said after taking a sip of her coffee. Pulse and I sat down at her table. “If only you didn’t need to be hired at all. If I was a bit younger, getting stuck in my own bathroom would have been impossible,” she took another long sip, “I’d take strength in age over wisdom any day.”

“And I’d gladly trade similar for my eyes,” Mister Pulse said. He sat directly across from me, allowing Daffodil to see us both from the head of the table. “How did you end up in that situation? The locking mechanism was broken from outside the bathroom.”

“And not just by physical force,” I added on. “The screws were loosened up. It fell off right as I touched it.”

“That would explain why you bucked my bathroom door apart,” Daffodil replied, the tiniest bit of resentment clear in her voice. “Can’t really complain since you two saved my life. As for why I was stuck in there, well…”

Resentment turned to a complex mixture of sorrow, terror, and rage. She put the coffee cup down, nearly empty, and took a bite of her sandwich. It was followed quickly by another, and another. Probably would have scarfed it all down right there but she managed to hold it to only half. Her stomach was no doubt relieved as Pulse and I was watching it.

“Good sandwich,” Daffodil replied. Then, she scrunched her muzzle and shook her head. “Sorry, sorry, it’s just… the reason I was in there… is because of a mare.”

“A mare?” Mister Pulse asked.

Daffodil scowled for a moment before returning back to merely frowning. “I don’t know the whole thing, but I know she broke into my apartment in the middle of the night. I-I had to go in the middle of the night you see, and Snow Powder was asleep in my bed. Was a little confused, and being half-asleep I thought he had gotten up and gone for a midnight walk or something. Then, when I left the bathroom I found the lights on and…”

Daffodil closed her eyes, taking deep breaths between attempts to try and get out what she said. Her body grew more tense each time she tried, her attempts to calm herself turning against her as her breathing quickened and her already tear-stained face found more tears falling from the corners of her eyes. When they opened again, their pupils had constricted to the point it was nearly impossible to see them.

“She was right there, on my bed with Snowy tied up like he was a heartwarming present from a slaver, staring at me as if-” her lips tensed as they briefly refused to work. Her jaw moved as if somecreature had their claws or talons trying to hold it closed. “I tried. By Celestia I tried to stop her but she hit me with something and the next thing I knew I was in there. It was clear she had taken him when Snowy didn’t set me free.”

She broke back down into quiet sobs, her shoulders and ears twitching at anger from the situation. I felt my own ears lie against my head, a small frown on my muzzle. There was still some small hope up till now that Snow Powder was not foalnapped up to that point. It died with Daffodil’s recounting of events.

“Seems Ruby was right then,” I said quietly, looking over to Pulse.

“With a case of assault added on top,” he replied. Pulse waited a few seconds as Daffodil calmed down from her weeping, and then took another bite of the sandwich before her. “This mare, do you know what she looked like? Clothing, fur and mane color, cutie mark, anything that would help us recognize her?”

“Yeah, I saw her. Couldn’t find her way to our bedroom it seems, considering she turned the lights on,” Daffodil said, emotion draining slightly from her voice. “She was a unicorn, maybe Rainy’s age or a bit younger so around nineteen to twenty-one. On the smaller side but built more like an earth pony. Green and white mane, red coat. Didn’t see her cutie mark but didn’t really need to. She had something more identifiable on.”

“And that is?” Mister Pulse asked.

“A stable suit and PipBuck,” Daffodil answered. A sound left Pulse’s throat that I couldn’t quite place, his attempts at keeping a neutral expression faltering slightly as the corners of his mouth tensed. “Mostly blue with yellow numbers and lining, just like all of them have. The number on it was eighty-three.”

“That’s the one up near the old lookout post,” I said, “on the hiking trail going from the eastern-most side of the mountain down to Manechester.”

Daffodil nodded to me before turning back to Pulse. “The stable opened up a few months back. The few I’ve met from there are decent folk. Not sure why one of them would want Snowy unless…”

She trailed off, terror eclipsing sorrow and anger. It took me a bit to figure out what she was scared to say, going through what few possibilities I could think of. For what little interaction I’ve had with stable dwellers, they weren’t bad folks but pretty gullible and naive. If they had foalnapped Snow Powder it was likely not for themselves but for somepony else. That left cryptids out of the question, and unless we learned of some deep seated hatred from another high end family then the best option that came to mind was…

…

I kept my muzzle shut and shook my head. Pulse didn’t need to say anything, it was pretty easy to reason that assumptions were not something a detective should voice or consider. With my heart beating just a little bit faster, I waited for Daffodil to respond; waited to see if I was right before going any further.

“You said your name was… Solitary Pulse?” Daffodil asked the batpony. Mister Pulse nodded. “You’re not native to the region I assume. You have this accent I can’t place.”

“I’m originally from Stalliongrad, Miss Daffodil,” he replied. “Why do you ask?”

Daffodil looked at me. “I’m guessing you have not told him about the Dark Corners?”

“No. Only got hired yesterday,” I said, frowning. Her question turned what was a mere assumption into something just a little bit more. “You think this is the Mare’s League’s doing.”

“Had plenty of time to consider the options, locked in the bathroom,” she said. “The pony foalnapped was a stallion, done by a stable dweller that’s probably only heard about Brayington from secondhoof stories. Snow Powder is well known enough where he could be a target for them.”

“I believe I’m out of the loop here,” Mister Pulse said, leaning into the table. “What are these Dark Corners? Who is the Mare’s League?”

I took a deep breath in, and let it out. Given the position I had signed up for this conversation was inevitable. The Dark Corners were too well known for it to not come up at some point, especially for ponies who dealt with lawbreakers. There was a bit of relief when it was Daffodil who decided to broach the subject, after gulping down the rest of her coffee.

“Brayington has always considered itself one of the more civilized parts of the Equestria after the Last Day, but we have our own share of troublemakers here as well,” she said. “The newspapers refer to the four biggest sources of trouble as ‘Brayington Four Dark Corners’. One of them, as you just heard, calls itself the Mare’s League.”

“And you have reasonable reason to believe they are behind your stallion’s abduction?” Pulse asked.

Daffodil looked down at the table, clearly nervous. I decided to take over for her sake.

“Mister Pulse, are you familiar with Blackjack?” I asked him. “The Hoof’s Lightbringer.”

“Heard the name, but that’s about it,” Mister Pulse explained. “Never visited the Hoof in my career.”

“She grew up in a dark place, where mares treat stallions less like ponies and more like… breeding tools,” I said, the last two words choking my throat as I attempted to get them out. He recoiled in disgust, brow raised and wings briefly reaching around to cover his front. “The Mare’s League is… similar. From what I know they are a group of misandrists, and are responsible for similar incidents in the past.”

“That’s decent enough for a basic description, but those of us who grew up in Brayington know a bit more,” Daffodil replied, voice even more hollow than it had been earlier. “We do elections here just like the NCR. Been doing them for a long time, in fact. You only get one term, and it lasts for five years. Not sure how long exactly we’ve been doing it but long enough to have a few bad eggs.

“About half a century ago, maybe more, some ponies formed a new political group, all mares. Seemed innocent enough at first, was giving a lot of promises creatures liked and around that time stallions and colts just suddenly started disappearing. Green Mountain Colts couldn’t find them, and this new group started chastising them. They added police reformation to their list of political promises if their leader was elected as Brayington’s governor. Probably would have won, but then one of the foalnapped stallions showed back up. Called the group out to the entire county, and it was that day everypony realized what the Mare’s League was.”

“Yet they are still around,” Mister Pulse said. “Should their leaders have been arrested? If they hate us stallions so much, why foalnap us?”

“Those they had put in the spotlight were, but the political group called the Mare’s League was just a front,” Daffodil explained. “The real leaders are somewhere else, but either nopony has figured it out or those that did have gone missing. As for why they foalnap stallions…”

She couldn’t say it, and who could blame her. My own stomach twisted and turned just thinking about it. When it was her own coltfriend that could possibly be in these mares hooves, the worst came to mind. With her muzzle and mind refusing to work, I decided to answer for her.

“The similarities to Blackjack’s upbringing doesn’t stop at misandry, Mister Pulse,” I said. I searched my head for a way to explain the Mare’s League that didn’t make me nauseous. “They view stallions on a level that can be considered more… there isn’t an easy way to say it.”

“I’ve been doing this for about half my life, Miss Day,” Pulse assured me, smiling in an attempt to help me relax. It only half worked. “I’ve seen a lot; I can take it.”

His words could only do so much, but he had made his point. With another deep breath in, I locked eyes with my boss.

“They see stallions not as stallions but… a-as things to make more mares,” I said. Daffodil turned to look at me, staring in wide eyed fright at the words spilling from my mouth as if she didn’t already know this. “It’s like all they see is the reproductive organs, and none of the intelligence, emotions, or otherwise that make a stallion a stallion.”

Pulse merely nodded. He looked down at the table, his hat hiding his face from Daffodil and myself. No way either of us could blame him, after hearing what I had just said. He was a stallion himself, the very ponies the Mare’s League stole away. No amount of experience dealing with pony-kind’s darker sides made that any easier than it was.

All the while Daffodil continued to stare at me, muzzle twisted into a grimace. It was clearly aimed at me too, the kind of stare that said ‘what is wrong with you’. Did she not expect me to tell him? We had brought the Mare’s League up as a possible suspect, what else did she expect? Mister Pulse had to know who we were possibly dealing with.

“We will keep them in mind, Miss Daffodil,” he said after what felt like several minutes of silence. The disgust and horror on the earth pony mare faded as she turned away from me and back towards my employer. “Until we have evidence linking them to Snow Powder’s capture, however, we must focus on what we do know. That means figuring out who this stable dweller was.”

“O-of course,” Daffodil said, nodding to him. “Anything else you two need.”

“Directions to Stable 83 if possible, and a chance to look around your bedroom to see if the suspect left anything behind,” Pulse replied.

“Go ahead. Never been to Stable 83, but ask one of the GMC around here and they should be able to point you in the right direction,” Daffodil said, her hoof pointing across the table to a specific door.

Mister Pulse got up after that, removing his hat with his wing and bowing in the exact same fashion he had to Ruby. He beckoned me to stand with his other wing, and without a second thought I rose and trotted up to him. I took the lead, bringing Pulse to the aforementioned door, noticing how it was not entirely closed. Opening, I bore witness to the state the suspect had left her bedroom in.

It was a complete mess.

The blankets, sheets, and pillows on the bed were all over the place, thrown around without care or consideration. A bedside light had been knocked on the floor, some small dents in the walls. Certainly appeared like a scuffle had happened in here, though to my untrained eye it didn’t seem like anything in here gave us any information we didn’t already know.

It did give me a good idea of what that night must have been like though. Easy to put myself in similar shoes, with Clear as the pony in danger. Walking into our bedroom to head back to sleep after a midnight emergency, noticing the lights were on but not thinking about it too much, and then suddenly there some stranger was tying my sister up to steal her away. Whether the Mare’s League was responsible, the entire situation sent a shiver down my spine and terror pumping into my vines.

“There is one thing of interest in this room, Rainy,” Mister Pulse said. I turned to him, shocked he was able to tell that much with his bad eyesight. He proceeded to step in front of me. “Consider this your first real test. I want to see if you can spot the one thing that I do.”

“You are sure there is something in here?” I asked, just to make entirely sure this wasn’t some trick question.

“If there wasn’t, I wouldn’t have said anything,” Pulse replied. “You have the education, and you're an intelligent mare, but now I have to see if you have the eyes to spot what’s truly useful.”

A test, one that probably meant a lot if he kept me around after this initial job. Gaining as determined a look as possible, I nodded to the batpony and got to work looking around. My hooves moved slowly as I trotted around the bedroom, checking the wall, floor, bed, everything in my general vicinity for something that seemed out of place. Wasn’t sure if I was looking for a needle in a haystack or something that might as well have had an old world billboard with the word ‘evidence’ on it.

My brain clicked on small things at first, and yet something inside me told me they were nothing. A misplaced item, a specific dent in the wall, all clearly caused during the night of the crime but none of them lead anywhere. It was like, as soon as Mister Pulse had mentioned there was something in here, everything was fitting to be the thing that stood out. I’d imagine most ponies probably wouldn’t have found them, with the very room seeming to fight for attention.

Yet somehow my eyes landed on one thing, stuck themselves to it, and refused to let go. Pulse took notice right away and smiled.

“There is one,” he said. “Good job. What is it?”

Up to that point I had been standing up, but something in my gut told me to lay on the floor and look under the bed. I did so, and thanks to the light on the other side of the bed I managed to catch the eye of something closer to the other side. As quickly as my wings would carry me, I got from one side of the bed to the other and returned to placing my belly to the hardwood underneath me. It came just a little more into focus though not entirely, mainly due to the fact the object was dark grey.

“It seems like a baton,” I told him. “Hard to make out any specifics from under here.”

Pulse trotted up next to me, letting a curious hum slip through his voice. “Mind if I see it?”

I took that as permission to touch the evidence. Gently nudging it out and picking it up with a wing, I held the baton out to Mister Pulse. He took it in his own wing, holding it close to his face and turning it this way and that. Then… he started sniffing it.

“Knew something was under the bed, wasn’t entirely sure what,” he said. “This confirms what Miss Daffodil said. I’ve seen this type of baton before; standard issue for security in most stables. Can smell grass and dirt on it too, not to mention two ponies I don’t recognize and Daffodil. That’s enough to confirm it should not be here.”

I stared at him for a moment. When I picked it up my nose didn’t catch anything off about it, yet he had managed to gain all of that. I knew it was possible for a loss of one sense to heighten others, but the ability to discern the different ponies and elements its been in felt farfetched.

A piece of me wanted to ask how in Tartarus he had managed to get all that information, but I held it back. Questioning my new boss seemed like a bad idea, and an easy way to get fired. So, I kept quiet about it for the moment, filing it away under something that I could ask at a better point in the future.

“You didn’t believe her?” I asked him.

“Creatures can lie,” he replied. “That, and our minds aren’t always the best at remembering things correctly. This backs up her story, both on who the individual was and on how she ended up in the bathroom. Our suspect was likely too panicked afterwards to know she left it.”

I nodded, eyes returning to the rest of the room and quickly landing directly between Pulse’s legs. It was not easily noticeable, nothing his echolocation would have picked up on, but I saw it. Long, thin fibers different to that of the carpet that they were laying on. My boss’ shadow made the color of them harder to tell, but not impossible.

Beige, like rope.

“It seems Snow Powder might not have been unconscious during his foalnapping as well,” I told him. Mister Pulse looked at me, and then went to where my eyes were locked. He lowered his head to the fibers, his nose sniffing it like a canine. “Must have tried to chew his way out while Daffodil and the suspect were fighting.”

“Seems likely,” he said, pulling his nose away. “We have enough reason to look into this stable dweller.”

Mister Pulse trotted past me and out of the bedroom, and I quickly made my way back to his side. Daffodil’s eyes initially locked on us, only for her pupils to dilate in shock at the baton in Pulse’s wing. Two and two were easily put together in her head; that thing is what knocked her out.

“Thank you for your assistance, Miss Daffodil. I would recommend spending some time with your marefriend, let her know you are safe,” Mister Pulse said. He then motioned to the condo as a whole. “Might be a good idea to spend some time away from here in general, after your experiences.”

“Yeah. Yeah good idea,” Daffodil said. She got up from her seat, giving a polite bow to the batpony. “I know I don’t need to say it but… please find Snow Powder. If it is the Mare’s League I… I don’t want such a good pony to get hurt for no reason.”

“We will find him, I assure you,” Pulse replied. “Have a good day, ma’am.”

We had finished up before Mori had, but not by too much. As soon as the alicorn had joined us, Pulse decided it was worth discussing things over some food. I was okay with that; I hadn't had lunch before work due to nerves and was definitely feeling the effects of it during that time. Being the local, I was charged with finding a place worth sitting down at.

My decision was a waffle shack near the base of the actual skiing part of Equinox Mountain. Small place, run by some earth ponies who tolerated me enough to accept my caps. Being a shack, all the seating was outside, but the wind was absent enough for Mori to do whatever paperwork she needed to do without trouble. While we waited for what we ordered, we were able to exchange what information we had obtained.

“The pony at the front desk was not there the night of the abduction,” Mori explained. “Talked with the manager, and it turns out they were fired. Apparently losing the master key to the complex was the last straw in a series of dumb decisions and poor customer service.”

“Did you get a name at least?” Mister Pulse asked.

“Evening Glow. Lives on the other side of town at Thirty-Two New Farm Road,” Mori answered.

“Then we will go there after this. See if they know anything,” Pulse said. His eyes turned from the alicorn to me. “Beforehoof, however, Rainy and I found something you should all know about.”

He motioned to me, a sign to take some show of leadership. I would need that just as much as detective skills, after all, if I was going to possibly work with Mori and Aereo after this. The latter was laxed, taking a bite of their waffle and looking elsewhere. Mori’s eyes, however, were locked on me. Soul piercing, intimidating, judgmental, and I was left unable to tell if it was another case of her just being herself or showing she did not yet trust me.

“Daffodil was in her apartment, locked in her own bathroom. Snow Powder was missing, foalnapped like Miss Gleam suspected. Daffodil says it is a stable pony responsible,” I said. Aereo groaned and rolled their eyes, receiving a disapproving glare from his boss. “According to her, they entered her apartment in the middle of the night. She was in the bathroom, thought it was Snow Powder until she saw him tied up by the suspect. Knocked her out, broke her bathroom door, and she couldn’t get out.”

I looked to Mister Pulser, just to make sure I had gotten it all correct. He smiled at me. That was enough approval from her boss for Mori to believe what I had said. She instantly brought a pen out and started writing down what I had told her.

“Rainy Day leaves out a few key parts,” Pulse suddenly said. “Frayed rope and a baton was found in the bedroom. The latter is the same as those we’ve seen from other stables in the wasteland. I smelt two ponies on it that I didn’t recognize, one stallion and one mare. If I were to guess, one of those is Snow Powder.”

“They never learn, do they?” Aereo asked. One of his talons motioned enthusiastically into the air, showing agitation his beak did not allow for. “I figured we might be able to get away from the young impressionable idiots over here but they’re still getting into trouble.”

“I guess it isn’t unreasonable to assume this isn’t your first case with a stable dweller as a suspect,” I said.

“Yep. For ponies who were supposed to be Equestria’s future, they seem to have less grey matter than even some raiders,” the hippogriff said, tapping the top of his skull for emphasis. “The moment they hear about the Lightbringer and how she was one of them, this little lightbulb goes off in their head saying ‘hey, I can be that’. Problem comes in when you realize said lightbulb is dim, flickering, and in heavy need of replacement because they think we’re still in a state of pure anarchy.”

“They are some of the biggest idiots I’ve ever met,” Mori said. Her attention turned to Pulse, and for the briefest of seconds I swore I saw empathy in her eyes. “No offense, Solitary.”

Her words led me to look back at my new boss, one of his leathery wings pinching the end of his muzzle. A deep, tired sigh, born from a place of begrudging acceptance. I stared at him long enough for him to notice, and failed to look away in time for him to not understand the question circling through my mind.

“Though I may have been born underground in one of Stable-tech’s shelters, the amount of my life spent above ground nearly doubles it now. I hardly think I fit in the same category as our suspect,” he said. It was just as much an answer for me as it was a reminder for Mori. “I’m not a stable dweller, I’m a detective from Stalliongrad. Spent many of those years working for a peacekeeping force known as Order, where I gained the skills I use in my job now. If you want to know more, it can wait until later.”

I nodded my head. “We got a job to do first.”

“Correct,” he replied. Mori merely snorted and returned her focus to the pen and paper before her. “Besides, there are some more important things to learn. Daffodil mentioned that a group known as the Mare’s League may be responsible. Supposedly they have a habit of foalnapping stallions and forcing them into sexual slavery.”

“Are you shitting me?” Aereo asked.

“No. They're real, and Daffodil has a right to suspect them,” I answered, my gaze falling towards the table, “although…”

“Something doesn’t sit right with you about it?” Mister Pulse asked.

“It feels oddly risky for them to foalnap Snow Powder,” I said. “All of Brayington County knows who he is, considering he’s one of the first skiers Equestria has seen in about two centuries. That isn’t the kind of pony they go for. It’s somepony more like the stallion who served us these waffles, or me. Those who ponies won’t immediately question why they haven’t been around.”

I tapped the table with my hoof a couple times as I looked up towards Equinox Mountain, and then back to Mister Pulse.

“It’s also well known that they don’t view the harm of mares in a positive light, no matter who they are. Trapping Daffodil in the bathroom feels odd to me, knowing that,” I said. “Though if what I’m hearing about stable dwellers is accurate, it’s possible they didn’t know.”

“Whether or not it’s true, every option must be put on the table,” Mister Pulse replied. He smiled at me encouragingly. “Just keep that in mind for the future.”

I felt my shoulders lose some amount of tension, seeing that smile. He was cutting me slack since it was my first day, a fact I was slightly thankful for. It wasn’t something I’d have for long, especially considering the line of work we were in. Mistakes weren’t allowed when life was in harm’s way. This first case was a firm reminder of that.

Not to mention, Ruby Gleam’s own threat. I have no doubt she’d go through with it.

“I won’t leave anything out from now on,” I told Mister Pulse.

“Good. I’ll hold you to it,” he replied. He picked up his own waffle in one hoof, and took a bit of it. “These are great by the way.”

I really hope he saw my smile. It had been a long time since anypony but Clear or Dahlia complimented me for my tastes.