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It had been less than a week since the famous Sparkledawn Glimmer Quartz, valued at 6.5 million dollars, had been stolen. Yet this particular security guard had a foreboding since of doom that a similar incident would occur again soon. He shook out the newspaper and neatly folded it up, setting it on the table.
There was increasing clamor online that whoever stole the Sparkledawn Glimmer Quartz would immediately be after the Emerald Stardustite and then some other precious gem that apparently completed a trio.
On the other hand, he thought this was all rather silly. Why had the police or detectives or anybody not find a single trace of the culprit? No fingerprints, footprints, nothing. The only thing of note were a few bird feathers. Actually, that wasn’t really of note that was just strange and irrelevant. Birds were kind of everywhere, right?
The headlines at the top of the newspaper read “Sparkledawn Glimmer Quartz Stolen! No Known Suspects!” and in a smaller subtitle, “Emerald Stardustite is Next?”. The security guard rolled his eyes.
The Museum of Approximate Knowledge was on high alert, security level 4 out of 5. The entire security team had been called in to make a plan for keeping the museum safe and locked to authorized personnel only. The security officer eyed the newspaper one more time, not looking forward to taking over the night shift and wishing he could somehow avoid it. The picture in the newspaper was indeed comical and he wasn’t sure if others were seeing what he was seeing in the picture.
The picture was of the front of the History of Mystery Museum that had previously housed the Sparkledawn Glimmer Quartz up until a few days ago. There were people in various states of confusion milling around and what looked like a reporter standing on the front steps of the building surrounded by cameras.
In the bottom right corner, almost out of frame, there was what appeared to be a goose staring straight at the camera. His body was facing forward but his head was twisted slightly to look back at photographer not unlike the meme of the child looking back and smiling at the photographer while a building burned in front of her.
He could almost hear a distant squawk of a goose in the distance now. And maybe large wings flapping. He must be imagining things.
–
The Emerald Stardustite was on ostentatious display as ever, lit with spotlights and a mysterious green glow from the bottom of the case. All other lights in the room had been dimmed.
The head of security had urged him to focus solely on keeping watch over the Emerald Stardustite tonight. The combined value of all other items in the museum amounted to less than half the price of this particular gem. Why it was here at this museum in the first place, the security guard had no idea.
But it was insisted that he must watch over it. At least this way the head of security could say that they took their most extreme measures.
He could watch over all of the security cameras at once in the control room, including this supposedly very special one. He was beginning to feel very silly just standing guard, basically doing nothing, in this particular room.
–
It had been about 3 hours into his shift, and the security guard was not going to admit to anybody that he was surreptitiously playing Sugar Smash on his mobile device. He had to stay awake somehow.
There was suddenly the distinct sound of metal rolling across the floor. The security guard pocketed his phone and took out his flashlight to get a better look. He shown the light on a fire extinguisher that had happened to come to a stop right in front of the display holding the Emerald Stardustite itself.
A checkmark had appeared next to “Free the fire extinguisher”
The security guard thought it was strange, but he had seen stranger. He picked up the fire extinguisher and looked for which location it might have come from.
—
With only an hour left of his shift, the security guard decided to go to the control room. He needed to prepare to switch out with the next security guard anyway.
When he returned to the control room, all of the camera monitors were showing static. Was there a connection problem? No, wait, one of the monitors wasn’t static. It was showing… a video of a line of cartoon geese crossing a road? Momentarily entranced, but then suddenly remembering that that one was supposed to be showing the camera feed of the Emerald Stardustite room, he frantically hit a few buttons, trying to turn the computers on and off again.
A checkmark had appeared next to “Play the geese cartoon”
The computers were taking too long to reboot. Although he felt silly doing this, the security guard knew he’d never live it down if this was indeed an attack and the culprit was on their way to take the Emerald Stardustite. He groaned and threw off his hat in haste, running towards the room that held the precious Emerald Stardustite.
As he ran down the hallway, he saw a glint of something green and glimmering in the dark. “HONK!” he dropped his flashlight and keys at the sudden loud noise. The items clattered to the floor loudly.
A checkmark had appeared next to “Make the security guard drop his keys”
“HONK!” Could it be… a goose?
Picking up his flashlight and pointing it down the hallway, he just barely caught a glimpse of… a bird wing? He ran closer and saw what appeared to be a goose running away and flapping its wings, the Emerald Stardustite clutched in its beak.
Before he could get close enough, the goose ran up an elaborately stacked pile of books and a chair and flew out the open window into the night.
–
After all of the kerfuffle and emergency alerts and arguments earlier in the morning, the security guard finally sat down with a sigh.
He peeked at the newspaper on the table with blaring headlines of “Emerald Stardustite Stolen!”
He looked a little closer at the picture at the bottom of the front page. It was a picture of the front of the Museum of Approximate Knowledge. There were people in front of the building looking around, seemingly trying to find any traces of what had just happened or looking to others for an explanation. There was one single white feather on the front steps of the museum. Undoubtedly, there was a goose in the corner almost out of frame but staring back at the photographer knowingly.