MLPFiM: 'Hush Now' Ch. 1 -PinkieDash-

"Hush Now"

Chapter One: The Unicorn Killer

Rainbow Dash had been an agent of the Equestrian Bureau of Investigation for over three years now. When she had applied for the position, she had imagined a life of excitement. One filled with high-speed chariot chases and dangerous drug busts. She had dreamt of giant magic battles and gritty hoof-to-hoof combat. Her expectations of an exhilarating life were quickly replaced with one filled with humdrum activity and boring paperwork.

The lightning cutie mark on her flank reflected her need for excitement, which was why she jumped for the chance to be on her first murder case. Nothing said excitement like serial murder and she hoped that the success would get her a permanent spot in the homicide division so that she could finally leave foreign affairs and achieve the life she always dreamed of.

- 0 -

Rainbow Dash rushed towards the conference room. She was late for her initial briefing and the last thing she needed was to make a bad impression on her first big case. She flew into the room to find herself face-to-face with several other ponies. Special Agent Twilight Sparkle, who was running lead on the investigation, was standing at the head of the room behind a podium. She was poised near a projector. She frowned at the cyan pegasus over her red-rimmed glasses and waited with pursed lips while Dash seat herself in the chair nearest the door. The violet unicorn hated tardiness.

Twilight Sparkle was a senior agent and despite the fact that she was the same age as Rainbow Dash, she had shot up through the ranks surprisingly fast due to her competence and magical ability. She was an incredibly stern mare with a pink and purple streaked mane that she usually kept in a messy bun with a pencil shoved haphazardly through it. Though she was incredibly organized, her need for perfection meant that she was also often overwhelmed.

"Glad you could join us, Agent Dash." Twilight said curtly, returning her gaze to the projector. She began speaking in a monotonous tone that made Dash want to slam her head against the table repeatedly. She wondered how Twilight got such a bright, star-shaped cutie mark when her special talent was clearly being incredibly boring.

Rainbow Dash took a moment to observe the other ponies on the case. There were six agents, not including herself, sitting at the table listening to Twilight drone on. She recognized most of them as a mish-mash of ponies from various units and wondered momentarily if this task-force was pulled randomly from a hat.

At the head of the table, next to the projector was Lyra Heartstrings, a veteran homicide agent who had been at the EBI twice as long as Dash and Twilight. She looked less than thrilled to be taking orders from a rookie. To her right was the ever-cheerful Cheerilee, a behavioral psychologist who specialized in cases of serial murder. She was known for her unwaveringly positive attitude, even in the face of grave atrocities and was the only pony Dash knew who could talk about evisceration with a smile on her face.

Across from Cheerilee was Doctor Whooves. He was originally a chemist, but had a change of heart after the death of his first wife in a terrorist attack. He returned to school and became an agent. He typically worked with the terrorist prevention unit because of his vast knowledge of chemical agents and bio-weapons, but he had been known to flitter from department-to-department when he was needed. To Doctor's left was Caramel, a friend of Dash's from her academy days. He looked as bored as she felt.

On Twilight's left was her secretary, a purple dragon named Spike. He was incredibly small for a dragon, but from what Dash had heard, quite competent with anything computer-related. He was busying himself taking notes while Twilight spoke, his little claws moving across the computer keys at lightning speed.

Rainbow Dash glanced across from her and Agent Fluttershy, an incredibly shy pony from foreign affairs, waved at her meekly. She waved back. They rarely interacted in their own department since Fluttershy was almost unbearably timid, with an introverted personality that made her difficult to become close with. Though her saccharine personality also made her incredibly loveable and Princess Celestia adored sending her out on foreign assignments because it only took a meek little smile and a few flutters of those lashes before a contract was being signed.

The sound of the projector whirling into life drew Dash's eyes to the front of the room again. It was only seconds before a grisly image filled the screen. It featured the bloody, beaten body of a pony. The victim's legs were twisted at odd angles and her hooves scratched and chipped. Her cutie mark was smeared with coagulated blood. There was a stump on her forehead that upon closer inspection, Rainbow realized was the remains of what had once been her horn. She felt her stomach turn.

"You may have heard rumors about unicorn abductions plaguing large cities like Manehatten and Fillydelphia. The only clue at each site is a large star-shaped burn mark in the ground." Twilight spoke quietly. Her features were devoid of emotion, though Dash could see a pain look in her eye. "As of now, there have been five abductions." she explained. A wink of white light lit the tip of her horn and zoomed through the following two slides, both showing equally mangled bodies. "The victims are found beaten, with cracks on their hooves and concrete chips in their fur. All of them have had their horns forcibly removed. He has been nick-named Horn Hawker."

Twilight switched to the next slide, featuring a map of Equestria labeled with photos of the five victims' faces. "The blue outlined photos show where each victim was abducted from, the red shows where the bodies were dumped." the violet unicorn told the table, "As you can see, each victim was taken from a well-populated city, then later disposed of in a different equally populated city." Twilight indicated the red-lined photos.

"Was there any indication the perp tried to hide the bodies?" Lyra asked; peering at the briefing packet Spike had just handed her. Dash opened her own folder and began paging through the information on each victim. She shuddered at the difference between the pictures of the victims before and after the killer had gotten to them, they were unrecognizable.

"No, they were left to the elements." Twilight informed her.

"So he has no remorse." Cheerilee said cheerfully, not looking up from her pictures of the corpses. "It seems that he just threw them out with the trash, not bothering to bury them first. The arrangement of the bodies also shows no signs of guilt." the magenta pony nearly laughed when she spoke. Her attitude in the face of death unnerved Dash. Part of her knew it was probably just a defense mechanism so that she wouldn't burn out, but the other part was just creeped out.

"He also doesn't seem to be gender-specific," Doctor Whooves pointed out. "There have been three female victims and two male victims." he took a sip of water from the glass in front of him and pursed his lips in thought, "The bodies we have found are also have dissimilar coat patterns and body-types."

"Do they have anything in common other than being unicorns?" Dash piped in.

"That's actually a really good question Agent Dash." Twilight smiled, "The problem is, we can't find that connection. There is not one factor that links these ponies together. They cross various socio-economic classes, ages, gender, and even marital status." she frowned, the lines in her forehead deepening.

"It looks like each pony was missing for a different amount of time before the body was discovered as well and the cooling off periods are all over the place. It was a month between the abductions of victims one and two, but a week between three and four!" Caramel pointed out. "What pattern is this guy even following?" he slammed one of his fore-hooves on the table in annoyance.

"Do we know for sure it is a stallion?" Fluttershy inquired, her voice a near whisper. The entire table turned to look at her; some of them had never heard her speak before. The yellow pegasus flushed from the attention, but stood her ground. "Th—there is no sign of seh—sexual assault." Fluttershy struggled valiantly with the word "sex", barely able to utter it and turning an impressive shade of crimson in the process. "We do not have any DNA indication the perpetrator is male."

"Aren't most serial killers male?" Lyra asked, smugly. She had no idea why in Celestia's name she was the only agent with any real homicide experience on this task force aside from Cheerilee. There were way too many rookies for a serial case. She blew her sea-green mane from her eyes and refocused her gaze on the younger pony.

"I am awfully sorry to correct you, Agent Heartstrings." Fluttershy murmured, "But you are incorrect. In fact, I hate to remind you, but the most infamous serial killer of our time was female. Did you forget the Cupcake Killer?" she asked Lyra, fixing her with a stare that chilled her to her bones.

Yes. Lyra remembered the Cupcake Killings. She was on the case three years ago when a string of ponies began disappearing in Ponyville. They had absolutely zero leads and no bodies. It wasn't until a mare named Colgate escaped from the killer that they had any inkling that it was anything more than a series of abductions.

The blue unicorn mare had arrived at the police station horribly mutilated. Her entire left flank was pulverized, her cutie mark missing. Her right eye was dangling from the socket, barely connected by a flimsy string of sinew. Colgate twisted a tale of cannibalism and torture. She told them about a mentally fractured pony who was kidnapping ponies and subjecting them to unspeakable horrors.

She led the authorities directly to the culprit, a young baking apprentice known around town for being friends with everypony. Her name was Pinkamena Diane Pie. She confessed to the killings without provocation. She led police to the basement below Sugarcube Corner, revealing an elaborate torture chamber outfitted like a macabre party palace. The pink earth pony had smiled when she told the police that she had been using the body parts of her dismembered victims as ingredients in her confectionaries and selling them in the shop.

Pinkamena admitted that she had not bothered to chase Colgate, even though she knew she would reveal her identity to the authorities. When asked why she had murdered so many ponies she simply said, "Their numbers came up."

Lyra still had nightmares.

The sea-green unicorn averted her gaze from Fluttershy's and nodded. The timid pegasus muttered her apologies for having to correct Lyra, pushing her fore-hooves together and blushing.

"Alright, everypony!" Twilight's voice was authoritative and drew the attention of her agents. "I am going to assign each of you tasks." she peered down over the frames of her glasses at a piece of paper on her podium. "Cheerilee and Lyra, you two will be re-interviewing the victims' next of kin and the last people who saw them prior to their disappearances." Lyra nodded the affirmative and Cheerilee looked positively giddy.

"Doctor and Carmel will visit the medical examiner and look at the latest victim." Twilight frowned and her violet eyes studied her notes intensely, "Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash. I need you to visit the police departments in charge of the initial murder investigations to make sure we didn't miss anything." she looked up at the agents, "Does everypony understand?" they all nodded. "Good. I need a report by the end of the week. Dismissed."

- 0 -

It was only now, eight months and two more victims later, Rainbow Dash thought she may have made a huge mistake joining the Horn Hawker case. They were no further than they had been and two more ponies were dead.

Dash had been pouring over the most recent victim, a mare named Midnight Sun. She had been missing for three months, until a week ago when a young colt working part-time at a Canterlot deli, came across her corpse lying next to the dumpster while taking out the trash. The mare's body had been pulverized. Her hooves were so chipped that the bone was exposed. Both of her hind-legs had been broken and were arranged at unnatural angles. Her horn had been removed. The colt had been utterly traumatized. His parents hadn't been able to get him to speak for days.

They had zero leads. Not so much as a single pony had seen Midnight Sun since she had left her job as a bank teller at five on the dot the night she disappeared. Rainbow Dash was about to give up on ever finding the Horn Hawker. This pony just kept outsmarting them!

Rainbow Dash glanced at the clock, it was almost four in the morning. She had to go home and get some sleep. She had been studying the case file for hours and her mind was numb. She brushed her multi-colored mane from her tired eyes and pushed herself up from her desk. Dash shoved some papers into her saddle-bag and threw it over her back.

Dash walked out into the hallway of the EBI and directly into a large figure. She looked up into a set of familiar piercing blue eyes, "Oh hey, Gilda." she greeted the griffon with a small smile, which Gilda returned. She was a good six inches taller than Rainbow Dash, and wore her badge on a chain around her neck. She and Gilda had been roommates when they were in the academy and an equally competitive nature with a shared love of excitement had forged a lasting friendship.

"Hey Dash, are you leaving?" she asked, peering down her beak at the exhausted pony. Gilda sipped at the cup of coffee in her claw and offered it to Dash who shook her head. No amount of caffeine would be able to help her at this point, she was beyond repair.

"Yeah, I've hit a wall with the Hawker case." Rainbow Dash confessed, "I really need catch a couple z's and look at things with fresh eyes in the morning. How are things in narcotics?" she asked Gilda, leaning against the wall in the hallway casually. It was more to keep her upright than anything, since she thought she might fall asleep on the spot.

"It's tough being undercover."

"Yeah?"

Suddenly, a blur of yellow flew into the hallway and slammed directly into the wall. A picture of Princess Celestia crashed to the floor with a giant clatter. Startled, Rainbow Dash and Gilda stared as the pegasus struggled to her feet. Breathless and wild-eyed, Fluttershy managed to right herself. Her bubblegum-pink mane was disheveled and her crash had caused a small gash above her left eye. She didn't seem to notice the blood dripping from the wound. "D—Dash!" even under pressure, her voice was soft and melodious, like a lute.

"What's wrong Fluttershy?" Rainbow Dash rushed to her side, her voice filled with concern. She tried to calm the yellow pegasus down, but she was hyperventilating. Gilda was at a loss. She had gone into narcotics because she was terrible at dealing with victims. She tried to hand Fluttershy her coffee cup, hoping the warm beverage would calm her, but the mare ignored the gesture.

"It's terrible, Dash!" Fluttershy cried, "There's been another kidnapping!"

Dash gulped.