Darkryt Orbinautz presents...
Across a Nevada plain, Fluttershy slowly walked through the sand, feeling the difference between her old pony hooves and her new Insecticon clamps in the desert material.
"Why?" A injured sounding female choked out.
Fluttershy looked to the left, then the right, before turning around and seeing Airachnid laying in the sand, covered in leaked Energon and looking hurt, physically and emotionally.
"Why...did the Queen chose you over me?" She barely manages to ask.
Fluttershy gave a psychotic lip-split smile. "The Queen chose me..."
A wretched screech came from Fluttershy's still-pony tail, but it didn't stay that way for long, turning into a extending metal stinger somewhat like the claw on Airachnid's extra legs. The tail continued growing in length until it was absolutely huge, large enough to wrap around even Bulkhead. She shot the stinger around Airachnid and wrapped her up like an anaconda.
"Because you were weak."
"No..." Airachnid begged as Fluttershy's stinger started squeezing her, causing more Energon to leak and her innards to show. "Please...please, no! No, please!"
"NO!" Fluttershy screamed, bolting upright. She took note of her surroundings. Insecticon hive. Nestled on top a pod in her ladybug mode. Pinkie, Rarity, Dash and Applejack still recovering from the shock of Twilight being alive.
"It was a dream..." Fluttershy muttered thankfully. "It was just a...really bad dream."
"Do not fly too high, or the sun will melt the wax in your wings. Fly too low, and the sea spray will wash it away."
Friendship Is Magic: Prime: Act III
Chapter IX: Wings of Wax
Episode Synopsis: Twilight Sparkle lays the foundation of her plan to siege the Decepticon warship.
At Autobot Outpost Omega One...
Miko, Raf and Jack all had their arms on the railings as they waited for the Autobots' return. The four Autobots metal steps echoed out from the GroundBridge, heralding their approach, but something seemed off. Like there was a fifth Autobot behind them. Arcee and Optimus came through, followed by Bumblebee and Bulkhead, who were, in turn, followed by a white and orange Autobot with an elfish-looking head, cradling a woman in a pilot's suit who was showing tell-tale signs of being infected with Dark Energon.
"Don't worry, Dani, you're gonna be okay!" The white mech told the lady in his arms. Then he noticed Raf, Jack, and Miko starting at him. "Uh...I mean..." Blades stiffened up and unfolded his visor. "I am a robot. Beep."
Optimus waved his hand over. "At ease, Blades. These humans are aware of our presence and true identities."
"Who's that?" Raf asked. He was referring to Dani, of course.
"Yeah!" Miko agreed. "Yo, Prime! Why didn't you tell us there was another bot besides Wheeljack on Earth?"
Optimus avoided her gaze. "There was...no need for it." pressing on, he pushed the communicator button on the main computer. "Ratchet, we need you back at base. Another human has been infected with Dark Energon."
"Another human?" Blades wondered aloud.
Ratchet came scrambling through the GroundBridge, practically skidding on the floor in his rush. "Where is he? Where is he?"
"She." Blades corrected, raising Dani up for Ratchet to examine. The doc-bot wasted no amount of time in yanking Dani out of Blades' arms and hurrying her over to the RC Chamber with a speed that Blades actually found kinda frightening. "Uh...is he always like this?"
"I apologize for Ratchet's behavior. He has some personal demons about treating this particular ailment..." Optimus apologized.
Blades hesitated to be near Ratchet, but walked up aside the doctor to keep watch over his partner as the RC Chamber became filled with radiation.
"Optimus?" Jack questioned. "Something on your mind?"
"No, Jack."
"Yes there is." Jack told him. "Optimus, look, I may not know you like Ratchet does, but I've been around long enough to tell when something's on your mind. Your face gets all creased...more so then usual. So what's up?"
Optimus heaved a deep breath and signed. "Twilight Sparkle has been resurrected by Dark Energon."
Miko gasped. Jack was uncertain to how to feel. Raf had an instinctive question.
"Resurrected, like Megatron, or resurrected like Skyquake?"
"Given that she gloated about how she won the round, I have to lean more towards Megatron-style." Arcee answered.
Optimus tore his gaze from Jack towards Dani in the RC Chamber. "Additionally, Jack, I am...conflicted. Twilight Sparkle's friends have told me over and over of her bravery and reliability to her friends...yet...it was she who infected Dani Burns with Dark Energon."
Jack knew what the Autobot leader was talking about. Once, Optimus and Megatron had been close friends, so Optimus looked the other way amongst Megatron's crimes, but Raf being infected with Dark Energon was the straw that broke the camel's back- The Megatron that was Optimus' friend and mentor was gone, and not coming back. Now...now Optimus was afraid that the Ponies would repeat his mistake, letting Twilight Sparkle's assaults slide because she was their friend until it was too late, and somepony got seriously hurt.
Of course...an optimistic viewpoint was that Twilight didn't know what she was doing.
Raf grabbed the railings, trying to look over to see how Dani's condition was improving. The sound of horseshoes suddenly became audible. The three humans looked to Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Applejack and Pinkie Pie looking like she'd been on the edge of an explosion.
"Guys!" Miko cheered, running down the stairs to greet them with open arms.
They all gave her stern, disapproving glares.
"I mean, girls!"
"Wow." Dash said. "You just don't get it, do you? Just because Twilight came back to life, doesn't make killing her in the first place okay!"
Miko took a step backward, then retreated back into the dwelling area.
Applejack turned her head towards Ratchet. "Ratchet, Fluttershy's ready. Just give the..." She noticed Blades. "Word. Who's this?"
Blades curled his hands into fists and pointed at her. "Your friend nearly killed my partner!"
The four of them were taken aback, then got angry.
"How dare you! First she dies, then you have the audacity to accuse her of giving somepony else the same fate?"
Blades tightened his grip on the railing, trying to ignore them. He had never liked fighting.
"Ah don't care if she is hyped up on Dark Energon! Twi would never do somethun' like that!"
"She totally did!" Miko snapped back.
"She did not, an' Ah'm offended y'all would even think that!"
"SHUT UP!" Blades snapped, unable to take it anymore. "Twilight blasted Dani, Dani got sick, that's all that happened, that's exactly what happened, and anything else is either not important or-or not true!" Blades huffed and puffed, tired from his outburst.
The four of them looked at Dani and absorbed her pale appearance. Twilight did this?
"So...does that mean we're even now?" Miko questioned. "You know, since I killed Twilight, Twilight came back, Twilight almost killed somepony so...I'd say that evens out?" She papped Jack on the back. "Right, Jack?"
"Uh...yeah, sure." Jack agreed, not really up to arguing with Miko at the moment.
Wooden towers were scattered about the area, standing upright and arranged in a position that would make them extremely difficult to maneuver through.
In a show of his abilities, Nemesis Prime swept and twirled through them, cutting them with his arm blades and reducing most of them to stumps. Twilight and Silas watched from afar with a rapt interest.
"Good so far..." Twilight noted.
The wood posts thus cut down, Nemesis Prime transformed into his cab mode and started furiously driving to the next part of the obstacle course laid before him. He drove straight through a wall intended to stop and onto a metal track that had been altered to replicate the friction of ice. He drove on it as effortlessly as he did any other ground. There was a similar metal track waiting for him once that one was completed. There was one more track like this he had to complete, then it was to a fighting section where cardboard standouts vaguely looking like Decepticons with disc launchers toys taped to them that were rigged to launch as they popped out from the ground.
"Remind me again why you chose a child's plaything instead of blanks for the training exercise, Twilight Sparkle?"
"I told you, Silas, it's because the launched discs do a better job at pretending to be Decepticon lasers than blanks do!"
"Hmm."
Nemesis Prime effortlessly swatted down the 'Con mock-ups, not being fazed by either the appearance of 'Knock Out' or 'Breakdown' but he flinched and gasped when 'Megatron' popped up. "Guh...ah...um, er, AAHHHHG!" regaining his composure, he started swinging his swords at the Megatron cut-out, cutting up beyond what was necessary to complete the test.
Silas' eyebrows furrowed. "Hmmm..."
"That's not uncommon." Twilight assured him. "I know would've reacted the same way to Megatron the first time I saw him- if I wasn't totally drug-happy at the time." Twilight suddenly let out a gasp of pain and put a hoof to her head. "Aggh...hello again, Megatron."
"Hello, Twilight Sparkle. " Megatron mentally greeted with a mocking politeness.
"Are you well, Miss Sparkle?" Silas asked.
"Yeah, just...talking to Megatron in my head."
"I see your little clone of Optimus... is afraid of me. That does not bode well for your intent to invade my ship."
Nemesis Prime turned his arms into blasters and aimed them at nothing. "Who's there? I am Nemesis Prime! I am a clone of no one! I am the most advanced technology ever built by humans! And I fear nothing!"
Twilight and Silas exchanged looks.
"Hmmph! It seems your pet can hear me as well. Hear me, Nemesis Prime; Twilight Sparkle intends to use you to attack my ship. This will be a futile effort. Don't waste your time with it."
"It will be a successful effort!" Nemesis Prime roared, still aiming his cannons. "Because it will have ME in it!"
Twilight 'hmm'ed.
"Pardon me," Morocco interjected, approaching the three of them in a lab coat. "But I believe I am working on something that may spark the good lady Sparkle's interest."
Twilight Sparkle let Morocco lead her to another portion of their base, where, to her surprise, what seemed to be construction was set up. What's more, it was multiples of the same construction site and materials over and over again.
Morbots. MECH agents were hard at work building extra Morbots.
"I felt they could give us the edge we need, as we are preparing for war against these...Decepticons, are we not?"
"Y-yeah." Twilight stammered out, still slightly taken aback by the veritable army in construction.
Morocco continued. "Well, with MECH's resources and COBRA's leftovers, I figured 'why not build an army of Morbots'. It really is quite brilliant, for you see, Bishop's troops will pilot the Morbots from the inside, eliminating that pesky issue of the Morbot's remote control..."
"COBRA?" Twilight repeated. "Who or what is COBRA?"
"Oh, DeCobray didn't tell you?" Morocco responded. "He used to have his own entire agency before some pesky renegades tore it apart. He packed up the remnants of his organization and offered his services to Silas while he attempted to get his good standing back...or, so I'm told."
Twilight 'hmm'ed. "Huh...hey, if we can build all these Morbots, why can't we just build more Nemesis Primes?"
"Budget costs." Morocco quickly answered. To prove his point, he held out a clipboard for Twilight to read. "We can make a dozen Morbots with the resources needed to make a single Nemesis Prime." He pocketed the clipboard, "By the by, Twilight, there's something I wanted to show you..."
Twilight followed Morocco to a completed Morbot, but being finished wasn't the only thing separating it's appearance from the others. It was slightly larger, as well as painted a subdued bright red.
"The Command Morbot." Morocco said. "I would be ever so honored if you would take it out for a test drive."
Twilight gasped. "I'd be honored that you'd let me do such a thing!" Twilight happily climbed up the building platforms and made her way into the Morbot's interior control. The red Morbot lifted it's arms, then rocketed off towards the sky.
"So that I can talk to Silas freely without worrying about his precious 'cover'..." Morocco snarled once she had gone, striking a girly pose with his hands under his chin and leg raised into the air with sarcastic intent.
He noticed Adam staring at him with his arms crossed.
"Oh!" He exclaimed, looking over his girly pose, Slightly embarrassed, he put his foot back down and leered back at Adam. "How long have you been standing there, Mister DeCobray?"
"Long enough." Adam hissed back, unfolding his arms and approaching Morocco. "I don't like that unicorn any more than you do. Not only that, but I have a plan to get around it..."
Morroco's interest was piqued. "Oh? What would that be?"
"I am going to make a grand return." Adam told him. "A return so powerful that the world kneel at my knees! Like it always should have..."
"You don't mean..."
"Yes, Doctor, I do mean. Can I trust you when the time comes?"
"That depends, Mister DeCobray...can you pay me better then Bishop can?"
"Oh, yes...I have been planning this right under dear Silas's nose since he took in that blasted unicorn."
"Then you may consider me on your side."
Morocco and Adam shook quickly parted them when the heard the thud of Cybertronian sized feet approaching. Nemesis Prime loomed over them, and then looked over at the Morbots. "What are these things?"
"Morbots!" Morocco told him excitedly. "By the dozens!"
"What do these...Morbots do, exactly?"
"They are my brilliant robotic inventions, of course!" Morocco began waxing off on about the Morbot's features. "They are capable of self-powered flight and transformation into an all-terrain assault vehicle, and of course, equipped with a powerful laser cannon!"
Nemesis Prime's faceplate pulled down. This was strange, as the MECH scientists hadn't designed his faceplate to be retractable. He was a war machine copy of Optimus, so the ability didn't really seem necessary. It was probably another side-effect of Twilight's stabbing him with Dark Energon.
"I am...confused." Nemesis Prime said slowly. "I thought I was the most powerful human-built machine to date? If so, then why are all these Morbots needed?"
"Errr..." Morocco was at a loss for words. It was clear that he needed a very nice answer, or Nemesis Prime would probably be offended and blow up all the Morbots.
"Strength in numbers." Adam answered for him.
Nemesis Prime 'hmm'ed. "...I see." He turned around began walking back the way he came, his feet making 'clunk's as he walked.
"That was too close for comfort." Morocco rasped.
"Yesss..." Adam hissed in agreement. "We should make sure he and Twilight Sparkle do not remain...separated for too long, lest he start feeling doubtful again."
Fluttershy paced back and forth, Insecticon clamps popping one and off the ground, wondering what was taking so long for her friends to get back through the GroundBridge.
"They must be talking about Twilight." Fluttershy reasoned with herself, looking up at the floor.
Up?
"Oh my goodness!" Fluttershy pancaked and, eyes squeezing shut, gripped whatever she was on for dear life. She opened one of her of here tentatively to see what it was-she was hanging from the ceiling! But how? She lifted one hoof/clamp off the ceiling and examined it. The clamp, of course! Her Insecticon clamps were letting her stick to the ceiling like...well, like an Insecticon. She must have climbed up the wall to the ceiling in her pacing without realizing it.
"Sorry about rushing out on you like that, Fluttershy. There was an emergency." Ratchet's voice called out, stepping through the GroundBridge. "Fluttershy? Are you okay?"
Fluttershy attempted to look up-,er, down- uh, up...down to see where Ratchet was. "I'm fine."
Ratchet turned his head left and right, trying to see where she was.
"Up here!"
Ratchet looked up. He blinked, taking the sight in, then shook his head. He pounded his fist into his hand. "Uggh...where is that Queen? I've got a few choice words to say to her for turning you into...this!"
"She had to." Fluttershy told him.
Ratchet's optics widened. "She...had to?"
"Um, yes." Fluttershy said bashfully. "Remember when she said we could modify the pods programming so the Insecticons obeyed us? She lied about that."
"What!? Why?"
"She wanted to be sure she could trust us with her hatchlings, and...she needed to get me to get into the pod to be converted, or the Insecticons wouldn't obey me."
"They wouldn't?" Ratchet asked.
Fluttershy shook her head. "No. Not all of them. Some of them won't obey a non-Cybertronian at all, so I had to...become one."
Ratchet latched his arms into the other. "Huh...Well, we would be ready to move the Insecticons into the base, but we found a problem. There's not enough space for all of them."
"Oh no! What do we do?"
"Either we keep the Insecticons here, or we can contact Agent Fowler and have him set up a storage." Ratchet turned back towards the Bridge. "I'll give you a minute to think on it." The Bridge closed behind him.
Fluttershy sat down-up, oh forget it. She lowered herself against the part of the cave she was on on all fours, trying to decide which option to go with. She didn't want make the poor Insecticons leave their home, and keeping them in a 'storage area' sounded like a magnet for a human to come snooping who didn't needed to snooping around. She heard a jet engine sound, which broke her thoughts off the subject.
Realizing the sound had the exact pitch and tone of a Decepticon, she tried to figure out a way to defend herself. She looked around.
Oh yeah. The Insecticons.
Somehow, she knew they were all mature by now. The moment their pods gave away would reveal not undersized beetles, but Bob-rivaling juggernauts. How she knew, she didn't know.
"INSECTICONS! TRANSFORM AND RISE UP!...Um, was that too loud? Because I understand if you don't want to, um, er, rise up because I was too loud. It's okay, really."
Ignoring her reservations about volume, the pods opened once again, the Insecticons in them standing in full robot mode, ready and willing to enforce Fluttershy's will, with the strength and endurance to make sure it was enforced. Not that Fluttershy would abuse her power like that.
After that debacle, Fluttershy flapped her new Insections wings and shook from their motions.
"O-o-o-h! I-I-I'm n-not used t-to wwwings tha-hat beat ttthis faaast!" She noted. She managed to pilot herself directly, but shakily up through the holes in the ceiling. The Insecticons followed her through, either turning into their beetle modes or climbing up on all fours into the strip Energon mine resting above their hive.
"Who's there?" Fluttershy questioned. Looking around, she didn't see the Decepticon. Which of course, meant that he was up high. The Insecticons mimicking her motions of flying up to the air.
Flying there, she still couldn't see him. At least she heard blaster fire from behind her.
There was a an Decepticon-sized robot deftly avoiding the Insecticons attacks. It was red, with purple flames jetting out the bottoms of it's feet with a huge cylindrical blaster for a right arm and a clamp for a left.
"Oh, hey Fluttershy!" A voice out from the robot. "Think you lend me a hoof?"
"Twilight?" Fluttershy asked in surprise.
"Yeah, it's me! I'm piloting the Command Morbot. Pretty neat, huh? So, anyway, about that hoof?"
"Oh, um, yeah, sure." Fluttershy stammered. She didn't say anything, but somehow the Insecticons knew they were supposed to be backing off. They, and the Command Morbot, lowered themselves to the ground. The chest of the Morbot swung open like double doors, and Twilight hopped out of it.
"So, Fluttershy, what's up...?" Twilight noticed the...change in Fluttershy's appearance she last saw the pegasus. Fluttershy did the same, seeing the Dark Energon embedded in her chest that was relatively small, but quite large compared to the tiny splinter in her Cutie Mark.
"I'm, uh...I'm an Insecticon Princess now." Fluttershy explained. "These are my subjects."
Twilight 'wow'ed. "You're a Princess now? Fluttershy, that's amazing!"
"Um, if you say so."
Twilight curiously looked over the Insecticons. "So, what have you been up-" She saw Airachnid's blind head hanging out from the rock pile. "Oh my goodness! Fluttershy, don't look!"
"Twilight..."
"No, no, really, don't! It's ghastly!"
"Twilight, I did that."
Twilight paused. "What?" She kept her gaze on the deceased Decepticon. "Fluttershy, that's...that's terrible."
"I know..." Fluttershy whined. "She...she had just made me so angry, Twilight. She had taken this poor Insecticon's ability to think for itself! That...that made me so mad. I...I don't know what came over me."
"Didn't you just say you got mad?"
"I did say that, didn't I?"
"Fluttershy...how can you be okay with this?"
"I'm not...but Airachnid killed Arcee's partner, and Airachnid dying gave her some peace of mind. So...I can bear the guilt of having killed somepony..."
Fluttershy then scraped her hooves nervously.
"Um, Twilight? Did you know you made Dani sick?"
"Sick? What do you mean sick?"
"You...you infected her with Dark Energon."
"What!? How did that happen!?"
"Blades told the girls that you blasted her in the mines..."
"Well, I did do that..."
"That's how...you know, I guess." Fluttershy shyly turned around. "Well, um, I have to go make a big decision for my subjects...it was nice seeing you."
"You too."
Fluttershy transformed into her ladybug, causing Twilight's jaw to drop, and hovered back into the holes leading to the collection of pods that formed the hive, her Insecticons following behind her, leaving Twilight Sparkle alone with her Commandbot and the dead Airachnid.
Twilight began walking in circles. How had she infected Dani with Dark Energon? Clearly, she didn't understand as well as she thought she did. With these thoughts on her mind, she trotted back towards the Commandbot's feet, then teleported herself inside the cockpit and closed it. Once she was inside, the Commandbot's head looked towards Airachnid's corpse.
Twilight tapped her hooves lightly against the controls. With nopony around to see her, she didn't have to rush.
"You may have lightened Arcee's spark, Fluttershy...but you haven't done just that."
The Commandbot marched down the rocks and towards the pile Airachnid's head was hanging out of. It raised it's huge blaster and swatted the rocks of the top of Airachnid's body, then shoveled both it's arms under her and picked her up.
"If I want to fully understand the Dark Energon, I'll need a test subject...and you've given it to me! Thank you, Fluttershy. This should be sufficient for my purposes."
The Commandbot's rocket boots activated, propelling it upwards through the cavern's open roof. Through the robot's optics, Twilight didn't notice a camera flash beneath the robot as it left with Airachnid in it's arms.
"And mine." A human standing on the edge of a cliff added, camera in hand and helicopter parked to his side. He climbed into the copter where a pilot was waiting for him, whom he motioned to start the vehicle, hovering off from the mine.
This was a very particular human. This was a military general with the body to match. But not just any general, oh no. This was General Rufus Madison. More then once, he had run-ins with his fellow General Bryce and Agent Fowler. Since the day MECH had first started its various illegal activities, Madison had been focused on putting a stop to them with a determination that approached fanaticism. For months now, he had been trying to get approval for his project to build robotic mobiles suites, or 'Walkers' in order to terminate MECH once and for all, but always his 'genius' idea would get shot down. "Unnecessary." The higher-ups would tell him. "Excessive." They would say. But with this camera, he caught an image of a piloted robot- with this proof that MECH had succeeded in it's experiments, Madison would get his permission. He would get his Walkers completed, online...
And on a path of destruction through all of MECH's personnel.
As the jeep made its way out of the forest, the General started laughing madly at the fruition of his plans. If his pilot, Colonel Leech, was in any way concerned by this, he hid it well.
After an hour or two's worth of flying time, the helicopter had arrived at the Alden Military Base, where Madison's competitor Bryce resided. Soldiers came out with guns demanding identification.
"Identify yourselves!"
"General Madison and Colonel Leech. We're here to see Bryce."
"Oh. Yeah, sure." The soldiers let them step out of the copter and pass by without incident.
Madison, Leech entrusted with his pink camera behind him, marched into one of the buildings and across that building's halls until he was barging into Bryce's office.
"Ah, Mad Dog!" Bryce exclaimed, addressing him by his nick-name. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"
"Lock the cupboards up, Bryce." Madison told. "It's real this time. You'll have to get the board to approve my Walkers now."
Bryce eyed him suspiciously. Madison had asked Bryce to appeal to the higher-ups to get his Walkers on the floor before, but Bryce just couldn't see the point when he had the Autobots around if they really, really needed some robots. (Not that Madison knew this.) Additional, it was kinda strange how Bryce had more pull with the government then Madison when had the same rank.
(It might have something to do with the fact that Bryce, unlike Madison, wasn't nuts in his nut.)
"Leech!" Madison barked.
Leech handed the camera over to Bryce, who looked at the photo of the Commandbot carrying Airachnid's body in it's arms.
"...What I am looking at, Rufus?"
"A flying robot, no doubt built by MECH. I'm not sure what the green thing is."
Bryce had an idea. The green thing was a Decepticon without a doubt. But the origin of the Commandbot eluded him. It kinda looked like a Decepticon, but it was a very vibrant red, which he understood to be the Autobot's color, who he knew weren't flight-enabled. So, why was there a Decepticon that looked like an Autobot carrying a Decepticon? Unless...it was an Autobot that Fowler's metallic buddies failed to mention, and if that was the case...
Bryce put the camera down and stood up from his seat. "Madison, I'll see about getting your Walkers approved...just in case."
"Just in case of what?"
"Uh...nothing."
The Rescue Bots, absent Blades, and the Burns family of heroes, stood opposite Baranova's acquired gray ship for quite some time. It was amazing, almost suspension-of-disbelief disrupting, how long it was taking for the scientists and Frankie to get their bearings back.
Baranova, being somewhat hardened by her underwater experience, was the first to recover, and the first words out of her mouth were, of course, "What the heck was that!?"
Kade, Graham, and Cody exchanged glances while the Rescue Bots did their best to continue appearing as non-sentient machines.
"Eh, what was what?" Chief Burns asked her.
"The unicorn! The other Rescue Bots! The gigantic purple crystal deposit! And that green portal...what was all that about?"
"I...have no idea what you're talking about, Professor Baranova." Chief Burns fibbed.
By now, Frankie and Doc got their senses back. Frankie pointed and started sassing the Chief. "Don't give us that! You were here before we were! What happened?"
Chief Burns signed. "Let's go back to the main land. You'll want to sit down for all this..."
The passengers on both boats maintained an uneasy quiet as they floated back to the harbor, once there, they all dismounted, the Burns family opposite the scientists.
"All right, everyone." Chief Burns told the scientists. "What I'm about to tell you is a strictly-controlled government secret that I am only telling you because you witnessed it firsthand. You absolutely cannot tell anyone about, do you understand?"
"We understand, Chief." Doc Greene assured him. "Don't we?" Baranova and Frankie nodded.
"The Rescue Robots...aren't robots. They're aliens."
"Aliens?" Frankie exclaimed. "Really?"
"Yes! Our home world is Cybertron, far, far away from here!" Boulder answered in his regular voice. Chase and Heatwave gave him disapproving looks. He fiddled his hands together. "I figured since Chief Burns told them..."
Baranova raised a finger. "If they are aliens, what are they doing on Griffin Rock?"
Heatwave did his trademark 'hrrrn.' "Didn't we just tell you we're alive? I'd might appreciate it if you didn't about us like we're not here."
Baranova nodded. "I'm sorry. What are you doing, though?"
"Optimus Prime assigned us the mission of posing as non-thinking robots and slowly learn the trust of the human populace."
Frankie raised her hand. "If you're going to do that, why not just tell everyone what are you right away?"
"Frankie, you, the Doc, and Baranova might think this is cool, but think about this for a moment: There real living aliens living right here on Earth. On Griffin Rock. This is groundbreaking. World-shattering." Chief Burns answered. "Think about how Ms. Nederlander would react, then multiple that by about a hundred thousand times. This is the kind of thing we have to do slowly."
The three scientists nodded in understanding. Doc Greene rested his hand on Baranova's shoulder. "Come on, my dears. We should leave the Burnses to their business."
"Wait!" Cody reached his hand out.
"What?"
"Twilight Sparkle- she said to tell you she ate some Squilsh samples."
"Ate it?"
"She said she couldn't help herself."
Doc Greene was confused by this, but also intrigued. "Hmmmm...I wonder..."
"Wonder what, daddy?" Frankie asked.
"Ehr, nothing dear. Come on." Doc Greene ushered Baranova and Frankie outside of the docking station.
Once they had gone, the Burns and Rescue Bots instantly turned on Cody.
"Are you okay?"
"What happened?"
"How were you informed Twilight's consumption of Squilish?
"Hey, hey, one thing at time!" Cody exclaimed.
"Right, of course son. Everyone, give Cody some space." Chief Burns instructed. The Rescue Bots, taking him literally, actually stepped backwards away from Cody a giant step or two.
"Okay, Cody, let's start with the important thing; Are you all right?"
Cody nodded. "Yeah. I'm okay. I pretended to work on MECH's side to spy on them."
"What!?" Chief Burns concern gave way to a fatherly outburst of anger. "Cody, you know undercover operations are extremely dangerous!"
"I know, dad."
"If I may interrupt, sir." Chase requested. "We were unable to reach the fire station before Doctor Morocco and Twilight Sparkle obtained the Morbot's parts. Under the circumstances, what Cody was very resourceful...and intuitive."
Chief Burns still looked upset, but he let Cody off, allowing Kade and Graham to ask their questions.
"You said you pretended to work for those mooks to spy on them. " Kade reminded him. "Did you find out anything?"
Cody shook his head. "Just that they were after the Dark Energon inside the Triangle. I don't what it is or- or what's for."
"Dark Energon?" Heatwave questioned, turning to Boulder. "Wasn't that the stuff that Arcee said Dani got infected with?"
"Yeah...yeah, it was!"
The Burns family cast solemn gazes on the ground, not knowing whether the only female in their family was going to be okay.
"Don't worry." Heatwave assured them. "If anyone can fix Dani, it's Optimus Prime and his team."
As if it had been pre-planned backstage, the familiar green circle of the GroundBridge materialized. Optimus, Blades, and Dani, now capable of walking on her own feet, stepped through.
"Dani!" Kade exclaimed happily. "You're okay!" he looked at his other siblings and put a hand on the back of his head. "Uh, not that we were worried or anything..."
"I'm sure you weren't." Dani teased.
"Dani has made a full recovery from the effects of the Dark Energon." Optimus said. "However, as this condition has only one other case to compare it to, I ask you monitor Dani's progress for the next few day, in case she suffers from side effects."
"Uh, Boulder, Chase?" Blades asked timidly. "Can you take our partners back home so I can to Heatwave alone?"
Boulder and Chase seemed concerned, but they transformed into their vehicles and opened their doors for the Burns family to divvy themselves up between them and rolled out of the harbor.
Heatwave made sure they had left, then crossed his arms at Blades. "What do you want to talk about, Blades?"
Blades curled his hands into fists and made angry gestures at the air. "I'm going to request reassignment to Optimus' team!"
"WHAT?"
"I'm tired of just rescuing people from disasters!" Blades explained. "I want to do something- to really make a difference in the world!"
"Blades, we make differences in the world every day!" Heatwave lectured. "We save Griffin Rock from volcanoes, freak storms, and blocked dams! What possibly more could you do?"
"I can fight the Decepticons! And Morocco! I can keep them from harming anyone, ever again!" Blades turned around back to Optimus and saluted. "Optimus Prime, I-"
Optimus didn't even let Blades' sentence get off the ground.
"No."
"No...?" Blades repeated. "But-"
"Blades, listen to Heatwave's words. Your contribution to the life of Griffin Rock's residents is invaluable, and you should not feel you are not contributing enough for any reason...unless there is something else you wish to do...something which you cannot accomplish in Griffin Rock..."
Blades put his arm defensively and shifted his eyes. "W-what are you talking about?"
"Blades, can you reassure me that your new-found desire to fight the Decepticons is in not in the hopes you will find an opportunity to exact revenge against Twilight Sparkle for the condition she put your partner in?"
Blades' arms relaxed and sagged down to his sides, showing that he couldn't do what Optimus was requesting.
"Then I will not reassign you to my team." The GroundBridge reopened behind Optimus, and the Prime turned to enter it. "Not that I would anyways."
"Eht, Optimus!" Heatwave shouted, reaching out his hand. "I-...sorry I can't keep my men in line."
Optimus' metal eyebrow lifted curiously. "On the contrary, Heatwave, your initial response of reminding Blades what he does for Griffin Rock assures me appointing you the Rescue Bots commander was wise."
Heatwave was taken aback by Optimus' praise, thus necessitating him a moment to compose himself. "It...it means a lot to hear you say that, sir." Heatwave and Blades saluted Optimus as he entered the GroundBridge.
Blades stood there for a while, looking justifiably quite ashamed and embarrassed, before transforming and flying above Heatwave's fire truck mode back to the rescue station.
When they got there, they found Chase and Boulder parked in their deployment areas.
"Everyone's gone to get some rest." Boulder informed them. "It's been a pretty tiring day."
Blades looked at Heatwave. "He has a point..."
"Yeah..." Heatwave admitted. "I think I'll take a nap myself."
Heatwave and Blades pulled up beside their companions and powered down for the next day.
The next morning...
Cody stretched his limbs as the sun began assailing his eyelids through the window. He rubbed his eye, then jumped off of his bed and groggily made his way to the bathroom to brush his teeth, only to find it was locked. Agitated, as most children, (well, everyone really) were when denied access to the facilities, he banged on the door.
"Cody, I'm taking a shower!" Dani shouted through the door over his banging.
"Oh." Cody said. He put his back against the wall, waiting for her to finish. But it was good that she was up at all. Cody yawned, casting a causal glance at the window as he did so. Mr. Harrison was having trouble with his heli-pack. Ms. Pettypaws was getting stuck in the tree. Twilight Sparkle was sleeping on her belly, curled up against the leg of the Morbot which had somehow magically turned red. Everything was norm-waaaaiiiitt...
Cody ran screaming down the stairs. "DAD! DAD! TWILIGHT SPARKLE'S OUTSIDE!"
"Everyone move out! If we act quickly, maybe we can keep her from doing any lasting damage."
Cody thought about how Twilight Sparkle was sound asleep. "Uh...I don't think that'll be too hard."
Cody, Chief Burns, and Graham all got dressed and rushed their way outside, Kade and Dani still finishing their respective morning rituals, and walked over to the red Morbot where Twilight lied.
The three of them turned to each other, expecting a solution to come from the other one.
"Should we poke her?" suggested Graham.
"No. We should just lift her up and carry her to the jail."
Cody, however, in spite of Chief Burns disapproval, went ahead started nudging Twilight Sparkle in the shoulder. "Hey, Twilight? Twilight Sparkle?"
Twilight stirred, barely opening her eyes and turning towards Cody. "Cody..." she groggily began. "You shouldn't be here..."
Cody got confused. "I shouldn't?"
"No, nooo...I'm on a date..."
"She's not fully awake yet." Graham concluded. "Shake her up a little more, Cody."
Cody gave Graham a thumbs-up, then started shaking Twilight by the shoulders. "Twilight, wake up! What are you doing here? I thought you already got all the Dark Energon from Griffin Rock!"
"I did..." Twilight muttered. "But Fluttershy told me I infected Dani with Dark Energon...so I...mmm, not now, sweetie...I came back to see if there's...something I could do to make it up to yoooooou-whhhoo!"
Graham looked at his father, wanting to know how he felt before doing anything.
"And..." Twilight added, standing up off of the Commandbot's legs. She circled the air with her hoof. "I still need to reseal the methane pocket inside the triangle." She kept circling her hoof in the air. Cody grabbed it to make it stop.
Chief Burns leered at Twilight suspiciously, as if trying to gauge her intentions. "Tell you what- there's been a cave-in at the lead mine. I'm going to go there in half an hour. Maybe you can beat me there and do something about it, and maybe I'll believe you about wanting to make up."
Chief Burns turned around briskly and walked off.
"Well, that was weird." Graham noted. He and Cody turned around to apologize for their father's behavior to Twilight, but she and the Commandbot were already gone.
"Hmmh."
Up ahead and over the rooftops, the Commandbot, piloted from inside by Twilight Sparkle, flew on it's rocket boots across Griffin Rock towards the lead mine.
"Now, let's see here..." Twilight said from inside her vehicle as it touched down just outside the lead mine. "This is probably the rubble Chief Burns was talking about."
Through the Commandbot's visor, Twilight Sparkle could see what appeared to be...
"Bob!?"
The Commandbot carefully tromped it's way over to the unconscious Insecticon, which wasn't Bob, but the Insecticon dispatch meant to terminate her. She had yet to have been informed of the presence of any other Insecticons on Griffin Rock.
"Bob?" The Commandbot reached it's pincer-arm to jostle the Insecticon awake.
With a grunt and a whir, the Insecticon's optic bands glowed again and registered this strange red robot standing above. Knowing whatever it wanted was nothing good, it shrieked and pounded it in the face. Twilight gripped the controls of the Commandbot hard for support as she tumbled around from the impact.
"Bob! It's me, Twilight Sparkle!"
The Insecticon flipped itself over onto it's feet. "Twilight Sparkle? That is the name that Lord Megatron sent me to eradicate!"
Twilight gasped. "You can talk?"
There was a pause.
"You work for Megatron!? Bob, what happened to Fluttershy?"
The Insecticon swiped it's claws across themselves, preparing for a rumble. "My loyalty has always been to Lord Megatron. I know not who this 'Fluttershy' is, but I believe you have me and this Bob you speak of confused with each other."
"All right, then, if you're not Bob, then...who are you?"
"My name is-"
A moving truck sped down the street nearby, drowning out the Insecticon's name as he said it.
"I'm sorry, I couldn't you over the truck. What did you say it was?"
"I said it's-"
A foghorn from a ship honked in the distance, causing the Insecticon's name to go unheard a second time.
"RRAAAGGH!" The Insecticon threw it's fists into the air, seeing that some sort of- cosmic force was determined to keep him a generic troop. "Enough introductions! Now I bring you to my master!" the Insecticon ditched speaking and shrieked, charging at Twilight's Commandbot.
The Commandbot uppercutted him with it's blunt laser, then pounded him in the cheek with it's other arm before Twilight opted to just pummel him outright. The Insecticon was knocked back, but eventually it used it's extra arms to grab the Commandbot's elbows and hold them in place. Twilight wrestled with the controls, trying to break them free of the Insecticon's grip. Seeing that trying to muscle her way out wasn't going to cut it, Twilight searched around for the button to make the cannon fire. She found it and pressed it. A huge purple laser with two rings around the blast shot out from the center of the blaster which pushed the Insecticon back. He attempted to hold his ground, but the laser seemed designed to push, eventually slammed him into the mine's outside wall. He grunted and attempted to back up, but the Commandbot charged at him and punched him out.
The Insecticon no longer a threat, Twilight Sparkle raised the Commandbot's arms through the visor. She wondered if the way she had beaten the Insecticon was what it was like to feel Cybertronian. She then cast one conspicuously long look at the unconscious Insecticon.
"Hmmmmmm..."
The Insecticon came to, only to find that he was in an underwater hole. He attempted to lift himself out, only to find something -or several tiny somethings- holding him down. He screamed in rage. Partly at his bindings, partly at his failure.
The Commandbot stood motionlessly by the cave, Twilight pacing outside of both, awaiting Chief Burns to arrive and judge her clean-up job of the mine. A whee-ooo-whee-ooo told her he wasn't far off.
Chase's vehicle mode drove up the hill and parked. Chief Burns and Cody stepped outside of him before he transformed into his robot mode. Chief Burns and Chase looked around.
"The rubble appears quite efficiently displaced, Twilight Sparkle." Chase complimented. "Well done. I also observe that the Insecticon has left. What has become of him?"
"You might say I..." Twilight chuckled. "Plugged him in."
Chase looked at Cody for an answer. Cody shrugged.
"Well, that's quite well done, Twilight." Chief Burns admitted. "Now that you've done that, I need a favor..."
"Sure, Chief! I am determined to make up for my mistake somehow!"
"Great...look at the town real quick."
Twilight Sparkle shifted the placement of her hooves until she was looking down the hill at Griffin Rock street below. "Okay, now what?"
"Just hold still for a second..." Chief Burns said, trying to remain calm, but Cody and Chase could sense a dangerous edge in his voice.
"Chief Burns, are you all right sir?"
"Dad? What's going on?"
Chief Burns reached into his pocket and pulled out an orange something that looked like- a gun! He pointed at Twilight pulled the trigger. A cable shot from the barrel and hooked itself in Twilight's Cutie Mark.
"Ow! What- AAAAHHH!" Twilight screamed in pain as the taser began electrocuting her.
"Dad, what are you doing!?"
"Cody, I'm an officer of the law." Chief Burns forcefully said. "Twilight Sparkle made me daughter sick. I can't let her just get away with that."
"But that's she came back for! To apologize and make things up to us!"
"So?"
"So...so...so it's wrong to shoot her with a taser!"
"It's not wrong, Cody. It's justice."
Chase got down on his knee and attempted to reason with the Chief. "Chief Burns, I concur with Cody. Twilight Sparkle has not been informed of her rights, so anything done to her in the name of the law is not done- lawfully!"
"Chase, stand down!"
Chase was saddened by this, but the Police Bot never, ever disobeyed orders without another order to override it.
Cody looked at Twilight Sparkle, now on her side and spasming from the surge of electricity in her.
"...Dad, can I tell you a story?"
"Right now?"
"It's kinda...relevant."
"All right, son. How does it go?"
"Right," Cody began narrating. "There was this one time where there was a little boy and an smart old man who taught the little boy stuff."
Chief Burns smirked, imagining himself to be the smart old man in question.
"One day, the old man said something he wanted the little to never forget, then, the next day after that, the old man did something that totally went against what he told the boy!"
Chief Burns frowned. Suddenly being the smart old man didn't seem so attractive. "What...what did the old man do?"
"I don't know." Cody answered. "I do know what the old man told the little boy though."
Chief Burns hesitated to ask, but he did. "Which was?"
"True heroes are strong enough to be gentle."
Reality came crashing down on Chief Burns. "..." he turned the taser off and yanked on the cord, jerking out of Twilight. Twilight lie down still, on the ground.
Cody put his fingers to his lips. "Is...is she-?"
The Dark Energon in Twilight's chest pulsed furiously, the unicorn's veins being highlighted by the dark power within. She got to her hooves, wailed like a Terrorcon, then charged at Chief Burns, goring him with her horn which sent him flying into the air. Chase reacted naturally, snapping his hand to grab Chief Burns mid-flight.
Chase shrunk. "I'm sorry, sir. I know you ordered me to stand down, but you told me that we were supposed to enforce the letter of the law with compassion."
Chief Burns regarded Chase appreciatively, then looked down towards Twilight, who was snorting and huffing away.
"I know I did, Chase...but seems I was trying to enforce it with just a little too much compassion."
Cody looked at his father, then turned to see Twilight standing right smack-dab in front of him.
"Cody..."
Twilight wrapped her front legs around him. "I don't know what you did, to make him stop, but thank you..." She patted him on the back, gave him a smooch on the cheek, then teleported out. The sound of clanking joints revealed she had teleported inside the Commandbot. The Commandbot aimed it's cannon the Chief and Chase, but it's mind -or Twilight's mind- changed at the last minute, and the robot took off towards the sky.
Chase transformed, waiting for the order to the Chief and Cody home.
Inside the Commandbot's cockpit, Twilight Sparkle was feeling a little huffy. Chief Burns had nearly tried to kill her a moment ago. This wasn't what disturbed her though. What disturbed her was that had been the second human who made an effort on her life.
The second...
Autobot-aligned...
Human.
A beep came from the Commandbot's panels. Twilight pushed a button to respond. "Twilight Sparkle here. What do you need?"
"Ahh, yes! I considered how you intend to siege the Decepticon warship..." Starscream's voice slowly came through the comm. "So I have returned to a wreck. A Decepticon ship known as the Harbinger which crashed sometime ago. I believe there may be equipment on board which we could salvage for our uses...Follow these coordinates to my location." Starscream hung up. Just after he did, another call came through.
"Twilight here."
"Good news, Twilight Sparkle! The Morbots are completed! When you get back, we can make preparations to move out."
Twilight started thinking. "Say...you have excellent timing, Morocco! Get those Morbots to follow these coordinates!"
Then, Twilight added something very ill-boding to her request.
"And bring some of the Dark Energon."
At the MECH base, Morocco would've rebuked Twilight's request, but as Novo was present, he had no choice. He spread his feet apart and pointed in a dynamic pose. "Send those Morbots out with the Dark Energon!"
Morbots, one by one by one by one, began rocketing out of the shelter of the trees in the MECH base and took off for parts unknown (to them, at least).
Not one of them noticing what seemed to be a blue gargoyle of sort watching them all as they left.
Coming to the inevitable conclusion the strange Morbots were no doubt of MECH origin, Laserbeak resolved to return to the warship. He turned around and flew off, but as he did so, he detected Decepticon life signals in the underground so far below him.
As his signal to his master Soundwave, a GroundBridge opened in the middle of the air for him to go through. The blue air of the jungle gave way the purple walls of the warship as Laserbeak passed through it.
Now inside the bridge, Laserbeak folded up and inserted himself into his spot on Soundwave's chest and began relaying what he had seen.
Soundwave, being the cheif of communications, sent a message to Megatron, who received it at wherever he was on the ship.
Megatron furrowed his browplates at the messages contents. He navigated his way through the halls until he came into a very large room with it's own bridge. A humongous, empty tube stood in the middle of the room, once having housed Dark Energon. Now, the tube was empty and the room was filled with the resting forms of beetle-mode Insecticons.
"Laserbeak has detected the presence of Insecticon Sparks underground where I found you." Megatron quietly explained to them. "Explain to me why."
"We were are all from Cybertron." One Insecticon answered. "We made our way to Earth...after which, our Queen was unable to keep herself from laying more eggs into this world's soil. It is likely those younger Insecticons are the cause of your mystery."
"Hmmm...and these Insecticons did not join me when I recruited all of you because?"
"They were too young. Too small. Too weak."
"Hmph!" Megatron walked out of the room.
Soundwave was hard at work, attempting to do...something with some files in the ships computer. His tendrils were plugged into the console, data traversing through them. As if he were a ninja, Megatron appeared behind him. Soundwave stopped, awaiting his soverign's bidding.
"Oh no, Soundwave. Don't stop on account of me...wait, what's that file there?"
Soundwave silently turned to Megatron.
"Yes, I can see it's not part of the database..."
That confirmed, Soundwave pushed a button that made the file's contents readily visible. He stepped aside to let Megatron read it himself.
There was a short time when Megatron had been incapicated where Starscream had succeded his ambition of being Decepticon Leader, hence Megatron didn't recognize the file at first; It had been recorded during that breif reign.
"In the Sudan...plague ship...Autobots exiled to die to prevent them from infecting others with...Cybonic Plague." Megatron turned away from the console and began walking off, but he stopped.
"Wait..." He pointed at the file. "This means there is a crashed ship here on Earth full of Autobot corpse that are sick with Cybonic Plague. Autobots I could raise and have an untouchable army! An army that Optimus Prime and his Autobots could not possibly fight against, for fear they too will succumb to the plague! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"
Megatron's laughter, so joyous with malice, came to an abrupt halt.
"Or possibly..."
Fluttershy's pacing had yet to reach an end.
Optimus, Arcee, and Ratchet Groundbridged back into the hive.
"Fluttershy, have you come to a decision yet?" Optimus queried.
Fluttershy nodded. "Mh-hm! I've decided...I'd rather keep the Insecticons here."
"Somehow, Fluttershy, I was expecting you to make that choice." Optimus said. "I apologize to make you do such difficult things more then once, but I must now request you make another one."
Fluttershy looked at him curiously. "What's that?"
"There is a mission I wish to undergo that will require the strength of your Insecticons to succeed. However, the mission is extremely dangerous. I will understand if you do not wish to put your subjects at risk, but their power is of tantamount importance in the mission's success."
"We won't even do the mission at all without them backing us up." Ratchet clarified. "That's how vital they are to it."
Arcee flicked her hand through the air. "But no pressure."
Fluttershy gazed out at her Insecticons. Excepting Bob, they bowed in succession like dominoes and proclaimed their loyalty in shrieks.
Fluttershy steeled herself.
"Well...what is it?"
The battalion of Morbots made their way through the skies above, headed by Twilight's Command Morbot.
Said Command Morbot suddenly stopped, looking at the ground. "Wait, what's that?"
The other Morbots exchanged confused looks. Or rather, the MECH troopers exchanged looks through their Morbots.
"We don't know."
"Then let's find out!" The Commandbot descended down to the ground. The other Morbots, after a moment of uncertainty, followed to find pieces of burnt metal and shrapnel on the ground.
"Looks like a wreck." one agent noted. The others had difficulty disagreeing with him. It looked like something that been exploded.
"Yes, it does look like a wreck...but there's something about it...something familiar."
The Commandbot looked around, trying to discern what it was that Twilight was finding so familiar.
"This was the ship me and my friends used to get here!" The Commandbot communicated Twilight's emotion by putting the ends of both it's hands against it's head. "Are they okay? Were they inside when it exploded?"
The MECH agents turned their Morbots heads, then fanned out the area. They came back moments later.
"All scans negative for signs of bodily decomposition, Twilight Sparkle." one agent reported.
Twilight seemed slightly eased by this. "...Did you check for ashes?"
The Morbots shied away. "Eerr..."
One raised its claw. "I did!"
"And?"
"Nothing!"
Twilight seemed just a little relieved by this. "Okay, okay...good."
One Morbot seemed intent on the ship parts. "Say, Twilight Sparkle? It occurs to me that we might be able to salvage these ship parts."
"Yeah!"
"Ain't nothing wrong with keeping a little scrap metal around, right?"
"Mmm...yes! We can use on the Harbinger! Grab as much as your Morbot can hold and resume course!"
The Morbots set about scooping up the pieces of the ship into their arms before rocketing back into the sky and resuming course, as instructed.
As her Commandbot scooped up a part, it cast one last solemn look at the ground to make sure Twilight's friends were no where to be seen.
Starscream walked in circles around the Harbinger piece that stuck out of the ground, waiting for Twilight to arrive. Where was she? His patience was now being tested at this point. He was debating calling her again when the whistle of descending rockets assaulted his audio receptors. He clasped his head with his claws, attempting to block out the noise, then removed them when he saw their source.
"Eerr...do I know you?"
"Starscream, it's us!" Twilight told him. "MECH helped Morocco build more Morbots to help assist in our attack! But right now, we're gonna use them to repair the Harbinger!"
"Repair it!?" Starscream exclaimed. "Twilight, I think you misunderstood my message; I said we could salvage something from it."
"Why can't that something be itself?" Twilight questioned.
"Because there is no way we could possibly dig the ship out! And even if we could-"
Twilight and MECH shut him up by blasting into the sky, then shooting their lasers at the ground over and over until the explosions had caused enough dirt for both pieces of the Harbinger to be exposed. It took awhile, but they were successful.
Starscream could only stare dumbfounded.
After that, the Morbots split up and began pushing the Harbinger pieces towards each other. This too took awhile, but with their teamwork, they eventually had the ship halves almost close enough to touch. Then they took the pieces of Twilight's old ship and began cutting them up to reshape them, using their blasters like cutting torches. With the same blaster-torch trick, the army of non-autonomous automatons began wielding the pieces of the ship in the empty space of the Harbinger's halves, eventually reconnecting the the two pieces. (This also took awhile.)
Once finished, they proceeded to the next intending stage of their repairs. Two Morbots wrenched the door open, only for a pile of dirt to come pouring out of it and on top of that. Some of the other Morbots helped dig them out. Under Twilight's supervision, the MECH agents directed their Morbots to start slowly and carefully removing the dirt from the Harbinger's interior.
This took a really, really, long while.
But it was worth it.
A glorious ship stood before them, of comparable size, but different shape and color to the Nemesis itself, gleaming green under the sunlight.
The dirt now cleared, Starscream walked over and examined the interior. "Good work, Twilight! Oh...and it wouldn't have been possible without the rest of you, either!" he quickly added.
"Thank you, Starscream."
"There's just one thing..."
"Oh? That is?"
"What do you intend to use as fuel?"
The Commandbot held it's claw out at one of the other Morbots. "Gimme."
The other Morbot handed over a clump of Dark Energon into the Commandbot's grip. The Commandbot transformed into it's vehicle mode and rolled out of sight, no doubt heading for wherever the ship's fuel deposits were in order to install the Dark Energon.
Some time passed before Starscream and the other Morbots saw the red variant drive by them again, this time in the opposite direction. Wondering what caused the shift, Starscream and the others followed after it/her.
They were led to a large room filled with Cybertronian-sized keyboards, computers, and swivel chairs, with an elevated platform that had a larger chair on top. They were no doubt on the Harbinger's bridge.
The Commandbot pushed buttons on the keyboards until there was a rocking in the ship that made Starscream and MECH flinch. The rocking stopped, but they could all feel the ship lifting upward.
The computer screens all came to life, purple light controls and Cybertronain text decorating them.
Twilight Sparkle's infusion of the Dark Energon had been successful in bringing the ship back online.
"Starscream, can you come translate this for me?" Twilight asked, the Commandbot making a come hither motion with it's claw.
"Mmm...let's see here..." Starscream approached the screen and rested his elbow on the keyboard. "Files about some of the experiments the ship was running before it crashed...Immobilization...cloning...some plans for something called a 'Neuron Refractor'...this is interesting..."
"What?"
"Apparently, there is a cloning laboratory hidden somewhere within this very ship." Starscream explained. "I might imagine we could utilize it somehow..."
"I'd rather we didn't." Twilight said. "I've read stories about clones. It always sounds like a good idea, but it's really not. They always try to 'dispose' of the orinigal, thinking it'll somehow make them the original..."
"Hmmmmm..." Starscream swept his optics over the files again, then looked at the Commandbot. "Perhaps we may circumvent the issue by cloning with something ..."
He tapped the Commandbot's head with the tip of his claw.
"Without free will."
The Commandbot, showing Twilight's emotions more then it's, put it's claw to it's head. "That's...that's a pretty smart idea. Morocco's budget only allowed for one Commandbot, but with a cloning laboratory..."
Twilight suddenly became silent, and not just because her sentence had trailed off. Something was up.
"Twilight Sparkle? Are you okay?"
"Megatron's thoughts." Twilight replied, walking away in her Morbot. "Apparently...there's a ship full of Autobots who died from Cybionic Plague that either he or I could use to raise from the dead. Something he doesn't want me to do..."
"I rather you don't, as well..." Starscream muttered.
"So, let's go make Megatron angry and do exactly that! Don't worry, Starscream. I will take the utmost precaution." the Commandbot pushed a button on the control panel. "We should pick Silas and the others up first, though."
"And besides..." Twilight added quietly. "If I'm gonna raise a whole ship of Autobots back from the dead, I'll need to practice first..."
Six robots. All green like military camouflage. Holes where their necks should've been and huge gun emplacements in place of arms. Bold font lettering on their chests and huge feet custom-built for stomping and searchlights building into their shoulders.
At the completion of his Walkers, Madison smirked. He made his way up the ladder leading into the top of the chest of the Walker reserved for him and plopped through the hole there like a bunny rabbit. Now inside, Madison adjusted himself on the controls and started practicing. He aimed the gun-arm at the wall and fired, blasting an enormous hole through it.
He felt more than satisfied at the result.