Chapter 30: Pursuit

OOM-340 sat in the Turret of his AAT, watching as his battalion of Droids slowly marched towards Manehattan train suspension bridge.

"Come on! The commander wants the city secured by this evening!" He yelled, hoping they would quicken their pace.

OOM-340 began to wonder how the rest of the invasion effort was going. As for how he'd know, he didn't, because no one told him anything.

There was a whoosh sound above him and he looked up to see several of the blue and yellow uniformed Pegasi from earlier fly over, several of them dropping rocks on the Droids below.

"That's it, no one throws rocks at us and he's away with it! Charge!" He yelled to his Droids, who began to increase their speed from a slow clanking march to rapid thunderous clanking as they began to full on run towards the station. From what he could see from that distance, ponies stood outside and began to take up defensive positions, yelling out commands to each other that OOM-340 couldn't hear over the sound of his own troops marching.

He pulled out his macrobinoculars and looked threw them to get a better view.

They seemed to have positioned catapults and Cannons to defend the train station and bridge. They would be effective against his infantry, but he had a tank, and could very likely one-shot them each. They also had a large amount of remaining Guardsponies and police ponies in position, along with what seemed to be makeshift militia, wearing only heavy clothing and wielding spears, construction tools or nothing at all.

He lowered his macrobinoculars and activated his radio

"All units, charge! Eliminate all of the equines defending the train station!"

OOM-340 sat down in the chair fully, closed the hatch and looked through the Turrets sights. Swiveling the main cannon with the foot pedals, he took aim at a cannon, and fired.

There was the loud boom of the tanks primary cannon firing, and one of the Equestrian cannons, along with several nearby ponies, was destroyed.

OOM-340 began to hum as he began to fire on other nearby Cannons. It was actually a lot of fun when they wouldn't hit him!

He tanks radio buzzed in, and the voice of another B1 came through.

"Something's banging on my hatch! Wait… wha… what's this thi-" there was suddenly static, and the sound of an explosion outside.

Suddenly there was a thud on the top of the tanks hatch, and the dent of 4 hooves became visible, before it was pried open and light flooded the dark compartment

He looked up quickly to see one of the uniformed Pegasi who grabbed him by his shoulders, pulled him out of the chair, and put onto the top of the turret. The Pegasi was yellow with an orange Mane and tail

"See you sucker!" She said, kicking him off the tank and dropping a lit bundle of fireworks and other explosives inside the command hatch.

OOM-340 hit the ground with a thud, and the Pegasi flew off as the tank exploded. This left only one AAT left.

"Aw, now I got to walk!" He said, standing up and retrieving his Blaster from his back, and moving to help his troops advance.

His troops had steadily been advancing, as OOM-340 ran to command his troops at the front, he noticed the dead Guardsponies and Droids that littered the ground.

His radio buzzed in again as he came to a stop behind a squad of B2s and a B2-HA.

"Do not the train escape the city. Destroy it if necessary." TA-175 ordered

"Roger Roger!" He said, walking up crouching down beside his fellow Droids, letting off Blaster shots and killing various Guardsponies as they advanced.

"Die equines!" A B2 said in its deep voice as it picked up one of the militia ponies, and blasted it directly in the face.

There was less that 25 feet between them and the stairs to the trainstation, when the ground shook and a large amount of rock shards flew everywhere, knocking OOM-340 many other Droids down, and destroying others.

OOM-340 picked himself up to see that the Catapults had started firing large rocks and boulders at them, in an effort to destroy the advancing squads of Droid that had clustered together.

He tapped the shoulder of the B2-HA, who turned and looked down at its shorter, thinner and frailer brother.

OOM-340 was mildly intimidated by his larger B2 brother, but continued with his plan.

"Destroy the catapults, they are taking out our squads!"

The large droid paused for a moment before uttering

"Roger Roger." and raising its right arm, and launching rockets at the catapults.

The catapults exploded into chunks and shards of wood as the purple rockets hit them, completely and totally destroying them.

"Huh. That was easier than I thought! Nice shot!" He said to the B2, nudging it with his elbow only to notice that it had simply moved on and did not care for his compliment.

"Stupid brutes…" he muttered "why do I even bother…", shaking his head and aiming his Blaster to continue walking forwards once more.

OOM-340 walked up the stairs to the trainstation, with his Droids following him.

He pounded on the door to the entrance, but there was predictably no response.

"Separatist Authorities! Open up!"

There was again no reply.

"Open the door." He ordered to a B2, who simply punched the door down with his metal fists, and opened fire on the ponies inside.

OOM-340 face palmed

"I was gonna give them a chance to surrender…"

He walked inside the train station, and raised his hand to signal them to stop firing.

"Surrender ponies!" He said to Guards who backed against the the train while it prepared to leave.

"Never! As long as I live I will stand and defend Equestria!" Replied a Guardspony.

"Give up!"

"I swore to protect Equestria, and I will!"

OOM-340 simply shot the guard dead with his Blaster.

"Anyone else wanna have a strike of patriotism?"

The others glared at them, showing their teeth in an attempt to look fierce as they fired magic blasts at the B2s up front, before they were gunned down instantly. There was a hiss and the train began to move away from the station.

"Oh no! They got away!" OOM-340 cried out

The B2-HA stepped up

"Not. Likely." He simply stated, and fired a rocket at the locomotive. There was a loud explosion and screeching as the trains left set of drive wheels were blown off, and as it derailed on the bridge, the engine falling into the river below along with 2 passenger cars.

"Capture them!" OOM-340 ordered, as they walked towards the wrecked train.

Back in Canterlot, the Mane 6 and Princess Cadance returned from the Crystal Empire, and headed to the Throne Room. Twilight and Cadance had started to calm down from the initial shock of Shinings death, and were ready to talk to Celestia and Luna about what happened.

Twilight opened the throne room door with her magic and they stepped in.

Celestia, Luna, and several royal Guardsponies were gathered around a map of Equestria, similar to the Cutie Map.

"Greetings Princesses…" Twilight said sadly "we're back"

"You seem troubled Twilight, is there something wrong?"

Celestia asked.

Cadance looked up

"Shining Armor… he…" she began to cry again

"He didn't make it" Twilight finished for her.

Celestia and Luna both were visibly saddened by this, and hugged Twilight and Cadance.

"We are sorry to hear of this" Luna said

Spike cleared his throat and wheeled in a table which had the Tactical Droid's body, head and severed left arm sitting on it, partially tied down.

"What is that Spike?" Celestia asked, as she stepped over to examine the partially disassembled Droid.

"It seemed to be the one in charge, almost like their king."

"Hmm…" Celestia said "yes, it does appear to be different than all of the others I've seen. However, it doesn't seem to match the one that called itself Kraken"

"Maybe it's some kind of… captain? Or officer maybe?" Spike suggested

"Good thinking Spike, does it still work?"

"Last time I checked, it did."

Spike picked up its head and shook it. There was a slight sparking from its neck cables, and its photoreceptors flickered on for a second, before flickering back out. Spike placed the head on the table.

"Cannot… see… cannot… move." TF-1726's head spoke in its monotone.

Spike lightly pounded the side of the head, and its photoreceptors flashed on again, lighting up their usual white color.

"Not the E-Equines again…" his head spoke.

Celestia bent down and looked the TF-1726 in the eye.

"My name is Princess Celestia, and this is my sister Princess Luna. We'd like to ask you some questions. Do you understand?"

Celestia thought she would try to be hospitable to their prisoner, as it was the proper thing to do, and at least show some compassion. Perhaps it would be more willing to cooperate.

"No…"

"Why not?"

"You are my enemy…" he replied

"Can we atleast have conversation? That's all I'm asking." She said, smiling, hoping to try and appeal to it.

"You want to interrogate me-e-ee." He spoke, glitching again.

The droid was smart, able to see through Celestia's caring demeanor to her true intent.

Dash flew over

"Listen here you little clanker, when Princess Celestia wants to know something you better tell her or I'll-AH"

Dash was suddenly yanked back by Applejack, who grabbed her by her tail with her mouth.

"Rainbow Dash! Mind yer manners!" Applejack scolded.

Celestia continued

"Can you at least tell me your name"

"Designation is T-Series Tactical Droid TF-1726…"

"No, tell us thous name" Luna clarified.

"TF-1726, T-Series Tactical Dr-roid."

"Okay…" Celestia replied "Can I just call you TF?"

"It does not matter. You are my enemy."

"Alright. If you just cooperate, maybe we can bring this war to a quicker end. Won't that be good?"

"It doesn't matter, as long as victory is assured."

"Luna would you like to have a try?"

Luna took in a deep breath, preparing to use The Royal Canterlot Voice

"THOU MUST TELL US ALL OF THOU'S SECRET"

"I have informed you equines several times, I am programmes to resist intimidation. TF-1726's head replied.

"Then we must do this the hard way sister." Luna said, as her horn began to glow along with Celestia's.

"No… no…" TF-1726 began to shout in his monotone.

The 2 royal sisters closed their eyes, and a beam of magic from both of their horns joined before arching into his head.

The droid began to shout gibberish before lettign out a sound of distress

"A-AA-AH"

Suddenly his eyes flashed red and the sound of static and various glitches was heard before his the lights in eyes and mouth shut off, and he became silent.

Celestia and Luna opened their eyes and looked at each other.

"What happened?" Twilight asked

"I'm not sure Twilight, it seems it… locked it memory to prevent us from gaining access with our magic."

"What do we do now?"

"I'm not sure, we'll have to see if there is any sort of spell in our library to get around it" Celestia said.

Back on on board the Providence Carrier 'Enforcement', clean up crews had finally fixed all the damage caused by Discord's magic.

In addition to this, Kraken had also ordered 4 Magnaguards, and 8 Commando Droids to the bridge to act as additional security.

Kraken sat in his command chair, examining all of the data logs his armies had created and sent him during their time in Equestria. He was looking for one file in particular, one on Discord.

He only found one result, an audio log from OOM-340, recorded a few days earlier before the war broke out. Kraken hit play on the recording

"That's so strange, I can't believe we have the same alphabet!"The voice of pony which Kraken recognized as Twilight Sparkle . "I thought it was fascinating that that we could understand each other too! The odds of this are crazy! Maybe you are one of Discords creations."

"Discord?" OOM-340's voice asked

"Discord is the God of Chaos, likes being wacky, silly, and chaotic. He once main it rain chocolate rain from

Cotton candy clouds!"

That was all the transmission said.

Kraken was mildly frustrated, he already knew basically all of that. It was too vague!

He was thinking what to do when an alert beeped on the display screen.

Kraken looked up to face it.

'T-SERIES TACTICAL DROID UNIT TF-1726 HAS ENTERED MEMORY LOCK DOWN AND HAS CEASED OPERATION. IF FURTHER ROBOLABOTAMY IS ATTEMPTED THE UNIT WILL PERFORM A MEMORY WIPE. DO YOU WISH TO DO SO NOW?'

[Yes] [No]

Kraken clicked no. He was already on an extremely limited number of capable commanders, and Tactical Droids as is. He only had 3, in addition to himself, but he needed to remain in orbit to oversee the fleet's operation. He couldn't risk the destruction of a Tactical Droid, especially one as experienced as TF-1726.

Kraken facepalmed at his subordinates arrogance that allowed this to happen. Now he had 2 major issues to deal with. They would need to perform a rescue mission once again, an incredibly dangerous one at that, along with how strange it was the for Separatists to rescue droids to begin with.

TF-1726's head corresponded to coordinates that placed in the Canterlot Castle, the Equestrian capital. He would need heavy firepower to get in.

He calculated that that Squadrons of Vulture Droids and Droid Gunships could escort a Sheathipede Class Shuttle to rescue TF-1726.

All they needed was his head, but they could return him to full functionality if they had his body as well.

However, once they got inside the Castle, the Princesses would likely destroy any forces they dispatched easily with their magic. Deploying a huge army would be efficient, as they would need to be quick and they would have to sacrifice other forces elsewhere.

Kraken continued to calculate…