Ponyville wasn’t the biggest town, but a town it was all the same. There people lived and from them came trash. Not too far out on the outskirts of Ponyville one could find the towns designated areas for the storage of their junk still waiting to be taken away for proper disposal or recycling. The deadline for the pickup was a positive for most as it meant a clearing of the buildup junk. For a few it was a negative as the removal of such wrecked and unwanted items and could spell a missed opportunity for those who knew how to put such things to use. What’s garbage to one person could be treasure to another after all, and Haywire knew the value in this saying better than most, especially considering how literally he often used it.

So, it came as no surprise that Haywire would make the occasional trek to Ponyville in the hopes of scavenging anything neat from their yard that he thought could be used in one of his projects. Today, he’d been lucky enough to reach it a day or two before it’s next scheduled pic up, this ensuring the maximum yield in his planned dumpster diving extravaganza and adding an extra pep to his step. He had tried not to get his hopes up, but as usual he’d failed miserably and was already daydreaming about finding just the right doodad that could jumpstart his J-Rex Protodoit or his PSG’s second tussup. The chances of them having a gravitational spinny flipper to be used in his Flapjack Bumfuzzler was negligible, but there! He was certain that all he needed to do was look.

Upon arriving, Haywire took a long breath at the entrance to take in the smell of rust and dirt. It was delicious to him, the possibilities it promised being far too enticing to ignore.

“Bubo!” Haywire called, Bubo popping up his head from the sleep like position he’d taken on Hay’s back, “We’ve made it! Let’s carry on with the program, round up some variety and draw up.” Bubo knew what Hay was getting at and took to the air with a chirp and a whir to start flying circles around the yard to see if he could spot anything of note. Meanwhile, Haywire found himself a nice big pile of scrap to start himself off with. Without slowing down, Hay walked directly into it and disappeared with the sound of shifting metal and the clattering of loose bits falling free being the only concrete signs that he’d physically interacted with it. From there you could only figure out where Hay was by sound and spotting which pile was trembling as he dug around since he seemed to somehow manage to change where he was without ever leaving the scrap.

Bubo would eventually spot the new pony entering into the junk yard and lower his altitude enough to get a good look at them. Neither he nor Haywire ever claimed to own any junkyard they poked through and weren't the ones to challenge the interests of others looking to find something cool, but it was usually in their best interests for Haywire to be warned if someone else was looking around so as to prevent him from accidentally raiding the stranger's claimed stockpiles. Who knows, maybe they'd even want to trade the things they'd found once one of them was ready to leave?

Bubo, after coasting nearer to the new pony, sounded a set of chirps and whistles as a signal to his friend swimming around in the junk. Like the periscope to a submarine rising up through water Hay, popped his head up and out of the junk pile the stranger was standing on. A mere few feet in front of her - and at an angle - he'd start off looking in the opposite direction then look around for a second before finally thinking to check behind him. Doing a 180, he would spot the other pony and grin.

"Hey there!" He greeted her, Bubo swooping down and setting himself down on Hay's head to give a wave of a metal wing, "Nice day for a swim, huh? You come to pick and choose or just take in the vista?" Hay rose from the metal until he was free, the way his legs were moving made it look like he was walking in place but somehow causing him to smoothly escape the junk pile until he was standing on it nice and even.

"You haven't picked up on a gravity spinner flip yet, have you? Lots of gyros and lights? Everyone keeps saying it 'doesn't exist' but I built one once so they're obviously wrong."

"Neat! A new-ish toaster is a pretty fancy find since most of the stuff here is old-full!" Haywire congratulated with a grin. He paid no mind to the bowl Golden disposed of as he also sometimes floated bowls around with him only to realize that he needed instead for them to be somewhere else. How exactly they had been floating at the time may or may not have had something to do with the decision. Bubo did give it a curious glance as it sailed away but found no reason to worry about it and instead continued to lok between the two ponies as they spoke.

"A gravity spinner flip," Haywire said again to clarify as if talking about a dishwasher or spork, "it flippy spins gravity to make gravity easier to spin flip. That way the spinner flippers can keep right when they are flippin' and spinnin' and gravity can't have any say in the matter. Unless it wants to in which case that's cool cause I'm open to suggestions. I did build it, but I think it would fit best to say that it tossed me away like a bubblegum wrapper when it got all fussy and decided to asplode while flipping to much spinny gravity, but I'm sure at least a few pieces and bits reached Ponyville. The umbrella bell bottom at least should have flung this way and its the piece that has the most blinky lights so its the best part. That or it was the tractiomatic, but I feel like I'd be seeing tire tracks by now if it was or at least be hearing puttering and a crowd of cheering onlookers urging it to smush things.

"Oh, I'm Haywire, by the way, and this here is Bubo!" He introduced himself with Bubo giving a whistle at the mention of his own name, "What's your name? And what are you gonna use that new-ish toaster for? I'd fix it up and add some power then use it to launch toast all the way across town in a new breakfast bid to build the bestest bistro boasting bread bombarding brunch this side of Equestria."

"OR, what if you could make it so you could load toast into it... then launch UNTOASTED bread!?" Haywire, excited by the idea, seemed to vibrate ever so slightly before spinning on his hooves to face Bubo, "Imagine the world we would live in! To unlock the secrets to reverse-toastificiation! No more scrip scrappin away ruined bread! Just try until its burnt the way you like it!" Just as Haywire was asking Bubo his opinion of the perfect level of burnt, to begin the process of gathering a general consensus to start from, there came a sudden eruption of junk from between Haywire and Golden. Bubo hopped back in surprise while Hay only snapped his attention back towards the thing responsible.

Between them now jerkily stomped and jumped a pony shaped thing possessing a metallic sheen and simple but menacing features, a grumpy expression etched into the curved plate that acted as its face just below frayed wires forming a makeshift and messy mane. From its back sprouted four stiffly jointed but erratically flailing arms ending in pop guns that seemed to not care at what they were aiming. On the side of this thing sprouted a short length of metal that ended in a flat plate. Shouting, the metal pony demanded surrender and reverence as it hopped about the ponies ankles, this being because it stood - at best - a mere four inches tall.

"-gold and biscuits!" it cried, its pop guns firing off in quick succession which soon led to the action figure sized thing to cease its erratic behavior long enough to calmly reload the string and plugs back into each one, "A castle built to rise from heaps of fluffy blankets and dashed contingencies!" it continued with another pair of pops, "Praaaise you'rrrre... neeewesssssst...... deeeeeeeeeeeeeeee-....." slowly the metal pony began to lock up, an audible clicking coming from its inner workings as its movements gradually slowed down and eventually ceased all together.

"Oh, hold on a sec..." Haywire muttered, reaching down to crank the key like object and wind the angry little pony back up, "Okay, sorry." he apologized just as it sprang back to life.

"-ity with bent straws and salted seashells!" Finishing his current barrage of harmless pop shots, two tiny slits lifted on the metal pony's face plate to reveal small beams of light that cast the shadowed image of a butterfly on the left and a smokey chimney on the right.

"Careful!" Haywire warned Golden, lifting a hoof and dropping into a readied stance, "He's skipping right to his third mode! If he gets you in the eyes you'll see spots for almost five whole minutes!" the metal pony whipped its beams in Haywire's direction where the stallion tried to duck out of their way but was caught just well enough to get flashed.

"Ack!" he cried with a slight stumble, "He got me goggles! They'll be seeing spots for minutes! Bubo! Help!" Bubo, in response, pointed a wing at the small metal pony and made the repeating sound of a zappy gun to which the assailant dropped low and took cover behind a dented can.

"Resistance is better armed than expected!" it announced, waiting for a pause in Bubo's imitated fire to roll out from his safety and cause two wings to sprout from just beneath the arms on its back, "tactical retreat required!" From the wings deployed two tiny engines that whirred as he jumped and launched himself into the air to take off. There was a hiccup however as the wings seemed to have been installed upside down and instead of flying off to safety the little pony was jack hammered back down into the junk pile beneath them where he disappearing into the cobbled mess and caused a splash of washers and screws.

Haywire shielded himself from the spray and double checked his goggles before looking at the junk around them. "I'll go get him." he volunteered with a small giggle just before sinking into the junk like he'd stepped into a pool of quicksand.

Bubo looked to where Hay had sunk. Then over towards Golden. Then to where the metal pony had been buried... Then to Golden... Then to the camera during a slow zoom in...