"Good thing I keep a universal key..." I turned and rammed the door with my shoulder. It broke cleanly in half on my shoulder, allowing me to get in. The hinged part of the door remained upright, and I caught the other half before it fell. I leaned it against the wall silently. I stepped in, then fit the pieces of the door back together and placed them in the doorway. It worked well enough to where I didn't think somepony on the outside would think it looked off.

"Hey! What was that?" I heard a voice from above me. The inside of the tower was just one long, curving staircase with stone walls on both sides of the stairs. I couldn't possibly hide. I heard tapping as hooves started creeping down the stone steps.

"Ah crap... if anypony sees me then I'll be identified for sure..." I looked around quickly for any method of escape. I looked to the wall. Every other brick on the wall jutted out slightly. Meaningless to a pony, but life saving for me. I grabbed onto the bricks and scrambled up the wall. I ended up clinging to the wall about 5 feet above pony eye level. An unsuspecting guard came down the steps. He was a huge white unicorn, and he didn't bother to look up. Instead, he went straight to the door and started inspecting it.

Poor guy... I let go of the wall and started falling towards him. As I fell, I swung my right arm around. I connected against the side of his head with a crippling hammer-arm. He flew acroos the little space and slammed into the wall I had been clinging to. I hit the ground in a crouching position, my metal boots clicked against the stone. The guard hitting the wall had made quite a bit of noise, but nopony came rushing down the steps. I guessed there was only one guard in this tower. That most likely meant no eggs, but I decided to check just to make sure. I started running up the steps quickly, but stopped after the first few. I gasped a little as I realized that I was reaching my physical limits.

"Aww crap! I'm so exhausted..." My various wounds ached, but I shrugged it off and started up the stairs again, more slowly this time. Eventually, I reached the top of the tower. It was a large circular room with plain stone grey walls. In the center of the room, the was a small plant. I tilted my head curiously. "What the hell?" I crept towards the plant slowly, suspecting a trap. I knealt down next to the plant. It was a tiny unsuspecting thing. It looked like a tiny venus fly trap. It had to long green leaves extending from it, and the inside of it's 'mouth' was a brilliant blood red.

What the hell... I reached out to touch the little plant. Right before I made contact, the mouth of the plant sprung forward and snapped down on my finger.

"Gah! Son of a..." My finger had been sliced open, and a small amount of blood poured freely into it's mouth. I pulled my hand away. I inspected my finger, and the plant had bitten right through the metal mesh of my glove, taking a small chunk out of my index finger. I cursed under my breath and looked back to the plant. "Oh my... Crap..." The plant was now at least 10 times the size it had been when I had entered, and was still growing rapidly. The flowerpot it had been in burst open and a massive tangle of roots fell forward and reached out towards me eagerly. The leaves had grown into vines and were reaching out to bind me. The whole thing was only slightly taller than my waist, but terrifying as hell. I fell on my butt and scooted backwards rapidly. "Fuck, fuck, fuck Booby traps dammit! Shoulda seen that coming!" The plant's roots started scraping along the floor, pulling itself towards me. The large jaw snapped hungrily. "Dear god that's horrifying." I scrambled to my feet and jumped away from the reaching tendrils.

I am going to kill Celestia for not warning me! I quickly unsheathed the Buster Sword and held it out in front of me readily. The plant was still growing with alarming speed, now it was easily as tall as my chest. It kept pulling itself along the ground towards me. It reached out one of it's long vines, and I slashed about a foot of it off. The vine retracted and the plant shuddered. The creepiest thing about it was, it made no noise other than the gentle scraping of it pulling along the ground. The vine I had sliced off fell to the ground with a gentle thud and wiggled like a worm on a hook. It quickly withered away, and by the time it was gone the plant had already regrown. I sighed.

"Why does all the weird crap happen to me?" I dashed towards the plant, hacking and slashing wildly. Vines and plant flew in all directions as I sliced like a crazed weed wacker. The plant kept growing despite my wild swinging, and soon it was as tall as me. I was trying to get to the head of the plant, but the vines and roots kept getting in the way. It only proved that I needed to strike the jaw of the plant. Then, one of the roots that had slipped behind me wrapped around my waist and lifted me into the air. It slowly pulled me towards the gaping maw as more vines and roots wrapped around me, binding my arms to my body, causing my sword to cut my left arm slightly. "For some reason, I just can't bring myself to be afraid of the imminent death." The vines, as it turned out, were covered in small thorns. The tendrils wrapped around my upper body twisted and writhed around me, slicing me repeatedly and causing blood to pour out of my from inbetween the bindings of the plant. I was suspended above the plant's jaw now, and my blood fell into it's mouth and it gulped hungrily.

God it was gross.

I twisted against the plant, slicing the plants around my arms with my shark blades. I was driving the Buster sword further into my left arm, and I could feel it cutting into the muscle of my arm. Within seconds, the vines around me snapped away and I plummeted towards the gaping maw of the plant. I ripped the Buster Sword out of my arm and pointed it at the jaw. It snapped shut around me as my blade punged into it. The plant fell with me in it's mouth as we both hit the floor. The plant started quickly wilting around me, and I punched my way out of it's wilting head with my sword. I gasped heavily as I encountered the fresh air outside of the plant's body. I tried to stretch out my arms, but I gasped, dropped my sword, and clutched my left shoulder.

"Oh my son of a..." I cursed under my breath. My arm felt like it was on fire, and I knew what that felt like. I looked at my left shoulder, and it had been split wide open right above my bicep. Blood poured out freely and drenched my arm flowing off my fingers in little rivers. It dripped onto the corpse of the plant. Kind of ironic now that the plant didn't need it. I pushed the cut together to try to stem the blood flow slightly, but there was nothing I could do about the tiny cuts all over my body. I grimaced as I bent down to pick up the Buster Sword and re-strap it to my back.

And I still had to wait another hour to move to the next tower and fight whatever was in there if it wasn't the eggs.

Fun.

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I waited by the door at the bottom of the tower that way I could hear the guards when they left. After waiting for what seemed like forever, I heard a tapping of hooves and light scraping of armor as the guards left their positions. I sighed in relief, and after waiting for a few more seconds to ensure they had all passed. As soon as I felt the coast was clear, I pushed the broken half of the door out, then turned around and replaced it before taking off to the next tower. At this one, I sliced the door in half with the Buster Sword, making next to no noise with the eveness of the cut. I gently edged the half of the door out of my way, then replaced it. I crept slowly up the stairs, desperate to not alert whatever guard there may be to my presence. When I got to the top of the steps, I saw a large white stallion staring intently at a pile of dragon eggs.

Score! I thought to myself.

"Why do we take these?" The guard was mumbling to himself. I started creeping up behind him. "It doesn't sit right with me... maybe I should bring it up with Celestia..." I was feeling really bad about having to beat this guard, but I knew it had to be done. I raised the Buster sword so that the dull edge of the blade was above him. "No, get ahold of yourself Rhino. The captain of the Celestial knights never questions the princesses... I sense an intruder..." He started to turn, and I brought the edge of my blade down on his helment.

*TING* *THUD* The guard fell over on the ground, out cold.

"Man, I'm a horrible person. Hey... let's shave him..." I looked at the pile of eggs, then I realized something. There were sixteen eggs, all of them roughly as big as a filly or colt. I had one functioning arm and nothing to carry them in. "Oh crap. Brilliant planning genius." I looked around quickly for anything to hold the eggs in, but the only things in the room were me, the eggs, and the unconscious unicorn...

Wait! Unicorn! I sat down next to the downed guard and started focusing my void on his magic. It flowed slowly, but I still had two more watch switches, so I wasn't worried.

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One watch switch and two more blows to the guard's head later, I had finally fully absorbed his magic. I wrapped his aura around the eggs and lifted them up. Luckily, it was just like lifting one egg, so it wasn't that difficult. I waited by the door for the sound of the guards moving, and soon the telltale jangle of armor met my ears. The last watch switch was now. I had to go. After the last of the sounds faded, I pushed the half of the door out, not caring about leaving it there this time. It landed in the snow with a soft thud, then I was on my way. The aura around the eggs was giving off a faint light, which only made me more worried about being caught. Not only that, but without being near the guard, my connection to his magic was slowly fading. I looked around quickly for an escape, but there was only the main castle, the other two towers, and the wall surrounding the castle. I sighed heavily. Nothing was going my way so far. Then, I had another idea. I ran over to the wall and levitated one of the eggs about a foot off the ground in front of me. I placed one foot on it tenatively, but no matter how much weight I put on it, it held it's position.

"Perfect!" I levitated the eggs in front of me like a staircase leading up the wall. I ran up the egg stairs until I reached the top of the wall. I levitated them all back up to me and took off towards the main gates, planning to jump off next to them. It was really the only place where I could jump off. The only other option was off the wall and down the mountain. Luckily, nopony saw me running along the top of the wall, and I made it near the gate unnoticed. I turned to the outside of the wall, and leapt down to the ground. I grimaced and hissed through my teeth gently in pain, but I was able to stand up and carry on. I levitated the eggs down to me, then started walking off towards the entrance to Canterlot Castle. Just a short distance away, Esmerelda was waiting near the gate like I had asked when she first dropped me off. Luckily for me, she had found a shadowy spot near where I had dropped and fallen asleep. I crept up to her mouth and pushed on her nose a few times. Her eyes fluttered open heavily, and she gave me a sleepy smile.

"Oh, hi Sharky... *Yawn* You sure took a long time to get back... why do you have a horn?"

"Oh, because this." I levitated the eggs up to her eyes. Her eyes flew wide open and she sat up quickly.

"Celestia gave them to you?! How--"

"Shhh!!!" I warned. She clamped her mouth shut I waved her towards me, and she lowered her head down to me.

"Not quite, Celestia asked me to steal them." Esmerelda gasped. "Calm! Calm! Nopony knows I have these, and it's only a matter of time before they discover the broken door. You need to help me get these out of here now." Esmerelda nodded nervously. I put the eggs on the ground, and Esmerelda stood to her full height. She grabbed me and lifted me to her neck. I sat down comfortably and she flapped gently to get a few feet off the ground. She grabbed four of the eggs in each of her talons, then we were soaring quickly away from the castle. She took off to the west.

"Sharky, what's dripping on my neck?"

"Oh, I've got a ton of blood dripping from a gaping wound on my shoulder. It's nothing Esmerelda... No big deal, just something I'll get fixed in Ponyville."

"Are you ok?! Let me see your injury!" She tried to crane her neck to look at me. I wobbled and was almost thrown off balance because I was only using one arm to keep steady.

"No! Don't do that! I'm gonna fall!" Her neck snapped back forward. "I didn't say I was injured!"

"Oh, sorry Sharky.... Steven told me... Thank you for doing this for me... though you'll have to explain Celestia asking you to steal from her..."

"Right, well you see, Celestia needs to take the eggs to keep from looking like a weak ruler. If she were to stop, some of her enemies would think she's weak and start a war."

"That doesn't explain why she asked you to steal them..."

"Well, you see, Celestia hates taking them. I'm the first one that confronted her about it, and likely the only one that could even pull off the theft."

"Oh, that crafty old alicorn... She problably had that planned from the moment of the egg delivery..."

"Yeah, I think she said something like that... Anyway... I'm... feeling kinda dizzy... I'm going to rest now..." The world was turning slightly fuzzy through my vision.

"Sharky? Sharky! Don't fall off!" I had started to lean to the right, but at Esmerelda's call I sat back up quickly.

"Ugh... Esmerelda... I... I need to get to Ponyville fast..." Esmerelda nodded and increased her flapping speed.

I could only hope it would be enough.