"You know who the burglar is?" Twilight asked, standing in the living room of 221 B Boulevard.

"No, but I know what he is," Phillip said. Twilight, Applejack, Rainbow, Fluttershy, Rarity and Pinkie had gathered in his home for a briefing bright and early the next morning.

"Besides a low, stinking rat?" Rainbow snarled, predictably and understandably angered by the burglar's treatment of her friend. Fluttershy's bruising had gone down, but her face was still a rather nasty purple discoloration, marked with bandages.

"Besides that," Phillip said calmly, spinning the knife that the intruder had left behind in his hooves. "He is physically fit, above average height but below average weight, green eyes, sandy brown mane and mud brown coat. Left hooved, low income, but can afford custom-made throwing knives, single, lives alone, smokes Blue Camelback cigarettes, face will be badly bruised after last night."

Even in the middle of a fight, he noticed all that, the mares reflected.

"Now here's the plan," Phillip said, producing a list. "These are all of the stores in Ponyville that sell Blue Camelback cigarettes. This stallion is a long-time addict: he'll have been buying them for years. I need your help to find the store that he buys cigarettes from."

"And then what?" Applejack asked.

"You bring me a list of names and addresses, and then I'll deal with them," Phillip said, gesturing into the next room. Looking up, the group saw a writing desk and filing cabinet tucked into the corner of the room. Dozens of folders, papers, photographs and newspaper articles were scattered on the desk, floor and walls, most of which had notes scrawled on them.

"Those are all the files from Monopoly's court cases," Twilight said, examining one of the papers on the floor. "How did you—?"

"There may or may not be a court clerk in Manehattan who owed me a favor," Phillip shrugged. "The point is, I've managed to establish that this stallion, whoever he is, is Monopoly's primary henchpony in this area, which makes him the missing piece; the thing I need to put all the dots together." He paused, looking around the room at the six mares. "Listen, Monopoly's beaten the rap a dozen times. The only way we're going to get him is if he confesses. And the only way he's going to confess is if I know everything. And that means that I need to know who this stallion is." He looked each of them in the eye. In each face, he saw the same determination reflected back at him. "Are you in?"

Six voices replied as one: "We're in!"

The clock was chiming noon when a stallion emerged from his home on the western side of Ponyville. A stallion with mud brown coat, sandy brown mane, and green eyes set in a bruised face. His cutie mark was of a silver barbell and he was sucking on a Blue Camelback cigarette, sending puffs of smoke into the air.

He thought of the pony from last night. The pony with the hat and vest and the terrifying expression, one of pure rage. A small part of him shuddered, but a much larger part of him desired revenge, both for the beating and for the loss of some of his "pension." The stallion growled to himself, clenching his teeth around the cigarette. If he ever saw that pony again...

He turned the corner and found himself staring into a pair of cold gray eyes. The cigarette was plucked from his mouth and ground out against the wall. "Those things will kill you, you know, Muddy," said the familiar, foreign-accented voice.

For a moment, Muddy froze, then turned to run. But he found himself surrounded on all sides by six angry-looking mares, including the pegasus that he had attacked last night. This time, there was no fear in her eyes; only a look of terrifying, steely determination. He looked back at the stallion, the gray eyes hypnotically freezing him in place.

"Monopoly. Start talking," Phillip Finder said in a voice that could have frozen the air around him.

The Starhoof hotel chain prided itself on its attraction to a wide variety of ponies. Hundreds of earth ponies, pegasi and unicorns from all trots of life went through golden revolving doors in Ponyville, Manehattan, Fillydelphia, Las Pegasus and Canterlot every day.

But for two Royal Guards to walk through the doors that evening, accompanied by a stallion with a gray hat and green vest and a yellow pegasus mare, was highly unusual, particularly in the Ponyville hotel.

Without a word, the strange entourage headed up the stair to the third floor and went right to Room 324. The stallion pounded on the door. "Monopoly. I want a word."

The door opened and Monopoly appeared, holding a martini glass in his hoof. "Oh, you again," he said in a bored voice, ignoring Fluttershy and the two stone-faced guards. "What do you want this time?"

"I want you to confess," Phillip said.

"To what?" Monopoly sneered. "To legitimately wanting to buy the property of a poor mare who has unfortunately and coincidentally had her home broken into?"

"That," Phillip said, advancing slowly, his voice lowering. "And to the money laundering business you're running out of Superior Quills and Matresses."

The martini glass fell to the floor, its contents staining the immaculate carpet. Monopoly's icy blue eyes widened in shock and disbelief.

"And to the bank robbery you arranged three months ago," Phillip continued, advancing with the heaviness and force of an oncoming thunderstorm. "The insurance fraud by burning down the Iron Storage. The illegal casinos. The gem smuggling in the mail department. The blackmail and extortion." He leaned in close to Monopoly, who had backed up against the wall. "The ponies you've had buried. I know about them all, and I can prove all of them."

Monopoly stared in growing panic at Phillip for a few moments longer, who remained as stoic as ever, though his mouth thinned a bit as the corners raised the slightest amount.

Finally, Monopoly managed to compose himself to some degree, straightening back up, but his eyes blazed with fury. This was a negotiation, but he already knew what the choices were. "What do you want?"

"Confess to everything and I'll petition for lighter sentence. If you don't," Phillip stated, his voice completely matter-of-fact, "I will personally throw you in a hole so deep you won't know which way is up."

For a moment, Monopoly looked like he might seize Phillip around the neck and add attempted murder to his list of charges. But then he slowly nodded. "Fine." He turned to the Guards. "Take me away then."

The two Guards stepped forward and placed shackles around Monopoly's legs and started to lead him away. As he left, he turned and glowered at Fluttershy. "You should have accepted my deal," he growled.

Fluttershy looked up at him without the slightest trace of fear in her eyes (even if one of them was a little swollen). She never said a word as the businesspony was lead away.

"Well," Phillip finally said as soon as he was gone. "There's still that silver vein. You're a rich pony, Fluttershy."

"Oh, I don't care about that," Fluttershy said with a small smile. "All that matters is that my animals are happy."

"And that you're safe," Phillip said softly.

"Hmm?" Fluttershy asked, looking up at him.

Phillip didn't reply, choosing instead to examine the stain on the carpet. "That's not going to come out," he muttered. He left quickly, leaving Fluttershy standing in the empty suite, looking rather confused.

Evening had stretched across Equestria. Twilight was stretched across her bed, reading a book, when there was a knocking at the door. "Come in," she shouted, trotting downstairs to greet her visitor.

The door opened and Phillip walked through. Immediately, Twilight could see something was up; his step, normally so sure of himself, was slower, almost hesitant.

"Can we talk?" he said softly.

Moments later, Phillip and Twilight were sitting in opposite chairs. Twilight looked at Phillip. Phillip looked at the floor.

"Something's changed about me," he said. "Something that I'm not really sure what to do about."

"What has?" Twilight asked.

Phillip bit his lip, an expression of uncertainty that only made Twilight more concerned. "I've always prided myself on my business being never personal. Nothing was ever personal with me. It's all just part of the job. But now...here..." He took a breath, seemingly struggling to come up with the words.

"When I got my crime sense from Fluttershy's cottage, I was...afraid. That's why my tail shivered. I was...worried about her. And then last night, when I found Muddy attacking her, I was...enraged. I was so angry that he would try to hurt her that I lost my temper and began to beat him."

"You've been angry before," Twilight pointed out. "Remember that time with Heavyhoof?"

"No, that was disgust and an act," Phillip said. "Anypony who would dare attack a foal is both the lowest of the low, and a coward. This...what I did to Muddy...was rage. I was so upset...so worried..."

"Because you care," Twilight said, suddenly beginning to understand.

Phillip nodded. Give him a case, give him a mystery, give him clues and suspects, and he was in his proper place, doing what he was good at. This...feeling, emotion, care...was everything that he wasn't good at, that he had no experience in: this was completely uncharted territory for him.

"Not just her; all of you," he said, finally looking up at her chest. "You are the first ponies in a long time to offer me friendship, to treat me as a pony. You all...you..."

Twilight looked at the stallion across from her and remembered when she'd first came to Ponyville: quiet and detached from everything around her, forced to enter the world of other ponies, where she'd never gone before, a strange, intimidating world with a set of rules that could not be learned, that had to be experienced to be understood. She smiled internally, even as she understood how difficult and embarrassing this must be for him, especially since he was so much older than her.

He took a breath and looked in her dead in the eyes for the first time since he'd came in. "You matter to me. I want to matter to you. I want to be...to..."

"To be a friend," Twilight finished with a smile.

After a long silence in which Phillip resumed staring at the floor, he nodded. "Yeah. I guess you could say that."

"Well, you're in luck," Twilight smiled. "I may have learned a thing or two about friendship over the years, and I might have a story or two. Spike?" she called.

"Yes, Twilight?" Spike bustled in from his position outside the room where he'd been subtly eavesdropping, eager to help as always.

"We're going to need some hot chocolate and those nachos that I like so much," Twilight said. "But first..."

"Way ahead of you!" Spike said, producing a quill and the a thick journal. Opening the journal up to a blank page, he began to dictate Twilight's entry:

Making friends can be difficult, even intimidating, for somepony who has no experience in that area, who may be confused about what they are supposed to do and how they are supposed to act. Somepony like Phillip Finder, who has never had a friend in his life until he came here.

But Phillip believes in responsibility, and considers it his responsibility to be a friend to us. And it is my responsibility, as his friend, to teach him how to be a friend. Friendship is a mystery, and a mystery that cannot be solved alone, but it is a mystery that has a very rewarding answer.

Author's Notes:

And that's the end of this story line. Hope you enjoyed!

And I'm thinking of calling this series, "MLP: Friendship is a Mystery." What do you think?

Josiah