Frantic jazz exploded from the stack of speakers in the corner. Loose tools bounced across the tabletop. An ornate tranquilizer rifle propped against the opposite wall clattered to the floor. A tenor saxophone fell out of time and puked low notes.

Rarity took a sip from her teacup, her eyes sliding across the porcelain rim, slicing the bottom half of the room into white.

“Nasty business.”

She turned, and with a very unladylike roar smashed the teacup against the wall.

“I hope he dies,” she mumbled to herself as she recomposed herself and tightened the straps of her pack. All the anger inside her held together with mane ties and transparent glue splintered and dislodged. She thought about Sweetie Belle, the armed guards, the anonymous stallion who spun the grooves into their rifles--or did machines do that nowadays?--the tour guide who would not have a job tomorrow. She thought about Noir, and through no fault of her own she made a silent wish for his death. She hoped it would hurt, that his guts would spill out and hang there like fancy drapes. It was horrible, she knew it was--but at this point, it hardly mattered.

All her life she had wanted to do something big. Art could be death, and now she was about to find out whether or not art could also be life. Some expression.