Midnight Belle (and the Case of the Vanishing Foals!)

Sweetie found several false starts on her way to the edge of town. She’d been around Ponyville so many times, it was a wonder she didn’t know where everything was—but the geography seemed unfamiliar at night. As much as she squinted her eyes and told herself that Midnight Belle needed only her instincts in the veil of night to guide her intuition, she’d had to stop several times and get her bearing on a landmark or familiar store before she finally found her way to her destination.

The edge of town. And hills in the distance.

Midnight Belle sniffed at the air. There was a certain scent on the night breeze—an almost earthen tinge that played with the senses, muffling them the same way the black sky muffled eyesight. A normal pony might have let themselves slip into fear, or apprehension—but Midnight Belle was not a normal pony. She was at home in the night, and she welcomed the tinny taste of sightlessness like it was a tender whiskey.

Sweetie Belle shivered as a strong breeze blew past. Her costume wasn’t particularly warm, and she could feel goosebumps on her skin beneath her fur. She hoped her bed was still warm when she got home.

The ground made no move to give itself up at a first glance, but Midnight Belle had expected that. She’d been given a tip that didn’t promise to lead to anything—an off-hoof lead from a flaky dame that she’d already learned not to count on in the best of times. But the lead was something, and if it was even close to being what she was looking for, it’d only take a few minutes of searching before Midnight Belle’s trademark sensibilities came into play and found the rest of the puzzle pieces that made up the nefarious rubik’s cube of kidnapping that she was on the trail of.

Midnight Belle scanned the ground closer, almost pressing her nose to the grass. The scent of empty night-air mixed with the tingle of freshly-forming dew, and the heavily trampled fragrance of dirt. It thinned out as she moved on, knowing full well that there was nothing to turn up in one of the most well-walked parts of town. The dame had said there was something in those hills, and that was where Midnight Belle intended to look. That said, it didn’t do any good to look past the obvious when clues were a scarcity. Anything that pointed in a direction was worth investigating, and Midnight Belle had all the time in the world to investigate—or at least until the sun came up.

Still; there was nothing here. Just grass and old-looking houses that were usually only kept up by ponies hurting for rent and not up to scrounging together the means for a better job to move to a nicer place. The walls had paint that was peeling, and lawns were unmowed, meaning it wouldn’t do much good to poke around in the giant lengths of grass for clues. Midnight Belle kept her nose to the ground closer and closer to the edge of town, following the hardly-there footpath until it disappeared and made way for the outskirts of Ponyville proper.

This is where there was something to see.

Or was there?

As far as Midnight Belle could tell, the whole thing was a wild goose chase. A look into the distance didn’t show a flickering light or pony milling about in the hills. It was as good a guess as any that the dame had simply been seeing things—she was always a bit out of it. Maybe the whole thing had been a setup, and Midnight Belle was wasting valuable time while the perpetrator made off with their goods—in this case, Midnight Belle’s partners, and two other inoccent fillies besides. She didn’t want that to be true, but the more she looked, the more it seemed like there was nothing here to warrant—

Sweetie Belle paused as her hoof touched an unfamiliar texture. The slightly damp grass was the norm at night, but she felt something underneath her hind leg that was considerably softer than any of the grass. Dryer, too, and smoother.

She backed up a few steps to look at whatever it was she had stepped on.

Even in the pale glimmer of the moonlight, the tiny obstruction glimmered.

Silver.

Sweetie Belle poked at the thing with her hoof. It moved together, though pieces of it shifted here and there, separate from the main chunk. The way it fell apart and bristled against her hoof, even through her costume, presented understanding immediately.

Fur. Silver fur.

Sweetie dug under the pile and raised it with her hoof. The moon caught it again, and it shone like a piece of polished silverware.

It was definitely a clue, and a promising one at that.

Sweetie eyed the snippet of hair more closely. The fact that it was here in the first place meant something had put it there, or caused it to be there otherwise. For all Sweetie knew, Silver Spoon had been on a walk this way before she fled town, and gotten her coat caught on something.

But there was nothing to catch on here. Just grass, and far-away houses.

Sweetie studied the fur even closer.

It wasn’t just a patch of fur—it was more like a clump. Sweetie could feel a firmness in it that suggested it wasn’t just gathered or swept up like somepony might after a day at the barber-shop; it was almost solid in parts. It reminded Sweetie of the few times she’d been coerced into helping groom her sister’s cat, Opalescence, and had come away with legs full of scratches and patches of hair that wasn’t her own coating her entire body.

Or clumps of fur, when Opal darted off with a brush in her coat.

A clump. Like it had been torn out.

Not by an obstruction. There was nothing there. It had been torn out by something else. A mouth maybe?

Or a talon.

Midnight Belle turned the clue over in her hoof a few more times, letting the soft silver light overhead illuminate it. That was it. Something in her gut told her she was on the right track now. A clump of fur from the dainty Miss Silver Spoon, heiress to her mother’s fortune and kidnapped in the dark of night. For some reason other than money? Maybe. But Midnight Belle’s hunch said different.

She’d thought about griffons as she mulled over the possibilities and particulars of the kidnappings. At first, things didn’t seem to add up. If griffons, why ponies? Why kidnapping? And why now, of all times? Midnight Belle was no history buff, but what she remembered said that griffons and ponies had been on good terms for ages—longer than she could remember. So why would a bunch of griffons decide to make their way into Ponvyille and start plucking up foals like it was nobody’s business?

Maybe if it wasn’t a bunch of griffons. Maybe if it was just one.

Griffons could be just as sour as ponies. The same way there could be one bad apple in an entire bunch of colts and fillies, it didn’t take a great leap of logic to figure there might be one bad griffon out there with an agenda. One bad griffon who had it out for foals, and wasn’t taking no for an answer. One griffon who’d had strong words and a stronger tussle with Silver Spoon when she’d put up a fight before he dragged her off to his secret hideout.

Midnight Belle tucked the silver fur under the neck of her costume for safe-keeping. She looked up towards the hills again.

On the edge of one, far away, she saw a flicker of light.

Sweetie Belle almost gasped out loud. Just the way Lyra had said, Sweetie could see a flash of something, like a torch or a candle or a tiny light-house, blinking occasionally at her from the hills. Like it was lighting something far away that she wasn’t meant to see.

What a clue this had turned out to be.

Sweetie mulled over the possibility in her head, of turning back and telling her sister what she had found. But that wasn’t a simple prospect—she’d have to explain sneaking out in the first place, as well as how she’d gotten the hint that she did—and if she knew her sister, even giving out information might get Lyra in trouble, and that was the last thing Sweetie wanted.

She was already out. She had a clue in hoof. And there was the conclusion to her investigation. She knew it, she just knew it.

Midnight Belle wouldn’t be the type to give up on the chase this close, she knew.

Sweetie swallowed loudly, grateful that she was the only one there to hear her hint at nervousness.

This crime wasn’t going to solve itself.

Sweetie tucked her chin towards her chest and steeled herself as she began to walk towards the hill.

As she stepped, another flash of something jumped out at her—off to the side this time. Not a light, like the one in the hills, but something caught by the moonlight the way her first clue had been. Leading her in the same direction, but just slightly off the path she was forming in her head. She stopped for a moment before walking over to it. If it was another patch of hair, she had no doubt she was on the right track.

But it wasn’t. Sweetie’s mouth narrowed as she poked at the thing and it crinkled back at her.

Just a piece of junk. A candy-wrapper.

Still. She had one clue already, and that was more than she needed. No need to scan the ground anymore.

With a glimmer of determination in her eyes, Midnight Belle scoffed and set focus once again to the inviting flicker of light in the distance.

She on target, make no mistake—and whether pony or griffon waiting for her, she knew there was no stopping until she had her conclusion.

As Sweetie Belle approached the hill, it occurred to her that the same light she was using to find her way was probably casting itself outward onto whatever was nearby as well.

The shape of the structure revealed itself as she came closer. It was almost like a shack, nestled snuggly on the side of the green earthy protrusion. Like somepony had taken some planks and structuring blueprints and a set of carpenter’s tools and made themselves a wobbly looking house.

It almost looked charming, in a rustic sort of way.

The windows were old glass, and the source of the flickering became apparent as they came into view.

A light behind them. An old candle, or lantern, blinking out into the night.

Sweetie froze as she pondered the logistics of her visibility.

Apart from the candle or lantern, the house looked dark. Even from a distance, Sweetie could tell there was black behind the windows, just the same as outside. Like somepony had left a lone candle-flame, to pretend that there was someone inside.

There was a front door with a round glass window on the top, about the size of a pony’s head.

No matter how inviting, Sweetie knew walking in the front door was probably a bad idea.

About fifty feet away, Sweetie began to veer off course and around the side. She started circling the house, examining it from every angle, trying to discern its origins or purpose. It was where her instinct had led her, and her instinct told her just the same that there was something else there for her; something presenting easier entry than a front door.

There. Around the back. Windows. Windows at the base of the house.

Midnight Belle cast a look to either side as she came upon the portals to the basement. Nopony made themselves seen in either direction, but Midnight Belle knew that might just mean there was someone else as familiar with the night as she was. Nevertheless, the crux of her investigation was at hoof, and there was no sense dallying at it. With one final look behind herself, Midnight Belle walked forward, slinking through the tall wispy grass of the hills, towards the house.

The basement windows were dark. But, as Midnight Belle pressed her nose to the glass, she could see a flicker of something around the corner. Maybe a candle downstairs as well.

Did that mean there was somepony waiting for her, or that somepony had left, with just a candle-flame behind to give the impression they were still there?

Sweetie Belle swallowed again. She became acutely aware of how loud her breathing was, and how sweaty her fur felt underneath her costume.

What if there was somepony downstairs waiting for her? Even if she’d stumbled upon the house of a would-be kidnapper, she didn’t feel equipped to confront them. Even worse, what if it was an ill-tempered griffon, and Sweetie’s prying spurred him to violence, turning a potential kidnapping into a murder?

Sweetie gulped again.

She was beginning to lose her conviction.

But, as she stood with her nose pressed against the basement class, a thought flickered through her mind like the dancing candle-flame that had guided her there.

Scootaloo. Applebloom.

If they were down there, their time might already been passing. What if the griffon or pony who had kidnapped them was planning to take them away someplace awful? What if he already had, and was lining up his next set of kidnappings, preparing to snatch another pair of unsuspecting ponies from town and ferry them off to parts unknown?

What if the kidnapper wasn’t just a kidnapper—what if he was torturing the ponies he had taken, and every second Sweetie Belle delayed was another second off her friend’s lives?

Now was not the time for hesitation. If the worst of the worst happened, Sweetie Belle knew she was a fast mover. If she had to, she could dart away, the same as she had that one day during her inopportune encounter with that questionable looking pony in the alley.

She couldn’t come all this way and not look. At least a peek inside, and then she could leave if what she saw needed somepony besides herself.

Sweetie belle pressed against the glass at the bottom. The metal catch inside gave way, apparently unfastened. It creaked quietly, and Sweetie held her breath.

The entrance to an evil-doer’s lair was always the most unassuming. Of course, they never wanted to be found out—but whether through hubris or evil ignorance, there was always a way inside they never accounted for. The simplest thing—an unlocked door or a broken window that said ‘enter here, crime dead ahead!’

Midnight Belle held back a smirk as she pushed the window further open. It stayed almost silent, due to the certainty of her movement. She felt like her instincts were taking over—at the zeroth hour, the only thing to do was to let her subconscious do the talking, and sort out the consequences later.

Bracing herself with her hind legs on the ground, Midnight Belle pushed forward into the glass and peeked into the basement. The light was dimmer than the night outside, which made seeing anything almost impossible. The only thing she could hope to make out was the dim glimmering of that candle in the corner—

Sweetie felt something on her hind legs. Maybe a sudden jitter of her muscles, maybe a faint breeze from the night, or maybe a shove from something she couldn’t see. But she felt it, and her whole body shook, costume and all, and her grip gave out. The weight of her body sent her tumbling forward, into the darkness of the basement.

The fall was longer than she expected. When the ground came up, she had a split second to make out the fact that it was solid stone before she met it head-first.

While she was used to landing from sometimes great-heights, head plus stone was not an equation she was familiar with.

Sweetie tasted something sour in her mouth, and stars flashed behind her eyes before the darkness took over, and she slipped into unconsciousness.