The Detective and The Society
The moon shone down on a dark lone street on the outskirts of Manehatten. There stood a two-story building that seemed aged several decades. The brick and cement had grimly steeped deeply after years of neglect. Dim candlelight came from the upstairs window. Inside the room was a blue dragon with thick scales, soothing cherry blossoms for eyes, and spines as emerald and sharp as the genuine article. The Dragon adjusted his black trench coat and then sat down at his rosewood desk.
On the desk was a study lamp shining on a type sixty-four typewriter. He typed down a report on a previous investigation he had just wrapped up. The clacking of the keys and the ping of the slider were like music to his ears. As he typed away the door suddenly opened with a young petite mare trotting in with an envelope. The dragon didn’t react to this. He just continued on with his task.
The mare's gray fur shined like platinum in the dim moonlight. Her eyes sparkled like a polished ruby with the finest cut. Her ultramarine mane draped down her form like a waterfall of gorgeous blue. The mare trotted to the desk and pulled out a chair. She ripped open the envelope and three ten bits his way. She then dropped the rest of the bits to her side and counted them. There were sixty-eight bits, looking down at her bits and then at the dragon, her guilt-wrapped her heart snugly, the mare was used to this by now yet it still bothered her.
She pushed thirty-four bits to the dragon's side only for him to push it back along with ten she initially gave him. She let out an exasperated sigh. “Come on Enigma. Take your bits!”
The silver mare pushed the forty-four-bit to the dragon. Without looking up from his typewriter, he pushed them back to her. “No, Silvy. Your apartment won’t pay for itself,” he stated leaving no room for argument.
“You know mom and dad would pay the difference. Heck, they would pay for it all if we asked.”
“Mom and Dad’s money is theirs. We make our own.”
“Which is why I think you should take the pay.”
“I don’t need it. The answers are payment enough.”
Silver gave him a deadpan look. “Sorry, my mistake. So how much do answers go for? Can I get some hay fries with those answers? Or gasp, maybe I can get a whole meal for it?” her voice dripping with sarcasm.
“Your cooking is better than any of that fast food trash.”
“I know, but ugh you know you could take on more cases instead of those crazy conspiracies of yours.” Her voice lowered, looking down at her bits that would barely make it through the week.
Enigma finished the report he was writing, and placed it in a folder, not responding to her comment at all. He opened the desk and pulled out a resume. Handing it to her, Enigma pulled out a sheet of blank clean paper from the factory and started writing with a pen. Silver looked down at the paper shocked. The resume was hoof written in calligraphy that would put the princess’s assistant to shame. It had Silver’s relevant information, work experience, achievements, background, and references. She glared at him.
Enigma passed her a letter. Silver picked it up and read it. Her eyes widened. It was the sweetest letter of recommendation.
Her eyes then softened as she looked at him typing away at no doubt another report for something or another. “This is it then” she stated sadly.
“Yes. It is. You deserve a better pay, and you're not a little filly anymore. There's no need to stick by me.”
“Come on, you can make this work. We can make this work. Just give me some time. I can get us more clients. I can find-”
“No!” Enigma stated simply. “Go to Kindle reporting. Show him the resume and letter. He’ll hire you. He owes me.”
She sighed and examined the room. The pastel green walls were faded and peeling off at points. The wooden floor was old and had weathered thin over the years of hooves trotting on it. She looked at a cheap clock on the wall hiding a hole they couldn’t buy the materials to fix. Her eyes fell on a rusted old filing cabinet. Some drawers were so rusted they couldn’t be used while others had a hard time opening. Next to the cabinet were boxes upon boxes of files of successful cases they had done over the past three years.
Her face morphed from anger to relief to sadness. Sliver let out an involuntary whimper, doing her best to suppress it. Enigma stood up and moved to her side, embracing her and gently stroking her mane. “This is for the best. You’ll get paid well, and he’s not in any shady business dealings.”
“I know, but… I wanted to help you here. You’ve done so much for us already, I just…” She trailed off. “I'm being stupid. Everything I do you can easily make time for.”
His eyes softened. “I could, yes.” The words felt wrong somehow. Yet they were true, weren’t they?
“I guess I could look into this. At least I’d be useful there.”
Enigma was going to give words of comfort but couldn’t get them out. He sighed and held her in an embrace letting her go only at her signal. The two locked eyes and sadly smiled at each other. Her rubies met his blossoms for a good long moment till a soft knocking racked the door downstairs so faint they wouldn’t have heard it if they were whispering.
Sliver smiled and nodded. “I’ll get it. You get ready”
Enigma looked over to the old clock and seeing Silver moving to the stairs he called out to her “Wait.” He reached into his drawer and pulled out a rusted pipe.
Silver looked at him unamused “Really?! I bet they're just clients.”
“At this hour? On this street. Wouldn’t count on it” he stated, passing her the pipe.
Silver rolled her eyes as she trotted downstairs. Enigma walked over to a coat rack and picked up the lone fedora hung up on it. As he walked up to his desk, sat down, opened another drawer, and pulled out a silver case with the label rose red. The door opened and there Silver stood two stallions beside her. Enigma took up a firm posture and steel gaze. He examined the two stallions and made a mental note of them then ready himself for the conversions to come.
Two earth pony stallions trotted down a lonely street, one more nervous than the other. The nervous one had fur that was deep sky blue with patches of Saffron yellow making him look like certain types of cheese. His eyes had a severe case of heterochromia with one eye being an aqua blue with the other a sunset yellow. Both of which ease the hearts of any who see. His figure was unusually petite for a stallion. Long and slender from his legs to his muzzle, not dissimilar to a mare.
The stallion next to him was a hardy chestnut type with a chocolate mane and tail, sparkling sky-blue eyes, and an innocent, joyful smile on his handsome face. He wore a velvet button-up with a grey suit vest. As the two trotted, their contrasting body types and demeanors were quite comical to any onlookers peeking from the windows.
The blue stallion looked to and fro hastily, making sure they weren't followed. The chestnut however trotted joyfully down the road as if nothing were wrong at all. As the two turned the corner, the blue stallion closed the gap between them and whispered into the brown one's ear “Ultra, what are we doing here? Do you know how bad things are in this part of town?!”
Ultra chuckled. “I know, but it's late and the guy we're looking for has his office here.”
The blue stallion looked at him as if he had grown a second head. “Uhm are you sure we want whoever this guy is on the team. Are we sure he's not gonna rob us?”
Ultra looked at him, confused. “Why would he rob us? He’s a detective!”
The blue stallion was about to say something when Ultra gasped and galloped to the end of the road.
The blue stallion quickly looked back and forth then quickly galloped to Ultra, hyperventilating all the while. He wrapped himself around Ultra shaking in fear. Ultra’s smile fell, and he looked at him worriedly. “Um Tsunami, if you want, I can take you home and come back later.”
“What?! This is... the place, right? There's no point in that anymore.”
“Yeah… I just want to make sure you're okay.”
“I am. So can we do this and get out of here?”
Sure…” The two stallions fell into a companionable silence as Ultra knocked on the detectives' office.
After what felt like an hour the door finally opened. Standing behind it was the most beautiful mare Tsunami had ever laid his eyes on. The mare examined the two before smiling “Welcome to Enigma’s Cases. An unsolved mystery is our bread and butter!”
Tsunami blushed as he tried to talk to the pretty mare only for it to come out a disjointed babbling. Both Ultra and the mare did their best to hide their chuckles. After a good minute of this Tsunami gave up and in silence, turned to Ultra. Momentarily confused by this ultra quickly caught on to what tsunami wanted.
Ultra cleared his throat. “We want to see your boss. Is he here?”
“Yes, follow me.” the mare turned around revealing a rusted pipe on her back making Tsunami’s eyes widen.
Ultra joyfully trotted up behind her as they moved upstairs. Tsunami quickly rushed up the stairs, catching up with two ponies. As the three landed on the top floor, Tsunami froze. Sitting at the strangely nice desk sat a marine Dragon who was studying them intensively. Ultra smiled at the dragon and gave him a kindly look. “Hello, my name is Ultra. I have an offer for you.”
The dragon blossom eyes looked him over once more, then he raised a brow. “You’re not the typical business stallion that comes to me, but I'll tell you the same thing I said to them. I'm not for sale, and there is no amount of bits you can give to change that.”
Ultra didn’t skip a beat. “Oh, that's not the offer. I just want to know if you want to be a part of a group I'm setting up.”
The dragon didn’t waver in his inquisitive examinations as he spoke. “I work best alone, and I don’t work with anyone I don’t know.”
The mare violently cleared her throat, and when Enigma didn’t say anything, she decided to speak instead. “No offense intended, of course. He’s just very skeptical of a lot of things.”
“Oh…. is there any way to change your mind?”
“No. Now do you have a case for me or is it time for you to leave?”
The mare turned to him with a glare. She looked back at the stallions and gave them a sympathetic look. “Sorry guys, it's nothing personal. He just doesn’t do well with others.”
Enigma didn’t feel particularly well after hearing this. He looked back to his typewriter and typed away marking down the two stallions' appearances. Tsunami looked at this with suspicion but when the dragon locked eyes with him a jolt of fear went down his spine. He jumped behind Ultra who looked back at him in concern.
Ultra looked back at Enigma with a slightly disappointed expression. “Are you sure you don’t want to work together?”
“The answer is still no.”
The mare silently fumed at the dragon, then turned to the stallion once more. “I'm sorry boys, it seems like it's time to leave.”
Ultra looked downcast as he said. “No, it's okay. We’re used to it.”
The mare’s heart bled for them. As Ultra and Tsunami trotted down the stairs, they heard an argument between the two creatures upstairs.
Tsunami’s heart fell as he looked back at what he did. He did it again, hiding away like a little filly. ‘What is wrong with him?!’ Tsunami berated himself in his head, he visibly got more upset. As he continued, he then felt a set of hooves around him. Looking on where they came from and saw Ultra hugging him.
“It's okay Tsunami, we still have a few more ponies to go through.”
Tsunami shook his head, then cleared his throat. “As long as they're not that dragon, we should be good” he stated with some spite.
Ultra looked at him sympathetically. “I'm sure he has his reasons. I'm sure every other pony did.”
Ultra pulled out a list of names and crossed out Enigma’s. He looked at all the names crossed out. Three rows with twenty names each, and every name leading up to Enigma was crossed out. He looked at the last ten names, sucked in a breath, and smiled. “It's late. How about we finish off the list tomorrow.”
Tsunami opened the door to let Ultra through the door, following right behind him. The two stallions walked the dangerous road once more, talking about what tomorrow would bring. Not noticing the emerald unicorn mare trotting up to Enigma’s office behind them. She overheard the conversation the two stallions were having, and she smirked. Knocking on the door, she then thought of a possibility that those two could offer her.
A week later
In the Canterlot outskirts was a rather cheaply built office. I had white brick with gold accents. Well, more brass than gold due to the cost of the project. Inside the building was a familiar blue stallion who was setting up a banner that read ‘Welcome to the society.’
As he finished the banner, he climbed down from the ladder he was on and looked over the four desks. They were clean and organized. There was plenty of room for the ponies to personalize and stretch their legs.
Tsunami’s ears raised up as he heard the front door open. Looking toward it, he saw Ultra and two other ponies walking in. He did a once over the room, then turned his attention to the two newcomers with the best smile he could muster. One of the ponies was a spring green unicorn stallion with a gold braided mane and tail with a short braided beard on his muzzle. Just like Tsunami, he had splotches of teal all over his body. He wore a headband made from beads with a simple gray hoodie that covered his thin frame.
Tsunami locked eyes with cyan ones and offered a hoof “Hello I’m Tsunami what's your name?”
The stallion looked him up and down, chuckled, and wrapped him in a hug “Come on man, loosen up! Name’s Scatter Spark! Did you get any snacks?” Tsunami shook his head. Spark chuckled, then pulled out some gumdrops from a pocket on his jacket and gave them to Tsunami.
He let go of the hug and spun around a few times, taking in the room. “Wooo, this place is nice! Thanks for letting us chill here, Ultra.”
Tsunami looked around, just noticing how bland everything looked. Looking over to Ultra, who gave a radiant smile to Spark. “No problem. This is our new office. Feel free to make this look like how you want it”
“Will do, will do!” Spark said, chipper as he could be.
Tsunami looked to the last pony who entered with Ultra and saw a short denim pegasus mare. She had a cute pair of Arctic glasses framed on perfectly feminine features. Her navy blue eyes were dipped in vats of anxiety as she looked at the unfamiliar stallion. The denim of her fur bled into white at the ends of her wings, hooves, and muzzle. Tsunami approached her only for her to whimper and hide behind Ultra. Tsunami cleared his throat and gave her the friendliest smile.
“Hi my name is Chessy Tsunami”
The mare just looked at him, trembling in fear. Tsunami gained an annoyed expression and rolled his eyes. Ultra looked down at her with a gentle smile. She locked eyes with Ultra and began a breathing exercise with him. The two did this for a few minutes before the mare finally got her breathing under control. Looking over to Tsunami she carefully approached him with slight paranoia still on her features.
She cleared her throat and shakily provided a hoof. “Hi, I-I’m M-Moonf-flame. I-its nic-ce to me-meet y-you.”
Tsunami shook her hoof carefully, making sure not to scare her. “It's good to meet you.”
Moonflame shakily smiles. “G-glad to not be the only mare here.”
Tsunami expression changed to one of offense and annoyance. “I'm a stallion. Why does everyone think I'm a filly?”
Spark then looked up from examining his desk, staring at Tsunami with a surprised expression that then turned into a smirk. “Uh, sorry, you're not a mare?!”
Tsunami looked incredulously at the pair of noobs before him. Ultra merely placed his hoof between his eyes and said, “That's not very cash money!”
Before anyone could say anything more the door opened and an emerald mare trotted in with harlequin eyes locked on Ultra. He was immediately dumbstruck by the mare’s beauty, as if Celestia’s visage had graced him. Sparkles seemed to come from her amber eyes, and her fiery mane seemed to blaze through the midday sun shining through the window. Her cutie mark seemed strange. No pony could tell what it was clearly, but it was meant to represent something.
After getting an eye full of the mare, Ultra absent-mindedly said something he soon regretted. “Yummy!”
Tsunami, Spark, and Moonflame all looked at the brown stallion in both shock and amusement. The Emerald mare chuckled and prowled around the group, eyeing them up and down like a predator sizing up her prey. Moonflame did her best to keep herself hidden from the mare circling them. She finally stopped right in front of a now-blushing Ultra with a sly smirk.
“You're not too bad yourself, stud~” she said flirtatiously.
Ultra shook his head violently before looking at her with a goofy grin on his face. “What can we help you with, ma’am?”
“Oh a Gentalcolt too, how exciting~” The mare stated, the grin not once leaving her lips. “There is something you four can do for me. That is, if you're up for it?”
“Of course!!!” Ultra proclaimed loudly.
“Wait, wait, wait.” Tsunami blurted out,giving the seductive mare a stern glare.
He trotted up to Ultra and pulled him to the back of the room. “Are we sure we should be helping her? Something seems off about her.”
“I know, isn’t she great!” Ultra joyfully stated.
Tsunami rolled his eyes and stared at him hard. “Yeah, she’s beautiful, but that doesn’t mean we should help her.”
Ultra lost his smile but he still held his head high. “True but I don’t want us to turn down ponies because they don’t ‘feel’ right. In fact, doesn’t that just mean they need help more?”
Tsunami locked eyes with ultra’s firm gaze, and his resolve wavered. Tsunami let out a tiny wine and sighed. “Fine, we’ll help her. But I don’t like it.”
Ultra smiled at him and hugged him. “Thank you, buddy.”
Tsunami smiled and hugged back. He seldom received a warm embrace, yet he wasn’t going to deny one. “If it's that important to you, then let's do this.”
Tsunami and Ultra moved back to the front of the room to see Moon hiding behind one of the desks, and Spark hooving over some gum drops to the mare who was giving him a strange look. Ultra cleared his throat and gave her a bright smile. “So, what do you need from us?”
The mare focused her attention on Ultra and her playful demeanor returned. “Well you and your friends can make your way to Manehatten at the Bluestar corporate office there. Tell them Jasper sent you. They’ll let you know what to do.”
Without another word she turned on her hooves and strutted away, knowing all too well she had Ultra’s attention all the way to the door. She didn’t however as Ultra was thinking about logistics. The set of four stood there in silence for a good long while until Spark spoke up with four train tickets in hoof. “Uh, who’s up for a trip to Manehatten?”
Everypony turned to Spark, aiming odd looks at him. Spark looked around at everyone and then shrugged his shoulders. He left three of the four tickets on a nearby desk and trotted out of the building.
Ultra lowered his eyebrow and gained a joyful smile. “Well, I won't let Spark sit alone! Skippity!!!” He then trotted out completely forgetting his ticket.
Tsunami and Moon locked eyes before she looked away and trembled in place. Tsunami sighed and grabbed the remaining tickets. Opening the door, he looked at Moon and gestured with his head for her to follow him. She shyly trotted up to him, and the two took off to the train station Tsunami grumbled to himself the entire way there.
Enigma got off the train grumbling over a paper he was writing. The paper was titled ‘bug pony conspiracy’. He crossed out several names in two different inks. Red as a confirmation and blue for clarity. It was crude and he had to find another, more secure way to tell them apart.
His watch beeped letting him know it was time for another case. Carefully folding the paper, he placed it in his coat pocket and set out to the south side of Manehatten.
As the detective walked the streets ponies gave him a wide berth. He didn’t mind. It was supposed to be this way. Dragons and ponies don’t mix well.
As he passed more and more ponies, fearful glances grated on his mind slowly seeped away at his resolve. He picked up the pace and quickly crossed several blocks keeping close to the brick wall. As he reached the set of offices the Bluestar owned, a group of ponies stood there.
Enigma cleared his throat, grabbing their attention. A small blue mare hid behind Ultra while the green unicorn and Cheesy Tsunami looked at him with both hesitation and fear. Ultra, however, gave him a kind smile. “Hello Enigma, what brings you here?”
“Work.” He looked at the two new ponies with suspicion. “Who are they?”
Ultra was about to answer when Tsunami snapped at him “And why do you want to know… um… scale head?!”
Enigma looked at Cheesy, unamused. “You have to do better than that. Then again, what do I expect from a dropout?”
Tsunami glared at the dragon. “How do you know about that?”
“Cheesy Tsunami, an earth colt who wasn’t the brightest nor the strongest or even the bravest.”
Tsunami fumed and was about to snap at the dragon when Ultra cleared his throat. “The stallion next to Tsunami is Scatter Spark and the lovely filly behind me is Moonflame.”
Enigma attempted to look at Mare behind Ultra, but when she kept moving to keep him from looking at her he decided to inspect her later. Moving over to the door and opening it, he gestured for them to enter. Ultra smiled kindly at him while trotting in. Moon rushed in faster than anyone could blink. Spark shoved a set of gumdrops into Enigma’s hand as he trotted in. Tsunami glared at him with venom bleeding from his eyes. Enigma shoved him through the door and followed close behind.
Enigma looked around the room. It was utilitarian, with only grays and faded blues plastered on the wall. Enigma growled at the blandness of the room. There was no life left. Sucked out by the lack of vibrancy. Moon quickly moved closer to Ultra, trying hard to hide away from the Dragon.
Ultra gently stroked her mane and tried to calm her with little result. He thought about a new way to calm her when a throat clearing grabbed his attention. Turning to the noise he saw Enigma gesturing for Ultra to come over to him. He was about to when Tsunami placed a hoof on his chest.
“I don’t think that's a good idea”
Ultra looked at him and sighed. “Skippity.”
“No, don’t give me that. That overgrown lizard was spying on us.”
“You’re better than that, Cheesy. I'm sure he had a reason and maybe he’s reconsidering joining.”
Tsunami sighed then shot a glare at the dragon who was adjusting his coat not paying him any mind. Ultra patted him on the back. “Just please look after Moon. I’ll see what Mr. Enigma wants to say.”
Ultra trotted to Enigma with a kind smile, who gave a neutral response. “So what do you want to talk about?”
Enigma looked at the blue mare hyperventilating with Tsunami, trying to calm her down with little success. Enigma grimaced, and without taking his eye off the scene beside him, he said “take the mare to one of the corners and have her take a deep, slow breath. Make sure her attention is focused on something that gives her comfort. That seems to be you right now, so do your best.”
Ultra smile widens. “Thank you Enigma. Can’t wait to work with you”
Enigma didn’t respond as the burley stallion trotted to his two friends and moved Moon to a corner of the room. Ultra walked her through the breathing technique he learned and she repeated it the best she could. Enigma looked on, a faint trace of a smirk on his face as the small mare calmed down.
Enigma heard the faint clopping of hooves coming up beside him. Looking over, he saw Scatter Spark smiling at him.
“Very cool of you dude.”
Enigma's expression faded. “What are you talking about?”
Spark shrugged. “I don’t know. Just helping, I guess.”
Enigma grunted in response as he examined the bland room once more.
A stallion soon entered the room wearing a slate gray suit and tie. Something that offended Enigma’s sensibilities. The stallion looked at the four ponies and single dragon, and sighed. “You’re all Jasper got. Fine, right this way.”
the boring stallion led the group to an elevator that took them up to the top floor of the building. The lift opened into a conference room with stale marble floors and clear windows that looked out upon the dull gray and muted reds of Manhattan’s buildings. Enigma took in every piece of the room and noticed runes written on the ceiling. He pulled out a piece of paper and drew them, along with the description of the room and the strange star-shaped table. The bland stallion told them to sit at it before he left the room, leaving the group to speculation.
“So, what do you think we're doing here?” Ultra asked, his trademark smile never leaving his face.
Tsunami thought for a moment then spoke. “Probably something, something bad.”
Ultra smile lost some of its intensity. “Oh come on Tsunami I’m sure they wouldn’t ask us to do that.”
“That’s not their M.O anyway” Enigma cut in writing down his own ideas all the while.
Everypony’s eyes were on him, wondering if he would elaborate or not. After a few minutes Tsunami let out a frustrated sigh. “What do you mean ‘M.O,’ dragon?”
“Blue Star Corporation is a conglomerate that has their grubby hooves in major cities across Equestria. Military, government, and private sector. Name an industry and blue star owns at least fifteen percent. minimum.”
“Skippity!” Ultra stated surprised
“Really?!” Tsunami question, skeptical of the Detective.
“Yes. However, away from the public eye they bribe and blackmail local politicians. They cut corners and bend the rules of labor to make an extra bit or two. They fund griffin militias to-”
Enigma was cut off as a periwinkle earth mare wearing a pantsuit slammed a stack of papers on the table. “I see that Jasper has got the local nut job on board this evening. What's your name again?” The mare glared at him.
Giving the mare a blank expression Enigma answered. “Princess Celestia.”
“Amusing! They are some school foals I’m sure you can frighten down the way.” The mare snapped.
Enigma checked his claws. “Don’t you have crooks to let off the hook, Penny?”
The mare recoiled in shock, but before anything more could be said Ultra cleared his throat. “Hi my name is Ultra SonicRainboom these are my friends - Moonflame, Scatter Spark, and last but certainly not least Chessy Tsunami.”
She looked at the four with the same amount of shock written on her face. “Those are really your names?! I’m sure all of you were popular foals.”
Before anyone could say anything The mare cleared her throat and spoke again. “Okay, I’m a busy mare so I’m going to make this brief. We're missing a lot of our own supplies. Weapons, armor, military-grade enchantment stones. I want this group to find out who and why, and a bonus for them to bring them to us quietly.”
Scatter spark raised his hoof. The mare looked at him in a deadpan. “What?”
“Are we, like, detectives now?”
“You're an idiot. Everypony out!” She said hotly.
“Well she was ‘friendly’” Spark said, downcast.
“I think you meant-”
“Skibbity!!! Cheesy you’re better than that.”
Tsunami huffed and sat down with his forelegs crossed. Spark pulled out a gumdrop and ate it while Moon looked around, confused, as if something was missing. The group of four tried to figure out their next move when Moon finally spoke up. “What happened to the big scary dragon?”
Ultra eyes shrunk to pinpricks and he looked around quickly. “What, what, what!?! Skibbity!!!
