There was a day of relative silence after the battle, people working to repair the walls and clear the battlefield. The funeral pyres took place in the center of town, a total of twenty pyres in a circle. The weather corps and and wonderbolts held their viking-style funeral on a large river leading into the Everfree, their losses amounted to twenty-five.

Those who fought returned to their homes or went out to try and enjoy themselves and rest. Vinyl and the others had met up with Emerald and Fluttershy, both nearly covered in blood of the injured, and after they did what they could for everyone they proceeded to one of Ponyville’s bathhouses to clean the gore and grime from them and to relax in the springs.

“Damn, I dislocated it a few times and it’s still sore…” Applejack said to herself as he held her right shoulder and stretched it out.

“Well no kidding, you just bowled them all over with that shield.” Rarity said.

“Hey, you try firing a cannon like the ones we carry with nothing to counter the recoil, they can blow your arms out of their sockets if you’re not careful.” Dash retorted. Applejack rolled her eyes.

“Oh come on guys, we all did well and we all had a bit of bad stuff happen to us out there, it’s a battle.” Pinkie said happily, despite her hands that how now scarred over major burns from how hot her chaingun gets after long enough.

“I’m always a little guilty whenever we all work together like that, since I’m almost always out of the fight giving you guys support.” Rarity said.

“Sniper cover is one of the most important kind of support one can have, Rarity.” Fluttershy said softly, staring at where there were still a few crimson stains on her hands.

“Yeah, they get to see the battlefield from a bit of a ways back so they can react better than the people in the battle too, and they rely on you to help protect them from things they can’t see.” Emerald agreed.

“Well sniper support or no, I think we owe this battle to you fliers, those Bats and that Dragon completely decimated their forces and ripped that Ursa to shreds.” Vinyl said. Dash grinned.

“Well that’s what we’re supposed to do, but really we owe it to you. With that Ursa an unknown factor and those two Manticores watching the skies we couldn’t get close. You took them apart like scrap metal, and you and Twi distracting that Ursa and managing to somewhat disable it with that artillery fire was amazing. Most of our losses were when that first Dragon was shot down and from pilots not being able to get out of their downed Bats in time before they burned to death. If they would have shot down Spitfire’s Dragon, the flagship, we would have lost so many more.” Dash explained.

“Your timing really was impeccable.” Twilight agreed. The rest gave their agreement too.

“Not to mention Emerald’s help treating the injured, there’s just no way I would have been able to save so many lives alone. She really knows what she’s doing.” Fluttershy said, smiling at the green haired girl. They remained silent for a little while longer before Vinyl thought of something.

“Hey, Twilight. We’re here because those Seekers wanted to get that drone Spike back, where is he anyways?” She asked.

“He’s currently at the wall making sure the repairs go well. By the time we’re done here he should be back home so you can meet him. I think you’ll like him, and he’ll definitely like you. He’ll beg you to scan and examine your systems and give you upgrades.” Twilight explained, chuckling lightly. That interested Vinyl.

“Should I let him?” Vinyl asked. Twilight shrugged.

“The thing is quite the little charmer by the way, especially if you know a thing or two about augmentation and Cybermancy.” Rarity chimed in.

“He and Twi developed the SPIKE systems, which is what we based our Bats off of. At least off of the prototypes and concepts they had a long time ago.” Dash said. Vinyl wanted to meet this boy now. But for now she resigned to continue relaxing, the battle may have been somewhat short for her; but it was still exhausting. Emerald had actually falling asleep, as had Fluttershy, keeping the dying from doing just that was not easy work.

“Spike, you here?” Twilight called when she, Vinyl and Emerald entered the unusually placed large tree that was a home.

“Yeah, downstairs.” A young voice came over what seemed to be an intercom at the door. “I’m guessing they’re Vinyl and Emerald?” The voice continued.

“I’ll introduce you in person.” Twilight said. Vinyl was fascinated by the laboratory-like structures and objects just scattered around the place.

“Downstairs is the workshop, Spike is probably the best Biometal technician alive, and he’s a full independant. We don’t even really know anything about him before we found him, but he’s a lot like you.” Twilight explained as they made their way down the stairs.

They entered a massive chamber, almost a chasm, that was like one of those cliche underground laboratories. They found Spike waiting for them at the bottom of the stairs. He was shorter than Vinyl. but they met eyes and stared at each other.

Spike’s false flesh looked like it had scales all along it, and he had major draconic features. His eyes were slit pupiled, but Vinyl saw something in them. Something that a Drone could never replicate.

“You’re no drone…” Vinyl said.

“I wouldn’t know, I don’t remember. But you’re definitely not, even though you look a lot like I do.” The draconic boy reply.

“How can you tell he’s not an independant drone?” Twilight asked.

“What made you think that I wasn’t going to try and kill you once you put your gun away when we first met?” Vinyl retorted. Twilight smiled lightly and nodded. “Your eyes, they have life behind them. Not even the Seekers that were once human have that when they’re brainwashed and indoctrinated.” She continued.

“Do you know how much of you is biometal?” Spike asked, a glint in his eyes.

“Almost all of me.” VInyl replied.

“Wanna find out the exacts?” The boy offered. Vinyl smiled.

“Maybe another time, I think we can have a rather interesting time together. For now, though, I have a secondary objective I need to uphold.” Vinyl said.

“The interrogation? But we couldn’t risk trying to spare some of them.” Twilight asked.

“I had Dash ask her commander, Spitfire, for scans of the area and I managed to find where I think they came from. It’s small, so it was probably just where they amassed, but there may be something there we can use.” Vinyl explained.

“How exactly does one interrogate a Seeker if they don’t want to be interrogated…?” Spike asked. Vinyl grinned.

“You’ll find out soon enough, after all for this mission I’ll be wanting some overwatch if that’s alright with you. Twilight, you and I will be going in. Emerald, you’ll stay back with Spike and provide sniper overwatch support while he gives us technical.” Vinyl said.

“Oh, a mission. It’s been a while since I’ve gone out on the field.” Spike said happily.

“Happy to help.” Twilight said.

“Thank you.” Vinyl said with a smile. “I’ll be ready whenever you are, I imagine you don’t want to leave right this very second.” She continued.

“I would like to make sure everyone is alright…” Twilight said.

“I’ll need to prepare a couple things, I dunno how long Twi’ll take but I’ll be maybe an hour.” Spike said. Vinyl nodded to him and looked at Twilight.

“About the same for me, give or take.” She agreed.

“Well what are we going to do until then?” Emerald asked. Vinyl looked down at her and shrugged.

“Why don’t you guys take a look around here? Plenty of experimental augments and weapons that could use some testing.” Spike suggested.

“I don’t think we’ll be taking anything experimental on a mission like this, but some of the prototypes are interesting. I’ll be back in a little while.” Twilight said, making for the stairs.

“Yeah I guess. If you wanna know what something is just ask me.” Spike said as he sat down at the larger workshop and began manipulating a holographic console. Vinyl and Emerald looked at each other and then at the wide array of different interesting things to look at.

Author's Note

Sorry for this one, but I had to transition from this to the next chapter, and while the last was an extended length for a battle, this next one will most likely be an extended length for a bit of subterfuge