Wolfhound: Secret Heroes

The next morning, I found Leon in the Mess Hall, having already finished his breakfast. We talked for a while as I myself ate, and then we went our separate ways.

I read a couple books I’d picked up from a library in Ponyville last week, and then I went and visited Leon in the barracks. He was often there, alone. I found him idly messing with a couple pieces of scrap metal.

“Whatcha doin’?” I asked him.

He jumped, startled. “Woah! Oh, sorry. I don’t normally get addressed. Everyone just comes in, does what they need to do, and leaves. Idle conversation aside, I haven’t really talked much.”

“Just not a talkative person?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, I was wondering if you wanted to talk more. About yesterday?”

He nodded slowly in understanding. Then nodded faster in the affirmative. “It’s not that important, but I still have some gear over in Fillydelphia.”

“Alright. You know, you can just ask for transport.”

“Well, thing is, I can’t go in there by myself. The house is guarded. I’m not a Pegasus, nor am I a Unicorn. I need help, if I’m gonna get my gear.”

“Got spotted one time too many?”

“A Policeman spotted me going into the house a couple years ago. It’s a known location, so they’re still casing it.”

“Huh.”

“Look, I’m not going to beg, or anything. It’s really not that important. It’s some lock-picking stuff, a listening cup, – It’s not an actual cup, you attach it to a door and put your ear to it, and you can hear what’s inside, as long as the door isn’t too thick – and a few stacks of money. I had a… well, not a friend. More like a trusted underground contact that I paid to enchant it, so that only I can open it. Even better, it’s incredibly hard to find. I don’t use most of the normal tricks. I doubt they’ve found it. There are actually a lot of containers in the place. Most of them had stuff in them.”

“So, the police would assume they’d found everything, when really they didn’t.”

“Exactly. I was a pretty good thief, and I knew a lot of tricks. Even came up with a few of my own. I knew how to look for things, so I came up with ways that would trick my own system, without it ever even knowing.”

“Well, as long as you remember where it is, let’s go.”

“What-Seriously?” He stood up quickly, utterly shocked.

His face was so comical, I couldn’t resist a laugh and a little tease. “Alright, close your mouth, before someone thinks it's a holster, and shoves a barrel down it.”

He shook his head to clear the insta-cobwebs, then laughed when my words registered. I grinned back.

“Let’s go, Pardner!”

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

We stepped off the train in Fillydelphia. I’d written a note telling Allen where Leon and I were, in case he needed to find me. I didn’t say why. Leon wasn’t ready to just go out and admit that he used to be a high-end professional thief.

We walked around, exploring the city. After a while, we came across Leon’s house.

I whistled, high to low in pitch. Double Whammy!

“Okay. That’s a big house, and that’s a lot of security.” There were at least a dozen traps that I’d spotted already, in only half a minute. If you didn’t know what to look for, you’d step right up and trip one off, too. We’d have to be careful.

“They’ve probably done the outside the most, hoping to catch me before I even get in. Door’s locked.”

I looked at him, surprised. “How do you know?”

“My door always has a blue streak on it when it’s unlocked. I had a guy design it for me. Another contact. There’s no streak; door’s locked.”

“Neat trick.”

“Picks up lock-picking, too. Not only does it set off a silent alarm, that streak pops up after five seconds. Gives the guy enough time to get in without knowing something’s up, but also enough time that he won’t get far in there before someone sees it.”

“That could be a problem, then.”

“Not really. Two years? I don’t think they have anyone just standing around wasting money doing nothing. No. They might have alarms of their own, but as long as we avoid them, my alarms won’t matter.”

“They can’t wire into your alarms?”

“Nope. They’d have to take them apart and rebuild them. I know my alarms by heart, and I could build them from scratch, by memory alone. I’d notice the difference, and we’d be gone before anyone shows up.”

“Sounds pretty easy, then.”

“Some things take more than one guy. And a criminal usually doesn’t have anyone he actually trusts. I guarantee you that some of those multi-pony traps were used. Luckily, I’m an expert on disarming traps. I just didn’t want to risk going halfway, leaving, and having someone walk in on my progress. They probably still check it, from time to time.”

“Huh. Alright, so what are we waiting for?”

“That guy at the diner to leave.”

“…What?”

“I’m pretty sure every policeman here knows what that house means. If that guy sees someone walking in, we’d be called in for sure. Look.” Leon pointed at a spot on the guy.

I could see a police badge. “Alright, let’s hurry up and wait, then.”

“You hungry?”

“Nah.”

“Whelp, then let’s wait.”

Ten minutes later, we started moving. It took us another five minutes to work through all the traps in the front rooms.

“Unfortunately,” Leon said, “the wanted items are in my bedroom, top floor. In the back.”

“Then why didn’t we go through the back?”

“Stairs are over here. Besides, if you were trapping a criminal’s house, wouldn’t you hit the backyard even more than the front?”

I stopped for a second, then nodded. “Good thinking.”

“When you live like I used to, things like that just become common sense.”

We worked our way through a couple more traps and found ourselves in a hallway. At the end of it were the stairs. I took a couple steps forward.

Right then, I spotted something less than half a foot from my leg. I froze.

“Oh, dear Celestia!” I whispered. I’d almost walked right through a tripwire.

“Whoa.” Leon stated. He went past me and stepped over it, but he indicated for me to stay back. He pulled out a can of something.

“What are you-“

He wordlessly sprayed it into the hallway. Suddenly, red beams lit up the entire length of it. Leon grunted. “They’ve added to it.”

I looked at him, incredulous. “Well, do you know which ones are yours?”

“I know what pattern they’re supposed to make, but that’s easy to mimic. Look carefully. Three triangles. My lasers only make one. I don’t know which triangle, though.”

“So, it’s random guesswork?”

“Pretty much. Just don’t hit any, and we won’t even have to guess.” He started navigating through.

I snorted. Smarta**. I followed.

I almost gave us away probably twenty times. The triangles all intersected, cris-crossed, and all that at different angles and heights. It was deceptively hard, and it looked difficult, in the first place. After we’d gotten through, I followed Leon up the stairs.

After careful searching, we only found a few lovely alarm-causing presents on that floor. Unfortunately, most of them required both of us to get either one of us through. We eventually figured it out, and we worked our way to the third floor. Soap, Rinse, Repeat.

Sixth floor. Finally we were at the top. We’d come across multiple open sections of walls.

“Hidden compartments.” Leon stated. “Some of them were meant to be found. A true criminal knows that there are things he can afford to lose, yet they still have value. He puts those things into areas that are meant to be found. Doesn’t mean it’s easy to find them, just easier than the other things.”

When we finally got to his bedroom, It had been almost two whole hours. Leon immediately walked over to a seemingly random section of the floor and stomped. Hard.

The floor broke. I looked at him quizzically. “Don’t you think that’s a little excessive?”

“After all this time, build-up would’ve practically sealed it. I’m not coming back. Might as well just do it the easy way.”

I shrugged, and just stood there while he pulled out a backpack. It was dusty, so he beat it off. I heard a small amount of clanking inside. Then he walked over to something sticking out of the wall, and tapped it a few times. Then he walked over across the room and hit a part of the wall there. It caved in. The wall opened up. I glimpsed stairs unfolding.

“Um, how far down does that go?”

“First floor.”

“And we couldn’t use it before?”

“Keypad was covered by the lasers. Even if I could reach the numbers, or even the pad itself, it’s got a timer. Whole code needs to be entered within a certain amount of time, or nothing happens. And I saw at least three lasers on some of the numbers I'd need to hit.”

“But the stairs are fine?”

“Stairs are fine. My lasers are off, now, too. Let’s go. Not too fast, some of this stuff is fragile.”

From then on, it was surprisingly pretty easy to work our way back to the front door, outside, and then just casually walk to the train station. We had to stay the night at a hotel, as there was no train to Appleloosa that night. But, come noon the next time, we were inbound.