There are many mysteries surrounding Pinkie Pie. Some ponies know the answers to some of them, like how her family knows what makes the Pinkie Sense tick. There are a few mysteries that nopony has an explanation to. The Cakes know of one such mystery.
It had been apparent to the Cakes from the moment she made the welcome wagon on the second day of her job as assistant baker that Pinkie was gifted when it came to engineering. It even surprised the Cakes sometimes that throwing parties was her special talent when she is able to come up with things like hoof powered helicopters, cannons that can fire parties, and, as they found on the day when the entirety of the SugarCube Corner split cleanly in half with little warning, giant robots.
The Cakes stopped what they were doing and grabbed onto the counters, their faces expression a wide range of surprise and confusion. Once their home had stopped moving of its own accord. They looked at eachother then cautiously peered down the giant hole. Upon seeing this, they realized that Pinkie was responsible and relaxed a little.
“Honey, can you get to the kids from where you are?” Mrs. Cake said, not bothering to be more alarmed than she absolutely had to. “I don’t want them accidentally falling into the huge hole in the floor.”
“I’m on it dear,” Mr. Cake replied quickly, being respectably frightened, but still retaining his wits. When you live with Pinkie Pie, things can still be surprising, but they tend to lose their edge when you deal with such chaos on a daily basis. Much to the chagrin of one draconequus, who had given up on the Cakes when Mr. Cake only paused briefly when the pie he was making had turned into a monster and followed up that pause with a calm but quick bludgeoning of said pastry in order to keep it in its tin.
As the Cakes made sure Pumpkin and Pound Cake didn’t get hurt by the unexpected splitting of their home, Pinkie was in the cockpit of a rather cool looking giant robot making some last minute diagnostics checks.
“Pre-launch launch bay opening? Check.”
She quickly grabbed a quill pen with her mouth and checked of a box on the checklist that was taped to the side window of the car-like cockpit of the giant robot. As she looked at the various meters and dials that lay just behind the steering wheel, she noticed that the check engine light was on. She frowned and thwacked the console once. Almost immediately the light went off.
“Temporarily fix the check engine light? Check.”
She looked at some of the readouts and began turning the radio knobs to adjust them. When they were satisfactory, she put the key in the ignition and turned it. The car, but not the rest of the robot, hummed to life with a dull roar.
“Cockpit energy flow levels satisfactory? Check.”
Pressing down the clutch and shifting the lever next to her, she shift the gear stick from ‘neutral’ to ‘giant robot’. The hydraulics and various whirs and grinds let her know the the cockpit was coupling itself to the main body of the behemoth of a robot. After the last satisfying click, she checked the readouts. Pinkie Pie smiled widely, happy that everything was at optimal levels.
“Remote cockpit coupling? Check. Hehee! Twilight would be so proud of me. Now...”
Pinkie Pie pulled a pair of goggles that had been hanging around her neck and fastened them to her face, adjusted the glove boots that allowed her to grip the steering wheel despite a clear lack of fingers, and tightened the obligatory badflank red scarf. With a hotblooded grin and a burning passion, Pinkie Pie pressed a button on the console.
“Now, let’s test drive this puppy!”
She turned on the music station of the radio and put her hind hoof to the metal. With a roar, the jet engines on the back of Pinkie’s Megas XLR Class Robot came to life as she flew out of the improbably large basement and rocketed off into the sky. Once the giant robot had flown far enough away from the Sugarcube Corner, the bakery came back together rather seamlessly. The ponies who had been inside in the eating/waiting area were still rather speechless when one of the proprietors came back out.
“We apologize for the interruption,” Mrs. Cake sweetly conveyed to the unsettled customers. “But it appear that our assistant baker forgot to warn us of this little incident ahead of time. Again. For your troubles, please have a complimentary cupcake on the house.”
One of the ponies, who clearly hadn’t been in Ponyville that long, responded to Mrs. Cake by falling sideways out of his chair and onto the floor, his face permanently frozen in shock and terror.
Rainbow Dash woke up from her nap with a huge yawn. She was absolutely refreshed and since the schedule called for partly cloudy weather to provide for shade on the hot summer day, she was free to do whatever she wanted, since the leftover rainstorm from yesterday had broken apart and pretty much had things covered. The rainbow maned pegasus stretched and popped her joints.
“That was great! Now I know I can totally handle anything that happens today!”
Then she turned around and saw a giant blue robot decorated with hot rod flames heading her way blaring “I Could Go Supersonic” on its radio. With patented Rainbow Dash skill, she flew out of the robots way as the cloud she was napping on was obliterated by the improbably aerodynamic chunk of steel. Rainbow Dash watched as it flew off and landed somewhere in the Everfree forest near the marshes.
At this point, the meek would turn in for the day, the intelligent would go to see if anyone else knew about the odd object, and the apathetic would carry on like nothing happened. The ambitious Rainbow Dash, who was Ponyville’s resident hotblood, grinned as she recognized the giant robot for what it was.
“Hello, excitement!”
With that, she took off and sped towards the Megas robot. Because she is Rainbow Dash, she flies right by the the need for a scene break and lands on the edge of the marsh. As she lands, she watches as Megas stretches its arms and makes a motion as if it were cracking its knuckles.
Pinkie Pie pulled out various controllers and joysticks and laid them out in a semi organized manner. Her gaze swept across them with serious intent as she silently decided which weapons to test out first. Eventually, the party pony settled on a quick test firing of the rockets. She picked up one of the controllers, quickly disabled the safety features by inputting the Contra Code, and took aim at some rocks on the far side of the bog. Rainbow Dash, not sure how to go about dealing with Megas XLR, decided to sit on an abandoned log.
With a series of whirs and whooshes, various parts of Megas’ exterior slid open and moved to reveal tons of missile compartments. With a glint in her eye, Pinkie Pie took aim and fired off salvo after salvo of missiles. Rainbow’s jaw dropped dumbly as she watched the display of missiles rocket through the air, leaving glorious contrails and slipping by each other with the greatest of ease. And when they hit their marks perfectly, the series of explosions was glorious enough to cause Rainbow Dash to internally fangasm on the spot.
Not everything was pleased with the success of the rockets, though. On the other end of the marsh, the murky water bubbled and broiled around a suspicously brown looking lump that had been hit by one of the stray missiles. Eventually, the four heads of the infamous swap hydra rose up to meet the new, metallic foe that alights hydra posteriors with explosives.
Pinkie, realizing her mistake, grins sheepishly and rubbed the back of her head. Having no way to apologize, though, Pinkie decided to skip the other lethal weapons testing and skipped straight to pure combat movement testing. Rainbow Dash watched intently as Megas got into a fighting position and taunted the Hydra with the universal come at me finger taunt. As an afterthought, Pinkie changed the music to a slightly more appropriate soundtrack.
The hydra charged with a fierce roar, slamming its entire body into Megas. Pinkie, gritting her teeth, wrestling with the controls to throw the hydra to the side. The multi-headed lizard crashed fiercely into the bog, splashing up a lot of water. Rainbow Dash’s eyes widened as the Hydra used its long necks to wrap around Megas’ leg and pull it over, sending it crashing into the bog.
Not wanting the metalic titan to recover, the leading head rushed forth to headbutt Megas as Pinkie frantically tried to get it to rise back up. The other heads surged forward as the main head kept Megas pinned, with two of them wrapping around the arms while the last one went for the cockpit. Thinking quickly, Pinkie pressed a button on the side of the dashboard, triggering the chest laser cannon to fire. Once the hydra had been knocked onto its back by the technologically awesome laser, Megas stood up and pointed its hands out. The hydra had only enough time to drop all four of its jaws as the hand balled up into fists and launched out towards the the Hydra, punching it in the chest and stomach.
“Woohoo! Go Robot!” cheered Rainbow Dash, who was now adorned inexplicably with a soda hat, foam finger, and a sports flag that had a simple depiction of the robot on it.
The hydra glared at the robot with three of its heads before it noticed that the fourth one was cowering behind the body. After dragging the last head from its hiding spot, it charged at Megas again. Pinkie prepared the chest laser again, but the hydra, in a fit of suicidal cleverness, stuck one of the heads in the oversized laser cannon. Unable to discharge properly, the cannon exploded, leaving one of the hydra’s heads unconscious and soot covered while Megas sparking with electricity.
“Ohnononononononononononono!” Pinkie panicked as the console sparked. “I didn’t even get to try out the laser sword or the hanheld laser! At least I still have steering.”
Pinkie, deciding to cut her losses, tried to beat a hasty retreat on foot. Megas was promptly tripped by the hydra the vengeful Hydra, who was somewhat faster than the robot. Once again grabbing the robots arms, the third head closed in to take a bit out of the cockpit when something small and blue buzzed in front of its face. After eating the parasprite, the Hydra resumed the attempt when Rainbow Dash came flying in and kicked it in its face.
“HAH! Take that!” Rainbow Dash cheered.
The other two heads let Megas go to try and catch Rainbow Dash, but the two heads just ended up crashing into each other after several misses caused by the pegasus’ aerial acrobatics. The remaining head, wishing that he had a palm or at least a palm tree to facepalm with, growled as it made its attempts to snap at the pegasus, who continued to dodge and taunt the remaining head just like she did with the other two. After several failed attempts, the head growled in frustration, roaring out until a robotic hand clamped around its mouth. It gulped as it looked into the cockpit of the robot and saw Pinkie giving the most evil grin she ever wore.
With ease, Megas picked the hydra up and began spinning it around like one would spin pizza dough. One rough toss on the ground later and the hydra whimpered as the giant robot piledrived it. While Pinkie piloted Megas to do this and other famous wrestling moves, Rainbow dash flew up to the car cockpit and knocked on the passenger door. Pinkie calmly took one hoof off of the steering wheel and unlocked the door, letting the Rainbow maned pegasus into the vehicle.
“Ohmygosh! This is so awesome Pinkie! Where did you get it!?”
“I made it myself!” Pinkie chirped, slamming Megas’ fist into the hydra. “Do you like it?”
“Like it? I think this is the coolest thing since... since the Wonderbolts! It can fly, shoot those explody things, use magic lasers, and even wrestle! I mean, what could be cooler than that- I mean other than myself and the Wonderbolts, of course. But that doesn’t matter! Can it do anything else?”
“Normally it would, but the hydra overloaded the cannon and now the controls are shot.”
“Wait, what does that mean? It can’t do anything awesome anymore?”
“Other than this?” Megas grabbed the hydra by the tail and spun it around plumber style before tossing it to the other end of the bog. “Just self destruct.”
“Wait, really? Like the one temple in Daring Do and the Griffon’s Goblet?”
“Yeah! But even more awesomer! Like this!”
Without thinking about it, Pinkie punched the self destruct button. One of the displays showed the countdown timer in bold, red numbers. Pinkie began to sweat and rubbed the back of her head as Rainbow Dash put her hooves on her hips and glared.
“Oops...” Pinkie said lamely. Rainbow Dash, fustrated with herself for knowing that she should have seen that coming, rolled her eyes and sighed, grabbing her friend as she flew out of there. By the time the Hydra came to, the two ponies were well out of the danger zone. Stupidly, the lizard walked over to the giant robot and roared at it.
“Mandatory self destruct reminder. This robot will self destruct in 10 seconds,” chirped the robot’s automated systems cheerfully.
It stared dumbly at it for a few seconds before sighing. Two of the hydra’s heads hugged each other and cried while the other two wrote a will. And then, Megas exploded spectacularly, sending the hydra flying even farther away from Ponyville as it sailed into the deeper parts of the Everfree forest.
Back in Ponyville, Rainbow Dash set Pinkie down in front of the Sugarcube Corner.
“Thanks for the ride home, Dashie!”
“No problem, Pinks. Just don’t press the self destruct button next time!”
“Okie Dokie Loki! See you tomorrow?”
“Sure!”
With that the two mares parted ways. Pinkie waved to the Cakes as she passed by them on her way to the basement.
“Oh Pinkie? You forgot to warn us ahead of time, dear,” Mr. Cake said as he was rolling out some dough on one of the cooking counters.
“Sorry about that! I’ll add it to the checklist so I don’t forget next time!’
The pink pony the bounded off to the basement door and down the stairs as Mr. Cake sighed with a weary but friendly smile. As crazy as things could get with that pony, he knew he wouldn’t have it any other way.
Meanwhile, after descending into its depths, the party pony flipped on the room’s light. The improbably large basement lit up in sections to reveal an inventor’s paradise. Vehicles, computers, knick knacks, and gadgetry of all sorts filled every inch of space that wasn’t being used to simply navigate the place. As she hopped along, the technology got progressively more impressive and cool until she reached the far wall.
Lined up along this fabled far wall were several other enormous robots of fame and prestige. One was a giant white robot with red and blue outlines that held itself like it was divinity. Another was a black robot with an orange set of stylised plates on the top of its head and enormous pistons in its arms, standing at the ready to pass judgement. Next to those was a red robot with giant black shades and a smaller robot attached crudely to the top of it, both aspiring for things greater than imagination. And finally was a series of animal based robots next to them of various colors, all of them eager to unite and become an unstoppable force.
Pinkie walked up to the space on the wall next to these behemoths where Megas XLR would have gone. On it was a small notebook. Pinkie opened it up to the first blank space and penned in the current date. Underneath it, she wrote two simple lines.
Megas XLR Model 1 was a complete success.
Bring on the next one.
