//------------------------------// // Spies Like Us // Story: Diamond Cutter Anthology Entries // by Mudpony //------------------------------// "I can't believe you applauded her story, Sil," Diamond Tiara said, as she trotted alongside her friend, down the empty street. "Oh, come on.  It was a good story, even if it did have multiple historical inaccuracies," Silver Spoon replied.  "Ponyville was actually founded three hundred years earlier by the Mares, a family that moved west out of Manehatten.  Our mayor is a direct descendent of them, you know?  The town did not really start to grow until sixty years ago, of course, when the lumber mill opened.  That led to a need to provide for the workers, and hence the founding of the Apple farmstead and your great-grandfather's store." "There you go again, showing off all of your book learning," Diamond Tiara said, faking a yawn.  She liked to tease her friend about being a bookworm, though truly she relished moments like these.  The moments when there was nopony around, and they could risk being their true selves. "You now I can't help it.  It is my special talent after all," Silver Spoon said.  Diamond Tiara nodded. She was one of the few ponies that knew that Silver Spoon's talent lay in knowledge.  Most ponies assumed it was due to her skill at working with precious metals.  A few joked that it was due to the wealth of her parents.  But neither of those things were the truth.  Give Silver Spoon a book and she could recite it back to you word for word even days later.  That was pretty amazing, but not nearly as amazing as watching Silver Spoon pick up an item and know things about it that she should not have known. That was how they had gotten recruited, actually.  All Silver Spoon had done was pick up her grandmother's favorite teaspoon while helping her with some household chores.  She had not meant to wind up with a head full of secrets and a cutie mark, but that is what she had gotten.  The secrets she had shared with her best friend, and when her grandmother had found out what she knew, they had found themselves part of something they would never had suspected existed. "Besides, I know the main reason you're so anti-Apple is because you're secretly harboring a crush on Apple Bloom," Silver Spoon said. "I am not!" Diamond Tiara said. "So we just tease her and her friends as part of our cover?" "Right.  You know that." "And tag along with your father whenever he has business at their farm because you see so little of him?" "Ah-huh.  With our jobs, any day could be our last.  So I want to spend all the time I can with dad.  Is that so wrong?" The two fillies pushed open the doors and entered The Fancy Store, the most upscale clothing store in Ponyville, part of a chain owned by one of the most influential unicorns in Canterlot.  The owner greeted them by name and mentioned that she had some new stuff on the back rack, just in from Manehatten.  The fillies returned her greeting and drifted toward the back of the store. "And you cut out pictures of her from the school paper because she's totally cute?" Silver Spoon asked, continuing the conversation from outside. "Of course," Diamond Tiara said, as she flipped through rack, haphazardly throwing a couple of items aside to try on.  Her eyes shot open as she realized what she had just said.  "Wait.  No!  No fair.  You tricked me!" "You can fool everyone else, Di.  You can even fool yourself.  But you can't fool me," Silver Spoon said with a wink.  She selected a few items of her own.  "Let's go try these on." Silver Spoon led the way, and Diamond Tiara followed silently behind.  They went to the third changing room, ignoring the sign that said it was in use.  The sign always said that, and it did its job: it kept the ordinary ponies out.  But Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon were not ordinary ponies. "It's just that it can never be, you know?" Diamond Tiara said, breaking her silence, while Silver Spoon tapped the rear wall in several places. "Like totally, three-seven-two," Silver Spoon said. "Best pony, zero-zero-seven," Diamond Tiara said. In a bright flash, the two ponies disappeared, only to reappear within a slightly larger room, deep below the surface.  The room was devoid of features, other than a heavy sealed door along one wall.  They stood still, as a green beam of light shone over them, verifying their identities further.  The light disappeared, a loud beep sounded, and the door opened, revealing a long, poorly light corridor, doors along its sides and one barely visible at its far end. "It still amazes me you got that pass phrase," Silver Spoon said, as she and Diamond Tiara walked. "Hey, you got your talent, Miss Encyclopedia, and I got mine," Diamond Tiara said with a winning smile and a swagger of her rump, drawing attention to her cutie mark..  "Being able to charm the feathers off a griffon has its advantages." "No doubt.  It makes me jealous sometimes seeing how easily you bend ponies around your hoof." Diamond Tiara shrugged.  "It's just not fair, you know," Diamond Tiara said, changing the topic back to the previous one.  "Her grandmother has a complete mental breakdown because of her mother's death, and because of that, I'm not allowed to form any sort of relationship with her.  I can't even just be her friend." "A real shame too.  Granny Smith used to be one of the top agents.  Nopony could throw a pie as far or as accurately as her.  Annie Oakley Smith was a legend," Silver Spoon replied.  "And her daughter and son-in-law were quite impressive as well." "And now all we have left is a kooky, old lady."  Diamond Tiara sighed.  "And because she's retreated completely into her cover identity, we can't recruit Apple Bloom, even though she'd be perfect.  With your brains, my charm, her knack for demolition and construction, why, all we'd need is a hoof-to-hoof specialist to be the best team ever." "Nobody ever said an agent's life was fair or easy," Silver Spoon said.  "But we do what we do for love of country." "For princesses and ponies," Diamond Tiara said, repeating the agency's mantra out of habit. "And they'll never even know all that we give up for them," Silver Spoon said, opening the door at the end of the corridor.. The two fillies entered the briefing room.  A large table sat in the center of it, with chairs around it.  A chalkboard covered the wall to the left, while its opposite side was a large corkboard.  On the far wall, two paintings hung, one of each princess.  They were the type of paintings found in most government offices in Equestria, with the exception that the one Celestia was currently sporting a drawn on mustache.  The chair at the far end, by far the nicest one in the room, spun around, revealing the assistant director of the agency, a white coated, blue maned unicorn mare known by the codename 'V'.  She looked quite fearsome, with an eye patch covering her right eye. "And?  How did it go?  Was she faking it?  Any chance we can bring her back in the fold?"  V rattled the questions off, one after another. "As far as we could tell, she totally believes she is her cover identity," Diamond Tiara said. "I see.  Well, that's too bad," V said. "She'd have been a valuable asset in training others.  She used to be quite the drill sergeant.  Any problems with the mission?" "Some interference from the youngest granddaughter.  Had to convince one Apple Strudel to visit Ponyville is all.  Diamond handled that with ease, ma'am," Silver Spoon reported. "It would have been much easier if we could just recruit Apple Bloom," Diamond Tiara suggested. V shook her head.  "No, we've been through this before, Diamond.  Annie Smith is unstable and knows far too much about too many things.  Ordinarily, we might take other measures, but she's an unsung hero of Equestria, and she's sacrificed so much already.  We'll let her live out her years as she wishes.  We don't want to do anything to jeopardize what little stability she has.  Now, unless there's anything else?" There was nothing else.  With a nod, V floated a folder toward her two agents and began the briefing for their next mission. "We've been charged by the head cheese, L herself, to complete this mission, which she deems of critical importance.  Operation Control the Press, ladies, has two goals.  The primary goal is the publication of this picture" —V held up the picture in question— "in the newspapers, including those in Canterlot, but in a way that cannot be traced back to us.  A secondary, optional goal is to place one of our own within the press, so that we can squash any potentially comprising news that might otherwise be printed.  Any questions so far?" Neither Diamond Tiara or Silver Spoon had any.  For now, they were content to let V explain while they flipped through the papers within the folder.  There was a knock on the door, and at V's acknowledgement, a colt entered and took a seat.  With a nod toward the newcomer, V continued on. "Okay, for this mission, Spoon, you'll be working in the background, support only.  Diamond, you'll be working closely with Agent Featherweight from our technical division.  Here's how it is going to play out..." The briefing complete, the two fillies and one colt walked down the corridor, toward the teleport room.  Featherweight was quite excited about being allowed out of the lab, practically bouncing off the walls.  It would be his first field mission.  Diamond Tiara hoped he would not screw anything up.  Had she been that excited for her first mission?  She was not sure.  It seemed like she had always been running missions.  And she always would be, until the day she died.  For princesses and ponies.  One thing was curious about this mission though.  She turned to Silver Spoon and asked, "Why do you suppose Princess Lu—, I mean L, wants us to publish these pictures of Celestia eating cake anyway?" Silver Spoon shrugged.  "Ours is not to question why."