Ice made her way towards her office at a fast trot once she'd left the palace courtyard, but as she approached the steps, she stopped. Shining Armor hadn’t been kidding when he’d said there were reporters camped outside. There were dozens of them, representing every city, town, and small village in both the Crystal Empire and Equestria. And it wasn't just ponies. Kallisto, a reporter from the Voice of Griffonstone was there as well. The tawny colored female griffon was talking to Ink Star, a cobalt blue earth pony stallion from the Manehattan Star. And there was Al-Karim, the brown stallion from the Saddle Arabian Times talking with Mystrium, the changeling female from the Empire Buzz. She wasn't even in disguise. Even representatives of student newspapers were there. She recognized Featherweight with his camera, a colt who had gained some notoriety for an incident a few years back where he had turned out to be the source of some unflattering photos of Princess Celestia that had appeared in the Ponyville school's student newspaper. How had he gotten here all the way here from Ponyville? Probably stowed himself away in a baggage car of one of the trains, she thought. She made a mental note to have a message sent to his parents. Although hopefully he'd at least had the sense to leave them a note. Ice took a deep breath and let it out, then approached the steps slowly.

Immediately, all heads turned her away, and the mob of reporters descended on her like a clan of rabid hyenas. The crowd erupted in a war of voices, each one trying to make themselves heard over the others. Ice shoved her way through the rabble, bombarded from the left and right with “Can you tell us,” and “What can you say about,” and “why is this”, and “How did the,” questions. She ignored all of them, continuing to work away through the maze of reporters. When one particular pony got a little aggressive, she turned and flank-checked him, shoving him to the side. Eventually, she managed to burrow her way to the door, where she turned around and raised a hoof, calling for quiet. The barrage of questions gradually slowed and the noise level faded as if the volume were being turned down on a stereo. When it was quiet, she spoke.

“I appreciate the interest all of you have in this case,” she lied, making a strong effort to keep sarcasm out of her voice. “However, given the sensitive nature of this issue, and the fact that this is an ongoing investigation, I can make no comments, nor can I answer any questions at this time.”

She turned around and opened the door as the volume knob on the mob of reporters immediately went up to full. All reporters had speech comprehension problems. She was sure of it. It was embedded in genes that made somepony want to become a reporter. It didn't matter how many ways you told a reporter that you couldn’t make any comments or answer any questions. They still continued to ask questions anyway, as if they thought you were just joking, or flat out could not comprehend what you had just told them.

She stepped inside and closed the door, the bombardment of questions becoming a dull muffle, then dissipating altogether as the reporters went back to talking with each other when it became obvious she wasn't coming back out to talk with them. A strong part of her wanted to ask the Crystal Guard to clear them out, but the reporters had a right to assemble outside of the office. As long as they didn't try to come inside the building, and as long as they didn't interfere with her work, there was nothing the Guard could do about it. If only it were winter, she wished sadistically. It would serve them right to have to camp outside in that. Al-Karim would probably pack up and go home. His desert acclimated hide probably wouldn’t be able to tolerate the bitter arctic cold of a Crystal Empire winter. Neither could the griffon, changeling, or even most of the ponies from Equestria (the southern ponies as most Crystal Ponies called them) for that matter.

As she made her way to her office, she passed several other ponies in the hall, most of them doing a double-take and wrinkling up their muzzles a bit before politely greeting her as they saw her. She almost never came into the office during the day, and most of the ponies who worked there had already gone home by the time she arrived. She wasn't used to so much bustle around the office building, and it made her slightly uncomfortable. Thestrals, by nature, were not the most social of ponies. Nevertheless, she nodded courteously and returned their greetings. The surprised glances, she could understand, but what was the muzzle wrinkling about?

“So you survived the sharks outside, huh?” A crystal earth pony mare whose name she didn't know said. “Seems like they are out for blood.”

“Can I dye your fur gray, put some fake vampire fangs in your mouth, and shove you out there as a decoy? I can probably find some at the bit store left over from Nightmare Night.”

The crystal pony gave her a questioning look for a few moments. “I think I'll pass,” she deadpanned before continuing on her way. Ice shook her head when the other pony had passed her. Sun worshipers just didn't understand thestral humor.

She made her way to her office, greeting the other ponies who worked in her department before going in and closing the door, the room becoming a peaceful sanctuary and shutting out the commotion outside. There was an envelope from Aspen on her desk. She opened it and dumped the contents on the surface. It was the report from the Pegasus Guard. They had been able to recover the data from the flight data recorder. She opened her filing cabinet, pulling out the file on the case and removing the statements Reid had sent her from the air traffic controller, scanning over the time they claimed the C-130 had left the field, the time it entered its death dive and dropped off radar, and the time it reappeared well away from where it should have been. Her eyes scanned back and forth between the controller's report and the report from the aircraft's flight data recorder. The times matched up exactly. It was disappointing, but not unexpected. And it didn't matter much anymore anyway. She didn't need to find time discrepancies. Not with the new information she'd gathered on her little hunting trip to Afghanistan. She added the flight data recorder report to the ever growing stack of documents in the case folder, which by this point, was stretching at the seams like Bulk Biceps trying to fit into a bikini. It'd be time to start a second folder soon. She placed the bulging folder back in the filing cabinet and flicked the drawer shut with a forehoof, then pulled a sheet of memo paper from the pad on her desk and wrote a memo to Doctor Fjord informing her of the girl’s situation, and the information she needed. Specifically, that she hoped the girl would have some information to incriminate the now deceased militia commander and to validate Duncan’s claims about him. When she finished, she slid the memo into a folder, then stepped out of her office and went out in the hall, stopping at the row of internal mailboxes. She scanned along them until she found the one she was looking for: Doctor Sigmare Fjord. Psychiatrist, Crystal Empire Department of Justice. She dropped the memo into the box, then went back to her office, sitting on her haunches behind her desk and turning on her computer display. Time to hit Reid with the new evidence she’d gathered on her little fact finding expedition.

% ptalk ltreid::jag.usnavy.mil

Ponytalk v 5.8, Connecting to jag.usnavy.mil . . . . . . . .

Connection established … U.S. Navy, Judge Advocate General, Lieutenant Reid

Lieutenant Reid: Hello, Ice Moon. It’s been awhile. I trust you are contacting me to make extradition arrangements for the prisoners?

“Presumptuous jerk,” Ice muttered to herself.

Ice Moon: Not quite. I have reason to believe this may have been justifiable use of force to protect an innocent child from death or serious harm.

There was a long pause. Ice smiled to herself. She could practically smell Reid’s anger through the screen. He’d thought he could pull one over on her. Thought he could deceive a former member of Bat Team Alpha. Now he would know otherwise, and perhaps finally, he’d start cooperating with her, now that he knew she was on to his game.

Lieutenant Reid: And who told you that?

Ice Moon: That’s classified.

Lieutenant Reid: ...What?

Ice Moon: That’s classified. I can’t tell you names. Certainly, you understand my need to protect my sources against any possible retaliation.

Ice grinned to herself, a feeling of satisfaction filling her as she dished out at Reid the same thing he’d given her earlier. He deserved it for being such an asshole. Granted, she was trying to take a new approach to humans after the dream and after the experience with the girl. But that didn’t mean she had to like Reid. After all, he’d lied to her, withheld evidence, and overtly tampered with the service records of the prisoners to try to hide the fact that three of them had been awarded very high honors for protecting children in the past. Combined with what Duncan had told her, everything was starting to become clear, like one of those old Polaroid photos that starts out like a dense fog, but then becomes more and more clear as the image replaces the haze.

Lieutenant Reid: Look, even if what you were told by this source you won’t reveal is true, and even if it somehow qualifies as protecting an innocent child from death or serious harm under the Uniform Code of Pony Justice, it does not qualify under local Afghan law. And you cannot force human nations to abide by your pony justice code.

Ice narrowed her eyes, as anger boiled inside of her. Did this guy have no conscience at all? No sense of morality? Did he honestly think the solders should have just stood by and watched a child get raped and done nothing to stop it? She unloaded on him.

Ice Moon: What!?! That’s not at all what I’m doing. Are we the ones who invaded their country? No! That was you guys! In case you forgot, we got dragged into this mess because your pilots got lost! But now, we are in it! And I cannot, in anything that bears any resemblance to good conscience, extradite or even recommend charges against the prisoners for taking action to stop a man who was in the process of raping a child! I don’t care which nation’s law you want to apply! I will NOT punish these guys for stopping the rape of a child!

Ice could feel herself trembling with rage. What kind of a man was she dealing with here?

Lieutenant Reid: With a 50 caliber sniper rifle? The man was killed from 1,500 yards away with a single shot to the head just after he stepped out of village hall! This was not a case of stopping a rape in progress. There was no boy anywhere near him! This was premeditated murder. They knew where he would be and when he would be there, and they were waiting for him!

Ice felt as if she’d been shot herself. A sinking feeling left a pit in her stomach. Duncan’s story had been wrong then? Had her initial instinct that he was lying to her just to try to get some friends out of a murder charge been correct? When he was telling it, his story had been a little hard to believe.

But then again, Reid had all but confirmed that what Duncan had said, was, in fact, going on in the villages of Afghanistan by stating that even if what she’d been told was true, that it did not qualify as protecting a child under Afghan local law. And there was no doubt that the girl had been abused. She was chained to the bed, for Luna’s sake! She’d seen that with her own eyes. So at least some part of Duncan’s story was true. Whether he had lied about the rest of it or just been mistaken was something she had no way of knowing. He had stated it was a rumor, though. And rumors had a way getting their details changed each time they were passed from person to person. That was exactly why secondhand accounts of events were not useful for legal purposes.

Still, a feeling for foreboding began to fill her. Yes, there was clearly law sanctioned child abuse going on in the village. The girl the police chief had had chained to the bed was proof enough of that. But that didn’t mean the militia commander himself had been guilty of any wrong doing. Even Duncan had admitted he’d only heard rumors, although they were common rumors. He’d also admitted that there would be no police reports because the police chief would have destroyed them as soon as the person filing them left the station. If Reid’s statements were true, then at best this was pure vigilantism, which was highly illegal under both the Uniform Code of Pony Justice, as well as local Crystal Empire law. For civil society to survive, law and order must be observed. If vigilantism were allowed, it would lead to a collapse of society. At worst, this was an extrajudicial execution carried out without trial against a man who may or may not have been guilty of any crime. Ice could feel her argument that this was justified use of lethal force crumbling like so much sand slipping between her hooves. Damn Reid anyway! If he weren’t playing this scavenger hunt game with her; weren’t withholding evidence from her, she would have known all of this before now!

Assuming, that is, that he wasn’t lying to her right now, in which case, Duncan’s story might still be true. And It wouldn’t be the first time Reid had lied to her. Ice realized more than a minute had passed since Reid posted his last message. Damn that too. Now he’d know he had her flustered. She’d have to recover from that. And she knew just how to do it. She narrowed her eyes, her lips curling and causing her fangs to show like large, razor sharp spikes.

Ice Moon: Alright, I’m through playing hide and seek with you, Lieutenant. This is information I would have already known if you hadn’t withheld evidence from me to begin with. I want crime scene photos and maps of the location where the crime occurred.

Lieutenant Reid: No. I already told you, I can’t send them. They’re classified.

Ice Moon: You’ll send them, or I’ll go to Cadance right now and recommend that the prisoners’ request for asylum be granted.

There was another long pause. Good, she’d taken another bite out of Reid’s composure. That bite might not have put her back in control of the situation, but at least they were on equal footing again.

Lieutenant Reid: Give me two days and I’ll see what I can do.

Ice Moon: You’ve got until tomorrow noon your time. If I don’t hear from you by then, I guarantee you that you’ll never see your boys again except maybe on your own national news as they walk out of Crystal Court as free men who are able to move around without restriction in any of the pony nations that subscribe to the Uniform Code of Pony Justice.

Another short pause before a response.

Lieutenant Reid: I’ll contact you by noon tomorrow, one way or the other.

A wave of relief washed over Ice. She’d bluffed, but it had worked. She was inclined to believe Duncan’s story. But at the same time, she had no intention of simply letting the prisoners walk if there was a chance Duncan was wrong, and they really were vigilantes who had executed a man based on nothing more than rumors of wrongdoing. She had to allow for the possibility the Navy Crosses they’d been awarded for throwing themselves into significant danger to save the lives of the children at the school meant that they were both impulsive as well as passionate. Passion and impulsiveness made for a dangerous combination that could lead someone to act out emotionally in ways that weren’t rational. The combination could also lead to poor judgement, and acting with insufficient basis, or without considering the full implication of the actions. But then again, if Reid was telling the truth, this was not an act committed on impulse. It had been planned, carefully thought out, and methodically executed as if it were a bonafide special operations mission. The crime scene photos and maps of the area should tell her whether Reid was being truthful.

But there was also still the possibility that the prisoners were innocent completely. In the witness testimony that Reid had given her, none of the witnesses had actually been able to make a positive identification of any of the prisoners. This was still a case that was based entirely on circumstantial evidence. Yes, the prisoners had run, and yes, they were refusing to talk now out of fear of incriminating themselves. But it was still possible that they had just been in the wrong place at the wrong time and had no alibi to show what they were really doing. In that case, it would be better for them if they didn’t talk at all since admitting to being in the area at the time of the killing would only make them look guilty. She might was well point out the circumstantial nature of this case to Reid again. Maybe it would convince him to throw her another bone.

Ice Moon: I also feel the need to remind you that all of the evidence in this case remains entirely circumstantial. You have no smoking gun.

Lieutenant Reid: No. But you do. You have their aircraft and everything that was in it. The MARSOC soldiers had 100 rounds of .50 BMG assigned to them. Inventory their ammo. They did not report engaging any targets. But I’ll eat both my shoes if there’s not one round missing. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a lot of work to do if I’m going to convince my superiors to allow me to send you classified documents in the ridiculously short time frame you’ve given me.

Connection closed.

%

Ice took a deep breath and let it out slowly as she stared at Reid’s last message on the screen. Then, she stood up and left her office, going over to Aspen’s cubicle (interns didn’t get their own offices.) The crystal earth pony looked up from his work and smiled, although a few wrinkles showed on his muzzle. What was with all the nose wrinkling?

“I was starting to worry. Hadn’t seen you for a few days. And it’s early for you to be in today. Is everything alright?”

Ice felt a few butterflies dance in her stomach at the earth pony’s show of concern. But she quickly slapped them down. It only meant he was a friend, or that he was just being polite. The idea that it meant he felt the same way about her that she did about him was reading too much into it.

“It’s fine, thank you. I had to take a little field trip,” she said with a smile of her own. She wanted to tell him where she had gone. To tell him what had happened. After her discouraging conversation with Reid, she really wanted to confide in him. It made her heart ache to hold back from him. But he was still just an intern and wasn’t press trained. She couldn’t give him any more information than he needed to do his job. She especially couldn’t tell him about the girl she’d brought back with her. For now, the girl’s existence in the Crystal Empire had to remain a closely guarded state secret. If it were to leak to either the Americans or the Afghans that the Crystal Empire officially knew the girl was here, and that they had given her refugee status and considered her a potential witness, it would destroy any chance of her getting any further information out of either of them. She didn’t think Aspen would intentionally leak it, but if the press outside …

“The reporters outside have been harassing me every time I come in. Trying to get information out of me. It’s kind of … kind of intimidating.”

And there it was. The press wasn’t even supposed to be trying to talk to interns. Attempting to talk to the interns was grounds for a fine, or in serious cases, having their press credentials revoked. Nevertheless, those rules often didn’t stop the reporters from schooling around the interns like hungry piranhas, knowing full well that they weren’t press trained, and would likely say something they weren’t supposed to if they could intimidate them into talking. Of course, the interns were told not to speak to reporters. And their standard answer was supposed to be ‘I’m not authorized to speak to the press.’ Still, if Aspen didn’t know about the girl, then there was no chance he could accidentally leak her existence to some pit-bull reporter who might try to intimidate him into speaking. Ice made a note to talk to the Crystal Guard about it. Yes, the press had a right to camp outside and try to get her to talk. But that right was conditional on following the rules. The Crystal Guard could make them leave if they continued to try to intimidate interns.

“I’ll talk to the Crystal Guard about it, and get them off your back. But in the meantime, I need you to take a little field trip of your own.”

“Oh?” Aspen’s ears perked at the opportunity to get out of the office and do some actual field work.

“I need you to go out to CHF field. Have the Crystal Guards there inventory the ammo for the weapons on the humans’ plane. Watch them do it and make sure they carefully follow all of the rules of evidence. Write down the tallies for each ammunition type and report back to me when they are finished.”

Aspen nodded. “When do you want me to go over there?”

“Right now if you have nothing more pressing to work on. And given this case has the attention of the Prince and Princess themselves, I suspect you don’t.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said with a smile, quickly gathering up the papers on his desk and placing them in his filing cabinet. Then he trotted out of his cubicle and toward the door of the office, his ears still perked, and his tail arched, clearly excited about the important job he’d been given.

Ice smiled as she watched him go, then gave a wide-fanged yawn as exhaustion caught up with her. Her normal schedule had been thrown completely off kilter by the trip to Afghanistan and she hadn’t slept since the raid on the house to rescue the girl. Well, except for the rough hour and a half of sleep she’d gotten on the chariot after they’d crossed into Crystal Empire airspace.

She returned to her own office long enough to pull the door shut and lock it. Then, she left for her apartment, waving to the other agents whom she rarely saw because of the night hours she kept.

After arriving in her apartment, she undressed and yawned again. She hadn’t eaten in more than a day, but she was too tired to prepare anything. She started straight for her bedroom, but then paused. She hadn’t showered since the raid on the house, and her saddle pad was still sticky with the lather of sweat she’d worked up during her mad gallop for the chariot when the jeep had started pursuing her and the girl. She turned her head, sniffing lightly at her side, then wrinkling her nose in disgust. Wow, she stank. Like the locker room of an entire hoofball team after a game. She blushed with embarrassment as it suddenly dawned on her why the ponies at the office had been wrinkling their noses at her.

She went into the bathroom, cast off the saddle pad, and tossed it into her dirty clothes hamper. She frowned, remembering that the coal black saddle pad was now the only saddle pad she owned. She went over to the hamper, reached her forehoof deep into it, and fished the saddle pad back out. The gaping mouth of the empty hamper stared back at her, like an empty cave, reminding her that unfortunately, she’d just done laundry the day before leaving on her trip. Literally, every piece of clothing she’d owned had been in the saddle bags that she’d abandoned in Afghanistan. Hoity Toity probably would have cheered in victory and said that the only thing that would have been more appropriate than her losing her entire bland wardrobe would have been to gather it all into a pile, poor lamp oil on it, and burn it.

She turned the valve on the shower, let the water warm, and climbed in, taking the noxious saddle pad in with her. She took a relaxing breath, letting the warm water flow over her back and down her sides. It had a soothing effect, washing her worries down the drain along with the dust and grime of the desert. At least temporarily. She looked down at the floor of the shower. Dark gray and brown mud flowed off of her and swirled as it went down the drain. She hadn’t been this dirty since her days in Bat Team Alpha. She squirted some lavender scented fur wash on herself, allowing it to sit for a few minutes and extract the stench of sweat from her fur before washing it off. Once she’d washed herself clean, she washed the saddle pad – normally she would have just thrown it in the wash, machine, but she was too tired to wait for the cycle to finish – then turned off the shower. She hung the dripping saddle pad from the shower head, then dried herself off quickly before stepping out, going to her bedroom, and leaping into bed.

She lie on her back, staring up at her ceiling and thinking of the star-painted ceiling from her apartment back in Canterlot before she’d had it painted over to try to wipe away her memories. That ceiling had been beautiful, with all of its twinkling points that caught and reflected the ambient light in the room like snowflakes dancing under street lamps. She made a note to call a contractor as soon as she had some free time and have the ceiling here painted like that. Ice worried that the wheels of her mind would be too busy turning over the case for her to sleep, but soon enough, exhaustion won over and her eyelids drifted shut. She didn’t have any dreams.

She awoke early the next day and went to her dresser, quickly running a brush through her mane and tail, working the tangles out. Then she went into the bathroom, taking the saddle pad down from the shower head and placing it over her back. It hadn’t had time to fully dry, and the damp chill sunk through her fur and to her skin, making her shiver for a moment. Her own body heat would finish drying it out quickly enough. She cooked a quick breakfast, then put on her sunglasses and stepped outside where it was still mid-day.

She arrived at her office a few minutes later, once again finding the stairs blocked by reporters. However, they cleared a path for her as she approached. The Crystal Guard could order them to all to pack up and go home if they actually interfered with her getting into her office. Again, she was barraged with questions as she climbed the stairs, and again, she told them that it was an ongoing investigation and she could not comment. She opened the door and stepped inside, slamming it behind her as if she were shutting out a hoard of zombies. The chatter of the reporters became muffled behind the barrier, as if she were under water.

Once again, the office was busier than she was used to. She’d arrived early enough that most of the employees who worked the normal day shift had not left yet. She nodded and exchanged polite greetings as she made her way to her office, then closed the door to her inner sanctum. Her eyes immediately went to the two new sealed envelopes on her desk. The first one was a large white cardboard mailer with the blue outline of an eagle on it. Overnight express mail from the United States Post Office, delivered to her by pegasus courier after the hand off at Crystal Skyport. The return address label told her it was from Washington D.C., Department of the Navy, Judge Advocate General. Her eyes moved to the second envelope. It was from Aspen.

She went behind her desk, anxiety rising in her and sending a chill through her body. A feeling of dread began to come over her, as if she were waiting on word of a friend who might have some horrible disease and the two envelopes contained reports from a doctor that would either give the all clear, or confirm a terminal diagnosis. For several long moments, she stared at the sealed documents, afraid to open them. What was inside stood to either make her case, or kill it. Finally, she picked up the one from the Department of the Navy, ran her fang along the seal like a letter opener, then dumped the contents on her desk.

A top-down photo of a robed man with a long beard lying face down on the dusty ground in a pool of blood stared back at her. The top part of the man’s head was completely missing, consistent with Reid’s story that he had been shot with a high powered, large caliber rifle. The spray of blood and the large, gaping exit wound on the right side of his head indicated he’d been shot from the left. In addition, the spray slanted at an upward angle, suggesting the trajectory of the bullet had been upward. Ice’s stomach sank. She felt as if she were reading a lab report, and all the numbers were serving as a sinister finger pointing towards the fatal diagnosis she feared for her case. She pushed the photo aside and looked at the second one in the stack. It was the same scene, but from a different angle, showing the village hall behind the body. There were no structures to the right in the direction the bullet would have traveled. That meant the shot angle had likely been planned to ensure the bullet wouldn’t lodge in the wall of a building, making it very difficult to find and thus making it impossible to perform ballistics testing. The upward angle also ensured it wouldn’t have lodged in the ground close enough to the crime scene to actually be found. The bullet could be a mile or more away, buried in a sand dune, or laying in the desert somewhere. Again, the photo seemed to confirm Reid’s version of events. She looked through a few more photos in the stack – closeups, wide shots, and different angles. All of them seemed to support Reid’s story.

There was, however, one benefit to the upward trajectory of the bullet. It must have been fired from well below the intendeds target. That should be able to help her pinpoint exactly where the shot had been fired from, once she had topographical data for the area.

She took a deep breath, pushing the photos to the side of her desk with disgust. The thought entered her mind that Reid could have sent her photos of some other incident instead of the actual crime scene. But that was reaching way too far. Not even worth seriously considering. Despite Reid’s withholding of evidence from her in the past, there was no way he’d take a risk that blatant. Even with the top of the man’s head blown away, it would be too easy for her to discover that the dead man in the photo was not the militia commander.

With her sense of foreboding increasing like gathering storm clouds, she opened the envelope from Aspen, skipping over the inventory report’s preamble and focusing on the interesting part:

Evidence inventory: Ammunition

* 9x19mm Parabellum (NATO) – 300 rounds

* 5.56x45 NATO – 600 rounds

* .50 BMG – 99 rounds

Ice stared at the new evidence on her desk, alternating her gaze back and forth between the crime scene photos and the ammunition report as if by sheer willpower, she could make them change to say something else. But all they did was stare back at her, laughing at her futile efforts to defeat Reid.

One fifty caliber round missing. Reid’s words played back in her head like the voice of a phantom. Mocking her. Taunting her. The photos and the ammunition report were a double blow that decimated both of the remaining options she had to defend the prisoners’ actions. Together, the two pieces of evidence were nearly fatal. They impacted her with as much force as a ball-and-chain flail wielded by a minotaur. The prisoners’ fate hung by a thread now, their future resting entirely in one place: The hands of a young Afghan girl. Next Chapter: XVI Estimated time remaining: 58 Minutes