Episode 14 - The Will of D
Ponyville was quiet for a change, with a warm spring breeze making the streets comfortable to walk through, but still not inviting enough to lure everypony out of their houses. There was no monster rampaging through the streets today, and with nearly a month since the last one had appeared the citizens were starting to think that maybe their ordeals were over.
They would be wrong, of course. In the back of a fairly busy shop in the trade district, a grey stallion was prising cracked gems out of rings and tiaras. It would take a master jeweller to cut a new stone that fit perfectly, probably costing more than the piece would ever be worth. The stallion would only bother with them if they were part of a job lot, a box mostly not worth the effort of sorting through for somepony’s next of kin, and then he’d probably sell a bag of fractured and scuffed stones for a couple of bits to a jeweller who could do the hard work of cutting them down to whatever part in the middle was undamaged. Worth more money were the rings, settings, and other pieces of metal. Though they weren’t jewelry without their stones, the rings could still be melted down and sold as scrap gold.
Now, he didn’t need to melt them down. He prised out a flawed ruby, and selected an octahedral diamond about the same size. He pressed it firmly into the setting, not caring if it even fit. But the crystal flowed into the setting, taking just the right shape to fill the gap and becoming a perfect part of the ring. It was almost like the shape-shifting gem was alive.
Which it had been, until the day before. Not too long ago, that stone had been the unicorn colt Lucky Break, whose luck at cards hadn’t served him well even when he used magic to cheat, and he’d ended up owing a lot of money to a certain shop owner. The debt was almost paid now, but the white stallion knew that to set a proper example, he’d need to take back the ring he’d sold Lucky, and probably make the colt’s special somepony disappear as well.
He could do that. He’d always had a good business sense, and skill at making other ponies a little nervous. Just to get in touch with the Seller he’d needed to raise ten thousand bits, but the magic crystal he’d obtained was easily worth it. There were as many diamonds as fools in the town now, and there really was one born every minute.
Rarity would normally be the first to get angry about that kind of manipulative trader. He was selling beautiful things, but cared only about the money and not at all about the beauty. She couldn’t be angry, though, because when her friends had discovered that somepony was going around turning others into gems, Rarity was already trapped deep underground. She’d gone mining, and found that the Diamond Dogs who inhabited some tunnels outside the Ponyville city limits were getting quite hostile to ponies.
They wouldn’t let her go, and they wouldn’t return the Element of Harmony they’d taken from her. They were angry because some of their young, and even some of their warriors, had been transmuted into diamonds by a magic they didn’t understand. Rarity had managed to get the story out of them easily enough, they’d been all too eager to show they had a sensitive side and share their own tales of woe as soon as she started the ball rolling by crying about the situation they’d thrust her into. They couldn’t tell the difference between one pony and another, she was sure, because of the way they’d kept on just calling her “pony” until she was forced to go for hysterics to catch their attention. The same trick had got her out of her cell to more comfortable quarters, though they still kept an eye on her whenever they could, and they wouldn’t reveal where they’d hidden her Element.
It helped that the Diamond Dogs weren’t very smart, or at least the leaders of this group weren’t. It helped more that they were all too aware of this, and all too willing to accept what she said if she implied it would be stupid to disagree. Nopony wanted to look like an idiot. She could make it quite easy for them to feign a higher intelligence simply by agreeing with what she said, or by not admitting they didn’t understand when she explained why she couldn’t dig for gems, or pull a cart, or wear manacles, or count gems without a comfortable seat.
She heard the sound of a key in the lock, and the heavy metal door creaked open. Rarity wasn’t in a jail cell any more, but she was still a prisoner in the counting room. She hoped having a visitor might mean they’d reconsidered and they were going to let her have her collar back, so she could call for help, though she knew it wasn’t likely. It was probably just Fido again, coming to check on her progress. He’d ask how many gems she’d counted, and how many were still to count, and then she’d explain why she couldn’t answer that and he’d sulk off, and then half an hour later he’d be back to ask the same question again.
This time, he didn’t have a question to ask. He had something in his hand, small and purple and struggling. The dog made a powerful underarm throw, which hit the counting table and sent gems flying in all directions.
“Don’t try to escape, Pony! No more chances,” he snarled, and then slammed the door and walked away,
“Sorry, Rarity,” Spike groaned as he pulled himself upright. The little dragon’s body was bruised, though the natural colouring of his scales made it less obvious. “I couldn’t get the Element back.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Rarity pulled him into a close hug. She always maintained an aloof air, but whatever else he did to help her, Spike was her friend. Seeing that he’d been so badly hurt trying to do what she asked made her feel like a monster, and she resolved to always think more about his feelings in future. “We chose to take the Elements of Harmony, and they chose us, we’ve got good reasons to fight monsters. But nopony said you’ve got to get involved, I should have asked you to escape and find the others instead.”
“I can’t leave you here!” he puffed out his little chest, “I’m supposed to protect you, and I’m not going to shirk my duty!”
“I shouldn’t have got you caught too, Spike, I’m so sorry. You don’t need to do what I say when it’s dangerous, your safety must be more important than your feelings for me, for anypony.”
“H–hey!” Spike stammered, and a deep blush rose to add to the constellation of colours already decorating his body, “It’s not because I got a crush on you, I’m supposed to be your bodyguard! I– I mean, I haven’t got a crush on you,you’re one of my best friends, I just thought maybe you thought– when you said feelings–”
“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t assume,” Rarity raised an eyebrow. She knew the little dragon must be really worried if he’d admitted something like that, even if he didn’t really intend to. She’d known about his nascent emotions ever since they met, but always been able to see that he was making an effort to be discreet. “But… you’re Twilight Sparkle’s number one assistant, not mine, and there’s a big difference between an assistant and a bodyguard.”
“Oh, yeah… Yeah, I just said the wrong thing. Was that too weird?” But now he seemed almost as evasive as he had when talking about his feelings, if a little less nervous. Rarity was good at reading expressions, even from a baby dragon, and she could see there was a secret hovering behind those big eyes. Not a secret to be ashamed of, or not something he thought he should be ashamed of. This was something Spike was proud of and wanted to share, and it was taking all his self control not to boast, so it had been easy for something to slip out when he was desperate to find something less embarrassing to say.
“A bodyguard, Spike?” she smiled, “I’m sure if you had such a lofty responsibility, I’d have to treat you a little more kindly. You can trust me, can’t you?” She knew there were more important things to deal with right now, like being locked in a cave without her Element. But Spike, who she’d always thought of as the most caring, obedient little friend, had a secret, and the incongruity of it all was too much to ignore.
“Well…” he started, “I’m not supposed to let somepony know, she said that’s important. But if you promise not to tell the others? Maybe…” Spike was uncertain, that much was sure, but he really wanted to share this secret.
“Did Twilight ask you to look after me? I know my magic’s not as strong as hers…”
“Oh no, I certainly can’t tell Twilight. She trusts her friends too much, she’d never be able to keep the secret. At least… that’s what the Princess…”
“Why don’t you start at the beginning?”
In the Golden Oak Library, six ponies were discussing plans, and none of them knew the secret. Rarity wasn’t there for a change, but they had welcomed Heart Flush in the hope that seeing something done would ease her worries about her coltfriend. All the problems with the Diamond Dogs, and at least one pony going missing whom they claimed not to have seen, had pushed thoughts of Spike’s secret right to the back of Twilight’s mind.
“We need to know who this white pony is,” Twilight said firmly, “If Lucky Break’s book turned into a diamond, there’s a good chance he got turned into a diamond as well. Just like the puppies. I think the Diamond Dogs are innocent in this, just taking out their anger about one pony on all of us, so finding the dopant has to be our priority.”
“Right,” Applejack nodded, “I’m not too happy about it, though. I wish Rarity was here.”
“She’ll be back soon enough,” Pinkie grinned confidently, “We just need to do a lookup, right?” and without another word she stood up from the table and let her eyes sink closed. It took her seconds to sink into a lucid dream, the library where she stored all the information she’d heard about every pony she’d ever met, and where Luna had provided a whole lot more information. As soon as it was clear she was ready, Twilight began the usual ritual.
“Keyword: Diamond,” Twilight spoke firmly, giving Pinkie the anchor to reality that she needed in order to do her research.
“Twenty-four thousand, six hundred and nine results,” Pinkie answered in a hollow, emotionless voice that was a stark contrast to her normal demeanour. For all the times they’d done this, the others still couldn’t get used to how strange she sounded while talking in her sleep.
“Keyword: White or grey pony,” Twilight added, “That should narrow it down a bit.”
“Four hundred and eighty-six results.”
“What else?” Twilight turned to the others, “I thought that would narrow it down a bit more.”
“Lucky borrowed money to buy the ring,” Heart Flush pointed out, “How many ponies are there who offer credit on a diamond?”
“Right,” Twilight nodded, “Keyword: Loans.”
“Seventeen results.”
“Not that many, it seems. Anything else we can say to narrow it down?”
“I think Lucky said…” she paused just a moment to choke back a sob, “Said we can trust the jeweller, because after we’d been to the shop they met at a bridge game. Lucky’s normally a pretty good judge of character over cards, but if somepony helps him clean out the other pair he’ll be happy to trust them in business too.”
“Keyword: Cards,” Twilight reiterated for Pinkie’s benefit.
“One result. Diamond Dopant, Honest Joe.”
“I had a hunch it might be that guy,” Applejack muttered, “Right, wake up Pinkie. We got us a monster to beat.”
A long time before, rather than six Champions of Harmony there had been two. Celestia and Luna, sisters as close as anypony had ever been. In those days, they had still been looked down on because their parents were of different tribes. It was strange for sisters to be born as a pegasus and a unicorn, even more so when they were twins. They looked as different as any ponies could be, and others sometimes didn’t treat them so fairly because they were unusual. But they were never really bullied as such, and isolation from other fillies their age had only drawn the sisters closer together, made them able to anticipate each other’s thoughts so that a conversation between them was almost like talking to yourself.
Their closeness had unlocked the Elements of Harmony, six crystals purified by a magic tree, and when they’d brought the six together they had received the seventh, special Element: the Driver. And then there was no discrimination, because they had become alicorns and princesses as they followed the path to defeating the Gaia Circus. They were both alicorns now, and held in higher regard than anypony in Equestria. But still, a few rogue agents sought to challenge them. Today was one of those days.
“IMPACT!” they heard the grating screech of the Memory before they saw its user. The stallion they’d first suspected, Awakened Force. He must have painted over the Memory Scar somehow to give an impression of a normal cutie mark. The two sisters looked at him, and a few unspoken fragments of a plan passed between them. They weren’t technically in the same place; Luna was planning decorations for the castle, while Celestia was on her way back from Ponyville after a fruitless search for the dopant. But they were wearing the Driver and its shadow replica, and they were closely enough attuned that they could see through each other’s eyes, hear each other’s thoughts, and even use each other’s magic.
“LUNARᏔTRIGGER!” the Driver sang as they slotted in their Memories simultaneously. They pulled off a small cannon that had appeared next to the Driver on Celestia’s flank, and fired a burst of a dozen shots. The rounds curved in the air to meet their target, but did almost nothing to stop what was barely more complex than a solid hunk of muscle charging towards them. The impact knocked them off their feet, and maybe broke a bone as easily as it smashed through the trees on the edge of the Everfree Forest. Before they could even get to their hooves, it was charging past them, deeper into the forest. The two Champions realised at the same time that he was heading for Luna’s sleeping body, while her heart had joined with Celestia’s form.
“HEATᏔTRIGGER!” the next shower of bullets were burning, singeing the monster’s retreating back like tiny suns, but they didn’t slow it down any and the sisters were acutely aware that they risked setting the whole forest ablaze.
Luna returned to her own body, and desperately looked around for somewhere she could hide during the upcoming battle. The castle was supposed to prevent anything like this happening, but it wasn’t finished yet. A huge torpedo of monster muscle leapt towards her out of the trees, and all she could do was cower back and hope that the incomplete walls provided some measure of protection.
The dopant stopped in mid air. It looked like a bullet had hit it hard enough to bring it to a halt, but the shot didn’t just vanish. It ricocheted off the walls and came back to strike the dopant, again and again. And then it was standing between Luna and the dopant, a tiny guardian. At first glance it could have been a forest creature; two legs, a head, and a tail. But its entire body was made from a grey crystal shaded ever so subtly with lavender highlights, and at the tip of the tail was what was recognisably a Gaia Connector. It was a sculpture, maybe, made from splitting and jointing shards of a Memory. But who would do such a thing? And why would the Memory want – assuming that it had wants, even if it was clearly alive – to protect Luna?
“It seems Skull’s prophecy is fulfilled,” Celestia called from the doorway, “The eighth Element, the bodyguard the Tree of Harmony created to preserve the others.” Luna didn’t know how to respond. She just held out a hoof, and the mechanical creature leapt closer. As she caught it, it folded up so all of its crystal pieces were parallel, taking the shape of a Gaia Memory that was larger than most, but otherwise didn’t look too different. There were no other obvious courses of action, so she reached towards the Driver on her haunch.
“FANGᏔJOKER!”
“There’s eight Elements?” Rarity wrinkled her brow in confusion, a millennium later, “So why do we only get six? Seven, I mean, with the Driver.”
“When they finished sealing the Gaia Fountain, the sisters sealed away the Elements too, to be ready for the next generation,” Spike struck a dramatic pose as he recounted the tale, though he still hadn’t given any indication of why Celestia would have told him this tale. “But they couldn’t. Fang was alive, they treated her like a pet almost. A living Element deserved better than being stuck in a castle for hundreds of years, or being re-absorbed into the Tree. They thought it would be cruel to return it, so they found a spell that would let the last Element turn into a real living thing. A dragon.”
“So you’re…” Rarity started, but she didn’t even know where the question was going.
“Fang was a living Gaia Memory,” Spike admitted, and he seemed a lot less excited about that than he had the rest of the tale, “She was a hero, maybe, but she wasn’t a real dragon until the Princesses made her one. They said she was kind of conflicted about that, and that’s a feeling I know too well. And then she went to the Dragon Lands, she fell in love, they had an egg. An egg that didn’t hatch for hundreds of years. I don’t know what happened to her after that, Celestia always said I wouldn’t want to know. But eventually a pony came along with magic that could hatch the egg, and Celestia said that right then, she knew who would be the next Champion of Harmony.”
“You were the egg? And Twilight… wow.”
“Right. But Celestia was worried. There was still some Gaia Magic in the egg, so it hatching meant the Gaia Fountain had gotten unsealed. And there were only seven Elements, not eight, because Fang was alive now. So she trained me to protect the Element Bearers, like my mother should have done. A half-size dragon instead of a living Memory. I’ve been looking forward to it my whole life, and I couldn’t even say anything to Twilight because if she already knew how the Elements worked, she wouldn’t have done the right thing to awaken them. You have to discover harmony with your friends, not just act it because you know what powers it’ll give you.”
Rarity sat back in silence. It was a lot to take in, and for a while she wondered if it was just a tall tale. But then she looked at Spike’s eager expression, and thought back to all the times he’d said nothing when he could have made a witty comment. She knew he’d been keeping a secret now, and it made sense that he couldn’t tell them. She could imagine it would have been a lonely life, and she felt that Spike was due a big reward once they got out of here.
“Honest Joe?” Rainbow Dash asked, though there was no way they could mistake the white stallion. They’d all spoken to him at some point in the past, and knew his reputation of being able to lay his hooves on whatever you wanted, as long as the price was right. It was no surprise he’d started selling rings, or even that he had the contacts to find a Gaia Memory, though that was one issue they’d have to ask more about once the fight was done.
“What can I do you for?” he grinned, turned around on the road and was already wondering if he could make a quick sale. He seemed as charming as ever, the rogue who you couldn’t help trusting.
“We’d like to know where Lucky Break is,” Twilight started diplomatically.
“Haven’t seen him in a couple of days.”
“Is that true?” Twilight stared, trying to figure out if there were any redeeming qualities, if it was even worth trying to negotiate here.
“Hey, ‘honest’ is practically my middle name!”
“Show us your cutie mark,” Dash demanded, patience rapidly running out.
“Why?”
“Because you’ve got a scar from a Gaia Memory,” Applejack stepped forward, “Those things will mess up your mind, as well as putting everypony who trusts you in danger. You can give it up now, and if you don’t that’s your problem.”
“I never hurt anypony,” he answered, “Only them that didn’t pay their debts or tried to get one over on me, and they got to deal with the consequences if they want to rip off an honest trader.”
“What about the Diamond Dogs?”
“What about them? They’re not ponies. They should keep out of Equestria if they don’t want to follow our traditions.” He just about finished the sentence before a pink hoof slammed him across the muzzle.
“That’s horrible!” Pinkie yelled, “I bet you’re thinking earth ponies are better than everypony else as well, aren’t you? That’s where your phoney honesty comes from, this salt of the earth thing? You disgust me, and it’s time to face justice.”
Behind her, Applejack had already taken her cue. The Driver shimmered into existence on Pinkie and Fluttershy’s chests, awaiting a second Element.
“Wait, wait!” Honest Joe raised his hooves, “I don’t want to fight. I got carried away, you don’t know what it’s like, I’m not like that normally, it’s this thing.” He produced a Gaia Memory from the pocket of his cloak, and held it out towards the Champions. “I’m not the problem here, though. You haven’t seen the real monster yet.”
“Don’t worry,” Fluttershy came closer at last, reaching out to comfort the anxious earth pony, “We’ve come across this before, we can break it and you’ll be yours–Aaah!” the comforting speech turned into a yelp of panic as Honest Joe jabbed savagely with the sharp metal tip of the Gaia Memory. Maybe he was trying to use it as a blade, but a more cynical observer might think he was aiming toward the empty tube on Fluttershy’s Driver. Nopony knew what that might do, but they really didn’t want to find out. As they jumped back, he was already ramming the Memory into his own flank under the cloak, and crystals spread across his body as if he’d been walking through a snowstorm.
“DIAMOND!” Only Pinkie Pie reacted quickly enough to try and stop him transforming, but she was still lunging through the air when Honest Joe’s body accepted the Memory and it vanished from sight. For her trouble, she got a hoof between the eyes. He didn’t hit her hard, more of a glancing blow, but as Pinkie tried to get to her feet again she found that her legs were weak and shaking. She turned to look at her friends and found that moving her head even a couple of degrees required a lot of effort. It was as if her body just wasn’t responding to her will. The whole process took seconds, and the tense silence was filled by a dull ‘pop’ as the air rushed in to fill the space formerly occupied by a fully grown pony. Now there was just a gem, perfectly pure and almost as wide as her eye. Worth more in a strictly fiscal sense, but any of her friends would have been happier to have Pinkie there.
“KINDNESSᏔHONESTY!” Fluttershy’s eyes narrowed. For a moment all her patience evaporated and the only emotion in her heart was anger, and then she was pounding the Element of Kindness into the Driver, ready to kick Honest Joe into the middle of next week.
“KINDNESSHONESTY: Maximum Drive!” They wasted no time in clicking in the Memories, calling on their most powerful attack immediately. Fluttershy concentrated all of her feelings of anger and disappointment, disgust even, and poured them out through her stare. But all she could see when she looked at the dopant’s crystalline body was myriad reflections of herself and her friends. She couldn’t even make out Honest Joe’s eyes to focus the stare on. Applejack’s muscle memory took over anyway, and she kicked out hard with two hooves, putting all the combined strength of two ponies into a single blow.
The dopant soared through the air and crashed to the ground, but started walking away with no sign of discomfort. He called back over his shoulder: “I’m made of diamond. Attacks like that won’t hurt me. Maybe you’re not as tough as he said.”
Flutterjack stepped forward uncertainly, legs trembling from the force of the blow. They couldn’t believe he’d just walked away from a kick that would have reduced an apple tree to matchsticks. They couldn’t let him get away, though. They charged across the clearing and bucked again. This time there wasn’t as much force behind the blow, but it was still easily enough to lift the crystal pony into the air. When he came crashing down, with no sign of injury to that outer layer or crystal, Flutterjack was standing right there. He was laughing, but he hadn’t seen what they were aiming for.
The third kick didn’t send the dopant flying. They struck downwards this time, catching the monster’s head between two strong hooves and a large rock sticking up out of the grass. He didn’t seem to care. They kicked again, hoping to keep the diamond monster between a hammer and an anvil until it cracked; or between a rock and a hard place.
(“Is this going to work? This monster’s as hard as a rock.”)
(“Even rocks break if you kick hard enough. We know the jewellers use a hammer to crack gems, to cut them to shape. How do they do it?”)
(“I think we need to ask Rarity.”)
They would have kept on pounding, just hoping that one blow would hit the right weak spot at the right angle. But the slab of basalt that had made such a convenient anvil cracked right down the middle. The rock must have been acting as a kind of scaffold, because as it broke the ground shifted beneath them. Champion and dopant tumbled together down a cascade of loose earth, and fetched up in an underground tunnel. Honest Joe didn’t waste any time; while Flutterjack was digging herself out of the rock, he pulled the Diamond Memory out of his haunch and squeezed the contact before slipping it back under his skin.
“DIAMOND!” Before the echoes of the grating voice even died away, he lashed out with a savage kick that was targeted with much more precision that any dopant had ever attempted before. He hit the Driver itself, flexing the joint between the device’s two tubes. Their magical armour disappeared in a shower of sparkles, and Fluttershy’s heart was catapulted back to her sleeping body. Applejack tried to strike the diamond monster anyway, but when their hooves met in mid air it felt like her whole body was freezing in place.
Honest Joe cancelled his transformation, becoming just a white pony in a cloak again. He picked up a large diamond from the ground and slipped it into an inside pocket without even checking its cut or clarity. Right now, he was much more concerned with another treasure lying on the ground.
“What happened?” Rainbow Dash asked as soon as Fluttershy blinked, not even waiting for her to be fully awake.
“He got AJ, I think,” her voice was quavering and nervous, “He can turn ponies into diamonds, it’s some kind of–”
“We got to beat him quick, before he can do that to the rest of us.”
“Agreed,” Twilight nodded, “Shall we go with Fluttertwi? I can teleport down there, and if we can use magic then we might be able to stay out of his reach until we manage to find some kind of weakness.”
Rainbow Dash opened her mouth to argue, but she couldn’t see any flaw in that plan.
“Fair enough.”
Then there was a long, uncomfortable pause. Twilight’s eyes went wide as she realised a problem, and her hopes all came crashing down.
“What’re you waiting for? You need to– oh.”
“Yes. Applejack had the Driver. Presumably, now Honest Joe has it.”
“That pony doesn’t play by the rules,” Fluttershy muttered, echoing what all of them were thinking.
“I really hope he doesn’t try to use it.”
Down in the tunnels, Honest Joe wasn’t alone. One of the Diamond Dogs, a common soldier with no rank or title, was watching through a cleft in the rock. He hadn’t seen much, but he was smart enough to recognise two ponies fighting. He didn’t step in, figuring that he’d be able to capture the loser once they were hurt, and get some recognition from the bosses. Everyone was barking about how ponies were suddenly the enemy, and if they came down here they had to be captured to preserve the pups. This guard didn’t have a litter of his own, but he knew there might be a reward in it if he could bring in a pony.
And then he’d seen the yellow pony turn into an orange pony, and its wings disappeared. And then the orange pony turned into a diamond. Whatever else was going on, he could be sure that the white pony here was the enemy. He didn’t have a personal stake in stopping the theft of the Dogs’ young, but he had plenty of friends who did. That white pony looked pretty tough, but something in the way it walked said it was a threat to the pack.
Rover took a deep breath and then charged in, bursting through a place where the wall between tunnels was only soft earth. He didn’t know he was doing the right thing, he didn’t even know if he could do anything useful, but he couldn’t bring himself to run away from his duties again. He also knew that a pony who hadn’t been troubled by the fall down here was unlikely to succumb to a single stab with a spear, so he didn’t even attempt to hurt it. Instead, he jabbed his weapon between the pony’s neck and leg, twisting the shaft as he came closer to knock some kind of jewelled thing out of its grip.
“They’re using some kind of magic jewel,” Fido had said. And this thing looked like a magic jewel, right enough. Crystal bits and leather bits and metal bits, like ponies put on their gems before they wore them. That was all Rover needed to know; he grabbed it off the ground and ran into the tunnels, thinking he surely knew the layout here better than any pony. In the back of his mind, he still felt bad for not staying to fight. But he could content himself by thinking that just maybe, this weird jewel thing could earn him a treat from the boss.
Rarity stared at the door as she heard a key in the lock. She’d stopped counting the gems some time before, and said nothing as Spike nibbled on two or three, or ten, to distract himself from the stress of the situation. They’d heard more than one scream in the past half hour, and they seemed to be becoming both closer and more frequent. The only other sound had been a faint yelling of orders, the clank of Diamond Dog armour as they tried to get organised. Something was going on, but she didn’t have any clue what it might be, and in times like this it was easy for her to assume a worst case scenario.
The door swung open and the Dogs’ leader walked in. The one who called himself Fido. In one hand he was holding the Driver, and Rarity found her heart racing as she tried to imagine how he could have got his paws on it. None of the options seemed good.
“What’s this, pony?” he barked.
“It’s called the Driver, and it’s not yours. You need to give that back!”
“There’s ponies in my tunnels. The white one’s turning everypuppy into diamonds with some weird kind of pony magic, I heard him say he’s leaving town now and he’s going to wipe us out first. He’s got a weird magic crystal to fight with, so we’re going to have one too. How do I use this?”
“You can’t,” she answered firmly, “You can only use the Driver in combination with the Elements of Harmony, and the Elements can only be used by the ponies they chose.”
“You can use this?” he was almost pleading now, “My pack, my family… you got to stop the bad pony before–”
Fido wasn’t standing there anymore. Now there was a large diamond on the floor, a little rough around the edges, and a horse-sized creature who seemed to have been grown from some kind of crystal. Rarity couldn’t help thinking of the living Element that Spike had described, though she knew such a creature would be nowhere near the size of this dopant.
“Why do they have to make everything difficult?” it muttered, “I told them I’d hunt them down if they got in my way, they should have taken me at my word. ‘Honest’ is practically my middle name.” His voice was like a thousand resonant crystals chiming in harmony, but Rarity could hear the distinctive sneer even through the distortion, and she’d heard that half-joking catchphrase before as well.
“Honest Joe?” she gasped, “You can’t take the Driver, it only works–”
“I don’t care,” he interrupted while bending down to pick it up from the floor, “I’ve watched you. Without this thing you can’t be the big famous Champion, you’re just ordinary ponies. So you can’t track me down, and even if you can make a new one I’ll be long gone before it’s finished, with a princess’s ransom in diamonds. You lost, darling, and I’m sure I know at least one geologist who’ll pay the world for this trinket. Who knows, maybe by studying this she can make her own one work better? That’s gotta be worth a million, I’ll be set for life.”
He would have turned and walked away, but at that point Spike leapt from the high shelf he’d been hiding on and bit the dopant’s ear. It wouldn’t even have occurred to Rarity. It was clear this monster had been fighting Diamond Dogs for some time, with their spears and clubs, and his body looked so solid now that she’d expect biting him to be a good way to break your teeth. But of course, Spike looked at the dopant and saw diamond: A good snack for a baby dragon. Honest Joe shrieked in pain and dropped both the Driver and the diamonds in his hand. He hadn’t expected it either, but it turned out that the hard exterior that repelled even a Maximum Drive so easily was no protection against a dragon’s unique digestive enzymes. As soon as it was in contact with Spike’s saliva, the diamond shell granted by the Memory became soft and pliable like good toffee.
Rarity stood frozen by fear as the dopant flailed around, trying to get the baby dragon off him. Spike did a remarkably good job of holding on, but Rarity knew that if she came closer he might be able to turn her to diamond with a single touch, like he had with Fido. Though she hadn’t heard of any ponies transformed into gems, she would be surprised if a Gaia Memory had a power that only worked on dogs. She backed slowly behind the table with its array of partially-counted gems, and gently started to pull the Driver closer. She didn’t know what she’d do when she got it, but if she moved slowly then the glow from her horn might be faint enough for a distracted enemy not to notice.
She just about got it close enough to pick up when he finally managed to shake Spike free and send the little dragon skittering across the table again, spraying carefully stacked gems onto the floor. He didn’t stay down though, turned and leapt angrily towards the dopant. Maybe it was because he felt in immediate danger, or maybe once he’d finally told Rarity he was their bodyguard he didn’t feel like he could back down. Maybe he was just hungry, he wasn’t even sure himself, but he couldn’t stop fighting now.
“DIAMOND!” a second was all Honest Joe had needed to partially extract his Gaia Memory and press the switch again. Rarity wondered if that was a necessary step for using some of its functions, but feared she was about to find out. She panicked then, unable to bear the thought that Spike could actually die protecting her. She flung the Driver around her neck, and gave a little surge of magic to illuminate the magicite crystals. There was still nothing she could do without her Element, but Honest Joe might not realise that.
She was too late; the dopant’s forehoof caught Spike in the face and sent him sailing back across the room with a crunch uncomfortably reminiscent of breaking bone. Rarity saw the spark of a spell discharged in the impact, but Spike didn’t turn into a diamond. If there had been longer to think, Rarity might have guessed that gem-based magic wouldn’t work very well on dragons. As it was, she was more concerned with saving Spike from further injury as he slammed into and then started to slide down the stone wall.
Back on the surface, Twilight and Rainbow Dash looked at each other in surprise as two shimmering, indistinct images of the Driver appeared on their chests.
“Can it do that?” Dash had voiced the question before she realised it didn’t make much sense.
“We never tried,” Twilight answered thoughtfully, “We know that if one of us wears the Driver, then the three Champions with right-half Elements get a projected Driver, and when they insert their Element the Driver transmits their heart back into the body of the pony with the real Driver. I can’t believe I never wondered if it could work the other way. Can we send our hearts and minds to help –” she stopped, realising that if the Driver had appeared, that probably meant somepony was in trouble, then spoke again: “Who’s wearing it? There’s no Memory in either slot. I’m not sure how–”
“Forget it,” Dash cut in, “If it’s Fluttershy or Rarity, or Pinkie somehow in her dream, they need help. If it might work we’ve got to try it.”
“LOYALTY!” the voice chimed, but then rather than the red Element being transported away, the Driver and Element vanished together.
“This can’t be good.”
“LOYALTY!” The Driver sang out, and a red crystal appeared in the left slot. Rarity looked down, unsure what to do next, and then realised that a few of the magicite gems had a faint purple colour. If she’d been holding Generosity then they would have quickly started glowing a brilliant emerald green; and if her magic had resonated with the crystals, it should have been a pale blue to almost match the colour of her eyes. She hadn’t seen this pale colour, almost lilac, before.
She hesitated for a second, possibilities running through her head. She had time to think, in any case, because the Driver’s voice had made Honest Joe think she wasn’t defenceless yet. He was waiting to see what she would do. But Rarity didn’t know herself. She wondered if the appearance of Loyalty meant that she could transform using her own body, or if inserting Generosity would send her heart to join Rainbow Dash regardless of which of them had the real Driver. But it was irrelevant without her Element. She looked around for anything that could be causing the lilac glow too. Magicite crystals could light up in the presence of any kind of magic, but the ones on the Driver should have been specifically tuned to only respond to the Elements of Harmony, which was why her own magic aura only elicited the faintest shimmer.
Could it be the dopant’s magic? That made little sense, it had never worked like that before. Then she looked over the scattered gems across the floor and the table, wondering if she’d found a Gaia Memory without noticing. But even for her actual Element, the magicite only lit up if either it was touching her body directly, or she was holding it with her magic. And the only thing she was levitating now was…
Rarity turned to look at Spike, still hovering where she’d caught him. He’d said his mother was a Gaia Memory, or an Element of Harmony, or both. Maybe he wasn’t an Element himself, but just maybe he’d inherited just enough of the right kind of aura to trick the Driver into letting her transform without another Element.
“Spike?” she whispered, eyes darting back to the Diamond Dopant as he tried to decide between attacking and waiting. He looked like he might move any second.
“I’m sorry, I couldn’t–”
“I’m sorry, I’ve got to try it,” she said, and lifted the little dragon right up to her face. He was so close that he couldn’t see their enemy any more, Rarity filled his vision. He tried to ask questions, tried to understand what was going on, but he found he couldn’t think any more when she was holding him so close, his mind was completely blank except for the desire to protect her. Spike would do his duty, and uphold the honour of his family, no matter what.
Rarity felt the magic this time, the magicite crystals glowing brighter as the Driver recognised the baby dragon. If only Twilight hadn’t been so concerned with not letting anyone outside the six of them touch the Driver, she might have known weeks ago that her assistant could prompt such a reaction; but now it was Rarity who would be first to experiment with Fang’s legacy. She pulled Spike close against her breast, touching the Driver, and felt him stiffen. She didn’t know if it would work, and maybe even felt a little stupid trying something so strange, but if she didn’t find a power now, nopony would ever know. She held Spike’s rigid form, and tried to imagine he was a jointed crystal construction like his mother must have been. It was hard to visualise, but easy enough to think what that would mean.
“What…?” Spike didn’t understand what was going on now. His own body was stiffening, reacting without any decision on his part, and a single gasp was all he could bring himself to say. Rarity lifted him to her chin and whispered a word he didn’t quite catch, then jabbed him into the Driver’s empty slot. In his current rigid form, he slipped in effortlessly. He could move a little, but he found a surge of instincts coming from some ancestral part of his brain. It was like a hunger he couldn’t fight, and he didn’t even try. He leaned forward and bit down on the protruding top of the red crystal in front of him, and then he didn’t see anything else as an overwhelming surge of Gaia Energy coursed through his body. He wasn’t a dragon now, just a conduit to complete the circuit between the red Element and the Driver that gripped his tail so snugly.
“LOYALTYᏔDRAGON!” the Driver’s voice boomed, and there was a deeper tone mixed in with the normal harmony. Neither Rarity nor Spike noticed, because their minds were overwhelmed by the sheer power of the transformation for an instant. A brilliant vortex of red and purple filled the room, and then the cage doors were breaking open, pillars splitting and the ceiling of the tunnel falling in. The collapse seemed to go on forever, but finally the ground settled.
“Well, I never expected that,” Rarity looked up at the sun, glad to finally see it again after what felt like a whole day underground.
(“What just happened?” Rainbow Dash’s voice was clear, but her normal confidence had for once been replaced by confusion)
(“I think we found a new Element,” Rarity couldn’t think what else to say. Then as she looked at the outskirts of Ponyville in the middle distance, and the forest to their right, she found a new question. “Everything looks so small from up here. Are we flying? I think I can feel wings, but it’s not the same as Raridash.”)
(“Wait, how are you talking without moving your mouth?” Spike’s voice joined the conversation, “Is this how your… Oh, wow!”)
He’d just caught sight of their new form reflected in a pool. All three were speechless at that. Their body and armour wasn’t divided into two colours down the middle, like most of the forms they knew about so far. Their scales were iridescent, seeming at times purple, or sky blue, or gleaming white. They had Rainbow Dash’s wings, or what her wings would look like if they grew much more elaborate, and Rarity’s horn, but also a second set of reptilian wings lower down their body. And as they looked down at their hooves, they saw that they weren’t hooves any more but claws, probably large enough to pick up a filly in one hand. Their new body was huge, maybe the size of a normal dragon, but their physiology was something between draconic and equine.
Honest Joe was pulling himself out of a pile of earth, while around him a few Diamond Dogs dug themselves out much quicker. They were dazed and shaken, but Rarity could breathe a sigh of relief that nobody seemed to have been hurt by the appearance of a draconequus larger than any of the tunnels.
Honest Joe was back to looking like any other shyster pony, but as soon as he caught the gaze of all the angry Dogs, he pushed the Gaia Memory back into his haunch and let the giant layer of crystals grow around his body. The dragon champion looked down at him and leapt without a thought, blowing out a circle of fire like a smoke ring to trap him where he stood. Then they leapt forward, mouth wide to swallow the insolent monster.
(“No!” Rarity yelled inside their mind, “He’s a monster, but we can’t eat him!”)
She tried to turn aside, but found that she could barely control their body. Rainbow Dash struggled too, but they seemed to be almost entirely in the grip of instinct. They couldn’t have stopped themselves from biting off Honest Joe’s head, if the dopant hadn’t realised his body was fireproof just in time to dive to safety through the ring of flames.
(“How are we a dragon?” Rainbow Dash asked, “Why’s Spike here? Has he got an Element somehow?” She was projecting concern and confusion, but Rarity was close enough to her friend’s thoughts to feel the excitement she was radiating. What Dash really wanted to say at that moment was how awesome she was finding the experience; right up to the moment they looked down at Honest Joe, a pony in a diamond carapace, and felt a wave of hunger, the strongest craving either of them could imagine.)
It was probably the fastest battle any of them could remember. Honest Joe snapped the Diamond Memory out of his body, went to squeeze the lever, and Spike just inhaled. Wind whipped across the ground, lifting Honest Joe into the air along with a few Diamond Dogs and even an uprooted tree. The Diamond Memory was whipped out of Joe’s hand, and Spike bit down triumphantly. It wasn’t the crystal he was craving so much, it had a bitter and metallic flavour, but absorbing the energy of the Memory made the dragon and his pony passengers feel enervated, more alive than they had ever been before.
It was crazy, it was something they’d never felt before. But on consuming the Gaia Memory, the craving only got stronger. It wasn’t the crystals any more, though they could still feel that hunger at the back of Spike’s mind. It was a craving for magic, for life energy, for the mark that Gaia Memories left on anypony who had even touched them. They smelled it on Honest Joe and just pounced, even though he’d already lost his memory. This time, his salvation took the form of a thrown rock to the back of the draconequus’s skull.
“I guess that didn’t work, then,” Twilight sighed, “I wish we’d thought to try using the Driver the other way, so we at least knew what was possible.”
Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy responded at the same time. Even so, it was quieter than their normal debates, where there were five or six ponies chipping in. It was only a couple of minutes before they realised that Dash’s eyes had closed and she was no longer adding to the debate.
“So the right Element can be the body, and the left the heart?” Twilight asked, but she never got an answer because that was when they heard the crash and roar from the outside of town.
“It could be another dopant,” she leapt to the worst case scenario right away, “Even if we can’t transform, we need to know if something’s happening.” Fluttershy just nodded, trying not to show how nervous she was, and followed out into the street. Even from the town centre, a cloud of dust could be seen beyond the rooftops. Within a few streets, there was no mistaking the form of an angry draconequus swooping towards them, and ponies were running in panic.
“Dragon!” was the word on the street. Most ponies didn’t know the difference, and used the same word to describe any fifty-foot-long reptile that could fly and breathe fire, especially when it was threatening to step on or set fire to their houses.
“We have to help!” Twilight decided, without a second thought, “Can you use that stare thing on it? The Driver just enhances part of our natural talents, so we should be able to simulate a scaled down version of our Maximum Drive in any case.”
“Umm…” Fluttershy was visibly shaking as she stared at the creature towering over them. She wanted to say she could help, she knew on some level that this was just an animal a little more aggressive than most, and it probably had some reason to be angry or scared. But she’d always been a little afraid of dragons, and the way this one bellowed in rage, sweeping its head back and forth as if it was losing some kind of internal argument, didn’t do anything to lessen that.
“What’s going on?” they heard Applejack’s voice as they got to the edge of town. The farm pony looked tired and disoriented, shaking her head as if she’d just woken up and needed to jostle her brain back into place.
“AJ! You’re okay!” Twilight rushed over, and used the first scanning spells that came to mind to check Applejack for injury, illness, or enchantment.
“I guess so. I remember that Honest Joe gave me a kick on the hoof, just a little thing like you might with some steer that’s being too playful. But then I couldn’t move, and the world all around me was like bright and full of rainbows, and then I was here. Did he turn me into a diamond, like them Diamond Dogs said he did to their pups?”
“We think so. We think he got the Driver, too, but we don’t know what’s happening now. You’re not a diamond any more, I can’t find any trace of the spell except maybe a bit higher background magic than usual. But I think right now we got bigger problems.”
They looked up at the draconequus. It didn’t seem to be attacking anypony, but it was getting ever closer to the town, and its roaring was causing considerable panic. It also seemed to be just a little uncoordinated, stumbling into an outlying building with enough force to smash bricks apart.
“Stop right there!” Applejack hollered, standing in the middle of the road right in front of the confused creature, “Can’t you see how much you’re scaring everypony?” Behind her, Twilight Sparkle and Fluttershy gasped, and rushed to stand beside their friend.
“Oh no!” Twilight caught sight of something, and pointed. On the strange dragon creature’s chest, it was just possible to see the familiar shape of the Driver. It was glowing in red and purple-grey, but embedded in the creature’s flesh with its light throbbing like a heartbeat. “How did it get the Driver? What’s wrong with it?”
Rainbow Dash and Rarity were trying everything they could think of to get Spike off the main road and away from Ponyville. They could nudge him to one side or the other, but it seemed to have little effect. Spike wasn’t even speaking inside their mind any more, reverting to some strange, animalistic state. It had been little more than luck that meant they hadn’t hurt anyone so far.
(“If I distract him, can you eject the Elements?”)
(“That’s what I’m trying to do! I can’t move our arms more than an inch while we’re thrashing around like this. Is this Spike’s headache or ours? I can hardly think!”)
Then they saw Applejack standing in the road. Like everypony else they’d passed, the two ponies focused as hard as they could on making sure that their foot landed somewhere, anywhere, else. And then they smelled her. Not like a regular scent, but some strange sense that they’d never really considered before. It was like they could smell the Element she was carrying on her collar, so sweet and tempting. They leaned closer and sniffed at their friend, savouring that magical sweetness.
(“Hey, are we drooling? Stop that! Spike, stop it!”)
(“Wow, I never thought AJ would taste so sweet, it makes me want to… Woah, no! But I can’t stop thinking…”)
(“She’d be so sweet. But we can’t even think about…”)
They couldn’t help themselves. Their head lunged forward and down, their mouth snapped. Applejack didn’t even have time to blink. Two other ponies were running up beside her,and they had their own enigmatic, spicy sweetness radiating from their bodies. Any other time, Spike and his mental passengers might have tried to consume them without a second thought, but their attention was fully focused on Applejack now.
They could barely see her expression over their snout, but there was a momentary flash of eyes wide in terror. Rarity had the presence of mind to be shocked by what they were doing, but on her own she had no way to fight the treacherous instincts. Rainbow Dash wasn’t even fighting now, she couldn’t see past the insatiable hunger. She closed their eyes as they bit down, at least, to better savour the unsurpassed flavour of a purified Gaia Memory and its bearer.
Hunger was surpassed by pain. A sudden burning in the side of their head, and a blow hard enough to break a draconic tooth. They turned and focused with some difficulty on the attacker, a red blur now racing around them in circles. They were dizzy from the force of the attack, and it was hard to make out who was hurting them.There was somepony there, that much was certain, and his body was radiating the unmistakable scent of a Gaia Memory, rich and smoky but somehow also bitter. It didn’t smell like something that would taste good, and even with the threat of violence they were tempted to finish snacking on Applejack and Twilight Sparkle first.
(“I can’t believe we’re even thinking this,” Rarity wailed, “But I can’t stop imagining how they’d…”)
(“Did you see that pony’s speed?” Rainbow Dash was at least distracted by the newcomer, “That’s incredible! Probably almost as fast as me!”)
“STEAM!” a voice like the roar of engines cried out. Now they knew who they were facing, at any rate. As he leapt up towards their head, the red metal-clad pony came into sharp focus, and they instinctively raised a claw to bat him away. But jets of steam rushed between their fingers, scalding the skin and getting in their eyes to blind them for just a moment.
“Help!” Rarity finally managed to get enough control to yell out loud, “We can’t control it!”
“That thing’s a dopant!” Twilight yelled, down on the ground, “Can there be a Driver Dopant? Celestia said the Driver’s an Element, and the Elements are a special kind of Gaia Memory. Did somepony try to use it on its own?”
“Leave it to me,” the mysterious Champion of Justice called from behind the monstrosity, “I’ll kill it, then you get your Driver back.”
“You can’t kill it!” Applejack yelled back, “That’s a pony in there!”
“It was trying to kill you,” it was the first time they’d heard the other Champion sound angry, and Twilight mentally filed that detail away, “and unauthorised Gaia Memory users have already given up their rights.” He pulled the Memory out of the hilt of his sword, adjusted whatever kind of switch was on it, and slammed it into the back of the blade. Twilight felt her muscles tense, wanting to do whatever she could to stop him killing an innocent, but she knew that without the Driver there was nothing they could do.
“JET: MAXIMUM DRIVE!” this time the Champion of Justice wasn’t leaping towards the draconequus, but flying on a pillar of vapour. He struck again and again with the sword, whipping past and then turning almost on the spot, faster than any pegasus could maneuver. Finally the engine noise coming from the armour stepped up in pitch, becoming a deafening roar, and the red blur slammed straight into the slender body of the dragon. Trees and even a couple of houses were entirely crushed as it fell back.
Fluttershy wasn’t sure what she was doing. She just knew that she couldn’t let a self-proclaimed champion kill anypony, no matter what they did. She ran to place herself between the red champion and the fallen draconequus as he raised his sword for a final blow, and then Twilight and Applejack were there beside her.
“Stop!” Fluttershy yelled, raising her voice enough that her friends turned to look at her in surprise. “If it’s a giant animal or a dopant, you can’t kill it! You have to be the bigger pony, show that you can forgive. They can learn not to cause trouble, like foals. You just have to care.”
“A Memory Break’s the only way to stop a rampaging dopant. That thing already ate one Gaia Memory, and now it’s hungry for more. You think you’re going to find a way to satisfy its hunger and keep your lives?”
Twilight blinked, and a faint shimmer of magic reached into her pocket as she answered. “I don’t know. Maybe. But it’s better than hurting somepony who might not have known what they were getting into. You want to kill this pony, you go through us.”
Justice drew back his sword, but his legs trembled. He couldn’t bring himself to strike.
Twilight produced a large gemstone from somewhere. A perfect flame ruby, shimmering with blue and red fire in the spring sunlight. “Dragons eat gems. Maybe the same for draconequui, I don’t know. Spike was going to give this one to Rarity, the most perfect example he’d found. Maybe it doesn’t compare to a Gaia Memory, I’ve never even considered eating one. But perhaps such a delectable gem can sate the hunger of an angry dragon?”
Spike opened his eyes, and saw the flame ruby shimmering as it turned to catch the sun. And he remembered how he’d felt when Twilight praised him for his generosity. Rarity remembered the gratitude she’d felt, a warm feeling in her heart on receiving such a heartfelt gift. Those weren’t the feelings of a monster who would eat their friends. Three minds together managed to overcome their hunger long enough to reach for the Driver on their body, and pop out the red memory. There was a flash of light, and then silence.
“Where did the dragon go?” Applejack looked around at the draconic-shaped crater on the ground. There was no sign of the monster now, and in the moment’s distraction the Champion of Justice was also gone.
“Hey, my ruby!” they heard Spike’s voice from behind a ridge in the ground, and climbed down into the ditch to find him hanging onto Rarity’s mane, his tail somehow trapped in the Driver.
“I thought you gave it to me, Spike sweetie?” Rarity was answering, “But I think you deserve a treat after today, if you want it.” Then she looked up and saw their friends gathering around, “Can we tell the others what happened? Or was it a secret?”
Spike looked around, and pondered for a moment. Rarity gently took the flame ruby from Twilight, and passed it to the little dragon, who began to nibble it contentedly.
“Well, we’ll need to say something. But I think maybe someone is listening in on our conversations, so I can’t tell the whole story. I’m sorry Twilight, the Element of Generosity is somewhere buried under a half-collapsed diamond mine, it’ll take a lot of work to find. But using what I’ve learned recently, I realised that we could trick the Driver into acting as if a baby dragon was one of the Elements of Harmony. As you can see, we didn’t have as much control as we would have liked. But we managed to defeat the Diamond Dopant, at least. I think that’s the best we could have hoped for in the circumstances.”
Twilight just nodded, her head so full of questions that she didn’t know which one to ask first.
“I’ll tell you more about it later. But you have to promise not to talk too much. Right now, I think Spikey-wikey has earned a whole basket of– Oh no!” Rarity was surrounded by a circle of concerned faces.
“What’s wrong?” Fluttershy was the first to say what was on everypony’s mind.
“I forgot about the dresses! Spike, come on! We need to go digging!”
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next few chapters please