Your Human and You: The Thief

Bink bink

"Let's see... is it on?"

Bink bink bink

"I think it is." An image of a griffin with a pair of goggle on his head begins to form. "Alrighty then." He cleared his throat. "Hello, I am Doctor Domanic Sawyer. And this is Sawyer Files Number 33! The Flamespitter!" Sawyer moved out of the way to reveal his newest invention.

It looked to be a large container hooked up to a hose with a nozzle at the end. There was a knob on both the nozzle and next to where the hose connected to the container.

"This is the latest of my ingenious ideas." Sawyer continued to speak. "After reading up on the process in which dragons breathe fire using magic. I have come up with a way to replicate the process without the use of magic." He went on to explain. "Through my research, I have found that there is a scientific way to explain how dragons breathe different things. For fire breathers, it can be theorized that they contain a separate, extra lung or bag like organ in their throat to hold a flammable gas. This is represented by this gas container." He pointed at the large container. "Inside this container is methane, which is most likely the gas dragons use seeing as it is produced by the body naturally." Sawyer walked over to the hose. "This fire-proof hose represent's the dragon's throat. The nozzle is the dragon's mouth."

Sawyer went off screen to where the nozzle was pointed After the sound of shuffling the view slid to the left to show a sectioned off area with a human shaped scarecrow standing straight up. As Sawyer reappeared on screen with a stand. "Originally it is thought that dragons had a pouch filled with phosphor, " Sawyer placed the stand right in front of the nozzle. "however due to the expensive price of phosphor, I will be substituting it with a pilot light." He walked out of the way of the nozzle. "Though it might be less effective, it will still work;hopefully."

Sawyer went to the container and put on a thick mitten. "This is the first test." He turned the knob on the container. A small sound of gas running through the tube followed as Sawyer rushed to the nozzle. He turned on the pilot light and lit the flame. He pulled down his goggles. "Test one." He held the handle on the nozzle and turned it.

Immediately, the gas spewed out of the end and through the pilot light and ignited. The ignited gas continued outward, but Sawyer let out too much. The fire engulfed the scarecrow. "Whoa! Whoa!" Sawyer turned the handle and cut off the gas. The stream of fire stopped and a charred stick of charcoal was left in place of the scarecrow. "Okay... opened too far. Must make a note of that." Sawyer picked up a piece of paper and jointed down his note. As he wrote down the results of the test he noticed that there was still heat coming from the test area. Looking back up he saw that the tarp he had covering the wall had caught on fire. "Gah! Fire fire fire!" The fire started to spread up the tarp and start smoking. "Uh oh." Sawyer panicked. The smoke began to fill the room. "*cough* Where is the *cough* sprinklers?!" The screen filled up in smoke.

"Sawyer! What the hell is going on here!?"

"Trist? That you? Nothing is wrong, everything's fine and under control." A faint silhouette in the smoke appeared on screen. As Sawyer finished talking the sprinklers finally activated and the room was showered in water. "Ah! No no nonononono!" The silhouette moved. "My work! The blueprints will be ruined!" The figure ran off screen. A loud smack was heard soon after. "Ack! Workbench! My shoulder!" The view spun as something knocked into the camera and the camera turned off as it hit the floor.

\\

"Dang it." Sawyer picked up his camera. "Water damaged the inside." He placed down the camera on the now dried workbench. "I'll need to get new parts to replace them." He turned to check on the wet blueprints, instead he came face to face with Phantom who had apparently woke up. Sawyer jumped back in response and bumped into the workbench. "Maker have mercy!" He clutched his feathered chest. "I know your profession requires you to be silent and sneaky, but warn a friend before you pop up behind him." All Phantom did was shrug his shoulders.

~Sorry, can't really speak. And you weren't looking in my direction.~

"You bring up a good point. I shall make a notice for myself to make a security alarm." He mentally noted.

~What are you doing in here?~ Phantom looked at the mess of a room.

"This is my experiment room."

~Then what's this?~ Phantom tapped the methane container.

"Hey, hey!" Sawyer moved Phantom's hand back. "Careful there, it's full of methane."

~Why?~

"This is the Flamespitter. I designed it after the way dragons breathe fire."

~But don't dragons use magic to breathe fire?~

"Yes, but this is a method if they didn't use magic."

~Okay then, what's with the camera?~ Phantom pointed at the broken camera on the workbench.

"Oh, that... I made a few years back to record my experiments. It's quite handy since I can look back on my past experiments." Sawyer walked back to the camera and opened a panel on the side of the medium-sized box. "Hopefully the recording I just made isn't gone."

~That's cool~ Phantom hopped onto a metal stool and swung his legs back and forth. ~ So you make...~

"What? Why'd you stop?"

~There isn't a sign for the word I'm thinking of. Moving picture?~ Sawyer opened a nearby drawer and handed a dry scratch-book and something to write with. Phantom wrote down the word and passed it back.

"V... log? Vlog." Sawyer pronounced it as best he could, but ended up saying it 'Veelog'.

~So, how does the Flamethrower work?~ Phantom walked around the Flamespitter.

"Not Flamethrower, Flamespitter." Sawyer corrected Phantom's words.

~Yeah, but the signs to say that would be Flame spit.~

"Fair enough," Sawyer consented. "To answer your question the Flamespitter releases methane gas out of the pipe and into the pilot light. From there the gas ignites and continues forward, creating a stream of fire just like those of fire-breathing dragons."

~Sounds awesome. Can I see it work?~

"Well," Sawyer checked the nozzle then, made sure that there were no leaks in the tubing. "The water doesn't seem to have damaged any of the parts. So I guess I can show you it. Although I need to make sure there's nothing flammable anywhere in the testing area."

~Alright!~ Phantom patiently sat on his stool as Sawyer looked around the test area, which was marked with a yellow and black stripped line. Next Sawyer walked over to a metal cabinet and pulled out a foot high stack of papers. He carried the stack over to a metal table and moved the table into the testing area. Sawyer backed out of the testing area and lit the pilot light. He rushed over to another table and slipped on pair of blackened mittens and poised himself t the nozzle.

"All right," Sawyer pulled his goggles down over his eyes. "Ready for this?" He smiled at Phantom and Phantom gave a thumbs up and eagerly looked at the test area. "Flamspitter test: Pile of papers in three, two, one!" As Sawyer said one he slightly twisted the knob on top of the nozzle and a steady stream of gas came out, igniting at the pilot light and continuing forward. Phantom turned wide-eyed as the fire licked the papers and the entire pile lit up. Sawyer closed the nozzle and the stream stopped. Sawyer had a large grin on his face as the pile of papers burned into non-existence. "Yes! Perfect test!"

~That was awesome!~ Phantom jumped off the stool. He ran closer to the test area, but before he could step inside the tape Sawyer stopped him.

"Whoa there! Don't touch anything!" Sawyer yelled. "Something could still be hot."

~Okay. But man, we need to burn more things. That was amazing!~

"Yeah, I've got to be honest that worked a lot better than I thought it was. We could try it at more intense temperatures as well as at something stronger than just paper."

Both thought about it before Phantom snapped his fingers ~I got something!~ He ran out of the room and returned ,quite fast, with an iron pot in hand. He gave it to Sawyer.

"An iron pot." He looked at the crude common iron pot. It was a cheap one, he had bought it a while back but never used it since he never cooked. When he inspected it further he had found that it was actually crude iron. "Alright. I guess we can use this to test just what the Flamespitter can do."

Sawyer took the pot over to the metal table. The table itself was just fine there were only ashes and some blacken areas, but overall still usable. After placing the pot on the spot where the stack of papers used to be, Sawyer backed away and repeated the steps he took to prep the Flamespitter.

Sawyer slipped on his goggles and held his claw on the knob. "Here we go. Flamespitter test: iron pot in three, two, one!" He twisted the knob about the same as before. The fire streamed out like the last time, hitting the pot directly. However, instead of melting the pot only glowed a red hue. Seeing this, Sawyer twisted the knob more and the stream of fire reacted by growing in size and intensity. The metal pot glowed even more in the flames and began to glow a bright yellow and white. The pot itself started to liquefy on the metal table.

Sawyer closed the valve and watched as the fire died down to reveal the puddle of what used to be a cooking pot. the half of the table that was closest to the Flamespitter was only partially melted.

Sawyer lifted his blurred goggles to get a better look. "In hind sight, I should have tested this at Smith's place. I'll keep that in mind for future tests with different types of metals." Sawyer grabbed his notepad, which and been singed at the edges, and jotted down his findings.

~We got to try um... testing more things!~ Phantom enthusiastically.

"Well..." Sawyer put his notepad away into his pack. "I really should stop before the room gets too full of smoke... But why the heck not? Why don't we indulge ourselves! Let's go find more things to burn."

\\

"*cough* *cough* Yup, too much testing." Sawyer staggered out of the smoking room and into the warehouse. A soot covered Phantom followed him out. After having a few coughs and wheezes Phantom begins chuckling.

~It's still pretty awesome. It melted everything we tried.~

"It was splendid wasn't it?" Sawyer agreed. "I just need to make a few more calibrations and I'll be even better!"

~Even better than it already is?!~

"10 times better. And it also probably won't blow up next time."

~Hell yeah! High five- I mean claw.~ They high-fived. ~Or at least whatever you call that.~

"We call it a high-five. Although I hear that the ponies call it a high-hoof due to their lack of-" Sawyer then noticed that Trist had walked in front the front lobby. "Ah, Trist, you're back. How was the visit to the Eiien?"

"Good." Trist answered as she walked towards the two. "You two look, and smell, like you had fun."

~Yeah!~ Phantom grinned. ~Sawyer invented a Fire thrower.~

"A fire thrower?" She repeated questioningly.

"Completely safe! Mind you. That's also not what it's called, but that's as close as he can get with sign language." Sawyer retorted.

"Alright then... On to more important matters." Trist moved the conversation on. "I met Tina on my way back. She said to go to Geno's tomorrow."

~Why does she need me?~ Phantom signed.

"I don't know!" Trist snapped.

~Ok ok!~ Phantom rushed up to the catwalk and into his room.

"And you," She turned her attention to the soot covered griffin next. "Get the fans on. It smells smokey in here and it'd be bad if it reaches the papers."

"Got it. Right on it!" Sawyer casually walked back into the smoking room. He searched the wall for the fans' switch. Finding it, he flipped it and the fans spun to life and began venting the smoke out of the room. Sawyer looked around and found his camera sitting in the spot he left it.

"Ah, there we are." He picked it up. "Oh it's still recording. Well then." He pointed it at himself. "This has been Sawyer Files #33, The Flamespitter. Final conclusion: Success, although will need some adjustments." He said before turning the camera off.