//------------------------------//
// Mini Chapter 2: Between Birds And Gold 
// Story: Harmonic Gift From The Stars 
// by DTavs exe 
//------------------------------//

The repairs at the castle were going great since yesterday’s explosion, Twilight moved the music box to her room since the studio was still being repaired, so far the worker ponies have been repairing the plumbing.

A bright brown earth pony, wearing a blue overall and a red hat tightened the pipes with a wrench meanwhile another similar but taller pony also wearing overalls but with a green hat, hammered another pipe to reshape it, their toned bodies covered in sweat for working all day meanwhile Starlight and Trixie supervised them.

Both mares were laying on the floor holding their heads with her hooves, continuously watching both stallions work on the plumbing, “you know Trixie, Twilight asked me to supervise the workers,” Starlight said without taking her eyes from the stallions.

Trixie clicked her tongue not making any other movement “yeah but the Great and Powerful Trixie is always willing to help a friend in need,”

Starlight kept watching the workers, “yeah and the fact that there are two strong stallions, working up a sweat has nothing to do with it right?”

Trixie cleared her throat “weeell, that might have something to do, but you wouldn’t keep your best friend from a show this good, would you?” Starlight shrugged, “I knew it… hey, is it true that they also have a pizzeria?” 

Starlight shrugged again, not knowing the answer when a glass filled with cold lemonade landed in front of her “Yeah, it’s called ‘Pizza dei Fratelli’ it’s very good, probably the best pizza I’ve ever had, but stop drooling on my floor or I’ll make you mop it after the workers are done,” Spike said while placing another glass in front of Trixie.

“Thanks Spike,” both mares said at the same time, while Spike went to the stallions and offered a glass of lemonade each.

The stallions removed their hats, grabbed two towels they had on top of their tool box and cleaned their face from the sweat, both mares were watching biting their lips at the show “Thank you bambino, you cano tell de boss-a de plumbing will-a be ready in a bit, isn’t it Lievito?” the taller pony nodded and drank the lemonade.

When they were done they cleaned their mustaches and gave Spike the glasses, “Thanks for coming right away Mozzarella, sorry for the sudden call,”

Mozzarella put a hoof around Spike and pulled him for a hug, “no problemo, mio amico, just let-a Twilight know, she is-a welcome to call us anytime, isn’t she Lievito?” which the other pony nodded with a smile.

“No problem Mozzarella and why don’t you prepare us one of your famous pizzas, later when we are at the ’ristorante’ , it will be a great way to celebrate finishing this reconstruction, wouldn’t it Lievito?” Lievito happily nodded and the three of them laughed.

Both mares were giggling like school fillies, Spike grabbed the empty glasses and put them on the tray, “why don’t you just talk to them? I’m seriously making you clean if you drool all over the place.” 

“You wouldn’t understand Spike, we don’t really want to date them but a show like that is fun to watch,” Starlight said and Trixie just nodded.

With an eye roll Spike left them there enjoying their eye candy, he went to the kitchen to leave the tray and then walked up the stairs straight to Twilight’s room to report the status of the repairs on the castle, he knocked on the door and he heard a “come in,” from Twilight, he entered the room and saw her looking at the music box like she had seen a ghost.

“Twilight, I came to let you know they will open the water line again in a bit… um… Twilight, is there something wrong with the music box?”

The young alicorn looked at Spike with a nervous expression, “yes… no… actually I don’t know, remember whenever we listen to a song, there is a green light and when the song finishes, the music box turns itself off and the light turns red?” Spike nodded, “well it didn’t turn red now, it’s still green and I don’t know what that means, maybe the water damaged it and now it won’t work anymore, maybe I shouldn't have left it outside all afternoon yesterday,” Twilight started hyperventilating, “maybe I should have protected it better, WHAT IF NOW IS RUINED AND WE NEVER LEARN ANYTHING ELSE FROM IT!!”

She was reaching critical levels of Twilighting, so Spike ran to her and did the only thing that came to his mind, he gave her a hug, “there, there, this is not your fault Twilight besides, you don’t even know if this is a good thing, have you tried turning it on?” she shook her head, “well, why don’t you try?” 

Twilight calmed a bit, she rummaged on a chest and got a shiny stone, Spike looked at it with confusion, she put it next to the music box and cast a spell on it, “this is a recording stone, I just casted my version of Bocafloja’s spell on it so it will translate whatever we hear, I would prefer a recording device since it will have better quality, but my new console might take at least another week to arrive, in the meantime this should be enough,” Twilight went to press the button but hesitated.

Watching her friend, Spike knew she needed another push, “I’m here with you Twilight,” she smiled and pressed the button, what appeared to be a string instrument started playing.




Twilight excitement was obvious “It’s… it’s alive, IT’S ALIVE!! HAHAHAHAHAHA” she said putting her hooves up.

Spike was enjoying the song, “hey this is pretty good, I dunno about you but it kinda makes me wanna fly around,” 

“Hey you are right, like the song is telling without words to spread your wings and let the wind guide you… wait, are they saying something? AAAGH the quality is awful, I think the spell didn’t recognize them as words, I hate this recording stones, they are so inefficient and archaic!” 

The song ended and for some reason, the music box didn’t turned itself off, it showed on it’s screen a symbol, two vertical straight lines surrounded by a circle, “Twilight? I think the music box is still on,” Twilight looked at the music box and confirmed it, “do you think we can press it again?” she pressed the button again, and a soft tune started playing.



Spike was amazed by the tune “WOW, this one is amazing, it feels like something epic is about to happen,” 

‘How can this be possible? What changed? What did we do different yesterday, the exploding console, the music box got wet… no that can’t be it, after that I moved it to the roof to dry and left it… under the sun…’ Twilight teleported her, Spike and the music box to the roof and just like she thought, the music box reacted to be directly exposed to the sun, on the screen a message in strange symbols could be seen.

[OPTIMAL SUNLIGHT SOURCE DETECTED - CHARGING - PLEASE WAIT - 95% -96%]

“AAAH! I’m an idiot, of course it will charge with the sun, that’s Energy 101,” Twilight facehoofed.

Spike tried to read the strange symbols, “but what does it say?” he asked, confused for the whole ordeal.

“I have no idea, but this just means that we might be able to listen more songs and more often, in fact as soon as the new console arrives I want all hooves on deck again,”


To be continued