Twilight’s lab was a fairly simple one, built off the side of her house. But it had more scientific tech than major government labs, and it was all DIY from Twilight herself. Granted, she wasn’t sure any of her tech would cooperate with whatever this technology in the meteorite was.
As the girls’ cavalcade approached Twilight’s house, the first thing on their minds was to analyze the device in Twilight’s pocket. They were just making their way toward past the park when Rainbow saw something behind them; the same Camaro as from the school, following about a car length behind AJ’s truck. “Okay, this is just getting creepy,” she remarked, looking at the car. “I mean we all know that there’s no one in that car, right?”
“Aliens don’t need to be seen when they’re driving.” Pinkie reminded.
“Maybe we should try and communicate with it,” suggested Sunset. “Ask it what it wants.”
“Well, we don’t have any better ideas.” Twilight shrugged, prompting the cars to stop. Once everyone was out, Twilight jumped off the truck and started walking over toward the Camaro. But as she approached, the car suddenly revved its engine almost like it was preparing to drive away. “Whoa-whoa-whoa, hey. Calm down. We just wanna talk.”
Then Rainbow saw something; a small green dot on Twilight’s shirt. “Uh, Twilight? I think you might wanna stand back. I think this thing’s targeting you.”
Twilight looked and watched as the dot moved down to her left pocket, which held the meteorite. “This isn’t a weapon. I think it’s some sort of scanner.” Slowly she raised her right hand in surrender and dropped her left hand toward her pocket… only to suddenly prompt a large laser blast to shoot nearby and impact the ground, knocking Twilight off her feet.
“Twilight!” Spike dashed out to her side, followed by Sunset and Rainbow, all more than concerned for her safety.
“What was that?” Sunset’s question was swiftly answered by a 2015 Dodge Charger police car, with a large cannon sticking out of the right door.
Suddenly it screeched over and bashed the Camaro in the back, sending it screeching down the street before stopping next to Twilight, barely even scratched. It was then that Twilight saw the frightening writing on the back of the car; ‘To Punish and Enslave’. And at the end of that writing was an almost triangular purple face-decal that looked fairly frightening.
No sooner had she read it then something really crazy happened to the police car; plates shifted, servos whirred, and when it had ended, the car had become a massive black robot with the same purple triangular face-decal on his chest and it looked down at the girls with burning red eyes in his gold face. “Where is it?” the machine asked in a deep voice.
The girls thought they knew what he was talking about, but were too terrified to say anything for a few seconds. “Where’s what?” Sunset asked, trying to throw him off.
Unfortunately, this only made the bot smirk. “Oh, so that’s how we’re gonna play it, huh? Alright then.” A mouthplate and visor almost like a tactical mask locked onto his face, only serving to make him look even more intimidating. “Let’s play.”
“Me first!” That voice surprised the girls, as did the revving engine behind them. When they looked, they saw the Camaro roaring down the street behind them before it transformed as well, revealing it to be a large yellow robot with a silver faceplate, bright blue eyes, and a blockier red face-decal on his chest.
The new bot quickly jumped and kicked the police-bot in the face, sending him screeching down the street. The gold bot quickly turns to the girls with a concerned yet still stern look on his face. “Run. Now.”
“Don’t need to tell me twice,” Fluttershy noted swiftly, diving to hide under AJ’s truck. The others however were entranced by these large machines as the first one slowly stood up.
“Bumblebee. It’s been a long time.” he snarled.
“Not long enough, Barricade.” This Bumblebee obviously wasn’t friends with this Barricade-bot. “Y’know Prowl’s still pretty sore about you two-timing him back in Praxis.”
“Prowl’s an idiot, and so are you,” Barricade smirked. “You Autobots defend the remnants of a broken system; a system that elevates those you deem worthy of it and leaves the rest of us for roadkill.”
“You know that’s not true.” Bumblebee scowled. “The Autobots wanted equality; all you ‘Cons ever wanted was power. And you didn’t care how you got it.”
Barricade just smirked, apparently seeing something. “Maybe. But at least we remember to watch our backs.” Bumblebee looked behind him in fear at that prompt, only for Barricade to shoot him in the back the second he turned his back, knocking the yellow bot to the ground right next to the truck.
He looked under the vehicle and saw Fluttershy huddled in fear. “What’re you still doing here? I said run!” It was then that Barricade planted his foot on Bumblebee’s back, making him groan in pain.
“What’d I tell ya? Idiot.” Barricade smirked, leveling the large blaster he had in his hand toward Bumblebee’s head. “I was at least hoping for a little more of a fight.”
Applejack smirked as she stepped forward. “You want a fight, partner? Well, I’ll give ya one.”
Barricade glanced over at her and just chuckled condescendingly. “Wow. Now I know you Autobots are pathetic. I know you chose this planet to hide on, but do you really let organics fight all your battles for you?”
Applejack just stepped forward. “This ‘organic’ is about to give you the whuppin’ of a lifetime.” She spit on his foot as if trying to taunt him… before she activated her power and delivered a powerful punch right to his shin, making him bunk over in pain.
“Gah!” he growled as he fell to his knees, seeing a deep punch-mark in his armor from Applejack’s fist. “What…?”
“And there’s more where that came from, pardner. So I suggest you hightail it outta here before I stop holdin’ back.” Applejack threatened, cracking her knuckles.
Bumblebee was amazed as well, but Barricade just scowled. “You’ve got spark, ya little gnat; I’ll give you that.” Then he aimed his blaster at her, smirking at the fear that crossed her face. “I enjoy killing lifeforms with spark.”
“Then you’ll love me.” That voice sounded almost female, and sure enough, a bright pink and white 1967 Jaguar E-Type roared in and suddenly transformed into a large female bot with a round white helmet and a large Glock-like blaster-pistol in her hand which she used to blast Barricade and send him stumbling back, allowing Bumblebee to find his feet.
(this but bright pink with white trim)
Looking closely, the girls saw the same emblem on her belt as was on Bumblebee’s chest. “We really need to stop meeting like this, Bumblebee. You know how much of a gossip Bluestreak is.”
“I’m not really in the mood for small talk, Arcee. Just help me take care of this bucket of bolts so the organics can outta here.” Bumblebee ordered, raising a small handgun.
“Wait, organics?” Arcee looked and saw the girls, still shocked at her presence. “Bee, you idiot! What was our first order when we woke up?”
“Yeah, let’s circle back to who’s an idiot after we discuss what that one’s carrying.” Bumblebee remarked, indicating at Twilight with his head.
“What, this?” Twilight reached into her pocket and retrieved the small meteorite.
Arcee’s eyes seemed to grow in awe as she saw the item. “By Primus…”
“So you do have it.” Barricade snarled.
Bumblebee turned back to Arcee. “And what the ‘Cons will be capable of if this guy gets his greasy servos on it.”
“Point taken. Let’s rumble.” Arcee smirked, both Autobots now firing on the police-bot to push him back.
“Everyone in, now!” Sunset ordered, climbing into the truck with several of the others as those remaining jumped into Rarity’s car before they both peeled out toward Twilight’s house.
“What was that?” asked Twilight.
“I think we already know.” Sunset shrugged. “Pinkie was right; aliens.”
“She said aliens, she never said anything about alien-robots!” Rainbow specified.
And these alien robots were still brawling with Barricade when a large honk roared through the area. When the bots looked, they saw a red 2015 Ford Explorer roar in and transform into a larger red bot with a fairly grizzled face.
“Alright, who’s ready to die?” he smirked with a southern drawl.
Barricade appeared frightened, but quietly smirked as he looked at something on his wrist. “Some other time, Ironhide.” With that, the cop-bot transformed and drove away, leaving the Autobots behind.
“Whew. Man, that was way too close.” Arcee sighed.
“What took you so long, old-timer?” Bumblebee asked Ironhide, smacking the large bot on the chestplate.
The red ‘bot just shrugged. “Traffic,” he said simply. “Cmon, Prime wants us back at base.”
“Alright, let’s roll.” Bumblebee shrugged and they all transformed, roaring away through the quiet streets. The future was about to get even crazier than anyone could expect.