//------------------------------// // Chapter 6 // Story: A Battle Droid Saves Equestria // by LinktheLazy //------------------------------// .XXX. When I finally managed to purge my circuits of the cascade of logic errors I found myself at the bottom of a large pile of stuffed cloth sacks. I supposed that it was probably a method utilized by the natives to prevent me from giving myself a dent... well it was better than packing peanuts at least... ...The Horror... ...Anyway, had I been capable of it I imagine I would have felt genuinely grateful for their interest in my well being. Concern for a Battle Droid is such a rarity in the galaxy these days. Curious of what my captors were doing I boosted the gain on my audio sensors to attempt and determine what was going on outside of my cloth sack fortification. “-and then I said ‘Oatmeal!? Are you crazy!?’” Had I a face capable of expressing thoughtfulness and confusion I would have done so harder than I had ever expressed anything before. Deleting that particular logic string before it causes my logic processor to seize... again... I returned to listening to the natives. “Yeah huh, sure Pinkie...” Came the voice of the Prismatic One. “Hey that thing has stopped squirming around, you think it’s calmed down?” “That or Twilight smothered it~” The Pink One, designation: Pinkie, replied in a melodious tone of voice. There was a long stretch of silence where I could only envision some form of nonverbal communication was taking place. I would need to pay closer attention to their social interactions, they obviously had a complex culture incorporating both spoken and nonverbal means of communicating. Perhaps some form of body language? My processors wondered for a moment if I would finally get to put that ‘Interpretive Dance’ software to use... “Holy- PINKIE! That was dark even for you!” The voice of the Prismatic One replied, obviously distressed in some manner. “Oh Dashie just wait till I get on a roll with the gallows humor! You’ll laugh so hard you’ll lose your head!” Pinkie replied shortly before there was the sound of a groan from The Prismatic One. “Pinkie! Cut the dark jokes, if the girls find out it’s Baltimare all over again! We only barely convinced them we were just trying to plan something for Nightmare Night!” The Prismatic One designation: Dashie appeared to be somewhat disturbed over the behavior of Pinkie. Was Pinkie perhaps mentally challenged in some potentially dangerous manner the two of them were attempting to conceal? “Ok Dashie I’ll cut it out~” Pinkie ‘sang’ in reply just before a nearby door squeaked open and the sound of many four legged creatures entered the room. “Princess!” Dashie shouted, sounding more than a little nervous. I could hear her fidgeting even over the sound of the rest of the beings in the room. “We caught a thing!” She blurted awkwardly. “A thing?” A much deeper and all around more mature sounding female answered. ...Wait a second... The rest of these individuals are fully grown right? I didn't just get captured by this species’ version of teenagers did I? If any of the other unit finds out about that I'll be the laughing stock of the droid army! ...I had better just edit that bit of memory to be safe... Let's see... Twenty well armed commandos... Heavy vehicle support... Super dangerous force users... ...Perfect! Now where was I? “-ing a while ago, we think it may have calmed down.” “Or suffocated-” Thump “Ouch!” One of the pillows blocking my visual sensors was lifted out of the way by a golden force thing and revealed the same six individuals I was captured by with the addition of one additional being. Tentative Designation: Princess [It is unclear at this time if this is a name or title.] [Alert: Potential Unaligned Head Of State, Obtain Clarification.] I sat up as well as the binding allowed and focused my view on the new creature. It was easily an estimated 2.2 times my own mass and possessed a pale coat of fur with portions that resembled Dashie’s coloration, who was also tagged as a potential VIP based on the probability of family relations. “Pardon me but are you the leader?” The one known as Princess looked surprised at my speech and was beginning to reply when there was a loud thump next to the still open door. All at once every individual in the room aside from the still unconscious bounty hunter turned to look at the stunned purple, bipedal, reptile that had dropped a bag filled with colorful paper pamphlets. Some of them had titles such as “Atomo The Destroyer” and Equestribot: Menace From Beyond” Now B1’s might not have the best reputation but I could put a cultural two and a cultural two together and get a cultural four. “This isn’t going to go well, is it?” .XXX. “THE PLANET IS DOOMED RUN FOR IT!” Twilight, the Princess and the five other ponies in the room watched with raised eyebrows and concerned looks as Spike nearly ripped the front door right off it’s hinges in his rush to escape. “THE ROBOT OVERLORDS HAVE COME! THE ROBOT OVERLORDS HAVE COME!” The Princess and the five other ponies slowly turned to look at Twilight, questions obvious in their eyes. Twilight blushed but said nothing, instead scooping up the comics and glancing over the titles and cover art depicting terrible metal monsters burning down some nondescript city with an unconscious mare or two in their metal claws. Her eyes moved over the images, then over to their current prisoner, then over the images again, back and forth. The rest of the ponies shared confused glances but remained otherwise silent until Twilight made up her mind. “Huh, so it is a robot...” .XXX. ... ... ... “CELESTIA’S BEARD IT'S A ROBOT!” The conscious native creatures in the room gasped dramatically, all except for the one designated ‘Princess’ who was busy frowning and rubbing her chin with one of her forelimbs. I looked around at the various individuals straining my logic processor trying to come up with something I could say to prevent any unnecessary tribulation. Their shock gave me a little time to process the information I had gathered about their culture and that was a depressingly short text document. The Confederacy of Independent Systems had never before entered into a contact situation with so little information, by my hasty (and likely somewhat inaccurate) estimations there was only a 2.6% chance of successfully integrating them into the CIS without further information. ... ... ... ThoughtTrian.exe has stopped working and must restart, we apologize for this inconvenience. ... THAT'S IT! By looking at the past actions of the leaders of the CIS I could easily deduce a course of action for myself! I would have an objective! I imagine that had I been capable of it my circuits would be bursting with glee at the prospect of no longer being utterly aimless. My processor temp began to crawl upward as I pondered how exactly to go about examining previous operations I had knowledge of and how best to apply their lessons to my current situation. I would need to run simulations. I organized the after action reports and other operations data into categories based on who was in overall command and created a simulation program for each. The program in question’s purpose was twofold, first it would gather and correlate data on each operation to determine the overall goal of the CIS and second simulate each commander’s leadership style to determine which behavioral mannerisms held the greatest chance of success. Running Simulations. Dooku... Ventris... Grevious... Durd... Kleeve... Loathsom... Tamson... Tuuk... .XXX. After taking a few deep breaths to calm down Twilight finally managed to refocus her attention on her immediate surroundings. Her friends were standing in a rough circle around the ROBOT! A few more, very rapid breathing exercises managed to calm her rising nerdgasm. -were standing around the robot with their hooves over their ears as it made some obnoxiously loud buzzing and clicking noises. Princess Celestia however seemed to be busy with a hoof mirror and tiny pair of scissors. “WHAT IN TARNATION IS THAT RACKET!?” Applejack shouted over the strange machine. “I DON'T KNOW, MAYBE WE SCARED IT?” Rainbow Dash shouted back. Fluttershy attempted to say something but she was completely drown out and Rarity wasn’t even listening to the conversation as she had produced a pair of fashionable ear muffs and was blissfully blocking out the din. Twilight lit her horn to cast a muffling spell to dampen the noise when the robot dinged like it was some kind of toaster oven. “Simulations Complete.” It stated in it’s high pitched voice as it slowly rose to it’s mechanical feet. “Objective: Integrate unknown planet into the Confederacy of Independant Systems in a needlessly convoluted manner while ensuring maximum opportunities for failure.” “Overall chances of success... 0.1-7%”