Let's get one thing very straight from the start here. Grimlock is not the kind of bot you'd think for being a father. Actually, if you were a parent your first instinct would be to pick up your child and run for the hills or the nearest strong structure preferably of Apple Family strength. Grimlock did turn into a giant T-Rex after all, and a tank before that when he was with the Lightning Strike Coalition now known as the Dinobots to you or I. No matter what his team was called, they were feared among the Decepticon ranks and rightly so thanks to their track record. Destroying factories in Kaon without a scratch and all Vehicons lost or taking Devastator head on and winning? That was their work thank you very much. In fact, the only bot more feared then the Dinobots was of course Optimus Prime himself. So to sum up you probably wouldn't want to tick any of them off.
The Ark: Now
"Er, I hate to be the one to ask this but..." Prowl trailed off nervously in fear of ticking off the hulking bot in front of him but he continued his question anyway. He wasn't the only one with a shocked look. All around, Ark crewmembers were staring at the very strange and quite out of the ordinary sight even for this ship.
"Why do you have three little... horses with you, and they're on your head?" Prowl said, summing up what everyone was thinking about then.
From a console, and barely focused on his work Pyro quipped "It is a very logical question." in a very amused tone.
In unison and in very happy tones the three little fillies, each a different pony type dropped the bomb so to speak. They all exclaimed "Because he's our papa!"
It was a testament to Prowl's long tenure as the Chief of Security on the Ark and that he was used to strange sights he managed to finally find his voice and make a small little "...What? Please tell me I heard right."
When Grimlock and his threesome of fillies nodded Prowl's logic computer finally gave out and he toppled over backwards with a loud "THUD!" as he hit the deck.
Pyro looked at the sight of the unconscious Prowl and sighed.
"...I'll go and get Rachet."
Ponyville, a few moments before...
Now, you may be wondering what the heck is going on or some strongly worded not fit for a child's ears variation of that. Well for me to explain what's going on here we have to travel back in time a few moments before to the Ponyville Marketplace where the Cutie Mark Crusaders and their older sisters were going about their day.
"Ah, nothing like a sunny day to make y'all feel great to be alive don't ya say?" Applejack said, and her two friends a rainbow maned pegasus named Rainbow Dash and a beautiful white unicorn named Rarity nodded in agreement.
"You said it." Rainbow agreed. "I think after we're done here I'm going to find a nice cloud to relax on and take a nap."
Rarity rolled her eyes in response to Rainbow's statement.
"Speak for yourself. I for one, intend to go home and create some new designs that have been just nagging at my brain for the past few days." She before looking at the CMC. "What do you girls want to do?"
Each and every member of the CMC gave big grins before Scootaloo spoke up.
"Well, we were planning on trying to get our marks in lumberjacking. You never know." She said before Applebloom seemed to remember something and spoke.
"Wait, wasn't mah cousin Babs supposed to be coming over later today?" She asked, and Scootaloo slapped a hoof to her own face as she remembered.
"Hey, you're right! She can join us if she wants!" The young pegasus said before in unison she and the other two members of the CMC exclaimed in unison "CUTIE MARK CRUSADERS LUMBERJACKERS, YAY!"
Applejack leaned over to Rarity and muttered "Ya had to ask, didn't ya?" who nodded after regaining her hearing. Suddenly, there was a loud sound, almost like thunder but there wasn't even a cloud in the sky to make the lightning need to create thunder. Suddenly, ponies were pointing and chattering excitedly at something coming towards the Marketplace. Those somethings were three jets, one red and white, another black with purple highlights and the third mostly blue. They all had yellow cockpit windows, and on the underside of the wings purple faces were visible. For some reason, anypony who looked at them felt very nervous.
"What the...?" Rainbow trailed off while Applejack's face showed recognition.
"Say, aren't those things those new fangled fighter jets Cloudsdale came up with?" The Stetson wearing Earth Pony asked before suddenly things got very strange indeed as all three fighter jets transformed with their nosecones and cockpits going up into their chests as the back ends became legs and arms appeared with heads revealing themselves where the cockpits once were. Each of the threesome landed with loud THUDs!
Then the lead robot spoke even as everypony screamed and ran for it.
"Alright Decepticons! Raze this place until you find what we're looking for!" The Decepticon Air Commander, named Starscream or Cybertron's Biggest Traitor depending on what your prefer shouted. "I want those Element Bearers!"
The blue Decepticon spoke up.
"Uh, don't you mean Megatron wants those Element Bearers?" He asked sarcastically but Starscream ignored him even as his optics narrowed in on Rarity, Applejack and Rainbow remembering the description Megatron gave him and his two partners in crime.
"There they are..." He growled and the eyes of his targets widened considerably. Rarity turned to the CMC.
"Girls, get out of here. I don't want you caught up in this." She said and understanding the direness of the situation the three fillies ran for it.
"We need to get out of here." Applejack said, in a tone that left no room for argument but Rainbow Dash of course had other ideas.
"Aw come on, we can take these tin cans!" The pegasus whined but Rarity grabbed her with magic as she and Applejack ran for it only to have several jet Vehicon drones come at them only to transform to robot mode and block their way.
"You'll be coming with us, ponies." Thundercracker growled as he aimed his arm mounted cannons at the trio.
"Excuse me, but a lady never goes anywhere unless she is told to do so." Rarity huffed but was ignored as Starscream scooped her up with his hand and put her inside his cockpit as the pony protested and banged on the window. Soon, both Rainbow and Applejack were captured as well.
"Ah swear, when I get out of here Ah'm going to buck you into the scrapheap!" Applejack yelled defiantly but her captor, Skywarp rolled his eyes and muttered "Yeah yeah..."
Suddenly a blast of searing hot fire flew by his head as it's owners the Dinobots charged onto the scene. As they did so, they smashed right through the drones from before turning them to scrap. I'll describe each Dinobot for you. Grimlock the leader, as I said before turned into a T-Rex. Swoop who was very sensitive and kind turned into a Pterodactyl, while hot headed Slug turned into a Triceratops. Also there was the slow witted Sludge, a Apatosaurus and the unsociable Snarl who changed into a Stegosaur. As a act of intimidation, Grimlock reared his head back and pointed it towards the sky before unleashing another blast of hot flame.
"Dinobots, attack!" Grimlock roared as his tail became legs and his feet became arms as he transformed to bot mode and pulled out his flaming Energon sword.
"Hey, you know how close you came to scorching my finish?" Skywarp complained but Starscream smacked him.
"Forget your finish, that's the Dinobots? Unless you want to be given a personal epitaph by Megatron I suggest you take my advice and bug out!" Starscream... well, screamed in fear before he transformed and flew off.
"We'll let the Vehicons deal with them. Better them then us." Thundercracker agreed before he too transformed and flew off with Skywarp soon joining him.
As they did so, some car Vehicons drove up and smashed through the market stalls as they transformed to bot mode and exchanged their arms out for triangular cannons. Grimlock's optics narrowed under his visor as he saw this and he smirked under his faceplate. The first two drones charged towards and with a slash from Grimlock's saber they were down for the count.
"You cut through these guys like they were Beryllium Bologna!" Slug complimented Grimlock.
"Nah, you mean Cesium Salami!" Snarl argued as he used his alternate mode's spiked tail and sent a Vehicon flying with a swing from it.
"No... I say Beryllium Bologna!" Slug snapped back, still firm on his statement as he punched a drone into a house, making it collapse in on itself.
"Cesium Salami!" Snarl yelled, not willing to give in. Grimlock groaned to himself even as he sliced apart a Vehicon. His comrades were such idiots. Why oh why did Primus give them such low brain functions? Soon, all of the vehicons were piles of scrap and each Dinobot roared in victory. Sludge took a long sad look at the destroyed marketplace.
"Uh, me think we in big trouble for doing this." Sludge said.
"Nonsense, me Slug say that we improved the looks of the town tremendously." Slug disagreed before there was a shout from Snarl (Now in robot form) as he lifted up some rubble and tossed it behind him just barely missing Grimlock's head.
"Hey, there's someones alive under here!" Snarl yelled as the Cutie Mark Crusaders were revealed as they trembled at the sight of the giant spiked robot.
"...Please don't eat us Mr Robot Sir!" Sweetie Belle squeaked in fear.
"H-have you seen our sisters?" Scootaloo asked nervously and Snarl gave his answer. Unsurprisingly, he wasn't very tactful about it.
"Yeah, I saw them get carried off by Starscream and his group. Probably already de-"
Swoop transformed and placed a hand over Snarl's mouth. Sadly, the damage was already done. Sweetie Belle and Applebloom gave whimpers while Scootaloo whispered "They're gone, I know it!"
"Idiot, now look what you've done!" Swoop said. "You've terrified them." He added before giving the three fillies a kind smile.
"I'm sure they'll be fine. Elements of Harmony and all that." He said. Snarl opened his mouth to disagree but was silenced with a glare from Sludge.
"Uh, what we do with them?" Sludge asked before he got quite possibly the only bright idea he ever had. "I know, why not we Dinobots take them in! You Grimlock can be father figure!"
Snarl and Slug's jaws dropped in unison while Grimlock stared before he took in the pleading looks of Swoop, Sludge and the CMC. He groaned to himself and slapped a hand to his forehead. Why did he have to be so nice?
"Ugh... Primus knows I will probably regret this."
There was then a shout of "YAY!" from the CMC, rending every bot's vocal receptors offline for a moment.