Chapter 3- (Not yet titled)

Morgan and Prentiss trotted through Ponyville, a half hour in and neither seemed to have anything but well wishes and hope of finding the missing alive and well.

Morgan was staggered by the positivity of the ponies. He had to remind himself that not everypony lived in the horrendous darkness he saw everyday of his career. He felt a horrible twinge of sadness as he realized that by the end of this case this bright, happy and innocent village will be forcefully plunged into understanding the darkest natures of pony kind.

Morgan spotted a young Pegasus mare, a pale yellow coat with a light pink mane falling into her face, a cutie mark depicting three pink butterflies. Large turquoise coloured eyes held a shining innocence Morgan had never seen in an adult before. He approached her and was alarmed by the sudden flash of terror he saw flit across those shining orbs.

"It's alright miss," Morgan said, carefully charming the Pegasus, "my name is Derek, this is Emily. We're with the FBI. What's your name?"

The pink haired mare said something in a whisper so small neither agent could make it out.

"I'm sorry," Prentiss said kindly smiling at the painfully shy pony, "what was that."

"Fluttershy." She whispered again, now audible enough to understand.

"Well Fluttershy, we just wanted to ask if maybe you know anything about the disappearance of Rainbow Dash."

Sadness overtook Fluttershy's delicate features, "Rainbow Dash is one of my best friends." She muttered looking at the ground.

"I'm very sorry for your loss Fluttershy." Prentiss said consolingly. The Pegasus looked up at the elder mare, small tears forming in her eyes.

"The last time I saw Dash she was saying something about a pranking date with Pinkie. Oh but I'm sure Pinkie has already told you that."

"Actually she hadn't." Morgan said thoughtfully

"Oh, oh no." Fluttershy suddenly looked petrified, "I don't want to get Pinkie Pie in trouble."

"You haven't," Prentiss reassured, "I'm sure it just slipped her mind."

"Pinkie is pretty scatterbrained." Fluttershy smiled just a little then her eyes went wide and she covered her mouth with a hoof, "Oh that was rude to say."

Morgan couldn't help but smile at Fluttershy's absolute cuteness, "It's alright, we all have friends like that. Anyway thank you very much. You've been very helpful,"

"I-I have." The shy little Pegasus seemed surprised at herself.

"Yes you have." Prentiss gave her a gentle pat on the shoulder, "Thank you Fluttershy. Have a nice day."

The agents turned to leave when Fluttershy suddenly seemed to have discovered the concept of vocal volume, "Please find Rainbow Dash!" She called after them.

Morgan felt that terrible blade of sadness once again stab him. He knew he wasn't going to find Rainbow Dash alive, but he couldn't bring himself to harm the pure innocence of the yellow Pegasus. So he sucked in a breath and put on his best reassuring face, "We'll do our best."

X~X

Reid held tightly to the sides of the basket of the hot air balloon. Desperately avoiding looking down. Rossi sat opposite his young partner smirking at the doctor's discomfort.

"You alright Reid? Not going to purge that delicious cupcake are you? It would be such a waste."

Reid glared darkly at the elder profiler. His face had taken on a nasty tinge of green. He would have retorted but felt it unwise to open his mouth until he was inside Rainbow Dash's house at least that was semi-solid ground.

"According to Pinkie Pie's coordinates we're right outside of Cloudsdayle, Dash's house isn't far from here." Rossi glanced around. He could see the Pegasus city of Cloudsdayle. He offered a smile and a friendly wave at a young Pegasus with a gray coat, yellow mane and brilliant yellow eyes that stared in different directions. She was looking at the agents in confusion as she flew by.

She seemed to lose her coordination and flew directly into the side of the balloons carrier basket. Rossi quickly leaned over the side and pulled her in before she could fall and hurt herself.

"Are you alright miss?" Rossi asked with concern.

"Yeah I'm okay." She said pulling herself into a sitting position, "Are you the guys who are gonna find Rainbow Dash?" she had a cute little almost child-like voice. Rossi couldn't help but smile when he saw the pattern of bubbles as her cutie mark.

"That we are. Maybe you could help us out."

"Really?" she smiled hugely, joy filling her odd eyes, "No pony ever lets me help! What can I do?"

"Can you direct us to Dash's house?"

"Yeah sure. Here I'll pull you there. It's not far." She soared out of the balloon and grabbed a rope hanging over the end of the basket. She then dragged the five times her size balloon towards a lone house on a cloud just on the outskirts of the main city.

She strained herself at the weight of the balloon. The movement of the aircraft become choppy and erratic. The tinge of green in Reid's face had darkened considerably and curled himself into a ball in the basket to avoid purging his stomach contents on the unsuspecting citizens of Ponyville below. He smiled slightly to himself as he imagined the one in a million chances that it would be Morgan walking directly under the balloon at the time.

In the less than three mile pull to Rainbow Dash's house the bubble marked Pegasus had managed to twist and turn and entangle herself in the rope so she was stuck dangling upside down off the side of the basket. The odd placement of weight nearly upending the balloon entirely.

As soon as the balloon touched cloud Reid leapt out skidding on the fluffy surface nuzzling his face appreciatively on it. Rossi now horrible shaky from the ride took a moment to resolidify himself before he and Reid turned to the entangled Pegasus. They managed to undo the rope and she stumbled onto the cloud.

"Thank you very much for the help... um..." Rossi realized he'd never gotten her name

"I'm Derpy." She said happily holding out a hoof.

"Well thanks Derpy." Rossi shook her hoof and the Pegasus took off, flying in loops back to Cloudsdayle.

Rossi and Reid looked at each other in amazement. These were some 'interesting' ponies.

X~X

"Not much in here." Reid commented looking around Dash's small house. It was basis, with a small kitchen, a bit of an entranceway and a little bedroom. "Dash doesn't seem to have spent much time here, really just a place to eat and sleep."

Rossi was in the bedroom looking though Rainbow's dresser. He didn't expect to find anything useful. He tried to hold onto a bit of optimism. But the only case breaking thing he could find this early into he game would be a note saying 'I was killed by –insert ponicidal psycho's name here- sincerely Rainbow Dash.' And well that just wasn't going to happen.

His eyes scanned over the small bookshelf in the corner loaded with the complete volumes of Daring Doo's adventures. He grinned a bit, he knew the books well. On top of the shelf was Dash's trophy for Cloudsdayle's best young flier, a picture of a filly Rainbow Dash and the also missing griffon Gilda at junior flight camp, and an ornately framed photo of six smiling mares. Rossi recognized Pinkie Pie and Twilight Sparkle. There was also a regal looking white unicorn with a deep purple mane, and orange mare wearing a cowboy hate over a sandy blonde mane, and a pale yellow Pegasus with a light pink mane. They looked happy, Dash grinning standing on her hindlegs in the background, on forehoof resting on Twilight Sparkle's head.

Rossi's smile faded from his face when he remembered that Dash would never smile like that again. Never stand with a group of happy friends, never return home, never even finish the Daring Doo series if the book missing from the shelf was any hint as to how far in she was. He felt saddened by this. Every victim awoke these feelings in him. An innocent happy life stolen from a good pony. It was unfair to see such light snuffed out.

"Oh, hello." Reid said from the next room. Rossi trotted in and was surprised to see a flying tortoise. Well not really flying, he was harnessed into a helicopter contraption that allowed him to become airborne. He was hovering at eye level with Reid, who was staring at him in confusion.

"Must be Dash's pet." Rossi commented approaching the airborne reptile. He looked at the small name tag around the animal's neck, "well hello there Tank."

Tank the Tortoise smiled at the agents. Then looked expectantly down at his empty food bowl.

"Oh you haven't been fed since Rainbow Dash disappeared right?" Reid asked the reptile not really expecting an answer. He was taken aback when the tortoise shook his head no.

"Wait what?" Reid exclaimed, "Somepony has been in here?" of somepony had been in Dash's house and evidence found may be contaminated. Reid pulled a cell phone out of the satchel he carried, setting it on the counter he began dialling Hotch's number when the door opened.

"Tank!" a small distinctly female voice called out, "Time for lunch."

Rossi and Reid poised themselves as the pink manned Pegasus from Rainbow Dash's picture entered the room. Upon seeing the agents she let out a terrified squeak of dismay.

"Miss we're agents with the FBI. We're going to have to ask you to go outside for a moment and wait for us. We have questions we have to ask you." Rossi said to the traumatized looking mare.

She squeaked again and slowly backed out of the house, "Reid go talk to her. I'll finish things up in here."

The younger agent nodded and followed the Pegasus outside. He found her nervously hoofing the cloud, a blush of fear and embarrassment was dusted across her cheeks.

"Miss, I'm Doctor Spencer Reid." He approached slowly no wanting to startle her, "You're not in any trouble, and I just have to ask you what you were doing here."

"Feeding Tank of course" the Pegasus said, "Since Rainbow Dash has been gone no pony's been around to take care of the poor dear, so I've been coming by and feeding him every day.

"What's your name?"

The young mare stared down at her hoofs and muttered, "Fluttershy."

Reid tried not to smile too much at her. He was reminded quite a bit of how he himself had used to be. Very shy and withdrawn, confident only in his intelligence as she seemed to be with animals, "Well Fluttershy, you have to understand that there may have been evidence in the house that we could have used to find Dash."

Fluttershy let out a gasp of horror, "oh no are you saying I ruined your investigation, oh I'm so sorry. I was just trying to be helpful. It didn't seem right to let an innocent little animal like Tank suffer. Oh I didn't mean to mess things up, and after those other agents told me I helped them too."

She probably would have kept going if Reid hadn't help up a hoof to stop her, "Other agents? You've already spoken to someone on our team?"

"Oh yes. Agent's Morgan and Prentiss."

Rossi came out with Tank flying alongside him. The older agent held the tortoise's food bowl in his mouth, which he placed at Fluttershy's feet, "Well it looks like there was really nothing to have found anyways. So no harm done. Why don't you take Tank home with you and you can care for him there."

"Really?" Fluttershy smiled shyly, "Oh thank you. I'm so sorry I almost messed things up for you."

"Not at all, Fluttershy was it? No harm no foul and if you've already helped our team, we're all good and you're free to go on home with Tank."

"Oh okay. Bye then." She bent to pick up Tank's bowl when she looked back up at the agents. Admiration and appreciation shining in her innocent eyes, and said, "Thank you so much for coming to help my friend." And with that she lifted the bowl and she along with Tank the tortoise flew back down to Ponyville.

"We should have asked her for help with the balloon," Reid said glancing apprehensively at their only way back to solid ground, "Derpy was sweet but I'm not letting her help us again."