Beast Wars: Friendship is Magic

If there was one regret Paragon ever would have had in his life, being stranded on this Primus-forsaken planet would be it.  The encounter with the local ponies turned him off almost instantly from their civilization, especially those pink creatures with their bubbly smiles and high-pitched voices.  If the Predacons and the elements of this planet didn’t kill him, they certainly would have.  He figured that he’d probably search for his teammates by himself.  He’d already seen enough of that town to know that he didn’t want to be anywhere near it or its populace.

Paragon had decided to take a rest nearby a large pond.  It was welcoming, compared to his previous endeavors.  The water lightly swished along with the wind, the low hums of dragonflies grew loud or faded as they close in near the Maximal’s ears, and frogs emitted the occasional croak as they peacefully sat on water lilies, the pond’s waves carrying their green rafts in whatever direction the wind willed.  Paragon let out an exasperated sigh to himself while staring down his own reflection in the pond.

“All of this for a stinkin’ Golden Disk,” He scooped up a rock in his hand and gave it a good flick with his wrist.  The pebble danced gracefully across the surface, shooting ripples in all directions, before it sank to the bottom.

A hiss shattered the harmony of the lake hole.

Paragon’s ears perked up, his eyes being drawn to the source of the sound; the pond itself.  The center of the lagoon slowly brewed with bubbles and the surface was breached by a large, dark brown, scaly head mounted on a long neck.  It’s lime green eyes glared down at Paragon as its neck towered over him by several meters.  The Maximal’s ears flattened as he gawked.

Another ripple followed, then another head burst from the depths, taking its position beside the first head.

Then another appeared.

And another.

And another.

Four serpent-like heads gazed at the Maximal, each licking their chops, eyes narrowed with ferocious malice.

A whimper escaped Paragon’s throat as he took an uneasy step backward.

“Heheh… nice four-headed, serpent… thing,” he squeaked out.  “I was just RUNNING FOR MY LIFE!”

The Maximal turned tailed and ran with his tail between his legs like a scraplet out of the Pit.  The hydra threw its four heads back, a rumbling roar breaking out that shook the trees and rustled the leaves.  The behemoth of the deep lurched from its home and pursued its fleeing prey.

Paragon shot a quick glance at the readers.  “I SWEAR, THE WORST THINGS ALWAYS HAPPEN TO ME!”

“Keep those flames going,” Steeljaws barked.  “Megatron’s orders.”

Fizzle and Fume panted loudly, tongues draped out the corners of their mouths.  They’d be at this for almost an entire day and he still wants them to keep going?!

“Steeljaws,” Fizzle sputtered.  “We’ve been doing this… for hours… we’re exhausted!”

“Yeah…” Fume added.  “Can we take a break?”

Steeljaws’s optics narrowed dangerously.   “Steeljaws, Terrorize!”

The cragadile shifted into his robot mode, standing tall over the two dragon slaves.  The rocks on his shoulder started to heat up, smoke dripping from the bases.  He planted his feet into the ground, kicking dirt aside as the stones rumbled.  He gave them one warning.

“Would you rather be tired or dead?”

Fizzle and Fume exchanged looks of pure terror.

“I think I just peed a little,” Fume whispered.

“No, no, we get it, we get it!” Fizzle exclaimed, waving his arms in a desperate motion.  “We’ll keep the fire going!  See?”

The two dragons jumped right back into their task, blowing new streams of fire, all thought of rest pushed out of their minds.  Steeljaws straightened himself once again before converting back into beast mode.

“That’s what I thought.”

Baff flew out of the thick brushes of the forest, carrying another shipment of logs, which he dumped into the inferno.  He wiped the sweat from his forehead as he turned around and flew back to collect more, as was his task.

As much as the dragons wanted to leave, they couldn’t help but be haunted by the ever looming idea that Megatron would somehow find them and make them pay for desertion.  And with Steeljaws around to enforce his will, along with kicking out the insubordinate Ragnarok, it only got worse as Megatron’s thug ran them ragged.

“An excellent display of authority, Steeljaws.  Yesss.” Megatron’s voice called out as he cut through the darkness of the cave’s mouth, stepping into the light for the first time since his encounter with Ragnarok.  “You will make a far more plausible lieutenant in Ragnarok’s place.”

“Thank you, sir!  It’s my pleasure!” Steeljaws proudly grinned.

“Has Garble found anymore Predacons yet?”

“I haven’t gotten any reports, though they’ve been checking in at intervals as you’ve ordered.  None of them have tried to run off.” the cragadile nodded.

The tyrant sighed a small whiff of flame.

“If my flyers were here then I wouldn’t have to put up with their incompetence.”

“Speak the Devil’s name and he shall appear.” said a voice from above.

Megatron and Steeljaws tilted their heads upward to see an overly sized changeling and cockatrice closing in on their campsite, landing before the Predacon leader.

“Razorwing, Terrorize!”

“Wyvernator, Terrorize!”

The two flyers changed into their robot modes, dropping to a knee.

“Razorwing, hm?  We’ve hit a stroke of luck.  Yesss.  That only leaves one of us left to find.”

“Megatron, thank the Matrix that we found you,” Razorwing said.  “It’s a miracle that you survived!” That’s not far from the truth as Razorwing had truly hoped that something had happened to Megatron’s pod, but not only was it fine, but now he was still kicking!  This… was going to require a lot of patience.

“It will be a miracle if any of the Maximals survived.  And if they did, they’ll need one to survive what we have in store for them.  Yesss.” Megatron turned to Wyvernator.  “What kind of name is ‘Wyvernator’?  Roosternator sounds more fitting, given your beast mode’s hideous head.”

“Wyvernator not like Roosternator!” the cockatrice Predacon whined.

“I’d buy Roosternator.” Steeljaws chimed in.

“We’ll put it to a vote,” Megatron finally announced.  Usually, he wasn’t one open for democracy, but with something as trivial as this, he’d let it slide.  Besides, he could use a good laugh.  “All for Roosternator?”

“Aye!” Megatron, Steeljaws, and Razorwing proclaimed.  “And against?”

“Nay…?” Wyvernator tapped his fingers together nervously.

“The ayes have it.  It’s official, your name will now be Roosternator.” Megatron decreed.

“But… Wyvernator not want to be called Roosternator!” the poor cockatrice slacked the torso of his body forward in defeat.

“You say ‘no’, I say ‘yes’, I win, I’m the boss, now shut up.” Megatron dismissed concerns.

Wyvernator, or Roosternator now, sighed as fate found a way to rob him of even his cool name.  Razorwing and Steeljaws chuckled amongst each other.

“Wait a minute,” Razorwing’s logic circuits kicked in.  “What do you mean there’s one of us left to find?  But there’s two of us still missing.”

“Our warrior friend, Ragnarok as he’s calling himself, has been… disposed of for insubordination.” Megatron reminisced.

Razorwing paused.  If he was able to dispatch a more hardened warrior like Ragnarok, who was a gladiator champion back on Cybertron, then perhaps a direct approach to taking over would be ill-advised.

Megatron cleared his throat.

“Now, if we’re done asking questions, let’s consider our next course of business.”

“What kind of ‘business’?” Razorwing’s brow shot up.

“The Predacon kind,” Megatron snapped.  “Our science officer is knowledgeable in Energon and knows how to properly extract it. As you all have undoubtedly found out, this planet is an Energon gold mine.  More than enough to fuel the Predacons’ galactic conquest.  Yesss.  However, he is the most properly qualified to segment it into useful energy.”

“But what about our ship?” Steeljaws pointed out.  “Our Energon’s useless in the long-term without a ship to fly us back home.”

“We’ll seek out its crash site and move our base of operations there, so long as the rectifier coil and weapons systems are still functional.” Megatron tapped his chin.

“Our next objective is find our scientist?  Roosternator and I can make that happen,” Razorwing offered.  “After all, we are capable of flight and can cover more ground.”

“Go,” Megatron nodded.  “And if you happen to run into any surviving Maximals, destroy them.”

“It will be our pleasure,” Razorwing transformed back into beast mode.

“Roosternator feel great pain coming on!  And for once, it won’t be on Roosternator!” the cockatrice sneered while ascending with Razorwing into the air.

“As for you, Steeljaws,” Megatron looked upon his lieutenant, who straightened himself, standing at attention.  “Do continue your post.”

“As you wish!” Steeljaws saluted.

Fume and Fizzle, who’d been catching a breath as the Predacons conversed, instantly resumed their work once Steeljaws’ eyes fell upon them again.

Blitz sighed to himself, exasperated.  He’d been searching for his friends for what seemed like mega-cycles now and there was still no sign of them.  Night had already fallen and he was just wandering aimlessly at this point.  He turned to head back to Rainbow’s, but was greeted with a rainbow colored blur shooting through the sky at speeds Blitz didn’t even think were possible without the use of a transwarp drive.

To add to it, the streak was heading straight for him.

And Blitz knew who it was as he felt a sense of dread take over his circuits.

“Oh no,” was all he could muster, instinctively shutting his eyes before he was struck dead center in the chest and sent careening into the ground below.  The fall hadn’t caused nearly as much damage as he initially thought it would have, but pain still surged through his body.  Part of him had hoped that this was a Predacon by some chance.

Sadly, that wasn’t to be.

Blitz opened his eyes and came face to face with an all too familiar and very pissed off looking cyan pegasus.  Rainbow’s brow was furrowed, her eyes burning with fury, her lips contorted into a deep and disdainful scowl.

So, what did Blitz do?

He decided to be coy.

“Uh… hey, Dash!  What’s up…?” he greeted with a nervous grin, a meek chuckle escaping his throat.

To which she replied with, “WHAT IN THE NAME OF CELESTIA WERE YOU THINKING?!” Rainbow’s voice ruptured Blitz’s audio receptors, causing them to droop downward while his irises shrank into dots.

“Searching for my friends…?” he gave another sheepish, toothy grin.  Suffice it to say, Rainbow was not impressed.  She felt like bucking him into the middle of next week.  In fact, she was on the very brink of doing so, her hooves aching with the temptation to kick something.  But she took a deep breath, slowly calming herself down.

“Do you know where any of the others landed?” Rainbow inquired.

“No.” he admitted.

“Do you know anything about the area you’re searching through?” she waved her hoof out in the general direction of the forest around them.

“Not really.” Blitz rubbed his fore hoof while looking off to the side.

“Do you even know how to get back to my house from here?” the cyan pegasus narrowed her eyes, her pupils burrowing into Blitz’s own.

“Of course I do!” Blitz objected.

“Alright, then.  How?” Rainbow crossed her hooves, scowl still glued to her face.

Blitz was silent, hesitation clogging up his throat and scrambling the words in his processor.

“Well?”

“… Go north until you come across a big cloud house…?” Blitz replied, rubbing the back of his head.  It was the best he could come up with in the given circumstances.  He hated to admit it, but she was right about every point she just made.  He sighed in defeat.  “I’m sorry, Rainbow.  This was probably not the best idea in hindsight, but I just figured that they’d need my help.  They could be in danger for all I know!”

“Come on, you and your friends are robots.  What could possibly be more dangerous than that?”

The answer to that came in the form of a bellowing roar that shook the ground.  Blitz and Rainbow diverted their attention to the source.

Paragon shoved his way through the trees, scrambling into the open terrain.

“I HATE THIS PLANET!” he screamed, shoving his way past the two pegasi.  The two returned their eyes to the forest from which he emerged and out came the multi-headed Hydra, eyes locked on the fleeing diamond dog.

The jaws of the pegasi dropped as their eyes shot open in shock.

“Does that answer your question?”

“Paragon, Maximize!” Paragon transformed, whipping out his rifle, and letting loose a barrage of blaster fire on the enormous reptile.  The projectiles struck the scales of the hydra, burning them black, but the armor held.  It roared with malicious intent as it continued advancing on the terrified diamond dog Transformer.

“Wait a minute,” Blitz’s mind clicked. “I know that bot!  Blitz Streak, Maximize!”

The pegasus changed into his robot mode, wielding his own rifle.  He leveled the sights onto one of the Hydra’s many heads and pulled the trigger.

The hydra felt a scorching pain rack one of its heads.  Plasma charred one of the head into a comedic ash black, leaving it with a dazed expression, its eyes dissolved into swirls while its tongue lolled to the side of its lip.

“Hey, ugly!  Over here!” Blitz taunted while waving his arms in the air to garner the hydra’s attention.

The hydra whirled its untouched heads at the Maximal, its tongues flicking in and out as it hissed with predatory instinct kicking in.

Paragon, who’d been preoccupied with scaling a tree to get a high vantage point focused his optics on the young Maximal.  He recognized him, as well as his voice.

“Kid…?”

“You want him as a snack, I’d suggest you consider otherwise!”

The massive reptile looked at its injured head, then back at Blitz, then its head, then back at Blitz one more time.

The hydra roared at Blitz, challenging his words as the charred head began to regain its bearings.

Blitz gulped and he turned to Rainbow.

“My intimidation skills need work.  Let’s just grab him and get out of here!” Blitz suggested as he transformed back into his pegasus form.

“No arguing with you there!”

Both pegasi rocketed upward and dove back down, sweeping across the floor, hooves outstretched towards Paragon, who was already about halfway up the tree.  The hydra’s heads struck at the two, but their speed and agility allowed them to evade, coming out unscathed.  Blitz and Rainbow passed over the beast and wrapped their forehooves around the smaller Maximal, who gave a small yelp as he pulled from the branch.  Beating their wings at top speed, they extracted Paragon out of there, narrowly avoiding the maw of the Hydra that snapped shut mere centimeters from the diamond dog’s tail.

“Oh, boy, now that was a close call!” Paragon panted, turning his head back to spot the hydra letting out an enraged screech at the loss of its meal.  “Woo hoo!  You ain’t eatin’ this dog today, lizard lips!”

The two dropped Paragon off on the floor near the edge of the Everfree, having put considerable distance between them and the Hydra.

“Kid, I never thought I’d be glad to see ya!” Paragon gave a smile, transforming back into diamond dog mode.

“Same here,” Blitz returned the grin.  “I’ve been looking all over for you guys!  And you got a new form, as well!”

“Yeah, it’s not a bad form, if ya ask me.  Call me Paragon.”

“Blitz Streak.”

“A bit tacky, but fitting to say the least.” Paragon crossed his arms.  “Who’s your friend?”

“Oh, yes, I nearly forgot.” Blitz chuckled, giving himself a small slap on the forehead.  “Paragon, this is Rainbow Dash.  Rainbow Dash, this is Paragon.”

“Hey there,” Rainbow gave a small smile, nudging him playfully.  “Enjoying Equestria so far?”

“No, I’m not,” Paragon deadpanned.  “First, we crash on an unknown planet, I wake up to a bunch of dogs who can’t think of anything but gems, I travel for hours to find a city, only to be jumped by a bunch of pink, smiling parasites that call themselves “ponies”, who love to jump around and go on about fun all day, then I get chased by a multi-headed reptile!  Oh man, I swear, everything on this planet is out to get me!”

Wait, smiling ponies?

Rainbow’s mind immediately recognized the pony who fit that description.  “Did any of them happen to be named Pinkie Pie?” she asked out loud.

“Oh, yeah,” Paragon frowned.  “All of them.”

“You must have met her during the whole mirror pool incident.” Rainbow pointed out.

“Mirror what now?” both Maximals stared at Rainbow, dumbfounded.

“Long story. In the meantime, let’s get you some place safe and away from the Everfree altogether.”

“We could fly him up to your place,” Blitz said.

Rainbow shook her head.

“I wouldn’t recommend it.  Only pegasi can walk on clouds.  Paragon would just fall right through them.”

“Well that’s real assuring.” Muttered the diamond dog.  “Is there no other place for me to go?”

Rainbow rubbed her chin.

“Well…”

"So let me get this straight: There are two factions of robots that were battling in space and during said battle, they crashed, and both of them landed in Equestria and now the two factions are trying to regroup so they can continue their epic battle of good vs evil, and now two of the robots on the good faction have been discovered, and you’re asking for my help so we can all help save the world! Am I right? I'm right, right?! Please tell me I'm right!" Pinkie asked excitedly while hopping in one place, a big, toothy grin plastered onto her face.

Rainbow, Blitz, and Paragon just stared at Pinkie for a long while in sheer amazement.

Blitz leaned over to Rainbow, whispering, “How did she guess all of that?  We’ve hardly said a word to her!”

“It’s just Pinkie being Pinkie.” Rainbow shook off her bewilderment.  “You’ll get used to it.”

Paragon didn’t say anything.  Instead, he began to punch himself in the head, over and over again.

Why?  Why?  Why?  Why?  Why?  Why?  WHY?! *WHY?!  WHY?!***

“I think I’d rather take my chances out in the wild,” Paragon said aloud, turning to make a break for the door.

“You’re not going anywhere, Paragon,” Blitz crossed his hooves.

“Oh, man, why do I have to stay with the hyper airhead?!” Paragon whined.

“Because Applejack doesn’t have any room in her barn, that much I can tell, Fluttershy already has enough animals to watch, and I don’t think she’d be able to take all of this in so easily, Rarity wouldn’t be able to stand you,” Rainbow explained.

“Hey!” Paragon yelled, offended, but the rainbow Pegasus continued.

“Twilight’s place is too small, so Pinkie was really your best bet.  Plus, she knows how to keep things on a need-to-know basis.”

“Yep!  I take Pinkie promises very seriously!” Pinkie appeared over Rainbow’s shoulder before retracting out of view.

In truth, Rainbow planned on telling her other friends about this alien robot war situation at some later point in time.  Unfortunately, she wasn’t sure on how she should word it without coming off as crazy.  Pinkie Pie was probably the most willing to believe in what she say because, well, she’s Pinkie.  Chances are, she could even help Paragon open up a little bit.

Whether he really wanted to or not.

“Oh!  Why don’t we have a sleepover?” Pinkie suggested.  “I’ve always wanted to have a sleepover with robots!”

"Since when?”

Since right now!”

“I should have guessed.” Paragon facepalmed.

“Sure, why not?” Rainbow gave a shrug.

“I’m okay with it.” Blitz added.  “I wouldn’t want to tire you guys out anyway.  It looks pretty late.”

“Sleep is kind of necessary for us ponies,” Rainbow stretched out her wings. “After the day I’ve had, I need it now.”

Paragon scooted off into a corner, preferring to stay as far away from Pinkie as possible.  He had had his fill of her the first time they met and this was really pushing it.

Blitz, on the other hoof, hung with the other two ponies.  Pinkie was a little bit too hyper for his taste, but he found her enthusiasm to be welcoming.  He could only hope that things would remain static between the remaining Maximals and Predacons for just a solar-cycle or two.  It wasn’t as if they’d regroup in such a small time frame, right?

Right?