The Heist at the Chocolate Factory.

      Thoren’s heart began to pound as the prospect of discovery grew nearer. He needed a way inside, yet the room swarmed with danger. Cameras disguised as sugar roses scanned every corner, and guards camouflaged as harmless nobles stood still as statues, with their alert eyes sharper than blades.

      Above, the chandeliers spilt relentless light, leaving no blind spots. Thoren’s yellow eyes fixed on the tapestry that separated him from the deeper halls and his mission. He would be a fool to try something brazen, for surely in that environment, he was not the only one with a trained eye. They also would know what they were looking for; he would certainly be caught. There had to be another way in, a distraction sharp enough to tilt the balance.

      His claws brushed a small pouch of Explodamelon mints he had taken from a careless guest while in the main room of the Ball. “Let’s hope this works,” he muttered, crushing the candies in one quick motion before tossing the bag toward the flames above. The pouch burst against a chandelier. The blast was modest, but the fire that spread upward was not. Smoke curled over the tables, sparks flew from the sugar sculptures, and the nearest chandelier rattled before crashing down with a thunderous roar.

      The ballroom erupted. Screams filled the hall. Nobles staggered backwards, guards lunged forward, and cameras whirred to capture the panic as smoke ruined their visibility. None noticed the shadow of a Kougra slipping behind the tapestry.

      Thoren advanced slowly, measuring each step and moving his eyes quickly to understand where he was. Inside, the air changed at once. The sweet aroma of cocoa was gone, replaced with the scent of oil, stone, and damp earth. Pipes ran like veins along the walls, with several valves around hissing faintly. Cartwheel tracks scarred the floor, carved by decades of crates being dragged through.

      However, the strangest of all was the silence and the presence of destruction where security would be expected. What appeared to be recently destroyed cameras hung limply from frayed bases along the walls, their red eyes dull and their cables cut. There were no footsteps, no humming of machinery. The most familiar stranger was the silence.

      “Too convenient…” Thoren muttered with his tail flicking with unease. “Either luck is on my side, or something’s already gone very wrong.”

      He advanced with caution as he started to hear some distant noises that made him increasingly attentive to the setting around him. The tunnel stretched deeper, splitting into two, then three, then more. Heavy doors lined the walls, some bolted shut, others hanging ajar. With each step, the halls felt less like a factory and more like a labyrinth, a fortress built to twist and trap intruders. For a moment, the sheer scale pressed down on him, but he forced himself to focus. Then he heard it again, clearer this time.

      Footsteps. Several, uneven, hurried. The sound of leather boots against stone. Faint screams, dull thuds. A hissing sound, like escaping gas. Then a scream cut short. It was like a frantic orchestra of people running and machines reacting to their movements.

      “This sounds like a job gone wrong…” Thoren thought, ears flicking to catch the direction of the sound. “…and I’ve walked straight into it.” he froze, stiff as a Miamouse. His whiskers pursed as he attuned himself to the situation; he may now be in. Faced with the confusion of these sounds, Thoren focused more intently, trying to find footsteps that might lead deeper and give him a clue as to which path was the right one to follow.

      He lowered his stance, claws grazing the stone floor as he crept forward, listening for the clearest path. Shadows of sound pulled him onward. He passed tools abandoned in haste: a wrench smeared with cocoa powder, a torn glove, a sprung chocolate trap with its bait smashed to shards.

      “Looting tools? This looks like a thief’s equipment.” Thoren muttered, inspecting his surroundings. Then he heard it: a faint, uneven heartbeat. Around the next corner, he saw him. A Grarrl guard in chocolate armour slumped against the wall, his jaw slack, his helmet caved in by a precise blow to the noggin. He was alive, but very clearly disoriented from whatever had put him into a temporary slumber.

      “Someone’s clearing the path ahead of me.” Thoren narrowed his eyes.

      He entered the next chamber, and a steel dart whistled past his head. He ducked, claws digging at the floor, but before he could leap aside, the ground itself gave way. The Kougra fell face-first into a pit, landing haphazardly as the air was knocked from his chest, experiencing a deep pain shooting through his ribs. Dust swirled around him as he lay there, debating his choices up until that point.

      Thoren groaned, forcing himself upright with his body aching and his vision swimming. When it cleared, he realised he wasn’t alone. Shapes shifted in the shadows, thieves like him, bruised and battered but still breathing. Some leaned against the walls, clutching wounds, and others rifled through scraps and gear, desperate for anything useful. How were this many of them in one place?

      One stood out: a lean female Zafara with a dagger strapped to her thigh and a cut along her arm. Her eyes, however, remained sharp, narrowed at him with suspicion. Thoren’s stance stiffened, ready for a fight, but the Zafara only scoffed. “And what are you doing here?”

      “I could ask you the same.” he replied back.

      She gave a sharp, bitter laugh and shook her head. “Probably the same reason you’re here. We were the team assigned to the west caves. Are you coming from the east side? We thought we’d chosen the right passages, followed every marker… but it was a trick. The corridor ended in this pit, waiting for us like a trap.” Her words carried the sting of a cruel joke, though her eyes stayed hard and unyielding.

      Thoren’s eyes swept the chamber. Dozens had been caught in the same trap, scattered like broken dolls. Some still breathed, others were too still. Then he heard it: the groan of a massive vault door opening.

      He snapped his gaze back to the Zafara. “Hey, that’s a good story lady, but help me gather what’s left. If we’re getting out, it has to be now. Something is moving up here, and it is making a lot of strange noise”

      “Don’t give me orders…” she muttered, but her hands were already searching the fallen satchels at her side. “But fine. We don’t have time to argue.” Together, with the Zafara leading, they picked through the bodies, looting tools and scraps of rope from the unlucky. The Zafara tugged a coil of rope free and tested its strength. Then, they climbed, the rope digging into their hands. With gritted teeth, strained muscles, and breathing hard, they dragged themselves out of the pit, collapsing against the tunnel wall.

      The corridors ahead twisted into darkness. The air pressed down, heavy with dust. Yet sounds still chased them. Footsteps echoing just ahead. A grunt. The whir of machinery activating. Someone was still moving forward, dismantling obstacles before them. At last, they stumbled into a chamber dominated by a vault door, or what was left of it. The massive steel face had been blown inward, its edges curled like brittle sugar. The floor shimmered faintly under the subtle glow of dim emergency lamps seemingly coated in glittering purple dust. Thoren crouched, dragging his claws through the residue. It clung to his fur like ash. His heart plummeted.

      “The Royal Purple Asteroid… it’s gone.” he whispered in defeat.

      Before he could think about what truly happened in that labyrinth, a series of conflicting sounds froze him. First was the stampede of footsteps, what had to be dozens of sets and closing in quickly. Then, a rhythmic “tick tick tick” coming from the walls, something was possibly primed and waiting to blow. And lastly, a heavy metallic groan, the sound of a door opening somewhere deeper down the line, which must be the exit that the true thief had taken.

      “Move now fool, there is nothing here!” the Zafara hissed as a new sound dominated the labyrinth: the cry of security alarms activating. What’s left of their cover was surely ruined now.

      They sprinted down the corridor, with shadows flickering red from the emergency alarms. A new trap sprang to life. Just then, a spear of sugar-glass shot out with the force of a crossbow bolt. Thoren ducked the projectile which grazed his shoulder. His fellow Zafara wasn’t as lucky as him. The glass slammed into her side, spinning her across the floor. Her dagger clattered away as she cried out, clutching her ribs. “Go!” she shouted while her voice was breaking. “Don’t stop for me! Get out while you can, you fool!”

      Thoren’s jaw clenched, every instinct urging him to drag his short-lived fellow along, but the alarms blared louder, and before him lockdown shutters began to fall. A mechanical voice boomed throughout the hall, “ALERT. INTRUDER IN SECTION B-718. LOCKDOWN IN EFFECT. ALL GUARDS DEPLOY.” His blood ran cold as he tore forward, chasing the metallic groan of the impending lockdown as the harrowing cry of the injured Zafara fell quieter as he distanced from its wake.

      “Delay the revelation of the Royal Purple Asteroid. Tell Mr. Truffle it’s secure. Distract the guests. Launch the fireworks now if necessary!” Thoren managed to hear voices ahead barking those sharp orders.

      Then Thoren realized: the ticking had stopped. If there were ghostkerbomb or otherwise planted behind them, they were ready to detonate at any moment.

      Thoren ran frantically, replaying in his mind the pattern of footsteps he’d heard back in the pit. That rhythm, that was the key to escape. He pushed himself harder, claws scraping against the stone, until he finally burst into the outer halls. He didn’t have time to think, only to push his body harder, forcing himself to escape. Yet his mind wouldn’t stop racing. It was all too convenient. The open access, the unconscious guards, the other thieves showing up… and now bombs set to blow, fireworks ready to launch. Were these all just distractions? Carefully staged diversions for the real heist?

      Thoren finally found a way out, a secondary exit, built in a stark, industrial style alcove. He slipped through and stepped into the open air. Glancing back, the structure behind him looked more like a cave than part of the factory. His stomach tightened. “So, these are the caves that Zafara was talking about… this was premeditated”.

      Before he could think of anything else, the night split open. Fireworks thundered overhead, violet sparks scattering brilliance across Neopia’s sky, and at the same time, explosions shook the ground. Thoren barely had a second to register that the cave he’d just escaped was now collapsing in fire and rubble.

      He bolted, lungs burning. Fireworks shrieked above, real flames roared behind, chaos twisting smoke, color, and heat into one dizzying storm. His thoughts spun: “So many thieves, so many entrances… every explosion perfectly timed. And the vault, emptied long before I ever got close. I wasn’t the main player. I was just a pawn in someone’s perfect game.”

      The Royal Purple Asteroid was gone. Stolen with precision. Not chance, not improvisation, but an orchestration. Someone had pulled the strings and left him chasing shadows. But his thoughts were shattered at a new sound as he sprinted toward the Haunted Woods. Not alarms. Not fireworks. Not explosions.

      A deeper rhythm. A primal pulse. The fur along his neck bristled. His sense of recognition struck hard: a unique heartbeat that he had discovered hours ago. It was the heartbeat of the Space Faerie. Each thrum was closer than the last, echoing like a distant bell. She was there, right after him, hunting. Thoren’s escape was no longer a race against guards or rival thieves.

      Something far greater had taken notice. And the worst part, this was only the beginning.

To be continued…