Princess Twilight Sparkle was talking with Applejack and Rainbow Dash when a wind came out of nowhere and started to whip her dress about as it did the same to everypony else’s clothes in the room. She looked around in confusion and her attention was drawn to the middle of the room where the air was shimmering with light and all the nobles were backing away from it as the guards started to ready their weapons.

Twilight started to charge her horn as this had to be the Purifiers launching another attack; it made sense as all four Princesses were present at the Gala though how they got into the castle was beyond her. Then there was a flash and what looked like a piece of a wall dropped to the floor, then what looked like a large slab of metal crashed to the floor with a loud clang as metal met stone. More pieces of debris, some of it sparking and looked like equipment she had in her lab back in the Castle of Friend ship though only part of it, as if this part had been torn from the rest of the whole.

The flashes came faster and faster and the center of the room was quickly filling with random objects and debris, then the last flash happened and the air returned to normal. In the place of the last flash was two strange floating sphere shaped objects with long tri-barrels suspended bellow them.

The objects appeared to look around and twilight could just make out something as being written on the front of both dark green objects when they seemed to notice something to their side. Quickly following where they seemed to be looking Twilight saw the Commander standing beside Celestia and looking to be surprised which was strange to see on the unicorn.

“Commander!”

Twilight blinked as the two objects spoke in unison in voices that didn’t sound quiet natural and then let loose a series of rapid beeps as they rushed the unicorn mare who stared at them with the same look of surprise on her face.

“It’s so good to see you Commander!” One of them said, seemingly excited as it bobbed in the air.

“Ye sit is good to see you well Commander.” The other said a bit calmer then the first object said.

Starting to make her way towards the Objects Twilight saw several guards doing the same as did her friends when they saw Twilight moving, most of the nobles just stared in fear while a few looked on with interest. As she neared she saw Celestia had a look of bewilderment on her face and that gave Twilight pause as she had never seen her former mentor bewildered in her entire life.

“We were so worried about you!” The excited object said and Twilight got close enough to see details of them. They were large spheres as she has observed, painted dark green with the tri-barrels suspended under them with many jewels embedded across their outer shell and somehow they hoovered about four feet off the ground.

“What’s going on?” Applejack asked and drew the attention of the objects, causing Fluttershy to flinch back while Applejack and Rainbow readied for a fight and Rarity looked on with curiosity while Pinkie wore a large smile about meeting somepony new.

However the objects seemed to ignore them and they locked onto Twilight herself. “YOU!” The first excited voice said though it sounded angry and the object rushed up till it was just a foot from the Princess’ face and she got a distinct feeling she was being glared at, though that feeling took a back seat when she saw the word LUNA painted on the front of the object in dark paint.

“You have a lot of nerve impersonating the Commander!” The object said voice clearly angry. “Equestrian Defense Force regulation is clear. “Impersonation of an army officer is punishable by dishonorable discharge and a minimum sentence of five years in Irongate Prison Complex” The object said quoting something rapidly.

“Luna stand down.” Twilight her the Commander bark. “Celestia, Luna front and center!” She said and both objects seemed to stiffen before rushing to hover before the Commander who switched into being a biped and gripped her hands behind her back as she looked over the two objects.

After couple of minutes she reached up and removed her sunglasses using a small cloth to clean them as she focused on the objects. “You two mind telling me how the hell you two got here?”

The objects seemed to glance at each other before the calmer of the two spoke. “We do not know Commander, we were with the Major as she over saw a test at the Equestrian Military Science Division meant to find and recover you.” It said, the voice sounded female but Twilight was hesitant to call it more than an it as she wasn’t sure they were actually organic.

“Then there was some weird surge and everyone was yelling and running around and as we were following the Major out of the lab we end up here!” The excited one said.” It’s good to see you alive and well Commander, those annoying quadrupeds keep trying to get the Major to declare you dead but she refuses.”

The Commander sighed and stopped cleaning her sunglasses, instead closing her eyes and rubbing the bridge of her muzzle as she spoke. “That’s sounds just like those pompous Nobles, good on the major for standing up to those arrogant asses.”

The excited object bobbed. “Yeah she keeps telling them she doesn’t care that it’s been six months since you went missing, tills he sees a body she won’t declare you dead, right now you are just missing in action.”

“Wait six months? I haven’t even been here a month.” The Commander said blinking at the objects.

The two shared a look once more then the calmer one spoke. “Commander you have bene missing in action for over six months, we were then when you vanished if you remember.” It said. “The Major has been doing her best to keep moral up but as time drags on more and more soldiers are starting to believe you are dead, or in some cases that you went AWOL and abandoned the EDF.”

“WHAT!?” The commander yelled and looked at them. “Who the fuck thinks I’d desert! I want their name and rank as I’m going to have a few words with them when I get back.”

“None of the Command Staff believe it, it’s more of the lower ranking soldiers, the Major and other officers have been dealing with it but it is spreading.” The calm one said. “But now we don’t need to worry as you are back.” IT said cheerfully.

The Commander sighed and replaced her sunglasses before her hands went behind her back. “Actually I’m not, this isn’t Equestria, well it is an Equestria but the EDF doesn’t exist here.”

The bots beeped a couple of times. And looked around. “But this is Canterlot Castle main ballroom and that is princess Celestia.” The calm one said.

“Yes, as I said this is an Equestria but not our Equestria. We are currently the only active EDF forces in this AO.” The Commander said. “Actually you said I’ve been MIA for six months?” She asked and the objects bobbed as if nodding.

The Commander nodded and looked at Twilight. “Princess, this may sound strange but how old are you?” She asked seriously.

Twilight blinked. “Um…”She said a bit embarrassed. “I’m twenty five as of a couple of months ago.” She answered wondering why the unicorn asked that.

The Commander sighed. “So there is a time distortion, it wasn’t just that one time.” The commander said and scratched her chin in thought. Twilight stared at her in confusion as did everypony else who was listening. “Right, you have no experience with this, to put it bluntly, I’m twenty-eight as of a couple months ago.” The mare said and Twilight blinked. “You didn’t just drag me from my home dimension but also through time as well it seems.”

Slowly Twilight’s jaw fell open as everyponie’s eyes were locked on the unicorn mare who was actually older then her alicorn self.

It was at this point Luna decided to join the group, she had been watching from the sidelines where she had remained after the objects had appeared. “Not that listening to you talk to these things...”

“Hey!”

“But what are they and why did you call them Celestia and Luna?” The dark alicorn asked and all eyes returned to the unicorn mare who looked back at them.

“Right, introduction time. This here.” The Commander said gesturing to the two floating objects. “Are Celestia and Luna, my two personal sentrybots. They are customized mark three security sentries I picked up while leading a team gathering some Intel from a building.”

“We were trying to kill her and her squad!” The Lunabot said happily. “We almost succeeded too but our armor wasn’t meant to stop a high powered rifle shot.” It said deflating a bit.

“Anyways. “The Commander said, drawing the word out a bit. “They gave us so much trouble I decided to grab a couple and rebuild them as I thought they could be of use. I was correct.”

“And you named them after the Princesses?” Rarity asked in disbelief.

“Why does every ask me that?” The Commander said with a bit of annoyance. “Yes obviously I did, I needed to give them some form of designation and why not the Royal Sisters who keep our nation safe? Granted they were helping keep a rebel base hidden in a sewer under an enemy controlled city safe and not an entire nation but that’s beside the point.” The mare said the last part a bit absentmindedly and waved her hand dismissively.

“I see.” The real Luna said and eyed the two machines baring her and her sister’s name.

“I have a question.” Lunabot said turning to face the Commander.

“What is it?” The Commander said turning her attention from the Lunar Princess to the bot that shared her name.

“If this isn’t our home nation does that mean all these annoying quadrupeds around us aren’t the same ones always calling for our deactivation because of our designations even though they looked like them?” The machine asked.

“That is correct, why?” The Commander asked eyeing the machine.

“No reason.” It answered and there was a click and the try barrels gave a spin. “Training rounds loaded.”

“Sister no!” Celestiabot said. “Just because they are not the same quadrupeds does not mean you can’t shoot them.” It scolded.

“But they are annoying and besides I was going to sue training rounds.” Lunabot defended turning to the other machine.

“That doesn’t matter; you can’t simply go around shooting quadrupeds just because they are annoying to you and the entire military.” Celestiabot said.

“Fiiiine.” Luna bot said and there was another click from it and the barrels spun again. “Live ammunition loaded.” It announced. This causing many of the nobles to recoil slightly and the Commander to burst out laughing.

“Gods I’ve missed listing to you two.” She said and patted both bots affectionately while smiling. Both bots gave beeps in response.

“Commander, if I may, what do you plan to do about the imposter?” Celestiabot asked as it looked over at Twilight and her friends protectively around her which made her feel a bit better about the fact these two sentybots seemed to not like her.

“Oh right!” The Commander said and smiled as she walked over to Twilight and threw an arm around the alicorn’s shoulders. “Celestia Luna, this here is Princess Twilight Sparkle, the Princess of Friendship.” The Commander explained. “She’s been under EDF protection for the past two weeks and…”

“Wait what?” Twilight said and looked at the Commander who smirked at her.

“What you think I’ve just been staying in your room for my own amusement? That’s only half the reason, the other half is if anyone wants to fuck with you they have to go through me first.” The Commander said and patted Twilight’s head, twilight had first been annoyed when the mare did that but she figured out it was one of the way the unicorn showed affection, that and constantly “screwing” with her.

“Anyways she is classified high value personnel.” The Commander said turning back to the two bots. And her tone became serious once more. “Do you understand?”

Both bots beeped rapidly then spoke in perfect unison. “Princess Twilight Sparkle is under Equestrian Defense Force protection. Primary Objective: Protect High Value Personnel at all cost, use of lethal force authorized.”

Twilight blinked as the machines spoke and the Commander smiled once more as she nodded. “Good, Luna on me, Celestia protect the Princess.” Both machines moved faster than Twilight thought they could as the one named Luna moved to flank the Commander while the Celestia machine flanked Twilight herself.

Nodding once more the Commander removed her arm from Twilight’s shoulder and walked around in front of her, Lunabot staying close beside her. “Now I won’t have to worry so much when I’m with the trainees as Celestia there will deal with anyone who threatens you or tries anything they deem as a hostile action.” She said with a smile and twilight questioned why she said it louder than one would normally do so.

Celestia had been watching all of this both out of curiosity and trying to figure out what was going on exactly, it wasn’t everyday one met a machine named after them. She stepped forward as there seemed to be a break in the conversation. “Commander can you please explain what is going on and what all of that is?” The Princess gestured to the debris in the middle of the ballroom, many of the nobles were staying far from it and some eyed the bots as they hovered near both twilights, The Commander had made it so none of the nobles will try anything with Twilight at this point, least not as long as this Celestia machine was with her.

The Commander looked at the debris and scratched her chin. “Looks like random bits of a lab from the EMSD Facility, most likely got sent here as whatever the science boys built went haywire.” She said. “Looks like we got a blast door, part of lab equipment, random bits of a wall and…”The Mare trailed off as she seemed to perk up.

Quickly crossing the room, Lunabot staying close she started to sue her magic to clear some of the rubble. The three Princesses looked at each other before following the mare over, Celestia found it strange that the machine bearing her name stayed close to Twilight, though it was told to protect her so it made sense. Celestia made a mental not to speak to these two machines since they could talk.

Twilight and the others reached the debris just as the Commander uncovered a few armored crates and let out a loud “AH!” as she pulled them out. Placing them beside her she started to unlock them and Twilight saw both crates were stamped with the same insignia that the Commander had on her beret with the words PROPERTY OF EQUESTRIAN DEFENSE FORCE under it. Though one of the crates had a yellow triangle on it with a small circle that was broke on one side as what looked like fragments flew away from it.

Smiling the Commander opened the crate with the yellow simple and smiled like a foal in a candy store as she looked in. “Commander what are these?” Twilight asked stepping forward to try and see inside the crate, all she saw were what looked like bricks beside them some small plastic objects.

“Oh, just some supply crates, most likely from an armory near the lab they ran the test in.” She explained as she pulled out one of the bricked and looked it over. “As for what this is, well this here is what we in the army call plastic explosive. Very effective for demolition or taking out enemy weapon platforms or just generally turning anything into a smoking crater.” She said and Twilight recoiled slightly as the unicorn mare looked back in the crate. “With the amount in this crate I could turn about half this castle into hole in the ground if I were to detonate the entire crate.”

This caused the gathered ponies, save for the Princesses to take several steps back as the Soldier rummaged through the crate. “Don’t worry they aren’t armed and requite a detonator to go off, they are very stable.” She explained as she replaced the brick of explosive before closing the crate.

Twilight moved up beside her counterpart as she moved to the next crate, her curiosity getting the better of her and she trusted the Commander not to open anything that would be dangerous here in the middle of the Gala, well not immediately dangerous.

Opening the next crate, inside were a bunch of green boxes and Twilight wondered what they could be. She got her answer when the Commander opened one of them and the alicorn saw it was filled with bullets, so they were boxes of ammo. Twilight watched as the mare opened each of them to probably see what ammo they contained. Both mares were surprised when the soldier opened the last one and instead of bullets they found two bottle of dark amber liquid.

“Ha!” The Commander said pulling out the two bottle of unopened whiskey. “Seems someone lost their hidden contraband, oh well these are mine now. “She said with a smile as they vanished into her pocket dimension. Closing the supply create both of them soon followed the bottles of alcohol.

Taking a step back from the debris pile the commander looked it over. “Well nothing really of use here, I’ll find some where to dispose of this later. “She said and moved it all into a pocket dimension to clear the floor.

She looked at the alicorn standing beside her. “Anyways, now that that interruption is over with I think we have a Gala to get back to.” She declared. Twilight looked around and saw no one seemed to be to egger to get back into the swing of things right away but then she felt an army around her shoulder and she was being dragged towards the dance floor. “Come on, I feel like dancing after all this good news.” She told the alicorn who was the closest potential partner. Twilight noticed her horn was lite and a few moment later a familiar FLUTE started to play from the sound system and Twilight knew what was coming, she idly wondered if the unicorn could pull the same thing off at the gala that she did at the party in Ponyville, though she doubted the nobles were the type to join in of the Commander’s form of dancing.

Still Twilight was willing to at least somewhat dance with the unicorn, the song was still just as infectious as it had been the first time and she was sure her friends would end up joining in at some point so it wouldn’t be just them dancing. Though thinking about it she didn’t really care what the nobles really thought about this, the song was a good and it wasn’t like she was the only one on the floor.

As Soon as they reached the dancefloor both bots moved off to the sidelines to watch and the commander wasted no time in grabbing the alicorn and starting to spin her like before, though twilight noticed that she had pulled her opened bottle of whiskey out and already took a large drink of it, yes the commander was set on enjoying herself.

As the Commander danced around with enthusiasm Twilight started to slowly move to the music and she was soon dancing with the Commander, though with nowhere near as much enthusiasm and she was happy to see her friends join them as the song restarted and the seven mares danced around the floor as the nobles stared on in pure bewilderment.

Twilight couldn’t help laughing at how they looked as she danced though as she spun to the next partner she nearly lost her footing as she recognized the white coat and ethereal mane of Princess Celestia and as she stiffly spun away she saw Luna had also joined them as well as Stonewall. While she wasn’t surprised to see Stonewall both royal Sisters had caught her off-guard and anytime she found herself spun over to one of them she danced stiffly. She was never happier to be spun to another pony as she danced and she ended up finding her brother and Cadence had joined as well though she saw the Commander made a point not to end up with Shinning Armor as a dance partner.

It wasn’t long before other nobles started to join either because of the princesses where dancing or because the music was just that infectious and soon the dancefloor had a small group of dancers, though Twilight still wasn’t sure if this was actually dancing as it was mostly just spinning from partner to partner and jumping randomly, all she knew was it was fun to just dance to the fast paced music and forget about the rest of the world for a short time.

Author's Notes:

So not much interaction between everyone in this chapter as it only covers a few minutes of time but we now have more evidence of the time distortion effect with the barrier of the Commander's dimension.

also yes I know I used that song already, its a good song and one of my all time favorites.

next chapter will most likely follow the Royals interacting with their machine counterparts.