Hello Mares and Gentlecolts and welcome to the continuation of my second story ever, if you liked this chapter please leave a positive review if you didn't like it then leave some constructive critism for me to look at, it will only make me better, and leave a like, everytime I see a new one it helps motivate me to write.

Mr. Carnage has found a murder and two potential suspects too interview, he has also found an assistant in Rainbow Dash and they are about to see if they can use the library to set up the interrogations.

Chapter 3: The great love triangle of Ponyville

When they arrived at the door of Twilight Sparkle's library/house Mr. Carnage realised that the house was in fact a hollowed out tree, "Wow that is really cool."

Dash turned to him, "Really? It's just a tree."

"Miss Dash you should learn to appreciate the smaller things in life, you will live a much happier life that way."

Rainbow dash didn't really understand what Carnage was saying but did not question it, Dash proceeded to knock on the door three times, Carnage took this opportunity too quickly ask a question "Can your friend be trusted with anything that could be overheard by her."

Rainbow nodded "Course, Twilight is a regular egghead like you so she knows when to keep things too herself."

Mr. Carnage didn't know how to respond after being compared to an egg, he'd been called worse, believe me far worse, but there was something about being compared to an egg that hit him the wrong way, before he could say anything about it Rainbow added "Anyway if that weren't enough, like me, she's one the elements of harmony, magic, so trust me when I say anything said in the room will remain confidential."

Something Dash said caught his attention "Elements of harmony?"

"Oh you don't know? Well you see…"

Before Dash could say anything more she was cut off by the door being opened by a very small dragon in a nightgown, "Can I help you…oh hi Rainbow Dash, do you want to see Twilight?"

"Yeah Spike, could you get her for us?"

"Sure, Twilight! Rainbow Dash and a weird Green colt are here to see you!"

"What makes me weird?" he thought to himself, as the dragon went inside he noticed that despite being woken up just a minute he didn't seem tired at all, before he could continue his ponderings a purple mare stepped before them in the doorway, she had a darker purple mane and tail with a pink stripe between them and her cutie mark was that of a star "Maybe it has something to do with astrology or something," the purple mare greeted them "Hey Rainbow what brings you here so late? I was just writing my notes from my recent experiment and…"

Twilight noticed the colt standing next to Rainbow Dash, "And I see that you have brought a friend, can I help you with anything?"

"Yes, my name is Mr. Carnage."

As he said this he bowed his head to her, "May we come in, I must ask you for something."

"Oh…um…sure I guess if Rainbow Dash knows you then I suppose its OK."

The two ponies followed Twilight into her house, as he stepped inside all he could see were books stretching all around the library, Carnage had always been surprisingly indifferent about books, he would read one gladly, but if it was something that had been adapted too film or TV then he would watch that, like the Sherlock Holmes stories, they stopped in the middle of the room as Twilight addressed them "My name is Twilight Sparkle, apprentice too Princess Celestia herself."

Mr. Carnage was about to make a sarcastic comment like [i]'Oh well excuse me for not bowing'[/i] but decided against it as he would have to ask her for her assistance in a moment, then Spike strutted up next to Twilight, "I'm Spike, I work as Twilights slave."

Twilight shot him a threatening glare "Oh…I…mean assistant, but I kinda end up helping all the ponies in the town."

Carnage was interested by this confession, "You mean that you're the local handyman."

"Nah, I just help everypony, I help Fluttershy count her animals, bring Pinkie and the cakes food supplies, oh and of course…Rarity."

Carnage took note that the subjects eyes had turned into hearts as soon as he said her name, also hearts were appearing above his head and bursting, and most intresting of all he gained levitation as he was hovering mere centimetres off the floor.

Rainbow Dash felt the need to tap him on the head to snap him out of it, and he looked like he was waking from an intense daydream.

Twilight had decided an explanation was in order "Don't mind him, he just has a massive crush on Rarity."

Spike was shocked at this "What! Twilight why would you tell him that."

Carnage felt it was best to reassure him "Trust me Spike, I'm a detective I had already figured it out, and I promise to keep your secret too myself."

Spike scratched the back of his head, "Was it that obvious?"

Twilight and Dash let out a small chuckle, obviously everypony knew about his 'secret' but he did not dwell on this, Twilight decided to add "And my pet owl and secondary assistant, Owloysius, is ill right now and our friend Fluttershy is treating him at her cottage near the Everfree forest."

Carnage took in every piece of information that was being given to him, Fluttershy, Everfree forest, Owloysius, every tiny scrap of info mattered, especially when there were virtually no clues to the killer's identity at the crime scene, Twilight had decided to get to the point "So what can I do for you, Mr…?"

"Carnage, it's Mr. Carnage"

Dash said his name with a sense of pride for remembering it, Carnage went straight to the point "Well you see Miss Sparkle, there is no delicate way to put this but several hours ago a murder was committed in the towns square."

Twilight gave a gasp "A murder! So that's what all that commotion was."

"Yes indeed, you see the victim was a pony named Bon-Bon, do you know her?"

"Yeah I'd seen her around, I know she was living with her marefriend Lyra."

"You see Miss Sparkle I need to interview the two ponies found at the scene of the crime, Cheerilee and Lyra, so Miss Dash here said I should ask you for the use of your library."

"Of course you can, I would be more than happy to help."

"Excellent, now they should be here soon, so all we have to do is wait for them too…"

His sentence was cut off by a sudden rumbling sound that was coming from the pit of his stomach, Dash immediately picked up on this "Looks like someone is hungry, actually come to think of it, I'm a little hungry too."

Twilight was feeling her generous self "Well I could get Spike to whip us up some Daffodil sandwiches for the three of us."

Carnage's mind said no as 'daffodil sandwiches' didn't sound very appetising at all but his belly was screaming 'OH GOD YES! FOOD!' on this rare occasion his stomach won out over his head, "Yes please, I could really go for something to eat before I interrogate the two of them."

With that Twilight called out to spike who was already in the kitchen and the three trotted in for some food.

---

Twenty minutes later after the meal had been completed and eaten, Carnage felt like he was in heaven, who knew he would enjoy a daffodil sandwich so much, Rainbow had finished before him and was reading what Carnage saw as something called 'Daring Doo and the terror of the gem dragon', Twilight who was sitting across from him noticed how much Carnage enjoyed the meal as he was rubbing his belly and still licking his lips "Yep, Spike can make a good meal for any pony, despite only eating gems."

"Gems?"

Spike got down from the side table where he was cleaning a plate and explained "Yep I can only eat gems, you know like diamonds, rubies, emeralds, any gem you can think of, I can eat it."

Carnage was genuinely intrigued by this, but before he could ask any more questions there was a knock on the door, *knock, knock*.

Spike walked towards the sound, Carnage watched him walk "It's nice to see someone walking on two legs for a change," he missed his legs, they weren't anything special but they were his legs, in fact he really missed his hands, now he had hooves but he was surprised by the fact he had no problem holding things, "Wait a minute, that's not physically possible, how can I and the other ponies be able to pick up things and hold them with such ease?" he decided that if he questioned too much then he may inadvertently rip a hole in the universe, besides the suspects were being escorted in by Spike "Come in, the detective is just finishing off his food so just sit over there…"

As Lyra and Cheerilee timidly entered the library, Dash threw down her book in a threatening manner (Twilights eyes showed absolute horror at this) and flew right up into the faces of the ponies "Alright suspects were on to you, which one of you did it?"

Carnage's eyes opened in horror at what Rainbow was doing "What in god's name does she think she's doing?" Dash continued on her tirade as Lyra and Cheerilee were cowering in fear "We know it had to be one of you two, I mean who else could it have been? So you might as well confess now or Mr. Carnage here is going to make you confess one way or another and his new assistant will be…"

Carnage was at boiling point "Rainbow Dash! We do not threaten suspects!"

Dash looked back at him in shock "But…I…"

"You do not accuse ponies (or people) of murder like that with no evidence in order to back up all of your claims, now apologise too Miss Lyra and Miss Cheerilee now!"

Rainbow landed on the ground in a huff, she pouted and tears were starting too well up in her eyes, she said in a low tone "Sorry."

Carnage calmed down slightly when he saw that Cheerilee and Lyra stood up, regaining their manner, Twilight still sat there at the table but remained completely silent and Spike had vanished, he presumably didn't like the shouting and decided to leave, Carnage spoke in a calm tone "Now really I should kick you out, but if you calm down and stay quiet you may stay."

Dash turned her head away from him, her cheeks were red again and a few tears could be seen "Okay, thank you."

She slowly walked towards the chair that she was reading her book and resumed but was now burying her head, trying to hide it from Carnage's line of sight, Carnage returned his attention to the two ponies standing in the door way, he cleared his throat "I do apologise for that, we are all on edge from the recent events and I hope we will be able to talk quietly and calmly."

Cheerilee spoke "It's fine, but may I request to speak first, I must be in school first thing tomorrow."

"Ah, so she is a teacher, she is very committed that even after this she will still come in to school the next day" Carnage felt that she wasn't the killer and was tempted to let her go now but he had to get all the details "You may go first Miss Cheerilee, let's talk upstairs, may I use your room Twilight?".

Twilight turned to him "Oh yes of course, but could I speak to you a moment?"

"Sure, please go ahead Miss Cheerilee, Miss Lyra please relax down here, as soon as I'm done with Miss Cheerilee I will call you up, okay?"

Lyra nodded silently and went off to find a book to read and while Cheerilee went upstairs Mr. Carnage trotted up too Twilight curious to exactly what she wanted, "Listen I know you're the detective and you take your work seriously but please go easy on Rainbow Dash, she was trying to help and she's the most loyal pony I know, hell she's the element of loyalty after all."

Carnage would of asked more about these elements but was completely fixated on a very sad looking Rainbow Dash, normally he kept emotion out of work but was saddened to see her like this, "Yeah I know, but you can't threaten suspects when you need to gain their trust, hopefully I will be able to regain that during the interrogations."

Twilight nodded in agreement "But she's also a very passionate pony, couldn't you just talk to her?"

He knew she was right and knew what he had to do, he approached Dash slowly, she dared to turn around to face him, they looked at each other a moment with neither willing to upset the other but Carnage decided to make the first move "Hey."

She replied meekly, lacking her usual energy "Hey."

"Listen um…I'm sorry for shouting earlier."

"It's fine, I don't mind."

Her eyes betrayed her, they were starting to water up again so Carnage decided to lighten her mood "Um…would you like to help me interrogate the suspect?"

Rainbow Dash's eyes lit up as soon as she heard his offer put before her, she turned to him with a large smile on her face "What! Really?"

"Only if you want to of course I would completely understand if you didn't, would you like to?"

She jumped up on the chair in excitement "Would I?"

Dash saw by the smile on Carnage's face how excited she had reacted, she reverted from acting like a fangirl to her normal cool approach in order to keep her reputation intact for being the most awesome pony ever and someone who is followed, not a follower, "I mean sure, whatever, it's not like I've got anything better to do than read crummy books."

She quickly kicked the book behind her out of eyesight, Carnage gave her a nod and a smile "Alright then let us go Miss Dash there are suspects to interrogate."

Dash flew up a little from the ground and her energy appeared to return to her "Right!"

She let out a quiet squeal of excitement, Carnage nodded to Twilight letting her know that he was ready and two of them headed upstairs.

---

When they arrived in twilights room something about it made Mr. Carnage feel nostalgic, his memories had somewhat become corrupted from the constant leaps to different realities, he read a collection of books about a kid going to a wizard school but for the life of him he couldn't remember what they were called.

The room had a single bed with Cheerilee sitting at the foot of it, the quilt had stars on it and what appeared to be dolphins "Wouldn't be surprised if they could talk too" thought Mr. Carnage.

There was also a basket like bed in front of Twilights bed which he presumed was for Spike, the window was right next to the bed, it had yellow curtains and a telescope pointed looking out the direction of the window, there was also another section of books which he presumed was for Twilights personal enjoyment, he noticed there were no other places to sit, "Rainbow, would you mind getting two other chairs from downstairs for me."

Still hovering in the air she raised her hoof too salute him "On it boss."

She moved at light speed downstairs, Carnage turned to Cheerilee "Now Miss Cheerilee I…"

Dash had zoomed back with two chairs before Carnage could finish his sentence and placed them just behind him facing the bed, Dash spoke enthusiastically "Here you go boss."

She had a wide smile on her face as she presented the chairs, Carnage was amazed at her speed "Damn she can move fast, I wouldn't be surprised if she really was the fastest flyer in Equestria" he noticed he was being watched earnestly by Dash "Oh…thank you Rainbow Dash."

Carnage sat in the right chair and motioned Rainbow to sit next to him in the left, which she did, Carnage picked up where he left off, "Now Miss Cheerilee I would like you to tell me what you were doing and how you found the body."

Carnage never needed paper to take notes, his mind was like a sponge that soaked up all the information, "Oh let me see, I was marking papers for the foals that I teach at the school, I remember they all did very well and it was getting late so naturally I decided it was best to return home."

Rainbow was remaining silent this time, learning from her previous error, Carnage asked a question "What time did you decide to return home?"

"Oh…um lets see I think I left the school much later than I usually do because I was buried with other work, I think I left at ten past twelve."

Carnage noted the time she gave him, he remembered looking at the clock near the crime scene was about 12:30, "What time did you discover the body."

Cheerilee pondered this for a moment "Well I think the time was, 12:15."

"I see, was Lyra there when you arrived at the crime scene."

"Actually no she wasn't, when I found the body I was in shock and then I saw Lyra heading towards me, I screamed and fell backwards, and then you arrived a little while later."

"I see, so it was your scream that caught my attention."

Carnage looked at Dash for a moment and asked "Where did you fly off after we met?"

Dash had been looking down at the time of Carnage asking her the question, he appeared to break her concentration on whatever she was thinking about, "Uh…what?"

"You know when we first met you came across me lying in the grass."

"Oh well I went home to my house in the clouds but then I heard this really faint scream so I thought I should check it out and that's when I saw you nearly getting attacked by an angry mob."

Carnage felt like they had gained enough from Cheerilee "You may go now Miss Cheerilee, I see no reason to contain you further so may return to your home, I doubt the killer will come after you since you did not see him but when you go downstairs could you ask Miss Lyra to come and see us upstairs?"

Cheerilee gave him a nod "Thank you Mr. Carnage."

As she walked downstairs Carnage knew that he had a couple of moments to ponder and talk with Rainbow Dash, he was surprised by Dash's sudden outburst "Well that was a complete waste of time."

He turned to her in disbelief "What do you mean?"

"Well she didn't really tell us anything did she?"

Carnage's look of disbelief quickly changed to a smile, he let out a small chuckle and got off his chair to face her "Well Miss Dash I learned two things from her."

"What?"

Carnage went over to a desk and wrote something on a piece of paper, he then turned back to Rainbow Dash and handed her the paper, Dash studied the paper he gave her.

12:10 – Cheerilee leaves school.

12:15 – Cheerilee discovers body, Lyra arrives also almost immediately.

12:20 – Mr. Carnage arrives.

"You see from the times she gave us we at least know that the murder occurred before quarter past twelve and now we can ask Lyra why she was after Bon-Bon."

Dash looked up at him "Wouldn't she have just heard the scream like we did?"

"No because the reason Cheerilee screamed was because she saw Lyra approaching and possibly was thinking she could have been the killer, but this thought probably left when she saw her embrace Bon-Bon the way she did."

Before they could continue they both saw Lyra coming towards them "Ah Miss Lyra please take a seat on the bed."

As Lyra sat down Carnage did the same on his chair and wasted no time asking Lyra the question on his mind "Why did you go out looking for Bon-Bon that night?"

Lyra was taken aback by the question "H-how did yo…"

Carnage finished her sentence "Know? I'm a detective, trust me when I say you won't be able to hide anything from me."

Lyra looked like she was trying to compose herself, "To tell you that, I have to go back a little bit, is that ok."

Carnage nodded his head to her "Please continue".

Lyra took a deep breath and began to tell her tale, "About two years ago me and Bonny became roommates, I had known her for a little bit now but I noticed that my reputation had changed, you see Bon-Bon was into mares and when I moved in with her everyone thought I was a filly-fooler".

Dash interjected "Wait, you're not?"

"It's hard to explain, I knew Bonny had a crush on me and since everyone thought it anyway I said what was the point of fighting against it, so I gave it a try, but I'm not like Rainbow who's always been into mares, but I kind of did like her."

Carnage was suddenly sad, he didn't know why but something she just said made him feel that way, he turned to Rainbow who had a look of utter bewilderment on her face, "What did you say?"

Lyra was confused "Um…about you liking mares?"

"NO I DON'T!"

Carnage felt happier again, he didn't know why, Lyra continued "But Rainbow everypony thinks that".

"WHY!"

"No one's ever seen you with a colt and you always hang out with mares so everyone thought…"

"Hey their just friends and…wait a sec."

Rainbow flew just above the top of the stairs and called down "Twilight do you think I'm gay?"

Twilight trotted up to the bottom of the stairs to face her friend "What? Of course I do Rainbow, everypony does."

A huge blush appeared on Dash's cheeks and she zoomed to the bedroom window and she screamed at the top of her lungs "EVERYPONY LISTEN UP! I AM RAINBOW DASH AND I AM NOT A FILLYFOOLER!"

Carnage felt sorry for the town's people who were just falling to sleep after the murder to be awoken by that revelation, Carnage stopped her there "Okay let's get this back on track, let me guess, a colt that you liked caught your eye."

Rainbow slowly few back to her seat in embarrassment as Lyra looked down in shame, she was having trouble now looking at anypony in the eye "Yeah, his name is Doctor Whooves."

Rainbow lit up, "Oh you mean that weird pony that everypony keeps seeing near a blue box?"

"Yeah him, I met him six months ago and we never really talked before but by circumstance we ended up seeing things that I can't tell you about and I kinda ended up falling in love with him."

Carnage took this chance to ascertain something "And let me make another educated guess, she found out on the night that she was killed."

"Yeah, he gave me a special present that day and I went back home and Bonny saw it, she quickly figured out what had been going on."

---

That night…

Bon-Bon picked up a jewel that Lyra had accidently dropped; she had never seen a jewel like this before it looked like nothing from this earth, it was green and what looked like little white stars inside it, she looked at the label at the bottom 'a little something I want you to have so whenever you look at it, it will remind you that I love you, no matter how far apart we are, love from Doctor Whooves'.

Bon-Bon looked at the mare that she had loved, Lyra could not look at her back in shame, there were no words that could describe what Bon-bon was feeling and all she could say was "You Bitch!"

She ran out of the house in tears leaving Lyra feeling guiltier than she had ever felt in her entire life.

---

Present…

Lyra continued "I did love her a little I guess, but I should never have been with her in the first place, and I love Whooves to pieces, I've felt closer to him in six months than I did with Bon-Bon in those two years, am I a bad pony?"

Rainbow was about to speak and Carnage knew what she was going to say so he stopped her by putting his hoof in front of her face, he rarely judged people (or ponies for that matter) as no one was perfect "No, you're not a bad pers…I mean pony, what time did she leave the house?"

"I think about five to twelve and I chased after her five minutes later, I was going to tell her that night, me and Whooves agreed on it, it was just bad luck she found out that way."

Carnage closed his eyes and processed all the info given to him, "Thank you Miss Lyra, it is clear to me now that you are not the killer, it should be safe for you tonight, so you may return home."

Lyra got down from her seat, "Thank you Mr. Carnage and please do everything that you can to find Bonny's killer, I know I didn't love her, but I cared about her."

He nodded his head and she left the room, Carnage got out of his chair and looked out the window in thought, he turned back to a curious looking Rainbow Dash and said "Well Miss Dash, it appears we have a new suspect…"

Who is the new suspect Mr. Carnage is referring to? Find out next chapter.

Again say what you liked and what you didn't like, it will only help me get better as a writer ;) and a like would also be greatly appreciated, thank you.