The Lost Masterpiece

There was a line of yellow police tape stretching across the hall on both ends, cutting off the viewing area for what had been called 'the discovery of the century' in the art world. Shining black-lights floated around the corners of the display and at the ceiling, bathing the entire hall in purple-white light and causing everything in a shade of white to glow.

The pedestal in the centre of the viewing gallery was in pieces. It was scattered about the room in bits of marble and dust. Only five hours prior, there had been a stunning sculpture of the Fausticorn from what experts had estimated to be five thousand years ago. Irreplaceable, timeless, and expensive beyond measure... and it was gone.

A slightly frustrated, slightly entertained DI Ebony LeBrun was standing near one of the floating lights, reading the report off of a file and checking the security spells for the fourth time. Ebony was the head of Homicide and Serious Crime; that entailed both dreadfully predicable and perfectly delicious cases that could not be ignored. A stolen sculpture? Not really high on her list of crimes to solve (such as the triple murder from last week), but, suddenly, there was a great uproar because this one was more special than the one in the hall over.

She had an appreciation for art, don't get her wrong; it just seemed irrelevant that this one is a little older than that one, or made by this artist or sculptor rather than another. However, there was a lot of money involved in this case, and she wasn't one for the politics that would surely become involved once this went public. That was Zefarin's job, and she refused to beg.

The inspector shut her file with a snap and tossed it haphazardly to the floor before turning to find the ponies who had been gathered up as witnesses. She was certain to get to the bottom of this; there was no other way.

Finn was angry. He was absolutely spitting with pure, unfiltered rage, and the only thing controlling himself from smacking his cat across the room was the fact that his cat would unleash his wrath on him; a presumably worse fate than smacking, trust me. Despite his attempts to stay calm, he couldn't help himself. A long, furious scream echoed through the hallway of the museum.

On a typical day, Finn was agitating others and being extremely infuriating.Today, that part had been switched with a temporary partner.  Temporary indeed. Finn was already suspicious of the little weasel's idea - steal a huge statue. It wasn't the fact of how noticeable the missing statue would be to Finn, as he enjoyed a good chase anyway: it was easy to drop and not nearly as easy to carry. And of course, the idiot dropped it.

Silently, the stallion attempted to cool down. Stroking Scratchy, his ragged cat, he thought of his situation.  He could probably get out of the crime scene, before anypony noticed him. It wasn't too late, and there were other statues to steal, right? He could get out of here unscathed, unlike his partner who he gleefully left sprawled on the floor as he sprinted away. Finn grinned at what he considered a little victory in terms of revenge, and began to walk away, then rammed painfully into another pony.... another pony with guard armor.

Finn scrambled to his hooves, and ran for it, his skinny twig of a cat following close behind.

Switchblade was excited, his first case in Canterlot since the relocation, it seemed ridiculous to him that this curator pony had decided to call in a freelancer and the royal guards, but he wasn't complaining; it was a high priority which usually entailed high amounts of pay, something he was a bit low on right now.

He walked to the tape and shuddered at the sight of all the royal guards who would certainly do the usual technique of mocking the freelancer, he shrugged the thought off; he was just as skilled as they were. He ducked under the tape and walked to the nearest guard he could find, she seemed to be inspecting a line of witnesses so he decided to wait for her to finish with them first.

Blown Speaker had no clue why he was here, he just happened to be in the museum, when apparently a sculpture was stolen, he knew nothing about what happened, but he was still called as a witness.
"This day couldn't get worse" he thought to himself, before turning his head and seeing a pony and a cat dash down a corridor.

Jet just stands there waiting to get interrogated for information. He starts tapping his hoof impatienly then he looks at Blown Speaker and says "Don't I know you from somewhere?"

"Yeah, I thought I recongnized you in the town square over in ponyville, but other then that, I haven't seen you before."Speaker said responding to Jet.

Ebony's ears pricked at the sound of a scream, followed hooves hitting the wooden floor of the gallery. The cadence of the sound was off, like the pony was running, and it was fading quickly.

A satisfied grin stretched on her face as she abandoned the witnesses and swept away in a dramatic swirl of black coat, sliding past the guard who had entered the hall with dark grace. She ran past two more witnesses idling in the corridor to the left, following the somewhat startled gazes of the stallions to the telltale scratches of cat's claws on the hardwood floor.

Silently, she ducked down to examine them, glasz eyes swiping over them in less than a second before she slipped around another corner and shot a stunning spell in the direction of the fleeing pony and cat.

(Shadowbolf, we do have a posting order. You joined after we had planned out the topic, so please refrain from skipping the rest of us. Thank you.)

Switchblade watched the mare with a mixture of intrigue and enjoyment; it was apparent that she was in the detective department, they were always interesting to work with to say the least.

He turned to the witnesses and walked over to Speaker, smiling his usual disconcerting smile "So." he said "What are you doing here?"

**Ponies, may I bring to attention the posting order.

Callilian
Happyhobbit
Switchblade
ShadowbolfRD
Bediepew

Please, please, please, obey from hereon out. Next post is Happyhobbit since she was skipped. Thank you.**

(On a smaller note, Shadowbolf, please do note that this was a private rp for the ponies listed. You're already in it, so please do stay, but check the sub-title next time, okay? You're fine now.)

(Sorry I did not relise that and im sorry for intruding)

( Sorry to keep you guys waiting, and the short reply!)


Finn yelped in surprise as he came toppling to the ground. Scratchy scampered off, not to his surprise. His companion was always by his side- but, of course when trouble came, he dissapeared. This wasn't right! He was agile! Extremely agile! Why did he trip? Realizing, he couldn't move, Finn realized he had been caught. Smooth. Real smooth. He sighed heavily. Finn hated to lose, whether it was a getaway or a fight.

This wasn't even his fault, anyway. The thief was well aware of his skill, in fact, he flaunted it all the time... so then why had he failed?

No matter... this was bothering him more than it should, anyway. Why, the fun had barely begun! He could still toy with the guards and whatnot, right? His green eyes darted about, searching for his captor, and landed on a mare with unkept dark hair. Her expression was unreadable, but he could see a flicker of a smirk on her face.

Jet looks at around at all the ponies rushing this way and that. As he just stands there he slowly falls asleep. He starts thinking 'Uhhhhh stupid heist. Why did I choose to come here at this time?'

Ebony felt a sharp spear of satisfaction jolt through her as the runner went crashing to the ground. The cat scampered out of sight, but it was a small disappointment in the face of a success such as this.

She was aware she didn't look the part. Her lack of guard uniform was both a testament to her hatred of the bulky and cumbersome armour and the need to keep a low profile. Combat wasn't her specialty; that was the purpose of the grunts on her team. No, the DIs usually showed up in business-wear or business-casual. Her attire stretched those parameters, as she was relatively certain that a big, dark, and mysterious coat wasn't something normally worn to the office. The blazer she sometimes wore underneath it when dealing with cold places or poshnosygits (*cough cough* Zefarin) was absent, but it was still enough to throw most ponies off on a first impression.

Ebony sneered down at the pony attempting to move from the grip of her spell, judging from the wild movement of his eyes. Swiftly, she bound him in a set of ropes conjured from the ambient magic surrounding the museum before propping him up against a large stand and releasing her paralysing spell.

'And who might you be?' she asked, subtly notching up the charm for the inherent interrogation. She was aware of the witnesses she had left behind, but judging from the sound of clinking armour, someone was dealing with that issue at the moment and she wasn't needed immediately.

'And who might you be?' The mare inquired. Finn opened his mouth, in slight surprise. He wasn't sure whether or not the spell parzalzed his mouth as well, but now he knew. This was good, this was something he could work with... maybe he could bite her? No, the mare was keeping her distance, she would have to get closer. All it would give him really was some satisfaction, but he thought it would be worth it to see the mare's face wrinkle in disgust as she pulled her hoof away.

The thief's eye's now looked more devilish than panicked, and he smiled despite is situation. That thought, even if it was small, but him in a much better mood.

" Squeaky Corn," he answered. Finn usually answered to a false name, and he had a strange liking to making up some really odd ones. Perhaps he had desired to come off as clever, but usually ponies just gave him an odd look, and pitied him for having such a strange, undesirable name.

Switchblade continued interrogating witnesses and cross examining them for inconsistencies, he glanced back at the detective, she appeared to have caught the thief, he knew she would, it was the job of a detective anyway, he was just there to keep the situation under control and provide an element of elitism.

"Uhhhh, I was just wondering, if since I dont know anything, if I could leave?" Speaker asked the pony Interrigating the witnesses.

Ebony cut through the lie like it was made of cobwebs. A very unimpressed look crossed her face as she leaned back, eyes darting up and down the trussed up pony in front of her.

'How unlucky a pony must be to have a name such as that,' she said dryly. 'However, you are lying, and things might move a bit faster if we stuck to the truth. Though, by all means, do continue to lie, if you wish. It just gets more entertaining for me. Now, answer me this: what are you doing here in the Gallery? We closed the place down, and you weren't among the ponies we kept as witnesses, which would have been everyone in the building. You were hiding. Clearly, not the innocent purpose of gazing around at the paintings and statues. You could say that you were frightened, but any innocent has nothing to hide if interrogated, which is why that one-' she pointed at Blown Speaker, '-looks plenty bored rather than scared. Do you have anything to say in your defence?'