Chapter I - Something lurks in the forest

Archimedes

Chapter I - Something lurks in the forest.

“And we do have enough bunting, right? And if not, why not?!” Twilight asked. “Oh! What about the flags, we definitely have those, right?”

Spike yawned to himself loudly and grumbled, watching as the lavender alicorn paced frantically back and forth in the library.

“Twilight… it’s like, three thirty. I know you’re are a princess and all, but can’t we do this later?” he asked wearily.

Twilight snapped her head to look at him, sending a chill down the drakes body as her left eye twitched, “No we can’t, Spike! I need to be sure that everything is going to go smoothly today!”

“But you’ve gone over the list, like, twenty times now,” the dragon grumbled. “All that’s left to do is wait till everyone else gets up.”

“I know, Spike,” Twilight groaned. “But I want the Summer Solstice Celebration to go well, remember what happened when Ponyville held the Summer Sun Celebration’?”

Spike cringed, he didn’t really need to be reminded of the chaos that happened the last time. He could still hear the screams of ponies as the parasprites devoured everything in sight despite the events happening a couple of years prior.

“Good point…” he replied. “But we can’t just demand everyone wake up now and get to work, they’ll be too tired and unable to focus properly.”

“Maybe… but I just want everything to go correctly.”

“What’s the difference anyway?” Spike yawned. “Isn’t the Summer Sun the same as the Summer Solstice?”

Twilight shook her head, “Not quite. The Summer Sun celebration is the celebration for when Princess Celestia defeated Nightmare Moon, and restored the sun. The Summer Solstice is the celebration of the longest day of the year. Furthermore—”

Twilight was interrupted by a loud knock on the door. Spike waddled over to it whilst yawning to open it and revealed a very excited and grinning pink mare.

“Morning, Spike!” Pinkie all but shouted.

Spike winced and held his head, a soft throbbing forming as he watched the pink mare bounce into the library, “Yeah, yeah…”

“Morning, Twilight!” Pinkie grinned as she saw the alicorn.

“Hey, Pinkie,” Twilight smiled. “What brings you here this early?”

“Well, I got up early to make a start on the food for the celebration when my pinkie sense started to go all funny and I thought I’d tell you—”

“OH DEAR CELESTIA, PLEASE DON’T TELL ME SOMETHING BAD’S GOING TO HAPPEN?!” Twilight screamed as she grabbed the mare, shaking her violently.

Pinkie simply giggled, “Of course not.”

“Really?” Twilight asked. “You’re not just… trying to prank me, right?”

“Why would I do that?” Pinkie tilted her head.

Twilight sighed, “Sorry, Pinkie. I’m just nervous, I really want today to go off without a hitch.”

“I know, but just incase I have all my instruments ready. You never know!” Pinkie beamed.

“Right… so what was the thing you had a twitchy over?” Twilight asked.

“Well… I don't know. First, my legs shook, then my head and tail, then I jumped into the air and my whole body flailed. Then my eyes twitched and I started to make weird noises like ‘humina humina!’ and then I just stopped.”

“That… doesn’t help in the slightest,” Twilight deadpanned.

“I’ve never had one like it before, but it didn’t feel like something bad was going to happen, just the complete opposite.”

“Really?” Twilight blinked a smile starting to grow on her face.

“Mhm, I mean, I think something bad might happen at first but that won’t last to long,” the pink mare said.

Twilight didn’t hear her, she had let out a sigh of relief that everything was going to be fine. Pinkie noticed that the alicorn was seemingly staring off into space with a dopey smile on her face and shrugged.

“Well, I’d better get back to the bakery. Those cupcakes won’t bake themselves! See you later, Twilight.”

Pinkie bounced away and out of the door which was soon closed by Spike. The dragon walked over to the still distant Twilight and prodded her side.

“Now that we now everything will be fine, can we please go back to bed for a bit?”

“Hmm?” Twilight said as she shook her head. “Oh, okay, I guess we can. The Princess’ won’t arrive for a while.”

Twilight watched the drake walk upstairs to his bed as she followed suit, the weight of getting everything ready practically melting away as she ascended the stairs.

“Come on, Luna. Where are you?” Celestia muttered.

The solar princess sighed for what seemed like the seventieth time that hour as she sat in the large open top carriage. Luna, for whatever reason, was running late. The Summer Solstice Celebration was due to start in an hour or so time and could only be started when she herself arrived to announce its start.

Blueblood, who had asked to join them this year, sat beside his aunt, yawning and tapping his hoof on the edge of the carriage clearly bored out of his mind.

“Does Auntie Luna always run this late?” he asked Celestia.

Celestia looked up at the castle to where Luna’s room was, “Not usually, I do wonder what—”

She stopped when Luna came rushing out of the palace followed by two of her guard.

“S-sorry, Tia,” the lunar princess panted. “I… was pre-occupied.”

Blueblood snickered softly as Celestia shook her head and sighed. Again.

“You were playing that infernal games contraption again, weren’t you?”

“I was not!” Luna protested, “I was… looking over some… reports.”

“Uhuh,” Celestia replied, clearly not buying it. “I make sure I’m up for when we hold the New Moon Celebration.”

“I know, I know!” Luna replied. “But I can't help it! This technology we have is so fascinating, we just have to keep researching it!”

Celestia giggled and shook her head, “Just get in the carriage, you silly thing.”

Luna huffed as she clambered in between her and Blueblood, her guard taking their spots beside Celestia’s. After a nod from Celestia, the group of guards opened their wings and took to the skies, pulling the carriage behind them and made their way towards Ponyville.

“So, why did you ask to join us again this year, Blueblood?” Luna asked.

“Auntie Celestia says I should try to interact more with the subjects,” Blueblood started. “And I figures the Summer Solstice Celebration is a good place to start, Ponyville is a small town after all. That, and I’ve never actually seen Aunty raise the sun, especially on the longest day of the year.”

“That does sound like a good plan, nephew,” Luna replied. “But you are aware of who lives in that town, yes?”

“Who?” he asked.

“Rarity, the element of generosity,” Luna said.

“That’s interesting, I believe getting to know the elements would be a good—”

“She was the mare that was hit by the cake at the Gala a couple of years ago, nephew. The one who spent the evening with you,” Celestia interrupted.

“Oh…” Blueblood muttered. “I never did apologise for that, did I?”

Celestia shook her head, “No, you didn’t.”

“I suppose that’s where I should start,” he sighed.

He looked over the edge of the carriage to see the town coming closer into view and sighed again. He felt that today was going to be, ironically, a long day.

Twilight, for once in her life, was relaxed.

Everything was going according to her plan. The town was decorated nicely, the tables and chairs were set up, the podium from where Celestia would raise the sun and the festivities would commence was standing proud.

“So,” Spike said, now more awake. “You finally calm?”

Twilight smiled down at the little dragon and nodded, “I am, nothing has gone wrong so far. We’re on schedule and the Princess’ will be here any moment. Nothing can ruin my spirits!”

“Good, can I go back to bed?” Spike grumbled, receiving a scowl from Twilight. “What? As much as I want to see the raising of the sun, which I totally haven’t seen a dozen times already, you woke me up at three o’clock… I’m still tired.”

Twilight was about to kick up a fuss, but he was right. She sighed and nuzzled him affectionately.

“Alright, Spike…” Twilight started as the dragon headed back to the library. “But I did hear Rarity had a new dress that she specifically designed for today, it would be a shame if you were to miss out on it. I hear she really outdid herself with it,” she said with a mock sigh.

“Who, what, where?” Spike said, blinking as he stopped suddenly.

“Not to mention, she would be all on her own during the party… no one except some stallions around the town to keep her company.”

Spike suddenly vanished in a puff of smoke as he darted for the tree house. In a few seconds, he came rushing back out. His scales glistened and he looked wide awake and alert. A small red bowtie adorned his neck and a bouquet of flowers firmly in his claw.

“Well, if you put it that way, Twilight,” Spike said as he briskly made his way to the boutique.

Twilight simply giggled as she watched the dragon walk off, she decided to do another inspection round, smiling happily to herself as she trotted towards the nearest building where a few ponies were setting up their decorations.

Deep within the Everfree forest not too far from the old castle of the royal siblings, the soft glow of the moonlight filled a small ruined tower. The once tall, proud building that would have loomed over the trees was now being consumed by the forest, with vines covering nearly all of its walls. Large bushes and other vegetation all but hid it from a casual glance, birds that had now taken residence inside of the cracks and other crevices of the tower.

Suddenly, a low rumble echoed from beneath the tower which shook the crumbling foundations slight followed by a thunderous crash as if something had landed hard on the ground. In alarm, birds shot out of their homes and into the sky, startling other birds which followed suit creating a wave of feathers that launched high above the trees.

Then, there was silence again. But this was short lived.

A low groan echoed from where the rumble had occurred followed by a loud hiss. Something was moving within the tower. Heavy, thudding footsteps rang out in slow succession and were getting louder and louder, indicating movement on stairs.

Something within the ruins of the tower, had awoken.

Zecora hummed quietly to herself as she made her way down the path. She was carrying two saddlebags on her back and was looking forward to the day ahead, having been invited to the Summer Solstice Celebration. She had headed off earlier than she normally would have in order to offer any assistance in setting up. As she walked, she couldn’t help feel more and more that she was being watched in the shadows of the trees. She decided to not stop and try to see what it was if anything, but did decide to stop humming and keep her ears up and alert.

Carrying on down the path for a few more minutes, she thought she heard something in the distance and out of instinct she spun her head around to where she thought the sound had come from. Squinting her eyes, she scanned the forest for any sign of life. Once she was satisfied that she couldn’t see anything she began to go about on her way.

Then, she heard it.

Slow, heavy, thumping footsteps in the distant accompanied by a soft hiss. She froze, the sounds were foreign to her, even for the forest. The zebra frantically tried to find the source but couldn’t see anything. Then, just as it came, it stopped abruptly. Swallowing a lump that had formed in her throat, she nervously made her way onwards.

Zecora wasn’t afraid of the forest, having grown accustomed to the sounds. She could easily distinguish the sounds of a timberwolf or manticore to a harmless rabbit and for the former she had precautions, various tools in her saddlebag that could help her in a jam should a predator make itself known.

However this new noise had her slightly on edge. She’d never heard anything like it before and it concerned her greatly.

Zecora had spent so much time fixating on the noise that she hadn’t been fully paying attention to her surroundings, and what was lurking in them. As she past a tree, she heard a low growl and immediately snapped her head in the direction of the growl and her eyes went wide, coming face to face with a large timberwolf.

Almost immediately, she went for her saddlebag and pulled out a vial with a glowing orange liquid inside it.

“I warning you right now, if you don’t leave, I’ll put you down,” she threatened the timberwolf.

The hulking wooden creature snorted, taking a step forward. The zebra stood her ground, raising the vial threateningly at the wolf.

“I tell no joke, this vials contents will reduce you to ash and smoke!” she said, putting as much confidence and intimidation into her voice as she could.

Again, the timberwolf showed no signs of backing down. Zecora decided enough was enough and hurled the vialt at the wooden creature as hard as she could. It smashed and coated the timberwolf in the liquid, but instead of doing what it should have done, which was to engulf the wolf in a special fire that affected only timberwolves, it merely coated the beast and did nothing.

The zebra’s eyes shot open in alarm as the wolf seemingly smirked at her, knowing her plan had failed. Zecora saw no other option but to try and outrun the timberwolf and immediately turned and fled as fast as she could, the timberwolf following close behind her.

She panted as she ran through the thick foliage of the forest, ducking and jumping over thick tree branches with the timberwolf right behind her snapping at her hooves. Eventually, zecora was able to use her smaller size and managed to put some distance between the two, finding herself in a large clearing and hid behind a tree, keeping her breathing as low as she could as to be able to determine the whereabouts of the wolf. The zebra leant against a small tree to catch her breath.

But something… didn’t feel right.

She looked at the tree she noticed it seemed, rusty? She touched it gently with her hoof again and felt a mixture of cold form the touch but a warmth coming from within.

As she was examining it, she heard a low growl and spun around to see the wooden beast closing in on her, it’s teeth bared and eyes fixed upon her. Zecora backed up till she was resting against the tree, the timberwolf being too close for her to make an easy escape.

Just as she was trying to think of something, the wolf stopped in its tracks and looked up. It growled loudly as it took a defensive stance and kept its attention locked on the tree. Zecora then heard a hiss coming from behind her and yelped in fright, spinning around as she looked up at the tree.

Except, it was no tree.

Her eyes went wide as the ‘tree’ suddenly lurched forwards, its eyes a fierce red and the clanking of metal and the hissing of steam escaping it as the wolf pounced for it. The ‘tree’ caught the wolf and roared, smoke pouring from its back as it punched the large timberwolf in the stomach making it howl in pain. Zecora watched, frozen in fear, as the metal ‘tree’ delivered blow upon blow to the wolf whilst seemingly not even being hurt in the process. As it grabbed the wolf from both ends and brought it up then down violently over its knee, snapping the wolf’s spine, the zebra saw this as the opportune moment to run and scarpered as fast as she could.

To Ponyville I must flee, before that creature catches me, she thought as she ran.

Had she turned around, she would have seen the metal creature watching her go with a look of confusion on its face, its metal fingers scratching its head.

Chapter II - Unexpected Guest

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Archimedes

Chapter II - Unexpected Guest.

The tower was silent, save for the occasional drop of water coming from an unknown source. The tower had seen better days, its outer structure slowly crumbling away as the Everfree slowly reclaimed what was it once possessed, the insides slowly falling in on themselves now played host to a variety of animals who took the ruined tower as their home. Many of these creatures were fast asleep, enjoying the warmth the old tower still radiated in the cold evenings.

However, it was short lived.

Suddenly, the entire tower began to shake, causing some bricks to crumble and fall to the ground. Several animals awoke with a start, birds flying out of the holes they called their home and fly into the sky, causing other birds resting in nearby trees to do the same. A low rumble came from beneath a large trap like door that lead into what seemed to be a basement of sorts, untouched by the wildlife outside.

In the darkened basement, old tables and workbenches rumbled. The dirty and ancient looking beakers and tubes resting on their surfaces rattled, and some shattered not used to such force. The room was suddenly engulfed in a bright, swirling blue light before a large metal contraption, covered in rust shot out of it, crashing into the floor, sending tables, chairs and anything that was unfortunate enough not to be nailed down flying about. The light vanished quickly just as it appeared, and once again, silence engulfed the tower.

As it seemed all was normal again, the metal contraption suddenly groaned loudly and slowly rose from the floor to an upright position, sitting on its backside. A metal appendage reached up to the top of it and rubbed softly. It slowly rose to its feet with a whirring sound as the large device strapped to its back began to splutter and cough out, steam rising from its twin exhaust pipes that stuck in the air.

The machine slowly rose to its feet, the few bulbs adorning its body flickering a dim light, two yellow eyes shone out from its metal body and squinted in the darkness. It blinked, and the two eyes produced twin beams of light that coned out and covered a good distance ahead of it, illuminating the room.

It scratched its head, as if it was trying to remember something. The machine then noticed that its body was covered in rust, further confusing it as to what had happened.

Looking up from its body, it studied its location, scrunching its eyes in concentration. It seemed to only get more confused as the surroundings seemed familiar to it. It took a few steps forwards, its metal feet booming with each stomp as a hissing sound escaped its joints. The metal machine ignored the crunching of glass beneath its feet as it looked left and right, curiously examining each section of the room it was in.

It came to a large workbench and it grunted as it held its head. On the workbench was a very old book, opened up and covered in dust. It picked it up carefully, the book seemingly smaller than normal in its hands and examined it. Something about the book was… familiar. With a shrug, it placed it back on the workbench and spotted some stairs. With a blink of its eyes, it started to head towards it.

As it was walking to it, it noticed a framed painting that still hung on the wall. It walked over to it with a glint of curiosity and recognition in its eyes as it pulled it off the wall and studied it.

In the frame was a white unicorn with a large beard, wearing a rather bizarre outfit that had bells on it. The unicorn was familiar to the machine, but he couldn’t place his finger on who it could be. Smoke started to escape its joints as it concentrated and tried to figure out just who this unicorn was.

A small pop and a spark came from his head as he wobbled and whined, holding his head in pain and shook himself. Then, he saw the other being in the painting and his eyes went wide. It was a pure white alicorn, with a beautiful flowing mane that was standing beside the unicorn with a smile on her face. She too, was familiar to the machine.

As its gears ground inside its head and smoke once again escaped it as it concentrated, it let out a loud, raspy gasp as it suddenly realised who the alicorn was.

“Ce… les… tia…” it rasped in a metallic voice, clearly having difficulty to speak.

It gave a gruff cough into its clenched hand as it focused on the painting again. Why did she seem familiar?

As it concentrated, it let out another raspy gasp and slowly lowered the painting in remembrance.

How could it have forgotten so easily?

It hugged the painting fondly before re-hanging it on the wall and turned its attention back to the stairs and quickly made its way over to them, not caring for what was in its path as tables and chairs got booted across the room with a crash.

It knew what it had to do.

It heaved itself up the stairs and came to the large door that kept the room in darkness and with one swift punch, it broke the lock and the door swung open.

The machine slowly stepped into the lower section of the ruined tower and looked around. Again, it squinted its eyes as it tried to remember something about the place, but couldn’t. Letting out a defeated sigh, the machine started to walk towards the door.

It grabbed the old looking handle of the door, only for it to snap off and the old door fall forwards with a thud. It blinked and shrugged, crouching down under the door frame and took several steps into the surrounding area before walking down a random path, each footstep making a soft hiss and clomp as it connected with the ground.

The ponies all cheered as Celestia’s carriage slowly touched down on the ground and came to a stop. Twilight beamed proudly as the princess’ and much to her surprise, the prince, stepped off to greet her.

“Hello, Princess Twilight,” Celestia smiled as she and the lavender alicorn shared a tender nuzzle. “How are you?”

“I’m fine thank you, Princess. I’m just glad you made it okay, but…” she leant in to whisper. “Why is the Prince here? I thought he didn’t much care for these types of things?”

Celestia smiled, “He’s trying to be more responsible, plus, he’s come to apologise to Rarity for the Gala incident.”

Twilight nervously smiled, the events still somewhat fresh in her mind. The princess simply giggled as Mayor Mare approached her.

“Your highness, it is a great honor to have you here again. I trust the flight over was pleasant?”

“Indeed it was, Mayor. And I thank you for such a warm welcoming,” Celestia replied, looking around at the decorations. “Might I add that you have outdone yourselves on the decorations!”

Mayor Mare smiled up at the alicorn as the crowd stomped their hooves again in applause. As Celestia, Luna and Blueblood made their way to the podium. The Mayor quickly walked over to Twilight.

“Have you seen Zecora yet, Princess Twilight?” she asked. “I would’ve thought she’d arrived by now.”

“As did I, Mayor. I’ll admit I’m a little worried… but Zecora is one of the bravest ponies, or in her case, zebras I know. I doubt she would have any trouble with the Everfree, given how long she’s been living in there. She must be running late, that’s all.”

The mayor nodded, “Alright, I’ll take your word for it, your highness.”

With a smile, she turned and headed for the podium. Twilight re-joined her friends were Rarity, who was wearing a beautiful white dress adorned with red emeralds, was being chatted away to by Spike.

“Ya really outdid yourself this time, Twi,” Applejack said with a grin. “So far, nothing’s gone wrong unlike last time.”

“Stop saying that,” Dash grumbled. “The more you say it, the higher the chance you’ll jinx it!”

“Oh come now, Rainbow,” Rarity tittered. “Surely you don’t believe in such things?”

“Well no, but this is Ponyville, weird stuff always happens! I just don’t think we should take any chances,” Rainbow replied.

“Sheesh, Rainbow. You sound like Twilight,” Spike snickered.

As the others giggled, the pegasus and alicorn gave the dragon a glare. Fluttershy fiddled with her mane softly as she coughed gently.

“S-so Twilight, where’s Zecora? Has she arrived yet?” she asked quietly.

“Not yet, Fluttershy,” Twilight replied with a sigh. “If she doesn’t get here soon, she’s going to miss the raising of the sun.”

“Want me to fly over to her house and see where she’s at?” Rainbow offered, flexing her wings.

Twilight shook her head, “Not yet, I think she might be running late. After all—”

“Ssh!” Spike interrupted. “It’s starting.”

The group looked up to the podium to see Celestia standing and smiling to Luna. By now, the horizon had a soft, orange glow that clashed with the still dark sky. Celestia then slowly flew into the air and her horn shone brightly as the sun appeared over the horizon behind her and started to rise. The sun was slightly larger than normal and the orange glow bathed the town in a warming light. As it peaked halfway, Celestia spread open her wings and the suns rays shone through her feathers, creating a large shadow of her image on the floor below. The ponies began to applaud and cheer as the sun slowly rose in the sky, the princess’ horn dimmed and she returned to the ground below.

As the festivities started, the girls found a fairly large table at which they could eat their food at and sat down, still talking about the Celestia’s display.

“Amazing, simply amazing,” Rarity said with a smile.

“Got that right,” Applejack agreed.

“It’s a shame that Zecora wasn’t here…” Fluttershy said softly.

“Yeah, maybe we should—”

Rainbow was interrupted as Pinkie started to twitch again and make random noises.

“Wowzers that was a doozy…” she giggled.

“What did that one mean?” Twilight asked, a little nervous.

“Well, it means—”

Pinkie stopped mid-sentence as Zecora suddenly appeared from the edge of the forest, her mane ragged and chest panting as she ran over to them.

“Zecora!” Twilight gasped, rushing over to the zebra. “What happened?”

Zecora panted softly as she tried to catch her breath before she finally spoke.

“Forgive me for how I am, for you see, I was frightened and running from a tree.”

The girls looked at each other as the zebra continued.

“But this was no tree, it was creature I have never seen before... of metal and steam, that frightened me.”

Twilight bit her lip nervously, “Are… are you sure?”

Zecora nodded, but before she could continue, the girls gasped when they heard a faint hissing sound coming from the forest before a thunderous crash filled their ears

Then, they saw it stumble out of the forest, and Rarity screamed.

“WHAT IN THE NAME OF CELESTIA IS THAT?!”

The machine hummed thoughtfully as it kept its slow pace through the forest. Every now and again it would come across a fallen tree or root sticking up, but it didn’t hinder it too much. It noticed that the animals who were nearby were keeping a wary distance of it, seemingly sizing and judging the machine to determine if it was a threat.

It paid no attention to them, naturally. It had one thing it needed to get done and that was what was important, the animals didn’t matter that much to him. As it kept walking, he spotted something moving out of the corner of its eyes and stopped where it was.

It squinted its eyes as the beams of light that came from them scanned the darkened forest for signs of movement. However, it didn’t see any and shrugged its heavy shoulders. The machine groaned as it started again, walking in its straight line until it reached a small clearing. From here, it could see the moon in the sky again, albeit it seemed to have lower slightly.

As it studied the sky, trying to get some form of grasp on what the time was. It felt something lean against it’s leg and looked down to see a strange, pony like creature with stripes. As it poked at its leg, and before it could speak to the pony creature, it heard a growl nearby and looked up slowly to see something he despised.

A timberwolf.

The timberwolf noticed it was being watched by the machine and growled aggressively at it. It didn’t take the machine long to figure out the timberwolf was after the pony creature and something clicked in its mind. Almost immediately, its eyes shone an aggressive red and it surged forward, just as the wolf pounced for it.

The machine grabbed the timberwolf as the beast tried to use its momentum from the pounce to flatten the machine on its back before delivering a blow to the beasts stomach. The wolf howled in pain and pushed against the machine’s grip in a vain attempt to break free. But the machine was having none of it.

It swung its heavy fist again and again into the stomach of the beast as it did its best to prevent the beast from getting the pony creature. Eventually, the wolf broke free and pounced again, aiming for its arm. The beast’s teeth crunched against the metal framework of the machine, making the machine roar in anger. It grabbed the head of the timberwolf with its free hand and ripped it off his other, before slamming the wolf into the ground. Hard.

The beast whimpered in pain as the machine repeatedly slammed it into the ground before slowly grabbing the end of the wolf and hoisting it over its head. Then, with a quick movement, it brought the wolf down hard, right over its knee. The sound of wood snapping echoed around it as it dropped the now limp form of the wolf onto the floor and rested its hands on its hips.

It turned around, ready to ask if the pony creature was okay only to see it running away in apparent fear. The machine’s eyes returned to their normal yellow and it scratched its head in confusion, then, it looked down to the body of the timberwolf and hissed as if it was inhaling sharply and cringed. Realising the display against the wolf might have scared the pony creature.

Deciding the best course of action was to apologise to the pony creature then carry on his task, the machine slowly stomped off after the pony creature, leaving the splintered remains of the timberwolf behind it.

After what seemed like several minutes, the machine was beginning to wonder if the pony creature might have veered off the straight path it was on. It decided that it must have and sighed dejectedly. It grumbled and gave a nearby rock a hefty kick into the bushes as it sighed heavily again and carried on walking, figuring that it should keep going just in case there was a possibility the pony creature had indeed carried on going straight.

As it was walking, it didn’t notice the color of the sky change slightly and suddenly gasped when the sun started to emerge from above the trees. Its eyes sparkled as it held a hand to its chest and sighed happily, a knowing feeling filled its body.

Looking forwards, it quickened its pace as it saw light coming from the distance, signaling it was at the edge of the forest. the machine stomped loudly as it approached the edge, excitement running through its circuits and it crashed through the trees and saw a group of ponies in the distance at a table, as well as the pony creature. Before the machine could do anything, the white unicorn screamed loudly.

“WHAT IN CELESTIA’S NAME IS THAT?!” and pointed a hoof at it.

The machine looked behind it in confusion, thinking that the unicorn was pointing behind it. It shrugged and continued to walk, giving a wave to the ponies. The machine became more confused as the ponies shrieked seeing its arm move. Suddenly, it was surrounded by the familiar sight of solar guards ponies, armed with spears pointing in its direction. It also spotted some odder looking guardsman wearing darker armor and appeared to have bat like feature.

“HALT! CREATURE!” a booming voice cried.

The machine looked up to see a dark blue alicorn glaring at him. It scratched its head, now completely confused.

Why was there another alicorn? Wasn’t… wasn’t Celestia the only one?

The machine took a step back in surprise as the dark blue alicorn was joined by a lavender one. How many alicorns are there?!

As it looked down and tried to process what was going on, it heard it.

“Creature, stand down. And I promise you no harm shall come to you.”

The machine slowly looked up to see a sight that was so familiar to it, so perfect in every format. The one whom he had been seeking, the one whom he had foolishly forgotten meant to him.

Princess Celestia.

It started to chuckle softly before throwing its arms up into the air and roaring with laughter, the metallic sound shocking and confusing the ponies present. Before they had time to react, the machine ran towards Celestia, its heavy feet making the ground rumble slightly and picked the startled alicorn up in a tight hug, twirling her around joyfully.

“MY BELOVED!” the machine cried in its raspy, metallic voice. “I’VE FOUND YOU AT LAST!”

The ponies stared in disbelief at the machine as it gently strokes Celestia’s mane. The solar princess; eyes were wide and her pupils were like pinpricks. The only word that came out of her lips came out as a quiet whisper.

“... What?”

Chapter III - DATA INACCESSIBLE

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Archimedes

Chapter III - DATA INACCESSIBLE

Now, the town of Ponyville had seen its fair share of oddities.

Ok… maybe more than its fair share.

It had been the brunt of several stampedes, one of which consisted of rabbits. It had endured a cranky Ursa minor that had been awoken from its slumber, endured the threat of a dragon sleeping nearby and it even had endured the wrath of Discord prior to his reformation.

However, this was something that really took the biscuit.

The ponies, guards and royals watched with shock and dropped jaws as their beloved monarch of the sun, who was now blinking in confusion, was being stroked softly by a hulking mass of metal.

“Oh my, dear, dear love…” the machine sighed. “I am so sorry for how long it has been, and I didn’t even bother with a letter! What must you think of me?”

Luna shook her head as she snapped out of her confused state and her horn lit up with her magic. She didn’t want to wait incase the machine did something to her sister, so she decided to act as quick as she could.

“TIA, MOVE!”

Celestia snapped out of her shocked state and teleported out of the machine’s grip, just as Luna fired a beam at the machine. The machine was hit dead on and was instantly struck by the effect of the lightning spell.

The machine emitted an ear piercing screech as it shook violently, making the ponies cover their ears as the metallic noise filled the air. As the lightning surged through its body, the bulbs started to flash brightly on and off as its eyes began to distort. Sparks began to emit from various spots on its body as it shouted in utter gibberish.

“WHOA!” it suddenly shouted in a high pitched metallic screech before it fell on its back with a loud thud. “That was a doozey…”

The crowd slowly looked as the hulking metal mass groaned from where it lay, sizzling away slightly. Luna nodded and the guards quickly surrounded the machine, pointing their spears which shone brightly with a lightning spell at it.

“Take that… thing to the towns guard barracks and secure it. We shall deal with it soon,” Luna ordered.

“Yes, your highness,” one of the lunar guards saluted.

Three unicorn guards stationed in the Ponyville barracks used their magic to carefully hoist the groaning machine into the air slightly, and carry him through the crowds and towards the barracks. Satisfied everything was under control, Luna nodded and turned to her sister who was watching the machine be carried away.

“Sister, are you alright?” she asked.

“I’m… fine, Luna. Just trying to take in exactly what just happened,” Celestia replied.

Luna nodded, “Alright, I’d better go assist the guards,”

She quickly made her way towards the barracks, passing the elements as she did.

“Princess!” Twilight called as she and the girls rushed over. “Are you alright? What is that thing?”

“I don’t know, Twilight. But we should be cautious on our next move, please go and retrieve the elements before we speak with it. I’m curious to learn what it is myself and where it came from.”

Twilight nodded as she and the girls quickly made their way to the library, past the remaining guards who were slowly dispelling the crowds. Celestia noticed Zecora and smiled as she walked over to her.

“Are you okay, Zecora? From the looks of it it was you who first encountered it.”

Zecora nodded, “I’m fine, Princess. Though the machine did cause me some distress.”

“As long as you’re alright, if you’ll excuse me, I need to join my sister and visit our strange guest and figure out what is going on.”

“Auntie, would you like me to remain here? Keep an eye over the festivities?” Blueblood asked her.

“Very well, Blueblood,” Celestia replied.

Zecora quickly trotted up to her. “Princess, may I come with you? Conversing with this metal being is something I would like to do.”

“I don’t see why not, just be careful and do as I say, though,” Celestia replied.

Zecora nodded as the pair waited for a few minutes, soon being joined by the girls who were all now wearing their respective elements.

“I told Spike to remain in the library, just in case, Princess,” Twilight said as she looked up to the older alicorn.

“Alright,” Celestia began. “This is how we will play this, we shall remain calm and confident in the machine’s presences. Do not try to provoke it, and try to remain civil and polite. Okay?”

The girls nodded. Celestia smiled and the group quickly made their way over towards the barracks of the town. and soon arrived at the barracks.

The barracks was a new addition to the town, having been built after Discord’s re-capture in order to give Ponyville a sense of protection from evil threats, given the town was prone to them on what seemed like a regular basis. It took the title of the largest building from the town hall, boasting twice the size with underground dungeon, offices, canteen and a large training courtyard. Ponyville had welcomed the barracks as it gave some of the locals a new job opportunity.

Upon entering the barracks. The guards inside immediately saluted her as they walked through the main entrance of the barracks and into the courtyard where the machine lay on the ground on its back, chains glowing a light blue holding it down. It was no longer smoking it seemed, and was chatting away to a lunar guard that was standing near its head.

“So, you’re a bat and a pony? I thought transmogrification or whatever the blasted word is was impossible for non-unicorns?” Celestia heard the machine say.

“No, silly. Bat ponies are a race in themselves,” the lunar guard grinned, bearing her sharp fangs.

“I know, I know. I’m simply teasing,” the machine chuckled. “I’d pet you so hard right now if I wasn’t in a bit of bother at the moment.”

Celestia held a giggle and smiled at the odd display as Luna walked over to her, clearly not as amused as her sister.

“Sister, the machine won’t stop talking… it snapped out of its daze halfway to the barracks yet it feels like it’s been talking for hours,” Luna groaned.

“Well, if it is so talkative, perhaps we should speak with it and see who or what it is?” Celestia replied.

Luna nodded, and led the group slowly made its way round the machine to where the lunar mare was still talking with the machine.

“And then I said—” the mare stopped mid-sentence. “Your majesties.”

Luna raised her hoof as the mare saluted, “At ease, Private Moon Dancer.”

As the lunar guard nodded and took a step back, the machine saw the group and wiggled at them, “I would wave, but— Ah my dear, so good to see you again!” the machine said as he spied Celestia. “I would hug you, but these chains are awfully tight.”

Celestia smiled in an amused expression as the machine rattled the chains lightly.

“So,” Luna began glaring at the machine. “You can start, machine, by telling us who and what you are exactly.”

“Why am I being questioned exactly? Did I do something wrong?”

“You were trying to kidnap my sister.” Luna replied.

“I was not!” the machine protested. “Have you never seen a reunion of lovers before?!”

“L-LOVERS?!” Luna spluttered loudly.

The machine nodded, “Of course, I’m not sure why you are surprised.”

Luna’s eye twitched and her jaw dropped. She wasn’t exactly sure how to process that, how on earth did this metal monstrosity think it was her sister’s lover, let alone anyones?

“You shouldn’t let your jaw dangle like that, it’s quite rude, and you're loud. Did you know that?” the machine seemed to snort.

Celestia and the lunar mare had to hold back a snicker as a vein throbbed on Luna’s forehead. Twilight tapped her chin and stepped forwards, resting a reassuring wing on the night princess’ back.

“Let me try,” she looked to the machine and smiled. “Hello, my name is Twilight Sparkle. And you are?”

“Didn’t I say already? You should pay attention, dear. It’s rude to ask more than once,” the machine scolded and shook its head.

Twilight blinked as she was scolded, “Uh… no you didn’t?”

“Are you asking or telling me?” the machine asked.

“Uh… telling?”

The machine stared at her, making the lavender alicorn a little nervous before it chuckled again.

“I’m only teasing, little alicorn. I am…”

It trailed off as a butterfly floated by and it watched it gracefully fly past. The guards murmured to one another a little confused and uneasy by the behaviour of the machine.

“Um… excuse me?” Twilight asked.

“Hmm? Yes, yes what is it?” the machine replied.

“What is your name?” she asked again.

“Really, again? I’ve already answered that question, ask me something else.”

“But—”

“Actually,” the machine interrupted. “I want to ask a question. Celestia, my dear—”

“Princess, to you. Metal being.” Luna glared..

The machine rolled its eyes at the alicorn.

“Oh very well, public formalities and the such,” the machine sighed. “Princess Celestia, my dear. Why on earth are there three alicorns exactly? There’s only ever been yourself.”

Celestia coughed gently into her hoof, “Well… metal one, this is my sister Luna and the other is my dear student, Twilight.”

“Luna…” the machine muttered turned its head to the sky. “Why, why… why is that familiar? And I’-I’m certain you didn’t even have a sister! Let alone a mare student, strange… I would have known about that...”

“And why is that strange?” Celestia asked.

“Hmm? What? Sorry, my dear. My mind went for a little wonder, what are we talking about?” the machine replied before spotting Zecora. “Ah! My dear stripy friend, there you are. You’re not hurt from the wooden beast, I assume?” the machine asked. “I hope I didn’t scare you with how I fought it.”

“I am fine, metal one. If not for you. I surely would be gone,” Zecora replied.

“Oh I am glad,” the machine chuckled.

Zecora smiled at the machine, her uneasiness around the machine started to fade away..

“This has to be somethin’ Discords done,” Applejack said to the princess as she kept her eyes glared on the machine.

Rainbow nodded in agreement, “Seems like something he would do, bet you he’ll pop out at any moment and laugh.”

Fluttershy, who was shaking in fear of the hulking mass, kept quiet, her eyes never leaving the machine as the metal contraption watched the group with curiosity.

“I think you’re right,” Twilight agreed. “It does kinda have Discord written all over it.”

“I am right here, you know,” the machine huffed.

“I must say, Princess. This does have a feeling of a Discord prank…” Rarity sniffed.

“Well, I like him!” Moon Dancer grinned.

“Me too!” Pinkie added. “He’s like a giant tea kettle, on legs!”

“Well I can make a wicked brew,” the machine chuckled.

As the others bickered and talked amongst themselves, Celestia studied the machine intently, secretly scanning it for any signs of chaotic, dark or malicious magic upon its person. The machine saw her staring and for a moment, they locked eyes and stared at one another intently. Something about the machine intrigued her, but she couldn’t put her hoof on it.

“Do stop, you’re going to make me blush,” the machine giggled, rolling its head left to right. “If I had skin that is.”

Celestia giggled softly as she finished her spell, finding no trace of malicious or dark forces at work, something that further intrigued her.

“Would you be so kind as to tell us your name?” she asked as kindly as she could.

“Oh, my dear,” the machine chuckled. “You already know my name, though.”

Celestia thought for a brief moment, “I know, but could you tell the others. I think it’s best if you introduced yourself like a true gentlecolt would,” she lied.

“Right you are, my love. Right you are… well, of course you’re always right but that’s beside the point,” it chuckled. “My name is Archimedes. The pleasure is all mine.”

“Archimedes… that’s a nice name,” Twilight said with a smile.

“Thank you, little alicorn,” Archimedes replied. “Now, would it be possible to let me out of these chains?”

“Hold on, sister,” Luna said quickly. “How do we know its not a threat? Or simply an irritating ploy of Discords?”

“I have to agree with her, Princess,” Twilight added. “I don’t think we should do anything just yet.”

Celestia looked around as the elements nodded their head in agreement, save for Pinkie and Fluttershy.

“I think he’s alright,” Pinkie beamed.

“Same here,” Moon Dancer added. “I don’t get a bad vibe from him for some reason.”

“I must also confess, that Archimedes here no longer makes me feel distress,” Zecora smiled.

“And what do you think, Fluttershy?” Celestia asked.

“W-well… he is big… a-and a little intimidating. But… I don’t think he is mean… just that he looks a little scary.”

“You can’t be seriously thinking about letting it go, are you?” Luna asked.

“I am, however. Archimedes must remain here under heavy guard for the duration of the night whilst I… look into something that is bothering me. Twilight, can I entrust you to speak with him?”

“O-of course, Princess!” Twilight beamed.

Celestia smiled and turned to her sister, “Luna, could you please remain here in Ponyville? As reassurance to the citizens?”

“I can, but why can’t I converse with the metal creature?”

“I don’t think he likes you,” Celestia giggled. “Might be your policy of, ‘shoot first, ask questions later’.”

“Ding, ding, ding! My beloved hits the bullseye!” Archimedes said and sighed happily. “Isn’t she just amazing…?

Moon Dancer, Pinkie and Fluttershy giggled softly as the others rolled their eyes or shook their heads.

“In fairness, I was concerned for you,” Luna grumbled.

“But, my love. Could I be at least allowed to sit upright? Whilst I adore your sun, it does burn the eyes somewhat,” Archimedes chuckled sheepishly.

Celestia nodded and her horn flashed, the light covering the whole area. When it died down, Archimedes was now only attached by his feet to the ground. Nodding with satisfaction the large machine slowly stood up, his body hissing and clanking as he rose.

“Ah that feels good,” he sighed as he stretched his body. “Nice job by the way with the chains, my dear. They do look rather fetching.”

Archimedes started to walk around the courtyard, his hands behind his back as he hummed and the chains rattled. Some of the guards nervously backed away but he paid them no attention.

As it walked, Twilight was able to get a good and proper look at him. He stood taller than Princess Celestia by at least a head and a half or so. His head consisted of a rusty, closed helmet with a moveable visor similar to the ones the knights of Equestria’s old would wear, from what she could tell, he had no visible face, only shadows seemed to fill the helmet save for the two, yellow circles that were clearly his eyes. The helmet rested on a small metal frame that reminded her of a diamond dog which cut off at the bottom, leading into twin thin metal ‘bones’ that, just below the joint where the machine’s knee was, sat in two large metal boots again reminding her of the knights of old.

Just like his legs, his arms were two thin metal ‘bone’ that slotted into two large gauntlets just below the elbow joints. Both the gauntlets were adorned with bulbs and small wires, with some of the former being very dim and cracked.

What caught her attention the most, though. Was the large, back-pack like device on the machine’s back. It looked like a large hiking rucksack but this one was made of metal, sticking out at the top were smaller tubes and two large exhaust tubes, all secreting a small amount of steam that drifted into the air and disappeared.

“Before you go, Princess.” Twilight said. “I think I have two questions you may want to hear the answers for yourself.

Celestia raised her brow curiously as Twilight turned to look over at Archimedes who now, despite the uncertainty of the guards, had Pinkie sitting on his shoulder and Moon Dancer floating beside him.

“Archimedes? May I ask you two questions before Princess Celestia departs?”

“Hmm? Of course my young alicorn friend,” Archimedes replied as he walked over.

“Just what are you, exactly? And where did you come from.”

“I’m a robot, your highness,” Archimedes replied. “As for where I came from… I-I don’t really remember… there was this unicorn fellow w-w-with a funny hat…”

Celestia and the others became a little concerned when he spoke, his voice started to raise and stutter and his frame shook a little like he was having difficulty remembering. Twilight raised her brown from curiosity, but decided to press on.

“Do you mean Starswirl the Bearded?” she asked, her eyes sparking in glee.

“I-I-I don’t know, t-that could be h-his name I mean. It’s all a little - little fuzzy... WAIT! I re-remember, I do, I… RUNES! Lots of - of runes.”

“Uh, Twi?” Dash said, getting more nervous as smoke began to rise from Archimedes.

“RUNES! dotted - dotted all around the laboratory!” Archimedes continued, his tone rapidly fluctuating every time he stuttered. His eyes began to distort slightly as the steam coming from his back turned grey like smoke, the smell of boiling hot metal emanating from him.

“Archimedes?” Celestia asked, backing up as did the others in concern.

“And there was this orb, a large o-orb flashing brightly in the centre of the room! A-and this unicorn was trying so hard to do this spell and I helped him so he—”

Everyone jumped as Archimedes suddenly arched backwards and cried out in agony, his metallic voice echoing in the courtyard.

“NYAAAAAAAH! DATA INACCESSIBLE!” Archimedes eyes distorted between red, yellow and white as his whole body began to smoke and sparks spat out from his neck before his tone increased in pitch. “REBOOT! REBOOT! REBOOT! REBOOT!”

Suddenly, Twilight’s horn lit up and a wave of her magic slapped him across the face. Almost immediately, the smoke returned back to steam and his eyes reverted to his normal yellow ones. He shook his head blinked a couple of times and looked down at Twilight.

“And you are?” he asked, twirling his hands nonchalantly as he looked at the alicorn.

“Wait, wait, wait! What about the laboratory?” Twilight asked.

“I want to say, Farsight,” he said.

“Twilight,” Celestia quickly said. “I think that is enough for now.”

Twilight blinked as she realised what had just happened and lowered her head, “I’m sorry, Archimedes…”

“It’s alright, don’t be t-too hard on her, love. My m-memory isn’t what it all once was… I’ve sort of lost my mind,” Archimedes twirled his hands in the air and laughed nervously. “Lost my mind…”

Everyone looked at each other as Archimedes sighed sadly, and looked upwards. Celestia turned to the girls slowly.

“I think it’s best for now, that Archimedes gets some rest whilst I look into this. I will return tomorrow morning as soon as I can. Luna, please tell the Mayor I apologise for my absence, I’m sure she will understand.”

“I shall, good luck on your research, Tia,” Luna replied.

“Girls, I’m entrusting you to look after Archimedes, make sure he gets some rest and, Twilight. No more questions until I return, okay?”

“Yes, Princess,” Twilight nodded along with the others.

“Private Moon Dancer, as you seem to be fairly friendly with Archimedes, I’m assigning you as his personal guard. With no objections from my sister, that is.”

Luna shook her head, “I’m fine with it sister.”

“Yes ma’am!” Moon Dancer grinned and saluted.

Celestia smiled and looked to Archimedes, “I am sorry for leaving so suddenly, but I do—”

“Say no more, my sweet,” Archimedes said with a soft chuckle, dismissing her with a wave of his hand. “I shall simply count the minutes until you return… but there is one thing I was wondering I could have before you left.”

“What’s that?” Celestia asked.

Archimedes kicked the ground lightly, “Just a tiny thing.”

“Yes?”

“Small… insignificant thing,” he said, making a pinching motion with his fingers.

“Oh tell her already,” Luna snapped.

“A little kiss, perhaps?” Archimedes said, holding his hands behind his back.

Chapter IV - Living Arrangements

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Archimedes

Chapter IV - Living Arrangements

Celestia blinked, her cheeks burned red from a heavy blush as Archimedes groaned as he lay on the ground, a nice column of smoke rising from his chest. Luna huffed as the magic around her horn faded out, a snarl on her lips.

“Luna?!” Celestia gasped. “What on earth was that for?!”

“What?!” Luna asked. “The metal beast dared ask you for a kiss!”

“And?” Celestia replied.

“I-It’s unheard of!” Luna protested.

Celestia rolled her eyes, “Luna, that doesn't excuse you blasting Archimedes in the chest with your magic.”

“It’s quite alright, my love,” Archimedes chuckled as he pushed himself up. “I should have remembered the protocol for addressing royalty and such.”

Celestia sighed as Luna huffed and looked away. It would seem that her little sister still had a lot to learn.

“Are you okay?!” Moon Dancer asked with a gasp as she flew up to Archimedes, Pinkie following shortly and sitting on the metal man’s chest.

“I’m fine, my little bat friend,” Archimedes chuckled.

“Would you like a nice big cupcake to cheer you up?” Pinkie asked as she nuzzled his chest where he was struck.

“I… suppose so, yes. I’m not even sure I can actually eat, though…” Archimedes replied.

Pinkie pouted at his reply and he quickly coughed, “B-but that doesn't mean I can’t try, does it?”

Archimedes mentally sighed in relief as Pinkie beamed up at him, seemingly happy with his words. He picked the pink mare up and gave her a friendly pat on the head before placing her on the ground as Moon landed on his head, turning to look down at the glaring alicorn.

“My apologies, Princess Luna,” Archimedes said.

“I should think so to!” Luna snorted before being bopped on the back of her head by Celestia’s wing.

“Luna…” Celestia deadpanned.

Luna glared at her sister but sighed in defeat, “Fine. I apologise as well, Archimedes.”

“Apology accepted,” Archimedes chuckled.

Celestia smiled with a soft nod of her head, “Now that has been settled, perhaps we should move onto other things?”

“Like what, Princess?” Twilight asked.

“Namely, where Archimedes will live,” Celestia replied.

“Oh! Oh!” Pinkie cried jumping up and down on the spot. “Archy can live with me!”

“Archy?” Archimedes asked, tilting his head making Moon squeak as she nearly fell from his head.

“Uhuh! All my friends have nicknames!” Pinkie replied with a massive grin.

As Archimedes petted her head in appreciation, Applejack coughed into her hoof.

“Ya’ll sure?” Applejack snickered. “Ah doubt he’d fit in your home, let alone not scare the poor Cakes.”

“Oh yeah…” Pinkie pouted.

“Not to worry, my pink friend. It’s the thought that counts,” Archimedes reassured her.

“Hey, Princess,” Moon said. “Why not keep him in the palace for the time being? He could fit in there.”

“But what about the nobles and staff?” Rarity countered. “Not to mention getting him there, dear.”

“Oh yeah… good point,” Moon pouted.

“Actually… that could work,” Twilight smiled.

“How?” Rainbow asked.

“Simple, me and the other Princesses can use our combined magic to teleport him to the old wing in the palace. The one that Starswirl used as a laboratory.”

Celestia blinked, “That’s… actually a good idea, Twilight. Well done.”

Twilight beamed up at the older alicorn as Celestia smiled back at her. Archimedes scratched his chin as his gears whirred, seemingly lost in thought.

“But, Tia!” Luna protested. “What of the nobles?”

“We’ll come to that block when we come to it,” Celestia replied. “Nopony goes to the old wing as it is sealed off from the general public, so Archimedes will be safe in there whilst we figure out a proper way of revealing him to the public.”

Luna snorted and rolled her eyes, “Very well. I suppose we could do that.”

“Then it’s settled,” Celestia said with a nod. “Archimedes will come to live in the palace for the time being, whilst we—”

Celestia stopped as she saw Archimedes looking forward, lost in thought. She grew a little concerned when steam started to escape from under his helmet.

“Archimedes?” She asked. “Are you alright?”

“Hmm?” He replied, his eyes blinking as he snapped out of his thoughts, the steam fading away almost immediately. “Sorry, my dear. Was lost in thought, your plan sounds wonderful!”

“Tia,” Luna whispered. “Are you sure about this? He could still be—”

“I’m perfectly sure, Luna,” Celestia interrupted. “Now, if you would be so kind as to help Twilight and me?”

Luna sighed but nodded, the three alicorn’s horns charging up before covering the area in a bright flash and teleporting the group. Leaving nothing but the shackles that held the giant robot on the ground.

Inside a dark and quite dusty abandoned room deep within the palace, there was a bright flash as the group suddenly appeared and landed with a soft thud. Save for Archimedes who landed with a loud boom. The three alicorns kept their horns glowing to allow the others to see in the pitch black.

“Here we are,” Celestia smiled. “Starswirl’s old laboratory.”

Rarity grimaced as she noticed all the dust and cobwebs, “Why is it so filthy in here?”

Rainbow and Applejack simply rolled their eyes as Twilight giggled softly, “Because, Rarity. When Starswirl was still living in the palace, he decided to one day move his experiments into the Everfree. In order to not cause anypony bother should something go amiss.”

Celestia nodded, “He was insistent on it for some reason, I still don’t know why. He did seem awfully sketchy about it now that I think about it...”

As they talked, Archimedes looked around, squinting his eyes as he scanned the room. Something about the room was bothering him but he couldn’t quite put his finger on it. Each time he tried to focus on what it could be his gears would heat up ever so slightly causing steam to escape from his joints. This received a light bop on his head from Moon Dancer.

“Hey, you okay, Archy?” She asked.

“I’m fine, just… this room seems familiar. Not sure why…” Archimedes replied with a mutter.

Moon shrugged it off as Luna and Celestia turned to address her.

“Private Moon Dancer?” Luna began. “I am putting you in charge of the guards that we will assign to… keep the metal beast ‘company’.”

“So… you want me to be his personal guard, Princess?” Moon asked.

Luna nodded, “In a sense, yes.”

Moon flashed her a toothy grin and saluted, “I’d be delighted to, your highness!”

Celestia again rolled her eyes but smiled, “We will brief a few of our finest guards soon about their new post. You don’t mind, do you, Archimedes?”

“Of course not,” he chuckled. “The more the merrier!”

Celestia giggled softly and smiled, “Very well then. We shall have some maids clean the place up as well as—”

Archimedes interrupted her by raising up a hand and shaking his head, “No need, my love. Just hand this ol’ bot a broom and dust pan and I’ll soon have the place ship-shape.”

“Are you sure? It wouldn’t be—”

“I insist, you have already done so much for me, my dear,” Archimedes bowed lowly.

Celestia giggled, bringing a hoof to her mouth as Luna glared at the robot, “Very well, Archimedes. Would you like anything else?”

“Well… just one thing—”

“Don’t. Start. That. Again,” Luna glared as her horn flared threateningly.

Archimedes brought his hands up in defense and nervously chuckled, “I jest, Princess. My apologies.”

Celestia glared at her sister, making a mental note to have words with her later on.

“Princess?” Twilight asked, “Can I stay here for a bit and ask Archimedes some questions?”

Celestia looked at the young alicorn, trying to resist the large puppy eyes she was giving her but sighed and shook her head with a soft titter, “Very well, Twilight. But this time try to be more careful, okay?”

Twilight nodded sheepishly as Rainbow trotted over and wrapped a foreleg over her shoulder and smirked, “Don’t worry, Princess. We’ll stay here and make sure she doesn't go overboard.”

The white alicorn smirked as Twilight blushed and glared at the now snickering pegasus and nodded.

“Very well. Come on, Luna. We should go and brief the guards.”

“In a moment, Tia,” Luna replied with a wave of her hoof. “I would also very much like to ask the metal beast—”

“Archimedes,” Celestia interrupted.

“Yes… Archimedes,” Luna said through gritted teeth. “A few questions.”

Celestia raised her brow suspiciously at her sister. Archimedes and the others saw this and looked at one another before the robot spoke up.

“It’s alright, Princess,” he said. “I don’t mind if Princess Luna wishes to interrogate me.”

“Hey!” Luna protested with an offended gasp. “I wasn’t going to interrogate you!”

Archimedes simply gave her a deadpan look along with the others. The alicorn shifted her eyes between the others and sighed.

“Okay, maybe I was. Happy?”

“There we go!” Archimedes chuckled patting Luna on her head, much to her annoyance. “Isn’t it better when you tell your friends the truth?”

“We are not friends!” Luna huffed, stomping her hoof.

“Oh? Is that so?” Archimedes said as he leant his hand down and started to scratch behind Luna’s ear.

Luna gasped and was about to blast the robot with her magic, but the second his metal fingers began to scratch she felt her body shiver and her legs nearly turn into jelly. It wasn’t until she heard the sounds of the others giggling that she realised she had been kicking her back leg and had her tongue lolling out of her mouth.

“W-we still aren’t friends!” Luna blushed and huffed, sitting on the floor on her rump and grumbling.

“Sure you’re not,” Celestia teased.

Luna glared at her sister before the older alicorn turned to the others, “Well then. I shall leave you all to it, I shall see you later, Archimedes.”

“Goodbye, my love. Until the next lovely encounter!” he replied with a wave of his hand

Celestia giggled as she watched his other hand wiggle its fingers at Luna who eyed them with a mixture of annoyance and want. She bid farewell to the others and made her way out of the old laboratory, making her way down the old corridor that was illuminated by her horn. Celestia came to the entrance to the corridor that led to the laboratory which was simply a dead end. No door, no curtain just a simple brick wall and cast a spell over her body, allowing herself to phase through the wall and appear on the other side.

She looked left and right to see if anyone was in the corridor and let a soft sigh of relief out seeing there was no-one. Celestia turned her head to look at where she had just come from. Instead of a door, there was a large painting on the wall that reached from the top to the bottom displaying rather fittingly a painting of Starswirl himself.

Turning to her left, she began to make her way towards the guard barracks in order to select some guards for Archimedes. As the solar princess walked on, she passed by a black unicorn maid with a grey mane and spectacles.

“Good afternoon, your highness!”

“And good afternoon to you, Blackberry,” Celestia replied.

She turned a corner, humming as little tune to herself. As she walked, she suddenly yelped as she vanished and appeared in a large garden outside the palace, blinking as she tried to process what just happened. She shook her head and sighed as she heard a familiar laugh coming from behind her.

“Discord, please don’t teleport me like that!” Celestia glared.

“Oh come now, Celly bean,” the draconequus chuckled. “I just wanted a chat.”

“About?” the alicorn asked as Discord appeared before her.

“Why, anything my dear! It has been so long since we spoke I just couldn’t bear it no more!”

Discord pulled out a handkerchief and blew into it making a loud and wet sound echo around the garden, before tossing the spoilt cloth behind him where it exploded into sombrero wearing confetti.

“We spoke this morning,” Celestia deadpanned.

“Details, details,” Discord replied with a wave of his claw.

“No offense, Discord. But could you make this quick? I’m… rather busy.”

“Busy? busy with what?” he asked her.

Celestia paused, wondering whether or not to tell Discord now about Archimedes or to wait a bit longer. She went with the latter.

“Uhm... nothing much, just an inspection of the guards,” Celestia replied, putting on her best fake smile she could muster.

Celestia felt a few drops of sweat form on her brow as Discord’s mouth slowly began to form into a twisted and mischievous grin.

“Oh? Is that so?”

“Y-yes?”

“Tia, you have the worst poker face of anypony, ever. Well, maybe save for Applejack,” Discord chuckled as he snapped his talons and teleported onto Celestia’s back.

“So… are you gunna tell me? Or do we have to do this the… hard way?” Discord purred into her ear as he wiggled his talons.

“I-I don’t know what you’re talking about! I’m just going to see the guards, that is all!” Celestia insisted.

“So be it…” Discord whispered with a grin.

Celestia screamed loudly and giggled as Discord suddenly tackled her to the ground and his fingers and talons went to work, tickling the alicorn without mercy.

“So… you’re the Princess of friendship?” Archimedes asked.

“That’s right.” Twilight smiled.

“And Luna is the night Princess?” he asked again.

“Correct-a-roonie!” Pinkie giggled.

“I see, I see…” Archimedes muttered.

Luna let out a sound equivalent to a purr as the robot continued to scratch her ear. She had long given up on being suspicious of Archimedes or on caring when the others giggled at her, just as long as she could enjoy the sensation of the scratching even more. It didn’t help that she was practically curled up in the robot’s lap.

“I’ve missed more than I thought, it seems. Tell me more about this… who was it again, Turok?”

“Tirek, darling,” Rarity corrected.

“Right, of course. Tirek.”

“Well, from what the Princess’ told us—”

Twilight was interrupted as Archimedes suddenly shot his head upright, nearly launching Moon from his head in the process and quickly looked left then right like an alert meerkat.

“What’s wrong, Archy?” Luna asked, a little peeved that the scratching had stopped.

“Didn’t you hear that?!” he asked alarmingly. “That sounded like a scream!”

“Scream?” Fluttershy asked. “I didn’t hear a scream.”

Everyone looked at one another and all confirmed that they all hadn’t heard it.

“It was my beloved screaming!” Archimedes panicked.

“You are hearing things my metal friend, continue with the scratching!” Luna declared with a smile.

“She warmed up quickly…” Rainbow snickered to Applejack.

But before Applejack could say anything, Luna squeaked as she was thrown off Archimedes's lap and landed on top of the girls. There was a loud boom as Archimedes ran through the closed door at speed, pounding down the corridor with a screaming bat pony clinging for dear life on his head.

“Don’t worry, my love! I’ll save you!” Archimedes shouted as he ran through the wall at the end of the corridor.

The group blinked as they stared through the two Archimedes shaped holes in the wall before looking at each other.

“Well…” Rainbow began. “Shit…”

Chapter V - Steam Powered Chaos

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Archimedes

Chapter V - Steam Powered Chaos

“Another boring patrol… joy.”

Iron Wing groaned as he trudged down the long, empty corridor. There were no sounds apart from the soft echo of his armored hoof connecting with the ground below. There were no nobles walking around, no other guards.

Not even a pretty maid he could watch from behind.

No, just himself and the worst patrol route in the rota.

The guards had all been assigned their usual rotas for that day, as per the norm. However, Iron Wing had been distracted, again, by the swaying of a maids flank and had wasted ten minutes when he was supposed to be at the rota switch meeting. As such, the pegasus was given the route that covered the old wing of the palace to patrol. The wing where no one ever walks in, the wing where no one even visits. Just a bunch of old paintings that dotted the long, dreary corridors for what seemed miles and miles.

Still, he couldn’t complain that much. It at least gave him a chance to be alone with his thoughts, take his sweet arse time and generally relax a little bit. In a sense, the route was a blessing. It was just a shame it had to be so bloody boring.

As he trudged his way down the hall, the floor began to ever so slightly rumble. Blinking, he looked down and tilted his head, somewhat confused at the slight vibrations. His eyes widened, however, as the vibrations increased and a heavy stomping sound grew louder and louder.

He looked up just in time to be able to throw himself to the side as a metal titan rushed past him, steam billowing in a black plume like a steam locomotives funnel and ran down the corridor. A screaming bat pony hanging on for dear life.

“Archimedes, stop!” the pony screamed.

Iron Wing blinked as not five seconds after, a blur of blue rushed past followed by Princess Luna, five of the six elements, a zebra and Prince Blueblood. He simply watched with his jaw dropped as the strange parade of metal and ponies disappeared around the corner. Shaking himself out of his shocked trance, he quickly galloped after them.

Needless to say, today wouldn’t be been boring.

“Archimedes, stop!” Moon wailed as she clung on for dear life.

Archimedes seemed not to hear her as he continued to pound down the corridor. Only one thing was on his mind right now. His beloveds safety. They soon began to get closer and closer to another door that made Moon’s eyes widen with fear.

The door to the main parts of the palace.

In a vain and desperate attempt to stop the hulking robot, she started to bash his head with her hoof, hoping to get some kind of response out of him, but to no avail. She squeaked and ducked so she was protected by his body as he smashed his way through the door, sending wood, stone and goodness knows what flying everywhere.

Two nearby guards jumped in alarm seeing the huge metal titan burst out from the now large hole in the wall and stared in shock and bewilderment. Archimedes quickly looked left and right before suddenly taking off to the right and darting around the corner, his heavy metal boots loudly stomping with each step.

The guards just stared when a pony they recognized as Rainbow Dash shot out of the hole panting, she saw the faint smoke trail left behind and dashed off to the right and around the corner as quick as she could before the guards had a chance to even ask her what the heck was going on. As the guards continued to stare, Princess Luna and her small group emerged, each one panting slightly.

“You there! Guards pony!” Luna cried, “Did you see which way—”

The guard interrupted by pointing his hoof to the right, seeing the smoke had now vanished. Quickly, the group took off leaving the two guards still staring in shock. The last pony to emerge, was Iron Wing who had a look of confusion mixed with pure excitement on his face.

“Uh…” the first guard started.

“No time! Come on!” Iron Wing replied before running after the others.

The two guards looked at one another before nodding and running after them.

As she flew past several guards who were all sharing the same dumbfounded look on their faces as she raced past, Rainbow gritted her teeth as she fought to hold back her coughs as she came closer to Archimedes, the thicker the smoke became. Finally, the mare caught up to him and flew to his left hand side.

“Hey! You big metal lug, you need to stop!” she shouted as she flapped her wings as hard as she could.

“It won’t work!” Moon replied as she continued to bash Archimedes head. “He can’t seem to hear us!”

Rainbow snarled and tried to think of something. Her eyes widened a little as an idea came to her mind.

“Moon, hold on as tight as you can! I’m gunna try something!”

“Okay!”

With a confirmation nod, Rainbow shot out in front of Archimedes, bashing through two double doors and into the room that was behind them and out the others, giving her a long, long run up. The pegasus came to a near sudden halt at the end of the corridor, she turned to face the stomping hulk as it came closer to the room she had flown out of.

“Get ready!” she shouted to Moon as she focused her energy.

Rainbow suddenly shot towards him, a loud boom as a circular wave of rainbow colours erupted from her and she collided hooves first into the robot's chest just as he came into the room in order to try and stop him. The sonic rainboom making the glass windows around her shattered and a loud clang echoed throughout the room.

She cried out in pain as her hooves near broke from the impact and she fell to the floor, cursing every single swear word that she knew under Celestia’s sun. Ignoring the alarmed cries of the concerned bat pony as she continued to hold onto Archimedes as the robot smashed through the opposite two doors and down the corridor.

It was only then, that Rainbow Dash realised she was not alone in the room.

And that many a noble and guard were now lying on the floor, groaning in agony from the sonic rainboom she had just used.

Celestia suddenly shot her head up, stopping mid-laugh which was something that impressed Discord and looked towards the palace.

“Did you hear that?” she asked, “It sounded like an explosion.”

Discord paused for a moment, he had felt a strange feeling of chaotic magic coming from the castle, but it didn’t feel as if it was worth his time investigating. Besides, he had more pressing matters to attend to.

“I didn’t hear anything,” the draconequus replied. “Now… where were we?”

Celestia turned her head suddenly towards him to protest but before she could say anything, Discord quickly coiled himself around her and began to mercilessly tickle her once more. Making the white alicorn scream in hysterics.

Archimedes came to a screeching halt in a corridor, making Moon yelp as her head slammed into the back of his from the sudden stop. He blinked a few times as he processed the noise he had just heard.

His beloved was screaming again! He was running out of time!

“Finally… you bloody stopped, now—”

Moon fell off him as she put her hooves to her head as Archimedes let out a loud and long angry whistle that sounded like a locomotive. Steam blasting from his pipes as he shook in anger and his eyes turning red before running off down the corridor faster than before, his feet leaving indents in the ground below him .

“Mother of me…” Luna whispered as the group raced into the room.

They saw all of the ponies who were lying in pain on the floor, groaning as they rolled left to right slowly. The elements gasped seeing Rainbow on the floor holding her front legs to her chest and groaning loudly.

“Rainbow!” they cried.

“I-I’m fine! Get after Archimedes he went—”

They were interrupted by a long and loud steam whistle.

“Oh sweet donkey teats…” Luna cursed.

She turned to Blueblood quickly and the small entourage of guards that had followed them.

“Go and get the medical staff, now!” she barked.

Blueblood and the guards nodded and took off as quick as they could.

“Rainbow Dash, what happened?” Twilight asked as Rainbow slowly sat up.

“I kinda thought I could stop him with a sonic rainboom…” she replied before muttering, “Think I broke something.”

“We need to get ya help, that looks nasty…” Applejack grimaced at her injury.

“I’m fine, we need to stop—”

“You must not be so rash, you need to get your injury seen to, Rainbow Dash,” Zecora interrupted.

Rainbow was about to argue but the concerned look from her friends silenced her, “Fine, I’ll go get it looked at.”

“Very well, come on everyone!” Luna replied as she rushed out of the room, quickly followed by the others.

“O-Oh come on!” Celestia cried in between giggles, “Surely y-you heard that whistle!”

“Probably just a train, stop trying to resist and tell me!” Discord grinned.

“Never!” Celestia cried.

The draconequus chuckled as his army of claws and hands he had spawned roamed all over Celestia’s stomach and legs, tickling her without pause.

“Though, I will admit there is a strong feeling of chaos coming from the palace…” he mused to himself, gazing up at the palace in thought.

Suddenly, there was a loud, almighty explosion and a crash as something blasted out the side of the palace wall that faced the gardens, destroying the wall and windows in the process. Discord blinked as something large, metal and seemingly on fire jumped through the hole and fell to the ground at great speed before charging at him.

“What the heck is—”

Discord never finished his sentence as a metal fist connected with his face.

Archimedes burst through another wall, scattering more guards who were trying to stop him. His pistons and gears were working overtime as the robot pounded down corridor after corridor and through door after door.

He came to a screeching halt in an empty room and quickly scanned all around him, trying to hone in on where he last heard his beloved scream. He looked towards a wall that had some very decorative windows on them, depicting Celestia and Luna as foals with two alicorns he vaguely remembered for some reason. Were they their parents?

On another window it showed Celestia battling with another alicorn who looked like Luna only more… evil looking. He made a note to ask Celestia about that.

The other windows showed the elements of harmony defeating various evils. Ranging from the same alicorn, a strange snakey thing that looked familiar to him and the little dragon against what looked like an angry cloud.

Suddenly, before he could look at the windows anymore, he heard Celestia scream again and rushed to the window, seeing her being assaulted by the same snake demon he saw in the windows.

His vision dark shade of red as he ran backwards before raising his right arm at the wall, his hand quickly retracting into his gauntlet and a long barrel extended in its place. Archimedes aimed it at the wall before a loud explosion echoed around the room and a large round metal ball rocketed out of his arm and exploded as it came into contact with the wall, shattering all the glass windows and blowing a massive hole in the wall.

Immediately, Archimedes ran through the large hole with a mechanical roar and plummeted into the gardens below. As soon as he landed, he began to run full pelt towards where Celestia, who despite having the claws and talons all over her was staring at him jaw dropped. The snake creature was also looking at him with confusion.

“What the heck is—”

It never finished its sentence as Archimedes’ metal fist connected with its face, sending the snake hurtling across the garden bouncing along the ground and into a wall with a loud boom.

Celestia gasped, “Archimedes! What—”

“Engaging hostile,” Archimedes interrupted with a loud rumble.

Discord groaned as he sat up in the small pile of rubble that was around him, little Discords running in a circle around his head, “Did anypony catch the number of that bus?” Discord murmured.

He shook his head just in time to see the metal titan grab him by his legs and firmly grasp them before pulling him out of the ruble, up over his head and slamming him into the ground hard, causing a small crater. Discord yelped as he was continuously smashed over and over into the ground, all the while the machine roared loudly.

Archimedes stopped and grabbed Discord by his neck, the latter groaning in dazed surprise seemingly unharmed from the assault. With a low rumble, Archimedes slammed Discords head into the wall behind him, causing it to become embedded into it. With a roar, he ran down the length of the wall, dragging Discord along with it and creating a long indent in it where Discord’s head was still rammed into.

As he came to the end, he turned his body and threw Discord to the ground, the draconequus bouncing slightly and landing with a groan, his eyes swirling in circles and a dazed goofy expression on his face.

“Terminating…” Archimedes said with a low rumble.

Discord slowly looked up as Archimedes lifted his left arm, the hand retracting and a long pole emerged before small pylons sprouted from within the pylon that crackled with electricity. The pylon began to glow as the electricity rapidly began to charge.

From the hole in the wall, Luna and the others, who had just arrived in time to see the draconequus bounce on the ground, were teleported to the ground thanks to Twilight and Luna. Celestia, snapping out of her shock, rushed in between the two along with the others.

“Archimedes! Stop this at once!” she shouted in her Canterlot voice.

Archimedes merely kept his cold gaze locked on Discord, his pylon still charging up.

“He’s a friend, Archy!” Luna bellowed beside her sister, “Stand down!”

The others nervously looked at Archimedes who stared down at them with his red eyes. What seemed like hours passed before the pylon began to lose its electricity and retract, the hand replacing it. Archimedes's eyes turned yellow and he blinked, looking down at them.

“B-but, my love… the windows… he’s evil!” Archimedes protested, “I heard you scream and found him assaulting you!”.

Before Celestia could reply, Discord groaned as he got up and shook his head. Fluttershy and Celestia quickly rushed to his side to see if he was alright.

“Discord?! Are you alright?” Fluttershy asked.

Discord blinked up at her, but instead of answering, he grinned widely showing a missing tooth and he snapped his talons and appeared on top of Archimedes.

“Holy tartarus, Celly! Where did you get this and where can I get one?” He grinned, squealing like a little filly in excitement.

“Get off me! Demon!” Archimedes hissed and swiped at him.

Discord chuckled and teleported again before the hand could connect and appeared on Celestia’s back, making Archimedes's steam turn black again.

“U-uhm, Discord?” Fluttershy squeaked, “Could you get off the princess? You’re making Archimedes's angry…”

“Very well,” the draconequus sniffed with a fake hurt expression before standing beside them as Moon Dancer landed on Archimedes's shoulder and give his head a calming stroke.

By now, a large group of ponies, a mixture of guards, nobles and civilians had gathered, drawn by the noise. Celestia looked around at them, seeing their confused faces that were screaming for an answer and sighed. The alicorn looked over to Archimedes who was glaring at Discord, Moon trying to calm him down and Fluttershy trying to get Discord to behave.

She sighed, knowing that she was going to have a long day of explaining to do. Not to mention sorting out repairs.

“I should have stayed in bed…” she muttered.

Chapter VI - Punishment and Understanding

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Archimedes

Chapter VI - Punishment and Understanding

Princess Celestia was using all of her willpower to not let out a large sigh. All around her in the courtroom were angry nobles, servants, maids and all manner of ponies who happened to be in the palace at the time of Archimedes… incident. All of them were crying out for the offenders blood, or, they would be if they were barbaric. They merely wanted to know what the Princess was going to do and wanted Archimedes to have some form of punishment.

“He nearly gave me a heart attack!” one noble mare shouted.

“Nearly trampled me!” another stallion shouted.

“He should be locked up for a year!! a mare shouted.

“I was told there’d be cake!” came a voice from somewhere.

Celestia frowned as she looked over the large angry crowd. She was about to raise a hoof in order to call for silence amongst the rabble but Luna beat her to the punch.

“Calm yourselves this instant!” she boomed in her Royal Canterlot voice, “stop behaving like foals and be quiet!”

The crowd instantly shushed up under the steely gaze and loud voice of the night princess, who nodded in triumph and smiled over to her sister who resisted the urge to slap her own face with her hoof.

“Thank you, Luna,” Celestia began before turning to the crowd, “Now, my little ponies, I know you are all somewhat upset… but please, rest assured. I will be giving Archimedes a proper punishment for his actions.”

“And what pray tell, is that punishment?” a rather large noble stallion said as others muttered to themselves.

Celestia looked down at him and held back the urge to groan.

This was Money Bags. A brown stallion who wore a monocle, a black tuxedo with a bow tie and had a bears face next to what appeared to be a brown bag with a gem on it as his cutie mark, something Celestia to this day was puzzled over. She didn’t particularly like this stallion, usually making things difficult for her by demanding stupid fees for projects she knew either didn’t need it in the first place, or probably would have cost less. But because he would always ask for it in times of urgency when she didn’t have another option, she usually was forced to pay him.

“Well, given his motive was to protect me from what he thought was an assault—”

“Of tickley proportions, I might add!” Discord interrupted from his perch above the court on a support beam.

Celestia glared at him before continuing, “As I was saying, his motives were clear and true, anything a guard stallion or mare would have done in the same situation. Granted, not as… extreme, but the thought of valor is still there.”

The nobles muttered to themselves again, as if they were mulling over her words as the Princess continued.

“As such, I have the most fitting punishment in mind for Archimedes…” she smiled before turning to two guards.

“Aww… cheer up, Archy,” Moon frowned as she sat beside the robot.

Archimedes groaned into the ground where he lay. After the incident, they had taken Archimedes back to Starswirl’s old laboratory room to await what fate had in store for him as the three princess’ left to deal with the crowd of angry nobles. When they arrived, Archimedes simply fell onto his front and laid still, groaning every now and again on his mistake. Pinky and Moon sat beside him and tried to comfort him and cheer him up, but to no avail.

“But, I embarrassed m-my love!” the titan wailed, “I assaulted Rainbow Dash with my chest and hurt many, many others! I destroyed her castle and for what? My over reacting nature!”

Moon sighed as Archimedes rolled over onto his back with a groan and a wail, Pinkie clambering onto his stomach and wrapping her legs around him as best she could to hug him.

“Ah it’ll be fine, hun,” Applejack started, “Rainbow won’t hold anything against ya, and ah’m sure as punch the Princess’ won’t be to harsh on ya!”

“Yes, darling. I agree,” Rarity added, “Discord himself said he had no ill grudge against you, which was surprisingly decent of him if I may say so.”

Archimedes scowled at the ceiling at the mention of the draconequus’ name. He still thought the beast was evil, just… in a different way to what he originally thought, for now, he was to be cautious of him. Be weary of his actions and watch him at all times possible. He was not going to let him get his hands on his love again.

“And besides,” Blueblood added, the prince having opted to stay with Archimedes before the princess’ had gone to the court, “If I know my aunts, and I do, they will be able to calm the crowds down easily. And as for a punishment…”

The prince tapped his chin with a hoof as he thought, the others watching with interest and a little nervousness.

“They’d, at best, give you community service or something. You know, pay back the community with some good old fashioned labour.”

“You don’t even know what labour is, do you?” Moon snickered.

Blueblood huffed and looked away with a tinge of annoyance as the others giggled softly.

“You think so, your highness?” Archimedes asked, rolling his head to look at the stallion.

“I do so, and besides. I think the others can confirm that Princess Twilight would be damned dead if the nobles tried to take away such a fine specimen of science and technology such as yourself before she got a chance to know you better.”

The others nodded, knowing their friend all too well when it came to this type of thing. Their smiles and the words of Blueblood made Archimedes let out a sigh of relief as he looked back up at the ceiling.

“Thank you, my friends,” he started, “Though… I still feel as if I should do something special for my beloved, to truly show her I’m sorry.”

Fluttershy coughed gently into her hoof. She’d been talking with Zecora and the two had come up with an idea.

“Then, my metal friend, perhaps there is something we can recommend?” Zecora said.

The robot looked over at the two as Fluttershy continued Zecora’s sentence.

“Maybe you could… give Discord a c-chance?” she suggested, “I-I think that if you were to get to know him you’d see that he’s a real sweetheart. Plus, i-it will make the Princess happy…”

“That thing?” Archimedes snorted, “why in the blue blazes should I try to get to know that filthy, heathounes and foul demon—”

Archimedes was interrupted by a loud clang as something smacked the side of his shoulder guard. He looked over to see Applejack giving him a deadpan look.

“Come over here, Archy,” she said and began to walk away from the others to the far side of the room.

Archimedes hesitantly got up, making the cuddling pink mare on his chest squeak in surprise and fall off onto the ground where she bounced, her body squeaking as it landed. The hulking machine stomped after Applejack who stopped at one of the far corners of the room.

The laboratory was fairly large both in width and height, so she was sure the others wouldn’t be able to hear her.

“Sit down, sugarcube,” she told him, pointing to the corner before sitting on her rump.

Archimedes slowly walked over to the corner and turned to face her, crouching down suddenly so he was face to face with her before he slowly leant backwards and fell onto his backside. The force making the room boom and Applejack be partly lifted into the air, the action however not phasing the mare at all.

“Comfy?” she asked.

Archimedes shifted his legs flat out either side of her and nodded down at her.

“Good… now, we all told ya about the elements of harmony, right?” she began.

“Of course. Fluttershy is kindness, Rarity is Generosity, Pinkie is Laughter—”

“Ya don’t need to tell me, Archy,” Applejack chuckled, “but you know what I am, right?”

“Honesty,” he replied.

“Darn straight! Now, Archimedes… ah may not be the best liar in Equestria, heck, I refuse to ever play poker cos I ain’t got no poker face!”

Archimedes chuckled, despite having no clue what she meant by poker or poker face. Maybe a red hot poker? But why would she play with one of those?

“Whilst ah might not be the best liar in the world, I pride myself on judging a ponies character and being able to spot lies a lot better than most’ ponies.”

The robot nodded as she continued.

“Discord… is a tricky fellah… When the Princess first asked Fluttershy to reform him, she was the only one who cared enough to try and see it through. The rest of us were jus’ plain suspicious of him the whole time.”

“Understandable,” Archimedes said.

“Even after his reformation, none of us bar Fluttershy really trusted him that much… especially with the incident with Tirek.”

“What happened?” Archimedes growled softly.

Applejack heard him growl and gave him a stern glare, “Ah’ll tell ya another time.”

Archimedes crossed his arms in a huff but nodded as the mare continued.

“Anyways, before we managed to defeat Tirek, Discord apologised to all of us and… I’ll be real honest with you here, Archy…”

Applejack looked Archimedes dead in the eye before she continued, “In all the time ah have known Discord, that was the first time he had spoken nothing but the Faust honest truth without a single hint of mischief behind it. It may seem strange to you, and ah do understand that. But Discord is our friend now, and ah genuinely trust him, as we all do. It was rocky to get here, yes, but he did his time after what happened with Tirek, he took his punishment without protest just like you will with yours.”

Applejack sighed before adjusting her hat.

“Ahm not asking ya to immediately befriend him, heck it took us near a darn year to even get close to him really… but for the sake of the Princess and to a slightly more important degree, for Fluttershy’s sake… can ya make the effort at your own pace?”

Archimedes mulled the words over in his mind. There was no doubt in his mind that the mare was being sincere and honest with him, making him chuckle internally given her status, He looked over to see Fluttershy sniffling, clearly trying not to cry as the others comforted her and he felt a twinge of guilt hit him. With a heavy rumble and a sigh he looked down at Applejack.

“I may not like it…” he began, “but for the sake of the one I love… and for my new friends. I will try to get along with the de—… Discord,”

Applejack gave him a grin and reached out with her hoof to which Archimedes simply stared at, “Uh.. sugarcube? Ya meant to hoof bump me.”

“Uhm… alright then?” Archimedes gently bumped his fist onto her hoof, confused at the strange gesture. What was wrong with a handshake?

“I will say this now, though, Applejack. I don’t like this, and it isn’t going to be easy, as long as Discord acts like a tolerable fellow, I will do my best to be the same and try to meet him on the middle ground.”

“That’s all ah ask for, hun. Now come one, ah think there’s a yellow mare you need to apologise to.”

Archimedes slapped his head and quickly rose up, “You’re right!”

He quickly stomped over to the others, followed closely by Applejack before he knelt in front of the sniffling Fluttershy.

“My dear friend… please forgive my actions. I allowed my emotions to get the better of me, and after speaking with Applejack…” he said before looking over to Applejack who smiled and nodded.

“I will try my best to find some middle ground with Discord, for yours and my loves sake.”

Fluttershy smiled and reached up to hug him, which the robot happily returned and gently held her to him, “Apology accepted, Archy… and i-if you want me to help you with being friends with Discord, I-I’m more than happy to.”

Archimedes chuckled and placed her down gently, “Yes, I think that is best as well… might stop us from trying to kill one another if you’re there.”

Applejack rolled her eyes as she shook her head, giving him a sharp buck to the leg to make him behave. As the group laughed, there was a knock at the door and two guards stood there, saluting the group.

“The Princess’ wish for Archimedes to join them in the courtroom for his sentence, they ask all of you to attend as well,” one the guards said.

Blueblood nodded and turned to the others, “Shall we, then?”

The group all slowly made their way after the two guards with Archimedes shuffling behind nervously as Fluttershy, Applejack, Pinkie and Moon all helping him along.

The nobles gasped as Archimedes and the others entered the courtroom. Just as Celestia was about to tell them his punishment, she had sent two guards to collect him and the others, believing he had the right to hear first hand what she had in mind for him. At first, Money Bags had been irritated by this idea but one sharp dual gaze from Twilight and Luna stopped him from saying anything.

“Welcome, Archimedes. Thank you for coming,” Celestia said with a warm smile.

“Yo, what up?” Discord called from above, offering the robot a cheery wave.

Archimedes glared at him, but slowly returned the wave before looking back to Celestia.

“Thank you, your highness, “ he replied, choosing to keep up formalities given the situation, “I am ready for whatever you have in store for me.”

Celestia smiled and nodded before clearing her throat and turning her attention to the now hushed crowd of nobles, “I will now deliver Archimedes’ judgement.”

She then turned to the still robot and looked up at him, “Archimedes, you are charged with property damage, disturbing the peace and assault of at least a dozen ponies who, thankfully, have only received a few scrapes and bruises. How do you plead?”

It was pointless asking him that, she and the others knew, but the nobles were sticklers for protocol.

“Guilty, my Princess,” Archimedes replied.

“Then I shall pass sentence. In light of your actions, given the noble intentions behind them, I will not be sentencing you to prison, Archimedes. Instead, I sentence you to two months of community service.”

And with that, Celestia called the courtroom meeting to and end. The nobles seemed pleased, with the exception of a few including Money Bags, and began to fill out of the courtroom. Celestia waited till they had all gone before she looked back up at Archimedes.

“So… when do I begin, my love?” he asked.

“Well, before you begin your official services. There is one further thing I am adding to your punishment that is mandatory,” she replied.

“And that is?” he asked, tilting his head.

Celestia allowed herself a small mischievous grin.

“You are to have tea, with myself and Discord this afternoon. No excuses.”

Archimedes groaned loudly and brought a hand to his face, as the draconequus squealed loudly and teleported onto Archimedes, wrapping an arm around his neck.

“We’re gunna be best buds! I just know it!” Discord grinned.

“Oh creator save me…” Archimedes grumbled.

Chapter VII - A Spot of Tea

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Archimedes

Chapter VII - A Spot Of Tea

Celestia sipped softly from her cup that was held in her magical aura and sighed in contentment.

“My… this tea is certainly delicious, is it not?” she said.

“Indeed it is!” Discord chuckled, “my compliments to yadda yadda you get the rest.”

She smiled at the two others seated with her, she was sitting at a white metal table that was situated in the palace gardens. To her left, was Discord, who happened to be drinking his tea using an unnaturally long straw that bended in several places with one end stuck in his ear of all places and the other in his cup.

To her right, not sitting on a chair due to his weight and height, was Archimedes. The robot hadn’t taken a sip yet and it wasn’t due to him not being able to, it was due to the fact for the duration of their ‘tea’ he hadn’t taken his eyes of Discord. He was quite content on glaring at the draconequus and keeping tabs on what he was doing, much to Celestia’s annoyance.

“Oh, come now, Archimedes.” She started, “Won’t you please just have some tea? I promise you Discord is not going to kidnap me or anything.”

“Hey, stop reading my mind!” Discord said with a pout, receiving a bop on the head from Celestia.

Archimedes simply continued to glare at Discord, but complied with the princess’ request and brought the cup to his helmet. Both Discord and Celestia watched with equal fascination as the robot brought the cup up to his helmet. Archimedes, eyes still on Discord, slowly tipped the brown liquid into the darkness that occupied his helmet where it simply vanished upon contact.

“Neat!” Discord grinned before taking a photo with a camera.

“Forgive me for asking, Archimedes. But, can you actually taste the tea?” Celestia asked.

Archimedes glared at Discord a bit longer before he finally turned to Celestia and seemed to smile at her, “No need to be sorry, my love. But, yes, I can taste the tea. It’s quite exquisite”

“But… how?” Celestia asked.

“I’m… not actually sure if I’m honest,” he replied, scratching the top of his helmet.

“Maybe the clever clogs who built you wanted you to feel more alive?” Discord offered, taking a biscuit and eating it quickly.

“Quiet, demon,” Archimedes hissed, “I don’t remember you being apart of this conversation.”

“Archimedes…” Celestia said softly before pouting at the robot, “You promised to behave and be reasonable.”

If Archimedes had a heart, it probably would have imploded at that point. Looking over at the one he loved, pouting at him in such an adorable way made his circuits melt. With a heavy sigh he nodded.

“My apologies, my dear. And… my apologies, Discord,” he said, the last part with a hint of venom.

“Archimedes…” Celestia said, raising her eyebrow at him.

The robot let out another heavy sigh, “I’m sorry, Discord.”

Celestia smiled as Discord appeared beside Archimedes and patted his back.

“No harm done, old boy!” Discord said with a grin as Archimedes gave him a vicious death glare, “But getting back to Celly’s point—”

“That’s, Princess Celestia, to you. Discord,” Archimedes snarled.

“Actually,” Celestia said, “I like the nickname, it’s much better than what he used to call me I must say.”

“What was that?” Archimedes asked her.

Celestia tapped her chin with her hoof. She contemplated telling the robot, but part of her was screaming not to, not wanting him to attack Discord because of the—

“I used to call her, Sun butt!” Discord beamed as he appeared back in his seat, “‘Cos of the cutie mark on her butt, get it?”

Celestia resisted the urges to face hoof then hit Discord and turned to Archimedes whose eyes were now starting to turn a shade of red. Quickly, she placed her hoof on his hand and his eyes immediately returned to normal.

“It’s alright, Archimedes,” she said with a soft smile, “Friends will do that to other friends, you should hear what Luna calls Discord.”

She whispered into Archimedes helmet quickly as Discord spat out his tea in a comic fashion, looking up to the alicorn and robot who shared a giggle between themselves.

“Wait, what does she call me?” Discord asked.

“Oh, nothing…” Archimedes replied with a snicker.

“Archy…” Discord said softly.

The draconequus tried to mimic Celestia earlier and put on his best pouty face. Sadly, unlike Celestia, he didn’t get the same response.

“That, is the scariest thing I have ever seen in my entire life,” Archimedes deadpanned at Discord.

“Ouch, you wound me, Archy!” Discord replied, dramatically placing the back of his paw over his head and swooning a little.

Celestia giggled softly as she watched the two, Archimedes rolling his eyes and taking another sip of his tea. She then lowered her cup as she remembered something.

“I nearly forgot! Before you start your sentence tomorrow, Archimedes, you’re going to be sent to the blacksmith to see if they can do something about your rust. I’d love to see your iron body shine.”

“Wonderful,” Archimedes said happily, “Going to give me the old, ‘spit n polish’, eh?

“So… I gotta ask, Archy,” Discord said interrupting him, twirling his claws and making a small cake sprout legs.

“What, pray tell, is that?” Archimedes asked him.

“Who built you? Like, was it a mad pony or aliens or—”

Celestia interrupted him by bopping his head, not wanting a repeat of the last time Archimedes was asked that question.

“Its okay, Archimedes. I don’t want you to have another melt down like last time.”

“Last time?” Discord asked.

Celestia nodded, “Twilight pressed him a little to hard on her questions and we found out he has a problem with his memory.”

“Sounds like her,” Discord snorted and smirked, “And I only really care about who made him.”

“I think… it was a unicorn called Starswirl, was it?” Archimedes asked, looking to Celestia for confirmation.

“That’s right, a dear, dear old friend of mine…” she said, her tone becoming softer as she gazed off to her left in memory.

Discord scarfed down another cake and wiped the crumbs from his mouth before looking over at Celestia.

“What… ever did happen to Starswirl anyway?” Discord suddenly asked, “I mean… I never met him ‘cos of my er… ‘little vacation’.”

Celestia rolled her eyes.

“But… every now and again since I was reformed I’ve seen you looking at portraits of him fondly, was he like, your coltfriend or something?”

Celestia blushed softly as she smiled, “No… he was like Twilight. My student, and one of the best magic users Equestria had ever seen. He was one of my best friends, I trusted him with everything and would go to him if I needed advice.”

Celestia tittered to herself and smiled down at her cup of tea fondly.

“Sometimes, it felt like he was the teacher and I was the student with the amount of times I relied on his help from dealing with nobles, to, well, anything really. I truly miss him…”

Discord smirked, “Did you have a crush on him~?”.

Celestia’s cheeks burned red as she choked on her tea a little, giving the draconequus a glare, “N-no, he was my student, and t-that’s all!”

“If you say so~” Discord replied with a halo above his head.

Celestia gave him a deadpan look and bopped the halo, making it reveal its true form of little devil horns on Discord’s head.

“Don’t worry, Celly. Ya secret’s safe with me!” Discord said, before pulling a large zipper over his mouth and zipping it up.

“Uhuh,” Celestia said, unconvinced, “So I won’t hear any rumors coming from Luna tonight then?”

“Perish the thought!” Discord replied.

Celestia giggled and shook her head before looking over at Archimedes. He was staring off into the distance and his eyes were flickering a little, the only sounds he made was the soft whirring of gears. She tilted her head and gently placed a hoof on his shoulder.

“Archimedes?” she asked.

No reply.

“Yo, Archy… you all right?” Discord asked, tapping his helmet with his knuckle.

Again, no response.

Celestia frowned slightly, this was just like the other day when he supposedly got lost in his own thoughts. However, she was now beginning to suspect something else was up.

“Discord, I think something is wrong with—”

Archimedes raised his hand up, interrupting her and looked to the pair. His eyes were a light yellow, unlike his normal colour.

“There is no need, my dear friend,” Archimedes suddenly said.

In a voice that was not metallic. And very, very familiar to her.

“Wait! Say that again!” Celestia gasped.

Archimedes blinked and tilted his head, his eyes returning to their normal shade of yellow, “Pardon? I was away with the fairies, what were you saying?”

Celestia opened her mouth but sighed and shook her head, “Don’t worry, Archimedes. It’s nothing important.”

Discord and Archimedes shared a confused look as the alicorn looked out over the gardens with a sad expression on her face.

“Was it something I said?” Archimedes asked Discord.

Discord simply shrugged, “No clue, never seen Celly like this before… I don’t like it.”

The draconequus pouted and crossed his arms, much like a child being told off. Archimedes stood up and slowly made his way over to Celestia, kneeling down and placing a hand on her back gently.

“Are you okay, my love?” he asked.

“I’m fine, Archimedes. Thank you,” Celestia smiled up to him, though he wasn’t completely convinced.

“Are you sure? You seem sad…” Archimedes replied.

“Just… something on my mind, that’s all. I’m sorry I’ve ruined our tea.”

“Nah,” Discord said, teleporting around Archimedes’ neck, “You haven’t ruined anything, has she, Archy?”

“Of course not,” Archimedes said, grabbing the draconequus and forcing him off his body and back onto the floor, “You could never ruin anything, my love.”

Celestia smiled warmly as Discord kept trying to wrap his arm around Archimedes, the robot flicking it off each time, as they both looked at her happily.

“Thank you,” she said as she gave Archimedes a hug, “Now, shall we continue with our tea?”

“I’d very much like that. Discord, if you—”

Archimedes stopped, glaring at Discord as he chugged the tea straight from the teapot and belched loudly, letting out a sigh of contentment before looking at the two confused.

“What? All this touchy feelsy stuff was making me thirsty,”

Celestia giggled as Archimedes continued to glare at the draconequus before flaring up her horn, ready to summon more tea to them.

The old tower was silent, save for the sounds of the Everfree around it. A bird that was preening itself on a branch suddenly took flight as a twig snapped nearby and a hooded figure, followed by a second and a third, appeared out of the bushes.

“You sure this is the place, Red?” one, a male from his voice, said as he inspected the tower.

“I’m certain. This is the location.” a female replied, looking at a map held in her talons, scratching her red beak, scanning over the map as the other two joined her side.

“Good, I’m getting tired of this damn forest…” the third muttered in a deep echoy voice.

The third one looked up, his large blue eyes scanning the tower before his jagged horn which was peeking out of the hood flared green but stopped seeing the door partly off its hinges. He tilted his head and gasped softly seeing the large indents in the forest floor.

“Hey… think someone’s already been here?” he asked.

“Probably not, this place has been abandoned for centuries. No one knows of its location or existence save for a few, hense why we have the map.” the female replied, her thin tail swishing a bit.

“But the door, and these prints”

“Probably just decayed over time or something, and it’s probably just some wild animal. Now hurry up, Meta, we’re losing daylight and more importantly. Pay.”

“Oh can it…” he muttered as he walked through the open door, looking at the third member. “You coming?”

“Nah,” he replied, flaring out his dark blue wings, “I’m gunna keep an eye on the coast, you two go ahead.”

The first rolled his eyes as the pegasus took off into the air and walked inside, being followed by the female. He flared his horn up to illuminate the room around them, adding to the natural light that was seeping in through the holes in the wall and the door. The room was pretty much as they expected, worn down and extremely filthy. Dust coated everything and the presence of many spiders were shown thanks to the ridiculous amount of webbing that stuck to the ceiling and walls.

“Right… so where do you want to start, Red?” the first one asked.

“You take downstairs, seeing as you have your magic to light up the darkness and I’ll do this floor. It shouldn’t be hard to find it,” she replied.

He nodded and made his way to the staircase, stopping for a moment to examine the door leading to the basement lying on its side with a broken lock. This made him slightly nervous as he started his descent, keeping his horn glowing and a counter spell ready just incase something was down there. As he entered the basement, he raised a brow in confusion.

Unlike upstairs, where everything was seemingly in place, virtually everything in the basement was either smashed or broken, completely beyond repair. But what made him more anxious was the fact he could see a large part of the floor had been disturbed, due to the dust that was coating it being different to everything else.

Shaking off his anxiety, he made his way through the wreckage, being careful not to hurt himself.

“Find it yet?” Red called from upstairs.

“Not yet, I’m not even sure if it’s still here,” he replied, “The amount of broken crap down here is ridiculous.”

“Well, keep looking. If we don’t find it we don’t get paid!”

“Well done, genius…” he muttered as he lifted up a broken table with his magic.

His eyes widened when he saw a square shape embedded into the ground and he gave a toothy grin.

“Found it!” he shouted.

He waited as the other made her way downstairs and joined him, her own smirk forming on her face as she walked over to the metal slab.

“You still have the amulet?” he asked.

“Of course, it’s the only way to access this safe anyway. Starswirl was too clever for a normal safe.”

She pulled out from a bag under her cloak a very bright amulet that was in the shape of crescent moon resting on a blazing sun, the sun was glowing yellow whereas the moon was glowing blue. Carefully, she lowered it near the metal slab. When it was just above it, the same shape as the amulet shone, revealing to the two a small slot that shared the amulets design.

With a smirk, she carefully placed the amulet into the slot and the metal slab slowly slided to the left, revealing the insides to them.

Remarkably, unlike the rest of the tower, the insides of the safe was completely clean. Inside it were various documents and bags, but they weren’t what they were after. Chuckling, Red reached into the safe and pulled out several dark blue papers that were tied together with some string.

Looking for somewhere to put them, she righted on of the tables and opened up the roll, grinning widely along with Meta.

“We’re getting paid tonight, Meta!” she cackled.

“Wonder what he wants with these anyway,” Meta said.

“Who cares? We’re gunna be rich and that’s all that matters.

Meta shrugged and made his way up the stairs as Red continued to scan the front page, her eyes catching the title which she read under her breath.

“Prototype Model A - Archimedes Unit And Weapon Schematics…”

Chapter VIII - A conversation between two Sisters.

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Archimedes

Chapter VIII - A Conversation Between Two Sisters.

Moon Dancer yawned and smacked her lips as she slowly opened her eyes, giving her body a stretch. The mare blinked lazily as she looked down at the rusty metal slab she was lying on. The dimly lit room made it hard for her to concentrate after just waking up, but she did wonder where her bed was and why she wasn’t lying in it. She looked around her surroundings at the very dimly lit room.

Soon coming came face to face with two dimly lit yellow lights.

“Morning,” Archimedes casually waved.

Moon Dancer let out a high pitched shriek as she jumped before landing on the robot’s chest, her own chest heaving as she tried to catch her breath.

Archimedes couldn’t help but chuckle as he poked her muzzle making her scrunch it up, “Cute, if I do say so myself.”

“Don’t do that!” Moon pouted, “I hate being surprised like that!”

“Figured a guards pony, especially one belonging to the night division would not be so easily spooked,” Archimedes teased.

“Oh… shush, you,” Moon glared, “What time is it anyway?”

“I’d say… around five in the morning,” the robot replied.

Moon grumbled, yawning before curling up on his chest again, “Wake me up when it’s eight, I wanna have brekkie before you get your body fixed.”

“I thought your race were nocturnal?” Archimedes asked.

“Sorta, most of my species are nocturnal. However, there are few of us in the guard that are trained to be diurnal in case of emergencies and the Solar guards need assistance,” Moon replied with a yawn, “It started around the time after the changelings invaded.”

Archimedes nodded and gave the mare a soft scratch behind her ear, to which Moon sighed happily as she settled back to sleep. The robot slowly rolled his head to look out of the window. Whilst he himself couldn’t sleep, he could opt to power down but he decided not to in order to let his mind wander.

Despite how much she had insisted she was okay, Archimedes couldn’t help feel worried for Celestia. Especially after he blacked out and she asked him to say something again.

He wasn’t quite sure what she meant, nor why she was so excited. All he could remember was the three talking about the unicorn Starswirl and he just, for a lack of a better description, lost consciousness and his mind went blank. That is until he woke up with Celestia looking up at him with excitement.

Was it something to do with Starswirl? It wasn’t the first time something… weird happened when that name popped up. Was he that important? After all he was technically his creator, so why would the mention of him cause him to have moments of forgetfulness.

As he pondered, he groaned a little and felt his head hurt. Not wanting to wake his friend, he decided to think on the subject matter later, and slowly powered himself down. The last thing he saw before his eyes dimmed into nothing was the smile on the bat ponies face.

Moon impatiently tapped her hoof as she kept looking over to the large clock in the palace gardens every few seconds. The mare then bit her lip as she looked back at the large robot who was currently engaging in polite chit-chat with the gardener, who looked like he was about to faint from shock at just who he was talking to.

“Oh man, oh man!” Moon Dancer panicked as she trotted in place quickly, “We’re so late! Hurry up tin-can!”

“Oh, you worry too much. Why don’t you just enjoy our walk to the blacksmith?” Archimedes replied as he slowly trudged behind her, saying goodbye to the gardener before said pony finally fainted.

Moon groaned and gritted her teeth, “I would. But you keep stopping to talk to everypony we come across! We’re already fifteen minutes late for your appointment!”

“Well, if I remember correctly,” Archimedes started as he caught up to her, “You were the one who just insisted in a second round of crumpets.”

Moon blushed and scrunched her face as she looked away in annoyance, “I can’t help it! Have you tried crumpets with apple jam?!”

“I’m afraid not, my friend,” Archimedes chuckled, picking up the mare who squeaked as she was carried in his arms, “But I’ll take your word for it. Now, lets see if we can’t make up for lost time, hmm?”

“Whatever,” Moon grumbled as she clambered onto his shoulder and huffed, “Now, git!”

Archimedes snickered to himself as the lunar guard pointed forwards with her hoof, “Right away, captain.”

The two made the way through the gardens with relative ease and soon came to the exit, Moon dancer pointed to a large plume of smoke that was coming from a nearby hill and grinned.

“There it is, that’s where the blacksmith is,” Moon said.

Archimedes nodded and as the two made their way towards it, Archimedes took note of a unicorn stallion nearby who was walking around as if he was looking for something. He had a crazed look in his eyes and his black mane was short and gelled up, the glasses on the end of his muzzle nearly falling off. What was more curious was the fact he was levitating a small key in front of him.

The robot merely shrugged it off and continued his way over the hill. As the two came to the top and began their descent, the robot took a look at the blacksmith and was impressed with what he saw.

The blacksmith was larger than he thought and was made up of two buildings. It easily was near the same size as the castle barracks, from the description that Moon Dancer gave him the previous night. It had two chimneys stood tall and proud from its roof, and unlike the other parts of the castle. The roof would dip before ending in a slight upwards point.

From where they were standing, Archimedes could see that the slightly smaller building was what appeared to be a home of sorts, probably where the blacksmith would reside. The building next to it, however, was taller than the former. It had one large room with in the far back and dominating the area was a large forge, the embers glowing brightly from it. Attached to it were the bellows being operated by an earth mare and nearby, a stallion was hard at work at an anvil.

All around the forge were several benches that had various lumps of metal, coupled with some ores. The robot also spotted a few benches that had weapons and armor on them. Aside from the mare working on the bellows and the stallion by the anvil, there was only one other pony present. A strong looking stallion with a grey coat, though Archimedes reckoned it could’ve been white and covered in muck.

The stallion noticed the robot approaching and unlike the mare and other stallion who both yelped in startled surprise, he kept his demeanor. As Archimedes and Moon Dancer got closer, he made a note that the stallion was a lot taller than others, and had very defined muscles. His mane and tail were black and his cutie mark was a symbol of an anvil, around his neck which went under his stomach and was tied around his midsection was a dirty brown apron. What stood out to him was the fact his left eye had a black patch over it and two faint lines of an old scar that dragged across his face hidden underneath it.

The stallion raised a brow as Moon Dancer hopped off Archimedes’ shoulder.

“Archimedes I presume?” he asked as the robot nodded, “You’re late.”

“Private Moon Dancer,” Moon said with a salute and a neutral expression, “I’ve been assigned to escort Archimedes here to be fixed up on orders of the Princess.”

“So I’ve heard,” the blacksmith replied before walking around Archimedes, sizing him up, “Caused a lot of ruckus yesterday.”

Archimedes winced a little and coughed, “Uhm… yes I’m afraid that’s correct, sir. As I’ve said too many of the noble ponies and guards I’ve seen today, I’m truly sorry for my actions.”

As Archimedes bowed, he and Moon Dancer were caught in surprise as the blacksmith burst out into a deep hearty laugh.

“Don’t be, you must have broken a lot of doors given how many locks, hinges and other things I’ve been commissioned to make. Not to mention the nice pile of bits the Princess’ gave us if we are quick about it,” the stallion smiled and offered his hoof, “Name’s Flint Lock, Royal Blacksmith.”

Archimedes took his hoof and gently shook it, “Archimedes, uh… robot.”

Flint chuckled as he turned back inside and suddenly scowled as he spotted his two assistants still gawking at the robot.

“Iron Horn! Silver Hoof! Stop gawking and get back to bloody work! We have orders to fill from the Princess!”

The mare and stallion jumped at his words and quickly resumed their work, “Y-yes, boss. S-sorry, boss!” the said in unison.

“Foals today,” Flint sighed shaking his head, “Anyway, if you’d like to follow me, Archimedes. I’ll see what I can do about fixing you up.”

Archimedes looked at the ceiling of the building and carefully bent down as to not bash his head and followed Flint Lock inside. Before he fully entered, he turned to Moon Dancer.

“Are you coming?” he asked.

Moon Dancer shook her head, “Afraid not, Archy. Got a few other things I need to do, I’ll be coming by later anyway with Princess Celestia as she’s requested to see you as soon as you’re done. How long will it take roughly, Flint Lock?”

Flint Lock rubbed his hoof on his chin, “Hard to say… give me, say… five to six hours to get it done.”

“Can’t you do it faster? Archy— I mean Archimedes has got to get ready to do his community service later,” Moon Dancer replied.

“I may be good, kiddo, but even I can’t perform miracles,” Flint replied with a wave of his hoof, “Just remember that I haven’t exactly worked on anything like Archimedes before.”

Moon sighed but nodded, “Fair enough, I’ll bring the Princess in about six hours then to see how you get on.”

“Very well,” Flint nodded as he trotted over to a space near the back of the smith.

“I’ll see you later today, Archy,” Moon said.

“See you then, my friend,” Archimedes replied, “I’ll make sure I look my best for my beloved.”

Moon snickered before she spread her wings and took flight, making her way back towards the castle.

Celestia sighed to herself as she sat in her study. She was currently having an hour or so break from dealing with the nobles all morning and most of the afternoon and had decided to take a break for some tea in her study, however, she found it extremely difficult to get relaxed.

Her mind was just racing with dozens upon dozens of thoughts, all of them about Archimedes and Starswirl.

She was brought out of her thoughts by a knock at the door and looked over to it, a soft smile on her lips as she composed herself.

“Come in,” she said softly.

“Tia? Are you okay?” Luna said as she poked her head into the study. “You weren’t in the courtroom and the guards said you’d called it off early complaining of a headache.”

“That’s right, I just have a slight headache. That’s all, Luna,” Celestia replied.

Luna raised her brow, “Discord was right, you are a terrible liar.”

Celestia grumbled as her younger sister giggled and trotted over to her, taking a seat opposite the sofa Celestia was laying on.

“So, spill. Something is clearly bothering you,” Luna said.

Celestia levitated her cup of tea to her lips before speaking, “Its… just something Discord said the other day. It’s gotten me thinking.”

“What about?” Luna asked.

“Starswirl.”

“Ah, your favorite student, other than Twilight,” Luna nodded, “What about him?”

“Well, Discord asked me whatever happened to him and we sort of got talking but I never actually answered him,” Celestia replied.

“Well, I’d thought it was obvious even to him. Starswirl was mortal so he obviously passed away as does all mortal life,” Luna said as she poured her own tea.

“You’d think that…” Celestia sighed, “But it’s worse than that… I couldn’t answer him if I wanted to.”

“What do you mean?” Luna asked, sipping her tea.

Celestia lowered her ears and looked away, almost shamefully, “He was my best friend, Luna. I cared greatly for him and I really miss him…”

She then slowly looked over to her sister, tears threatening to burst from her eyes.

“So why can’t I remember when or how he died? Or where he’s buried?!” Celestia all but screamed.

Celestia choked on a sob as Luna quickly rushed to her sister's side and wrapped her into a loving embrace, softly stroking her back and giving her a reassuring nuzzle.

“Tia, it’s okay…” Luna whispered.

“No it’s not!” Celestia cried, “I can’t even remember how my best friend died, let alone where he’s buried! What kind of friend does this make me?!”

Luna held her closer and frowned as the sun princess continued.

“I spent all night scouring the archives for any record of his death and burial grounds, but there is nothing down there!”

Luna raised her brow, “Are you sure?”

“Of course I’m sure!” Celestia shouted, “There is nothing in the official records, nothing in the palace employment records and nothing in his own personal wing!”

Luna winced as her sibling shouted at her, but let it slide when Celestia sniffled into her neck, “But what about his work? That’s all down there, am I right?”

Celestia nodded as Luna continued.

“And up until now, you’ve never really thought about his death or grave specifically. Just about him, the stallion, now and again, right?”

Again, Celestia nodded.

“So I’m sure there’s a reasonable explanation, Tia. Maybe, you might have just missed something in the archives. You only did search for one night, It’s not like somepony could just up and vanish, even Sombra’s fall over a thousand years ago is kept in a record to the date. And goodness knows the old part of the archives need proper organising, especially in the Starswirl wing.”

Luna nuzzled her sister’s cheek affectionately.

“You’re under a lot of stress, Tia. What with Archimedes arrival and the… fiasco it’s brought on. Not to mention, we have the alliance meeting with the Griffin Emperor next week to discuss our continued alliance with them.”

Celestia sniffled and used a wing to wipe her eyes, “M-maybe you’re right, Luna. I have been a little stressed… a more thorough search can be done at another time.”

Luna smiled, nudging Celestia with her hoof, “That’s right. And besides, I doubt he’d be that miffed if you’d forgotten. So much has happened since then, you’re bound to forget a few things. And from what you’ve told me about him, he’d have told you to ‘stop being so silly for goodness sake, you silly little thing, you’,” Luna said, adding a deep voice, puffed out cheeks and a goofy wiggle with her body to the last part trying to mimic Starswirl.

Celestia giggled softly, “That does sound like something he’d say…”

“What’s this? A thingy-ma-jig? A do-dad? A do-hickey? A knick-knack? I must study it and find out what it does! What’s that… ? It’s called an umbrella? Fascinating...’” Luna continued.

Celestia brought a hoof to her face and stifled a snort of laughter.

“‘But Celestia! You do not understand! I need to continue my research into why ponies like socks!’” Luna continued.

Celestia burst out into a fit of giggles and leant against Luna, tears of laughter now running down her face, “O-oh, Luna! You have him spot on!”

Luna grinned as she joined in on her sisters contagious laughter. After several moments the two calmed down and Celestia gave her sister a firm nuzzle into her neck.

“Thank you, Luna. I needed that…”

“My pleasure, Tia. Sisters should stick together when in trouble,” Luna replied, nuzzling back, “Don’t be afraid to come talk to me if you ever need to vent, Tia.”

“Likewise,” Celestia replied with a smile.

There was a knock at the door, making the two alicorns turn their heads to it as the head of Moon Dancer peeked into the room.

“Your highness’?” she asked, “Flint Lock says he’s finished with Archy.”

“Wonderful,” Luna replied with a clap of her hooves, “I cannot wait to see how he looks now!”

“Neither can I, shall we?” Celestia added with a smile.

“Same here!” Moon grinded before chuckling nervously, “I mean, as do I, your majesties’.”

The two princess’ giggled at the guard before they rose from their seats and followed Moon out of the room and down the corridor.

Chapter IX - Trouble brewing on the Horizon.

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Archimedes

Chapter IX - Trouble brewing on the Horizon.

“Well, I must say it is a vast improvement!” Luna smiled.

“You really think so?” Archimedes asked.

“I must agree, you look so much better now, Archimedes. Much younger looking, I think I’m rather jealous,” Celestia added.

“Nonsense, my dear. You look as young as ever,” Archimedes chuckled before whispering to her, “Maybe more so than Luna.”

“Hey!” Luna pouted.

“I’m just teasing, you silly little alicorn,” Archimedes chuckled, ruffling Luna’s mane as Celestia giggled beside him.

“But still, do you really think I look that great?” Archimedes asked, going over his appearance in the mirror. Albeit with a little difficulty due to his height and the position of the mirror.

No longer was he covered in rust and grime. His iron body glistened slightly, each part of him looking brand new and polished, reflecting the light much like the armor of the royal guard. The bulbs dotting his gauntlets along with his eyes and wiring seemed to glow brighter than they once did. The once dark and gloomy grey steam that vacated from his back was replaced with a much lighter shading, one that evaporated into the air quicker.

Celestia rolled her eyes as Moon Dancer floated behind the robot and gave his head a gentle smack.

“Stop asking that, you vain git,” the bat pony said, “we think and know you look fine so stop it.”

“I know, I know. I’m sorry, Miss Moon. I just want to look my best for my beloved,” Archimedes replied, winking at Celestia who couldn’t help giggle slightly.

“I swear, how does a giant walking tin can get this vain? He puts Prince Blueblood to shame!”

Luna snorted loudly as she forced a laugh back down her mouth, “Y-yes, quite.”

“Well, shall we get going? I believe I have some community service to be doing and I—”

Archimedes was interrupted by a flash of a camera and a grinning Discord hovering by the door.

“One for the album,” the draconequus said.

“What do you want, Discord?” Archimedes asked, crossing his arms.

“Who, moi?” Discord replied, faking a shocked expression, “Why, I just came to admire your new body work and might I say you are just dashing!”

Archimedes blinked as Discord appeared on his shoulder, admiring himself with a hand mirror.

“If this handsome rogue hadn’t caught my eye all those years ago, I’d be willing to take you on the most romantic of dates chaos could buy!” Discord said, winking at his reflection.

“Oh you charmer, you,” Discord’s reflection giggled back and fluttered his eyes.

“You… are a strange one, Discord,” Archimedes said as he shook his head.

“Why are you really here, Discord?” Celestia asked.

“Hmm?” Discord replied, still gazing at his reflection, “Oh yes, that’s right. I found this on the floor, discarded by some careless servant.”

Discord snapped his talons and a rolled up scroll bearing the seal of the Gryphus Emperor before he handed it to Celestia who opened it with her magic.

“My dear friend, Princess Celestia—”

“Princess!”

Before she could continue, the door burst open and a guard ran in, looking worse for wear as his helmet sat on his head askew, his body wrapped in loose ropes and his chest heaving. His eyes wide as he tried to regain control of his breath.

“P-princess!”

“Calm yourself, Lieutenant. Catch your breath first,” Celestia said with a warm smile.

The lieutenant nodded as he panted, taking deep and heavy breaths before regaining his composure, “Princess Celestia, we have an emergency!”

“What is it, Lieutenant?” shea asked.

“I was ambushed, your highness, whilst trying to deliver a scroll that came for you straight from the Griffon empire!”

“Oh?” Celestia replied as Luna and Moon tried not to snicker.

“With all due respect, your highness. How can you be this calm!?” the lieutenant cried, “I was blindfolded, hogtied and left dangling from the ceiling! I never saw the attacker so who knows who has that vital information! We need to scramble the guards, find the culprit and—”

“Is this the scroll?” Celestia asked sweetly, waving the scroll in her magic gently.

The lieutenant blinked as he stared at the scroll, wondering why he had only just noticed it, “Y-yes… but how did, I was, you have…”

“Why don’t you have a lie down, Lieutenant?” Celestia smiled softly, “you seem to be under some stress.”

Moon snickered and handed the lieutenant a couple of bits, “Go get a cup of tea, Lieutenant Sky High. My treat.”

“Yes… tea… tea is good…” he mumbled.

The four of them watched as the guards stallion turned around and slowly made his way out of the room, mumbling to himself softly before Celestia turned to give Discord a glare.

“Was that really necessary, Discord?” she asked.

“Well, why come visit my bestest-westest robot pal without a reason?” Discord grinned, wrapping his arms around Archimedes who tried to pry him off.

“I’ll be talking to Fluttershy about this,” Celestia replied, giving him a stern look, “I don’t think she’d be happy you’ve been messing with the guards. Again.”

Discord immediately let go of Archimedes and looked at Celestia with fear as sweat began to drip from his body, falling with the speed of rain and creating a floating yet slightly smelly lake around his body.

As the draconequus shook, a little black and white steamboat came around from behind him, puffing around the lake in a circle whilst a small black and white mouse saling it whistled a merry tune.

“Oh yes, Discord. She will be most displeased…” Celestia sighed, “shame really, she said you were doing just fine as of late. Doing nothing mean to anypony.”

“Tia, for the love of me. Please don’t tell Fluttershy!” Discord pleased.

Archimedes, Luna and Moon Dancer all shared an equally shared look of confusion before Archimedes scratched his head.

“Discord, why are you so afraid of her telling Miss Fluttershy?” he asked the draconequus.

“S-she’s quite the uh… scary one when riled, shall we say?” Discord replied, his frame shaking a little.

“Miss Fluttershy? Preposterous! Why, she’s one of the kindest and loving mares I’ve ever—”

Archimedes was interrupted as the draconequus grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him. Glaring at him and growling a little.

“You haven’t seen her angry, man! You don’t know what she’s capable of, it’s always the quiet ones! You ain’t seen what I’ve seen, man! I remember the last time…”

Discord trailed off and turned his head, looking into the distance with a thousand yard stare. The sounds of faint whirring blades, explosions and gunfire filling the room along with someone shouting ‘There In the trees!’

“Discord, I doubt I’m ever going to understand you, my friend…” Archimedes sighed and closed his eyes before he shook his head.

The robot looked up to see everyone looking at him with a shocked expression.

“What? Is there something on my helmet?” he asked.

“You… you called me friend…” Discord said softly.

“I did?” he asked, getting a nod from everyone as a reply, “Huh… guess I did.”

Discords’ lower lip began to quiver slightly and his eyes watered up. Archimedes took a step back before yelling in alarm as the draconequus burst into hysterical tears and pounced the robot, clinging tightly to his metal frame.

“Oh, Archy! You finally called me your friend!” Discord wailed, “I’m just so happy!”

He stopped crying for a second as he turned and wrapped an arm around Archimedes before ginning and giving a thumbs up. A second later a large old fashioned camera appeared with another smaller Discord in a black and white tuxedo operating it.

“Say ham,” the camera Discord said.

“Olives!” Discord replied

The camera made a click as the bulb went off and a bright light enveloped the area, blinding both the draconequus and robot. The smaller Discord disappeared leaving behind a polaroid.

The photo had a confused looking Archimedes who for some reason had a large stove top hat, a pipe sticking to the lower half of his helmet just below his eyes and a monocle. Whereas Discord was wearing some odd looking white shades with one glass red and the other blue, a brown tailcoat around his body with a suit and tie underneath. A small caption titled ‘bst buds 4 lyfe’ was at the top.

“Gosh, darnit.” Discord grumbled, “they never get my good side. Oh well.”

He snapped his talons and the photo appeared in a photo album which in turn vanished. Celestia shook her head as she looked back at the scroll.

“Now that that’s over with…”

She cleared her throat and began to read.

“My dear friend, Princess Celestia.

Firstly, I hope this message finds you well and you are doing wonderfully. I hope you enjoyed the Summer Solstice celebration this year. If I remember correctly your young student was in charge of it down in her new little Kingdom, how is she doing? I haven’t seen her since the last gathering of nations, would she be attending our little meeting as well? I do hope so, she was a delightful little unicorn.

Secondly, I hope that you do not mind. But I must insist we move our meeting forward. I have matters of grave urgency to discuss with you regarding both our nation's safety. As much as I’d hate to admit it, I fear I may have some traitors within my beloved Empire’s military ranks and I fear a plot against my crown.

This letter is more of a forewarning. By the time you have received this, I will have already made my way to your capital along with two of my advisors and Grand General Buckbeak.

I apologise for this sudden turn of events, but you know I would not be doing this if it wasn’t very serious indeed. I shall see you and your sister in a couple of days time.

Warmest regards,

Your friend, Emperor Ironclaw III.”

Celestia lowered the scroll and frowned, “Oh my… that doesn't sound good, does it?”

“Sister, are you sure about this?” Luna asked.

“Ironclaw has been a dear friend for many years, Luna. I do not believe this is a ploy.”

“That old fart?” Discord asked, “he seems pretty solid to me, if you ask me. Which, by the way, no one did!” he finished with a huff.

Celestia ignored him as she once again scanned over the scroll. Quickly rolling it up, she turned to the others.

“Luna, we need to find Twilight and inform her of these events as well as Cadence,” Celestia said.

Luna nodded, “Of course, Tia. I’ll contact our niece and you can contact Twilight.”

“Archimedes,” Celestia said, turning to the robot in question.”You may go and begin your community service by assisting in the repairs of the castle.”

“Will do, my dear.” Archimedes replied.

“Private Dancer, you are to stay with Archimedes and make sure everything goes smoothly,” Luna added.

“By your command,” Moon replied with a salute.

Celestia smiled as she and Luna turned to head out of the room but stopped when a loud, throaty cough filled the room.

“And what about me?” Discord asked.

“Hmm, you can assist in the repairs,” Celestia replied.

Discord grinned, “No problemski, comrade! One click of the ol’ talons and—”

“No, no magic. You will help repair with manual labour.”

“Manual… labour?” Discord asked, tilting his head in confusion.

“Yes,” Celestia asked.

Discord tapped his chin,” Manual labour…”

The draconequus snapped his talons, making a pair of spectacles appeared on his face followed by a book titled ‘Definitions for dummies;’. After flicking through the book, muttering to himself. Discord stopped at a page and nodded.

“Manual labour… the act that sees an individual or more performing tasks by—”

Discord shrieked and threw the book at the wall with a loud thud as he wrapped around Archimedes arm and shook in fear.

“W-what are you doing?!” Archimedes spluttered.

“Those words! The horror, the utter horror!” Discord wailed, “I refuse to do work without my magic. So nyeh!”

“Oh, alright,” Celestia smiled sweetly, “I guess I’ll just send a scroll to Fluttershy and let her deal with your punishment for messing with the guard—”

“Wait! L-let’s not be too hasty now, Celestia.” Discord nervously chuckled, tugging on his neck like a shirt collar as he started to sweat, “I’ll not use my magic, Pinkie swear.”

Celestia nodded happily. For whatever reason, ponies feared that particular promise. turning away again, she and Luna departed from the room leaving the bat pony, draconequus and robot alone.

“So… shall we, my friends?” Archimedes asked.

“Lead the way, tin can,” Moon replied as she flew up to his shoulder and rested on it.

“Onwards!” Discord declared, sitting on the other shoulder, dressed to the nines in a pirates outfit complete with inflatable cutlass.

Archimedes shook his head as he began to head out of the room, his heavy feet making a low boom as they connected with the floor.

“So… ever thought about manning up?” Moon smirked as Discord, “Fluttershy can't be that bad.”

“It’s not that easy… trust me. After last time… lets just say, never turn her rabbit into a carrot head. It isn’t pretty…”

Moon just blinked at Discord as the draconequus placed his paw and talon over his crotch in painful remembrance.

“I don’t understand you organics one bit…” he sighed.

Just beyond the borders of Equestria to the east lay a small town by the name of New Finiceway. It was a decent enough town, made up of a mix of races from ponies to changelings and even the odd kobold or two. For any adventurer or a mere traveller of the roads, the best place to stay was ‘The Smuggler’s Return’. A quaint little tavern that was situated near the town center that didn’t care what race you were so long as your gold was good.

As townsfolk and travellers continued their daily routines, a carriage pulled up just outside of the tavern. The door opened and the hooded figures disembarked, paid the driver and made their way inside.

Once inside, they lowered their hoods to reveal a changeling with yellow eyes and a scar over his left, a red feathered griffon with a black bandana around her neck and a blue pegasus. They approached the bar were and elderly, yet muscular stallion was currently wiping a solitary glass, despite all the dirty once around him.

“What can ah do for you—” the stallion paused and smiled recognizing the griffon, “Ah, Red. Good to see ya lass.”

“And you, Mister Daniels,” the griffon replied.

“He’s been expectin’ ya. Usual place, second room on the left as ya go up the stairs.”

Red nodded to the stallion as she and her three partners moved away from the bar and towards the stairs, the loud ruckus from the bar fading as they ascended.

Soon, the three came to the room in question and the griffon knocked twice, then thrice, then once followed by two bangs. One on the top of the door and the other on the bottom.

She took a step back as a series of locks were unfastened before the door opened and they walked inside past a griffon who had opened the door. In a chair near the window, was another hooded figure, watching them approach it.

Red swallowed a lump in her throat as she approached, “S-sorry we’re late. Sir.”

No reply.

“We uh… had a little trouble with the border guards, you know those ponies. Always thinking there’s gunna be another inva—”

“Do you have them?” the figure interrupted.

“H-huh? Oh, yeah course we do!” Red beamed as she nodded to the changeling.

The changeling levitated the documents the dark blue documents over to the figure who picked them up with their talons and carefully scanned them. There was a stagnant silence before the figure spoke up again.

“There’s one missing…” it growled.

“W-what?” Red asked.

“You had one job!” The figure shouted, throwing a bottle of alcohol that soared over the groups heads, narrowly missing them.

“”L-look, how about, we get the last document for ya? Free of charge?” Red offered with a nervous grin.

Once more, silence filled the room before the figure spoke again.

“Fine… but fail to do so… and it won’t be your paycheck you’ll be worrying about losing,”

Red and the other two didn’t need telling as they quickly made their way out of the room, leaving the two in the room as the figure in the chair turned it to face the window. It lit a cigarette up which caused part of their face to light up as it inhaled deeply and flicking their tail.

Chapter X - Broken Pinkie Promise

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Archimedes

Chapter X - Broken Pinkie Promise.

Archimedes was, to say the least, enjoying himself rather well. He was currently standing at where he had launched a cannon ball into the wall where he had first seen Discord ‘attacking’ Celestia and was assisting the work ponies around him.

“Pass us a few bricks, eh?” one called to him from a makeshift scaffolding.

“Sure thing!” Archimedes happily replied.

He bent down carefully and picked up with ease a stack of bricks and brought them to the ponies height.

“Ta,” the pony said as he and a couple others began to continue their work on the wall.

The robot would be lying if he said he wasn’t impressed. When he, Disord and Moon Dancer had arrived, the earth pony construction team they were to assist had not only already gotten a secure scaffolding up and ready. But they had already fixed nearly half of the wall damage.

“I still think we don’t need to help…” Discord grumbled glumly.

He was wearing a high visibility vest and and two hard hats as he spread a dollop of cement down ontop of some of the bricks before plonking a brick on top and tapping it with the handle of what he refused to call anything but a trowel.

“Oh, lighten up, Discord.” Archimedes laughed, “nothing wrong with a bit of physical labor here and there.”

“Exactly!” Moon agreed as she sat watching them, her spear idly resting against her body.

“If you think it’s so easy, why don't you help us!?” Discord glared at her.

“Because, I’m not the one who caused the damage. Nor am I in trouble with the Princess,” Moon replied as she stuck her tongue out at the draconequus.

“Princess’ pet…” Discord grumbled again.

He let out a loud sigh as he continued the monotonous cycle of placing cement followed by a brick, sighing every five seconds much to the annoyance of the worker ponies.

“Discord, try and show some enthusiasm,” Archimedes said as he lifted up another batch of bricks, “after all, you are doing something with friends.”

“Don’t you mean friend?” he replied with a huff.

“Hey!” Moon shouted with a glare, “I’m your friend!”

“Since when?” Discord challenged.

“Since you been Archy’s friend. Any friend of his is a friend of mine,” Moon replied.

“I knew that was a real phrase!” Discord growled, “That lying pegasus Rainbow owes me fifty bits…”

“What?” Moon asked.

Discord waved his paw at her, “Not important… say… you know what could make this whole thing easier? If you let me use—”

“No!” everyone replied in unison, making the draconequus jump in surprise.

“Oh come on,” Discord pouted, “If I use my magic, this gets done in a pinch, you guys get paid and then we can play Dungeons and Dragons!”

They stared at him as he beamed at them with a large toothy grin, batting his eyes at the group.

“You know…” Archimedes began, “I have to admit that he does have a point…”

“You’re not serious, are you?” Moon replied.

“Well, think about it. It is a sort of… win-win for everyone, right? The wall gets fixed, these marvelous gents get paid and have their work done for them, we can play Discords little game—”

“Little?!” Discord spluttered, “I’ll have you know, this game requires the greatest of intellect to solve cunning and devilishly hard quests in order to save the day! Why, I’m a level twenty paladin with a plus seven mace of purging!”

“A paladin… really?” Moon deadpanned.

“... Okay I’m a level twenty chaos wizard with a triple magic damage dealing stave. But who's paying attention?”

Archimedes’ eyes sparkled a little as he turned to look at Moon, seemingly giving her a look reminiscent of a look a puppy gives when it wants something. Moon Dancer quickly realised why he was looking at her like that and gave him a stern look.

“No, the Princess said no chaos magic,” Moon said.

Discord slinked over to join Archimedes, the pair giving the bat pony a pleading look.

“I said, no,” Moon said firmly.

“Actually…” one of the workers said softly, but loud enough for everyone to hear, “I wouldn’t mind doing that.”

“Can I be a bard?” one asked.

“Oh! I wanna be a shaman!” another added.

“No!” Moon shouted, stomping her hoof, “No chaos magic! No dungeons and dragons! We are going to do this bloody job properly, is that clear?!”

The bat pony huffed and turned her head away, closing her eyes. Only when there was no reply and no sound of work going on did she open them again and look at the group.

Who were now all giving her the same pleading look, their lower lips wobbling slightly.

Moon Dancer glared at them for what seemed like an eternity before she let out a low sigh.

“Fine... but I’m the dungeon master.”

Celestia and Luna waited patiently in the throne room for the arrival of Cadance and Twilight. They had sent out the respective scrolls to the princess’ and were anxiously expecting their arrival, knowing that Twilight would most likely arrive first due to the distance between Ponyville and Canterlot against the distance between Canterlot and the Empire.

“So, how are we going to play this out, Tia?” Luna asked.

“We be honest with them, seeing as how Twilight will be at the meeting. I might as well make a point of keeping Cadence up to speed on things as well,” Celestia replied.

Luna nodded as a guard opened the door and saluted, “Your highness, Princess Twilight has arrived.”

“Thank you, Sergeant. show her in,” Celestia replied.

The sergeant saluted and stepped to the side to allow Twilight to enter.Given the severity Twilight had sensed from the scroll, she had brought along the other elements of harmony.

“Greetings, my little ponies,” Celestia smiled.

“It’s nice to see you, Princess Celestia and Luna,” Twilight replied with her own smile, “sorry about not informing you that I was bringing the girls with me, but I felt your scroll was one that was really urgent and I thought that—”

“That if the situation was truly dire, you may need to call upon the rainbow power of harmony. I understand, Twilight, and do not worry for I feel that they should be privy on what is happening.”

“Princess? If ya don’t mind me asking, jus’ what in the hay is going on? Twilight was so flustered and worried earlier and it’s kinda made us all a lil nervous…” Applejack asked.

Celestia looked over the group as they all nodded in agreement before she spoke, “All will be revealed once Princess Candence has arrived. Come, let us adjourn to the council room and wait for her arrival, then we can begin.”

“Where’s Prince Blueblood?” Twilight asked as the gorup began to make their way out of the throne room.

“Our nephew is currently away in Manehatten on business for us, overseeing the opening of the new Royal university there,” Luna replied.

“I heard about that, the one that teaches advanced magic not just to unicorns, but the magic that the other pony races can use?” Rainbow Dash asked.

Everyone looked at her with a stunned expression, making the rainbow mare huff at them.

“What? I read the news from time to time, thank you!”

The elements snickered at their friend as they all entered a large room with a beautiful ornate wooden, circle shaped table in the center. There were a fair few dozen seats located around all of them with three of them clearly constructed for the three royals who lived in the capital.

“Have a seat, and we can have some tea and sandwiches whilst we wait,” Celestia said as she took her seat.

“Tia, what about Twilight and Cadence? There will be only one of the royal chairs left,” Luna replied as she took her seat.

“Oh, I don’t mind sitting on one of the other chairs, Princess. I’m still not used to my own throne back in Ponyville,” Twilight tittered.

“Very well, and please. Call me Luna, we’ve been over this,” Luna rolled her eyes and playfully nudged the lavender alicorn with her hoof.

“Right, right. Sorry, still getting used to it,”

Celestia smiled as she beckoned one of the maids over and ordered for a selection of sandwiches and tea to be brought up as the others chatted to one another, all waiting for Cadence to arrive.

After an hour, Princess Cadence finally arrived and joined the rest of them in the council room. Celestia lightly tapped her hoof on the table in order to get the attention of the others.

“Thank you for coming, now, let us begin…”

The alicorn cleared her throat delicately before continuing, “Earlier this morning, I received a scroll from the Griffon Emperor, Emperor Ironclaw III, in which he makes a mention of a fear he has to his Empire as well as the Kingdom of Equestria.”

“I see, but what does this have to do with the Crystal Empire if I may ask, aunty?” Candence asked.

“Even though this scroll only makes mention of their Empire and out Kingdom, I have no doubt that this situation will probably affect the Crystal Empire as well, due to the fact of how close an ally you are with us as we are to the Griffons.”

Cadence nodded as Celestia looked back to the others.

“In two days time, the Emperor will be arriving in Canterlot ahead of our scheduled meeting on the discussion of our alliance in order to talk about these fears he has. Which is why I have brought you two, and now the elements, here to inform you ahead of time so you are brought up to speed.”

The group nodded in understanding, expect for Twilight who looked a little puzzled.

“If that was the case, why didn’t you just mention that in a simple scroll? Spike is the one who delivers your messages to me, to which I could have passed the message on to the other elements. And cadence has the spell you have that allows scrolls to be sent to her directly from you.”

“I must admit, aunty… Twilley has a good point,” Cadence admitted.

As the others realised what Twilight said had logic behind it, they turned to Celestia as the alicorn sighed deeply.

“I know… but I can’t help but think this all related to the arrival of Archimedes,” Celestia admitted.

“W-what?!” Luna gasped, “whatever do you mean, Tia?”

“Yeah, Archy ain’t causing trouble. Well, aside from the other day… and the other day in Ponyville,” Pinkie added.

“I have to say, Princess. That does seem like you’re jumping to conclusions slightly,” Rarity added as well.

“Uh.. can I ask who this Archimedes is?” Cadence asked.

“Archy is our super duper bestest robot pal!” Pinkie replied.

Twilight saw the confusion in her sister-in-law’s eyes and whispered, “You’ll meet him later.”

“I know it does sound strange, but please bear with me. I just can’t help but find it odd that a machine that Starswirl supposedly built just happens to appear a few days before the Griffin Emperor contacts me with the concern of our nations,” Celestia replied.

“What do you suggest we do then, Tia?” Luna asked.

“We need to find out how Archimedes came to be. We need to find Starswirl’s old tower and try to find out what’s going on once and for all,” Celestia replied, giving everyone a glance.

“I agree, no harm in a little bit of past history digging,” Twilight said, “I can look into the archives later to find any map records that lead to his old tower.”

“Very well, once the matter with the Emperor has concluded, we shall make our way into the forest and—”

A low boom that lightly shook the castle interrupted Celestia, causing everyone to look around in panic.

“What on?” Luna said.

“Princess!” a guard cried as he burst into the room, “It’s—”

“Discord, I should have known,” Celestia let out a frustrated groan as she quickly exited the room, followed quickly by the others.

“You won’t win dis!” a tall green bipedal creature shouted.

“Yeh, you dum horsie ain’t guna beat us!” Another one added.

“Discord, what are you waiting for?! Banish them!” Moon Dancer cried.

Discord snarled, “I can’t you stupid bat twit! They stole my rod of magic suppressing!”

“Why in the name of all that is holy would you bloody carry that with you?!” Moon shouted back.

“Sentimental value?” Discord offered.

“You idiot!” Moon snapped back.

Moon Dancer ducked as another axe flew past her head and slammed into the wall behind her. She, along with Discord and the builder ponies, were hiding behind a makeshift barrier of bricks, cement bags, two wheelbarrows and some of the scaffolding. Discord had tried to spice up the game of Dungeons and Dragons by making it more realistic, however, he had accidentally summoned some very powerful orcs into the room with them.

Somehow, during the scuffle, they managed to steal a red rod from Discord which was preventing him from sending them back into their world. As well as the rod, the orcs had a chest that gave them unlimited weapons dn had decided the logical course of action before they would try leaping out of the window was to throw as many weapons as they could at the makeshift barricade in order to try and get past them. Meanwhile, Archimedes was doing his best to block all incoming attacks as well as keep the orcs at bay.

“Archy! use your guns on them and just end this, now!” Moon Dancer shouted.

“I can’t! I don’t want to disappoint my love again!” Archimedes refused.

“Move eet tin man! We gots stuff to destroy!” One orc shouted.

“Yeh!” Another agreed.

“Please, Archy! We’re already in enough trouble as it is by letting Discord use his magic!”

“But—”

“Archimedes! Hostiles are trying to engage and kill Princess Celestia!” Discord suddenly shouted as he let out a yelp, ducking under another axe barely grazed his head.

Archimedes eyes suddenly went red as he let out a thunderous roar and turned to face the orcs, the steam coming from his back turning a darker shade of grey.

“Engaging enemy hostile.”

Archimedes's left and right arm quickly transformed into their respective weapons and without hesitation, he shot a round into the orcs, scattering them and killing two of them in a loud explosion which destroyed more of the wall. He then quickly raised his left which crackled with electricity before an arc of lightning shot out and connected with the bodies of the orcs, electrocuting them as their screams couple with the sounds of the electric ray filled the room.

Once they had stopped moving, a plume of smoke rising from their charred, dead bodies. Archimedes eyes returned to normal as Moon Dancer grabbed Discord and shook him violently.

“Why did you bloody do that?! We could have handled that better!”

“Oh, pish-posh. It got the job done,” Discord replied.

He walked over to where the rod lay and hid it before he snapped his fingers, making it, the orcs disappear and the damage repair itself.

“See, no problem!”

“Oh, I wouldn’t say that, Discord…”

Discord slowly turned round and gulped, seeing a very eerily calm looking Celestia in the doorway with Luna, Cadence and the elements behind her. But it wasn’t the looks of the elements, Luna and Celestia that got him shaking in fear.

It was Pinkie.

“So… I see you broke your promise…” Celestia said calmly.

“B-but… they said it was fine!” Discord replied, pointing at Moon and Archimedes who were now nervously looking at the group.

“I see… maybe they won’t be punished as bad seeing as they didn’t make a certain type of promise,” Celestia replied.

“What kind of promise, Princess?” Twilight asked, tilting her head in confusion.

“Tia… please, don’t!” Discord pleaded.

Moon Dancer and Archimedes backed up a little, standing beside Discord and both started to shake a little in fear as Celestia gave the draconequus a sweet, but sinister smile.

“A pinkie promise…”

The room went cold and silent. The three just stared in fear at Pinkie who was shaking a little herself and looking down at the floor. Moon Dancer had heard the tale of the fabled pinkie promise, hearing what had happened to those unfortunate to have broken one.

And to those who had helped someone break it.

She didn’t know if what she had heard was completely true, but right now. She was bricking it.

As for Archimedes, everything in his system was screaming ‘warning!’ at him as he continued to stare at Pinkie.

“Oh, we’re so boned…” Moon whispered.

“Told you I shouldn’t have used my powers, but oh no you insisted!” Discord snapped at the bat pony.

“Not. Now. Discord,” Moon hissed back.

“You… broke… a Pinkie… promise…” Pinkie whispered softly before lifting her head up, “Nopony breaks a Pinkie Promise!”

No matter where you were in the castle that day. You could have easily have heard two things. The sounds of an explosion.

And the screams of a mare, a draconequus and a robot.

Chapter XI - With the Princess of Loves Approval.

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Archimedes

Chapter XI - With the Princess of Loves Approval.

Discord groaned loudly as he continued to move his arm back and forth, dragging a tin cup across a set of bars that were in front of him in the prison cell he sat in. He was wearing a black and white stripped shirt with a small badge that had a few numbers on it along with a small hat that sat slightly crooked in between his horns. The sounds a of a violin playing sad music was filling the room along with the sounds of the cup being dragged across the bars.

“I wanna go home! I can’t take this anymore! Someone get my mama!” Discord wailed.

Moon Dancer groaned, “Oh for the love of everything holy, will you shut up!?”

The bat pony scowled at Discord from the sofa she was sitting on and reading a magazine. Discord looked back from the small cage that held him that dangled from the ceiling. The cage was so small that his legs poked through the bars and dangled below along with his tail that protruded behind him.

“I must admit, Discord.It is a rather irritating sound,” Archimedes added, standing by the wall of the room.

Discord pouted, “Oh, you two are no fun!”

“Good,” Moon replied, “because your fun gets us in bloody trouble!”

“Hey, you didn’t have to join in ya know!” Discord snapped back.

“Well we could of avoided the whole mess if you just acted like a normal pony for a few bloody hours and got the bloody job done. Normally!” Moon shouted back, “But ooooooh no, you couldn’t even do that! You're Like a bloody hyperactive child!”

Discord snapped his talons and the cage along with the outfit vanished and he appeared in front of Moon, his snout pressed against her face.

“You take that back, you fruit head!” Discord shouted.

“What did you call me? Frankenstable monster reject!”

“Overgrown fruit pest!”

Archimedes watched with concern as his friends continued to bicker, getting louder and louder as they butted heads.

“My friends, please stop. There’s no need for this—”

“Stay outta this, Archy!” Moon and Discord shouted at the robot.

The machine blinked as he was taken by surprise and remained quiet as the two continued to shout before he arched his back a little as if he was taking a deep breath. He then lurched forward a little and let out a long and loud whistle as if a steam locomotive was in the room. The whistle forced the draconequus and bat pony to hold their ears as the room rattled. Archimedes slowly stopped as the two lay on the floor groaning.

“My apologies, it was the only way I could think to get you two to stop.”

“I-It’s fine…” Moon groaned rubbing her head before glaring at Discord, “This isn’t over, you know?”

The bat pony stared at Discord and blinked as she watched the draconequus looking back at her from the floor, resting his chin on his hands as he gazed at her with a dumb looking smirk.

“What?” She asked.

“You’re really cute when you’re angry, you know that?” He purred.

Moon Dancer felt her cheeks warm up as she blushed before she grabbed a pillow from the sofa and walloped Discord in the head with it, ignoring the laughing draconequus. The laughter was somewhat contagious and soon the bat pony found herself giggling before laughing loudly along with the metal man who was happy to see the two finally no longer arguing.

“Well, I’m glad everyone is having a good time.”

The three turned to the door that lead into the room to see Celestia looking back at them with her brow raised. Moon Dancer immediately stood to attention and saluted nervously as Discord rested his head on top of hers, not particularly phased.

“P-Princess!” Moon Said with a forced smile.

“Yo,” Discord said with a casual wave of his paw.

Archimedes remained silent as he lowered his head in respect.

Celestia’s facade wavered and she smiled before shaking her head, “At ease, my little pony.”

She entered the room and was followed by Princess Luna, the elements and a new alicorn that Archimedes had never seen before.

“Goodness, just how many more alicorns are there, my love?”

Celestia’s eyes went wide as she quickly brought up a hoof to her hips and tried to shush the robot, but it was too late.

“Love?” Cadance asked, tilting her head as she looked at the giant metal creature.

“Indeed,” Archimedes happily replied, “Celestia is my beloved!”

“Oh lord, here we go…” Luna groaned, slapping a hoof to her face.

Celestia quickly looked at her niece who was slowly looking back and forth between Celestia and the robot. The pink alicorn’s eyes slowly widened as a large open smile formed on her mouth. She gasped loudly before letting out a loud squeal of happiness and trotted quickly on the spot.

“Oh my goodness, that’s so adorable!” She giggled.

“Cadance…” Celestia groaned softly.

“I mean, I’ve never seen you with anypony and me and Shiny thought you were just waiting for the right pony. But now, now I see you were just waiting for the right being!”

Celestia rolled her eyes, ignoring the giggling of her sister and the elements as Cadance trotted over to Archimedes and inspected him all over. The metal man watched with curiosity as he was inspected, watching as Cadance hovered in front of his face.

“Oh, and he is very exotic looking. Auntie. You have some interesting tastes in partners,” Cadance teased.

Before Celestia could speak, the pink alicorn turned to address Archimedes.

“So how long have you too been an item?” Cadance asked, her eyes wide and sparkling with excitement.

“Oh for many a year, my dear alicorn friend!” Archimedes proudly replied with a metallic, hardy chuckle, “Our love is like the sun, forever burning even when it is night! Nothing can extinguish our passion, our burning desire for one another!”

Celestia felt her cheeks burn a deep red as the night Princess burst into laughter and fell to the floor as Applejack, Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash soon joined her. Moon Dancer was struggling hard not to laugh as Discord sat in a directors chair, holding a megaphone whilst a clone of himself held up an old fashioned film camera, filming the event.The pink alicorn peeked over her shoulder and smirked at Celestia.

“It’s settled,” Cadance nodded, “As the Princess of Love and all forms that love can take. I give this loving relationship my official blessing!”

There was a moment of silence before the laughter returned in full force and louder than before, the elements rolling with the night princess and the bat pony in hysterics with the exception for Twilight and Rarity who remained standing up and struggling not to join in on the contagious laughter. Archimedes tilted his head, confused as to why his friends were all laughing but soon joined in with a soft chuckle. The pink alicorn continued to examine the metal man’s body, noticing just how shiny he was as she stared at her reflection. She also noted how much he was built to resemble an knight from the pasts armor.

“Huh, looks like he’s your knight in shining armor. How about that... you must tell me how you and he—”

“Okay!” Celestia interrupted quickly with her royal voice, her cheeks burning as she struggled to control her expression and coughed into her hoof.

Cadance landed with a giggle and looked over to Archimedes who was smiling at his beloved as the laughing subsided. Celestia looked to Archimedes as she raised a hoof in gesture at Cadance.

“Archimedes, this is my dear niece, Princess Cadance. She and her husband, Captain Shining Armor, rule the Crystal Empire to the far north.”

“A pleasure to make your acquaintance, your majesty,” Archimedes replied, gently kneeling and bowing to the pink alicorn who smiled.

“Please, no need to bow. And just call me Cadance.”

“Cadance, this is our dear friend, and somewhat of a troublemaker, Archimedes. One of Starswirl's old creations.”

Cadance politely bowed to the robot a little as she smiled. With the pleasantries over, Celestia inhaled and exhaled before she began talking.

“Now, before we continue with today’s agenda. I need to deliver punishments to the three of you.”

“Wasn’t what Pinkie did enough?!” Discord shuddered, wrapping around Moon Dancer like a snake till just her head was visible, resting his head on top of hers, “I see see the pink elephants in my dreams…”

“G-get off me!” Moon spluttered as she struggled in Discord’s playful grip.

Celestia tittered, “Relax, Discord. This isn’t that bad.”

“Oh, and how so?” Discord asked, still wrapped around the struggling bat pony.

Celestia smiled as she looked to Luna, “Sister?”

Luna nodded, “Private Dancer, your punishment will be that you shall take all bathroom barrack cleaning details for the next month.”

Moon Dancer internally groaned but nodded her head softly, “I understand, Princess.”

“That being said, you will still be Archimedes private guard,” Luna finished with a smile.

Moon smiled with a toothy grin and nodded, relieved that she was still able to be around Archimedes.

Celestia smiled as she turned her attention to the the draconequus, “As for you, Discord…”

Discord yelped as Celestia’s horn shone brightly and something snapped around his wrist. He looked down to see a metal bracelet wrapped around it. He snapped his talons but the bracelet refused to come off, making the draconequus frown.

“What did you do?” He asked the alicorn as he continued to try and remove the bracelet.

Celestia tittered as she smirked mischievously, “Oh… nothing. Just a harmless magic suppressing bracelet me and Luna created after your re-formation. Just as a precaution.”

The draconequus looked up at the alicorn slowly before he glared and crossed his arms, turning his head away with a huff.

“I don’t like this. Not one bit,” he pouted.

Celestia rolled her eyes, “Oh, get over it. It won’t be forever.”

“So, when does it come off?” He asked as he inspected it, “Do I have to do something that proves I can accept someone loving me, and I then return that love back or something ridiculous as that? Hasn’t that been done before?” He scoffed as he inspected the bracelet.

Cadance blinked as she turned to Luna, “What on Equestria is he blabbering about?”

“I don’t know, perhaps something from his past?” Luna replied.

Pinkie opened her mouth to answer, but decided it was best to keep what she knew to herself, giggling softly.

Celestia couldn’t help but let herself have a playful, yet mischievous giggle as she smiled innocently at Discord.

“Nope, it comes off when I say so.”

“Oh come on!” Discord whined, “that’s not fair!”

“With you, Discord. I have to be sometimes,” Celestia replied.

Discord huffed as Moon snickered at his misfortune. Archimedes began to twiddle his metal fingers as he waited for his punishment patiently. However, Celestia turned away and started to head out of the room.

“Come along, everypony. The day is still young,” the alicorn said with a smile.

“Wait!” The machine replied as he took a step forward with an outstretched arm.

“Yes, Archimedes?” Celestia replied.

“Not to sound like I’m demanding anything from you, my beloved. But…. what about my punishment? I am to blame as much as the other two and I should join them in equal punishment.”

Celestia smile up at the automaton, “Aside form you are still serving community service. I think a few more days on top of the original time will suffice.”

Archimedes nodded as the draconequus flailed his arms.

“Oh come on! How come he doesn't get as bad a punishment?! Even Moony doesn't have it that bad!” Discord whined loudly.

“Moony?” Moon asked as she looked at Discord.

Discord suddenly dropped his whining facade and smirked at the bat pony, his eyes half closed as he spoke in a teasing tone, “Cute name for a cute bat.”

Moon’s cheeks went red as she looked away annoyed at his teasing, her nose scrunched up and ears flat on her head. Cadance noticed this and winked at Moon Dancer, which only made the mare’s cheeks go a darker shade of red. During this, Discord failed to notice Celestia had stopped walking out of the room, and had turned around. The draconequus chuckled as he turned back to find Celestia now mere inches from his own face and yelped slightly in surprise.

“Because, Discord. It was your magic that brought those creatures out of your game. It was your fault they couldn’t be subdued before they caused damage to the reconstruction and it was your influence that swayed the other two to play your game. That is why you have your punishment and they have theirs.”

Discord went to protest but looked over at Luna, Cadance and the elements who were looking back with a stern look and all shaking their heads, as if to say to the draconequus not to argue back.

“Fair point…” he muttered.

“Not to worry, old sport,” Archimedes chuckled as he patted Discord’s back, “My love is merciful as she is radiant with beauty and I’m certain it shan’t be for too long.”

As Celestia felt her cheeks burn again, and felt the eyes of her niece on her again, Discord groaned dramatically as he brought his arm to his forehead and wailed.

“Oh but my dear, Archimedes!” He wailed as the white alicorn rolled her eyes. The violins from before began to play again as Discord flopped back first onto Archimedes who caught him, two waterfalls of tears shot out of Discord’s eyes as he blubbered, “How will I cope with the day to day activities of life without my full power? How can I, an innocent draconequus find any sort of entertainment without my magic?”

As the others rolled their eyes, Archimedes chuckled, “I’m certain you will find something, my friend.”

“Or somepony, right, Moony?” Discord smirked at the batmare, giving her a wink.

“W-Will you cut that out?!” Moon Dancer snarled as she blushed, “It’s not funny anymore!”

“I beg to differ,” Pinkie giggled.

Luna and the others giggled slightly as Discord waggled his eyebrows ‘seductively’ at the angry red faced bat pony, who had tried to launch herself at the draconequus but was held back by Archimedes.

“Lemme at him! I’ll pummel his face so hard he’ll feel it in a different dimension!” She snarled, blushing furiously.

“Promise?” Discord replied with a sweet smile before yelping as something hit him on the head, “Hey!”.

Celestia lowered the hoof she used to hit the draconequus and shook her head, “Enough, Discord.”

“Fine. Spoilsport.” Discord huffed.

“Now, I’m sure everypony is busy. So we shall all bid you good day and see you all for dinner at the castle,” Celestia smiled.

The group started to chatter to one another as they all began to slowly disperse from the room.

“I think I will visit the shops, myself.” Rarity said as she brushed her mane with a hoof.

Pinkie bounced along as she giggled, “Oh! Oh! Rainbow Dash, wanna come to the town bakery with me!?”

“Only if you're buying—OW!” Rainbow replied before yelling out as Applejack hit her with a hoof.

“Ah’ll come with yah, Pinkie. Jus’ in case this one tries to get outta payin’.”

Fluttershy trotted over Discord and smiled, taking his paw in her hoof, “We can always go and feed the ducks if you want, Discord.”

Discord shrugged, ignoring Rainbow Dash and Applejack snickering at him, “Eh, I suppose so. I got nothing else to do today.”

The draconequus snapped a talon and both he and the pegasus vanished as the rest of the elements walked out the room. As Archimedes began to leave with moon Dancer on his shoulder, Celestia raised a hoof.

“Not you, Archimedes. We need to ask you something.”

“Oh? What’s that?” Archimedes asked curiously.

Rainbow Dash, who was the last of the elements to leave, turned and tilted her head as Twilight remained behind, “Twi, you coming?”

“I’ll catch you up later, Rainbow. Princess type stuff,” Twilight replied with a smile.

Rainbow scrunched up her nose and made a retching sound, “Urgh, no thanks. See you guys at dinner!”

“Princess, do you wish for me to leave during this discussion?” Moon Dancer asked.

Princess Luna shook her head, "No, please stay. After all, you are his guard and this will involve you.”

As Twilight waved Rainbow goodbye and closed the door, Celestia made her way to the window and looked out towards where the everfree forest stood.

“Archimedes, do you remember where you were when you awoke?”

The mechanical man stroked his chin as he looked up in thought, “Yes… I believe I do. It was an old tower that had some sort of laboratory in it. Why do you ask, my dear?”

“Many years ago,” she began, “Starswirl mysteriously vanished and no pony knows how or where he went. Not even myself, his best friend.”

Archimedes nodded as Celestia continued.

“I scoured the archives and could find nothing about his death, his burial grounds. I simply do not know what happened to him.”

Archimedes could sense the sadness in Celestia’s voice as she spoke. He had an overwhelming urge to pick her up and hold her close, to comfort her and whisper silly things to her to cheer her up but restrained himself as Luna continued for her sister.

“That’s why, Archy. We need to ask you a favor.”

“Anything.” Archimedes replied.

Celestia looked over to the machine and smiled, “We need you to take us to his tower. There must be something there that can tell us what happened.”

Archimedes chuckled, “Then let’s not delay! I shall take you there right now!”

He let out another hearty chuckle before he confidently strode out the room, his heavy feet stomping on the ground as he turned a corner and down the corridor leaving the four alicorns and the bat pony behind.

“Auntie… does he know—” Cadance started.

“Give it a second, your highness,” Moon Dancer giggled.

The stomping in the distance suddenly came to a halt. There was a long pause before the stomping resumed but this time got louder, indicating Archimedes was heading back. The machine poked his head into view as the four looked at him with amused expressions.

“Uhm… perhaps, one of you should lead the way as I have no idea how to get back to Ponyville...”

Chapter XII - Two Souls, One Body

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Archimedes

Chapter XII - Two Souls, One Body

“Mind yourself there, your highness,” Archimedes said.

“Thank you, Archy,” Cadance smiled.

Archimedes nodded with a happy smile in return as Candace walked past him. The automaton held back the large branch that was blocking the path for the others to walks past. Alongside himself and Private Moon Dancer was a handful of guards from both Lunar and Solar corps, the two Princess’, Twilight and his new friend, Cadance. It had been a couple of hours since they had begun their trek into the forest, having been teleported a small distance into it by the alicorn sisters. Archimedes was the leader of the group, as now he was back in the forest he was able to figure out his bearings and where the old laboratory was. Though, he couldn’t explain for the life of him just how he knew where he was going. It was just a kind of gut instinct, or whatever it was for a machine to have.

“So… what was Starswirl like?” Cadance asked.

“Well… he was rather, eccentric,” Celestia began, “he always got intrigued by the most peculiar things.”

Luna nodded and snickered, “Tell her about the lecture on Terra.”

“Lecture?” Cadance asked, tilting her head at her aunts in curiosity.

Celestia had to hold back a giggle as she remembered the day fondly, “Starswirl had a somewhat short attention span at times. He would be talking with you one moment, and the next he would suddenly stop, his attention focused on something else.”

Cadance nodded as Celestia continued.

“Anyway, one day he was giving a large lecture to the royal court about his findings on when the planet Terra was discovered. He was… I’d say about midway through his lecture when he got, as always, distracted…”

“As you can see, from this new updated star chart I have created to include the new discovery, the new planet is roughly the same size as our own Equus. Further examination will be carried out using the latest magical detection spells but I Roughly estimate that the planet is about one hundred and fifty billion light years away.”

Starswirl beamed with pride and confidence as he used his pointer, levitating it in his magic, to point towards the planet ‘Equus’, the ponies homeworld and a small area that had a highlighted circle around a slightly blueish green dot. The new planet, ‘Terra’.

Starswirl walked over the stage as the members of the court watched in awe and curiosity, some scribbling down notes whilst others waited on baited breath for the unicorns next words. Celestia sat at the back, watching with pride as her friend delivered his lecture.

“Now, we won't get anymore information about the planet for a few days, due to the time and effort it will take to focus enough magic to…. to…”

Starswirl slowly stopped mid sentence as he slowly found himself gazing out the window at the night sky outside. The members of the court muttered to themselves as they watched in confusions as Starswirl walked over to the window and poked his head out, carefully scanning the sky.

“Uhm.. Lord Starswirl?” one of the court, a stallion, asked, “is everything—”

“Confound it!” starswirl shouted, interrupting the stallion and causing nearly everypony present to jump out of their seats, “Why in the hell is that buggery blasted star there?! It should be approximately three hundred million miles to the west!”

Starswirl cursed loudly as his chart was ripped off his board by his magic and quickly shot over to him. He held it beside him as the court members watched with slight concern. Starswirl began to jab angrily at the chart, still scowling up into the sky.

“See?! You’re supposed to be here you utter bastard! Right next to—”

The unicorn stopped as he looked at his chart, squinting at it as he twisted it left and right as he scanned over it. He then rotated it one eighty and glared before his eyes went wide.

“Oh… wait… you ARE supposed to be there. Huh... looks like I need to make adjustments to the new chart.”

With that, he tutted and sucked some air through his teeth before he left the courtroom, using his magic to levitate over his various equipment he had brought with him and slammed the door shut, leaving the courtroom in stunned silence. Celestia shook her head, but was trying her hardest not to laugh.

Cadance giggled uncontrollably with her aunts as their guards struggled to remain focused. Moon giggled softly as she sat atop Archimedes shoulder, the machine joining in on the laughter.

“So he actually just got up and left after swearing at a star for not being in the right place? Then realized he needed to fix his chart?” Cadance giggled.

Celestia nodded, “He was always doing things like that. He had a great mind, he was just incapable of really focusing on one thing at a time.”

As they entered the next clearing, they were greeted by the site of a ruined and decaying tower that stood tall, peaking just over the tops of the tallest trees around them. Twilight gasped as she took in every detail of the tower, her tail twitching with excitement and anticipation. Celestia took it all in, inhaling a long draw of air before exhaling. Luna gently rubbed her sister’s back with a wing and frowned in concern.

“Tia?” she asked.

“I’m fine… I’m just relieved I might be able to finally find the answers I have been craving.”

Celestia was about to talk to Archimedes but noticed he was slowly looking around the area surrounding the tower, particularly around the door area.

“Archimedes, are you okay?” she asked.

Aside from Twilight who was frantically scribbling away in a notebook, the others turned their attention to the giant machine. Archimedes was carefully scanning the floor before he took a couple of heavy stomps forward and looked up to the door.

“Archy?” Moon asked.

There was a brief moment of silence before he turned around with a cheerful expression, “Yes, my friends?”

“Are you alright?” Luna said, tilting her head.

“Oh quite alright,” Archimedes replied, dismissing her with a wave of his hand, “I just had some memories come back to me about the tower, that’s all.”

Celestia nodded, although she wasn’t one hundred percent convinced. She turned her attention to the guards that had accompanied them and spoke.

“Sergeant, form a perimeter around the tower. We shall head inside and investigate.”

“Yes, your majesty,” the Sergeant replied.

The three princess headed towards the tower as the guards took up their positions. The two princess’ headed inside with Twilight right behind them, her eyes wide and a massive eager grin on her face. Archimedes soon followed with Moon Dance in tow, Archimedes having to dip under the door frame again and saw that each princess had engulfed their horns in magic allowing them to see. Archimedes blinked and two beams of light shne from eyes, letting him and Moon have light as well.

The ground floor was just how he remembered it. Dusty, covered in a few worn down and a few broken pieces of furniture. He wondered over, past the princess’ and stopped when he looked at the floor. So wrapped up in their examination of the room, the princess’ had failed to notice that the floor had been disturbed somewhat. He stared at the ground as his eyes roamed the floor, catching Moon dancer’s attention as she whispered to him

“Everything alright?” she asked.

Archimedes nodded slightly, “I’m fine, my little friend, just reminiscing.”

The machine carefully looked around to see if anything else had been disturbed. Seeing nothing out of the ordinary, he left the princess’ and started to make his way back into the basement, the dark much heavier as his eyes scanned the area. There was several broken chairs and tables, glass bottles and vials as well as stains from an unknown liquid. Two cages were on either side of the wall, the doors long broken and whatever was inside of them long gone. Archimedes curiously noticed several very smooth and similarly shaped rocks dotted about the room.

“This was his laboratory,” Archimedes told Moon.

The bat pony nodded as she looked around where Archimedes eyes shone, noticing all the broken furniture and arched her brow. “What’s with all the broken stuff?”

Archimedes coughed embarrassedly. “That… would be my handiwork. I didn’t really take much care leaving here and I sort of just walked through everything.”

Moon snickered behind a hoof, “You silly tin can…”

“Oh my, it’s awfully dark in here.”

Archimedes turned at the sound of Celestia’s voice, the alicorn being followed by the two others. Twilight now had several books floating around her, each one with its own quill furiously scribbling away.

“Allow me, sister,” Luna said.

The alicorn closed her eyes and her horn shone brightly before a ball of magical light shot out and rested near the ceiling at the center of the room fully illuminating it for all to see. Archimedes turned off his lights and looked around, seeing a large series of cracks in the floor where he figured he must of landed.

“Ohmygosh!” Twilight squealed, “I can’t believe i’m in Starswirl's laboratory!”

“You’ve been in his old one, though, back at the palace,” Cadance replied.

Twilight gave her a dismissive wave of her hoof, “Yes, yes, but this is his other one. No pony has been in this place for centuries!”

Cadance shook her head but smiled at the antics of her sister in law. It didn’t matter that Twilight was a princess and an alicorn now, she was still the same loveable filly who would get excited about anything she knew and loved dearly.

“Sorry about the mess,” Archimedes said, “I kinda destroyed a lot when I left here.”

“Speaking of which…” Celestia began, “where you always down here?”

Archimedes shook his head as he pointed to the area where he had appeared in, “No… I think I actually appeared in here like magic. I think, anyway… memories a little fuzzy.”

As steam started to seep out of his helmet, Moon bopped him on the side of the head, “No thinking, it hurts you too much.”

“My apologies,” Archimedes repled, “I just wish I wasn’t so gosh darned faulty.”

“It’s not your fault, Archy,” Cadance smiled.

The machine smiled down at the pink alicorn before he heard Twilight squeal again somewhere in another part of the laboratory.

“Ohmygoshohmygosh! I found his journals! Maybe there’s something in one of these!”

Twilight rushed back to the others as she carefully opened one of the journals, grinning madly as she hungrily read the journal, devouring its words. Luna shook her head as her own eyes wondered about before they settled on an unusual looking slab on the laboratory’s floor. She squinted at it and made her way over and carefully scanned it and noticed that unlike everything else in the room, the slab had little to no dust on it.

She turned her head back to the others, “Twilight, I thought you said nopony had been in here for centuries?”

“They haven’t, why do you ask?” Twilight replied.

“I believe somepony has.”

The princess’ Moon dancer and archimedes headed over to where Luna was. The alicorn pointed at the floor, revealing the slab to the others. Twilight pouted a little as she scrunched up her face.

“Darn… I was hoping we were the first.”

“Oh well, my little student,” Celestia replied, using her wing to gently pat Twilight on the back reassuringly, “I’m sure there are still things we can discover in here. But do remember we are here to see if there is anything that can tell us about what happened to Starswirl.”

Twilight nodded as she trotted back to the journals along with Cadance. Luna, noticing a few sheets of paper on a nearby table that was still in tact, walked over them to inspect them. Celestia was about to join Twilight and Cadance but noticed Archimedes staring at the slab. She could feel a strange energy emanating off him and it didn’t feel right.

“Archimedes, are you alright?” she asked.

Archimedes didn’t answer, remaining still in his spot. Moon flapped her wings as she got off him and landed beside him, looking up at the metal man.

“Archy…?” she asked worryingly.

“Confound it!” Archimedes suddenly shouted, startling everyone before he stormed to the far wall.

“A-Archimedes?” Celestia asked.

Archimedes ignored her as he reached the wall, and promptly smashed his fist into it causing a massive dent and a loud thud to echo in the room.

“Archy?!” Moon cried out.

“Why. Can. I. Not. Remember. Anything?!” Archimedes shouted, punching the wall in between words.

“Enough!” Luna shouted, using her magic to hold his arm back.

Archimedes swiveled round, his eyes glaring at the others and flickering between yellow and red. Luna held firm on her grip as he let out a loud exhale and slumped against the wall with his back against it.

“I… I’m sorry, I don’t know what came over me.” Archimedes apologised.

“It’s fine, Archimedes. But you need to tell us what’s going on, you’ve been acting funny ever since we arrived here.” Celestia replied.

The others nodded in agreement as he sighed and nodded himself.

“Alright… something's been bugging me ever since we got back. Someone’s been here recently and that is making me feel unnerved for some reason. And when I look at that slab, my warning system goes into overdrive and I have no idea why!”

Archimedes looked away as he rested his hands on his hips before continuing.

“It’s positively infuriating having a faulty memory…”

“It’s not your fault,. Archimedes,” Twilight said with a warm smile. “I’m sure once we are done here, we can figure out a way to restore your memory circuits.”

Archimedes was about to reply when Moon Dancer suddenly spoke up.

“What’s that?”

Everyone turned to look at the bat pony who was pointing to a dusty looking ball that was on the floor near one of the walls. Curious, Celestia levitated it towards her before she gasped and her eyes widened.

“I… think it’s a memory recall orb.”

“A what now?” Cadance asked.

“Starswirl was always on about these, they were designed to record visual and sound and be able to replay it at a later date.” Celestia explained, “Though he never got around to fully finishing them before he vanished I think.”

“Fascinating… so it’s a sort of early form of camera?” Twilight asked.

Celestia nodded, “Exactly. I wonder if this one did work though…”

Celestia rolled the orb around in her magic before she let out a gasp as it suddenly shone a bright blue and staring back at her was the face of Starswirl himself.

“S-Starswirl!” she cried.

“There, that ought to do it.,” Starswirl replied, ignoring Celestia.

The alicorn sighed, remembering it was just showing her a glimpse into the past. However, she smiled and tear rolled down her cheek as she heard and saw her long lost friend again.

“Amazing…” Moon whispered.

“Alright. This is the fifth experiment I will be conducting into inanimate possessions, or in laymare’s terms. Fusing the soul of one being into another. Archimedes, bring me the specimen and the…. lets try it with the ferret this time.” Starswirl said as he finished adjusting the orb and headed back into the center of the room

“Of course, Master Starswirl.” Archimedes in the recording replied.

“Hey, that’s me!” Archimedes said as his past self replied.

“Shh!” Luna said.

They all leaned in a little to continue watching the recording, eyes wide and glued to the orb.

“Now, as you can see here. We have a goose and a ferret.” Starswirl said as Archimedes brought in two cages, one carrying a goose the other a ferret and placed them on the table, “I will now try to remove the soul of the ferret and infuse it into the goose. Two souls one body. Now, Archimedes if you would be so kind?”

“Yes, Master Starswirl,” Archimedes replied as he walked over to a stone and brought it over, placing it around the two animals before placing more rocks around the two.

“Those must be the runes you mentioned, Archy.” Moon whispered.

Archimedes nodded as Twilight turned to Celestia,

“Why is he using animals? That’s just wrong!” she asked.

“It was a different time back then,” Celestia replied, giving her student an apologetic look before they both returned to viewing the orb.

“Alright, experiment five is ready to begin!” starswirl said, his horn flaring up as the stones shone brightly displaying their rune markings.

The runes floated above the cages and started to spin. The two animals were by now panicking and doing all they can to get out of the cages and get away. Starswirl closed his eyes in concentration as his magic engulfed the two animals and slowly but surely, a small white orb of light left the ferret and slowly made its way towards the panicked goose as the body of the ferret fell to the bottom of the cage.

“A-almost…!” Starswirl groaned as his body began to shake.

“Master, what’s wrong? Your body is showing signs of distress and pain.”

Starswirl opened his eyes and he along with the others could see his veins clearly poking up under his fur, before he let out a pained gasp and fell to the floor, propping himself up on one leg. Something was wrong. The white orb of light had returned back to the ferret and both animals were still panicking, yet he could feel a life force being pulled out and his eyes went wide in alarm. It was his life force.

“Master! Cancel the spell!”

“I-I can’t! Something's not r-right!” Starswirl replied and whined in agony. “Archimedes! Initiate the failsafe, destroy the runes, now!”

Archimedes in the recording quickly went to grab one of the runes as Starswirl seemed to struggle to cancel the spell. As the machine grabbed one of the rune, the unicorn screamed in agony as his eyes rolled back into his head before he felt himself being pulled towards the runes. Just as Archimedes turned to see what was going on, Starswirl’s body contorted until it suddenly shot into Archimedes, throwing him to the wall in an invisible explosive blast. The machine crashed to the floor just as the magic in the runes suddenly exploded, creating a portal tear, Archimedes had no time to grab onto anything before he was violently pulled forwards into the portal along with a few other items in the room. The portal then suddenly vanished, the now spent runes falling onto the floor as the orb’s recording slowly faded out.

There was a long silence in the laboratory as everyone stared at the now dull orb.

“My gods…” Luna whispered.

“What happened?” Moon asked, “Did he die?”

“No… I think he fused… with Archimedes,” Twilight gasped.

“He… he…” Celestia began.

“Hmm, so that’s what happened?” a voice behind them said.

Everyone slowly looked round to see Archimedes looking down at them cheerfully. However, one of his yellow eyes had now turned a shade of ice blue and his usually grey metal armor had a tinge of blue to them. Celestia gasped as she looked up, tears in her eyes. Unlike Archimedes robotic tone, this one whilst robotic had a very distinct Trottingham accent.

“Very peculiar, was wondering why it was so dark in here. But now I know. And I appear to be sharing my automaton's body with him.” The voice continued.

“Well, that explains a few things. It's good to hear you again, Master!” Archimedes voice said.

“And indeed it’s good to hear you, my faithful companion!” The voice replied.

Archimedes laughed, but this time both the unfamiliar voice and Archimedes’s rumbled together through the laboratory.

“S-Starswirl…?” Celestia asked with a whisper.

Archimedes chuckled, “Yes. Celestia. It’s me. Stuck in here with Archimedes. So, how are we all doing?”

Chapter XIII - Chaotic magic is NOT for eccentric unicorns

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Archimedes

Chapter XIII - Chaotic magic is NOT for eccentric unicorns

None dared to speak a single word. They all just stared up in utter disbelief at the mechanical being as he, or rather, they returned the look. The stagnant silence hovered in the room for what seemed like hours until Starswirl decided that it was time to break the ice.

“So… why are we my old laboratory? And how long have I been has it been, exactly?” he asked.

Well,” Archimedes began, “I arrived here not too long ago, but we are approximately shy of eight hundred years after the uh… experiment mishap, Master.”

“Fascinating… did you arrive here instantaneously or did you take your time?”

“Instantaneously, though my memory units are somewhat faulty since arriving.”

“Easily fixed, my faithful servant. Not sure why it took me so long to awaken, but that’s a problem for another time. Now, shall we see what we can salvage?”

The robot began to move as Starswirl hummed a cheerful tune as Archimedes walked over to one of the bookshelves. The others simply stared after the machine, confused and wondering what had just happened.

“Uhm… Archy?” Moon Dancer said.

“Hmm… well, seems like most of the journals are beyond repair. Have you checked the upper rooms, Archimedes?” Starswirl asked.

“I have, Master. They are the same as down here.” Archimedes replied.

“Starswirl, uh, Sir?” Cadence asked, a bit louder than the bat pony.

“Blast… well, how about the old laboratory? Or did we ever go there after I built you?” The unicorn continued, ignoring Cadence completely.

Archimedes shook his head, “Not since before my creation, Master. Though, I have been there recently myself.”

“And it’s state?” Starswirl inquired.

“Adequate, I imagine a few touches and it would be up and running as it might have looked back in the day.” Archimedes replied.

“Wonderful! Perhaps we should go there now?” Starswirl suggested. “I am curious as to what new things await me in this time period!”

Archimedes chuckled softly, “You’re going to be very busy then, Master.”

“Sir Starswirl, if I may—” Luna started.

Luna was interrupted as Starswirl again ignored the others in the room. “Right then! It’s settled, we shall leave immediately for the old laboratory, my metal friend! Let us—

“Starswirl!” Luna bellowed loudly, enough to make the room rumble slightly.

The machine turned around and blinked before responding in a slightly irritated tone, “Hmm? Yes, yes what can I do for you?”

Luna blinked herself before coughing, “Uhm, well… we were hoping that. Well, could we talk? I mean, you've been gone for so long, there are so many questions that need answering!”

Starswirl lifted the right arm of Archimedes to his chin and stroked it before he looked to the arm and hummed in curiosity, slowly waving it back and forth, “Curious… it appears I have control over the right arm. Fascinating…”

He coughed a little before looking back to the others.

“Hmm… well, I suppose a little session of questions and what not is something I too would be happy to do, I myself have a few things I need answers to. But shall we do it away from here? Perhaps in my old laboratory?”

“Very well, though I think it’s best we get there quickly, I feel dear Twilight cannot hold her excitement back anymore,” Luna chuckled.

The machine looked to the young alicorn who was literally shaking on the spot, her eyes wide wand filled with excitement as her smile threatened to rip her face in two. A quill, parchment and ink had appeared from nowhere and were currently floating beside her.

“Ah, a scholar! Wonderful!” Starswirl chuckled. “Now, let me just...”

Everyone watched as Archimedes seemed to strain, the metal body shuddering loudly as black steam rumbled from the exhaust pipes on its back.

“Oh confound it! I can’t use my blasted magic!” Starswirl cursed loudly.

Luna couldn’t help chuckle as the right arm crossed across Archimedes chest in a foal-like tantrum, the alicorn picturing the unicorn as he would have looked back in his day pouting.

“Here, allow me,” Luna said.

Luna’s horns lit up before the room was bathed in a flash of light and the group vanished, leaving the room in heavy silence once more.

The group re-appeared back in the old wing of the castle where Starswirl's laboratory was located in a bright flash, causing Moon Dancer to blink as she let out a low groan as the bat pony landed on the ground with a noticeable wobble in her legs.

“I will never get used to being teleported… leave that stuff for the magic users,” she grumbled.

Archimedes chuckled at his friend and gently petted her head, which only made her legs wobble even more. “You’ll live, my little friend.”

As everyone became oriented with the room and its surroundings, Starswirl moved Archimedes head as he soured the remnants of his old laboratory and scoffed quietly to himself.

“Not as bad as I imagined it would look like, nothing a bit of elbow grease and a can-do attitude can’t fix. But that’s for later, I believe we are going to do a bit of back and forth?”

“Correct, now, if I may—”

“I can’t hold it in any longer!” Twilight suddenly cried, interrupting Luna mid sentence and rushing towards the metal man, “I have so many questions for you!”

Archimedes watched as Cadence used her magic to, with some level of difficulty, hold back her sister-in-law. “Down, Twilight!”

“But! But!” Twilight whined

Cadence fixed her a glare, “Calm down, you’re working yourself up!”

Twilight huffed as she was restrained, pouting at Cadence, “Fine…”

“She certainly is enthusiastic, Master.” He chuckled.

“Well, of course she is, she’s a scholar! Only the very best Scholars are enthusiastic, eh?” Starswirl replied.

There was a moment of pause as an awkward silence fell upon the room, no one knowing who should start off the conversation that was long overdue.

“So, who talks first? You talk first?” Starswirl asked, looking towards the group, “I talk first?”

“Well, I would say Twilight.” Cadence began, snickering a little, “But I feel as if nopony else would get a question in if we did.”

The metal machine looked to Twilight, who was looking calmly at him. Though, he could tell she wasn’t too happy with Cadence’s words, primarily due to how her body was vibrating, clearly trying to control her excitement and posture.

It was at this point that Luna suddenly realized that Celestia had been rather quiet, seeing her sister standing there with a warm smile on her face and eyes a little watery from the tears she was trying to hold back. Looking back to Archimedes then her sister, she brought a hoof up to her mouth and coughed into it.

“Well, it’s nearly time for dinner. Perhaps we should meet up with the bearers of the elements, and inform them on what has transpired before introducing them to Starswirl,” Luna suggested. ,

“Hmm?” Starswirl piped up, “The element bearers? The harmony elements?”

“That’s correct, Twilight's one of them in fact.” Luna replied.

“Oh that would be splendid! I always wanted to see the damn things in person, only ever saw and read about them in old books,” Starswirl said.

Luna smiled, looking to Celestia who mouthed a ‘thank you’ to her younger sibling before Luna turned to Cadence, Moon Dancer and Twilight, nodding her head towards the exit. Moon Dancer and Candace both replied with a silent nod, both understanding what Luna was suggesting and began to make their way out of the room. Twilight, however hadn’t quite got the message and was still patiently staring up at Archimedes and shaking a little ready to burst.

“A-hem!” Cadence coughed into her hoof, getting Twilight’s attention.

“Hmm?” Twilight said, her ear flickering a little as she looked over, “What?”

Cadence nodded towards the exit twice expectantly as Twilight stared at her, switching from looking at Cadence and Archimedes, “But—!”

Twilight stopped mid-sentence when Cadence gave her a stern glare that immediately sent a shiver of fear down Twilight’s spine. It was a glare she had not seen since she was a filly and it immediately brought back terrifying and dark memories of when she was in trouble. Swallowing a lump in her throat, Twilight quickly trotted over to the other two alicorns and Moon Dancer as the three excited the old laboratory. Leaving Celestia, Archimedes alone.

There was a stagnant silence between the three before Celestia’s lip wobbled and she started to sniffle before she quickly ran up to Archimedes and stood on her hind legs, wrapping her forelegs around the metal man as best she could and hugged his frame tightly. Without hesitation, Archimedes returned the hugh as gently as he could to console his beloved, whilst Starswirl using his controlled limb, comforted his dear friend.

Celestia smiled for a moment before they let go of one another and they both looked at each other fondly. Archimedes then gently sat down on the ground, followed by Celestia as they got themselves comfortable. Celestia sniffled softly before looking to the side a little as she thought about all the questions she had for him and trying to choose which one to ask Starswirl.

As the alicorn mused over her thoughts, Archimedes patiently sat and stared Celestia, waiting for her to say something. It was Starswirl's voice that broke the silence as he brought up Archimedes’ right arm and coughed into it.

“So… how have you been?” Starswirl asked

Celestia stared at him, a hurt and upset expression on her face, “That’s what you say to me? After hundreds and hundreds of years not knowing what happened, that’s how you start things off?!”

Both arms of the metalman raised up in defence as Starswirl began to stutter, “I-I’m sorry? I’m j-just not used to t-talking about how I feel o-or what the situation calls for and—”

He paused as Celestia’s lips wobbled threatening to break into a smile before he sighed.

“You’re teasing me. Aren’t you?” he asked.

Celestia giggled softly, “Somewhat. I like to think my sense of humour has improved somewhat over the past several hundred years.”

“You're a menace, you know that?” Starswirl grumbled

“She’s certainly something, isn’t she, Master?” Archimedes sighed dreamily.

“I say, are you alright, Archimedes?” Starswirl asked, curious as to why he had spoken in such a manner to Celestia.

“Of course, Master. Why wouldn’t I be?” Archimedes replied.

“Indeed. So, back to the matter at hoof,” Starswirl said. “I know we haven't much time for reminiscing, and I know that I have some explaining to do…”

“The understatement of the year,” Celestia replied.

Starswirl nervously chuckled, “Quite… so, what questions do you have? Ask away my old friend, I’ll hold nothing back from now on.”

Celestia smiled warmly before she looked out of one of the nearby windows and let out a sad sigh, realizing how late it had become and she would soon need to return to the others to have dinner..

“Oh… I wish I could just talk away the evening with you, but we don’t have much time till dinner with the others.”

“Not to worry,” Starswirl replied with a hearty laugh, “Being stuck in ol’ Archimedes here means neither of us need to eat or sleep. We’re more than happy to chat the night away if you so wish after the meal, isn’t that right, Archimedes?”

“Of course, Master!” the automaton replied.

Celestia beamed at their response as she mulled over what to ask him. Because of the time and the fact she had to later on retire with Luna in order to raise and lower the sun and moon, as well as have their evening meal with the others, she decided on her questions.

“I think for now, I’ll ask the bigger question I have. Like you say, we have all night to talk and reminisce with one another..”

“Ask away, my dear,” Starswirl replied.

She looked up to the metal machine as her smile slumped into a slight frown, “Just… what happened? How did I somehow seemingly forget almost everything about you when you vanished?”

Starswirl mused over her question for a moment before he let out a low sigh, “Alright… I’ll try to explain as best I can,”

“Are you sure that’s wise, Sir?” Archimedes asked.

“She deserves the truth… no more secrets,” Starswirl said.

“Thank you,” Celestia smiled.

He paused, looking down at her before continuing. “Do you remember the time I grew wings for a month, that had independant thought from one another and refused to do what I wanted them to?”

Celestia tried not to giggle as she nodded in remembrance. She found it hysterical when Starswirl one day turned up with wings that had their own movements, actions and refused to co-operate with one another or himself. A magical mishap, as he put it then.

“And... do you also know how I claimed it was a spell gone wrong?

Celestia's brow arched as Starswirl chuckled sheepishly and continued.

“Well… I may have sort of found a way to harness the chaotic magic that the draconequus used.”

“Are you insane, Starswirl!?” Celestia shouted, “Nopony is able to use their power! It’s too unpredictable, only they could use its raw power because of their bizarre physiology!”

“Well,” Starswirl snorted, “I found a way. Sort of…”

“Explain,” Celestia asked, looking unamused.

“Well, I remember it was a tuesday evening ,and I was doing some research deep within the old archives when I got a little uh, sidetracked and stumbled upon some interesting tomes about their chaotic powers.”

Starswirl chuckled as he paused for a moment in reflection.

“I can’t remember how long I was reading for, but by the time I had gone through several of those tombs it was already the following morning. Anyway, I was simply astounded by their form of magic, it being neither dark or light and always unpredictable and wild. Just like how the ancestors had once described. Pure raw magic that hasn’t been refined into our school of magic, wild and free of order.”

Celestia’s expression remained unchanged as Starswirl carried on explaining.

“So, being the curious little dickens I am, I began to wonder if there was a way to control chaotic magic, at least, in a small way. I spent months secretly experimenting and trying to understand how to control it, with... little to no success. The wings being once such example. Until one day, it just… happened.”

“What do you mean, ‘just happened’?” Celestia asked.

“Exactly how it sounds,” he replied, snapping Archimedes’ right fingers, “It literally just happened. I somehow, and honestly still not one hundred percent sure how I did it, but I managed to use a combination of my own magic as well as some ancient draconequus artifacts and tapped into the raw power of chaotic magic, just like how a draconequus can.”

Celestia blinked, staring at the metal machine in restrained awe. She was a little angry that Starswirl had done something so dangerous, as raw magic if not handled correctly could instantly kill a caster. But she had to admit she had some form of respect for him, if this was indeed what the had done.

“Although… looking at it now, seeing my predicament of being inside Archimedes. I think I may not of actually fully grasped complete control over it.”

Starswirl laughed awkwardly and rubbed the back of Archimedes’ head as Celestia remained unmoved, waiting for him to continue. He cleared his throat and resumed his explanation.

“Anyway, nothing really happened to me for several months after I harnessed chaotic magic, and I decided that I would keep it to myself whilst I continued to study and master it. And then on that day it went horribly wrong.”

“The day of the experiment,” Archimedes added.

“Quite,” Starswirl replied, “When I felt my life force being drained from me as the experiment went wrong. I was unable to use my own magic to free myself. So, in my panic, I tapped once more into the chaotic magic power to try and use it to escape or cancel my spell. However… it was then that I made another discovery about chaotic magic.”

“What’s that?” Celestia asked.

“Chaotic magic isn’t just raw magic energy floating about as everypony once thought it was. It’s alive. And not only that, but it it wasn’t too fond of me continually tapping into it and using it, considering I wasn’t a draconequus, which the chaotic magic favours highly. In fact… you could say I royally angered it.”

Discord shuddered and made a displeasurable grunt like noise.

“What’s wrong?” Moon Dancer asked, turning her head to see his displeased expression.

“I have a sneaky feeling someone is trying to explain chaotic magic…” he huffed, “And I don’t like long winded explanations, either. Wish they’d get on with it.”

Moon Dancer simply shook her head and ignored him.

“So, when I tapped into the power for the umpteenth time, I think it decided it had had enough of a unicorn using it’s magic for non-chaotic reasons and decided to reject me in a bad way. A very bad way. From the look of it, it thought it would be an absolute hoot if it threw me into Archimedes and fused us together as a way of ‘saving’ me.”

“I… see,” Celestia replied, finding it hard to process everything he had said, “And… my memories? And the portal that sent you both into the future?”

“I honestly don’t know about that part. I’m sorry. I’ll need to do more research into this before I can actually confirm it myself, you understand? At the moment, I’d hazard a guess that it would be part of the chaotic magic’s ‘joke’ on me, warping and distorting parts of reality to mess with me and everypony else. As for the portal, a possible combination of the rune magic, my own and the chaos magic fusing, maybe?”

The alicorn sighed softly. Despite getting answers to her questions, she didn't feel fully satisfied with them. She was about to ask another when a grumble came from her stomach which caused her to blush bright red, “O-Oh dear, I am sorry…”

“Not at all, it must be very close to being time for dinner,” Starswirl chuckled.

Celestia sighed, “I have so many more questions I still want to ask… but I must save them for later this evening.”

“Well, I will always be willing to answer them all, my dear,” Starswirl chuckled.

Archimedes stood up, stretching his robotic limbs, “Should we join the others now, Sir?”

“Yes, I think that would be good. Right, Celestia?”

Celestia nodded in agreement as she got up as well, following Archimedes towards the door. Just as he was about to reach it, Celestia suddenly remembered something else she wanted to ask Starswirl.

“Oh, there is actually one more question I need to know before we go and join the others, if I may?”

“And what is that?” Starswirl replied.

“Well, it’s a two parter,” Celestia smiled, “Just what is Archimedes? What did you actually create him for?”

There was a brief paused before Celestia’ got a response from Starswirl.

“W-What do you mean?” Starswirl replied. “He's m-my assistant!”

“Well, it’s just that I’ve seen the weapons he has, weapons I’ve never seen the likes of and I’m curious about them. That’s all. After all, I will have to explain this to the nobles and my little ponies at some point fully, you understand?”

Archimedes fidgets on the spot, keeping quiet.

“Starswirl, please. Tell me the truth,” Celestia asked with a concerned frown, “He’s not an assistant… is he?”

Starswirl paused before he let out a long sigh, as if he had been holding it back for centuries, “Okay… I’ll tell you.”

“Uh… Master?” Archimedes said nervously, “are you sure that—?”

Starswirl interrupted with a sigh. “Like I said earlier, Archimedes. She... deserves the truth...”

“Thank you, Starswirl” Celestia replied with a warm smile.

“But, you must promise me you won’t freak out… okay?” Starswirl said uneasily.

“Master?” Archimedes asked, becoming more anxious.

Celestia frowned slightly, not really liking where this was going. But Starswirl was always over-reacting about how people would react to him telling them something, smiling up to him and nodding her head. “Okay, I promise,”

“I have told you about him before. And what he was built for…” Starswirl admitted.

“Really?” Celestia asked, arching a brow, “Then why don’t I remember anything about him?”

There is a possible, slight chance that I... may have cast a memory suppressant spell on you using chaotic magic about Archimedes’ creation and true purpose. ” Starswirl nervously chuckled, making a small pinch motion with Archimedes’ right hand. “You could probably locate it, now I’ve told you about it… couldn’t before hand you see, you had no idea I’d done it.

Both Starswirl and Archimedes nervously watched as Celestia continued to smile sweetly, her eyes closed hiding her any sign of hidden emotion.

Suddenly, alarms went off in Archimedes head and Starswirl could sense the suppression spell he had cast on her had been found and removed by Celestia. The metal man took a nervous step back as the room temperature started to increase rapidly and her eyes opened, sending a wave of utter terror into his circuits.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa. Are ya’ll being serious? The Starswirl?!” Applejack exclaimed.

“That’s not possibly, is it?” Rarity asked.

“Oh my gosh! I can’t wait to see how he reacts to modern day parties!” Pinkie Pie chipped in.

“Settle down, girls,” Luna said, gesturing with a hoof, “I know this is a lot to take in, but I’d appreciate it if for the time being we keep this to ourselves. I would like to see how Celestia wishes to play this out in the public eye.”

Luna, Moon Dancer and Cadence had made their way back through the palace and had bumped into the rest of the Elements of Harmony coming back from an outing in the city. Luna had initially wanted to keep what had transpired a secret, at least till the following day. But Twilight’s friends knew her well and could tell she was struggling to keep something hidden.

Pinkie Pie was able to get the information out of her in exactly four seconds,, impressing Luna and giving her a moment of thought to make the bubbly mare her new interrogator. After Twilight had spilled the beans, Luna brought them all to the council room where the nobles and the Princess’ would discuss current affairs and exchange or create new laws in order to bring them up to speed. As they settled, with Discord once more coiling his noodle body around the Lunar guard, Luna had begun briefing them all on what had transpired.

“So… no over-the-top firework displays and mega speakers?” Discord asked, feigning disappointment as his lip pouted

“Behave, you,” Moon Dancer replied, whacking his head.

Discord let out a purr as he coiled around the bat pony more and wiggled his eyebrows at her, “Hit me baby, one more time.”

Moon Dancer sighed as the draconequus snuggled into her like a snake before groaning in irritation, “You know what, I don’t even care anymore, what’s the point?!”

Luna rolled her eyes as she looked back to the others and cleared her throat, “As I was saying. Starswirl is looking forward to meeting you all, but we’re letting Celestia speak to him alone for a while. Given their history, they have a lot to catch up on in a relatively short time.”

Twilight Let out a huff as she pouted and mumbled under her breath as Cadence giggled softly, giving her sister-in-law a playful ruffle of her mane.

“I’m sure Starswirl would be delighted to spend hours talking with you about his life. But we must let others get a word in first. You know how you can be when it comes to questions, remember when we first met Archy?”

Twilight sheepishly chuckled, “Yeah… that’s a good point.”

“So…” Rainbow Dash asked, “we going now or what?”

Luna looked out of the window to see the sun position and nodded, “Yes. I think it’s best if we do head back now, I’m sure that my sister has asked what she has wanted from him for now. Besides, it’s nearly time for dinner and then the transition of the day into night.”

The group rose from their seats and began to make their way towards the old laboratory, Moon Dancer reluctantly dragging a still, wrapped around her body Discord. As they got closer and closer, they all began to notice that it was getting warmer.

“Is it me, or is it a lil’... toasty, all of a sudden?” Discord asked, fanning himself with one of Moon Dancer’s wings.

Luna stopped for a moment, sensing something was wrong. Before she could say anything, Pinkie Pie began to vibrate in places as her mane and tail spazzed about in different directions.

“Pinkie Pie?” Fluttershy nervously asked.

“Hit the deck!” Pinkie suddenly screamed, diving for cover.

Before anyone could respond, there was a massive soar in temperature followed by an almighty explosion that sent them flying back a few meters and tore apart the wall ahead, right by where the old laboratories entrance was, followed by yelp and an almighty crash of something heavy slamming into the ground. Looking up after the dust had settled, the group saw the body of Archimedes embedded into the wall, his whole frame red as if he had been dropped in fire,and steam and smoke rising off him. The machine groaned before shaking it’s head before pulling himself out of the wall and stumbling slightly.

“N-Now, now!” Starswirl stammered, “L-let’s not be too hasty! I h-had my reasons!”

From the hole in the wall, Celestia emerged. However, she was not her normal self. Both her mane and tail were ablaze and flowing longer than normal, a wisp of embers and smoke billowing around her body. Her eyes were pure white, glowing so brightly it caused the group to partially shield their eyes as flames danced wildly from the corners of Celestia’s eyes. A tuft of flames danced under the alicorn’s hooves as she snarled loudly and glared at the machine.

“M-My beloved? Please calm down?” Archimedes added, “W-We can talk about this rationally—”

“You. Scheming. Little. Bastard. Starswirl! How dare suppress my memories about that?!” Celestia thundered in her Canterlot voice, interrupting Archimedes. “I distinctly ordered you to not do go through with it!”

“I know, I-I’m sorry!” Starswirl said, “I just c-couldn’t, I mean I thought E-Equestria was on the verge of t-total war and—”

“And you, Archimedes!” Celestia roared, interrupting Starswirl “Why did you not tell me about what you are when we met?!”

“M-My beloved, I swear I-I couldn’t remember! “Archimedes stuttered, “I only j-just recalled it w-when Master Starswirl awoke within—”

Before he could finish, though. Celestia’s horn began to glow as a large ball of fire formed at the tip.

“Run, Archimedes!” Starswirl screamed.

“You don’t have to tell me twice, Master!” Archimedes cried back, not wanting to take another blast of fire to the torso.

The machine scrambled down the hall, running as fast as he could just as Celestia threw another fireball at him which blew a large hole where he was just embedded, and past the confused looks of the group that had to dash out of his way. His heavy boots causing the ground to rumble as he ran out of sight.

“Come back here you pair of cowards! That’s an order!” Celestia hissed as she took off in great speed, her wings spread, a twin trail of fire in her wake as each hoofstep matched the heavy, shaking thuds of Archimedes’ boots.’

The group stared after them in silence before Discord broke the silence with a large amused grin on his face.

“Fifty bits says she kills him.”

Chapter XIV - Past Betrayal

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Archimedes

Chapter XIV - Past Betrayal

Iron Wing let out a low and weary sigh as he slowly made his way down the corridor. He got into an incident with his fellow guard, Copper Hoof, which resulted in the noble stallion Money Bags somehow getting coated in a mixture of flour, oil, and a bunch of cockatrice feathers. Iron Wing was still unsure as to how it had all happened, considering the pair were just meant to be escorting the stallion from one part of the castle to the other.

Needless to say, their commanding officer wasn’t happy about it.

As such, whilst Copper Hoof had his own punishment, Iron Wing was given three months lavatory cleaning duties and was told to remain posted at the old laboratory for the mean time.

Again.

He hadn’t been back there since the day the giant metal man called Archimedes ran by him, and whilst he hated the fact he would be on his own for so many hours he did have to appreciate that it did give him some time to be with his thoughts. Not to mention, he had smuggled his favourite book and some fizzy soda to keep him company.

He yawned as he rounded the corner to see, already knowing it was going to be a long day for him. “Least I have my book to—.”

A sudden explosion interrupted him and sent him fall to the ground with a startled yelp of surprise. Groaning, Iron Wing shakily got back to his hooves and collected his spear, only to narrowly avoid being slammed into by Archimedes, again, and pressed his back into the wall as hard as he could as he watched the machine run by him.

He could feel the ambient temperature become boiling hot instantly as his eyes shot open wide seeing what was chasing Archimedes.

“Come back here, liar!”

Iron Wing felt the sheer heat flow over him as the flaming embodiment of Celestia stormed past him, he felt his fur became matted with sweat almost instantly due to the temperature rise. He panted as he looked back just in time to see Princess Luna, Princes Cadance, Moon Dancer, Discord and the elements of harmony race after the pair.

“Hurry! We need to catch up to them!” Luna shouted.

“Right behind you!” Cadance replied.

Iron Wing stood by the wall watching them run past. His guard instincts told him he should run after them and help in anyway he could. But, he didn’t think they saw him.

“Well, not much I could do anyway, right?” He asked aloud to no one in particular.

He removed his helmet and wiped his brow before putting it back on and heading towards his post, humming a little tune to himself as he did.

Archimedes thundered down the hallway as he narrowly avoided another blast of fire that shot past him, slamming into the wall and causing a large explosion that sent rubble flying.

“Faster, you tinhead!” Starswirl screamed.

“We’re at maximum speed!” Archimedes replied back.

They spun round a corner, just as another volley of fire blasted past them. Two guards stationed at the corner yelped as they dove out of the way as Archimedes and Celestia ran by them, blinking in confusion and shock as they were passed by Luna and the others.

“This is bad! We need to stop her!” Cadance cried. “If she gets to the main part of the palace, who knows what will happen!”

“I’ll be damned if I give those lazy nobles anything to complain about!” Luna shouted.

“Why? It looks like it could be a bit of fun,” Discord replied as he remained coiled around Moon Dance,r who was struggling to keep up with the others due to the extra weight.

“B-but how?!” Twilight cried out, “I’ve never seen her this angry.”

“I have,” Luna replied matter-of-factly, “at least twice. It normally takes three days to calm her down.”

“T-Three days?!” Twilight spluttered, “The Emperor is arriving in two! We don’t have time for this, we need a quicker way to calm her down!”

As they began to close the gap between the two, Luna’s eyes went wide as she grinned, and idea coming to her head. “I know how to stop her!”

She spread her wings wide to stop the group, causing everyone to stop suddenly and run into one another.

There was a crash as everyone ran into one another, Discord flailing as he grabbed onto the nearest thing to steady himself which happened to be Pinkie Pie who in turn grabbed Rainbow Dash by her tail causing the pegasus to yelp and slam down into Rarity and Applejack. Twilight bumped into Cadance and toppled over her as Fluttershy, who had been at the back of the pack, managed to avoid crashing into the others.

Everyone groaned as they slowly got up, Discord letting out an over the top groan as he slunk off Moon Dancer into a heap on the floor.

“Why did you stop suddenly?” Twilight asked.

“I think I’m concussed…” Rainbow Dash groaned.

“I think my brain fell out,” Pinkie Pie added, her eyes rolling about in their sockets.

“So, what’s the plan there Moon—” Discord started.

He was interrupted when Luna’s horn shone brightly, so brightly that everyone had to cover their eyes. When the light died down, Celestia and Archimedes had stopped in front of them, frozen in place. As they slowly approached the two everyone was able to see just how angry Celestia looked, now she was frozen. And it was utterly terrifying.

Along with her already terrifying body they had witnessed when she had exited the laboratory. They were now able to see Celestia’s eyes. Both were a dark red with yellow slitted pupils with flames that were frozen coming out the corners of her eyes. Her mouth was wide open in a fixed snarl, showing two protruding fangs as a frozen fireball spell was stuck on the end of her horn.

Despite being stuck in place, the heat still radiated from the flames around her body. Archimedes had several black scorch marks over his iron body, and despite having no face to read emotions he still somehow had a look of terror on him.

“So… what do you have in mind, Auntie?” Cadance asked, “we can’t just keep them frozen in place, it’s going to drain your magic quickly for a start.”

“Discord,” Luna began, turning to address him, “I need your help.”

“Moi? Why moi?” Discord gasped, feigning surprise.

Luna inhaled and let out a deep sigh, “I… need you to use your magic.”

Discord's lips curled into a large mischievous grin as he floated into the air, propping his chin up with his claw and paw, “Oh? This should be interesting. Do go on, my dear.”

“I need you to send Celestia into your realm along with Archimedes. I think she’ll only be calm once she has vented all of her rage and the only place I can think of where she can do that quickly is your realm.”

“But why his realm?” Twilight asked.

“Because, my dear Twilight,” Discord began, smirking at Luna, “My realm warps time. Three days in there is the equivalent of three hours. Or something like that, I was pretty drunk when I created my realm, the rules are a bit off here and there. It would explain why the monsters keep coming in from the closets…”

Luna nodded, “Precisely…”

“Buuuut,” Discord added, waggling the suppressing bracelet on his wrist, “my poor magic’s being suppressed.”

“Which is why, I’m taking it off.” Luna finished.

Twilight, Applejack, Rarity and Rainbow Dash voice their blatant disapproval of Luna’s idea whilst the others remained a little unsure about it. Though, Cadance, Fluttershy and Moon Dancer were the only ones who looked as if they agreed with Princess Luna.

“You can’t be serious? He’s still under punishment!” Twilight replied.

“What other option do we have, Twilight?” Cadance said, “We need to calm Aunt Celestia down now.”

As the group began to bicker amongst themselves, Luna flared her wings open, “Enough! I’ve made my choice. Discord, please extend your arm.”

Discord grinned as he stretched out his arm, watching with the others as Luna’s horn began to shine brightly with her magic. They watched as the bracelet rattled for a moment and Luna let out a grunt as she gritted her teeth, struggling to remove the bracelet.

Luna hissed softly. She was finding it more difficult than she had been expecting to channel her magic into the bracelet, considering the sheer amount of magic she had to call upon in order to freeze Celestia and Archimedes, and to prevent from Celestia from breaking free of the spell.

Not an easy feat when your older sister is engulfed in flames and is enraged.

“Are you okay, Princess?” Rarity asked.

“I-I’m fine, just harder to do this with one pony.” Luna lied, a few beads of sweat forming on her head. “Two are, uh, usually required to do so.”

“Auntie? Do you need help?” Cadance asked, “Both me and Twilight are alicorns and could—”

“No thank you!” Luna interrupted with a growl as she stared venomously at the bracelet, “I have got this, thank you!”

Discord watched with amusement as Luna began to sweat more as she strained with her magic, her horn shining brighter than before as a vein throbbed painfull on her forehead whilst the others watched a bit concerned.

Luna was not one to simply back down, and her stubborn pride refused to allow her to ask the other two for help, especially in front of Discord who would never let her live it down.

“Stubborn little…” Luna growled under her breath.

“Sheesh, I forgot you lose your cool quickly, Luna. Or is it an alicorn thing, I mean, your folks were pretty clam when we were young—” Discord asked,

“Be quiet, I’m concentrating!” Luna hissed.

Twilight took a step forwards, frowning a little at Luna, “Princess? Are you sure you don’t need—?”

Twilight stopped mid-sentence when Luna shot her a glare from the corner of her eye that could stone a cockatrice immediately and back peddled a little bit into Cadance, who giggled as she gently petted her sister-in-law’s head.

“I think we should just let Auntie Luna do it, I don’t think we need two angry alicorn rulers right now,” Cadance whispered.

Twilight nearly snorted at the irony of Luna getting angry, trying to find a way to calm down her angry sister. Luna paused for a moment, her magic fading as she tried to get her breath back, the bracelet stopping its rattling before her horn suddenly ignited in light again as she strained to force the bracelet off.

She could feel her anger increasing with each second passing, and could feel sweat beds roll down her face. Luna she gritted her teeth so hard they threatened to crack, she knew that it would be better if the other two helped her, but she was set in her stubborn ways.

“Don’t pull a muscle there, Moonbutt.” Discord teased.

“Shut it you mismatched lizard!” Luna roared at him.

Everyone’s eyes, with the exception of Discord who burst out laughing and Cadance who had seen the brash side of Luna before, went wide, shocked to hear the Princess speak so crudely not to mention loudly. Even if it was Discord.

Discord kept snickering away as Luna suddenly let out a loud primal roar of anger as she poured more of her magic into the bracelet as a second vein throbbed on her forehead.

“Break you little piece of shi—”

Luna stopped mid-sentence as she screamed in rage and the bracelet finally broke, exploding into several different pieces. Luna haunched over as she stared angrily at the floor, her pupils like pin pricks as she panted hard and for a brief moment her mane lost its starry, ethereal appearance and was blue, flat against her head.

Everyone looked at each other, unsure if they should say anything.he let out a sigh and shook her head, making her mane return to normal as she turned her head and saw the others staring at her with mixed expressions of shock, concern, confusion and a small amount of fear. Luna felt her cheeks blush a little as she smiled sheepishly at them.

“Sorry, everypony… got carried away.” Luna apologised.

Cadance raised a hoof to her mouth in order to hold back her giggles soon being followed by Pinkie Pie, watching Luna adjust her crown that had become wonky and smooth down the slightly damp patches of her coat with her hoof

“Anyway,” she started, coughing into her hood before turning to address Discord, “Now that it’s gone, can you—”

“Nah,” Discord said suddenly, interrupting Luna as he rolled over in the air and rested his arms behind his head.

Luna blinked at him, “Nah? What do you mean ‘Nah’”?!

“I dun wanna,” Discord replied, “I don’t really feel like it. You know? The time of day is all wrong and whatnot.”

Luna’s eye twitched as a third vein joined in on the throbbing. She was about to lose her cool when Cadance put a hoof on her shoulder and offered a reassuring smile.

“Discord, please. We need your help,” Cadance asked.

Discord stroked his beard, stretching it out long as he over thought about his answer, “Hmm… alright, I’ll do it. But on one condition.”

“Come on, Discord,” Applejack said, “this ain’t the time for games!”

“Oh come now I—.” Discord started.

“Now. Discord!” Luna shouted.

“It’s only a small request though…” Discord replied, pouting a little and pinching his claws together.

“Discord…” Twilight said, glaring at him.

“You know, I can just go, you don’t have enough power to put another bracelet on me. And I don’t really care about this meeting or whatever it is, I could just go to albuquerque for a bit if I wanted.” He replied.

Discord slowly raised his paw up to snap and teleport when Fluttershy took a step forward.

“What is it?” Fluttershy asked. “Your condition?”

Discord looked at Moon Dancer with a goofy grin, “I want a kiss from Moonie.”

Everyone looked at Discord, before turning to look at the bat guard, who in turn was staring at the draconequus with an unreadable face.

“... Come again?” Moon Dancer replied, blinking slowly.

Discord grinned, “You know., a kiss. A smooch, a tongue wrestle, a saliva swap, a snog, a frenchie, seven minutes in —.”

“No.” Moon Dancer replied, shaking her head, “No way, no how, no chance!”

Discord’s eyes welled up as his lip wobbled, “But, but!”

Moon Dancer glared at him, “Don’t you even think about using puppy eyes on me you, you…”

“Sexy rogue?” Discord smirked, wiggling his eyebrows.

Moon Dancer was about to shout at him when she felt Luna’s hoof touch her shoulder gently.

“Please, Private. This is for the good of Equestria…” Luna said.

Moon Dancer opened her mouth, but looked around at the others who all looked at her pleadingly. Except for Princess Cadance, Rainbow Dash and Pinkie who were trying not to giggle. The bat mare inhaled and sighed before grumbling a little.

“Fine… one little kiss.” She grumbled, “I don’t like this… I feel like I’m being pressured.”

“I know, my little guard, and I am sorry. But if this is what it will take to get Discord to co-operate. I’ll make it up to you, I promise.” Luna apologised.

Moon Dancer nodded and sighed before she stuck her cheek out to Discord, waiting for the horror to happen.

“Uh-uh, on the lips,” Discord smirked.

The mare rolled her eyes, grumbling as she stuck her lips out slowly and shut her eyes tightly, praying for the nightmare to be over quickly. There was a moment of silence where nothing happened. Slowly, Moon opened her eyes to see what was going on.

“Are we doing this or—MMMPH!?”

Moon’s eyes went wide as she felt Discord press his lips onto hers and pull back with a loud smooch.

Discord sighed happily as he nuzzled into her neck firmly before coughing, “Whelp! A deal's a deal!”

He snapped his fingers and produced a suit with sewn on patches and a pair of large rectangle framed glasses.

“Come on, you two. Therapy time!”

Discord snapped his talon’s again and teleported himself, Celestia and Archimedes away. Leaving the others alone in the hallway.

“Thank the ancestors…” Luna sighed, “Let’s just hope he can get them to calm down fully and sort out, whatever it was that caused her to snap like that.”

“I’m curious to know what happened to, to be honest,” Twilight added.

The others all nodded in agreement as Luna turned to Moon Dancer, “Private, would you—”

Luna stopped as she looked at her guard, who was staring off in the direction where Discord was floating a moment ago with a goofy look and grin on her face and her eyes half closed. The mare was humming softly and happily to herself as her body gently swayed left to right, her head tilted at a slight angle and one of her ears flopping down at the side of her head.

The kiss had been over in a second, but to Moon Dancer. It was an eternity. Fireworks went off as she felt her lips tingle where they had been touched by his, a choir somewhere sang the most beautiful song as a string quartet began playing a song that would make angels weep. Moon Dancer sighed happily as the others tried not to snicker at the display.

“Private?” Luna asked, trying not to laugh. “Are you okay?”

“Hmm?” Moon Dancer replied, still staring off into the distance before shaking her head, “S-Sorry, your highness, I’m okay.”

“I’d say more than okay…” Rarity tittered.

“Huh? What do you mean?” Moon Dancer asked.

Cadance giggled as she felt her body wiggle with excitement, “I think someponies in love~.”

The others began to laugh as moon Dancer’s face scrunched up and she blushed, glaring at them as she looked away, “I-In love?! With Discord?! D-Don’t so ridiculous!”

“You can’t hide your love from me,” Cadance smirked coyly, “I am love.”

“I-I’m not!” Moon Dancer protested, her cheeks burning more which caused the others to laugh even harder.

“You’re a terrible liar, you know that?” Applejack laughed.

“But, but!” Moon Dancer started.

“As the Princess of Love, I approve of this,” Cadance nodded sagely, “Oh, I am on a roll with my approvals lately! Wait till I tell Shiny about you and—”

“Please don’t tell Shining Armor!” Moon Dancer interrupted, waving her hooves in the air “I’ll never hear the end of it from the other guards!”

“Oh, so you do like Discord?” Luna asked, smirking widely.

Moon Dancer tried to speak but let out a frustrated groan and turned away from the others, crossing her hooves in annoyance. “You’re all just as bad as him!”

“And you love him for it,” Rainbow Dash replied, bursting into hysterics as she fell to the ground with Pinkie Pie.

“We can have a ‘congrats on your special somepony party’ later!” Pinkie Pie said in between giggles.

Luna shook her head as she watched Applejack and Twilight restrain Moon Dancer who was shooting an angry glare at Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie, doing her best to try and grab the two laughing mares and lay a beat down on them whilst saying a colourful choice of words.

Discord sighed as she stretched and then clapped his paw and claws together, “Now… Tia, darling.”

He floated over to Celestia, still frozen in place albeit her eyes were able to move now showing that Luna’s spell was starting to wear off.

“I’m going to let Archy boy out first, then I’ll let your mouth have some movement. Mkay?”

Celestia didn’t reply, expect glare daggers of hatred at him. Discord grinned and clapped loudly.

“Excellent! Let’s begin therapy!”

He snapped his talons and Archimedes suddenly fell face first into a platform that materialized beneath him, making him let out a groan as the clang of metal rang out in the seemingly empty realm Discord called his home.

“Who? What? Where?!” Archimedes spluttered, standing up and looking all around him.

To say he was surprised would be an understatement. He had no idea where he was an all he could see was bizarre patterns in what he assumed was the sky, of blue and purples. All around him were floating islands, big and small, connected to one another with floating planks of wood that looked to represent some form of bridge. One one particular island, he could see a quaint looking house with a white picket fence and a single tree in the garden. It stuck out like a sore thumb compared to the rest of the realm.

“W-Where are we, Discord?” Archimedes asked.

“My home away from home!” Discord replied, twirling in the air and spreading his arms wide, “my own little chaos realm!”

“Great Scott…” Starswirl said, “I thought I’d never see this place for myself.”

Discord suddenly appeared before Archimedes and tilted his head, knocking on the metal man’s helmet, “Starswirl the Bearded, I presume?”

“You presume correct, good sir, and I take it you are the Discord from legends? Bringer of—”

“Bringer of chaos,” Discord interrupted, “Lord of mischief, King of anarchy, Duke of annoyance, Baron of cucumber sandwiches and overall a sexy danger noodle with limbs. At your service!”

Discord coughed into his paw as he stretched out his limbs and yawned, “Though, i’m a good little lad now.”

“I hate to interrupt,” Archimedes began, “But I think my b-beloved is about to become un frozen…”

Discord looked behind him to see that Celestia’s wings were beginning to flutter about as the spell was indeed starting to wear off faster than he was expecting it to, “Whoopsie, one moment.”

He snapped his talons and Celestia was freed, but she let out a squawk as she was forced into a overly sized armchair and had several straps wrapped around her to keep her restrained.

“Let me out, Discord! I have smelting to do!” she roared, her mane and tail still engulfed in flames.

“No,” Discord replied, suddenly looking very seriously as he crossed his arms, “I don’t want you to hurt our friend.”

“Oh, come on, just one little fireball!” she hissed, shooting a ball of fire towards Archimedes.

Archimedes let out a yelp and covered his face, bracing himself for the explosion. Discord, however, was quicker than her spell and managed to step in front of Archimedes and the fire ball. He opened his jaw wide and swallowed the ball of fire, patting his stomach before it suddenly expanded as a boom echoed from inside of him and he belched a small burst of fire,

“That’s-a spicy meatball!” He chuckled before returning his gaze to Celestia and walked over to her, all the while staring sternly at her.

“I’m going to fry his circuits!” Celestia roared, thrashing about in her restraints.

“Okay… screw the therapy, I’m just going to cheat and get this over with,” Discord said as he stood in front of her, snapping his fingers and changed his attire to a firepony. “Okay, Celestia, I’m going to do something and you’re not going to like it. It’s not going to go down well in Celestia town.”

“I’ll burn his shiny metal backside!”

“What are you going to do—?”

Archimedes was interrupted as Discord snapped his talon’s and a small rope appeared beside him to which he tugged on. As he did, a torrent of water fell from no where right over Celestia, making her scream from the cold as steam suddenly rose into the air. When the water vanished, Celestia had returned to normal, albeit her mane was now pink and flat against her frame and her eyes were wide with shock.

“There we go, fire’s out!” Discord grinned, snapping his talon’s and returning to his normal look.

“T-Thank you, D-Discord,” Celestia spluttered, her teeth chattering from the cold, “I needed—”

Archimedes gasped as Discord pulled the rope again and caused another torrent of water to fall onto Celestia who again let out a high pitched shriek. She spluttered and panted as she glared at him, her teeth clattering as she shook from the cold. There was a long pause and a silence that filled Archimedes and Starswirl with a terrifying dread.

“Sorry, just making sure,” Discord said. “You know, I have no idea why Moonbutt said this would take three days… seems like she was taking the pointlessly longer way. Chaotic magic water always does the trick!”

He snapped his talons and Celestia was dried and the chair had vanished, letting her stand up on the ground for herself as her mane returned to its normal ethereal flow.

“Are you going to be calm now, Celestia?” Discord asked sternly.

Celestia nodded, “I am. I apologise for how I acted, Archimedes, Starswirl… I don’t know what came over me.”

“It's fine, my friend,” Starswirl replied, “I think we had it coming.”

Discord stepped back, knowing for once that he should keep quiet as he snapped his talon’s and vanished, leaving the two along with a chair for Celestia to sit in. She climbed up into it and sat down as she looked up at Archimedes.

Both he and Starswirl knew what she wanted to hear, and she didn’t need to hear her ask. With a heavy sigh, Archimedes sat down on the ground as Starswirl spoke.

“As you now will know, Archimedes… was a prototype. He was originally meant to be the ultimate super soldier for Equestria should we ever find ourselves in a war, and at the time of me creating his blueprints. We were close to war with the griffons,” he explained before mumbling. “Though… he soon became my assistant due to certain… guilt factors.”

“But I told you we were having peace negotiations, Starswirl,” Celestia replied, “and we got them as well.”

“I know, I know… but I just couldn’t help myself. I used chaos magic to find out how I could create him, using magic and technology and I just had to do it!”

“And then the day came when you showed me your project… Project six two x five.” Celestia replied sadly. “When you cast that awful spell on me…”

Now that her memories had somewhat been restored, Celestia looked away as she remembered the day she had been summoned by Starswirl to overlook some blueprints he had created. She remembered how horrified she had been at what Starswirl had even suggested creating and she had remembered how loudly she had berated him and ordered him not to go ahead with it and to destroy the blueprints.

And she remembered what had happened the following day.

“Yes… that day. ” Starswirl said softly, his thoughts drifting to the day in question.

Starswirl wiped the sweat from his brow as he put down the soldering rod and let out a heavy sigh. Using his magic, he closed the door to the chest of his creation and took a couple steps back.

“Finally… after all these months, it is time.”

From outside, a crackle of lightning illuminated the room followed by a heavy boom of thunder as he walked over to a series of levers, buttons and switches. Pressing a couple of them and flicking a switch, he turned his attention back to the metal slab in the centre of his laboratory as it whirred and slowly moved at a ninety degree angle, revealing the metal machine strapped firmly in metal restraints to it with cables running from the sides of its head up through the tower and out the top, connected to something.

As the whirring stopped and the table came to a rest at ninety degrees, Starswirl pressed another button which allowed the tower's roof to open as two doors swung down, revealing the stormy sky.

“Now just a little juice to spark the dynamo core…” he muttered.

The lightning crackled as Starswirl waited impatiently, grumbling as the lightning avoid his masts until suddenly, a bolt of lightning struck one. Within a second of it doing so, Starswirl flipped a switch, sending the electric current down through the cables and straight into the machine with a loud buzzing noise.

The brightness forced Starswirl to cover his eyes until it the buzzing had stopped, leaving the room in relative silence. He opened his eyes and grinned widely as two yellow lights from within the helmet began to shine brightly and a billow of steam began to rise from the piping on its back. Several bulbs and see-through tubes along the machine’s body began to flicker into life as a whirring sound rumbled from within the metal body. Starswirl quickly pressed two buttons that released the clamps and wires on the machine.

“Can you hear me?” he asked

“I can.” The machine rumbles.

“Then step forward. Obey.” Starswirl commanded.

The machine creaked and groaned as steam began to slowly rise from his back, taking a lumbering step forward with a heavy thud. Starswirl ecstatically clapped his hooves together as the machine stopped in front of him.
“Wonderfull! I know I can sway her to liking you, I just gotta sell it to her and—.”

There was a knock on the door from downstairs that interrupted him, and a familiar voice called out into the tower.

“Starswirl? Are you here?”

“Up here, my dear Celestia!” Starswirl replied cheerfully.

He trotted up to the door humming to himself as he heard Celestia order some of her guards to remain downstairs as she began to ascend the staircase. Starswirl opened the door and closed it, waiting patiently as Celestia reached the top.

“So what is this big thing you wanted to discuss, Starswirl?” Celestia asked. “I’m running late for a meeting with the ambassador of the Yaks.”

“It won’t take long, I promise!” he beamed, “Now, I know that you said I was to not do this, but I just couldn't resist and I think you will love it! If you give me the time to explain, that is.”

Celestia’s brow arched as she eyed her friend suspiciously. Whenever Starswirl was this excited, it was never a good sign.

“What… have you done, Starswirl?”

“I’ll show you,” he grinned wickedly.

Celestia felt a little uneasy as Starswirl opened the door and ushered her inside. She stepped in and looked around before gasping in shock and horror at the machine standing in the middle of the room. Starswirl, not noticing how she was reacting, trotted beside her like an excited foal as he proudly stuck a hoof out to the machine.

“Ta-da!”

Celestia tried to find words to use but failed, her head shaking a little as she looked from Starswirl to the machine and back.

“Okay, watch this,” Starswirl said. “What is your name?” Starswirl asked.

“This unit is part of Project 62x-5. Designated username: Archimedes,” the machine replied in a monotonic tone.

Celestia took a step back, thrown off in surprise at the deep tone the machine used as Starswirl nodded, his excitement growing by the second.

“Report, what is your purpose?”

The machine whirred a little bit, the steam changing to a dark grey as the right arm and left arm transformed at the same time, revealing the hidden weaponry within as the yellow glow of its eyes faded into a crimson red as it chest opened up to reveal an ominous looking sphere attached to his mainframe.

“To Protect Equestria no matter what, and to eradicate all who dare oppose Princess Celestia. By any means necessary.”

Starswirl’s lips curled into a wicked smile, rubbing his hooves together as a lightning bolt flashed and illuminated the room. Celestia simply stared at the machine, not from shock, but from fear. It was imposing and intimidating looking and the weapons sent a shiver down her spine.

“Excellent… Archimedes, standby mode. Command code zero zero five alpha.” Starswirl said.

“Acknowledged.” Archimedes replied, his eyes dimming a little as the weaponry returned back into his arms and he stood motionless

“Well? What do you think?” Starswirl asked Celestia.

“Starswirl… but how? You only showed me the designs yesterday!” Celestia replied, slowly finding herself getting more and more angry.

“I’ve actually been working on him in secret for a while now,” Starswirl said nonchalantly, not noticing that Celestia had gone quiet. “Now, if you’ll have a seat I can explain everything and—.”

“How dare you…” Celestia whispered, interrupting him.

“Pardon?” Starswirl asked.

“How dare you!” she roared using her voice.

Starswirl was thrown back as the sound wave from her voice hit him, sending him crashing into some crates that were holding metal parts.

“B-But Celestia, I had to!” Starswirl spluttered, “I didn’t know if war would—.”

He stopped when he saw the sheer rage Celestia was display as she glared at him, her tail and mane were ablaze and she was snarling at him. However, what got his attention the most.

Tears that had gathered in the corners of her eyes.

“How could you do this to me, Starswirl? You gave me your word…”

“I-I know but—”

“I ordered you not to do this!” she shouted interrupting him, “Equestria does not need a weapon capable of mass destruction! How does this make us look to the other nations when we preach our ideals of peace and harmony?!”

“Celestia, I—.”

“Silence, Starswirl!” Celestia interrupted, pointing at Archimedes with disgust in her voice. “I read your notes you gave me, yesterday. I know what that thing is capable of! I will not have you jeopardize our peace with the griffons, or any other nation. You will destroy it, and everything about it!”

“But Celestia!” Starswirl protested.

“That’s an order, Starswirl! Or I’ll…” Celestia paused for a moment, as if she was struggling to finish her words, “I’ll have to arrest you for treason…”

Starswirl gritted his teeth as he slowly got up. He couldn’t do it. He didn’t want to do it. He had created the ultimate creation, given life to something. Starswirl had single handedly done something that would have seemed impossible and he couldn’t bear to get rid of it.

Even if his dear friend commanded it.

“... No.”

“No? What do you mean no?!” Celestia replied.

“I can’t! I spent too much time creating him, so many hours, bits and care! I can’t just, just get rid of him like a used tissue! He’s my creation!” Starswirl said, stomping his hoof.

There was an ominous silence between the two before Celestia broke it, glaring at the unicorn.

“If you won’t… I will!” Celestia replied coldly.

She pointed her horn at Archimedes and it shone brightly, covering him in her magic aura. Starswirl’s eyes went wide as he quickly ran in between Celestia and Archimedes.

“No!” Starswirl shouted.

Celestia was about to say something when she felt her magic suddenly get cut off. She looked at Starswirl whose horn was now glowing and felt her body get covered in his magic as she was lifted of the ground. From downstairs, she could hear the guards shouting in confusion, seemingly being affected by Starswirl’s magic as well.

“What are you doing, unhand me!” Celestia shouted.

“I'm sorry, Celestia, I’m afraid I can’t do that…”

Celestia gasped as she felt like something was crawling inside of her head and screamed, looking at Starswirl with tears running down her cheeks. His eyes had become yellow and red as he stared at her with a maniacal stare, his magic aura changing to a dark purple and the familiar sense of magic flowed off of him which caused Celestia to widen her eyes in surprise.

“C-Chaos magic?! How did you—?”

She screamed mid-sentence as she felt something force itself into her mind, into the very source of her magic like something was trying to suppress something and could feel her body go limp as she suddenly fell into a state of unconsciousness.

Starswirl grunted as his horn shone brighter and in a flash of light, Celestia was gone, along with her guards having being sent back to the palace from where they had come from, leaving him alone with Archimedes. Starswirl fell to the floor exhausted, huffing and panting as his own eyes filled with tears and he shut them tightly.

“I’m… so sorry… Celestia. But I can’t… Equestria will need Archimedes, one way or another.”

Chapter XV - A Small Upgrade

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Archimedes

Chapter XV - A Small Upgrade

Moon Dancer felt the vein in her forehead throb painfully as she glared hateful daggers at the group of ponies ahead of her. She had long given up caring that three of them, were in fact, Princess’. Right now, they were all just pains in her flanks. What was annoying her the most was Pinkie Pie dancing around her, singing an obnoxious song as well as babbling about throwing a party for Moon and Discord.

Rainbow and Applejack were simply laughing their heads off, finding the whole thing amusing.To the credit of both Twilight and Luna, they were both doing an excellent job of holding back their own laughter, whereas Rarity was having a harder time doing so.

“So… you do like him?” Cadance asked, smiling like an excited school filly.

Moon let out a frustrated groan, “Yes, okay? I don’t really understand why, but he’s just...”

“Exotic?” Applejack offered as she snorted.

“Into some weird stuff?” Rainbow teased.

Cadance suddenly snapped her head to glare angrily at both Applejack and Rainbow Dash. The two froze upon seeing the fiery gaze of the alicorn and immediately shut up, their pupil;s shrinking as they swallowed a lump in their throats.

Fluttershy was well known for her ‘stare’, and the two had witnessed it before when Fluttershy had broken up an argument the two were having. And whilst it wasn't as effective, Cadance could certainly give the shy mare a run for her bits.

“Love, is no laughing matter!” Cadance scowled. “Everypony has the right to love who or whatever they wish to. I’ve seen ponies and dragons be together, heck, Archimedes wants to be with my aunt. Are you going to make fun of him for that? Or her?!”

“Well… no,” Applejack replied.

“I guess not…” Rainbow Dash mumbled, “But come on, we were only joking. No need to get so offen—.”

“Are you two picking on Moon Dancer and Archimedes because you two can’t just shut up and kiss each other already?” Cadance asked, interrupting Rainbow Dash.

Both mares eyes shot wide as they stared at the alicorn, then back at each other.

“What?!” they both replied.

“Well, I can sense when ponies are in love and there is some kinda built up sexual tension between you two. Not to mention, I can tell when ponies are too nervous to act on those feelings, and instead lash out at other couples.”

Unbeknownst to Rainbow Dash and Applejack, Cadance winked at Moon Dancer before the aforementioned ponies sneered and pointed a hoof at each other whilst addressing Cadance.

“Me?! In love with a thick headed numbskull?!” they both shouted in unison.

The two blinked and spun their heads to glare at one another.

“Who you calling numbskull?!” they both shouted again in unison.

“I asked you first!” Rainbow snapped.

“Mah rootin tootin behind ya did!” Applejack snapped back.

“Oh please!” Rairty chipped in tittering, “Must you bicker? Just kiss and get it over with!”

Twilight chuckled, “It does seem you two are a good match, opposites attract. I think you’d be a great couple!”

“Oh!” Pinkie squeaked, coming between the two and pulling them into her in a bone crushing sideways hug, “I get to through a ‘congratulations on coming out of the closet party’ for you two to!?

The two mare’s eyes widened gain as they stared at their grinning pink friend, for once in their lives speechless as they heard Rarity finally lose it in the background along with Twilight who fell to bits laughing.

Cadance tittered, using the ensuing argument Pinkie caused as a distraction to place a hoof on Moon Dancer’s shoulder and smile.

“Love is strange and often cannot be explained. Maybe—.”

“I don’t love him!” Moon interrupted, scrunching her nose, though a small blush formed on her cheeks.

“Oh? Don’t you?” Cadance asked.

“W-Well, I mean. I like him… I guess? But I dunno if I love him.” Moon mumbled, pressing her hooves together

Cadance nodded, “Like I said, love is strange and more often than not it’s complicated.”

Moon Dancer mumbled something and scrunched her nose again. As she did so, she failed to notice the small flash come from behind her. However, Cadance didn’t and quickly looked up before looking back to Moon Dancer with a mischievous smile.

“So… what is it about him you like?”

Moon dancer she sat on her rump and groaned. There was no way in tartarus she was going to get out of this, and against her better judgement she decided to throw all care out the window and take advantage of the fact it was technically just her and Cadance, seeing as the others were distracted.

And Cadance was at least, being supportive and being genuinely sincere about her curiosity on her feelings to Discord, even if Moon Dancer didn’t one hundred percent understand them herself.

“He’s infuriating! He winds me up and winds himself on my like a bloody scarf!” Moon replied, glaring at Cadance, “All he has done since he bloody showed up in my life is cause me nothing but chaos! I’ve nearly been killed by summoned fantasy orks, witnessed what happens when a promise got broken under a weird ritual, gotten into trouble with both rulers of my home land!”

She paused and let out low sigh and smiling a little.

“But at the same time… I’ve felt more alive than I have done in a long time. I don’t know why, but ever since the freaky danger noodle started flirting and generally being annoying. I’ve felt… weird, inside. I’ve had plenty of crushes I mean, who hasn’t? But… with him it feels different. I’ve tried ignoring the feeling, tried beating him up to push them down when he’s flirted and tried to show my disdain for his affections. But nothing worked, he’s insufferable!!”

Moon crossed her forearms, flattening her ears and scrunched her nose for a third time as she blushed. “Then the git goes and kisses me. I tried to hate it… but… oh, sod it!”

Moon let out a frustrated groan and threw her forearms up.

“I liked it. Okay? I kissed a draconequus and I liked it! The damn insane lumox makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside and I hate it but love it but want to hate it more but can’t and I want more of it.”

Moon let out a lid and frustrated groan as she threw her forelegs into the air. “Who in Tartarus gets these feelings so damn quickly? It makes no sense!”

Moon looked up at Cadance who was grinning and shaking on the spot as if she was ready to burst. The mare tilted her head in confusion, turning to see that the others had also stopped watching Applejack and Rainbow Dash arguing and were also now looking at Moon looking like they were all about to laugh.

It was then she heard someone sighing in happiness behind her.

“Thank you, Faust... That. Was. Beautiful…”

Moon Dancer’s eyes went wide as she felt her body go cold and her ears splayed against her head and swallowed a lump in her throat.

“Oh, Faust no…” she whispered.

She slowly turned around to see that, not only that Archimedes and Celestia were behind her, but that Discord was standing behind her with the largest grin on his face and his eyes were wide with delight aqn tears threatening to flow from them.

“It’s okay, Moonie. You just said how you feel. Honestly? I am so full of your love right now, I literally could not take another drop.” Discord said before he opened his arms and smiled. “Brace yourself, I’m coming in.”

Before Moon could say anything, Discord swooped down and wrapped his arms under her forelegs and scooped her up into a hug.

“H-Hey!” Moon squeaked.

“You smell like a father figure…” Discord whispered.

“Wait, what?” Moon asked, blinking in confusion.

Discord ignored her and continued to hug her tightly to his body,” Mmmmmm….”

Moon Dancer sighed and gave up, letting her limbs dangle as she was cuddled by Discord.

“Did… we miss something?” Archimedes asked trying to hold back a snicker as he turned to look at Celestia.

“I’m sure we will hear all about it at dinner,” Celestia replied.

She tittered as Moon Dancer glared daggers at the others as the continued with their laughing as her blush burned through her grey fur. Deciding enough was enough, Celestia coughed loudly into her hoof.

“Whilst this is all amusing, perhaps now is a good time to head for dinner?” She asked.

“Allow me, my dear!” Starswirl chimed in. “I shall teleport us there in no time!”

Aside from those who knew it was Starswirl, this was the first time the others actually were able to realize there was a second voice coming from archimedes. Whilst they had heard the second voice before when Celestia had turned into a fiery embodiment of fury, they were too focused on her to pay it much attention at the time.

“Wait, is that… Starswirl?” Fluttershy asked softly.

“Hmm? Oh, hello there!” Starswirl replied, waving Archimedes’ right arm.

“Holy moley…” Applejack muttered, “You weren’t kiddin’!”

“Kidding about what, my earth pony friend? I am indeed the one and only Starswirl the Bearded! Well… not so much bearded now, more or less Starswirl the stuck inside his metal assistant,” Starswirl chuckled.

“But. How. I. Huh?” Rainbow spluttered as her eyes space a little.

“I think we’ve broken Miss Dash, Sir.” Archimedes’ voice chuckled.

“Oh, I certainly hope not. I find that fixing a pony… oh wait, you were just using a phrase of some sort?”

“Indeed, Sir,” Archimedes replied.

“Oh! Oh! Oh!” Pinkie squealed, appearing on Archimedes’ pauldron, “I can’t wait to throw you a party Mr Starswirl!”

“A party? Sounds wonderful!” Starswirl replied, “Never one to turn down a party and— wait… will there be alcoholic beverages?”

“Well… I won’t have any, I’m not allowed to drink alcohol… not after last time.” Pinkie sheepishly replied, “Buuuuuut Applejack has the best cider!”

“Bolly!” Starswirl replied with a joyful laugh.

“How are you going to drink it though, Mr Starswirl?” Rarity asked, “What with you being stuck in there and all.”

Starswirl waved her off dismissively with Archimedes’ right arm, “Pish posh! Where there’s a will, there’s a way. I’ll think of something don’t you worry my friend!

Discord rolled his eyes and let out a groan of annoyance, bored of the conversation and pulled his arm up revealing several different styles of wrist watches, tapping on of them on the screen.“Yes, yes this is all very fascinating, but some of us are getting hungry over here. Me and Moonie need to hurry this meal up so we can plan an official date. Right, Moonie?”

“I will gouge your eyes out,” Moon Dancer hissed as she glared at Discord.

“Glare all you want, I know how you feeeeeel~” he replied wiggling his eyebrows.

“Bugger me sideways…” Moon Dancer grumbled before glaring at Cadance, who only grinned happily back.

“Yes, I think we should save all of our questions for Starswirl after the meal has ended.” Celestia added before looking to Archimedes, “As well as some more of my own.”

Archimedes nodded as Starswirl coughed into the machine’s right hand, “Agreed, now allow me to teleport us there!”

Starswirl snapped the fingers of Archimedes’ right hand and paused for a moment before letting out a low groan of irritation.

“Confound it! I forgot about not being able to use my blasted magic! I’m nothing without it!” Starswirl wailed.

“I’m sure we can find a way to fix that, Starswirl.” Luna replied, rolling her eyes.

“It’s whatcha get for ticking off chaos magic~,” Discord added, “chaos doesn't like being used like that, so it’s pretty much not letting you do anything.”

Starswirl muttered several curses under his breath as Discord patted Archimedes on the head.

“But don’t worry your old pal Discord is here to help!”

“You are?” Starswirl replied.

Discord chuckled as he nudged Archimedes’ head, “Sure am! I’m a good guy now, remember?”

The draconequus snapped his talons and an ear splitting sound of metal being scraped against metal echoed loudly throughout the hallway, forcing all the ponies to cover their ears with their hooves. When the noise suddenly stopped, they all gasped at what had happened to Archimedes.

Just above his visor, was a long, spiral unicorn's horn that jutted out around ten inches in length. Archimedes looked at the group, then averted his eyes up to see the horn and gasped.

“Discord, is that a—?” Archimedes started.

“A genuine, one hundred per cent unicorn horn!” Discord interrupted with a beam, “Patented by yours truly, and made out of metal to boot!”

“And can I—?” Starswirl began.

“Use magic? Of course!” Discord interrupted again.

“Discord, my friend. You are a star!” Starswirl laughed cheerfully. “Though, will be tricky to return to my full power. Quite hard to magic through another sentient being. Once I get back to grips with my magic, I can research a way to amplify the restrictiveness. You can assist me with that if you wish, Miss Sparkle.”

Twilight froze on the spot and stared up at Archimedes as her jaw dropped and the notebook fell from her magical grip. “M-Me? Help you? Starswirl wants my help?!”

Cadance giggled softly as she poked her sister in law. “I think you broke her, Starswirl. Working with you is something she’s always wanted to have been able to do.”

“Oh… well, give the old girl a moment,” Starswirl replied. “Archimedes, can you face some of those pedestals nearby?”

“Yes, Sir,” Archimedes replied as he turned his metal body to be in front of a couple of pedestals.

Starswirl mumbled for a moment before Archimedes’ horn suddenly sparked and lit up, covering it in a soft yellow aura before several nearby stone pedestals holding some vases began to lift into the air.

“Fascinating… I should make a journal on the experiences of using magic through another!” Starswirl said before gasping and looking to Discord “ Oh! What about me using chaos magic to project my own magic—?”

Discord interrupted him by appearing right in front of Archimedes and hissing aggressively, his whole body warping into a swirling cloud of dark colours and shapes that alternated rapidly. “No! You are not allowed to use my magic, ever again. Starswirl The Bearded! Try it again and I will do far worse than seal you inside your tin contraption!”

The room rumbled and the walls groaned and creaked as the lightning began to fade into black before it suddenly stopped. Everyone stared at Discord in shock as he suddenly returned to normal and blinked. He brought his paw up and coughed daintily into it.

“Uh… sorry about that old boy, that was chaos talking. Literally. It tends to use me as a spokesman every now and again but yeah,” Discord explained, before becoming very serious and glaring at him, “I agree with it, you’re not allowed to use chaotic magic ever again.”

Starswirl was about to protest when he saw Celestia scowling at him.

“Seconded.” Celestia added, glaring intently at the robot.

“Oh… you two are no fun, “Anyway, enough chit-chat let us—”

Starswirl paused for a moment as Archimedes stood still, making several grunting noises as if he was straining to do something. The others looked at one another a little confused before Starswirl spoke up.

“I appear to no longer have function of the right arm…”

“Oh yeah, that. I could only give you that horn in exchange for something of yours, which was the control of Archy’s arm.” Discord said before donning a pair of large circle spectacles and a pipe, blowing bubbles out of it. “If you want to gain something, you must present something of equal value. Or something along those lines. I haven't read the books in a while. Foreign comics can be so dark yet gripping in emotio, you know?”

“You did that on purpose.” Starswirl huffed.

Discord smiled innocently, “I assure you, my good sir. I only did what the natural laws demanded!

“Uhuh,” Starswirl replied, obviously not buying it.

“Cheer up, Sir,” Archimedes said, “I’m more than capable of piloting us around.”

Starswirl let out a frustrated and weary sigh, “Let’s just go have some blasted dinner...”

“Can you even eat, Starswirl?” Celestia asked.

Starswirl chuckled, “Well, we’ll soon see won’t we. If Archimedes can drink tea, then I’m sure he can eat.”

He focused his magic into his horn and the group shone yellow before suddenly vanishing, leaving the hallway vacant.

As the sun started to set over the horizon, the tower remained silent as it had done for so long, even with the recent disturbances it had endured. However, as it seemed like the night would fall in silence and cover the tower in its midnight hue, rustling from the forest broke the silence as three individuals stepped into the small clearing before the base of the tower.

“Alright, let’s just get what the boss wants and get out of here. I am sick of this fucking tower and I don’t want to come back a third time!”

“Sheesh, Red. You don’t need to yell.”

“I’ll yell all I damn want, I’m fed up of being screwed over like this. He has the plans, doesn't he?!”

“Yeah, but it was incomplete. Must be pretty damn important if he got that mad.”

Red groaned in frustration. It had not been too long since their return to their employer, who she still wasn’t exactly sure who it was, but the pay was too good to ignore and she took the job without informing the others about the finer details. The gang itself wasn’t all that much as it only consisted of three members. Red, the leader, Metamorphosis, changeling infiltrator and Blue Wing, a pegasus scout. The three had made a fairly decent reputation for themselves in the outskirts of Equestria, doing odd jobs here and there.

Red was hoping with this job she would be able to finally persuade others to join her and eventually set up a large company of mercenaries. However, she was now hating the fact she took on the job, and didn't like being treated by her employer like this. But she had heard rumors, only after taking the gig, that he had a short temper and was very well connected to certain unsavory individuals. So failure really wasn’t an option.

“Next time, Red. Do us a favour and actually check who the hell is giving out the contracts?” Meta said, “I’d rather know before hand, you know?”

“Yeah I know, let’s just get this over with. The sooner we get paid, the sooner I can get drunk and enjoy myself.”

“You should really cut back on that,” blue snickered, “Or do you want to wake up tied up again and being sore from having a big old minotaur ram his thick—”

“Shut up, Blue!” Red snapped, her cheeks burning as the pegasus laughed.

“Couldn’t wake straight for days!” Blue laughed louder before yelling as Red tackled him and started to punch him.

Metamorphosis shook his head as he grumbled, glaring at the two as they fought, “Bloody kids, I’m getting too old for this shit… shoulda just stayed with the hive.”

“Oh, quit your moping, Meta,” Blue said, pushing Red off him and pulling the old changeling into a shoulder hug, “After this gig, we’re going to be set for life!”

“Yeah, yeah. Let’s just find, whatever it is we’re looking for.” Meta replied.

“Same as the other thing, it should be in the safe still,” Red explained as they approached the tower, “It should—.”

She stopped mid sentence and stopped in place, holding up her left arm making the other two stop and immediately become alert.

“What is it?” blue asked.

Red pointed to the ground around the tower, “Remember how we though no one had been here before? Someone's been here, and recently.”

“Are you sure?” Blue asked. “I thought you said this was a forgotten place?”

Red nodded, “Positive. Look, these tracks are pony hooves.”

The griffon pointed to large steam iron shaped imprints in the ground, as well as several small hood shaped prints as Meta inspected them, his horn glowing over the larger imprints.

“Aren’t these the ones from before? The ones you said were probably animal prints?” He said indicating the larger prints.

“I didn’t look properly then,” Red defended herself with a huff. “I just assumed they were from a big animal. You know the weird creatures in here.”

Meta merely rolled his eyes, “Whatever… let’s just be careful. I can’t sense anyone here with my magic, so whoever it was is long gone.”

“Musta been a few…” Blue muttered, “I count at least eight or nine ponies.”

“Let’s just get the plans and go, no point wondering who was here.” Red said, before she turned to address the pegasus. “Blue, can you fly up top and keep an eye out, just in case.”

“On it,” Blue replied with a mock salute, taking off into the sky.

“Meta, gimme some light, yeah?” She asked.

Meta nodded, and his horn shone brighter as they entered the tower. Red looked all around her as she made a note of what had changed.

“Oh yeah… there’s definitely been activity here since we last were. See that hole in the wall? And all these prints in the ground?”

“Yeah… they’re definitely fresh. You think they came for the same thing?” Meta asked.

Red scanned the area where the safe was located and shook her head, seeing it was covered in some debris, “No, I doubt it. Besides, we have the amulet, it’s the only thing that can open the safe.”

“True… let’s just find this damn thing and get outta here.” Meta replied.

Red nodded as she shoved the debris aside when something caught her eye. As Meta levitated the amulet from his satchel, the griffon walked over near where the hole in the wall was an picked up an orb on the ground. Her eyes widened a little bit as she chirped in curiosity and turned it around in her claws.

“Alright… got it open. Now can—.” Meta started before looking up at her, “Red? Hey, Red!”

“Hmm?” Red replied, still focusing her attention on the orb.

“You going to help or what?”

“Hmm?” she replied, again her attention on the orb.

“Griffons…” Meta mumbled as he rolled his eyes, rummaging in the safe.

There was a light thud as Blue landed in the entranceway, shaking out his wings a little as he stepped inside. “Hey guys, there’s a big storm coming from the east. We should get outta here before we get caught in it.”

“Damn you ponies, why can’t you control this weather like in every other part of the Kingdom?” Meta grumbled.

“Oh, quit whining, you old fart. You find it yet?” Blue replied.

Meta hummed before he levitated out several rolls of paper and sighed, “Has to be one of these… but bird lady is a little preoccupied.”

“Huh?” blue asked, looking over to Red who was happily batting the orb about. “Why do they do that?”

“Don’t know, don’t care. Red, stop being a twit and help me find the document!” Meta replied as he used his magic to throw a book at Red.

Red squawked and dropped the orb, the orb making a chunk sound as it rolled forwards a little, “Hey, what was that—?”

“There, that ought to do it.”

Red jumped at the sudden voice as both Blue and Meta took up defensive positions and looked around the room to see where the sudden voice had come from. Red stared at the orb and quickly picked it up as the other two, realizing there was no one else there, joined her and all three looked into the orb.

“What in Equestria is that thing?!” Blue asked.

“I have no idea…” Meta whispered.

Red’s eyes widened as she recognized it from the paper she had brought their employer. As she watched the orb play its message, she couldn’t shake the feeling that something bad was coming, something ominous, something she and her friends had inadvertently started when they took the job.

What the hell is going on… ? she wondered as all three continued to watch the orb’s message.