"Confidentiality is a virtue of the loyal, as loyalty is the virtue of faithfulness..."
-Edwin Louis Cole

A few minutes earlier, just after SP-K3 went to find the others...

"I have a bad feeling about this..." Spike mumbled to himself on the way back to the Holodeck they were sat in when Master Twilight gave them a lecture, hoping they would think logically and regroup to a familiar and safe area. Distant rumbles shook the Gambit yet again, this time albeit a bit softer than before. "Well the good news is the deflector shields work!" Rushing a little bit faster on his treads, Spike headed towards the Holodeck and, hopefully, where the rest of the learners are.

Unfortunately, only two out of the five were accounted for: Pinkie Pie fidgeting with what looked like a toy party cannon, and the most dazzling creature his monitors ever beheld. There she sat, adjusting her coiffeure and makeup and looking radiant as ever. It was almost enough to fry his circuitry before his logistical matrix kicked in and he gave his head unit a good slap to get him rolling again. "Where are Applejack and Rainbow Dash?" He asked both of them, heading to the holotable in the middle of the room.

"Engine room, fighter bay." They simultaneously replied, none too concerned.

"WHAAAAAAAT?!" Quickly, he tapped into the Holotable's control board and brought up an internal holographic map of the Gambit's interior, 5 colored dots flashing in various intervals. The purple and pink dot were exactly where he stood, while the orange dot was 20 floors down and heading towards the Reactor Core, while the blue dot sat just outside Fighter Bay 2. "Nononono, this is really bad! If anyone gets hurt, it'll be my rear exhaust port on the scrap heap!"

"I wouldn't fret too much, darling." Rarity said, now filing her nails.

"Yeah! We all got places to go when there's a battle!" Pinkie followed up with, still tinkering away. "I mean, it's not like it's our first time seeing one!" She giggle-snorted.

Oh... I nearly forgot. These were all EX-pupils of various Jedi Masters on the front lines. Of course they've seen battles! "...You all have ways of coping, huh?" SP-K3 said, rubbing the back of his head unit.

"Oh there there, Spikey-Wikey!" Rarity hovered the astromech closer to her using the force, wrapping him up in a big hug. "There's no need to berate yourself! You were very dear to check on us and keep us safe, but we can handle our own." Looking behind him, she was worried about how close that little red dot on the map was to one of the fighter bays. "However," she said, letting go of the little droid. "I'm a tad concerned about Rainbow. With how long I've known her, being that close to one of the Fighter Bays can only mean bad news."

Glancing back down at the astromech, she smiled. "Could you be a dear, and go check on her for me?"

A few minutes later, SP-K3 arrived at Fighter Bay 2 via droid maintenance tunnels. Looking for Rainbow Dash, he found her inspecting a nearby starship. It was an ARC-170 Fighter according to his database. "Rainbow Dash! I'm glad to see you!"

"I WASN'T GONNA FLY IT, I SWEAR!" She yelled out of habit, probably from the dozens of clones occupying this hangar. Opening her eyes, the young Padawan breathed a sigh of relief. "Oh, it's just Twilight's astromech! Phew! For a second, I thought somebody caught on, heh-heh!" Turning back around, Rainbow began trying to jar the cockpit open so she could get in. If my new master wants to leave us, fine! This time I'm gonna take the fight to them! That'll show those walking rust buckets for Sp-

"Uh, you do know I can understand you, right?"

Rolling her eyes, she turned back around. "Yeah? What about it, DROID?"

"...."

She scoffed. "Figures it can't get a good comeback going..." Rainbow mumbled.

"I have feelings too, ya know." Spike crossed his arms. "You really ought have faith in Master Twi-"

"Faith? FAITH?!" The tools around her began to rumble unnaturally, as if there was an isolated earthquake centered around Rainbow Dash. "It hasn't even been one day and my so-called 'Master' decided to bail on us!"

"Uh, Rainbow-"

Her fists clenched as hard as they could, bending the nearby pieces of scrap metal, most likely for quick patches on Fighters coming in from dogfights. "SHE should have faith in US!" A bolt from the fighter she was tinkering flew off, snapping her out of it. Looking around, she saw lots of clone engineers and pilots staring in her direction. Blushing out of embarrassment, she took a deep breath and got back under control.

With the incident now over with, the clones carried out their orders once again. "She should have faith in me..." The once arrogant and angry girl now looked shy and composed, rubbing the strange blue and yellow patch on her arm absently.

Deep down, she's just a teenage girl. I feel sorry for her, for all of them. They sacrificed so much to get this far...

"*sigh* Look, Twi- I mean Master Twilight, she had faith in all of you, and probably still does, knowing how forgiving she could be." He chuckled. "A force of habit she picked up from her Master, Miss Celestia if you asked me! Uh, you alright there?"

Rainbow stood flabbergasted. "Woah, woah, woah! Time out- you don't mean Celestia Sol Invictus, Guardian of Harmony, do you?"

"Um-"

"Because if she was trained by someone as legendary as that," she grabbed a hold of SP-K3's head unit and brought him face-to-face with her rose colored eyes. "She'd be sent straight where the biggest, meanest, and most powerful droid occupied planet was, and would nuke the Wampa-Rat droppings outta them!"

"Um, well, if you quit staring at me like that and put me down I'll answer your question." He cautiously said. Spike already saw what happened when she was mad, he dreaded to see what she'd do when she turned manic!

"Oh! Uh, sorry!" She unceremoniously dropped the astromech like it were another piece of scrap metal.

Dusting himself off, he turned to face her. "First off, I'm an astromech and not another droid you can 'look menacingly' at, okay?!" He pointed his claw at her. "Two, I'm not just any other astromech off the assembly line either. Master Twilight modified almost everything about me-my programming, my speech, and even my hull and combat protocols! Also," he reinforced with a few jabs to her chest via pointed claw. "I am your one and only chance to prove her faith in you guys wasn't for nothing!"

"And lastly, to answer your question: Yeah, she was trained by Miss Celestia. However, she retired many lightcycles ago. Twilight probably doesn't even realize it, and the only reason I know is because I have a database containing several hundred books' worth of historic documents, famous battles, and ex-Jedi Masters in my head." Silence ensued afterwards, Rainbow's jaw agape.

"Uh, you still there?" He waved a mechanical claw in front of her face. Great, I broke her...

Author's Note

A little background knowledge for the automatic messages for ya: Regardless of the safety and whereabouts, Spike is recording ALL data being sent in, even on a base level. That means, even though he's hoping they're all safe and sound, that order put in to "monitor" all the Padawans takes precedence over emotion. Cuz he's a robot, and robots don't rely on touchy-feely stuff. But maybe I'll pull a "Pinocchio" and give him more human thoughts and make him a real boy ;).

Also, he's a Robot[emphasis on the word], so he isnt going to be little baby dragon Spike, and he'll have some "tough love" moments such as this one.

Btw, the "my rear exhaust port on the scrap heap" was droid slang for "my a$$ on the line" and I probably shoulda not sounded like a dingaling but my best friend/ new editor complained about lack of explanation and I'm salty af about it SO HERE YOU GO EXPLANATION STUFF.

Feel free to leave a comment, constructive or otherwise!

Part 2 involves space and battles that happen there via lasers and stuff cuz space battles are par for the course, especially for a hothead like Rainbow Dash or(sometimes) Applejack.