Princess Celestia returned to where the drone and Twilight were standing. She looked over the metal beast once again to make sure she wanted this thing guarding her castle. She sighed knowing she got a weapon that she wanted, she just wished it wasn't so dangerous.
"Reaper, I have sent letters regarding your presence to everypony in Canterlot. We will have to take you down to Ponyville to let them know you are here. Actually we can go now, I said the meeting would be in 15 minutes."
"Yes ma'am, after I am done may I start my mission?"
"Yes, you may."
Princess Celestia teleported the drone, Twilight, and herself to the center of Ponyville. When they had arrived many ponies had already gathered. Princess Celestia walked up onto the stage to speak to the citizens and Twilight found her friends.
"Welcome, I have gathered all of you here today because we have an important matter to discuss regarding him." Princess Celestia pointed her hoof at the drone. Everypony in the crowd gasped when they saw it.
"Do not worry, I am the one who asked that he would be sent here. He will not hurt you since you are identified as friendly."
One pony in the crowd spoke up. "How do we know he will not hurt us?"
The drone positioned himself in front of the stage causing everypony to back up.
"She knows because I told her. Any other questions?"
The mare stayed silent because she didn't know it could talk.
"This beast will guard both Canterlot and Ponyville, so if you see him in the sky do not panic. If you report something bad happening to me I will report it to him. If he spots the target and you are nearby, you may die..."
Everypony in the crowd stared wide eyed at the drone. "Isn't he dangerous to have around then?"
"Yes, however, if anypony like the changelings or Discord come back, they stand no chance against him."
"Wouldn't they just use magic to stop the beast from attacking them?"
"In theory yes but his race constructed him without the use of magic, so in reality there is no way to counter his attacks."
"What if he attacks us?"
"I have many ways to stop that from happening, even though I don't trust him fully, I do trust that he will not attack us without good reason."
"That I promise." Reaper spoke up.
Everypony in the crowd stayed silent after the drone had spoke.
"Everypony can return to his or her houses, that is all I had to say." Princess Celestia teleported back to Canterlot.
The crowd had dispersed but a few stayed behind to get a good look at the metal machine.
"Reaper, don't you have something to do?" Twilight asked confused.
"Yes, however, I would like to know more about you before I leave that is. Who are your friends?"
Twilight pointed at each of them saying their names in the order they stood in.
"I see, nice to meet you all."
"So you can fly?" Rainbow Dash spoke up.
"Yes, at very high speeds."
"I bet you can't fly faster than me!"
"I do not wish to upset you, however, I can fly at speeds past Mach 8. I can break the sound barrier after 3 seconds of being in the air."
"Prove it." Dash said with a smirk.
"Everyone back up."
The drone turned on his engines and drove to a straight field to take off on. He readied himself and dumped all power to the engines. He took off, scarring the ground where he was. He broke the sound barrier in 2.9 seconds and it sounded like an earthquake. After going the top speed of 1327 MPH he came around and landed where he took off. Rainbow Dash stood with a shocked expression on her face.
"Now if you would like me to clear up anything else just ask, if not I must get back to my mission." Rainbow Dash glared at the drone as it took off again.
"I don't like him." Rainbow Dash mentioned to her friends.
"What's not to like about him? He is protecting us you know." Twilight replied, obviously annoyed Rainbow was taking what the drone did to hard.
"He just had to show off!" Rainbow continued her rambling to herself much to her friends delight.
The drone came back into view again and landed much to Rainbow Dash's dismay.
"Ma'am quick question. How will Princess Celestia communicate with me?"
"Magic. She will simply talk using her Magic and you can hear her. You can also talk back."
"Your world never fails to astound me."
The drone prepared himself and took off again leaving them in a pile of dust.
"Well girls I'm going home, have a good day." Twilight walked back to her house in relative peace, knowing they now had a guardian.
Ryan stared speechless at the conversations the drone had with the ponies. They even had announced him in a meeting so that everyone wouldn't be scared. Ryan made sure he had recorded it all. His niece would be arriving in a few minutes and he had to show her the recordings to see if she knew anything about it. Besides studying what was happening before him, Ryan didn't do much else. He turned his head over to the doors when he saw them open.
"Sir, there is family here who wish to come in."
"Let them in."
"Yes, sir." The soldiers saluted and left. A minute later he returned with Ryan's sister and niece.
"Hi Uncle Ryan!"
"Hey, how's my favorite niece doing?"
"I'm your only niece silly."
"So, your still my favorite."
She giggled and looked at her mom.
"Alright Ryan what do you need?"
"Glad you asked, now if you would please direct your attention to the screen."
He played the first video he took, that showed the drone in the middle of all the ponies. His niece started jumping up and down.
"Look it's Princess Celestia!"
"So you know her?"
"Yeah she's in the TV show 'My Little Pony'."
"So your telling me, my drone got teleported into a TV show?"
"No silly! It looks like they are real."
"I don't see how that's possible."
"It's magic, anything can happen."
"Yeah, I don't feel comfortable with that answer."
Ryan pulled up the other video showing the drone taking off after arguing with the blue pony.
"That's Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Twilight Sparkle, Fluttershy, Applejack, and Pinkie Pie!"
"You know their names too?"
"Yep, I almost know all of them."
"Hmm, maybe since you know all of them, then you could talk to them when communications come back up."
She stared at him wide eyed. "Oh my gosh I would love too, I've always dreamed I would meet them or talk to them!"
Ryan just shook his head and concentrated on what the drone was doing now.
Twilight sat in silence at her library anxiously waiting for something to happen, of course when you wait nothing ever happens. She sighed and grabbed a book off the shelf and began to read. She was deeply enveloped in the book that she wasn't even paying attention to the time. After she had read through the first 10 chapters she looked at the clock. It was 1:48 in the morning. She silently sighed to herself as she put a bookmark where she left off. She slowly trudged up the steps thinking to herself. There was so much to be explained with the drone. She just didn't have the time to ask the questions. She silently made her way towards her bed, carefully not stopping on Spike. She settled into her bed for a night's rest.
*BOOM*
Twilight jerked up, she sighed for only being down for a minute and she had to get up again. She was more worried, however, about the explosion. The sound also had woken Spike up who stared at Twilight with a confused look on his face.
"Twilight what happened?"
"I'm not sure, it sounded like and explosion. I'm sure Princess Celestia is up, do you mind sending her a letter?"
"No, what do you want to say?"
"Dear Princess Celestia,
Do you know what caused that very loud explosion a few minutes ago?"
Your faithful student Twilight Sparkle."
"Send it please."
With a breath of green flame the letter was whisked away to some unknown space to be found seconds later by Princess Celestia. Seconds later Spike belched green flame and a letter popped out. He handed it to Twilight.
"I ordered Reaper to perform it, Twilight something terrible has happened." Twilight held her breath as she read the next line. "The Changelings are here, assemble the Elements. The situation is dire."
"Spike stay here, I need to get the girls!" Spike stared bewildered as Twilight ran as fast as her hooves could carry her. 2 more explosions rattled her body to it's core. She could see smoke erupting from Canterlot. She arrived at Sweet Apple Acre's first.
"Applejack! Open up!" The door opened a few seconds later and Applejack was a mess.
"What in tarnation are yall doing here?"
"No time to explain! Go get Rarity and Rainbow, i'll get Fluttershy and Rarity. Meet me at the library when you have them!"
Twilight raced to Sugarcube Corner. She knocked frantically on Pinkie's door. It soon opened a crack.
"Pinkie this is important we need to go get Fluttershy now!"
"Oki Dokie Loki." Pinkie said as she bounced in pace with Twilight running.
They made it to Fluttershy's in record time. Twilight hammered on the door until she heard stirring inside.
"Um, what is it?"
"This is important Fluttershy, lets go!"
"Oh... Ok..."
The three ponies ran back to the library. The other three had just arrived there moments before.
"Girls, the changelings are back, and I'm sure you heard to explosions. Reaper apparently recognizes them as a threat. Princess Celestia wishes we get there as soon as possible, so lets go!"
They all went to the train station and boarded the late train to Canterlot.
"Girls get some rest we have a long day ahead of us tomorrow."
Each of them laid down so they could rest for the impending battle that was sure to come.
2200 hours
Equestrian Sky
"Reaper can you here me?"
"Loud and clear ma'am."
"Just making sure that the communication stuff worked."
"Yes ma'am."
The drone turned on his heat seeking radar trying to establish if anything was near his post. He had all his safety's off like he did for every mission. He continued to scour the area for anything out of the ordinary for 3 hours. He flew everywhere almost certain nothing would bother his VIP's. Until he saw splotches of red on his radar.
"Ma'am unidentified objects, they seem to be flying towards your castle. Establishing numbers..." Counting objects in the dark only using heat signatures was tough. Numbers could be very inaccurate. "Ma'am I've identified at least a thousand objects. Flying at a velocity of 100 MPH."
"Reaper, they are the changelings." The Princess said with a hint of fear in her voice. "Classify them as enemies, they almost enslaved all of us last time."
"Ma'am target locked. Shall I continue?"
Princess Celestia hesistated for a moment. "Do it."
"Yes ma'am, taking down targets. Destruction of enemies imminent. Taking down with extreme prejudice."
Princess Celestia almost felt bad for the changelings, almost.... Her train of thought was interrupted by an explosion. It rippled through Canterlot in a shockwave. She stared out in dark sky that was momentarily lit by the explosion.
"Destruction confirmed, 100 KIA's 200 wounded." The Princess had no idea what KIA meant but it probably had something to do with death. "Engaging hostiles." The sound of a fast firing machine gun was heard in the distance followed by another 2 explosions.
"600 KIA's 300 wounded. Circling around for another run. Ma'am they have reinforcements, I count about another 2,000 or so." A magic bolt whizzed past the drone and dissipated above it. He turned around for another run and fired another barrage of missiles each locking onto a group rather than single targets. The superheated fragments sliced through the Changelings flesh before they even knew what was coming.
The changelings didn't have the element of surprise anymore, they began to search frantically for the source of the attack. The drone, however, was not stupid and deployed his cloaking device as soon as he spotted them. That made the task of finding the attacker much harder. Shells of metal rained down on their army and cut through them like a superheated scythe. Their losses were unrecoverable. However reinforcements just kept coming. They stop focusing on where the attack was coming form but instead starting going towards to castle.
"Ma'am they are approaching the castle, I can't handle so many at once." In the background of him talking 5 missiles went off and killed at least 1,000 changelings. The ground below was littered with pieces of them. "I have to come out of stealth mode so they have something to attack." The drone turned off his coating and turned on his lights. He continued to rain hell on anything that got in the way. With their attention diverted he continued to attack them.
"What is that?" That was all a changeling could say before a .50 Caliber round tore through his skull and made his head explode. The Changelings now visibly afraid of the metal beast continued towards the castle faster than before. They were a mere 100 yards away when Reaper got concerned. He flew ahead past the castle and arced backwards. He came straight towards them shooting rockets and bullets into the pack. They tried to move out of the way but a few unlucky ones were torn to shreds from the impact.
Princess Celestia watched the light show and caught parts falling to the ground, she grimaced at the sight. The Changelings kept growing and getting closer to the castle. All Celestia could hope for was that her spell held up against the Changelings. She silently hoped the Element's would be at the castle by daybreak.