Day 7, 12:06

“Fillies and Gentlecolts! It brings me great joy to inform you that the second body has just been discovered in a parlour on the west wing of the first floor. Please follow the directions currently being sent to your hoof computers, the time for investigation is now, the second trial is just around the corner. Have fun!”

Day 7, 12:10

Twelve ponies were gathered in the parlour, surrounding the newest body. Pinkie couldn’t help but think how it looked like something out of one of her murder mystery dinners, in any other circumstances it might have made her laugh.

“I can’t believe this is happening again,” Cloudchaser exclaimed frustrated. “So much for everypony working together to get out of here.”

“Hey now, let’s not jump to conclusions,” Braeburn began hurriedly, “For all we know, the Mastermind did this to try and turn us against each other.”

“I don’t see that being likely,” Fleur said with a little sigh, turning away from the body. “No, I think we have to accept the fact that once again a murderer is amongst our numbers.”

“Sho who ish it thish time?” Gizmo asked, scanning the surrounding ponies.

“I guess we won’t know until we investigate,” Pinkie said, hanging her head.

“Are you dimwits serious?!” Blueblood exclaimed, causing everypony to look at him, some in surprise, most in annoyance. “This case couldn’t be more clear cut, the culprit is as plain as day.”

“Care to enlighten us Blueballs,” Vinyl said in a sickly sweet tone. Blueblood did not rise to her insult, instead maintaining an attitude of lofty superiority.

“If any of you stopped to use your brains you would see that the culprit is, beyond a doubt, none other than that Wonderbolt Soarin!”

“What?!” Soarin exclaimed from the sofa where he sat next to Redheart who was attempting to monitor his pulse. “Look here buddy…”

Soarin didn’t get much further than that as he had tried to stand up and immediately began swaying dangerously. Redheart and Coco quickly leapt up to catch him before he collapsed again, placing him gently back down on the sofa.

“Soarin, seriously?” Lightning exclaimed, “Just look at the state he’s in!”

Indeed Soarin had been the last to arrive at the crime scene, and upon stumbling in he immediately threw up the contents of his stomach upon seeing the dead body.

“A clever charade,” Blueblood said dismissively.

“We haven’t even investigated yet,” Braeburn said, “what possible reason could you have for suspecting him?”

“Clearly none of you noticed the trail of water to this room,” Blueblood began, Pinkie was nearly going to interrupt him there but he continued before she could. “It obviously leads from here to the swimming pool where Trendyhoof and Soarin have been swimming together, alone each morning at ten. That Pegasus clearly attacked him at the pool but did such a poor job at it, that the victim was able to run away. He then chased him to this room and beat him to death.”

“That’s a load of crap!” Soarin shouted.

“Your entire accusation is based on little more than assumptions,” Fleur pointed out. “If you expect to be taken seriously, you need to present a little more proof.”

“Actually I don’t,” Blueblood said smugly. “We need simply ask everypony here what they were doing in the last few hours. I guarantee he will be the only one who was anywhere near the victim in the last two hours. Why don’t I start, I was in the dining room, which can be confirmed by the lovely pony who decided to take it upon herself to bother me the entire time.”

Fleur groaned. “I suppose, I can confirm that Blueblood and I were in the dining room for the last few hours.”

“You spoke to him for a few hours?” Lightning asked in disbelief.

“No actually,” Fleur admitted, “almost all of the time was spent in icy silence.”

“Well Trixie was in the library at the time,” Trixie chipped in, “she can recite word for word what she read if that would help support her claim.”

“Pinkie and I were out walking,” Vinyl explained, “we were together right up until shortly before the body was discovered.”

“I was doing cardio in my room as usual,” Lightning said with a shrug, “I guess I can’t really prove that, I only met up with Cloudchaser after I was done.”

“Well me and Coco were taking inventory of the kitchen like we’d agreed,” Braeburn added looking over to the remaining ponies in the room.

“I was in the labs,” Redheart explained, “I didn’t have anything to do so I was just taking stock of what all we’ve got in case we needed to treat injuries.”

“And I was with Glasses here,” Cloudchaser finished, gesturing to Gizmo, “I was teaching him how to shoot darts in the game room on the other side of this floor.”

“So that’s everypony accounted for,” Blueblood began sounding satisfied, turning once more to Soarin, “everypony except you.”

“I…” Soarin began in a weak tone before finishing lamely, “I was asleep.”

“Asleep,” Blueblood repeated, a winning smirk appearing on his face.

“I’m serious!” Soarin exclaimed, looking around the gathered ponies, desperation in his eyes. “I got to the pool before Trenderhoof and… I must have dozed off because the next thing I woke up in the changing rooms and the Mastermind was shouting down the halls about a body.”

“What did I tell you all,” Blueblood announced, triumphant.

“Please, you guys have gotta believe me!” Soarin insisted desperately.

“You have to admit,” Braeburn began hesitantly, not meeting Soarin’s eye. “It does sound pretty unbelievable.”

“But it’s the truth!” The room was filled with silence for the longest time, until at last Pinkie spoke up.

“It doesn’t matter,” she said, causing everypony to look at her in surprise. “It’s like Fleur said, at the moment this is just assumptions, we need to investigate properly instead of pointing hooves at each other. Don’t forget all our lives are on the line here, we can’t afford to get this wrong.”

“Yeah Pinkie’s right,” Vinyl exclaimed, sounding pumped.

“Indeed, we’ve wasted enough time already,” Trixie agreed. “For starters Redheart will need to examine the body, we’ll also need to examine this room and the pool for additional clues. If you aren’t going to help in the investigation then stay out of our way.”

There was a brief period of mumbling and shuffling, until only Pinkie, Vinyl, Fleur, Trixie, Blueblood and Redheart remained in the room.

“I’ll get out of your manes,” Soarin said miserably making to stand up, only to have his hooves tremble and give out beneath him. “Or I’ll just lie here, whatever.”

“Soarin, you’re in a terrible state,” Redheart said examining him where he lay. “How long have you been feeling like this?”

“Since I woke up,” he replied, earning a sceptical glare from Blueblood.

“Have you eaten or drank anything strange lately?” Redheart continued, not questioning his alibi.

“I don’t think so, just what I usually have,” he informed her.

“It’s alright bro,” Vinyl assured him, “we’ll just investigate around you. Red, you can watch over him while you’re here examining the body.”

“I can,” Redheart responded, “you can all go investigate, I’ll have an assessment on the body as quickly as possible for you.”

Thanking her, the group left the parlour into the hallway where Pinkie had encountered the girls trying to enter the room.

“You really believe he’s faking that?” Pinkie asked Blueblood sternly.

“Just you wait,” he replied snidely, “You’ll see I’m right.”

“So where do we begin?” Vinyl asked.

“From what you have told Trixie, this was a closed room murder,” Trixie began. “The door was completely blocked from the inside?”

“That’s right,” Fleur confirmed, “a sofa had been moved in front of the door.”

“Well we need to figure out how the killer got into the room,” Trixie continued, “We can take care of that. Pinkie, why don’t you and Vinyl follow this trail and see if it really does lead to the pool. Either way, see what you can find.”

“Sure, we can do that,” Vinyl said with a nod before her and Pinkie turned away and began following the trail. Just before they turned around the corner, Pinkie overheard Blueblood say one last thing.

“I look forward to seeing the looks on your faces when I’m proven right.”

“Princey,” Trixie replied in a neutral tone, “shut up before Trixie castrates you.”

Pinkie grinned upon hearing that.

Day 7, 12:27

As the pair walked they discovered two things about the trail. One, it was clearly made by wet hooves. Two, it did in fact lead back to the swimming pool, although they had never really doubted that.

“It feels different,” Pinkie said, breaking the silence as they circled the pool. “When the victim was Twilight I was devastated, she was my best friend after all. But now it’s Trenderhoof and… I don’t really know how to feel. I mean he was a good guy and all, but I barely knew him. I feel like I should be sad but… I’m just not. Does that make me a bad pony?”

“Of course not,” Vinyl assured her, “you can’t be expected to scream and cry your eyes out for everypony, that would just be crazy. We might not be distraught, but we’ll still mourn him, and we’ll still find his killer.”

“Do you believe Blueblood’s right?” Pinkie asked. “That Soarin did it?”

“Well I’m not saying Blueblood is right… like ever,” Vinyl answered making Pinkie smirk. “But Soarin’s not lookin’ too good right now; you have to admit his alibi is kind of… crap.”

“It does sound ridiculous,” Pinkie admitted, “but I think there’s more to it.”

“Well whatever it is, we’ll get to the bottom of it.” Pinkie split off from Vinyl and approached the pool. She stood at the side closest to the door, the trail led right here. She was basically standing in a large puddle.

How does this much water get outside the pool? There must have been a lot of thrashing about while Trenderhoof climbed out of the pool. Maybe the murderer was in the pool with him.

Was it just the light or did the water around her hooves look slightly… discoloured?

Water doesn’t have a colour dummy; if it has any colour at all it’s probably discoloured.

Crouching down she peered closer at the water. Against the white tiles it looked almost… pink?

Could it be blood? I can’t see any in the rest of the pool, although if there was any it probably got diluted.

“You got anything?” Vinyl asked over her shoulder.

“I think so,” Pinkie replied unsure, “The water seems to be tinted pink, I’m thinking maybe it’s blood.”

“So Trenderhoof was attacked and injured here,” Vinyl surmised, “then he tried to run away?”

“What kind of attack would leave so little blood?” Pinkie questioned, “We’ll need to see if he had any other injuries on him when we get back.”

Standing up Pinkie walked away from the edge of the pool, making for a slightly ajar door with the sign reading ‘changing room’. Opening it up, she flicked on the lights and wondered in. The room was completely bare apart from the usual fixtures.

Nothing to suggest Soarin was or wasn’t in here sleeping.

Disappointed she turned to turn off the light again and leave, but as she did something caught her eye. Looking back over at one of the hardwood benches, she noticed a clear bottle of water. Walking over to it she picked up and examined it. It looked to be about two thirds full. Staring at it from all angles, as well as unscrewing the cap and looking down into it, Pinkie concluded it was just a regular bottle of water.

It’s still cold; it can’t have been here for too long. That doesn’t exactly prove anything, but it suggests somepony was definitely in here.

Turning off the lights she left to find Vinyl waiting for her outside.

“Did you find anything?” she asked, Pinkie held up the bottle of water, giving a little shrug to indicate it wasn’t much. “Well I took a dander down the hall to the door outside, it was lying wide open.”

“So somepony came into the pool from the outside, or left here to go outside,” Pinkie concluded as the pair began walking that way. “So what could that mean?”

“Maybe the killer left that way,” Vinyl suggested.

“But they definitely followed Trenderhoof to the parlour,” Pinkie pointed out, “why come back this way at all?”

“I don’t know, maybe we’ll find something outside,” Vinyl said disgruntled, “I hope the others are having better luck than us.”

Day 7, 12:45

Trixie rubbed the curtain with her hoof. It was still damp, soaking even. The window was directly opposite the door to the parlour, just one of the many narrow, floor to ceiling windows that lined the hall. Like all others this one had a posh set of red velvet drapes hanging on either side, unlike all others Trixie noticed one of the curtains on this particular window was heavily creased. Upon further investigation she found it wet to the touch, she quickly drew her conclusions from there.

“You can quit your bickering,” she said, silencing Fleur and Blueblood who were standing next to the door having a heated debate as to how the killer managed to infiltrate the room. “This curtain is wet.”

“What an amazing observation,” Blueblood replied, his voice dripping with sarcasm, “I believe that’s this case closed.”

“And what do you believe that indicates?” Fleur asked, trying her best to ignore Blueblood.

“So far we’ve been trying to deduce how the killer entered the room from this point, based on the assumption that they didn’t go anywhere else due to the fact the trail ends at this spot,” Trixie explained. “However if they dried themselves off here, they could have left to find another entrance to the room without leaving a trail.”

“Excellent work Trixie,” Fleur complimented, “I’m going to see about the rooms above this one, why don’t you look into the adjoining rooms?”

“Fair enough,” Trixie replied indifferently, making her way down the corridor towards the next door.

“What about me?” Blueblood asked Fleur surprised, “You aren’t going to give me some benign task?”

“I’d like to think you’re old enough to find something to do on your own,” Fleur replied with a smirk as she carried down the opposite end of the corridor. Leaving Blueblood to fume away on his own.

Day 7, 12:56

Pinkie was about to admit defeat and head back to find the others. In all their time spent investigating all they’d found was what might be blood in a puddle and a half empty bottle of water. They were no closer to either condemning Soarin or clearing his name, and so far this walk outside had proved entirely fruitless. But then they hadn’t known what to look for to begin with, on the off chance something important had been out here they’d probably have missed it. Pinkie was just about ready to call it quits when Vinyl let out a loud yelp.

Spinning around Pinkie saw Vinyl hoping up and down, clutching her right forehoof, swearing in between sharp in takes of breath.

“What’s wrong Vinyl?” Pinkie asked panicking.

“Stupid… broken glass!” Vinyl exclaimed, finally standing still and holding her hoof out for Pinkie to see. Pinkie flinched upon seeing the large triangular shard deeply embedded in Vinyl hoof, which was gently oozing blood.

“Hold still, I’ll take it out,” Pinkie offered, but Vinyl shook her head.

“Nah, I got it,” she said, then grimacing she lit her horn up and wrenched the shard out as quickly as possible, eliciting another wave of swears.

“We should go see Nurse Redheart,” Pinkie said as Vinyl gripped her now bleeding profusely hoof in a telekinetic hold to keep pressure on it.

“Sure just…” Vinyl began before drifting off, looking down at the gravel pathway before turning her attention up. Pinkie followed her gaze and saw what she was looking at, a window on the second floor had had its glass smashed out, the pieces of which were now piled to the side of the path, not counting the overlooked piece that had found its way into Vinyl’s hoof. “Is that… one of the bedrooms?”

“Maybe somepony got too warm during the night, I know I certainly did before I discovered the air conditioning,” Pinkie replied.

“Air conditioning!” Vinyl exclaimed, “Our rooms have air conditioning?! I mean… that seems a little extreme, putting your window out like that.”

It could have been an accident; they might not even know it’s broken. But then how did the glass all end up in that pile over there? No they must know it’s broken, but then why has nopony mentioned anything about it?

“Hey Vinyl,” Pinkie began thoughtfully; “do you think you’d be able to levitate me up to that window?”

“Seriously?” Vinyl asked, “I’m kind of putting a lot of pressure on this right now.” Pinkie frowned at that, nodding understandingly. “But, if you think it’s really important then I guess I could give it a shot.”

“Thanks Vinyl,” Pinkie managed to say before she was rocketed into the air. Pinkie felt herself hurtling skywards only to be yanked back down again before final being frozen in place.

“Sorry!” Vinyl shouted up from the ground, “I’ve never had to lift another pony before; I guess I put too much juice into it!”

Pinkie wanted to shout down ‘clearly’ but was worried if she opened her mouth, she’d lose her breakfast. Instead she just looked forward at the broken window in front of her; it did indeed lead through to one of the bedrooms.

Gesturing for Vinyl to bring her closer, Pinkie felt herself float towards the window sill, which she latched on to, before scuttling inside the room. It was just as generic as all the others, or what she assumed all the others looked like based on what she had seen from her own and Twilight’s rooms. There was absolutely nothing that distinguished it from another, besides the broken window. Looking around she checked through all the nooks and crannies, investigated the dresser and the bedside table, searched the bathroom and looked under the bed covers.

There wasn’t a single item to be found, let alone something interesting. Either the pony stayed here was notoriously neat, or they were trying very hard to clean up after themselves. Sighing she threw herself onto the bed, praying the owner of the room didn’t walk in at that point. Maybe all the rooms weren’t exactly the same, this bed certainly wasn’t as comfortable as her own… no just the pillow. Wait…

Sitting bolt upright, Pinkie spun around and grabbed hold of the pillow, feeling the outside of it. Sure enough she felt something hard inside. Pulling the pillow case off, she found two pillows, between which a book had been stuffed.

A Modern Medical Encyclopaedia? A little heavy for a bedtime read.

Turning the book to its side Pinkie noticed one of the pages was disturbed slightly. Opening it up she found the corner of the page had been dog-eared. Scanning the text she found it detailing different kinds of drugs, it seemed to be in alphabetical order and she was specifically looking at the K page. Turning over to the other side of the marked page Pinkie found something interesting. One of the passages in the book had been circled in pen.

Ketamine?

Pinkie read through the description and the list of effects, as she did a sense of understanding seemed to dawn on her. Quick as lightning, she sprung off the bed and hurried to the window, looking out she saw Vinyl still standing bellow, looking from side to side to make sure nopony was going to stumble upon them

“Vinyl!” Pinkie called, “get me down, quick!”

Vinyl obliged, her own curiosity rising at the urgency in Pinkie’s voice. Once Pinkie was down on the ground she immediately began walking back around the house to the front doors, leaving Vinyl to hobble after her.

“Are you going to fill me in?” she asked in a joking tone.

“I will,” Pinkie assured her, “but I need to check something in the lab before the trial starts. Can you go see the others and see what they’ve come up with?”

“I guess, but…” Vinyl didn’t have time to finish her sentence before Pinkie galloped off. “What’s this about?”

Day 7, 13:21

Fleur stepped into the shared wash room. Judging from her map it was directly above the parlour where Trenderhoof had died, the killer might have entered the sealed room through here. However after having spent a good twenty minutes scouring the room and casting various detection spells she was forced to accept that she was probably wasting her time. Taking one last look over the area she found herself peeking into the shower stalls. So far there was nothing out of the ordinary, but then she hadn’t expected anything to be. After all she had already looked in here, she was just double checking in case she overlooked something, like a single stall covered in black grime.

Okay, maybe she had been a bit rushed before resorting to magic to do what her eyes couldn’t. Stepping in she found the floor and wall tiles coated in some thin sludge, the whole cubicle was wet, suggesting it had been used recently, but if that was the case why would it be so dirty? And why did this picture look so familiar to Fleur?

Day 7: 13:24

Vinyl stepped into the parlour to find Redheart pacing back and forth, clearly waiting for one of them to return. Soarin was still sitting on the sofa, but he didn’t look quite as weak as he had when Vinyl left.

“Where did the others go?” Vinyl asked, announcing her presence.

“They all left to try and find where the killer entered the room from,” Redheart explained.

“Any luck with that body?” Vinyl asked walking over beside Redheart as the pair looked down at the soaked corpse.

“Not a lot that will come as a surprise,” Redheart began, “he was struck on the back of the head with the fire poker, I’d guess five times.”

“On the back,” Vinyl repeated, "so the killer snuck up from behind?”

“Maybe,” Redheart replied with a small shrug, “I wouldn’t know anything when it comes to that deduction stuff.”

“Did he have any other injuries?” Vinyl asked, “Anything at all, even something as small as a paper cut.”

“No,” Redheart began, “and I was very thorough, I checked all over but didn’t find a single injury beyond the blows to the skull. Why do you ask?”

“We found some blood at the pool,” Vinyl explained, “or at least we’re sure it’s blood, it was lying in water so it was pretty diluted.”

“Maybe the killer was injured,” Soarin suggested causing both the mares to turn to look at him. “And just so you know, I don’t have any cuts or anything like that on me.”

“I guess that’s a…” Redheart began before noticing Vinyl’s now swollen hoof. “Vinyl, what happened to your hoof?!”

“Broken glass,” Vinyl explained, “I can barely feel it now.”

“I’ll have to treat this before it becomes infected,” Redheart said examining Vinyl’s hoof. “I have some medical equipment in my room, come with me and I’ll get you patched up.”

“Why do I get the feeling you planned all this to get me alone on your room?” Vinyl suggested slyly.

“Because you’re delirious from blood loss,” Redheart deadpanned. “Now let’s go.”

“If I don’t make it back Soarin,” Vinyl shouted back as she was forcibly dragged from the room. “I’m probably having the best time of my life, so don’t try to rescue me!”

Day 7, 13:29

Pinkie trotted into the lab, allowing the door to swing shut behind her. As she wondered in, she heard a faint squeal, but looking around she saw nothing, nothing besides a scarlet hair pin poking up over one of the counters.

“Hey there Coco,” Pinkie greeted knowingly. Coco stood up nervously, averting her eyes from Pinkie. “Whatcha doin’?”

“I was… just looking for medicine for Soarin,” she replied in high pitched whisper making Pinkie’s ears ring. “I’m not getting in the way of your investigation am I?”

“Not at all,” Pinkie assured her, “in fact, you might be able to help me.”

“Really?” Coco asked hopefully.

“Yeah, I’m looking for a drug called Ketamine,” Pinkie explained, “could you help me find where it’s kept?”

“Um, sure,” Coco replied unsure. “I think drugs are stored over here.”

Pinkie followed Coco over to section of shelves she had indicated, indeed they were chalk full of drawers labelled with everything from Paracetomol to Corticosteroids. However a quick scan indicated they were in no obvious order, so Pinkie had resorted to running up and down the shelves as quickly as she could in the hopes she spotted what she was looking for.

Even Pinkie was surprised such a brash method could yield any results, but soon enough Pinkie came skidding to a halt in front of a drawer labelled ‘Ketamine’.

“Found it!” she called to Coco a few shelves over, who was taking a much more refined approach to searching.

As Coco trotted over, Pinkie pulled the drawer out. Inside rows of bottles were laid out, held in place by metallic frame. Roughly three slots were empty, and confirming Pinkie’s suspicions, one of the empty slots was completely devoid of the dust that had gathered in the others.

So somepony took a bottle from here recently. And I have a funny feeling the one who did is our culprit.

“Attention everypony!” the Mastermind called out, making Coco squeal in fright. “The trial will begin shortly, please make your way down to the entrance hall!”

“Well,” Pinkie began, stepping away from the shelf. “I think I’ve done all I can, hopefully the rest will have found enough that together we can figure this out. Are you coming Coco?”

Pinkie looked over her shoulder only to find the other pony had not followed her while she was monologuing , but rather, was examining the shelf intently.

“Coco?” Pinkie called out, this time getting her attention. Coco looked around surprised, keeping her forehooves noticeably out of sight.

“Oh, sure, I’m coming now,” Coco said hurrying past Pinkie, keeping her head low.

Whatever she’s hiding, I trust she’ll do the right thing, I won’t push her.

With that, Pinkie took a determined breath and followed after Coco to the second trial.

Author's Notes:

Isn't it nice of Blueblood to take such an interactive role in the investigation? Where would our protagonists be without his constant support?
I wasn't pleased with this chapter, I felt like my head wasn't in the game at all while writing it.
Regardless, you now have all your evidence before the reveal is made in the next part. Anyone who correctly guesses the culprit or some aspect of the murder will receive a shoutout in the next part's author notes... Such an alluring prize I know.
Finally I changed Fleur's game tag from model to Noble, same as Blueblood. This is to fit in better with her backstory.