What happened to this? It was such a good story, and then Vyolette had to write chapter 16, and then it never appeared. Please, PLEASE continue.

*laughs awkwardly* Sorry, guys. I really forgot about this. I've just been so swamped in schoolwork and life in general, I haven't had time to write in like a month. But I did participate in July's Camp NaNo, so I have quite a few more chapters ready to show you all. Like... twenty-six, I think? I'm not entirely sure. XD But either way, without further ado, here is the long-awaited Chapter Sixteen!

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Chapter Sixteen

Carnie wheezed to keep up to Topaz's swift pace as they rounded the next corner, but Topaz didn't slow. Carnie knew that he either had to keep up, trail behind, or stay out of his way when Topaz was busy raiding.

Then Topaz paused, eyeing the building to his left. It was a bland eggshell color as always, probably home to some sleeping Gem, because they were in the Gem's district of the town. But what had caught his eye was that there was a window left wide open about a story up, next to the rusted metal fire escape. Why not go in through the window, instead of Topaz having to make his own way in?

Waving at Carnie to follow him, Topaz crept over to the fire escape and began climbing it slowly, not completely sure that it would hold his weight. After scaling several steps, he concluded that it would hold. He motioned to Carnie once again, who had been watching Topaz with a slightly confused expression on his face. After Topaz did his best to explain to Carnie with only hand motions that he was trying to break into the building, Carnie nodded.

Carnie followed close behind Topaz, though he made considerable more sound on the rickety ladder than Topaz did. As another loud "CREAK" erupted from behind him, Topaz turned, holding his finger to his lips and said "Shhhhh."

Carnie nodded tried to move slower. Topaz shook his head and climbed on upwards until he had reached the open window. The room beyond was dark, as was expected. Creeping up behind him, Carnie peered in along with Topaz, scrunching up his brow and whispering, "You going in there?"

Topaz nodded.

"It could be someone's bedroom," Carnie told him, whispering still. "You could get caught as soon as you put your foot down."

"Or, I couldn't. I've done this before, Carnie. Stay put. I'm going in."

Topaz climbed over the ledge, sitting on the sill for a second or two before he made sure that there was nothing underneath him that he might accidentally step on that would alert his presence. He set his feet down carefully on the plush, carpeted floor and inched to the right, away from the window, and waited for his eyes to adjust to the light.

There a settee in the corner to his right, a few feet away from him. To his left stood a lamp and an armchair, but to his surprise, there were no other pieces of furniture in the room. Topaz crept through the room, his eyes searching for anything that might be of value. There was a vase sitting on a small end table near the armchair that he appeared to have missed in his first sweep across the room, but if it was put in such a precarious place near the chair and left out in the open that he thought for sure that it couldn't be worth anything.

Topaz left the room without seeing anything of importance that he could steal to go look in some other room of the house. He slid down the hallway and into the next room, where the door was slightly ajar.

That was a mistake. Dead-center in the middle of the room was a four-poster bed with a person snoring away peacefully. Topaz inched back out of the room, not wanting to risk the person waking up and seeing a stranger scrounging through their bedroom. He just made it out of the doorway and took one more step backward before he collided with something.

Topaz spun on his heel, and there stood Carnie, looking rather sheepish. Sucking in a breath, Topaz tried to retain his annoyance, but what had he expected? For Carnie to obey him and stay where he was? Since when did that ever happen? Topaz shook his head and motioned with his hands to Carnie to move away from the door to the bedroom.

Carnie did as he was told for once in his life and scooted back into the room they had come from, but not before he knocked over the vase. Topaz's reflexes kicked in, and he quickly reached to catch the vase before it hit the ground. He set it back on its place on the side table and turned to glare at Carnie.

"Sorry," he mouthed, his orange eyes apologetic.

Topaz exhaled silently and sharply, but said nothing. He instead briskly tiptoed out of the room and down the opposite direction of the hall where the sleeping person was located, not caring if Carnie was following or not. The next room he came to was another bedroom, this one with another person fast asleep.

Great, thought Topaz. But he was getting desperate enough to be out of the house and away from danger for the moment that he didn't care. Topaz threw a quick glance over his shoulder, but Carnie was nowhere to be seen. Swathed in blankets, the sleeping person rolled over onto their side, but made no more noise.

He crept over to the corner, where a dresser sat with many jewelry boxes scattered across its surface. Topaz eased open the lid of one and found only earrings; something he never bothered with during a break-in job. He closed the lid softly and moved on to the next one. This jewelry box he could tell would be more promising, since there was a small padlock fastened to the lid. Something valuable must be inside because it was kept under lock and key. Topaz lifted the whole box --which weighed no more than a large apple and was about 5 inches in diameter-- and, being careful not to shake its contents, tucked it under his arm and made his way towards to door.

Taking one step over the threshold, Topaz was about to let out a mental sigh of relief over not being caught when the person in bed abruptly sat up.

"No!" Shouted the person. "Pearl, don't go... " Their last sentence became an unintelligible mumble and the person, who must've been sleep-talking, lay back down again.

Topaz sucked in a breath of sweet relief. Too soon.

The sleeping person sat up again, eyes wide and very much awake now, noticing the stranger standing in their room. Topaz bolted.

He raced down the hallway, trying to muffle his footsteps on the plush rug so as not to wake anyone else.

"Help!" Shouted the person. "Burglar! Stop him! Help!"

Lights flicked on in the house and more voices sounded. But Topaz and Carnie, who had been standing in the living room, nearly scared witless, were already out the window, down the ladder, and disappearing in the night.

Yay! this is starting again!!!

YASSS! It's back! This is so good, Vy!

AAAAHHHHH YESSSSSS IT'S BACK! TIME TO GO REREAD EVERYTHING!!!!

~Starseeker 

Yayyayyayyayyay! More writing!

My first thought when I read Chapter 16 was that it was a trap. But no! Just Topaz being as amazing as always! 

KITTEN AAAAAAAAAAAH *Tavkle hugs*

Chapter Seventeen

"Hurry, Amethyst!" Larima hissed from somewhere in the darkness. Amethyst stumbled on, trying to obey. But she was so exhausted and tired and whatever energy she might've had before at the beginning of the raid was gone. Instead, after their close call at the Classification Governor's home, she felt like she barely had it in her to take another step.

Almost there... almost home... She told herself, then paused. Where is home? Where are we going?

It was only after Larima explained very clearly for what she claimed was the thousandth time where they were going (back to the Priceless Headquarters) that Amethyst realized she had spoken out loud. She was too fatigued to care.

Larima stopped in her tracks and spun on her heel, then walked over to Amethyst and wrapped her arm around her shoulders, letting Amethyst put most of her weight into Larima. Amethyst sighed.

"Come on, we're almost there," Larima told her.

"Really? It seems like you keep saying that, but we never are!"

As soon as Amethyst saw Larima's offended facial expression, she regretted her outburst. She shook her head. "Sorry. I'm just ready to call it a day."

"I think we all are. No worries, we're here. And I mean it, now." Larima and Amethyst --more-so Amethyst than Larima, probably-- broke into a grin at the sight of the rusted HQ tunnel entrance.

Larima tapped out the entrance code, and the grate slid open. No head popped out, however, which seemed odd. Amethyst felt a chill crawl over her body as she thought what that might mean --the Authorities had found the hideout and were trying to catch them red-handed?-- but dismissed the thoughts for sleepy paranoia. And her fears were banished when Carnie's head appeared.

"Back already?" He asked the two of them.

"I could say the same for you," Larima said, and scampered down the hole without another word. Amethyst followed more slowly.

They walked down the tunnel in silence, just the three of them, for a few minutes until they reached to porthole to the actual HQ. While Carnie tapped out the other passcode, Larima asked him, "So why are you back so early?"

Shrugging, Carnie said, "Paz and I were breaking into a house and there were a bunch of complicated things with that. Plus, we were almost caught. Like, just by the cat's whiskers did we escape. By that time, we were just ready to be done. Or, I was." He grinned sheepishly.

Larima barked a laugh, but said nothing.

"We almost got caught, too," offered Amethyst, since Larima didn't seem to want to say it herself. "By the Gem's Classification Owner."

Carnie's facial expression was priceless. Eyes wide, he said, incredulously, "What, for real?"

Amethyst nodded, and before she could say anything more, the hatch swung open.

Topaz gestured them inside impatiently. A quick glance around the room told Amethyst that it was only the four of them who had come back so far.

"How did it go?" Inquired Topaz.

Amethyst was about to speak again, but Larima shrugged and began talking: "Fine."

"Fine? What did you do?"

"Broke a few lampposts and..." Larima trailed off, probably realizing that they actually hadn't done much. They had broken the light bulbs, but then Amethyst had stopped Larima from trashing the Classification Governor's car and then the lights had gone on and they ducked for cover.

"And...?" Topaz prompted.

"And that's it," Larima finished, shooting Amethyst a look that clearly told her not to speak about the car incident.

"How wonderful," Topaz told her sarcastically, obviously disappointed, though Amethyst didn't know why.

"What did you do that was so spectacular?" Larima asked him, looking slightly miffed.

With a shrug, Topaz gestured to the table in the middle of the room, where a wooden jewelry box sat, a padlock firmly fastened on its clasp. Larima quickly walked over to the box and looked it over. Raising an eyebrow, she asked, "What's inside it?"

"We don't know yet," Carnie piped up. "We haven't had time to break it open."

"But we do now," said Topaz, striding over, picking up the box in one hand, and going to rummage around in his storage cubby, no doubt looking for something to break the lock with.

"Here," Larima told him with an exasperated sigh, holding out her special knife to him.

Topaz took in and wedged the blade between the padlock and the clasp, pressing down hard. With a loud "SNAP"-ing sound of metal, the padlock broke into two. Wrestling the lock off, Topaz lifted the lid to reveal what was inside.

Glittering, expensive jewelry. And lots of it. Necklaces, chokers, bracelets, and more lay resting inside the velvet interior of the box. Gingerly, Topaz lifted one of the necklaces out. It had an emerald pendant, overlaid with silver.

A slow grin overcame his features. He must be pleased, thought Amethyst. Topaz did not say so, but it was clear to everyone in the room that he was.

Topaz gently put the necklace back into the box and snapped the lid shut, startling Carnie and Amethyst, who had been looking over his shoulder.

"Enough goggling," he told them all. "Moldy will know what to do with these when he gets back."

"When will he get back?" Amethyst wondered aloud. "When will the others get back?"

Not sparing her a second glance, Topaz stretched out his wrist and began typing out a message on his comm. "Within a few minutes," he told Amethyst. A millisecond after he hit "send", Amethyst's own comm beeped on her wrist, startling her once again.

Digital text scrolled by and alerted all the other Priceless members who were still busy raiding to come back to Headquarters.

The four members of the Priceless already present waited a few more minutes in silence --Carnie going back into the tunnel to manage the outer porthole-- until the other members began slowly returning.

First came Sphene and Kyan, who had teamed up. They were closely followed by Cassy, Lolite, and Bloodstone. Moldy arrived last, and when he did, Topaz immediately pulled him aside. Probably to show him the jewelry box, thought Amethyst. Though she wondered why Topaz even needed Moldy's opinion or "help", as he had called it, since he seemed completely capable of playing the role of the leader by himself.

A little while later, after waiting some time, Topaz told everyone that if they had any stolen goods that they had pillaged during their raid, they were to set them down on the table, and then they were free to go back to their homes.

A sweet wave of relief washed over Amethyst when she heard those blessed words: Home. Her body wanted to give way and call it a night on the cold floor of the Priceless Headquarters, but her mind was still thinking sensibly, at least. Amethyst watched the other members as they handed over whatever stolen objects they had acquired to Topaz and Moldy.

There were several wallets, a purse, a fancy vase, a small padlocked safe, and, oddly enough, a single shoe.

Amethyst didn't even hear Topaz when he told everyone to go home and rest, because she just followed the small crowd of people out the porthole door without thinking. When the cold night air hit her face, her senses seemed to shake themselves out of somewhat of a daze.

There were no stars out anymore; a cloud must have drifted over the sky. As the vague shapes of other people faded into the darkness, Amethyst turned in the direction of her house. Or, what she hoped was the direction of her house. Amethyst half-entertained the idea to ask Topaz to bring her home once again, but she made her mind up in the end not too. Her feet had traipsed the path so many times back and forth from her home and the Headquarters that it should be easy to find her way home by now.

A few minutes later, Amethyst came upon the backyard gate leading to her house and breathed a slow sigh of relief. Then she climbed up the steps, into the house, and crept silently up into her room, ready to collapse with exhaustion.

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Nearby, hidden in the shadows of the night, two unmoving green eyes watched the girl enter her home. The creature belonging to the fluorescent green eyes, Peri, cocked his head to one side, then stole off into the darkness in search of the man.

The man hadn't come up from his hiding hole when Peri had mewed and purred near the opening earlier in the day. And the two little girls and the big girl had not come either when he had gone back to his closet home. And Peri, being the smart cat that he was, could see that the big girl was very, very tired now, so he went to go visit the man instead.

The man was always awake.

He trotted off in the direction of the man's hiding hole without a sound.