My Little Pony & Robot Friends: Infiltration

In Ponyville's library, specifically, in the basement, an experiment was taking place.

Twilight Sparkle had done some reflecting, and upon observation, made a startling conclusion. Everypony had ways of dealing with Decepticon goons who didn't follow Shockwave's truce order. Unicorns had magic they could use to smelt their armor or throw something big and heavy. Pegasi could control weather to devastating effect against the robots. Earth Ponies had their prodigal strength that could dent holes in the lighter-armored ones. That was even before getting into the various mutations Twilight and Fluttershy had gone through.

But what about Spike? His claws were barely sharp enough to carve paper, his scales were thick, but not nearly so thick as to resist a Vehicon's laser fire, and his fire breath would not melt their armor. Just give them an irritating singe sensation.

Which is why Twilight had hooked up to her various science machines and doohickeys, monitoring his brainwaves with a helmet.

"Twilight, I don't understand." Spike complained, looking for an excuse to get out of Twilight's mad studies. "How is this going to help me fight Decepticons on my own?"

"By monitoring your brainwave patterns, Spike," Twilight answered, and Spike could tell he had just triggered a burst into Twilight's "Exposition Mode". "I can build a helmet to keep you in control of yourself while I use my magic to turn you into your adult form that you turned into when you became a greedy monster on your birthday!"

Spike raised an eyebrow. "Who what now?"

Twilight sighed. "I'm going to use my magic to mature you into an adult, and then I'm going to give you a control... helmet..." Twilight spoke slowly and waved her hooves in the air to make sure Spike understood what she was saying. "To keep you in your right mind without giving into your dragon greed!"

One year ago, during Spike's birthday, Spike had magically been turned into a full-on adult dragon by basically going through dragon puberty and giving into the natural greed present in Equestria dragons. After some mishaps, everypony was able to turn him back to his normal, non-greedy baby dragon self, but Twilight had become interested in harnessing his adult form as his method of defense against Decepticons.

"Oooh!" Spike groaned. He put his finger to his lip as he was seized by a fantasy of being in his matured form, using his improved fire breath to take out a horde of Decepticons, rescuing Rarity from their clutches, perhaps forgetting Rarity had earned an honorary spot in the Wreckers for a reason. "That would be pretty cool!"

"A few adjustments here, a little programming there...and done!" Twilight proudly held up a metallic, black ring with a tiny pole attached to it that had green and red lights blinking. It was much too large to be of any use to anypony, but it would the adult form of Spike's head just fine.

"All right... we'll need to go outside." Twilight said, taking the electronic instruments off Spike. "Wouldn't want to you tear a hole in the library." Twilight and Spike chuckled, and then they climbed out of the basement and exited the front door of the library, where Celestia's sun was shining brilliantly, warming the hearts and bringing smiles on all who resided underneath it.

"There we go." Twilight placed the helmet on Spike's head, and pulled out a small white gem like the one Fluttershy had.

"Oh!" Spike wiggled his claws and greedily snapped up the gem, meaning to eat it the way dragons did. Before Twilight could object, he popped the gem in his mouth, adopted the expression of somepony who just ate something sour, and spat the gem back out.

"Spike..." Twilight scolded softly, catching the saliva gem in her magic. "This is a transformation gem. It's enchanted to switch ponies between forms. Fluttershy and I both have one for turning into our Terrorpony/Insectipony forms when there I can't use my magic for either of us. It should enable you to switch between adult and child forms without a problem...if it works."

Twilight prepared to stick the gem back in Spike's claw, before remembering it was covered in dragon drool. She blasted it with a magical cleaning spell, then put it in his claw. Twilight backed away and lowered her head, then blasted Spike himself with her magic. A beam of purple light escaped her horn and hit Spike directly in the chest.

Spike began growing in his size, his round, cute face extending into an intimidating snout of a full-grown dragon. His limbs began stretching out, and his haunches became fuller, in the sense he got haunches, as he had them, as before he had thighs. His tiny claws expanded and sharpened into brutal slabs with pointy things attached it. The light on the control helmet began blinking furiously as it tried to monitor Spike's brainwaves. When he was done, Spike was tall enough to look an average-sized Cybertronian in the optic sensor.

"Well?" Twilight called, raising her voice so he could hear her. "Are you turning into a mindless monster yet!?

Spike raised his now-massive claw and rubbed his head. "I think," he answered with his voice several baritones lower, almost to the point of being as deep as Grimlock's, "if I was going to turn into a mindless, rampaging monster, I would have by now."

Twilight put a hoof to her chin. "I suppose you're right."

Spike clutched at his throat suddenly.

"Spike? Are you all right!?"

"Uh, yeah... I think so, I just..." Spike gagged and then seemed to hack a fireball the way a cat did a hairball, which then turned into a floating letter marked with a royal Canterlot seal. The letter floated down to Twilight, who held it steady in her magic so she could scrutinize it.

"That's funny..." Twilight noted, observing the royal seal. Usually, the royal seal was a gold circle with a 'C' emblazoned on it, tied around the scroll be a red band, but this one had a silver circle and a blue band.

Twilight undid the knot, and unfurled the letter and began reading it. "Dearest Twilight Sparkle... come to Canterlot, immediately! Please do not involve any more parties than necessary. Signed... Princess Luna!?" Twilight put the letter on the ground and looked at Spike.

"Uh...why are you looking at me like that?" Spike asked, anxiously bringing his claws together.

"I think it's time you returned me a small favor." Twilight said mischievously, making Spike uneasy. Twilight blasted him with magic again, and a blinding blue light began to swirl around Spike, forming cocoon that encased his ribcage before a burst of even more blinding light flashed through the air.

"Aaagh, I...huh?" Spike raised his arms and looked over his back, seeing to his displeasure that he now had transparent wings like a butterfly's. They were beautifully decorated with green and purple swirls, as well as very sparkly. The same magical wings Twilight conjured for Rarity during the Best Young Fliers' Competition. They were pretty and functional, but much too girly frou-frou for Spike's tastes. "Aw, man!"

"Oh, shut up. My magic's improved, so they won't be as fragile. Of course, you're going to fly into the sun, are you? Now, about that favor..." Twilight reminded him. She galloped around the side of him and climbed up his tail to his back, her hooves ascending up his now much more scaly back. Twilight placed her hooves firmly at the base of her wings. Spike had a habit of climbing onto Twilight's back during long treks, variable as to whether he was out of energy, or was just being lazy. So, now that Spike had grown to the size of a house, it would be much more efficient for Twilight to ride him instead.

Once Twilight nestled herself in firmly enough she wouldn't be easily knocked loose, she patted Spike's neck. "Mush!"

Spike groaned at being reduced to a sled dog, but flapped his wings and flew towards the Canterlot mountain.

With ease, Spike landed on a royal platform nominally intended to house several partying nobles, but frequently used as areas of roost by Autobot and Decepticon ambassadors. Spike's presence did not go unnoticed with his increase in size, and Luna rushed out to meet him and Twilight.

"Twilight Sparkle!" Luna exclaimed. "It is good that thoust hath arrived! We have two very major issues to discuss!"

"What is it?" Twilight asked, running down from Spike's back.

"First, we have a most unusual situation... there is a dragon on the pavilion of the other whom proclaims to have forsaken her lesser-educated kind and wishes to sign into Canterlot's royal services."

"A dragon?" Twilight raised her eyebrow.

In a rare inversion of the normal situation, the easy-going Spike corrected the erudite Twilight. "Dragoness."

Twilight rolled her eyes. "Whatever. Let's meet her!" Twilight rushed ahead, only for Luna to hold out a hoof and blocked her from entering the building proper.

"We have another issue, Twilight Sparkle." Luna calmly explained. Luna looked around as if suspicious of there being spies around. Once satisfied that no one was around, Luna leaned in and whispered.

"Our sister hath disappeared."

"WHAT!?" Twilight shouted, pushing herself away from Luna. "PRINCESS CELESTIA IS MISS-" Luna shoved a hoof into Twilight's mouth.

"Twilight Sparkle!" Luna snapped. "There is a reason that our letter carried the instructions not to involve more parties than necessary! Dost thou realize the state Canterlot would be if everypony knew that our sister hath disappeared? Panic and riot in the streets! Especially when human-pony relations art the way they art! Thoust must keep this a secret, understand?"

Twilight nodded, though with Luna's hoof in her mouth she couldn't really articulate any words effectively.

"Until our sister can be found, all operations will be run through us- discreetly." Luna added sharply. "We must keep her disappearance a secret from the public and proceed as though nothing hath happened. Understood?" Twilight nodded again.

Luna removed her hoof from Twilight's mouth and turned away imperiously. A Royal Guard came trotting out to the pavilion and was startled by Spike's monstrous appearance, but remained focused on his task.

"Princess Luna!" The Guard saluted. "I thought I heard shouting! Is everything all right?"

"Fie, solider!" Luna shouted over her shoulder. She applied her hoof to her face in embarrassment at her speech quirk giving the wrong messages. "We mean, everything is fine, solider. Dismissed."

The Guard nodded, and left.

"Now, about that dragoness..." Luna emphasized, tilting a knowing glance towards Spike. Luna led Twilight into the building, while it took Spike a moment to realize the best course of action for him would be to fly over the building to the other pavilion.

"Her name is Whimsey Weatherbee." Luna explained to Twilight. "She appears to have a limited ability to use weather magic centralized in her wings. She also appears much more refined than her dragon brethren, being quite the polite speaker... here we are."

They arrived to the other pavilion, where a dragon the size of Spike's adult form was waiting. She was rather plump in the belly, with a green underbelly and orange scales that seemed to have a dash of pink injected into them. Her eyes were small and round, and she had her head scales curled backwards life a tuft of hair after treatment from Rarity's makeover sessions.

"Hello." The dragoness said to Twilight. "I'm Whimsy Weatherbee. You must be Twilight Sparkle?" Whimsy bowed, prompting Twilight to do the same.

"Yes, I am. What brings you to Canterlot, Whimsy?"

Whimsy rapped her claw proudly against her chest. "I grow tired of the brutality of my fellow dragons. I saw there had to be more to life than their bullying ways, and that is why I am here; to offer myself, in whatever I can, to the aid of Equestrian in any way I can."

Twilight blinked awkwardly. Princess Luna wasn't kidding when she said Whimsy was a polite speaker.

A shadow fell over them, and Whimsy looked up see Spike descending gently down to the pavilion.

"Oh!" Whimsy exclaimed, a blush forming on her face. "H-hello... w-who are you?"

"I'm Spike!" Spike declared proudly, pointing a thumb proudly at himself. "Who are you?"

"Um, W-Whimsy W-weatherbee..." Whimsy stuttered.

Luna noticed Whimsy's change in demeanor. Earlier, when they had spoke, Whimsy had been clear and concise, using carefully selected words and always retracting anything that might have offended the Royal Guards. Now she was stuttering, and, stammering, and muttering. "Whimsy? Art thoust feeling well?"

"Um, yeah, yeah..." Whimsy cleared her throat and shiftily looked away from Spike. "Just something in my throat, that's all. You were saying, Your Majesty?"

"Wait here, and we shall bring thou thy paperwork to be granted a home in Canterlot, then we shalt work on getting thy a job." Luna said before turning and trotting back into the castle.

Luna stopped and turned around with a hoof raised for attention. "Oh, and Twilight Sparkle! There is a meeting on Cybertron later involving Optimus Prime, Lord Shockwave, and some humans we haven't met on top of General Bryce."

Twilight grimaced. General Bryce was the main reasons she kept on hating humans, even against all the good she could see them do with no strings attached. Always, she would help Jack with a problem, or watch June working furiously at the Jasper Hospital, wondered why she kept hating them, and then she would think about Bryce and Chief Charlie Burns of the Griffin Rock Police, both of whom had tried to kill her in retaliation during a time when a terrorist organization and a Decepticon had tricked into waging war on the Autobots. Admittedly, Burns had a good reason, as in the course of said trickery, Twilight had kidnapped his youngest son, but Bryce was just a fanatical, pony-hating human supremacist, and Burns' murder attempt was done while Twilight was trying to apologize for the kidnapping, so she had an excuse. As choppy as any of Rainbow Dash's excuse for slacking off, but an excuse.

Twilight signed. "Who are the new guys?"

"Business partners by the names of Dylan Gould and Porter C. Powell, as well as Gould's employees."

"Oh!" Twilight squealed sarcastically, following after Luna to help in royal duties. "Only two letters away from 'Ghoul!' He must be an absolute delight."

Luna laughed. "Huzzah! We doth thyne's sarcasm...most amusing, Twilight Sparkle."

Twilight jerked her neck back, not sure how to respond to that. How does one responded to that, being told by royalty that her brand of sarcasm was amusing? With another dry remark?

Twilight decided to keep things simple and just accept the compliment. "Um...thanks, Princess."

"This way." Luna quietly ordered, returning to business mode. "We art to investigate clues to Celestia's disappearance."

Twilight followed Luna, and Luna led her down the castle's stairs to the hallways where the castle had its guest suites. They talked as they went down the hallway.

"Our written records show that a very tiny Autobot by the name of 'Countdown' t'was staying in one of the guests suites."

"Tiny Autobot? Not a Mini-Con?"

"No. He had a proper vehicle mode, just...smaller. Ah!" Luna stopped and gestured at the door on the right. "This was Countdown's room." Luna pushed the door open, and Twilight peered in to look. She was befuddled by the contents of the room.

They were three computers with blue screens hooked up in the room, situated next to each other. On each screen were cyan electronic-line drawings of Sweetie Belle, Apple Bloom, and Scootaloo, with text in Cybertronian Cybertronix font with input commands on each limb of the ponies.

Twilight began surmising what little they had. "All right. We have a tiny Autobot who unaccounted for, Celestia missing, and apparently some computers." Twilight approached the computer and pushed a hoof on the interactive controls. "With what appears to be tech specs of the Cutie Mark Crusaders..." Twilight pressed the button, only to be met with a bleep she knew to be the Cybertronian form of an error message. "Hmm..."

"What?" Luna asked. "What dost thou see?"

"Well, it looks like these are intended to somehow control the Crusaders." Twilight explained. "It seems like the connection's been severed, so they don't work anymore. But if they did, I could push this button, and that button and make Sweetie Belle dance like a chicken." Twilight put a hoof to her chin and. "Hmm..."

Luna shook her head at the lack of evidence. There wasn't much to conclude on, beyond that Countdown was up to no good, and had something to do with Celestia's absence, but they had no way of figuring out where Countdown himself was or what his motive might be.

Luna cast a glance outside the room to spare herself from the pitiful atmosphere, then her eyes doubled in size and she lost control of herself. "Scrap! Twilight Sparkle, the conference meeting will be held soon! We must make haste!"

Very soon, a recently-formed three-nab team of all three major species, each one a representative for the media output of their respective planet. The human was only brought in later, but now the trio of reporters were all together, they had no trouble working together. Photo Finish, Glyph and their new addition, Hector Ramirez, a tanned-skinned human with a ridiculous haircut and nice suit.

Waiting for the conference to start, the three had set up shop just outside Shockwave's ever-looming, ever ominous tower. Photo Finish was standing on a mobile platform, designed by Cybertronians specifically for organic use so they could converse eye-to-optic, holding up the camera in her hooves and recording Glyph and Hector as they spoke.

"Hellooo, worlds!" Glyph bombastically said to the camera. "Glyph here, with my new partners, Photo Finish – you can't see her on the camera – and Hector, here bringing you a live, that's right, LIVE report of today's intergalactic-"

"Interplanetary." Hector corrected Glyph. "There's only three planets involved, not galaxies."

"Whatever. Anyways, we're bringing you a live conference between the Equestrian Royalty, the tensely-united Autobot and Decepticon leaders, and the American government, along with a few high-ranking business folks! It's a pretty exciting day, as many of you will know, while the Autobots have met with the Ponies for political talks, and the humans, but never both contemporaneously."

"Yes, indeed!" Hector added. "The exact reason for this is unknown. Optimus Prime would have us believe the reason that as many of his visits to Equestria are often casual, but is that the whole story? Perhaps Optimus Prime and the good Princesses are secretly conspiring against the U.S?"

"What!?" Glyph exclaimed. Photo Finish looked up from the camera and shrugged. "Mister Ramirez, where did you get that ridiculous idea?"

"Thank about it!" Hector explained. He turned to the camera. "Viewers of Earth, we want to know! What's your reason for Optimus and the Princess meeting so often?"

"Mister Ramirez..." A deep voice hissed. Hector and Glyph were both startled to see Shockwave himself had graced them with his presence.

Shockwave walked towards them, looking down literally and figuratively on Hector. "I would appreciate if you would deliberately slant the truth in an effort to turn the public over to your side." Shockwave turned his head to Photo Finish. "Miss Photo Finish, please disable the recording while I attempt to...educate Ramirez." Photo Finished swung her hoof across the off switch of her camera. Shockwave raised his arm-cannon menacingly.

"Whoa, hey now!" Glyph saw Shockwave's cannon raising and began to fear for her human friend's life. "There's no need for violence, now, is there, Lord Shockwave?"

"Of course not." Shockwave answered, and Glyph got the feeling she had offended him. "The cannon is merely a symbolic gesture. Now, Glyph, my terms for allowing you and your crew to view the conference state that they will keep their personal opinions of their reporting." Shockwave leered at Hector. "Do I perhaps need to retract my permission?"

Glyph made an incoherent squeak. "Nnnhhh...uh, well..."

"Shockwave," Hector asked, "I've heard about your logical abilities. Can you honestly say I'm wrong?"

"Yes." Shockwave growled. "Your hypothesis is biased, has no basis in actual fact, and frankly, in human terms, is just plain stupid."

"But-" Hector raised his arms to object before stopping and huffing.

Shockwave squinted at him.

"I will be having Barricade keep watch on you."

Just as Shockwave began walking away, Two Space Bridges opened in front of them. From one stepped out trio of identical dark-green Autobot soldiers with faceless heads and large cannons equipped, aimed at the nearest target.

"Stand down!" A baritone voice shouted urgently. "Stand down!"

The triplet of soldiers sighed, but obeyed the order and lowered their weapons. Optimus Prime stepped out of the Bridge, giving them disapproving looks. "If this truce is to last, we must learn to trust each other."

"Yeah." One soldier gruffly responded. "Trust a 'Con. That'll be the day."

Optimus furrowed his browplates, continuing towards Shockwave. Soon, Luna, Twilight, and Twilight's friends with an accompaniment of Luna's specialized Night Guards exited out the second Bridge.

The first two Bridges closed, then a third one opened by itself and an arrangement of humans stepped out, a few of which Optimus recognized from the U.S Government, though some obviously weren't.

Two men separated from the crowd, almost complete opposites of each other. One of them was tall, good-looking and pulled off a five-o-clock shadow, the other was short and stocky with a bit of pudge to him, as well as garish pink glasses that made Rarity scowl and a blond mullet.

"Who be it thou?" Luna snapped at them.

The one with the mullet put a hand over his chest. "Porter C. Powell and my businesses frienemy, Dylan Gould."

"You're too kind, Powell." The tall one flushed. "But yes, I'm Dylan Gould." Powell walked away and went to talk with Hector, while Gould approached Luna.

"Luna, where is your sister?" Dylan raised his hand over his like trying to keep the sun out of his eyes, even though Cybertron's sun-like object was not shining very brightly today. Luna got the impression he was mocking her and her sister.

"She was not able to attend." Luna narrowed her eyes. "Why dost thou ask, Gould?"

"Well, imagine that." Gould quipped dryly. "We finally have a pony-robot-human meeting, and Celestia isn't unable to attend?"

"What art thoust implying?" Luna snarled, instinctively taking a battle stance. She would not stand for Gould insulting her sister for any reason.

Twilight, due to her acquired distaste for humans, was more easily able to identify them when they're were being deliberately malicious to make it easier for her to justify herself. But right now, her observations would be a saving grace, as she put a hoof on Luna's neck. "Princess Luna, he's goading you. He wants you to get angry and hurt him because it'll make us look bad."

Luna glared at Twilight, but couldn't think of a counterargument. She turned back to Gould. "How doth thou manage to get thy way into this meeting with such a pompous attitude?"

"Simple, Luna." Gould answered with an unbearably smug grin that Twilight and Applejack both would have loved to punch right off his face. "I have money, and to us humans, money is everything."

"That's Princess Luna to you!" Twilight snapped.

"Hmm." Luna turned around, and she noticed Powell speaking with Hector a suspicious distance away from anypony else. "What are they talking about, that they cannot share with the rest of the class?" Luna raised her neck, which for reasons known only to himself, distressed Gould.

"Oh, come now, Princess!" Gould reached over, grabbing Luna's neck, much to Twilight's irritation. "I...highly...doubt..." Gould attempted to pry Luna's head away from Powell, to no avail, as Luna's neck had more muscle to it than his entire body. "Powell would be...doing anything questionable!"

"What makes thou so sureth?"

"Powell and I have been friends, er, frienemies for a long time! I know him! He wouldn't do anything wrong, like, say, bribe a journalist to sow discontent among the races!"

"That's awfully specific, Mister Gould." Twilight growled, for once, her suspicion of the Terrans justified.

"Err..." Gould froze like a deer caught in headlights. "I..." Before Gould could say anything one way or the other, Shockwave's footsteps caught their attention.

"Everyone, with the exception of Princess Celestia, has been accounted for." Shockwave informed them. During the course of their conversation, the rest of Team Prime, as well as Magnum, Shining Armor, and Cadence had arrived."Where is Her Majesty, if I may be so bold?"

"She was not able to attend." Luna answered stoically, but she threw Gould a sharp glare before adding, "Through no fault of her own."

"Very well." Shockwave gestured to his Tower. "Let us go inside."

The assembled groups, divided by species, began migrating towards the entrance of Shockwave's seat of power. The crowd began to blur and blend together, between the Cybertronians' paint jobs, ponies' varied coats, and Powell's ridiculous mullet, they formed a wonderful collection of colors as they moved to the obsidian castle of Shockwave's Tower to began discussing all manner of unpleasant, and in some cases, trivial and unnecessary politics.

The foyer of Shockwave's Tower was empty and spacious, something Rarity found worthy of note, as last time she was in here, there had been a miniature science lab set up for the emergency involving Rainbow Dash's ill-fated attempts at Spark extraction. Did Shockwave have the resources to constantly revamp the floor to serve a new purpose for whatever occasion cropped up?

Inside the building, Shockwave's main troop, consisting of Blackout, Barricade, and the Combaticon crack team were waiting. No one was quite sure if they were there to partake in the talks or to guard Shockwave. Every one split into different groups to talk about different topics.

Blackout seemed quite startled when Bumblebee approached him.

Deet beep.

"Uh, hello, Bumblebee." Blackout said shyly, drawing his arm like Bumblebee was going to strike him.

Beep bleep beep beeee?

"Yes, I am surprised to see you." Blackout admitted. He turned his head away and muttered. "It normally takes longer for someone to get back up after I shoot them..."

Beep beep?

"Nothing!" Blackout shouted, drawing away fearfully. "Nothing at all!"

"You all right, Blackout?" Onslaught asked. "You're normally this...jumpy." Blackout only gave Onslaught silence.

"Princess Luna, would you come with me?" Optimus said quietly, scooping Luna into the curve of his boot and dragging her away to a corner of the room where they could talk without being overheard, to Gould's suspicion.

"What are they doing?" Gould raised his neck to spy on them, but Twilight Sparkle intercepted him.

"Hello again, Mister Ghoul! What are you up to?"

"Well..." Dylan drawled, giving Twilight an 'I'm on to you' look. "Isn't it funny how your Princess and Optimus are over there talking to each other?"

"I'm sure they're just talking about something that doesn't concern you."

"Like what?"

"I don't know. Maybe Optimus wants to know what Luna had for breakfast?"

"Your Majesty Luna," Optimus crouched down, addressing Luna with a charitable amount of respect, as he always did to everyone, regardless of they were his enemies or friends. "You have said Celestia was unable to attend. Why?"

Luna looked over to Gould to make he and his partner-in-crime weren't listening. "We do not know, but we suspect she has been ponynapped."

Optimus' optics widened. Even for all his Patience and ability to adapt to difficult situations, he still found the idea that Celestia could be abducted a bit surprising. He would think whoever was behind had to employ a large army with a few tanks.

"Who all knows?"

"Twilight Sparkle and her friends, and now thou as well, Optimus."

Optimus got to his feet, turning towards the rest of the assembled dignitaries, but Luna flew up to his face and stopped him.

"Optimus Prime, we wouldst appreciate it if thou would restrict this knowledge until it is necessary."

"Your Majesty Luna, if you are concerned that the humans would see Equestria as weak for losing its leader..."

Luna cut him off with a derisive chuckle. "Appearing weak? Thoust make us laugh, Optimus. No. That is hardly a concern. We simply do not wish for Equestria's civilians to panic, as that could cause chaos in the kingdom and keep us from tracking down the parties responsible."

"Mm." Optimus shifted his gaze on the floor. "Why do I suspect chaos is their intended goal?"

"Hmm..." Luna mimicked Optimus' action. "Not an unreasonable guess, Optimus Prime."

"I must talk with Shockwave. Excuse me."

"Of course." Luna watched Optimus go, watching with detachment as he struck up conversation with the Decepticon Lord. Luna took a cursory glance around the building, and it suddenly occurred to her that if somepony wanted to disrupt political relations, now would be a perfect time to do it. "Hmm..."

"So, Twilight Sparkle!" Powell shouted. Twilight was quickly finding his voice obnoxiously attention-grabbing. "What kind of science have you been up to since leaving Sumdac Systems?"

"Uh..." Twilight raised her hoof nervously. "Huh?"

"I was just wondering if maybe you be interested in working for my company instead."

Twilight rolled her eyes. "No thanks. I don't work for slime bags."

Powell pursed his lips at that.

"Twilight..." Applejack said, nervously but sweetly. "Not while we're a big, fancy conference, now, ya hear?"

Twilight gave Applejack a bemused look, then humphed. "Fine."

Before Powell could provoke Twilight further, or Optimus and Shockwave could actually get anywhere progressive, there was a very loud rumble, like an earthquake was starting, but it stopped as it quickly as it started, followed up by the sound of something bursting into a monstrous flame. But the building was fine, the Ponies didn't smell any sulfur.

"That's weird..." Twilight noted.

Then the main entrance tore wide open, two aerial Vehicons with black and silver paint jobs instead of the normal purple paint job came running side by side, seemingly quite frazzled.

"Lord Shockwave!"

"We don't want to anyone to panic, and we don't want to worry about a potential attack, but we're under attack! By a combiner!"

Powell raised his hand.

"A little help for the Cybertronian language impaired?"

"Uh..." The Vehicon stammered. "Combiner. Five Cybertronians merged into one. Typically characterized by having the strength of about twenty times that many bots."

"How do we really know we're under attack?" Gould sneered. "Did you see the alleged assailant? Who's to say this isn't just a distraction so you can leave us humans here?"

"Oh!" Twilight laughed like an evil witch out in the woods, cackling from her chicken-legged hut. "That would be the human thing to do, wouldn't it? Just stay in here and keep talking while pretending nothing's wrong on the outside world?"

"Twilight!" Rarity chided. "Really? Right now?"

Optimus pointed his finger, taking charge of the situation. "Autobots, we must protect the humans!" Optimus ordered, drawing up his faceplate.

"Don't forget 'bout us!" Applejack protested, rounding up her friends and galloping to get her squad and Optimus' team in closer proximity.

Powell scoffed indignantly. "Excuse me!? Why we should we wait here while the rest of you go out and deal with the problem?"

"Do you have Cybertronian technology available to defend yourselves with?" Magnum grilled Powell."

"Uh, no."

"Do you have Pony Magic- don't give me that look, Powell, that's the term the Equestrians use – that allows you to bend the laws of reality?"

"No."

"Do you have any form of weapon on you?"

"No?"

"Then stay back," Magnum snarled, converting his arm into a blaster incidental to Optimus', "and let us do our jobs."

"Decepticons!" Shockwave screamed. "We are under attack! Our authority has been challenged! Will we let this insult stand?"

"NO!" The Decepticons shouted, raising their fists in the air.

"Shockwave!" Optimus grabbed Shockwave by the shoulder and pulled him over. "If this truce is to work, we must work together, under the same rhetoric."

Shockwave stared blankly, even though Optimus was sure Shockwave understood what he meant by that. Optimus raised his arm to Shockwave, offering his hand.

Shockwave gazed down at the hand as if it was the strangest thing in the solar system. Shakily, the Decepticon raised his lavender claw, as if reaching out to accept Optimus, but hesitated at the last minute. Shockwave took his claw back and rubbed his hands (such as they were) nervously. Shockwave then looked at his Deceticons, at Optimus' Autobots, and Twilight's friends, all of whom seemed quite expectant of him.

Realizing he needed to save face and accept the gesture, as a symbolic act of good will and faith, Shockwave nodded and grabbed Optimus' hand, shaking it to show their alliance was pure. The two leaders turned to their troops and raised their weapons.

"Auto-!"

"Decep-!"

Both Shockwave and Optimus cut short like they were making grave mistakes, then silently regarded each other before nodding in acknowledgment of their mistake and how to correct it.

"Cybertronians," Optimus stressed, "ROLL OUT!"

All around the room, Autobot and Decepticon alike began shifting form, mechanical parts splitting into broken forms, like bricks suspend on pins, rearranging themselves from humanoid shapes into various vehicles, significant in numbers of which were human- model trucks and Cybertronian military vehicles. When they were finished shifting forms, they rolled out the door, braking to let the ponies of their choice climb, except for the Combaticon Brawl, who forcefully rammed Applejack, catching her between the twin-barreled cannons his Cybertronic hover-tank mode. Ironic, as the first time Brawl and Applejack met mostly consisted of Brawl trying to roll over and/or blow Applejack up.

In seconds, a troupe of vehicles were rolling out the doors of Shockwave's Tower, ponies hanging off them from various areas of roost. Shockwave's own vehicular mode towered over the pack with its elevated turret and raised treads. No one talked much. No one tried to get the two Vehicons to give a better explanation of what was going, as the constant whirling of Blackout's and Vortex's helicopter blades fed into each other, producing a constant drone that pushed out all other noises.

The moving convoy of vehicles would made for quite an impressive sight. Smoke poured out exhausts systems from the menacing block of rolling metal, ready and willing to fight for their lives, their rights, and the lives of the others. It would be terrifying, enough to leer dissenters into silence, if not for the brightly-colored ponies riding on their sides, pink and blue tails billowing in the wind.

The convoy of unexpected allied troops made their way across the plains of copper-coated Kaonian ground, their wheels echoing wordlessly against the helicopter blades of their flying troops.

The two Vehicons who had raised the alarm jetted around the cornerstone of a building, not minding their grounded compatriots.

"Look!" A sound much familiar to the Autobots of the Vehicons transforming, whooshing through the air and landing on high ground with a thud. "This way! He's destroying everything!"

"How are you sure it's a he, huh?"

"His chest is much too square...y to be a fembot."

"'Squarey?' That's the best you can come up with?"

The convoy was eventually able to access the position of their wayward guides, accelerating their treads, working their resistance of friction to the bone to propel themselves around the building to an open space where they screeched to halt and at last, lay optics on the being who was so bold to attack them.

It wasn't hard to see him at all, as combiners, known as gestalts to the more scientifically minded, were titanic beings even amongst the towering Cybertronians, combiners were huge. The distinguishing traits of the combiner process was the unnatural fusion of bodies, twisting and contorting together in ways even the automated joints of robots were not meant to bend. The behemoth stood amongst a collection of towers, growling at them and all the blinking signs on them.

He certainly looked the part, as his paint was a mismatched application of red, yellow, green, black and purple, not at all like the clean-cut paint of the Combaticons combined form, Bruticus. He had a skeletal face and a hanging jaw. The various vehicular modes of his components could not be ascertained, as they were many parts attached to him that looked like they'd been slapped on as an afterthought, diluting what could be recognized as what. A beaked face appeared molded into his chest, which in itself had stubby black claws like a dinosaur's, reaching to grasp at prey. His hands were demonic, huge purple claws that could grasp three large Cybertronians.

The convoy transformed, Ponies jumping off the sides of their partners to the ground, to face their foe. Everyone prepared their weapons, and those that had retractable battle mask, drew them.

Optimus Prime stepped forward, placing himself at the head of the pack. He called out to the beast, remaining as polite as he could while raising his voice to cover the distance. "Can you hear me, gestalt?"

The gestalt did, as it turned towards Optimus, its optics burning with a loathing for all they saw. He spoke in a warbling, disjointed voice, like his components were struggling to speak at the same time, a problem the Combaticons didn't have as Bruticus, as they were like-minded to enough agree on what to say.

"MONSTRUCTOR HEARS YOU, PRIME."

"Is Monstructor your name!?"

"YES."

"Monstructor, what is your purpose here?"

Monstructor blinked at Optimus, its head tilling like it didn't understand what Optimus was asking of him. Before one the more trigger happy Cybertronians could get sick of waiting and fire their ammunition, Monstructor spoke again.

"TO...SOW DISCORD."

"To what end!?" Optimus demanded.

Monstructor paused again, but this time, everyone was ready to wait, as it obvious that he had trouble thinking, let alone speaking.

Then he did something Twilight Sparkle and her friends hadn't seen before; they had seen Cybertronians with arms that turned into blasters, blasters that mounted on the arm, and cannons that lifted over their shoulders, but never before had they seen panels swing upwards and reveal chest cannons like Monstructor's armor did now. The guns were tiny, at least compared to Monstructor's frame, barely a handgun size to him, but that didn't diminish the yellow sparks they fired at the crowd.

The Cybertronians and Ponies scattered, ducking for cover behind buildings and ruins yet to be rebuilt. Monstructor's blast tore into the ground, fraying the battlefield with an impressive explosion that would've damaged them easily,

Everyone gathered and began firing on Monstructor, unicorn magic, Autobot blasters, and Decepticons cannons firing into him, a shared light show of purple, blue and red laser fire. Some of the most powerful members of their groups were in this platoon, Optimus Prime's Ion Blaster, Twilight Sparkle's trained sorcery, Princesses Luna's night magic, Cadence's love magic, Shining Armor's defensive lasers, and the ever-heavily armed Gatling-equipped Blackout, not to mention Shockwave's devastating Hyperflux Cannon. Such an arrangement of weaponry would tear down most defensive installations with ease, the ponies' magic lifting rock and plaster straight up, allowing the Cybertronians to move in for the kill and completely level the hypothetical base.

Monstructor was bombarded with all of that firepower, all that magic and weapons with totally different effects and forms from each other from one Cybertronian to the next... and didn't get a scratch on him. When the firing had to stop for the autonomous robots to recharge and reload their armaments, Monstructor retaliated with another shot from his chest-cannons, tearing up the ground even more,, making it difficult for them to move.

When the platoon resumed firing, after a full second barrage, and still Monstructor showed no signs of wear nor tear without so much as a scratch or ding to show for their efforts, everyone began to realize their weapons weren't having any effect.

"We're not hurting him!" Shining Armor wailed with despair.

"Thank you, Captain Shining Armor," Vortex seethed, "for the blindingly obvious!" Vortex looked up and yelped, seeing Monstructor's attack on them continue, and ducked back behind the cover, before rising up and firing at him again for all the good it did.

"Slag, we're really not hurting him at all..." Vortex muttered. He looked around. "Is there a Teletran-1 terminal nearby!?"

"A what!?" Cadence shouted.

"It's a type of computer with built-in resources." Twilight explained, having spent enough time in the Autobot base to overhear enough details about the technology. "It can reformat and install new weapons into an Autobot's – or Decepticon's – arm to adapt to new scenarios."

"Yeah. Oh!" Vortex pointed back aways, where there was indeed a Teletran terminal. It was a Cybertronian sized thing that looked like an arcade game, with a steel grate as a standing place. It was covered in gold-ish color, with a bright blue computer screen, and what appeared to be a Cybertronian version of that leather cuff thing human doctors use to take blood pressure sticking out like a sore thumb. "There! Prime!"

Optimus became puzzled by Vortex's referral to him.

Vortex made clear his feelings. "I don't really like Shockwave's whole truce deal, but the guy did technically bring our dead planet back to life, so I guess I kinda owe him a little bit. So, I have a plan, and since we're supposed to be working together, I have to include you in it."

Shining Armor and Magnum leered at Vortex.

"Vortex," Shining Armor growled, "if you think Optimus is going to take battle plans from a violent, hay-spouting Combaticon like you, then-"

"What is your plan, Vortex?" Optimus quickly cut Shining off before he said something really offensive. "And will it work?"

"You want the optimistic truth, or the real truth?"

Optimus tapped a finger to his chin, mulling over what Vortex meant by that.

"You're taking too long to answer, so I'll just tell you both. Optimistic truth is, yes, yes it totally will, with pony sparkles and glitter and rainbows! Real truth? I have no slagging idea."

Magnum, Shining Armor, and Shockwave looked to Optimus, wondering how Optimus would react to that. Optimus was a cool and logical thinker. He wouldn't go rushing in with a blind plan that had no guarantee of working.

"I've had to make do with worse, Vortex. Proceed."

Magnum's and Shining's jaw dropped, while Twilight and Luna admired Optimus' knack for dealing with crummy odds in an effective and straightforward manner.

"Sweet. The crazy Combaticon-" Vortex glanced sideways at Shining Armor,"-got bright and shiny Optimus to go with his plan. All right, Prime. Go to the terminal, I'll cover you."

"A Path Blaster would be of good use..." Optimus muttered.

"What? No, no! Get an A-4 Pulsar Cannon."

Optimus raised a browplate, but followed Vortex's orders, dashing to the terminal and sticking his arm into into the cuff thing, which expanded and unfurled around his arm, clenching into it as utilized Cybertronian biology to maximum potency, rebuilding Optimus' natural blaster and replaced it with Vortex's recommendation of a Pulsar Cannon, a type of Cybertronian weapon that functioned like a grenade launcher, of sorts. Vortex lived up to his promise, as when Monstructor attempted to fire on the now-exposed Optimus, Vortex raised his blaster and fired, distracting Monstructor's aim.

"Blast Off!" Vortex pointed at his fellow airborne Combaticon. "With me!"

"What?" Blast Off inquired. "What are we doin'?"

Vortex sauntered his way from their cover, and after a moment to hesitate, Blast Off followed him.

"We're going to fly up there onto that thing's back, lay down some signal beacons at strategic locations, and then have Optimus lay some grenades on the targets, and hopefully blast him to Canterlot."

Knowing they were giving him glares for the thought of Monstructor running his rage loose on Canterlot, Vortex glanced at Shining Armor and Luna over his shoulder. "Figuratively speaking, of course."

On that note, Vortex and Blast Off raised their arms and clapped them together as a pre-flight exercise, then transformed into their vehicle modes, speeding towards Monstructor with the intent to kill. Vortex's copter blades folded back, and a jet engine formed allowed Vortex to fly more at jet-rivaling speeds.

They flew through the air, buzzing about Monstructor's head like giant metal gnats. Monstructor regarded them contemptuously as much, and attempted to swat them aside, but they demonstrated expert aerial maneuvers and flew over his shoulders, where they resumed automotive forms and landed on Monstructor's back, grappling their smooth, but skilled Cybertronian to keep themselves steady. Not wasting a second, Vortex and Blast Off pulled out spherical devices like Cybertronian gyros, with all the glowing lines that implied, and placed them on Monstructor's abdominal plate and backside.

"WHO IS SO ARROGANT AS TO LAY HANDS ON MONSTRUCTOR!?"

"I am!" Vortex shouted, defiantly and possibly a little suicidal. "I'm Vortex, and I am arrogance made manifest!"

Blast Off looked to his partner oddly. "Uh...you know that's not a good thing to be a manifestation of, right?"

"Just lay down the slaggin' beacons!" Vortex jumped off Monstructor's back and transformed, rocketing up Monstructor's back before transforming again and throwing a gyro onto Monstructor's shoulder from the air, transforming again before gravity brought his robot body plummeting down. Blast Off followed suit, leaving another beacon device onto Monstructor's other shoulder. Both Combaticons then flew back down to cover, landing forcefully and hightailing it on foot before Monstructor could get a lock on them.

"Prime!" Vortex shouted. "You got that Pulsar uploaded to you yet!?"

Optimus appeared from the cover, his hand replaced by a cylindrical machine that appeared like a cup that had been destroyed of all but its top and bottom.

"Good! The beacons are on Monsty over there! Fire at your leisure, Your Primeship!"

Optimus nodded, and combat-rolled out from the cover. His movements seemed to draw Monstructor's attention, and Monstructor glared at Optimus Prime as the mighty Autobot stomped forward on the edge of the destroyed ground and began firing the Pulsar Cannon boldly without the slightest hint or fear of trace of hesitance.

Shining Armor respected him for that.

The grenade shells flew over Monstructor's shoulders, and like flies to rotting cheese, the grenades launched themselves, attaching directly to the signal beacons, beeping away as they ticked away to their coming explosion.

Everypony raised their limbs to shield their eyes as the grenades went off like fireworks, masking Monstructor's hulking form in a formless miasma of sulfur and burning cinders. Shining Armor preemptively raised his hoof in the air and cheered, before he got a sense of deja vu and suddenly though about Tarn...

The smoke slowly peeled away, revealing Monstructor's form as unharmed, looking exactly as he did before, not a single scratch on him.

"This guy's unstoppable!" Shining groaned, much to everyone's annoyance at his depressed attitude. Why'd he have to be so down, maaan?

"Eeergh..." While Monstructor did not appear hurt, he did seem to be reconsidering his attack on them. He began scanning the area. He saw a Changeling Grid Battery, the green magic of the Changeling critters sending fizzles lighting up the skyline with a cloud.

With surprising speed for the clunky combination process, Monstructor dashed towards the Battery, appearing to the allied platoon like a blur of mismatched paint that disoriented the fighters below. Monstructor swept his claw over the grid, crushing it in his claw before tossing it off the building. The grid plummeted towards the ground, and before anyone realized what had happened, the tubes feeding the Changeling magic into the building around stopped. The natural lights of the robotic landscape turned off in the area around the building, and the Changelings were loose from their bonds, flying through the air with their bug wings flitting and their blue eyes glaring, hungry for revenge against their oppressors. They had been drained of their magic, of their energy, by all rights they should have dropped to the ground like dead bugs the instant their bounds had been snapped, but their release, combined with the idea of taking vengeance on their captors, provided them with a surge of adrenaline that kept them aloft.

"Monstructor's destroyed the Changeling Battery!" Shockwave exclaimed when he overcame the shock of Monstructor's blurry dash. "QUICKLY! CAPTURE THEM BEFORE THEY CAN GET AWAY!"

The Changelings rubbed their hooves, cackling with wicked glee as they salivated for the thought of getting revenge on their captors. They fired green blasts of magic from their horns at the platoon above them, causing them to flinch and scatter.

The Changelings quickly found, to their displeasure, that the ponies' hatred and the Cybertronians' apathy for them ran further than they though, as within seconds, they were bombarded with a laser rain of magic and blasts. Optimus made sure to sort through the ranks and separated those amongst whose weapons used bullets from those they did not, and then make sure the energy-based weapons were set to low charge times. The Changelings weren't much use to the ponies alive, but they were even less useful to the Cybertronians dead, so it wouldn't be good if a bullet or strong lasers cut a hole through the Changelings' midsections.

The lasers cut through the ranks of the insect ponies, electrocuting them and sent them careening to ground. It wasn't like long at all before they were down to their last man.

Optimus had the Changeling dead to rights, but he hesitated to pull the trigger and send the Changeling back to its post as a living fuel, able to see all it around it, and unable to do anything. A statue. A statue drained of a blood over the course of a day, every day...

"Optimus!" Shockwave shouted. "Why do you hesitate?"

Optimus blinked, taking in the moral consequences of his actions.

"I'm sorry." He whispered in the Changeling's direction, even though the Changeling couldn't hear. Optimus covered his face, turned away, and fired. The shot hit the Changeling right into the chest, and like its brethren, fell to the ground.

The Decepticons and some of the more violent Autobots began hopping off the plateau and picking up the unconscious Changelings like antsy vultures picking the meat off carrion dried out in the sun.

Shockwave gave Optimus a look.

"Calculations indicate your moment of hesitance is caused by your sentimentality, Optimus."

"Yes." Optimus answered wearily.

"That makes you...weak, Optimus." Shockwave said, somehow being respectfully while still being disapproving.

Optimus turned wearily towards him. "I am well aware of that, Shockwave."

In the ensuing chaos of trying to keep the Changelings all in one area before they could disperse through Kaon, Monstructor had disappeared. Seems he wasn't quite as unintelligent as his speech suggested. The Changelings were all routed, then brought to a barbaric Decepticon holding cell when Shockwave explained it would take him some time to assess the total damage to the grid for repairs. It might be so badly damaged just building a new one would be proficient. The US Representatives were told the conference would have to be rescheduled and possibly relocated; they could not risk them being there while Monstructor was still on the loose. Naturally, that didn't sit well with any one of them, and it took a furious shouting match between Luna and the government head – an old, decrepit, grey haired man by the name of Forrest Forscythe – to convince them to pack up and leave before they got hurt. Once everyone was inside the building, Shockwave slipped out the door and arranged for Glyph and her friends to transmit a broadcast across the network of Cybertron.

Glyph and her crew quickly set up their equipment, just outside and around the floor of Shockwave's Tower. After Hector's attempt to stir up a tempest in a teapot cost her the right to record the conference, Glyph was made absolutely giddy when Shockwave approached her and explained what he wanted done.

With Photo Finish's camera trained up at him, Hector surrounding the area with sound equipment, they were all set for Shockwave's broadcast. Shockwave made an odd request that Photo Finish focus the camera on him from the chest window up; when Glyph asked, Shockwave simply answered that the angle made him look powerful, and Glyph had no trouble accepting that. After all, she had several interviews before with stars who wanted to be sure she caught their good sides. Ir was all about impression, baby.

"I can't believe this!" Glyph squeaked with excitement as preparations neared completion. "I'm finally gonna get a broadcast from Shockwave!" Glyph narrowed her gaze at Hector. "No thanks to you, of course."

"Hmm." Hector raised his hand. "Well, Powell-"

"What about Powell?"

"Uh-nothing! Who said anything about Powell?"

"You did. Just now."

"Theef, toof, vun! ACTION!" Photo Finish dictated, waving her hoof through the air. A single flick, and her her camera was on, aimed way up high at Shockwave's broad chest and scope-like optic.

"My dear Cybertronians..." Shockwave began. The camera began replaying a live transmission of the footage to any Cybertronian screen within range.

"As many of you know, there was to be a conference today at my tower." Shockwave recounted, tone never rising or falling. "However, there was an attack by an unknown entity whom called itself 'Monstructor'. Despite the very best efforts of Optimus Prime's Autobots and my Decepticons, we were unable to hurt the beast, and it escaped before we could understand its motives." Shockwave began playing Monstructor's appearance, talking of the dreadful beast to instill a sense of fear into the citizens of Kaon, and of other Cybertronian cities. The citizenry did need to know what threats to its safety were out there, didn't it? About the kind of things not even Optimus couldn't defend them from?

"It was a terrifying visage, a sight to behold. As his name implies, he is a monster. He is unstoppable. And he is loose, my good Cybertronians. Loose amongst our cities. Loose in our towns! Loose near our acolytes and our trainees!" Shockwave stopped a moment to let that sink in.

"But fear not, my good citizens!" Shockwave raised a finger to the camera. "I have a plan- a plan several years in the making, that will ensure your safety, not just from Monstructor, but from any who might wish to disturb the fragile stability of our homes and streets. This plan's name...is Project: Predacon."

"Predacons are anicent creatures from Cybertron's distant, distant past." Shockwave elaborated. "Long ago, I stumbled upon the CNA of one these creatures, and using it as a reference, was able to locate more of it. Through my scientific knowledge, I was able to bred these creatures – to rebirth them, should we need a the fierce rage of beasts to protect ourselves. It would seem that time has come. However, the Predacons, though tamed by me, are unruly and difficult. I need to be sure this is the right way. I must be sure unleashing them to make way for revolution to evolution is the right path. I need, in a word,"

Shockwave pointed his finger directly at the camera.

"YOUR VOTE, Cybertronians! Would the Predacons make for a more effective police force than the current Autobot/Decepticon alliance? Do your own research, draw your own conclusion, and then cast your ballot! This is Lord Shockwave, signing off!"

Shockwave saluted the camera, and by proxy, the hundreds of screen it was transmitting to and the crowds of Neutral Cybertronians, making them feel like what they had to say mattered; the Decepticon Lord, the brutal warlord, was saluting them and asking for their vote! Clearly, they mattered. The voice of the citizenry mattered to Shockwave.

"Very nice for your first time!" Photo Finish clapped her hooves. She pinched at the air. "Vut mite I suggzst redoin' a few shots with a pink hat and and an ermine coat?"

Shockwave glared, unamused. "No."

Miles and miles away in Iacon, the live transmission played, lagging behind by a few seconds because the Autobot marshals observing were replaying it, over and over to study it, sifting through for any concealed message Shockwave may have hidden in his broadcast.

This was the Autobot Elite Guard's Headquarters. It was a large roughly egg-shaped steel dome, with a large, circular wall surrounding it. Exactly how a wall worked in a society were enormous laser cannons were an everyday thing was unclear to Twilight Sparkle.

Inside, the Headquarters was as complex as the Autobots who built, with rooms accessible by shifting elevators, rising platforms and walls that shifted places with other walls inside themselves. Everything inside was marked a plain, formed blueish gray paint with a yellow and black stripes on the very top of the walls, denoting the area as high, high security. The shifting floorboards almost gave the impression that the building itself was forcing its visitors to go through the Elite Guard's bureaucracy, which they were infamous for.

Twilight Sparkle, Fluttershy, and Luna were laying their stomachs on the keyboard of the main control – much larger than the main control in Omega One, with an absolutely ginormous computer screen that was blue instead of green, at least when not showing a replay of Shockwave's purple mug rousing the citizens to vote yay or nay for Predacon enforcers.

Spike, still in his adult form, stepped through the entrance to the room with Whimsy at his side. Spike didn't understand why Whimsy continued to evade his gaze and dodge any of his friendly questions that pony convention dictated him to ask.

"He certainly knows how to keep a farce going." Ultra Magnus observed, having joined the group in transit, as it were from Shockwave's base to theirs.

"Well, I think it's sweet Shockwave wants to give his Predacons to the public to keep them safe." Fluttershy mumbled sweetly.

"HA!" A loud, boisterous voice jeered. "Yer a naive one, ain'tcha?"

Everyone turned around to see Grimlock storming his way into the room. While Spike's slightly tense shoulders suggested he stomached through the arduous Elite Guard bureaucracy to get into the control room for what he wanted, Grimlock's shoulders were up high and pulled taut, a sure sign he bypassed bureaucracy by using his bulk and muscle to simply pelt aside the bureaucrats, the same he shoved Spike and Whimsy out of his way, knocking them down. Magnum crossed his arms and grimaced. Grimlock ignored it.

"It's what's called a gradual change." Grimlock informed Fluttershy, raising a finger as he stomped towards the gathered politicians. "Did ya hear anything 'bout how the Autobots controlled those Predacon things?" Grimlock pointed at the screen. "If Shockwave's slag speech gets through to the smeghead populace, they'll vote to let the Predacons loose, and then Shockwave will take over from there."

Twilight started picturing Grimlock's logic in this, and she would have eventually figured it out herself with enough time, but Fluttershy asked him ahead of time, depriving her of that victory.

"W-what do you mean?"

"I mean..." Grimlock said, finger still raised. "The current 'police force', is made of Autobots and Decepticons just barely working together. If Shockwave gets those Predacons hooked in, that takes OUR authority out of the equation. At first, it's just a curfew and 'oh, please be respectful to the mindless beasts', but then one thing leads to another, and bada-bing, bada-boom, we're living on an entirely Decepticon-dominanted Cybertron." Grimlock crossed his arms and glowered, taking up a proud posture.

Magnum continued to grimace, while Ultra Magnus tilted his head and Optimus kept his eyes to the screen.

"Well!?" Twilight exclaimed, shaking a hoof. "He's obviously right! Magnum, please don't let this be like my brother's wedding or Bumblebee when he tried to stop my wedding to Shockwave."

Grimlock glared more and more furiously, before getting fed up and turning to stomp out the room.

Magnum picked up Twilight Sparkle by the scruff of her neck, and lifted her ear to his lips.

"We know he's right, Miss Sparkle." Magnum whispered. "He's just so much of a...rude person that we really don't want to admit it."

Grimlock stopped short of the door. "I heard that!"

"Slag." Magnum dropped Twilight back on the keyboard, causing her to grunt.

Optimus turned around, and rather than the hulking mass of invulnerable grey wall that was Grimlock, he noticed the purple and orange dragons he hadn't seen before.

"Hello." Optimus said to them. The victims of Grimlock's brutishness staggered to their feet, er, talons, and approached Optimus Prime. "Can I help you?"

Both dragons saluted. "Spike..."

"And Whimsy Weatherbee, reporting for recruitment into Autobot services, Your Primeship!" Whimsy finished.

Optimus' head cocked backwards. He put his hands on his hips and gave a Spike an through rundown of his features. "I was not privy that Equestrian Dragons matured so quickly."

"Indeed." Magnum added. "Twilight Sparkle's A.P.D file gave me the impression her immediate family included a infantile dragon."

"No, no, no!" Spike waved his claws out. "I'm still a baby- Twilight just used her magic to make me big and strong!" Spike flexed his biceps, earning a headshake and a facepalm from Grimlock.

Optimus blinked, unamused. He maintained his stoicism. "What division would you like to be in, Spike?"

Spike tucked in his lips. Optimus could see he wasn't prepared for that question.

"Uh, I figured I'd go in the Autobot Pony Division?" Spike muttered.

"Well, that's for Ponies." Magnus dryly quipped. "You are not a pony, Scales."

"It's Spike."

"I know. It's a nickname."

Magnum drummed his fingers against his perpetually crossed arms. "Well, you're large..." Magnum began pacing around Spike, sizing him up, which made Spike uncomfortable. "Fire-breathing, armored with heavy scales." Magnum grabbed Spike's arm and banged a fist to test the scales' durability. Spike reacted to the pain, but he endured the impact enough for Magnum's standards. Magnum cupped Spike's jaw and began to scan him like a doll. Spike whimpered, and Fluttershly nearly broke her silence to protest that Magnum was unnerving Spike, but Twilight stopped her.

"You're both scaly monstrous creatures, whom, if the Earth myths are to be held factual, are capable of causing untold destruction with the force of a natural disaster." Magnum remarked.

"Where in the great, grand Autobot army would they fit?" Magnus questioned. "I can tell from the looks of 'em they aren't Wrecker material."

"They lack the proper training to be Elite Guard." Magnum interjected. "Optimus?"

"While I give everyone a chance, I believe Spike would be best suited aiding his skills elsewhere than my team." Optimus said, which to Spike, seemed like Optimus' polite way of saying

'I don't want him!' Optimus was thinking more in terms of where Spike would be at his most effective.

"I don't think Griffin Rock would appreciate their Rescue Bot team having a dragon perform their rescues. He needs to go a team who will be good with having a monster on their side." Magnus commented. "Rough, and tumble where those dragon scales will be of good use..."

"Who don't mind their teammates breathing fire from their mouths..." Magnum added.

"And can whip him into shape." Magnus added. "You know, dispel any illusion he might have about heroism."

Spike and Whimsy shared confusion. "Um... I thought the Autobots were heroes?"

Magnus and Magnum, despite their polar opposite attitudes, agreed on this and laughed.

"In theory..." Magnus explained. "But did you know, on some planets, hero is another word for casualty?"

"What do you think of when you hear hero, sonny?" Magnum snarled. "Standing up in ruins of the evil dragon's – no offense, just trying to paint a picture- lair, the beautiful princess held in your arm as the sunset shines down on you, and you walk away to get hitched?"

"Well...yeah." Spike parroted.

Magnum and Magnum both snorted. "That, sonny, is why we want your field commander to give you a three-thousand dollar reality check."

"Let's recap. We got scales, fire, monsters, huge and a brutal wake-up slap to reality..."

Magnus', Magnum's and Optimus' browplates shot upwards with a ping like a pinball table being absolutely whipped. They both turned their attention to the mech who had nearly left the room.

"GRIMLOCK!"

"What?" Grimlock demanded, stepping half-way back through the door.

Magnus placed himself in the middle of Spike and Whimsy, resting his arms on their shouders before he pushed towards the Dinobot commander. "These are Spike and Whimsy Weatherbee, your new recruits."

"What!?" Grimlock repeated, visor contorting in disbelief. "You can't be serious-"

"Please, Grimlock. These two need someone brutal commanding them, and that pretty much delegates it to you." Magnus turned and walked off, dismissing the dragons that were not his problem.

"Urrgh..." Grimlock groaned, slumping against the doorframe. He re-entered the room and took a glance on Spike and Whimsy both.

"Fine." Grimlock said, though he didn't sound at all happy about it. "Come on." Grimlock made a come-hither finger gesture and walked out the door again. "We don't have all day to get you into shape."

Whimsy looked at Spike, hoping he'd have a bit more detail explanation of what was going on. He didn't, so he shrugged. They followed Grimlock out of the room, and Grimlock began laying out for them what their training regime would while operating inside his unit, the Dinobots.

"So, you want to be part of the Lightning Strike Coalition." Grimlock sneered at them as they walked into the impossibly complex halls of the HQ.

"That's a terrible name." Whimsy whispered to Spike.

"Really? I think its kinda a cool..." Spike admitted, thoughtfully rubbing his chin.

They exited the room to come to a block of concrete that split in opposite directions of blank stairs. Grimlock turned and led them down the right side, where the Autobots below, working in what amounted to an in-built crater, suddenly stopped what they were doing at Grimlock's descent.

"What, do I look like Princess Celestia just walked into the room without any clothes on!?" Grimlock shouted at them, raising his gorilla fist into the air over his head.

"Ponies don't wear clothes..." Spike mumbled.

Grimlock slammed his fist down into wall, creating a spiderweb of cracks. "GET BACK TO WORK!"

The Autobots scurried to resume their jobs, some of them typing in on their computers harder and faster than before, others running to ferry paperwork between rooms.

Grimlock scoffed, as he was prone to doing, and led the two dragons towards the exit of the base.

"Damn idjits." Grimlock cussed, making Spike uncomfortable. Twilight had always taught him not to swear. Whimsy also disapproved of Grimlock's foul language. "Think jus' 'cause I turn into a reptile that can stop workin' to gawk when I walk into the room..."

Spike and Whimsy looked at each other. Whimsy tapped her fingers together.

She could see through Grimlock's mask. The lack of a proper face did nothing to keep her from seeing the pain in his eyes. Whimsy had made herself who she was, a dragon so unlike the bullies of her kind, because she had the knowledge, the intuition to see there was more to life, and part of that was learning to read people.

"Grimlock?" Whimsy spoke barely above a whisper.

"Speak up, Wimpy." Grimlock retorted.

Whimsy didn't bother to correct him, as he was likely to just respond with another insult. "I can't help but notice you seem bitter about everypony in the headquarters staring at you?"

"Yeah? What about it?"

"Would you like to talk about it?" Whimsy offered politely.

Grimlock stopped, causing a chain reaction where Spike and Whimsy attempted to stop without bumping into them, but momentum, even momentum as simple as walking, doesn't just go away, so they slammed into his boulder of a backside. They pushed themselves off like flies getting up after being swatted and coughed.

Grimlock turned around to face them. He bent down and lean forward on Whimsy, and his bulk began to induce a feeling of claustrophobia.

"Whimsy Weatherbee, you do not ask me if I would like to 'talk' about my problems, is that understood?"

"Um..."

"There are only two correct answers, Whimsy. One is 'yes sir, sir!', the other is 'no, sir!' Pick one."

Whimsy glanced at the ground, as if the cold silver of Iacon's tarnished streets would make her decision. She lifted up to Grimlock. "Yes sir, sir."

"Good." Grimlock appeared satisfied and resumed marching.

Iacon was a gleaming city. The Autobot capital and answer to the Decepticons' Kaon. It shone and sparkled into the night, and the reluctantly accepted Changeling Batteries there were hardly much of a blemish between all the sterling silver of the massive buildings.

So Spike and Whimsy were quite confused when Grimlock led them to what appeared to be a run-down alleyway that hadn't a person so much as pick litter off the street in forty years.

Both dragons stopped, backing away from the neighborhood. It didn't take more than a second look to see this was the kind of place where muggers and robbers coalesced.

"Come on." Grimlock instructed, mildly irked that would be so unsure. "This is where the Coalition is stationed. No one here is goin' to hurt you. Those dirty 'Cons know better than to mess with my turf."

"You're stationed here!?" Whimsy shrieked, as they nervously followed Grimlock into the alley. "Can't you ask Optimus Prime for a transfer to cleaner neighborhood?"

"Could." Grimlock answered simply as he lifted a huge piece of copper shrapnel and tossed it aside without difficulty. "Don't wanna. Everyone leaves us alone here."

"Why would you want to be alone?"

"Simple enough. No one likes us, so we don't like them right back." Grimlock's voice lowered a fair bit, as though what he was talking about made him sad. Whimsy couldn't help but notice how his normally loud voice had reduced a few volumes. "No Autobot wants to go into this scrapheap of a place, so they leave us alone here. No thug one goes to this place because they know we're in it."

"The we being...?"

Grimlock raised a finger for them to wait, then knocked on a nearby abandoned garage three times. "HEY, GUYS! THE STUFFIES AT HIGH COMMAND HAVE SADDLED US WITH SOME FRESH MEAT!"

"Meat?" Whimsy squeaked fearfully. "Does that mean you're going to eat us!?"

"No." A deep voice like Grimlock's, but lower answered. "It just means you're new here."

Whimsy looked around for who said that, but couldn't find anypony. Then the wall Grimlock had knocked on move, pulling back into the building. Whimsy heard people grunting, and the wall was tossed to the side, revealing a group of four huge Autobots standing behind it, each with a color scheme matching Grimlock's of grey, red, and gold, though arranged differently between members. There was an athletic one with a red head crest, a pair of mechanical bird wings on his sides. a stocky one built like a Cybertronian football player, with a gold hood and two red black spikes from his back. One who was covered in spear-shaped plates on his legs, with two stalagmite-like pillars poking from his back that were covered in those same plates. The last one was a wrestler on steroids in comparison to the football player, without any disturbing characteristics beyond being large.

"These are the Lightning Strike Coalition." Grimlock introduced them. "Swoop..." The one with wings transformed into a pterodactyl. "Slug..." The football player crouched down and converted into a triceratops. "Sludge..." the wrestler did the same as Slug, except turning into an apatosaurus, a long-neck reptilian creature with...well, aside from being big, didn't have much to set it apart besides said long neck. "And finally, Snarl." The spiky one transformed into a stegosaurus, tiny compared to the rest, but more than made up for it as the spikes and stalagmites arranged into a long row of spines that Spike winced as he imagined an unfortunate Decepticon falling on top of Snarl and getting all those plates right up uncomfortable places. A spiky hairbrush of death.

"Hello." Whimsy bowed graciously. "I'm Whimsy, and this is Spike."

Slug scoffed. "Good manners ain't gonna get you anywhere with the Dinobots, missy."

Grimlock made an uncomfortable noise. "Lightning Strike Coalition."

"Grimlock, please. That name is terrible. Why are you so inconsistent on it?"

Grimlock turned away, unusually quiet.

"Hmm..." Slug reverted to his automaton mode, and walked towards the dragons. He put his hand out "Put 'er there, pardners."

Spike raised his claw to accept, but Slug proceeded, well, slug him hard across the snout, knocking him to the ground.

"Eeyup." Slug noted. "We got a ways to go with these two, Grimlock."

"Ow!" Spike rubbed his sore cheek. "What was that for?"

"Lesson number one." Slug answered. "An attack can come at any time. Always be on your guard." Slug offered his hand to Spike to help him up, and Spike tentatively approached to accept it, but he stopped halfway.

"Oh, no!" Spike swatted Slug's hand away, wagging his finger. "Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me!"

Slug let out a deep, hearty laugh. "You catch on quick, kid! But seriously, though, let me help you up." Slug grabbed Spike's shoulders and lifted him back onto his feet. "Why don't you come inside?" Slug gestured to the hole in the wall the Dinobots came out from.

Accepting their invitation, Spike and Whimsy were guided inside to what they thought would be the Dinobots' base, but it was more like an Autobot version of a run-down apartment. They were enough chairs for the Dinbots and a guest, cobbled together from leftover or unused sheet metal, and an Autobot command terminal with chipped, flaking paint, and cracked screen. There was a table with a placement of oil tankers on it. Spike knew Twilight would have a fit she found out about him living in a place as rundown as it was, but the Dinobots made themselves right at home, and invited the dragons to do the same.

Grimlock began pushing buttons on the terminal. Against his wishes, an image of Shockwave materialized.

"He's makin' another broadcast..." Grimlock noted ruefully.

"Attention, citizens of Cybertron!" Shockwave's image declared, happily clapping his claw together with his cannon. "The votes are in! The results have been tallied, and...by a landslide, the majority vote has gone to unleashing the Predacons!"

If he'd been drinking something, Grimlock would have done a spit-take.

"Remember;" Shockwave pointed at the camera. "You voted for this, my dear citizens! Please prepare to receive your new police force at an appropriate area. They will keep you safe. They will not lose control. They are your hope, in this dark time of a terrible being like Monstructor being loose."

Grimlock had enough, and began working his fingers on the terminal until an annoying screech blared out that made Spike winced. "Autobot HQ, this is Grimlock, requesting GroundBridge into Kaon. The vote's in for letting the Predacons loose."

"We heard." Magnum answered from the other line. "Your Bridge is being prepared."

"Come on, youse!" Grimlock shouted at everyone, taking his finger off the comm button and picking up a hanging sword off the wall. "We gotta put a stop to this!"

"Wha-" Spike stammered, before Slug grabbed by the shoulder and dragged him outside, where a GroundBridge was waiting, beckoning them with its eerie green glow.

Sword dragging from his hand like a monstrous tail, Grimlock charged into the Bridge, the Dinbots tailing him and the dragons struggling to keep up with the Dinobots' pace.

The Dinbots and their plus two steamrolled from one of the Bridge to the other, wanting to be sure there was as little ground between them and their objective as possible.

Grimlock grunted as he jumped out the other side and landed amidst a pile of Kaonian scrap, the force of his landing causing discarded steel braces to fly around like a tornado had hit. The other Dinobots soon followed, as did the dragons, and Grimlock looked up at the top of Shockwave's Tower.

"What?" Slug questioned. "What do you see, Grimlock?"

Grimlock only pointed upwards the Tower. Everyone else craned their necks to see what was so fascinating.

"Um... was that docking bay there already?" Whimsy wondered.

Indeed, there was a docking bay mounted atop the tower that hadn't been there previously. A huge, steel ramp leading off the edge, with two pillars rising from the side to directs cargo to it. The pillars had holes in their sides, and were strung to the ground by massive cables. Like Shockwave had lifted a portion of the Golden Gate Bridge of San Franchiso and given it the Decepticon makeover.

On the bay, at this very moment while all the Dinobots were watching, Shockwave pressed a big blue button on a black, pointy terminal.

"Despite some setbacks..." Shockwave murmured to himself. "Project: Predacon is proceeding as planned." Shockwave walked from the terminal. His armor shifting anxiously, Shockwave took a few steps, than raised his claw in the air, screaming of the success of his creations to the heavens.

"PREDACONS! NOW IS THE TIME! YOUR TIME! TAKE FLIGHT!"

Spike's was soon abandoned by his wits as he heard a terrifying tromp of a metal foot stomping across the docking bay. It must have been hollow to give off an echo loud enough for them to hear from the ground, but that did nothing to dimish the terribleness of it. It was like the Predacon, whatever it was, had metal trees for limbs.

A bass of thunk-thunk-thunk repeated itself as the Predacon made its across the bay, scaring Spike and Whimsy with every door-rattling step of its claw.

When it finally reached the end of the bay, Spike and Whimsy could see it, and the reason for their fear now made so much more sense.

It was a dragon. Shockwave had tamed a dragon. Spike didn't think Cybertron had dragons, but there it was, gazing out into the moonlit night sky, hiding amongst the shadows of the stars that Shockwave's Tower allowed it to reach. Lit only by the moon, its shadow was akin to a werewolf's in an old Earth movie.

It also had no resemblance to any dragon Spike had ever seen, not even this one time where he briefly lived with an entire pack of them. He supposed it made sense the Cybertronian dragon would look nothing like an Equestrian one.

It was huge. Massive. Far too big for a normal-sized Cybertron to stand on par with. Its limbs were thin like bones, as if it had anorexia, and its wings, though covered in the dark, were detailed with all manner of Cybertronian runes and lettering. An empty gap was in the wings that seemed to serve no purpose other than to highlight how monstrous it was. Its tail was very long, almost like a whip, and ended in a leaf shape that was bristling with thorns. Its head was rounded, but pointed forwards, like a T. Rex. Two horns sprouted from the back of its noggin, that twisted and spiraled like a Viking's helm.

The Predacon roared, rearing its front up like an untamed wild horse, and then flew off the bay into the night, where it whipped and swerved and twirled. It came far too close to the Dinobots' position for Spike's comfort before it flew off in another direction entirely, but Spike was able to see it dash under a street lamp and get a better view of its colors; it was blue, white, and covered in ridges, giving the impression that it was made of ice.

"So, that was a Predacon..." Grimlock murmured, watching as the Predacon's massive wings flapped and carried it away into the night.

"How are we supposed to fight something like that?" Slug questioned.

A rumbling noise soon followed its departure. The Dinobots looked around and got their trigger fingers ready, looking for the threat.

"What's that noise!?"

"Uh...Grimlock?" Spike nervously pointed up at the bay. "Look!"

"I'm looking, but I'm not- oh, scrap." Grimlock hissed.

On the landing bay, another Predacon had appeared, and could not have been more different from the first one if it tried, as if was another beast entirely, somewhat of a cross between a moose, a dear, and a dragon. Then another one marched forward, also completely different in appearance, like a robotic gryphon with the arms of a bear, followed by more and more, all of utterly and vastly different shapes and proportions. An entire Predacon army, made of variation upon variation of the form.

Each one of the vastly different beasts reared up and roared like the one before them, and like the first of their member to depart, they spread massive, technologically-looking wings like beasts and began flying through the sky, filling it with a whirlpool of mechanical dragons.

One by one, they divided. One by one, they separated and flew different directions, all arriving to designated cities of Cybertron, where the hoodwinked populace would be waiting to welcome their new dragon police, meant to protect them from Monstructor appearing and attacking like a ghost. From there, Shockwave would use the mighty beasts' power and intimidating presence to 'convince' the citizens they protected to surrender more and more power to him, until he had total control of the planet.

"Grimlock?" Spike whimpered fearfully. "What do we do?"

Grimlock remained unusually silent. He stared at the ground, his grip on his sword slackening. One Predacon caught Grimlock's notice, as it appeared to be lagging behind its brothers, taking its time simply so it could lays it yellow optics on Grimlock.

If the first Predacon had been big, then this one was colossal. It was black and orange, with electric wire running through its wing like exposed veins. Silver braces seemed to cover every once of its hefty frame. Its head had an exposed maw of teeth even when it closed, and its neck and tail ran long through its body, like a serpent.

Grimlock gave it his best 'back off' stare, but that had no effect on it.

The enormous Predacon narrowed its gaze on Grimlock, then shrieked – a high-pitched mechanical sound that gave Spike goosebumps with goosebumps on them. When the Predacon opened its mouth, the bottom of half of its jaw split sideways, freaking Spike out even more. If he didn't know better, Grimlock would have thought the shriek was an assurance from the Predacon that Grimlock would be seeing it again.

When it was finished, the Predacon turned around and flew off, the same as its brethren, off to guard a city against a potential attack from the unstable gestalt that had everyone in such a huff.

When the sky was finally emptied of all its dragons, and the quiet of the night returned, Spike and Whimsy were left wondering what to do.

"W-what do we do now?" Spike asked.

Grimlock resumed staring at the ground.

Slug and Swoop stepped around to comfort Grimlock on either side. They had been friends with Grimlock for far too long to not see when he was upset about something, and something about the Predacons had disrupted him severely.

"Grimlock?"

"Yeah?" Grimlock responded in his usual rude tone, but with an emptiness to it.

"You all right?"

"What are you, my motherboard?"

"The Predacons...they've got you thinking about Shockwave's lab, don't they?"

"No!" Grimlock snapped, swinging his arm blindly at Swoop. Swoop crossed his arms and glared sharply until Grimlock gave in. "Yeah, all right, yeah, they do..."

"Shockwave's lab?" Spike questioned. "What about Shockwave's lab?"

"Forgit about it, kid." Slug instructed him. "Ain't nothing that concerns you. So, Grimlock, what do you want to about the Predacons?"

Grimlock turned his left to right, reassuring himself of the presence of his team while thinking about bad memories.

"First, we've got a couple of things." Grimlock answered, his normal bravado seeping into his voice. "We've always a reputation for ignoring Prime's orders. Well, now we need Prime to step up on the podium and publicly endorse the Predacons."

"What!?" The Dinobots exclaimed. "Isn't that the opposite of what we want to do!?"

"Listen, if we start trying to take those things out now, Shockwave will use it as leverage on Optimus. This isn't about Dinobots versus Predacons – well, okay, yeah it is, but there's more to it than that – this is about politics. Imagine rogue Autobots – who are not us- attacking the Predacons in the middle of the night. Shockwave would use it against Optimus and hit him where it hurts, consolidating support and power for himself. But WE are already know for disobeying and defying Optimus' orders, and everyone knows we don't like Shockwave." Grimlock explained. "So with Optimus' public opining being for them, rather than against them, it'll give him a diplomatic immunity when we start taking out the Predacons before they take over. Once that's done, we start taking the Predacons, one by one. Is everyone clear!?"

"Yes, sir!" Rang out from the Dinbots around Grimlock. Whimsy, prone to filibusters herself, followed it all perfectly, and saluted. Spike, however, was lost, so he saluted and merely mumbled.

"Good!" Grimlock snapped, swerving around dramatically to where the large black Predacon had flown off to. He began marching in the same direction on foot.

"Then we got a secret war to start."