In The Name of Science

In the Name of ScienceChapter Five: The Science of Breaking an Entering     "A diamond?!" I screamed.     'Yes. A diamond. I am at least nintey four percent positive that nothing less than a diamond will be adequate.'     "Oh you are, are you?" In a highly mature manner, I blew a raspberry at the bracelet "Where in the ever loving hell am I gonna get one of those?"     'How am I to know? You're supposed to o the so-called expert on this world!'     I opened my mouth to retort, but it just hung open without sound. He was kind of right, not that I'd admit it. I should know how to get something like that in Equestria. If ponies could just dig under the ground three inches deep and find enough gems to be set for life on Earth, then one meager little rock shouldn't be too valuable on this planet, right? Hell, it wouldn't be all that expensive, either. I could've had enough left over after today's market trip to buy one.     "Alright, I have an idea." I said "And she should still be open."Loading, please wait. . .     The sun had already began its gradual decent below the horizon as I trudged through Ponyville. The precursor bracelet had a handy little watch function, which told me that it was around eight o' clock.     Heh, what a day this had been. From playing guitar in Central Park, to falling from the sky, having my life saved, learning that I'm a guinea pig in a planet-sized gladiator arena, getting my hands on a sweet new peice of gear, and finding out that my employers are mega science nerds (oh, and the speed of sound, too). Now, I was about to go buy a bona fide diamond. I'd call that a full day!     But now, that day was coming to a close. The pale blue sky of the daytime was no more, replaced by a pallet of warm shades that washed across the sky in waves of color. Purples, reds, yellows, and mostly oranges mixed and mingled above, creating a work of natural art that no painter could ever replicate in their lifetime.     I stood at the door of the...Carousel Boutique. Blegh. Just hearing that name in my head made my testosterone level drop. The building itself was even worse than its moniker; most of the outside was the color of flamingos, that specific shade of pink made me want to go home, eat cake and dark chocolate as I watched "The Notebook" and talked about my feelings.     Regardless, I needed to see the pony inside. I stood on my tiptoes and knocked as high up on the door as I could. Hopefully, Rarity was in the mood to sell off some of her gems.      I instantly regretted that decision because I had no plan of attack, so to speak. I couldn't just say "Hai Rarity, my name's Si and I'm a human! Can I have some of your precious gems for my science project?" How could I explain to her why I knew she would have any?     It was too late anyway. Moments later, the door to the shop swung open, nearly clocking me in the face because apparently the door went out rather than in. What I had not expected, was the pony behind said door. Instead of seeing the kneecaps (do ponies have kneecaps?) of that white dressmaking pony, I met the eyes of the one and only vannila ice cream-colored Sweetie Belle.      "Uh, hi." she said, eyeing me warily with those green orbs of hers. I half-expected her to have a robot voice. "Hey, what are you?"     Funny, people-- er, ponies tend to ask who are you before they ask what are you. How rude. "I'm a musician." I answered.     She rolled her eyes at me. "No, I mean what kind of animal. I've never seen one like you before."     "Oh." I said "Well, heck if I know." This gained me a raised eyebrow from the filly.     'You're an ottsel!' Pi protested. Oh yeah, I totally forgot about that.     "Oh-kaaaay," she droned "but what do you want?"     Oh shit! Quick, think of a good lie! Ummmm...     "I'm going door to door looking for somepony who will sell me a small diamond for, uh, a science project of mine." Technically it was the truth. This was just the first door that I tried. "Will anyone here be willing to part with one?"     She shrugged. How ponies do that without falling over, I'll never know. "I dunno. Let me check." She turned away from me to shout farther into the shop "Hey, Rarity! Somepony at the door wants a diamond!"     A voice with a cheesy high-class accent came back "A diamond? Gracious. I'll be there, just give me a moment, please."     Soon, the Element of Generosity came trotting out from another room. I barely held back a snicker the moment I laid eyes upon Rarity. She had the goofiest-looking set of curlers in her hair. Knowing Rarity's Modus Operandi, I felt like I should say something, but it was just too damn funny to ruin!     "What? What is it?" she asked innocently, before glancing up at her own beehive of hairstyling devices. "Oh, Celestia take me!" Before I knew it, the door slammed in my face.     'That went well.' Pi commented.      I let a small smirk find its way on to my face "Waaaaait for it..." Three, two, one...     Just as quickly as it had slammed, the door reopened, this time revealing the default wavy-maned Rarity. Jesus, she looked exactly like she did in the show, only life sized. Shocking, I know, but I just couldn't get over the fact that they were actually real. I'd come to terms with it eventually, but at that moment, I was determined to suck every last drop of joy out of the magical talking rainbow ponies as I could.      "What are you staring at, sir?" she asked, coaxing me out of my awestruck daze "Heavens, do I have something in my teeth, too!?" Rarity instantly pulled a mirror out of nowhere and bared her teeth at it like an animal. Her teeth, for the record, were all pearly white and unblemished. A dentist's dream.     Agggh! I couldn't take it, she was just so Rarity-ey! Needless to say, it was awesome, but I was still there for a reason.     "I, uhhh, I'm here too ask you if you or someone you know could possibly be interested in selling any amount of pure diamond to me and my organization at an elevated market price that would be an immediate profit to you." I was pretty good at faking the whole "door to door salesman" thing. God knows I've seen a few of those in my time.     Rarity put a hoof to her chin and hummed, seeming to put some thought into my slightly fibbed proposal. "Dear, you should really reconsider that outfit. Look at the color of it! That shade of blue denim really clashes with your  darker coat. Then again, not too many colors go well with orange. Perhaps a nice brown blazer with a--"     "Miss." I interrupted,  making sure this time to not call her by name and cause a major freak-out. I'd admit that her advice wasn't at all that flattering. I liked this jacket! I didn't want something brown and boring--unless it was a coat that was made from the tanned flesh of a cow that was long enough to go down to my ankles and came with a P.I. fedora.      "Oh, sorry about that. Bad habit." she said, shaking the fashion-themed thoughts from her head "And no, I won't sell you any diamonds. Well, I would, but I don't have any!"     "What?" How could Rarity not have any diamonds?! She had three of them tattooed on her ass, for Christ's sake. That's like the Cookie Monster saying he didn't have any cookies!     "Belive me, I normally have an extravagant stock of gems, but you know how it is with the embargo and all."     I cocked a bushy orange eyebrow "Embargo?"     "Yes, the embargo."     "What embargo?" Scratch that, what IS an embargo?     She looked at me as if I had asked her what a pony was. "You truly don't know? Why, Equestria has been talking about it for over half a year! You can't say that you haven't heard about the gem embargo."      I shrugged "I haven't read a newspaper since I was fifteen."     "It doesn't ring a bell? You haven't learned of the slave labor or the diamond dog revolution?"     "Nope."     "Wow." Sweetie commented from deeper inside the shop "You must be paying too much on your house insurance, because you live under a rock!"     Rarity turned around and barked "Sweetie! Manners!" She gave me a genuinely sympathetic look "Equestria has stopped buying gems from most diamond dog cities that used slave labor for over seven months now. Gems are a rarity in these parts, I'm afraid. Even I don't have a single diamond in the house! Well, I do have my great grandmother's old necklace, that has a diamind in it, but that's a family heirloom! I wouldn't ever part with that." Rarity smiled sadly "I'm sorry. Perhaps you can find a dealer up in Canterlot."     Great. Juuuuust great. There goes the prospect of buying one. And what the hell was with diamond dogs and slave labor? This is Equestria! Land of rainbow sunshine ponies. There shouldn't be any slave labor here. Though, come to think of it, after seeing A Dog and Pony Show I shouldn't have been suprised at the idea of slavery. But was it really on such a mass scale that Equestria had to take action? Jesus Christ.       Whatever. Slavery or no, I still couldn't get a diamond. I politely thanked Rarity for her time and went on my way, grumbling to myself.     "Alright," I said to Pi "What's next? The diamond thing is a no-go for now."     'Wrong, it isn't.' he cooly replied.     Ugh. I really didn't want to deal with him right now."Didn't you hear? Rarity doesn't have any, and I don't think anyone in this whole town does either."     'But she does, didn't youhear? She said she had an old necklace with one. Ergo, we have our sample.'     "Even if I she was willing to give it to me, what makes you think that I have something just as valuable to trade for it?"     'Then don't trade.'     "What are you--" Wait... don't trade?! Oh no. Hell no! Not a chance.  "I hope you're not saying what I think you're saying."     'Oh come now!' Pi chided 'Is the idea of theft really that alien to you? Your society idolizes people that have stolen from the rich and given to the poor!'     "Yeah, well this would stealing from the middle class and giving to myself, which it a completely different thing! I wouldn't be Robin Hood, I'd be just a common criminal."     'Crime is merely disobeying the common rules set against you by a governing body. A government which you are not a citizen under, Mister White. Therefore, you are not bound by an rules or regulations that it has set forth.'"I might not be Equestrian,  but I sure as hell am American! And we don't tolerate that shit in the US of freakin' A." 'Wrong again. Since you have agreed to work for us and accept your permanent transformation into an ottsel, you have renounced your citizenship to any human government and pledged yourself to the Precursors. You follow our laws now, and as an offical of our government, I will sanction the theft of that diamond.'     God damn, this guy is really pissing me off! He can say I'm not American all he wanted, there was still no chance in hell that I'd steal from Rarity, of all peopl- ponies. "No," I said simply "We'll just have to find another way. I'll go grab a shovel and a pickaxe and start digging holes everywhere of you wanted me to, but I am not stealing."     'You will. Any other way would just be an utter waste of our precious time. I won't allow you to take a week to do something that needs only a single night.'     "I, frankly, do not give a shit!"     Then at once, my entire body seized up and erupted into untold levels of pain. Seeming to come out of nowhere, this unknown power forced every muscle in my body to spasm wildly. I collapsed to the ground in a helpless heap of agony, unable to scream for help. I thought I was going to die...but that would be anticlimactic, wouldn't it? No, whoever was writing this damn fan fiction wanted me alive. Asshole.     Just as fast as it came, it went. I returned to normal in the time it took to blink, the only evidence of that phenomena left was a dull ache throughout my whole body. I wanted to get up, but my limbs refused to move. So I just lied there like a lump on a log.     "What..." I began, but the words died in my mouth. God, I was so tired. More than anything, I just wanted this day to end!     'That was the defibrillator function of your bracelet. It was meant to restart your heart, should you die a death that you could be revived from. I find it to be more useful as a, ah..."motivational aid."'     "Go to hell." I managed to croak.     'I could deliver a lethal dose, if you wish.'     Crap. Knowing that this twisted mother humper could kill me any time that he felt like it didn't make me feel any better. In fact, it made me feel worse about pretty much everything. The rat bastard was using death threats to manipulate me into stealing jewels from innocent ponies That was just plain low; lower than an exhausted ottsel lying in the dirt.     "Fine,"  I began to pick myself up off the ground for the umpteenth time that day. "I get the point. You say 'jump' and I say 'screw you,' then you zap me til I say 'how high, your worship?'."     'An apt description.'     " ..."Loading, please wait. . .     Night.     Now that my electrifying adventure had passed, I went back to Fluttershy's, but only after getting lost in Ponyville a few times (not that I minded, this place was awesome). She welcomed me back in with open arms,  or rather,  forelegs in her case. I managed to crawl onto her surprisingly cushy couch and catch some much needed sleep. Wonderful, beautiful, restful, reinvigorating slumber. Unfortunately, Pi apparently never needed to sleep, like, ever so he woke me up right around midnight-ish like a true douche. I, of course, begged him to do it tommorow. He just gave me a speech about not wasting my employer's precious time and blah blah blah. When that didn't work either, he gave me a much smaller taste of the defibrillator. Ouch. I climbed out from under my ridiculously comfortable blankets and tiptoed out of the cottage.    One step outside, and I couldn't move.      I wanted go cross back through Ponyville and get this over with, but I couldn't, I wouldn't,  and I didn't. My eyes were locked upon the night sky. The stars were out. My god, the stars. They were... like nothing I could ever imagine. I was utterly entranced by the spectacular light display of whites and blues hanging above me in an endless blanket of the night.     I was paralyzed. More than a hundred thousand pinpricks of twinkling light shone down upon the Equestrian landscape, each one a tiny beacon that stood out against the deep dark background of space. It was like someone had spilled sugar all over a pitch black table in the sky, like fireworks whose shining flares of light had been frozen in time, like looking at an infinite field of flickering candles. In the center if it all was the moon, like a magnet pulling all the shining metal particles around it in a swirling image of natural beauty. The crescent seemed to hang there on an invisible string, never once swaying or twisting.  Nothing I had ever seen could compare. No words in the English language could ever do the night sky justice. It was almost too much to bear.     I'd lived all my life in New York City. Never once had I been able to look up past the towing cityscape and see even a single point of light. The lights never go off in the city that never sleeps. In fact, I had never seen the stars at all. They were a fairy tale to me, nothing but a made up idea that you only saw in pictures and movies. I had never seen them, therefore they didn't exist. It was a fairy tale come true... in more ways than one.     Was this how the people in the days past really saw the sky back on Earth? Could the settlers of the old west or the knights and peasants of the dark ages really look up on any night of the year and see these dazzling lights upon the sky? If I knew what I had been missing back then, I would have envied them. They got to see nature in raw form, without all the light pollution and industrial smog. They saw the world before we ruled it.     Right then and there, I felt like the luckiest man in existence. All my life, I've been deprived ofthis, and I hadn't even known it. It felt like a long lost part if my soul had come back to me after years of being away. I felt... enlightened.      I pried my eyes away from the stars to take a good, hard look at sleepy town down the moonlit path. It all suddenly seemed so trivial now, like worrying yourself to death over a speck of dirt on your window. All my pissing and moaning over how Equstria wasn't a pony-themed heaven for me amounts to absolutely nothing comapred to the wondeful world that lay around me. I was just dust in the wind, like a single cup of water in the the lake of history. For the first time in recent memory, I felt small.     'Taking our sweet time, are we?' Pi snarked inside my head.     "Enjoying the veiw." I answered dreamily. I was still angry at Pi, but it didn't seem to last. It didn't matter anymore.     I shook myself out of the hypnosis that the sky had put me in. I could stare at it all night after this was over. I had a store to rob. Gah...all those years of parenting and discipline from my mom and dad seemed to urnfurl before my very eyes. Need science, but don't got the cash? Just break in to an innocent pony's fashion shop and grab the biggest gem you can find! It'll be alright, just don't get caught and you'll be golden.     I didn't want to do it, I hated the idea, but I had to. Either she lost a rock, or I get zapped to death by a psyco scientist living in a souped-up basement. Besides, it's not like Rarity will lose anything that she needed to survive, she said herself that she couldn't give it up, probably even for a boatload of money. It would've just sit there collecting dust for a million years. Once it's gone, I'll only cause her a little distress, then she'll get over it like everyone does eventually.      I steeled myself for what was to come, then took a starlight stroll through the town and back to the boutique. I didn't get lost again, thankfully. It wasn't as dark as you would think, a combination of the flickering stars and the radiant moon shed just enough light for me to see where I'm going.      The boutique was just the same as it had been hours ago, as expected. Geez, it still managed to be a beacon of utter girlishness, even in the dead of night. I feared that I might turn ten different shades of pink and baby blue the moment that I stepped through the door.     Okay...First off, I had to get in. That should've been easy to accomplish, seeing as how the lack of a crime rate in this town made the folks feel all safe and secure... Probably. Hopefully. Next, I had to find the diamond. Not so easy, seeing as how the only thing I actually knew of it was that it existed. Third, I had to get out without waking up either pony inside. If I got caught in the act...yeesh. I really didn't want to piss Rarity off.     Step one: get in. I sauntered up the the brightly painted door and tried to pull it open. It was locked. Duh. No key under the mat, either. Eh, it was worth a shot anyway. "Okay, next." I muttered to myself.     'Wait a sec,' I thought 'what's that?' I squinted in the dark at a little mark in the door. It was all ragged and splinter-ey, like some little kid carved it in with a screwdriver as some kind of practical joke. The mark looked kinda like a capital F, but it was backwards, and with three lines going out from the stick instead of the usual two. It looked like a caveman's drawing of a key, or a comb.     Huh, strange, but I had bigger concerns, like breaking an entering.      It took a bit of effort to climb up on to the window sill, since I was only about two and a half feet tall--a fact that the world reminded me of every chance that it could get. They were huge, oval-shaped hunks of glass with heavy curtains on the inside. I tried to lift one open, but my fingers couldn't even get a good  grip on them. They were either too heavy, or locked. They were big, but not thick, so it was likely the latter. I squinted in the darkness looking for a latch or something. When I concentrated on the inside, I saw that wasn't made to be opened from the outside at all. Damn, that idea was out.     "Next."     I circled around the house a few times, looking for an in. Perhaps I wasn't cut out for this whole "burglary" thing. I didn't want to get tazed by the grumpy precursor, so I couldn't walk away and leave my crime career in the dust.     Wait, something up on the second floor caught my eye. There was dark peice a of fabric fluttering to and fro in the wind. "Score." That meant that there was an open window, and therefore a way inside. It was my lucky night, too! Right across from said window was a short and very climbable oak tree growing not a few feet away from the shop. I was in business.     The thick, coarse trunk of the tree was a cinch to get a good grip on with my wierd animal paws. I had three short black nails protruding from my comically floppy feet, and they dug into the side like a thumb tack in a wall. Climbing all the way up was a chore, though. I really needed to stop smoking. I was barely halfway up when my arms started wobbling like jelly. I had to scramble up the the nearest branch in order to avoid dropping like an orange rock. It was just a matter of hauling myself up from branch to branch til I reached the top. My heart lept into my throat and my stomach did backflips more than a few times as I occasionally lost my balance and nearly plummeted.      Two minutes and a pair of aching arms later, I was on the only limb of the tree that was even remotely close to the boutique. Wow, climbing this thing really lit the fiery pain of exhaustion in my chest. I needed to quit smoking. After I laid there for a good two minutes to catch my ragged breath, I managed sit straight up and notice how god damn far away the branch actually was from the window. Crap... it was like three feet, and that was a lot considered how I was a little less than three feet tall.     Okay screw this, I'm going-- I looked down. Oh what a bad idea that was. The distance between me and the ground was dizzying, to say the least. I immediately clamped on to the sturdy trunk of the tree for dear life, as if I were going to fall at any given moment.     I gaped at the sizeable gap between me and the open window. There was no way I was going to make it across.  Nuh uh. Nope. Not doing it.     I looked down again.     There was no clean across, and no clean way down. I was going to have to make jump. Damn it. Like a kitten stuck in a tree. Meow, I hated gravity sometimes.     The branch that I was perched on was fairly thick; I could plant both feet on its width with a little room left, so making a running jump was my best option. Why did I take this job? Why? Never trust a man offering you a job and a trip to magical fantasy land.     I held my breath and took the leap.     For a brief and terrifying moment, there was nothing under me. No ground beneath my feet and no branches to hang on to. In that moment, I was a mere slave to the laws of physics. My heart stopped, my lungs refused to pump air, and my mind could only process the most primal of thoughts.     I couldn't have been more relieved when my hands found purchase on the smooth wooden window sill. I landed on my chest and arms, I was close enough to get a good grip in the inside edge of the window. It was a good clean landing, unlike what I had expected. It only took a little more effort to pull myself up, over, and out of the cold. My body made barely a sound as I landed on my back onto the fuzzy shag carpet.     I was in.     I carefully and methodically scanned the room I had broken into. There was little moonlight shining through,  but I could make out a frilly vanity mirror, pink wallpaper, some stuffed plushies, a collection of toys, a bed, a--     I froze. There, nestled under the gaudy pink covers of the bed, was the one and only Sweetie Belle. She was peacefully sleeping on her side turned toward me, wriggling a little in response to my gasp of surprise. Thankfully, she hadn't woken up. Her breathing was slow, rhythmic, and deep, she didn't show any signs of knowing I was there.     I closed my eyes and swallowed the lump in my throat. I could've failed the, dare I say, heist right then and there. Okay, it was so far, so good. Lucky for me, her bedroom door was cracked open just enough for me to slip through silently. I had to supress the urge to stay in here for another moment and look around. When does a man ever get a chance to go through a beloved television character's stuff? I was just too damn curious sometimes.     The hallway was a little better in terms of foofyness, but it still screamed "the girliest being in the universe lives here." The walls were lined with various framed pictures of Rarity and her family. Geez, looking at her parents....I could safely guess that the fashionista thing wasn't hereditary.      Now, where to find the diamond. I was pretty sure that it wasn't in Sweetie's room--call it a hunch. If it where anywhere, I'd bet it would be in Rarity's bedroom. Perhaps in a chest or something of the like. Hopefully unlocked.     Her room was conviently placed at the end of the hall opposite of Sweetie's. I could tell by the word "Rarity" spelled in a million sequins on the door. It was akward to pull off with my weirdly shaped feet, but I managed to make nearly inaudible sounds as I tiptoed across the shag rug. Hey, I was actually pretty good at sneaking. Maybe being small and lightweight had something to do with it.     Unlike her sister, Rarity kept her door shut. God help me if she hadn't oiled it in a few months. It looked pretty heavy and hard to push open. Though, I caught another break because ponies don't have fingers, therefore they can't use doorknobs. That would be a hell of a chore trying to force open a door while twisting a knob with both hands.     I braced my back against the door and put my weight in to--     "Maooow."     "Holyshit!" I hissed softly, my heart leaping into my throat. I lost my balance and fell to the floor, my head knocking onto the door on the way down. I hoped that didn't come back to bite me in the tail. Please, oh god please let Rarity be a heavy sleeper.     Sitting in front of me with an indifferent look on its flat face, was a pure white cat. Rarity's cat: Opalescence. It idly regarded me with that condescending look that cats give you with those creepy little eyes of theirs. I hated cats.     "Maooow." she repeated.      "Shh!"      "Maooooow!" Opal repeated with greater volume. Oh crap. This thing was gonna screw the hell out of my plan! I had shut it up or else.      I stood as tall and menacingly as a fuzzy ottsel could be, trying in vain to intimidate the feline with my greater size. "Shut the hell up or I swear to god, I'll skin you alive and make you into a fur jacket!"     It didn't even blink. She just stared at me with her yellow eyes, completely unfazed by my half-hearted attempt at scaring her.     "Just screw off!" I hissed and made the universal shooing motion with my hands. Opal, in turn, hissed back, her face contorting into a hideous visage of animalistic anger. She growled a growl that was louder than I ever thought something that small could make. She was gonna wake up the girls and I'll be shit outta luck.     Think think think think...What will it take to get her to leave me be? A treat? Cats like treats, but sometimes they're finicky about who they take them from, kuz cats suck. Besides, I didn't have anything on me that a cat could want.     Oh screw this. It was just a dumb animal anyway. I pulled out the Multitool from my coat and with but a thought and a whisper, it morphed into a razor-sharp dagger. The bronze blade shone dully in the silvery light of the crescent moon. I waved the knife a foot away from that miserable little cat's pink nose.     "Maoow."     "Don't follow me." I ordered, backing slowly into Rarity's door. I kept eye contact with it and my dagger between us the whole time while I pushed on the door and easily slipped inside. I tried as best I could to let the door close with an audible click that wasn't too loud.      Inside Rarity's room....I'm sure you're tired of me saying how damn feminine the shop was. You get it by now. Frilly lace, pink curtains, the works. Thankfully, Rarity hadn't been stirred by Opalescence or I. She was out like a light; the dressmaker was nothing but a pile of snoring horse under a lavish four poster bed with the translucent net canopy pulled shut. Heh, Rarity snores louder than my ex. I was pretty sure she couldn't hear  jack shit over her own self. Thank god for small favors.     The bedroom was in fairly neat order. There were a few light coats and oversized hats haphazardly strewn about the place, as well as an odd makeup implement left on the floor here and there. It should have been a breeze finding my prize.      The first place that I check was a tall dresser next to her theater-style vanity mirror. The peice of furniture was about half a foot taller than I was, so I had to pull open a few of the drawers and use them like stairs to get up. The dresser was a mess of makeup kits, jewelery of the non-diamond variety, and other various pieces of miscellaneous stuff. There were a few plain boxes, but none of them held the necklace, as they were mostly filled with photographs, beads, and other keepsakes.      I carefully slipped back down to the floor. Hmmm.... maybe it's in her closet? I strode across the room and pulled it open. There was a collection of sparkly dresses sorted by color, tons of them in fact. Wow, this closet alone could have clothed all the girls at my senior prom. Tons of dresses, but no jewelry. Damn.     Next up came the nightstand, which only held a couple of boring fashion magazines, an assortment of trashy romance novels, and other random pieces of pap--hold the phone, what's this? I opened up one drawer and it was bursting at the seems with loose pieces of sketchpad paper. They were all stuffed together and crumpled, they were designs. Hundreds of different clothing sketches, each one signed at the bottom by--as I'm sure you've guessed-- Rarity. She had really nice hand, er, hoofwriting, and most of these pieces were pretty extravagant.      You know what? I wanted one of them. I was already a soon-to-be diamond thief, what's the harm in taking a little keepsake? I grabbed one of them that wasn't too crumpled up--a drawing of a faceless stallion in a flashy pinstripe suit and fedora--rolled it up, and slipped it into my backpack. If I ever find a place to call my own, I can put it on display somewhere, maybe pin it to a wall.     Nothing else in there, so I shut the drawers and continued my search. Maybe it wasn't in her room at all? Perhaps she had a safe somewhere downstairs? Hell, it could take all night to--      I pulled up the sheets hanging down from Rarity's bed and spotted it: an ivory white chest with gold leaf trim. Could this be the jackpot? It was a chore to lug the thing out into the open, it was pretty heavy, but that not a bad thing! Heavy meant that there was stuff inside... and stuff was good.      I glanced at Rarity; she hadn't even stirred since I came in here. Cool.     I tried to pull the chest open, but alas, it was locked. "Dammit!" I cursed under my breath. Why couldn't it have been easy? How am I going to open it anyway? There was no use complaining, so I went to work.     I went back to a few places that I had been. Dressers, nightstand, closet, all of them didn't have any kind of key. I checked my science-y bracelet; it was only a few minutes past one, so I had plenty of time until morning. I stifled a yawn I needed sleep, godammit! Today had been both the weirdest and greatest day of my life, and all I wanted was for it to end!      'Screw it,' I thought 'I don't need a key, I've forgotten my keys enough times to know what to do here.'     Of course, that was easier said than done. Waaaaaay easier. I slipped out the Multitiool dagger from my belt and murmured the word "lockpick" to it, and bada bing bada boom, it was a perfectly flat piece of shiny metal with a thin hook at the end of it. It was still heavy as balls, even though it looked I could snap it with my fingers.      I went to work on the inside of the locking mechanism. Now don't assume that I don't know jack squat about picking locks because, in fact, I do. I read a couple of wiki pages and saw a few YouTube videos on the subject after locking myself out of the apartment a few times. It's a fascinating process to watch, if you've got the time. It cost me twenty minutes and a couple of paperclips, but I managed to do it.     The basic idea is this: each one of the tumblers on the inside have a specific position into which they need to be set. Once you push a single one of them into the right spot, the lock should turn a little. When you've found the sweet spot for all of them and put them in the proper place simultaneously, you're in. It's not as easy as it looks on the video games and movies, but it is doable. I prayed that Equestrian locks work in the same way as cheap American ones.     Luckily, they did. I only found two tumblers on the inside, which meant that the box wasn't designed to ward of burglars such as myself. I popped in a nail file (hoof file?) to serve as my torque tool and ever so slowly applied pressure to the left. The lock wobbled a little bit as I fiddled with the first tumbler. It suddenly lurched barely a centimeter as numeral uno slid into place. The second one went the same until...     Click.     The locking mechanism gave way with a satisfying sound of metal lightly grinding on metal. The lock was no more, I did it! Who's a badass criminal? I'm a badass criminal! Oh, god... I'm a criminal. Well, there goes my hopes of ever being an upstanding and productive member of pony society. They went out the window the moment that I threw open the chest full of goodie-- Erhm, I mean Rarity's property.      I forced those thoughts out of my head. It was not the time nor was it place to ponder that particular moral dilemma. With another glance at sleeping Rarity, I threw open the lid of the chest and, lo and behold, it was positively filled with all the good stuff.      Ever see those old-timey pirate movies where there was a chest of gems and gold and all that jazz at the end of the movie? That's exactly how this chest looked. I'm not even exaggerating. The ornately decorated box was full to the brim with shiny golden bits, pieces of intricately made jewelry with real gems, and a few important papers in a manilla parcel, probably birth certificates and stuff.      My eyes went as wide as teacup saucers the moment that I laid them upon...it. Never in all my life have I imagined that such a big chunk of ice could ever exist in any reality. The thing was as big as a peanut and heavier than a brick lead. Yes siree, this diamond was what I was looking for. It was cut into the shape of a teardrop and set into a necklace of gold and silver that looked like mere string compared to this massive rock, like someone had made jewelery out of an old baseball and some fishing line. It was absolutely gorgeous.     'That... will work.' Pi said, sounding almost astounded as I felt. 'That will work nicely.'     I tenderly slid my fingers over this new prize; it was smoother than glass. I found that I could easily slip it out of its soft gold setting. To hold something this valuable in my very own hand was completely unthinkable and totally impossible. In Earth, a diamond this big could set me for life. Alas, I couldn't have kept it. What a shame that was. No, this burglary was purely for scientific gain.     I held it closer to my face--holy shit it was bigger than my eye!-- It turned the world into a sparkly kaleidoscope of shifting shapes and melding colors. This was it... mission accomplished. Time to freakin' go.     "Groovy."     I shoved the rock into my right breast pocket, just above my own heart, and double--no, triple checked that it was buttoned up tightly. I reeeaaaally didn't want to drop this baby. I briefly considered grabbing a fistful of bits to boot, but it only lasted a moment before I mentally beat that idea out myself with an imaginary blunt object. Stealing. Was. Wrong. I had just taken something frim somebody--dammit! Somepony who held a deep emotional attacment to it. I was a thief, though I didn't want to be. Hell, I just wanted to put it back in the box and go to Fluttershy's place and SLEEP. Maybe I could just sleep off this royally screwed up day? I felt that a good night's slumber would set everything right in the world. When I woke up, Rarity will still have her grandmother's diamond and I won't have my conscience and the nutty profesor bugging me for the rest of my life.     I inwardly sighed. No amount of sleep will ever--     There came a scratching at the bedroom door.     "Maoooow!"     More scratching.      "Son of a whore."     Shitshitshitshit--Instantaneous karma, man! It's like god was watching a monitor every second of the day waiting for a chance to hit the big red "Screw Silus White" button. I should have skinned that cat alive when I had the chance! Jumpin' Jesus on a pogo stick, she was so loud! Like, almost worse than an ambulance or cop car racing down your street in the middle of the night.     "Maooow!"     I slammed the trunk shut and put all of my strength into shoving it back under the bed. It made a horrible scraping noise as I dragged it across the floor, but it didn't matter, I was on a clock with very little time to spare.     "Maoooow!"     Gotta hide gotta hide--! Oh, screw it; I made a dive under the bed right along side the chest that I had just pillaged. The sheets provided ample cover, though it looked like floor hadn't been sweeped in the last millennium. I stifled a sneez as my frantic movements kicked up a thick cloud of ichy, floaty dust.     "Unnngh..." came a distinctive voice that wasn't my own. I'll give you three guesses as to who it was, and the first two don't count!     "Maoooow!"     "Opal?" Rarity asked. My entire body went rigid with surprise as the bed over my head shifted and creaked. In a moment, two pairs of pure white hooves appeared not more than ten inches from my face as I peered out from under the hanging sheets.     At once, my eyes were assaulted with light as the dressmaker above me flicked on a lamp. Rarity dragged her hooves toward the door groaning "Opalescence..." She threw open the door and that wretched feline cat strutting in with its nose in the air like it owned the house.      "Maow." It meowed at its owner.    "Darling," she said with clear exasperation "what in the wide wide world could you want? I just fed you and changed your kitty litter an hour ago!"     In response, Opal elected to weave through Rarity's legs and purr like a furry motorboat.     "I don't have time for this. Go on now, leave mama be."     The cat continued to do what it was doing.     "Fine." Without warning, the world erupted into a horrible noise like a rusty nail on a chalkboard made by Satan himself. The screeching forced me to pull my ears to my head as tight as they could possibly go. Good god, where the hell was it coming from? I was in pure and unrefined agony, worse then when I broke my ankle! I had to bite my lip to keep from screaming like a child at the dentist who's getting his teeth drilled without any novacaine.     Through the tears in my eyes, I could see Opal hiss and whinge as she became enveloped in a sparkly blue aura that lifted her off the ground and out if sight. Then the hooves of Rarity troted clumsily out of the room, apparently with her cat in tow.     Then as soon as it came, it went. The noise stopped, Rarity and the puss was gone, and I was left clueless and reeling.     "What the hell?"Loading, please wait. . .     To this day, I still couldn't tell you exactly how long I stayed quiet and still under that fru-fru pink bed.     It could have been minutes, but it was equally likely to be hours before Rarity finally went back to sleep. I waited and listened for her breathing to become more rhythmic and deep. I crawled out from under the bed and brushed the floor debris off of my jacket the moment that her slow breathing eventually turned to heavy snoring.     The cat was nowhere to be found in the house, so I just strode downstairs, through the shop, and out the door like it was my own home. I made sure to lock the door behind me. Wouldn't want a burglar to get in, now would we? I took another look on that mark from earlier. I didn't know why it sparked my interest so, I guessed that it was just a little out of place. Then again, I had yet to learn how freaking weird Equestria could get at times.     Shrugging, I set out back on the path to Fluttershy's crib. I craned my neck the entire way to see the sprawl of stars and space set out above me. I never really got used to looking at the night sky after that day, each time seemed to be justnas mesmerizing as the last. I almost wanted to grab a blanket from the cottage and just sleep out in the open air, but I elected to catch my Zs inside, just in case Shy liked to keep wolves or poisonous snakes around her place.     The cottage was utterly dark when I snuck back in. It was too bad that flashlights weren't invented yet, since I stubbed my toe twice on my way to the couch.     Before I could finnaly get back to the couch that was calling my name, Pi interrupted. 'Now that you're in a safe spot, perhaps you could allow me to scan the sample?'     Oh, right. I had almost forgotten why I was stealing in the first place. "Is it going to burn up like the grass did?" I asked.     'It isn't going to "burn," per se. It will be disintegrated into an ultra-fine dust that the bracelet will collect and scan. The data will then be relayed to me for processing.'     "So I'm going to loose it? "     'Entirely.'     Well that was a damn shame. I mean, here I was with a chunk of ice big enough to buy a small island with, and I was going to just turn it to dust for the sake of knowledge! Knowledge that I didn't even care about. Whatever. Screw this. I don't got time for this. I'm in the land of magic, rainbows, dragons, and talking horses, I shouldn't be bitching about rocks. Besides, it's not like diaminds are a commodity--OHWAIT.     "Here goes something." I touched the poor, defenseless diamond to the cold, uncaring bracelet like I had done earlier with the grass. It was like holding a fistful of sand for a moment; the gem burst into a cloud of sparkly dust the moment that it made contact. The way that the glittering particles caught the moonlight filtering in through the window reminded me of the night sky that I had bared witness to.     "So what did it say, professor?"    'I can't say for sure in merely a moment's time. It could take all night to sort out. I'll let you know in the morning.'     In the morning? Yes...yes yes YES! I could go to bed,praise Jesus! Praise him!     I was dead asleep before head met pillow.