The Alicorn of the Stars

by mushrumluver

Chapter2- Diamonds Among the Sapphires

The Alicorn of the Stars
Chapter 2: Diamonds Among the Sapphires

The stallion then approached Rarity and helped her get up from the ground. Rarity was relieved to the stallion’s timely arrival. “O thank you, thank you, thank you!” she immediately hugged the stallion as she was really happy that Twilight is safe and the avalanche is finally over and they can finally rest and recuperate. After saying her thanks, she gazed at the medium built unicorn stallion. His coat is sky blue, his unkempt blue ,with a white stripe, mane and tail, his drooped expression in his blue eyes and his cutie mark of an opened scroll with four yellow four-point stars on the corners of the scroll. “It’s like everything in him is blue.” Rarity thought to herself. “Who is this pony? What is he doing here?” she knows that it was rude of her to doubt their savior, but she just can help herself. “Twilight!” she suddenly remembers that her friend is still inside that cage of boulders. She suddenly rushed over and hopes to see Twilight okay and the stallion also followed her.

Rarity checked inside the boulders hoping to see Twilight alright. “Twilight!” she was relief to see her friend still in one piece after that explosion. She then quickly went inside and helped her friend get up.

“Ugh…” Twilight still feeling dozy, she was beneath the explosion. Twilight then shook her head to regain her consciousness and vision. “Rarity? Did you do that?” Twilight asked while Rarity is escorting her out of the boulder cage.

“Ohohoho...Twilight darling surely you jest.” Rarity answered back with a smile of laughter on her face “but it would be amazing if I were the one to do that…”

“If you didn’t, then who did?” Twilight asked again and as soon as they were out Twilight immediately sees the blue unicorn “And who’s that?”

“Why, he is our savior my dear.” Rarity proudly presents to Twilight their savior “If it were not for him them who knows what would have happened.” “Thank you, uhm…” Twilight tried to thank the stallion but she was paused to silence since she doesn’t know his name.

“Ovan” the stallion continued.

“Come again?” Twilight sudden struck with the stallion’s immediate response.

“My name, Ovan Starshine” the unicorn replied.

“In that case, thank you Sir Ovan Starshine.” Twilight, now knowing his name, thanked the stallion properly. “S-sir?” Ovan was kind of embarrassed to be addressed as “Sir”, he was not a knight of some sort and was definitely not of noble lineage, so being addressed as a “Sir” was kind of uncomfortable for him. “You can just call me Ovan, I’m not really comfortable with the Sir. Since you know, I’m no knight or some nobleman”

“Oh but you are, for us maybe.” Rarity insists “After all you did save our lives.”

“No really, that was nothing…” Ovan scratches his head in embarrassment.

“We are really grateful for your timely arrival.” Twilight approaches the knocked down Spike where Rarity laid him down earlier. “But that spell you used, what was it?”

“That? That was just simply a fire ball.” Ovan answered back.

“Simply just a fire ball spell?” Twilight skeptic about his answer, in all her years of studying magic there was no way that a simply fire ball spell would blast a pile of boulders into smithereens. “No need to be shy. With that level of magnitude and if you say it was a fire spell, then it has to be a level of a Flare ball spell.”

“A flare ball?” Ovan denying Twilight’s claim “No-no-no-no… I simply cannot cast a spell of that level, although I do know how to cast it but I just can’t.”

“Magic talk” who would have known that there was a pony that is also into magic as that of Twilight, Rarity thought while trying to wake up Spike while the two were arguing about what spell was used in their rescue and laughing at the two’s argument.

“I told you, given the level of power that a fire ball has, it has barely enough power of punch a crack on a boulder.” Twilight sternly objects Ovan’s claims. “Well I could show you how, but the thing I used is already in shambles.” Ovan points towards a pile of cracked red gems near the boulders.

“What the hay is that?” Twilight curiously approaches the shattered gem.

“It’s a broken catalyst, a fire Ruby to be exact” Ovan responds.

Upon hearing the word shattered gems, Rarity quickly rushed over to the pile of shattered gems “you poor-poor thing” Rarity caressing the broken gems while tears are falling in her eyes “You vile fiend!” Rarity hissed at Ovan.

“Ehehehe… Don’t mind her, she’s just like that.” Twilight was slightly embarrassed at Rarity’s behavior and labeling their savior as a vile fiend. “No worries, I get that a lot” Ovan assures Twilight that it didn’t bothered him one bit.

A few moments later, Spike finally came through “Ugh… Don’t worry Rarity! I’ll save you!” Spike thinking that the crisis is still ongoing but was soon disappointed upon seeing that the situation is already resolved “Is it over?” the group just then laughed at Spike disappointing realization. After taking a break, the group, with Ovan tagging along, left the area and soon reached the foot of the other side of the mountains.

---

“If only I wasn’t knocked out by that rock, I could have saved everypony” Spike, riding over Twilight back, still grumpy about being unconscious the whole time of the avalanche incident.

“It’s just isn’t your time to be hero yet Spike.” Twilight cheers Spike up. Twilight, Rarity, Spike and Ovan walks further up north after going through the mountain range.

“What were you guys doing there anyway? Ms.—” Ovan curiously asked the group, since after they left it was bugging him to see ponies passing through those dangerous mountains.

“Oh right! How rude of us, we still haven’t introduced ourselves. My name’s Twilight, Twilight Sparkle” Twilight responds while also pointing out those she was introducing “and this is my assistant Spike, this is my good friend Rarity.” Rarity slightly bows her head after being introduced.

“Okay. So Ms. Twilight Sparkle, what are you guys doing there anyway?” Ovan finished his question earlier.

“Just call me Twilight” Twilight slightly embarrassed by being addressed so formally. “We’re trying to find this Icy Sapphire mine just nearby those mountain ranges.”

“For?” Ovan follows-up his question.

“Pretty interrogative pony, if you asked me.” Rarity whispered to Twilight.

“You can’t blame him, any pony would be curious as to why would we fling ourselves to danger without any reason.” Twilight whispers back.

“You got a point there, but it’s still rude to ask so many questions to a lady” Rarity whispers.

“Sorry about that,” Twilight apologizes for the delay for reply to Ovan’s question. “I’m planning to use them for a magical experiment. And my friend here wants to use them for her new dresses.”

“I understand the magic part, but dresses?” Ovan’s right eyebrow rose.

“I prefer to call them ensemble” Rarity corrects the two.

“I don’t really know about that, I just use them as catalysts for my magic.” Ovan is somewhat skeptical about Rarity’s plan on the Sapphires.

“You and Twilight are so alike, magic this and magic that, you two should go out sometime.” Rarity jokingly answers after realizing that Ovan and Twilight are so into magic.

“Ahahaha. Don’t mind her, she’s just being Rarity” Twilight quickly interrupts in slight emabrassment before Rarity says something more “Now that I remembered, you used a catalyst earlier ago?” Twilight changes the topic.

“What about it?” Ovan responds.

“Well you seem pretty skilled in using those.” Twilight complimented Ovan.

“Well… I’m not really skilled but more of used to using them.” Ovan humbly denies.

“No, I mean it…” Twilight insists “Calculating the impact and magnitude so that I won’t get hurt while I’m still in the area, knowing how much of the catalyst you will use, that‘s just brilliant and amazing. To be able to pull it off, you must have lots of experience in that field.”

Ovan can’t help but smile after hearing Twilight’s compliment. In all of his life, that was his first time getting praised in his field. Usually he was belittled due to his dependency of catalyst in his spells. Most unicorns from where he came from were magically gifted so they can cast advanced level spells. For his case, he can barely cast an intermediate level, however he does know even the master level spells, their formulas and theories involved but he has no practice, which made him the laughing stock of his university. “Thank you…” Ovan embarrassingly thanks Twilight.

“I just can’t wait to start those experiments.” Twilight is really eager to test out the new things she learned from that book. “According to this map, it should be in sight right now.” Twilight pulls out her map and scans where they are and their goal.

“Let me have a look see on that map.” Ovan curiously peers into Twilight’s map “Well for starters the coordinates are somewhat off.” Ovan points out.

“But the book said—“Twilight argues.

“It’s more of the site was initially there but it was soon relocated into a more sustainable environment.” Ovan then draws out a circle on the new location of the site.

“But how can you move a whole mining site? And how do you know about that?” Twilight skeptically questions.

“It’s because I’m one of the ponies responsible for doing that. Although this was declared a mining site, the Icy Sapphires actually found here were only 3 out of the hundreds of gems that were rooted out.” Ovan explains and also justifies their reason for altering the nature of the mine “So we did an experiment, we altered the nature of the ground planted the Sapphires and Boom! Although it just only produces five gems per quarter, we managed to make Icy Sapphires more acquirable, but it was made a law that the gems here were only to be used for magical experiments and never for economical practices since it may derailed the system so it is a kept secret to most regular ponies, and Icy Sapphires are quite expensive so we can’t go busting everyone of those gems when we do trial and error.”

“That seems logical” Twilight slowly nods her head in agreement; but on the other hand Rarity seems to disagree with Ovan’s method of generating the exquisite gems. For her, it destroys the value, rarity and the exquisiteness of the gem itself.

“That’s just wrong!” Rarity objects “With what you ponies are doing, it just ruins the beauty and rarity of the gem. I mean this is a travesty.”

“I know, that is why we put markers on the gems, for one pony to sell a gem that is labeled under the Catalyst Abundance Propagation Program, it must go certain check points. If it is found with a marker, then it is either declared unsellable. Our team is tasked to ensure that these gems are strictly used for magic and no other else.” Ovan knew where Rarity was going at so he tried his best to ensure her that the sanctity of the gems is still kept despite their program to increase the production artificially.

---

After a heated argument regarding the nature of the CAP Program, the group headed into the new mining site. From the outside one could already see the chunk of rock that was magically enchanted to generate the gems. Twilight, Spike and even Rarity despite her objection earlier stood in awe of the magnificence of the just the glimpse of the generator. In the entrance of the mining site, there is a huge wooden arch with “NEO SAPPHIRE MINE” inscribed on it. Besides the arch there is a wooden board which Ovan pointed out as the rules of the place that must be observed upon entry, mining and exit.

Rule 1: All ponies must first register their name, address and intent before entry to the mine and must await further instructions afterwards.
Rule 2: All ponies must be escorted by an authorized member of the Catalyst Abundance Propagation Program at all times.
Rule 3: Each Pony can only acquire one Icy Sapphire in the process
Rule 4: All ponies are subject to inspection before leaving the area.
Rule 5: ALL ponies can only visit the mining site ONCE
Failure to comply may result to Arrest and Jail time for 6 months.

“There is it.” Ovan shows them the place. “We prefer to make the rules short since most ponies don’t really read top to bottom; we just show them what they need to know. Since I’ll be the one escorting you guys and I already know who and where you guys are from, I think there’s no need for the first rule” The group walked towards the giant generator in the middle but as soon as they were approaching the center, Ovan noticed something was off and paused for a moment thinking. There were no guards stations, not even fellow members, it’s like the place has been abandoned and yet the generator is still running.

“Is there something wrong?” Twilight asked as soon as Ovan quickly stopped walking.

“There is, this place can’t be this empty.” Ovan told the group while looking around the barren office shacks near the entrance, empty walkways. “Something must have happened.” That was only thing Ovan could think of regarding the situation.

“Well it was kind of weird seeing that this place is empty after the way you described it earlier.” Twilight also agrees to Ovan’s deduction.

“Maybe they took a coffee break?” Rarity tries to ease up the tension.

“Coffee break or not at least somepony must remain.” Ovan not in the mood of jokes after getting a hunch that something bad happened while he was away.

“Let’s just try and look around for some clues.” Twilight suggests.

As the group walks towards the center, they also braced themselves of what awaits them there, Twilight, Rarity and Ovan ignited their horns in case of surprise attackers and Spike sharpened his senses and readied his claws in case for an attack.

“You again!” a rough and raspy voice out of the blue suddenly called to them. The group was startled searching for wherever that voice came from. From the roof of the office shacks jumped three dog silhouettes. Twilight, Spike and Rarity immediately recognized the three. In front of them were three dogs all wearing different colored jackets but wearing the same gem-studded collar except for the one in the middle since that one had a gold piece hanging like a pendant in the middle of the collar.

Ovan, being the only one in the group to first ever see these dogs, stared at them top to bottom. He knew that they are the Diamond Dogs, a group of ruffian miners who would steal other pony’s land to drain all of its resources. He has read about them in articles and papers but this is his first in actually seeing one. “You do know that this is a violation of Equestrian laws.” Ovan asserted himself only to be laughed at by the Diamond Dogs.

“Hahahaha!” The one in the middle started laughing to be followed by his companions. “We are the Diamond Dogs and I say the gems in this place are now ours.”

“Yeah! It’s ours! So buzz off! Isn’t that right Rover?” the small one followed up while looking at middle dog.

“Ugh… Yeah… The boss said so…” The big one also followed-up. That statement alone ticked off Ovan , he knew that these are ruffians but he never expected these dogs to be like this. He slowly braced himself to pick a brawl with the Diamond Dogs

“You must be patient with them Ovan my dear.” Rarity calms Ovan down as she saw that Ovan was subtly casting his magic “They are really like that.”

Ovan started to calm down however when he saw that each dog flashed one Icy Sapphire in each of their paw, he blew it. If at least two gems where not present in the generator and after a few hours the generator will collapse and deactivate permanently. That was the main reason why only four Icy Sapphires were allowed to be mined within the quarter. The generator can only generate six at max. His year’s worth of research and work will be wasted by just some idiots and they could no longer rebuild one due to lack of resources since the program just started a few weeks ago. “Put Those Down!” Ovan charged his horn and Rover in turn cracked his fist as a sign of accepting Ovan’s challenge.

“This is perfect. Now me and my boys can get back at you ponies for humiliating us last time.” Rover declared with a huge smile and confidence in his face. “Spot!” Rover looked to the smaller dog “Fido!” he then switched to the bigger one. “Let’s show these ponies that you don’t cross the Diamond Dogs”.

“You’re gonna get now, the boss is pretty scary when angry.” Spot followed and he seems confident in their boss.

“You’re really going to fight here?” Twilight tries to prevent the brawl from taking place. “Well it’s either this or my entire project goes bye-bye.” Ovan justifies his actions.

“Well in that case” Spike assumes a fighting stance “Let’s bring it!”

“Oh come now, do you really expect a lady to fight?” Rarity tries to back away from the front line.

“Don’t worry Rarity, This time I’ll protect you.” Spike shielding Rarity from the front.

“That’s sweet of you Spike.” Rarity commends on Spike noble words.

“Don’t worry it’s four of us and three of them.” Ovan ensures that they are going to win since they have the number advantage. “We’ll see about that!” Rover snaps his fingers and on corner, alley and the mining site itself, came out a dozen of muscular looking dogs wearing metal armors.

“Oh great! We have the numbers advantage huh?” Twilight sarcastically comments about the sudden turn of events.

“Don’t have much of a choice do we?” Ovan replies. They can’t just walk away from this so fighting was their only option, to save Ovan’s project and also to acquire some Icy Sapphires.

“Any plans?” Ovan inquired the group as they soon found themselves surrounded.

“You’re the one who provoked them.” Twilight blaming Ovan for she was slightly annoyed of her fortune, not only she was in danger once but twice on a single day on different scenario.

“Well, I thought that-" Ovan tries to reason but was soon interrupted by Spike.

“Guys, this is not the time to have a little Lovers’ Quarrel.” Spike interrupts.

“We’re not lovers!” Twilight and Ovan, in synch, denies.

“Tch! Fine” Ovan with no choice tries to stir up a plan using a spell he knows that can instantly solve this problem. Although he knew of a spell that could send these dogs away, he didn’t have that much of magic capacity to do so. Before he scrapped that plan, he remembered Twilight holding on to lifting those tons of boulders earlier, maybe with that it will suffice.

“Twilight, you know a teleportation spell?” Ovan whispers to Twilight.

“Yeah, we could get out but it can’t be used to expel these dogs.” Twilight responds.

“Good! We just have to modify it a bit.” Ovan continuously whispers to Twilight’s ear regarding on his modification on the teleport spell.

“Not to the time to be keeping conversations.” Spike tries to battle of some of the thugs. Spike constantly swings his tail, swipes them with his claws and rolls up like a hedgehog and tackles them but despite his efforts, these dogs seems to have toughen up compared to last time.

“GWAHAHAHA! I guess that enchantment paid off” Rover proudly announced. “After that humiliation, we decided to take revenge on you ponies and how lucky of us to meet here and get all these precious gems at the same time.” The three confident in their numbers didn’t even move from their spot and just let their grunts do all the fighting.

“But that’s a little—“Twilight, skeptic about Ovan’s modification.

"Trust me, it’s going to work.” Ovan assures.

“If you’re done there, mind a little help here.” Rarity cries as she and Spike were getting being backed into a corner as she levitates and throws stones to the dogs showing no effect at all

Twilight and Ovan nodded and teleported to in front of Rarity and Spike at the same time and casted a force back spell sending some of the grunt dogs flying away.

“Thanks heavens, you made it.” Rarity thanked the two. “It’s still not over yet.” Ovan points out the dogs quickly recovering after being flung away in such a short time.

“Buy Twilight time to finish the spell I just taught her and this will be over.” Ovan instructed. Rarity and Spike relieved to finally know that there is a plan and both of them nodded in agreement of what they have to do.

The four of them split up, with Twilight getting a safe place to hide her casting, Spike accompanied Rarity and Ovan was on his own. The grunts also split up to pursue different targets thus reducing their number.

Ovan charged his horn while running from about four thugs. He then pointed his horn to the ground and a small lump of rock popped out in the middle of path just in front of the thugs, tripping them over and sends them falling flat one by one. He then follows-up casting a spell that raised ground of the surrounding area which traps the thugs in a stone cage. He knew that it isn’t going to hold that much and he ran quickly to aid Spike and Rarity.

Spike, on the other hand is curled up into a ball and Rarity uses her magic to toss him around and around towards the Diamond Dog thugs knocking them one by one but to no avail they just quickly recover after falling down.

“Ugh…” Spike feeling nauseous after being bounced off several times.

“Sorry about that Spike, you’re more effective than rocks.” Rarity apologizes.

“Hehehe… No problem…” Spike pretending to be fine but he is still feeling dozy.

The grunts, snickering, are slowly stepping forward pressing the two on a wall and confident that they are going to get their share of fun. Their confident resulted in their carelessness to not notice that they were already in Ovan’s line of sight for his spell.

The grunts’ feet were suddenly swallowed by a pink bubble. They instantly flipped with their heads now on the floor and feet towards the sky and slowly levitated giving Spike and Rarity the needed space to escape and regroup with Ovan. After levitating a few feet, the bubble pops send the grunts back into the ground.

. “Imbeciles! Can’t even catch a few ponies by yourselves” Rover lashed out after losing his patience as he sees his grunts are being single handedly toyed by Ovan. “You two! Tell those useless idiots that there’s a change of plan.”

“Yes Boss!” the other two nodded together and dug a hole and headed towards different directions.

“Almost there…” Twilight hiding inside one of the office shacks nearby. As she peeps through the window beside her, she can see what was going on outside from Ovan’s barrage of spells to Spike’s devoted protection for Rarity and Rarity’s struggle since despite not being the combat type. All she can do now is concentrate and hasten the spell casting. As she was nearing the end of the spell, a tragic realization soon came to her mind. “Oh my…” Twilight suddenly forgot the last part Ovan told her on how to finish casting the spell.

“Is the spell ready?” Rarity feeling a bit impatient as to why Twilight taking longer.

“I don’t know the spell should be ready as this rate.” Ovan is also wondering why.

“Hahaha, maybe she forgot the spell.” Spike jokes around unknowingly that his joke is the reason.

“Impossible, OUR Twilight forgetting a spell?” Rarity defending Twilight.

“I sure hope so…” Ovan worriedly replies.

Ovan, Spike and Rarity are hiding and creeping around the alleyways in search for any signs of those Diamond Dogs. To their surprise, it was like the entire place has been abandoned. No sign of any Diamond Dogs. Going out of the alley towards the main path of the site, they were surprised by Rover jumping in front of them.

“NOW!!” after Rover commanded.

The grunts that they were searching earlier suddenly rose from the ground surrounding them in an instant and behind Ovan came out a burrowed Spot holding a mace. “Look out!” Rarity cried out upon seeing Spot. However it was too late, before Ovan could even do anything, Spot delivered a knock-out blow striking Ovan down. “Now it’s payback time” Rover maliciously declares his intent.

“Now that pesky unicorn is out of the picture—“before Rover could finish his statement Fido appeared behind Spike and pulled up his tail and tying him up. “It’s the dragon’s turn.” Rover finished.

Rarity now alone, finds herself surrounded by the Diamond Dogs. “TWILIGHT HELP!!” Rarity cries out in hopes of Twilight coming out to her rescue. But despite her shout, Twilight didn’t show up like she always does when ponies need her help.

Twilight, on the other hand, sees the situation from her hiding place. “Casting an unfinished spell? What should I do? If I go help Rarity now, I myself am not pretty much sure I can take them all by myself. But If I finished this spell then I’m sure… but it will be too late by then” Twilight was at first in a dilemma, until she realized that it was her friend that’s in trouble; screw the unfinished spell, how can she even think of leaving Rarity there. Clearing her doubts, she charged outside to confront the entire Diamond Dogs with just her unfinished spell.

“You Stay away from Rarity!” Twilight demanded.

“Or else what?” Rover instigated.

“Or else this!” Twilight charging the spell and decides to blast it towards the lot. A purplish aura suddenly swirled all over Twilight and purple balls flicked in and out of her glowing horn. These balls soon grew bigger and fired themselves directly towards each of the Diamond Dogs. In just a second the entire Diamond Dogs teleported away to who knows where they will end up.

Twilight scans the area for any trace of the Diamond Dogs, to her relieve it was only them that are in the site at that time. The empty roads, the abandoned office shacks, the huge gem generator, the gems that the Diamond Dogs left behind; there was no sign of hostiles anymore.

“You- you did it!” Rarity still breathing heavily from her nearly horrifying experience quickly embraced Twilight in joy. “You did it! Thank Celestia!”

Twilight also relieved to see that it was over, although deep inside her, she was curious as to where she sent the Diamond Dogs but it didn’t matter since all she cared about that time is she was able to protect her friends.

With the sun setting and nighttime starting, Twilight and her friends just want to go back to Ponyville after a long day. So many have happened within just one afternoon, from the avalanche to this, they just wanted to get a good night sleep. But after realizing that it will take them an hour go back and with Ovan still lying unconscious.