Twilight came to consciousness.
Taking quick stock of her surroundings, an instinctual reaction brought by her years of adventuring that had saved her life at least once and saved an artifact from being stolen another time. Her hooves were locked into manacles and chains, a Thronestone sat nearby, blocking her magic, and a pair of ponies were watching her. Fantastic, things were a lot harder.
As she became more aware, she quickly realized that she was alone. Night hadn't been caught yet, which meant that there was a chance he could grab the pouch and escape. That was...good. She could deal with that. A part of her recognized that she also was still in her disguise from the amulet, and the fact that she was a Princess moonlighting as a thief still remained hidden.
She sighed and relaxed. So far, things weren't as bad as they could be. Now all she needed to do was find a way out of this.
As her mind began to turn on the different possible things she could do, a singular thought pierced her mind.
"You shouldn't even be here."
It was a dumb thought. Of course, she should be here; this was a matter of national security. This could lead to the single largest drug ring in the history of Equestria, not to mention the fact that two large criminal industries were now working together—
"Captain Azure could have handled this."
I...No...no, of course, he couldn't. He wasn't aware of the…
He wasn't aware of what was going on.
"Because you didn't tell him."
Well, he…she was using this time with Night to decide if he was useful! The fact that she didn't...tell...the Captain...
"Night is doing just fine without you," her inner critic growled. "You're the one that made this complicated. You could have sent the Captain with Night and taken care of all of this while you did your job as Princess and sign some papers."
Twilight didn't answer that.
A third part of her mind said she was being unfair. That this criticism wasn't taking other factors into account, that she ignored critical facts to make a harsher point, but Twilight didn't defend herself.
She'd already felt that she was putting a few things off, but this…
This only brought it to the forefront of her attention.
"I might have messed up on this one," she thought. This might have been all her fault.
---$---
Night clung to the I-beam over the Princess and glanced around for the best angle of approach. Coming straight down would leave him hanging in the middle of the air when he would be in the range of the Thronestone, and suddenly visible to everyone in the warehouse. Approaching from the front would be alright, up until he got close enough to stone, which might leave him suddenly appearing as he stood between the two guards.
That one seemed to be slightly worse than appearing in the middle of the sky.
The last option was coming from the "back." The problem with coming through the back was that Twilight was surrounded by metal shipping crates, and beyond that was the warehouse's main floor space, all of which was crawling with ponies, both armed and dangerous, and paranoid as could be.
Working through that would be dangerous enough, but doing so while they are now all terrified that the mare they found might have a partner still around. Which, of course, she did.
Night slid down the I-beam to the side of the building. With a quick move, he then used his rope to climb down to the warehouse floor. He stuck to the walls, keeping as many ponies in sight as possible while trying to stay out of the range of the stone that would reveal him. Right now, his Image was above him, hovering over the roof of the building, but that would only last as long as he stood outside of the Thronestone's range, which he didn't have a good grasp on.
He exhaled sharply before he crouched behind a box and prayed to Celestia he wouldn't get caught.
He dropped the Control Image spell before he used Create Matter to form a tiny ball. The ball was thin and hollow, so it wouldn't tax him as much, but hopefully, it wouldn't last long enough to matter.
He pushed the ball forward, toward the wall of shipping crates where the Thronestone and Twilight sat. It disappeared a foot before it hit the container, and Night quickly changed back to his other spell, and he once again became unseeable.
The matter spell drained him quickly, and he hoped he still had enough energy in him to work through the rest of the night. The good news was that he now had a better idea of what the range was for the Thronestone.
He began to steel himself for his move when he saw the door open on the other side of the warehouse, and a unicorn walked in.
Night took one look at him and recognized the stallion from the night in Canterlot when he went counter-thieving right after he made the bet with the Princess.
Night grit his teeth. Why on earth was Moon Light getting involved in this? He typically thought of himself as better than causing direct harm on a pony, so why get involved with the drug trade?
He observed the new pony as he slipped in before handing one of the guards a sizeable cloth-wrapped bundle. The guard took it carefully before another rushed in, a scrawny looking-pony, that Night could swear he'd seen with Legger's crew.
He took the package carefully in his own grip and tugged at the cloth to reveal a set of hoof guards that shone like volcanic glass.
Night blinked as he ran through a mental catalog of magical items that Celestia shared with him, and while he couldn't put his hoof on it, they certainly reminded him of something.
He set the thought aside. He didn't have the time to worry about it. He needed to get the Princess out of here. Once he'd done that, then he could worry about magical items, real or replica, that these ponies were securing.
He refocused and glanced around.
Most of the other ponies were being distracted by the new pony's arrival. They weren't looking in the direction of the crates and the prisoner behind them. Not one of them was watching for Twilight.
He smirked.
Now he'd get a chance to work his magic.
---$---
Twilight shook her head. Why didn't she see this coming? She should have known that she couldn't always rely on her magic. "Getting into a fight with thirty ponies wouldn't be a problem," she mentally mocked herself. "The only thing that can go wrong is if I'm totally rendered helpless by Changeling throne rocks."
The same stones that Twilight knew that Legger's ponies had run before. "You definitely had no way of knowing they could get their hooves on more."
That third part of Twilight that acted as her advocate remarked that the critic part of her mind was excessively harsh, but Twilight nonetheless took the beratement.
She was messing this one up and messing it up bad. Night could have probably gotten away by now, but she was only slowing him down at this point. She muttered darkly to herself and grumbled about how she messed this up before she heard a whisper at her ear.
"Alright, Twilight, here's the plan," Night whispered from behind her. "We're going to have to move quickly and quietly. The only real way out for both of us is forward. The range of the Thronestone is about a foot off of the crates, so we can cast spells once we get that far away, but we need to worry about getting past the guards."
"What, are we fighting our way out?" she asked back.
"No," Night said. "We don't know if they have more stones or not, and I'm not going hoof-to-hoof with a pony that's armed with a spear."
"So escape?"
"As fast as possible," he whispered back.
Twilight nodded. "Alright. Run for the wall in front of us."
The chain suddenly went lax, and both of the ponies immediately shot forward across the floor.
They rushed past the guards, who yelled in surprise before Twilight unleashed her Create Energy spell. A beam of heat and magic tore a perfect hole in the wall, and both ponies ran out into the open as cries and yells echoed out behind them.
Night and Twilight didn't stop. They both rushed into the street and ran up and out of the city's storage district to the castle walls itself.
Panting, they both took a moment to catch their breath before Twilight cursed. "I can't believe I was caught like that! I can't believe it!"
"Don't... don't beat yourself up about it, Twilight."
"I've been through enough adventures to be better than that!" she said. "I've been captured by ancient evils, invading royalty, and some of the most powerful ponies in the world, and now I have to add a bunch of drug-pushing nut-jobs."
Night smirked. "Well, new things happen to ponies every day."
"It's not funny, Night!" she growled. "We went in there and got nothing."
"Excuse you," Night said, pulling the pouch from his cloak. "We got the pouch, and we found new information."
"You found the pouch," she muttered to herself before she pushed the thought aside. "What did you find out?"
"Moon Light's ponies are also involved," he replied. "It's all three of them working together."
Twilight groaned. This night was just getting worse.
"I think it gets worse than that, Twilight," Night said. "I think they're starting to trade in magic items or replicas of them, at least."
"What?" she asked.
"I saw them moving something while you were locked up. I couldn't tell you what it was right now, but I have a suspicion."
"What do you think it was?"
"I…" Night began. "Do you remember that thing I told you about, the Alicorn Amulet?"
Twilight nodded.
"Well, there were supposedly two other artifacts to go with it, ones powerful enough to, when worn together, give the user all of the power of an alicorn at the cost of their soul. I think that might have been one of them."
Twilight sighed. "Great," she growled. "Because we need that to hit the market. And I suppose you couldn't grab it too?"
"Grabbing the pouch only worked because you were the distraction," Night said, "and you were indisposed this time around."
Twilight glared up at him but said nothing.
Night must not have seen it because he drew his cloak tighter around him. "I'm going to dig around and see what I can find. I'll get you a letter as soon as I can. Let's get you back to the Castle. We've got a lot of things to plan."
Twilight nodded and resigned herself to being led back to the Castle.
---$---
When Twilight got back to her office, still in the dead of night, she shook her head. "That's what you got, Twilight? You got rusty; that was your problem. Back before all of this, you would have been three steps ahead of Night every step of the way. Instead, you not only got caught, but you also slowed the expert down! Great job!"
She paced a circle around her office, muttering to herself when a scroll on her shelves caught her eye.
She picked it up and read it over again, quickly becoming sick with the distance, professional tone she took.
"Mr. Night Silk,
"After much deliberation, We have decided that the efforts you deploy to deal with the criminal element of this country to be inefficient, though well-meaning. Your actions do not solve long-term issues but instead solve short-term problems at the cost of long-term solutions."
"A lot of it is preventative," she argued. "He stops problems from getting worse."
"That is not to say that what you do is without merit.
"Your motives are obviously built on a need for justice. However, in your need to enact justice, you're ignoring the more significant problem at hand. These solutions you offer are short-sighted and fail to attack the source of the problem. Thus with Our most generous sympathies, We decree that you cannot continue in this way."
"They do attack the source of the problem! What else do you call the ponies that are stealing everything?" she asked.
"Your salary from the Royal treasury is to be reduced to one-tenth of its current amount. You shall continue to act in your advisory role in castle security, as your talent in this area is undeniable. However, any further criminal activity will not be tolerated and shall be prosecuted to the furthest extent of the law."
"Prosecuted to the furthest extent of the blah," Twilight mocked.
"Thus do We decree,
"High Princess Twilight Sparkle, Keeper of the Skies, The Archmage Ruler, Protector of the Tribes, Lady of Friendship."
"Listen to you," Twilight mocked, "with your long list of titles. You don't know what you're talking about. You're only good for…"
She didn't finish that one. Instead, it hung in the air like a thick, heavy fog, filling her thoughts with the words she didn't want to say.
"...sitting pretty on a throne. You're not an adventurer anymore."
She threw the scroll to her desk.
"Cut that out, Twilight!" she growled. "You're not useless! You can do whatever Night can do, and can do it better! You're one of the most powerful mages in Equestria! You're not going to let a thief show you up, much less some rocks!"
She walked out of her office with a powerful stride, toward her bedroom, where she had the full intention of going to sleep. After a full night of being captured, running around, and spell-slinging like she did, she needed to rest. Not to mention the fact that, as always, she had to get up early in the morning.
Besides, she had a council of friendship to plan. She only had a few days.
And the scroll sat on her desk, open.
---$---
Gleaming Coin sat down in a large, over-stuffed chair, smiling as she enjoyed a small chocolate bar. She never had much growing up, so she frequently indulged in a candy bar or two. It's not like she didn't work off the calories whenever she had to deal with somepony trying to take her out.
A knock sounded on her door. "Come in," she said.
Blackjack entered the office, scowling. "Boss," she hissed in greeting.
"Blackjack," Gleaming greeted, smiling the entire time. "Did you need something?"
"Yes, I wanted to let you know that your foolproof plan to earn some cash blew apart," Blackjack said with a vindictive smirk.
"What?" Gleaming asked.
"Yeah, the pouch was stolen, right under your nose, just before the Moon-Lighter arrived with a new delivery of herbs."
Gleaming narrowed her eyes. "Stolen from under your nose," she corrected. "The Muscle, as your gang is now called, is still, for the most part, under your control. They just all know that I run things. When I took over, I made it very clear that I would let you live, and run the Muscle, just like Boot Legger runs the Purse, and Moon runs the Hooves. Now, I hope that you're going to prove that was a good idea, or are you going shove off responsibility until I change my mind?"
Blackjack's own eyes narrowed, as though daring her to try before she answered. "Of course, my mistake."
Gleaming nodded. "That's what I thought. Now, what happened?"
"A pair of ponies stole the pouch in the middle of our operations last night," Blackjack explained. "If I had to guess, I'd say it's the same one that Celestia used to hire. Possibly with an apprentice or something."
"Celestia used to hire a thief?" Gleaming asked.
Blackjack snorted. "Well, considering that the guard typically showed up after he did whenever he came snooping around for some of our cash or drugs, I'd say very likely. I doubt they'd work with a thief out of the kindness of their hearts."
Gleaming went silent and steepled her hooves together. "How do you know it was two ponies?" she asked.
"We caught one," Blackjack replied. "Mare, unicorn, orange coat, a little on the small side."
"Good," Gleaming said. "Start interrogating her. I'm sure the Purse can point us in the right direction of a field to bury the body in."
"She got away," Blackjack said through clenched teeth.
"What?" Gleaming demanded growling. "And how did she get away?"
"The other pony got her out," she replied.
"Oh, really, and what did he look like?" Gleaming asked.
"Unicorn, brown coat, ivory mane, and one of my gang keeps swearing up and down that he has a coin cutie mark."
Gleaming blinked. "A gold coin?" she asked.
Blackjack stared back at her. "Yes…"
Gleaming frowned before she sat up a little straighter in her chair. "I see. Thank you for letting me know, Blackjack. I'll get you new orders in the next week or so. We'll use that to recover, though we should be able to begin stealing the real prize by then."
"And what about the Royal Thief?" Blackjack asked.
"Oh, don't worry about him…" Gleaming said. "I think I know just how to handle him."
Blackjack snorted. "Not the first time I heard that," she growled.
"But it may just be the last. Now get out of here. You have enough work to do."
Blackjack frowned but left.
Gleaming turned her chair around to face the window of her office and smiled. "Well, well. It seems that Night may have survived after all. It'd be good to see him again, I suppose."
She stared out into the darkness beyond her window, where the sun was already beginning to set.
Yes, yes, it would be good to see Night again.
It had been far, far too long.