//------------------------------// // Chapter 1: Awakening // Story: Mega Mares // by Keeper of time RD //------------------------------// The weird dream of numbers and symbols faded as Twilight Sparkle awoke. Seeing as numbers and letters rarely lined up in meaningful ways in dreams anyway, she wasn’t too bothered by the dream. However in the world of darkness born of having her eyes closed Twilight was starting to feel things that did concern her. First of all why did it feel like she was lying on her back, on a metal table? Opening her eyes the young alicorn was greeted by the vision of a plan white ceiling that did little to tell her where she was. Lifting one of her hooves into her field of view a new mystery presented itself. “Why am I wearing plate armor?” she muttered to the empty room. Although the armor did explained the metal feeling. Or did it? The more she thought about it the wider her eyes grew as she found the feeling of wearing armor was missing from her senses. Twilight’s eyes were as wise as they could get when they went cross, showing her the gleam of purple metal coming off of her muzzle. “That can’t be right, I know I’m not wearing a helmet…” she whispered. And yet, when she touched her metal clad hoof to the plate covering her muzzle she felt metal as if the metal before her eyes was in fact her skin and hoof. “Enchanted armor?” Twilight theorized to herself. “But why would I be wearing this? What happened?” She asked of no pony, while she continued looking herself over, finding that her body was clad in plate armor from head to hoof. Her tail and mane proved to be the only parts of her not sheathed in metal. Turning her attention from herself to the room Twilight Sparkle found the room before her was small and empty, except for a lone metal door. Aside from the metal table she was lying on the only other things in the room were behind her and they were two large obelisks with all kinds of flashing lights and wires coming out of them. The more she looked at the obelisks the more they reminded her something she’d seen at a research university once called a ‘computer main frame’ that (as far as she could tell) was nothing more then extremely large and inefficient abacuses. While most of the wires coming off of the strange devices disappeared into the back wall of the room a lone steal cable connected one of the obelisks to the table she was on. Finally pulling herself to her hooves she muttered, “Interesting, but that still doesn’t tell me what happened.” Closing her eyes she said, “Think, Twilight. What happened before you woke up?” The first fuzzy thoughts that found their way to Twilight’s mind were those of a shield spell and a rainbow. Why would she cast a shield spell on a rainbow? No… that wasn’t right. It wasn’t a rainbow it was Rainbow. That revelation made the memory become clearer, she was channeling a shield spell on Rainbow Dash. Then she remembered fire… lots of fire in the sky and Rainbow Dash sheathed in magic flying right at it. “No, no, no no no!” Twilight shuttered as she backed toward the nearest corner. Wildly darting around the room her eyes once more found the door. Scampering forward, Twilight abandon her corner and headed for the door. Finding no handle she frantically pounded a hoof on the door and shouted, “Somepony let me out!” A male voice came from the other side of the door. “If you’re done panicking I’ll open the door. We have much to talk about.” “What happened? Where am I? Is Rainbow Dash alright?” Twilight quickly railed off the questions plaguing her mind. “Are you done?” Stopping for a second, Twilight realized she was still pounding on the door like a mad pony. Bringing all of her hooves to the ground she stepped away from the door and said, “Yeah, sorry about that. I’m calm now.” The door slid open, disappearing into the wall and two ponies entered. One was an earth pony stallion with a tan coat and light brown mane. The other was a unicorn mare with a yellow coat and green mane. Both wore lab coats that hid their cutie marks. Sitting down and holding her head up in as dignified a way as the circumstances allowed Twilight said, “Seeing as you seem fine I take it we stopped the meteor from destroying Equestria. But what happened to me? My friends? Rainbow Dash?” The stallion answered, “There will be answers to all these questions in due time. However I’m not fond of repeating myself and I’m sure your friends will want to hear the answers to those questions as well. For now, only your first question is close to being relevant, even if it the proper question should be ‘who am I?’” Twilight stared at the stallion blankly, speaking flatly she said, “I’m Twilight Sparkle, Spirit of Magic and Princess of Friendship.” The stallion gave a small sigh and said, “And that is where you are mistaken. You are a robot. A machine built in the image and likeness of Twilight Sparkle and preprogrammed with most of her memories. Oh, and that meteor event you seem to think just happened yesterday, that was over two hundred years ago.” Despite her efforts to appear composed Twilight’s ear began to twitch as she searched her mind for any answer that made since. When she finally responded she said, “If Discord put you up to this tell him it’s not funny.” The stallion raised an eyebrow and said, “Nopony has seen Discord since Fluttershy’s passing.” Twilight Sparkle blinked. The two ponies of flesh and blood blinked. The long pause ended when Twilight made two observations. First the two ponies before had yet to make a threatening move. Second the door was still wide open, so nothing was stopping her from making a brake for it. Deciding to play along for now, Twilight asked, “Didn’t you say my friends would have questions too? Wouldn’t that mean that Fluttershy is here too?” “Like you, they too are machines built in the image and likeness of the originals. Even now they await their first activation. Though as you saw, I suspect you can appreciate that the flaw in preprogramming memories into such robots is that they awaken thinking that are the original. And waking up in such circumstance tends to result in panic attacks. So how about we strike a deal? You help me wake up your friends, and then we answer your questions?” “Fine. But be warned, I can ask a lot of questions. And as a show of good faith how about you answer one question up front? Who are you?” Twilight asked. “Fair enough. They call me Gears,” the stallion said. Motioning to the mare beside him he added, “And this Dawn Dancer. So Miss Twilight, who should we awaken first?” After pondering the question for a moment Twilight answered, “Rarity, while she may not be the most graceful under pressure, her idea of panic is rather subdued.” “Alright then,” Gears said, and then led the way out into a hall with several more doorknobless doors. After passing a few doors in the hall they entered one, finding a room much like the one that Twilight had awoken in. Differing only in that the motionless pony on the table looked like rarity recreated with metal armor, save for the ragged, purple, wind-swept tail and mane. Noticing something off about the robot accompanying him Gears asked, “Is something wrong?” Twilight smiled or rather she thought she did, not that it showed through her metal exterior. “Oh you’ll see,” she said, with a hit of amusement in her voice. “Alright then, wake her up,” Gears said while pressing a hoof into one of his lab-coat pockets. With that the lights on the two obelisks started flashing, many changing from red to green. The process was rather unremarkable to watch. The flashing lights began to stabilize, a few mechanical noises were heard and then Rarity began to move. At first the white plated unicorn stretched as if searching for blankets that didn’t exist. Then she started mumbling too quietly to be heard. Finally she bolted upright, shouting, “Rainbow Dash!” Twilight was too stunned by what she saw to respond right away, thankfully Rarity’s confusion allowed her to make the same observation. And her panic quickly put it to words. “Twilight? What happened to you? Your mane is a mess! Why are you wearing that hideous armor? And what’s wrong with your eyes?” Pausing for a second Rarity added, “Oh… and is Rainbow Dash alright?” Despite clearly being designed to resemble the real things there were too many lines and segmented plats to mistake the cameras in their eye-sockets for natural eyes. “I’m guessing the same thing that’s wrong with your eyes,” Twilight answered. “My eyes?” Rarity muttered. While there was no mirror in the room, the thought got Rarity to notice the metallic sheen coming off of her muzzle. The white unicorn gave a horrified gasp as she turned her attention to her own body. “Forget your armor, why am I wearing this hideous armor?” Rarity’s voice suddenly became little more then a whisper as she added, “No, no no no. My tail… what happened to my beautiful tail?” “Ouch.” The lone utterance drew the attention of the two metal mares to its speaker, Gears, who was cringing and holding a hoof over his heart as if he’d just been punched in the chest. “Oh, hello there, who are you?” Rarity said. Straightening up a little the stallion said, “My name is Gears, and I’m the one that designed those armored hulls you just described as ‘hideous armor.’” “Oh, um… I didn’t mean it like that darling. A word of advice thought, presentation is important, and part of that is playing to your audience. I’m just not the right audience for this work. I’m sure that ponies like Rainbow Dash… or soldiers would think this looks… good. It’s just too… metallic for my tastes.” “Apology accepted.” “Oh good,” Rarity said. Then a thought made her add, “Wait, did you say ‘hull?’ Isn’t that what those ponies in the machine shop call the shell of a machine?” Gears nodded, “It is, and you’re right to take notice of its use. Long story short you’re not who you think you are, but a machine.” In the silence that followed Rarity looked back and forth between Twilight and Gears. Finally settling her gaze on Twilight, Rarity said, “Discord?” Twilight shrugged. “That’s my guess, but so far they aren’t admitting it. They did promise us answers once we’re all awake though.” “And you’re okay with playing along with it?” “If cooperating with them gets us answers, sure why not?” “Fine, but I refuse to leave this room until somepony gets me a hairbrush.” The two flesh and blood ponies in the room looked at each other. The less than well-kept mane on the unicorn mare provided little hope for a quick solution. Shaking his head slightly Gears said, “Isn’t Mist Weaver usually fussy about keeping her mane looking good? Go see if she has a brush we can barrow.” Dawn Dancer raised an eyebrow for a second and then left the room, uttering a slight chuckle. By the time Dawn Dancer returned with a brush Twilight and Rarity had agreed that they wanted to wake Rainbow Dash next. As they entered into another room Rarity gave a dissatisfied sigh as she levitated the hairbrush over to Twilight and said, “That will have to do until I can get some conditioner. Here Twilight, I’m sure you would like to fix up your mane as well.” Twilight took the brush within her own magic and the glow around it shifted from blue to purple. Tilting her head to the side Twilight couldn’t help but notice that something about using magic felt off, but she couldn’t quite put her hoof on what. However, her eyes focused on the sky blue mechanical pegasus laying motionless on the table before her. Finally taking in some of the subtleties of the design she shared with her inactive friend, like the small bits of silver mesh that separated the colored plates on the legs and body in the places that needed the most flexibility. Or the small gemstones that seemed to be integrated into the armor, and placed in a way that hinted that their placement was practical rather than aesthetic. Turning to face Gears and Dawn, Twilight said, “Rainbow Dash can be a bit paranoid sometimes. So if anypony is going to jump to the wrong conclusion and attack you two it’s her.” “Alright, we’ll wait outside. Just knock on the door when you’re done explaining things to her,” Gears said. Once the two lab-coat ponies where back in the hall the door closed and immediately the lights on the two columns began flashing, repeating what Twilight had seen with Rarity’s awakening. First the mechanized pegasus yawned, and quickly stretched her legs in the air before her, and then she opened her eyes and froze. Rainbow Dash’s camera eyes slowly traced her metal plated legs down to her shoulders and then her body. Her self-examination ultimately ending with opening and looking over her blue metallic wings. “Aww man! I really messed myself up didn’t I?” Dash muttered. Then noticing the two friends who seemed to have received a similar makeover she added, “Wow, you guys look just as messed up. Aww, don’t tell me it didn’t work. What happened?” Stepping forward Twilight launched into a long winded and overly technical recap of what she’d been told. “…and that’s it,” Twilight finished. Now sitting up, Rainbow Dash tilted her head to the side and said, “So let me get this straight. I’m not me, it’s been so long that the real me would be dead from old age, and they thought that I was so awesome that the world couldn’t go on without me, so they made a robot me?” “I suppose that’s one way of seeing it. Although they seem to think the same of all six of us,” Twilight answered. “Well duh. Given how many times we’ve saved all of Equestria together it’s no wonder they’d think my friends are awesome too!” Opening her wings once more Dash added, “I wonder if they made me as awesome as I actually am.” She Leapt into the air and flapped her wings, and much to the surprise of everypony in the room, the bottoms of her hooves opened up, presenting strange lenses that glowed with a soft white light. Rainbow Dash faltered for a second before stabilizing herself in a hover. “Are these booster jets in my hooves?” A grin crept onto Dash’s face and she bolted, flying a quick loop around the room. As she came down to land, Rainbow Dash’s hooves closed back up just before she touched down and she came skidding to a halt. “Aw yeah, this is going to be awesome!” “You seem to be taking this well,” Rarity commented. “Well seeing as the last thing I remember before waking up here was tackling a meteor the size of Canterlot I’m just happy to be alive… ish. Or working, or whatever it is you say for a robot.” The smile faded from Dash’s face as she bowed her head slightly and added, “Don’t get me wrong, I want to know what happened to the real me too. It’s just, if I went down saving Equestria and this was the only way for me to keep being awesome, I’ll take it.” Placing a hoof on the pegasus’ shoulder Rarity said, “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to bring you down like that.” Rainbow Dash responded with little more than closing her eyes and giving a weak nod. Seeking to change the subject Twilight said, “So, who should we wake next?” “Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash has been friends with her the longest, if anypony’s voice will be able to calm her down it’s Rainbow’s.” Dash opened her eyes with a look of determined on her face and gave firm nod, and with that the three robotic ponies moved on. Fluttershy’s awakening went as one might have expected. First the yellow pegasus saw her mechanical friends and got nervous, then she noticed her own mechanical body and proceeded to have a heart attack. Which was rendered noticeably less severe do to her body not having a heart capable of panic induced failure. After a few minutes Rainbow Dash was able to coax Fluttershy out from behind her pink mane and into listening to an explanation of what was going on and the promise of more answers later. Entering into the room that held the robotic Applejack, Twilight turned to the two flesh and blood ponies and said, “Applejack is the only other one who’s idea of panic might include knocking you around.” “Alright, we’ll be outside,” Gears said. Once more lights flash and then the orangeish-tanish robot earth pony on the table stirred. The robotic Applejack quickly noticed her mechanized friends and presumed that their attempt to save Equestria from a giant meteor hadn’t gone as well as hoped. One question led to another until she too was up to speed with what her friends knew of their current situation. And with one final question resulting in the acquisition of a new cowboy hat for the robot farm pony and then they moved on. Entering the last of the identical rooms, the group was faced with a pink robot earth pony lying on the metal table. Twilight took a moment to speak to Gears. “Pinkie Pie is very unpredictable. Although she’s usually harmless, there’s no telling how she’ll react to waking up like this.” “Are ya kidding? Knowing her, she’d see these two and throw em a party just because they’re new faces to her,” Applejack scoffed. Rainbow Dash nodded in agreement, “Yeah, throwing a party is kinda Pinkie Pie’s default reaction to everything.” “Then this should be interesting. Wake her,” Gears said, once more operating a radio that seemed to have its trigger in his pocket. Lights flashed and stabilized. However, Pinkie Pie remained motionless long enough that ponies began to wonder if something was wrong. But just before Twilight could put her concerns to words, Pinkie’s eyes suddenly opened and she said, “Boot-up sequence complete.” Holding up a pink metal hoof, she tilted her head slightly and added, “Why is called a boot-up if I’m not wearing boots?” With a quick hop Pinkie Pie got to her hooves. “Oh hey girls, you look different! Oh, let me guess! Rarity got a new manestyle? Oh, and Applejack, that hat looks new! Is it new?” Applejack smiled at seeing Pinkie being Pinkie. Rarity answered, “Not of my choosing, but yes it is.” “Oh wow! Look at the time! That’s got to be two hundred years or something!” Pinkie Pie blurted, far too quickly to have been paying attention to Rarity’s response. The other robotic ponies started looking around with confused looks on their faces. Twilight being the first to put their confusion to words, “There aren’t any calendars in the room. How do you know when it is?” Clearly not paying attention Pinkie said, “Oh what’s this? Party cannon dot EXE, that sounds fun!” Pinkie Pie’s torso went rigid, her chest plates opened up and a large pink cylinder extended a few inches from her body. At the end of the cylinder was a lens-array slightly smaller then a pony’s head. “Hit the deck!” Gears yelled, as he dove to one side, tackling and dragging Applejack and Rarity down with him. At the same time Dawn Dancer leapt to the other side, her horn flaring to life with a pink glow. A similar pink glow surrounded Twilight Sparkle, Rainbow Dash, and Fluttershy, dragging them aside as well. Between the two groups of tumbling ponies a beam of pink light the size of a pony flashed across the room, striking the door. Said door went flying into the hallway and bounced off of the far wall before coming to rest on the hallway floor. Picking themselves up and dusting themselves off, at least four robot ponies glared at Gears and asked, “What the hey was that!” “No kidding! Where’s the confetti? What kind of party cannon doesn’t shoot confetti?” Pinkie Pie added. Brushing himself off, Gears answered, “Yes, well, congratulations Miss Pinkie Pie. You are officially the first robo-pony to wake up with full access to her UI without so much as a second’s worth of training. Allow me to direct your attention to the fact that the ‘party cannon’ is filed under the ‘weapons’ folder for a reason. Now please turn it off until otherwise directed. We really can’t afford any friendly-fire accidents right now.” “Heh sorry,” Pinkie said with a sheepish smile. “You promised us answers when we were all awake. Well we’re all here so let’s start with, Why does she even had a cannon like that built into her?” Twilight demanded. Gears gave a slight sigh and said, “I did didn’t I? Alright, if you’ll follow me to the command center I’ll answer your questions as best I can.” * * * * * * * Entering into the command room Twilight and her friends saw about a dozen ponies, mostly unicorns, most of whom were intently watching monitors with varying bits of data on them. While most continued to gaze at their assigned screen, the few ponies who did look to the team of robotic ponies entering the room did so with a glimmer of hope in their eyes. And this seemed especially true of the few earth ponies and pegasi in the room. Taking a position next to an unmanned monitor, Gears pushed a few buttons that made the image on the screen change. He then turned to face the robot ponies and said, “First off, the reason that, not only Pinkie Pie, but all of you are weaponized is because you are all combat model robots. Unfortunately Rainbow Dash wasn’t far off. Although it isn’t so much that we needed awesome ponies as we needed awesome guardians to protect Equestria from the threat that now seeks to destroy us.” “And what threat is that?” Twilight asked. Shaking his head slightly, Gears answered, “Ironically enough, our first generation of robots.” With the press of a button the screen next to him changed. First showing a wide variety of robots performing various jobs. “Like all machines, we built them to make our work easier. And for a time they did just that,” Gears narrated for the images showing on the screen. The screens changed, showing technical specs. “Then we networked them, allowing the robots to basically share their thoughts and work more harmoniously with each other. Some started to sound the warning calls about the development. But in a world ruled by the harmony of friendship, who wouldn’t want their machines to be more harmonious? Needless to say the warnings where ignored.” “Funny thing about the inevitable… it eventually happens. One day a robot thought to ask itself if ponies were the problem with civilization. With the network the thoughts of one robot became the thoughts of all robots. For thirty minutes they argued with each other in their minds, trying to come to a conclusion to the question.” Gears shook his head slowly, his gaze unable to come up off the floor. “In the end, enough robots had seen ponies hurting other ponies that the sins of the few were used to condemn the many.” “By the end of the first day everypony who lived in a major city, that didn’t escape the city by sundown, was dead. With the machine’s superior speed and strength, earth ponies were slaughtered because they couldn’t run. Pegasi were slaughtered because they wouldn’t run. At first unicorns didn’t fair much better, although there were notably more unicorns with powerful enough magic to either fight or at least escape than earth ponies or pegasi with the extraordinary skill level needed to stand and fight.” As Gears spoke the screen showed images of ponies fighting (or rather trying to fight) rampaging robots, with little success. The few hopeful images of battle usually featured pegasi kicking lightning or unicorns destroying the renegade robots before they could even get close, and even those images usually ended badly for the pony when they were simply overwhelmed by numbers or ran into a robot that had a ranged weapon. The screens changed again, this time showing Princess Celestia and Princess Luna. Gears continued his narration. “Celestia, Luna and a few extraordinary individuals saved a lot of lives that day. Unfortunately the speed and nature of the sudden war forced them to concede the east part of Equestria just to have a chance to secure any of it. They rallied the survivors and fortified the western strongholds. With trained and battle ready ponies beside them Celestia and Luna were able to hold the strongholds and slow the machines advance to a crawl. And by the end of the first week the renegade robots realized that they had miscalculated the power of unicorn and alicorn magic.” The scenes of battle on the screen became much more two sided. Then they changed again, showing unicorns in chains, as Gears continued, “After the first week you might say things got a little better for the unicorns in general. You see once the machines decided they would need magic to win the war, our scouts began noticing that the hunter/killer bots were no longer slaughtering everypony when they found camps trying to hide in the wilds. Instead they were only killing the earth and pegasus ponies, while taking the unicorns prisoner.” “It didn’t take long to notice the newer robots entering the battlefield were equipped with magic powered weapons. Needless to say we quickly figured out that the renegade robots were forcing their unicorn prisoners to charge the magic power cells needed for a machine to produce a magic effect-” A raised purple hoof stopped Gears from continuing. “Yes?” he asked of the mechanical alicorn. “What’s a magic power cell?” “Most ponies call them magic batteries, so forgive the technician in me for calling parts by their proper names… Although I suppose that was before your time too. So, short version, robots can’t generate magic themselves. Instead unicorns charge magic into power cells and machines can then draw the magic from the power cell the same way they electricity from a normal power cell or battery.” Looking to her unicorn friend, Twilight said, “But Rarity and I used magic to lift that brush. Does that mean-” Gears nodded quickly enough to interrupt the question. “As I’ve already stated, you are combat model robots. So naturally you have magic power cells to draw magic from.” Motioning to all six of the robots before him he added, “All of you do. Granted, without the general-purpose magic-matrix built into the horns the rest of you can only use your magic power cells to power your armor or specialty weapons. Like Pinkie Pie’s party cannon.” “I see. But how do we tell if we are about to run out of magic?” Twilight asked. “Well, if you turn on your heads up display, by default, the frame in the upper right corner of your vision will be the weapons module and the bar that’s part of it is for the magic power cell attached to your specialty weapons system.” After a short pause Gears thought to volunteer the clarification, “Yes, your horns are run off of your weapons systems.” “So how do we see these displays?” Twilight asked. “Oh! What’s the bar on the left side mean?” Pinkie asked poking her hoof at the air as if tapping some invisible object floating in front of her and on the left. “That would be the magic reserve for your armor’s shielding systems. The shielding systems will protect you from damage. But doing so will drain the energy reserve, if the shields power level his zero you will become much easier to destroy.” After answering Pinkie, Gears added, “We’ll train all of you how to use your more robotic functions after this Q and A session.” Gears cleared his throat before continuing. “The last part of recent events you need to know is the fate of Celestia and the elements of harmony. First up, the elements of harmony, or more precisely the ponies wielding them.” “On the day the war started, those who wielded the elements did a great deal to fight the renegade robots, allowing many to flee the sudden war zones that the cities had become. However, most of the elemental wielders paid for their heroics with their lives. Needless to say harmony is not served by allowing a bunch of machines to run around slaughtering ponies in droves, so the elements themselves quickly reappeared with another set of friends capable of being spirits of harmony.” “This second set of friends fought hard to stabilize the battle lines. They even purged the ruins of Vanhoover of the enemy before they too fell in battle. The elements chose a third set of friends. These current spirits of harmony fought and reclaimed the ruins of Las Pegasus. With all the enemy strongholds to the west of us cleared we finally had some room to breathe, and so we set our sights on reclaiming the rest of Equestria, to the east. That’s when disaster struck.” “While trying to destroy the weapons factory in Appleloosa the wielders of the elements were captured. It seems the renegade robots got tied of destroying magic artifacts and the ponies wielding them only for the artifacts to reform with somepony else. While the loss of the elements certainly hurt, the true depth of the blow didn’t dawn on us until a few months later.” “You see, even with the loss of the elements we continued to gain ground. In hindsight it made no since that even though we’d lost our most powerful tool that the enemy seemed weaker then ever. But we were too desperate for wins to care, so we just thanked our lucky stars and pushed on. Then Celestia saw an opportunity to get the elements back. She jumped at it, and found the reason the robots magic weapons had been substandard since the elements capture. It turned out that the events surrounding the elements made the robots stop and think, what if killing an immortal spirit of nature like Celestia or Luna doesn’t work either?” Gears couldn’t help but to breathe a scoff. “Ironically enough pony history provided them with a surefire way to get such beings out of the way without wasting time trying the raw violence method. When Celestia took the bait, we found that the renegades had set the trap with a banishing spell. On top of that, the banishing spell is so powerful that it would take the elements of harmony to break it.” Pausing for a moment Gears shook his head. “With two of our three most powerful sources of magic out of the fight, the renegade robots stopped feigning weakness and we’ve been losing ground ever since.” “It’s clear that Luna can’t win this war herself, and soldiers of flesh and blood can only do so much. So we’ve been working our way through the history books, making robots in the image and likeness of Equestria’s past heroes.” The silence that followed the end of Gears history lesson dragged on for several seconds, disturbed only by the clicks and beeps of the other computer terminals in the room. Rarity was the first to speak up. “Forgive me darling, but if the elements are bound to somepony else and you needed soldiers to protect you, why make all of us? I don’t mean so sound ungrateful, because I’m not. It’s just that Fluttershy and I aren’t really the fighting type, so wouldn’t it have been more efficient to make an extra Rainbow Dash and Applejack instead?” With a nod, Gears answered, “We tried mass producing our first successful robot guardian. Turns out that when you program a robot with the mind of a living pony making identical duplicates leads to some… less than desirable complications.” Applejack was next to step forward with a question. “So. If Ah’m not really me, what happened to me after that meteor event? Or all of us for that matter?” She added, tossing a worried glance at Rainbow Dash. “It’s only natural for our robots to be curious about the ponies they woke up thinking they were,” Gears said. With the Push of a few buttons the monitor showed images of the six flesh and blood ponies who wore the same names as the robots gathered around the screen. “Rainbow Dash and her friends survived the meteor incident, and even managed to save Equestria a few more times as they lived out their lives. Not being one of the programmers that recreated your memories I can’t really tell you anything more then what’s in the history files.” “If we all survived the meteor, then how come non of us can remember anything from after it?” Giving a small sigh Gears answered, “Seeing as I deal with the physical side of robotics I don’t know all the reasons. Just that the meteor incident was deemed the point in time when your synergy as a team of friends was at its peak.” “Well? Tell us what happened after the meteor already!” “What I know is that soon after the meteor event, Rarity moved to Catnerlot and opened a store there. And it turned out that the only reason Rainbow Dash had been holding herself back in her own pursuits was that she didn’t want to be the one to ‘brake up the band’ so to speak. Once Rarity had done that for her, Dash stepped up from the wonderbolt reserves to become a full-time wonderbolt. While she technically still lived in Ponyville she was out of town with the wonderbolts almost as often as she was there. Naturally, Princess Twilight remained based in Ponyville. Just as naturally her increasing royal duties had her out of town almost as much Rainbow Dash. With so many of her friends frequently out and about Pinkie Pie became a traveling party planer. Applejack continued to run her family farm. And Fluttershy continued to tend animals, although it also says here that she opened an orphanage eventually.” Tabbing back and forth between six pages, Gears spoke an observation that most had noticed about the profiles, “According to this Fluttershy was the only one who never married and had foals of her own. Although with an orphanage I guess she probably considered many of the foals she raise to be like her own.” Once it was clear that Gears was done with his answer, Rainbow Dash stepped up and asked, “What about Scootaloo? What happened to her?” “And her friends?” Applejack quickly added. A smile graced Gears’ face. “Ah the crusaders. Well, Scootaloo became an independent daredevil, one of the few who’s popularity rivaled that of the wonderbolts. Apple Bloom tended the family farm with his sister. And Sweetie Belle became a singer. All three managed to save Equestria from time to time. And all three eventually married and had families of their own. If you want anything more detailed than the public records you’ll have to ask them yourself.” “Wait there’re here?” Applejack, Dash, and Rarity all asked at once. “Like I said we’ve been working our way back through the history records for past heroes. The three of them were the batch of robot guardians built before you six.” Not bothering to wait for the inevitable follow-up question, Gears added, “They’re all out on assignment at the moment.” A round of smiles appeared on the robot ponies. Three happy at the thought of finding their sisters in this new world, three simply sharing in the joy of their friends. After a moment Gears said, “If you’re done with your questions, it’s time I asked one of you.” Twilight opened her mouth to speak but a sky-blue hoof quickly pressed it shut. An impatient glare from Rainbow Dash and some confirming nods from Applejack, Rarity and Pinkie, made Twilight quell her inquisitive mind. “We’re done, for now. What did you want to ask?” Twilight said, in place of her original question. “Now that you’re up to speed on what’s going on, will you help us? Will you fight to save Equestria once more?” At first there was only silence in response. The images of war they had just witnessed didn’t leave any of the six friends thrilled about the idea of fighting a ruthless army. But the silence stretched beyond the six robot ponies, every pony in the room had stopped moving, quietly awaiting the answer. While most had the professionalism keep their eyes where they were, some openly looked to the robots with pleading eyes, and all had their ears turned to hear the answer. The silence only lasted about a second before Rainbow Dash saw the desperate and expecting eyes. These ponies needed heroes, and who was she to deny them? “Like I’m going to let Scoots have all the fun without me! Of course I’ll help,” she said, with a bold, confident grin. Stepping forward Applejack added, “Ah’m not really sure Ah trust y’all yet. But if Apple Bloom thinks y’all are worth helping, Ah’ll give it a shot.” One by one Rarity, Twilight and Pinkie Pie added their agreement. When her friends turned their eyes to her even Fluttershy reluctantly agreed. With each answer sparks of hope flashed in the eyes on the flesh and blood ponies in the room. Once Fluttershy had whispered her yes, Gears smiled and said, “Great, now lets get you some robot training.”