Beast Wars: Friendship is Magic

“Megatron, the Flyers and the dragons have returned.” Steeljaws reported from his lookout post.  “They’re not alone either.  They have someone else with them.”

Megatron slinked from his cave, the light burning away the dark shadows as he awaited their arrival.  The dragons landed first, the Flyers following with a zebra in their grasp.  Megatron’s expression twisted in puzzlement.

“Who is this?”

“You don’t recognize me?” the equine feigned an offended face. “Megatron, I’m hurt.  Allow me to jog your memory.  Dementia, Terrorize!” The zebra shifted into robot mode within moments, his visor gleaming in the sunlight.  Megatron let out a low chuckle upon recognizing his colleague.  Thanks to the combined efforts of his dragons and Flyers, their final asset had been recovered, and the Predacon unit was made whole again.

"So, you’ve survived after all.  This is good news, yes.” Megatron greeted his scientist. "And I see that you’ve become acquainted with the locals?" He smiled as he had noticed the sadist was covered in blood.

“It appears that I wasn’t the only one dabbling in a little bit of slaughter here and there,” Dementia hinted at the decaying corpses of Clump and Vex that still plagued the perimeter.

“A minor misunderstanding, but in due time, the others realized who their true leader was, and fell in line,” Megatron’s head swiveled to the red teen dragon, who stiffened instantly. “Isn’t that right, Garble?”

"Y-You can count on us, Megatron!" Garble shakily replied as he and his friends gave a salute, complete with nervous smiles. "We'll be the best scouts you could ask for!" For the dragons, the rules were simple; keep Megatron happy, and he’ll have a reason to keep them alive.

His answer had pleased him enough.

“Good man.” Megatron returned to his official crew, allowing the conscripts to breathe easily once again.  “What information do you have about the planet we’re on?”

“The Energon deposits are abundant, that much we know for sure.” Dementia scratched his hand against his chin.  “It’s also a very prosperous land with multiple species of wildlife.  None of which I have encountered are a major threat to us.  If I were to create a theory, based on these dragons that you have recruited, there also appears to be civilization, albeit rather… primitive.  Cyberbee can attest to this.”

The Mini-Con detached from his back, landing on Dementia’s forearm.  This caused a shiver to spread among the teen dragons.

“Was that thing in his back?” Baff muttered.

“That’s just freaky.” Fume whispered.

“Quiet.” Garble snapped, not wanting to attract attention to his group.

Megatron crossed his claws over his chest. “And what news from your little assassin, Dementia?"

With a nod of approval from his master, Cyberbee began,  “There are intelligent lifeforms on this planet.” He said.  “The fact that we have these alternate forms should reinforce that.  But these beings also seem to be weak, in comparison to us.  There was this one zebra I encountered, which I scanned for Dementia’s form, who threw some kind of jar full of gunk at me.  The best it did was slow me down for a cycle or two.  They have means of defending themselves, but from what I seen, it’s nothing to worry about.”

Megatron exhaled a small stream of flame, then turned to Garble.

“And what have you to say, Garble?  You live on this backwater planet, so you should know a thing or two about it, yes.”

Garble scratched the back of his neck. “Yeah, well, he’s not exactly wrong.  The only real problem here is a bunch of stupid ponies.  They’re hardly a threat, just some annoying, uppity pests.”

“Interesting,” Megatron hummed. “And where would we find these ‘ponies’?”

“They’re everywhere.  They come from small towns outside the Everfree like a bunch of parasprites.”

“Outside the Everfree.” Megatron echoed. “Our next course of action is clear, then.  We shall crush these ponies and bring them under Predacon rule.  Then we shall take the next town, and the one after that.  This will be the first stepping stone of our glorious conquest of the universe, and the Cybertron, that is rightfully mine to rule!” Megatron turned to his troops, who were already prepping.  They were already feeling inspired.

Steeljaws bared his fangs with a grin, the rocks on his shoulders dripping with smoke, cracking his knuckles together.

Razorwing’s sawblades spun rapidly, fading into rotating blurs.

Roosternator loaded his blaster, the weapon emanating a high-pitched beep.

Dementia gave a dark chuckle, malicious intent known only to him running through his mind.

Cyberbee buzzed as his wings flapped in anticipation, running his scythe-like appendages together in a manner of sharpening them.  “Alright, we get to massacre some more squishies!”

The teen dragons felt a small sense of glee erupt from within them.  The proposition of being able to torch pony towns with large aliens as allies?  How could they resist?  Better yet, how could they lose?

Megatron stood upright, his wings stretched to their full length as his voice boomed.

“Predacons, Terrorize!”

The Predacon forces wound up walking, or flying, depending on their role, in their Beast modes.  Megatron concluded that it was best not to short out in the middle of the destruction they would soon wrought.

“Y’know, when he said ‘terrorize’, walking wasn’t exactly what I had in mind.” Steeljaws griped to Dementia, who nodded in agreement.

This was going to be a long trek through the forest.