It had been a normal day at the base. The same old day of hanging out within the mountain, with no one to see or know of the fact that aliens, of the giant robot variety, were inhabiting them in a war that ruined their planet. Mind you the humans sitting with them was more akin to seeing them like family members. That was a strange sentiment to have, but it was the one they lived with.
Sure, it was a bunch of soldiers from another planet with a lifespan that made them hundreds (or hell thousands) of years older than them and they lived inside a flat mountain that used to be a Cold War missile silo, but it wasn’t that crazy after a while.
But then there were moments when Jack hated the relationship. And right now it was one of them.
“Again!” Fowler howled happily as June and Miko found another Energon crystal in the cave. Two pickaxes clawed through rock, chipping away the earth to unveil a pink glow that almost felt it was screaming light itself. Even with the lights around them, the glow proved to be greater. Raf simply took it with a pull, revealing it to be the size of something around two pillows, yet the crystal was surprisingly light.
Currently they were trapped inside a cave system bathed in multiple colors of stone, with the black, almost ink-like markings like a plague swarming the entire vicinity but not enough to give the very place a feeling of pathosis, like the cave was afflicted with a plague. It hid the Energon in a way that seemed to either be a byproduct of the pink energy ores itself or something within the earth that attracted the energy to it. It wasn’t even a rock type as Jack learned about, being that it was something of a fourth factor to the sedimentary, igneous and metamorphic stones that bathed and filled the earth.
Was it made from the Energon? That wasn’t as impossible as it would sound.
The computers found through a strange faint signal, one that was never caught again and Bee was sent mostly to see if it was worth looking into past what Bee was doing because it was something, and with what Jack could accuse of being a horror meter. It was outright beneath the current tunnels of Jasper. Some old mining ruins that fell apart and was abandoned but thankfully no longer toxic. And now Jack was in a uniform mining Energon with Optimus and the rest, with his mother happily joining in due to boredom.
Currently, the Energon was consistent, almost insanely so.
“What is this thing anyway?”
At Raf’s question, Ratchet simply turned from his datapad for a mere blink, before going back to it. “A strange thing to behold. Usually, Energon is something that exists with a limit to the energy within its mass.” Then the bot pulled the crystal he was examining, another one the size of Raf himself. “But this? Rarified. Borderline myth back on Cybertron.” The hushed tone and almost worship of it made Jake roll his eyes, and then the lack of an actual answer made him groan.
“Anyone else can actually explain?” He looked around. Bee was simply pumping a drill right into the stone upwards, cracking the ceiling to make a glow bleed through. Bulkhead was in vehicle mode with Arcee helping. "Optimus?"
“Of course.” Optimus jumped in. The bot was, strangely, very jubilant ever since he found the stash directly. “It’s not something that is easily created. Rarified Energon is Energon more or less akin to sparks. Acting as a mass-shifting storage of the Energon itself like how we Cybertronians use our sparks to shift and contain mass to transform. The size is truly deceptive as you can see.” As the leader waved to the screen, showing the numbers between two crystals.
One that was the size of Raf, had about 2 tons of Energon. The one that he recently pulled and was significantly smaller had about 12 tons of it.
“Magnificent.” Optimus whispered. It was weird to hear him like this.
With a chuckle, Miko simply shrugged. “Cool.” She simply grunted with a slight frown before going back to the cave wall with June going to the other side. Fowler walked to Arcee as she loaded more of the Rarified Energon onto Bulkhead’s back, the pink glow almost making him blind before a sheet covered it. Barely.
“How long are we going to be here exactly?” Miko asked.
Jack slammed his pickaxe again. "Days at this point."
With a few more hits, Miko found herself hitting metal, the distinct sound ringing against the edge of her pickaxe. Looking closer, she found a dead-like blue reflecting her face. “Wh-”
Before even managing to get a full word out, Miko was suddenly launched upwards, landing her back onto the rough dirt with the sound of a loud shockwave echoing across the cave system, the air feeling like a violent tsunami crashing through, with a strange blue glow erupting from the spot. Miko barely felt it past the strange light nearly blinding her as her world became weightless.
As the power of the blue light rippled right through the cave to the attention of everyone, Miko’s rough landing onto the dense soil drew June’s attention. “Fuck.” The girl groaned.
Optimus, Arcee and Bee both dropped their equipment and went to the source as Ratchet began using his scanners.
“Miko!” Bulkhead screamed as he formed up, R.E dropping like flies as he rushed to her. Miko herself grumbled as she picked herself back up with June’s hand dragging her upwards. As the dirt covered her body, slight tears in her suit and some layer of her senses messed with, Fowler was the first to look into the source as the light enshrouding it slowly receded.
A strange metal cube with its pointy edges being flat triangle faces, the sharp edge lines being slightly smooth. It had a plethora of symbols foreign to him with a single blue circle atop it. The small circle shuttered into a dead light.
“What the fuck?” Fowler asked as Optimus took his eyes from Miko to the cube. As his steps grew closer the agent, Fowler stepped back and allowed Optimus to slowly grab the thing he easily assumed was a relic. “So what is it?”
At his question, Optimus narrowed his optics. “A relic, but the sigils are not something I am familiar with.”
"Let's wrap this up." Fowler groaned, only to see both Miko and Ratchet rise against him.
Optimus cut them both off. "You are hurt Miko, you must not be here."
"But at least pick up the ones we already have!"
As the group left the cave, Bulkhead and Ratchet both dumped the R.E down. The former chuckled for a bit, before going back to his charge.
Optimus continued looking at the cube with curious tinkering. As she prepared to give Miko some ointment and bandages, June looked over to Optimus, who simply nodded before putting the cube onto the Autobot table.
“The fuck was that!?” Miko bemoaned as she tiredly glared at Optimus.
“Language Miko.” June fussed lightly.
The cube quietly brimmed with energy, the circle simmering its light. “Your thoughts are mine as well, Miko. Whatever it is, the cube must be kept at an arm’s length until then.”
Miko groaned, barely managing to stand despite June’s help. “Don’t move.” June spoke as she wrapped bandages over Miko's bleeding forearm.
Raf sighed, slumping onto the sofa before taking a look at his laptop. “Regardless, we should make sure the Decepticons don’t ever find that place.” June forcibly sat Miko down from moving, while Jack drained another bottle.
As the bots around her began going through the motions, with Bulkhead in particular being very concerned for her, Miko surprisingly paid no heed to the worry, having taken her gaze and focus to the thing that nearly killed her, feeling … kinship?
Whatever it was, she wanted to feel it again. Despite logic that her friends would tell her. “Give me the cube.”
Ratchet, who was in the middle of dragging his tools into the table, nearly dropped them in bafflement. “Why!?”
Miko tried to find a reason, to put to words the feeling she had. She shrugged in her spot. “Dunno, just wanna.”
A snort came from the motorcycle bot as she looked over the humans on their spot. “Nope!” Acree instantly replied, grabbing the cube and putting it a bit farther from the edge of the table and near the monitors.
Miko simply looked offended at the worry. “C’mon! I wanna see it more! I found it!” She looked to the leader of the Autobots.
Ratchet groaned, picking his tools up to closely examine the cube, while Optimus simply sighed. The bot turned to face Miko, not giving her the favor. “While I am appreciative of your eagerness to know the relic you found, you are far too fragile to handle Cybertronian relics. Much less those with such volatile reactions.”
In the slump of wounds, and stinging pain, hearing of her own fragility struck something inside her. “I wish I was a bot.” Miko bemoaned.
On the table, the cube shuttered.
Jack snorted. “Yeah. You would be-”
Before he could even finish the word the cube glowed again, this time the erupting light forming something into a hologram projector as everyone backed from it. Optimus readied his weapons, his hands retracting to reveal his Ion Blasters, to meet whatever the cube gave him.
As everyone stood apprehensive at the glowing screen, weapons drawn, Fowler was the first to realize that maybe he and the rest should not be in the vicinity of a coming shitshow with an unknown relic that even Optimus had zero understanding of. “Maybe we should leave.”
“And miss the show?” Miko retorted, to the bewilderment of Ratchet and Jack. Suddenly the screen began making a typing noise.
[PROGRAM KEYWORD FOUND. UNIVERSAL STREAM UNIEND 87634.45. PROCEED?]
At the sight of the words, Optimus could only respond confused. “...What?” He didn’t lower his blasters, keeping them aimed at the cube with narrowing eyes. “…Proceed?”
The cube … did not respond to the demand. As his bafflement increased, Optimus looked around the cube cautiously to see for any operation system on it. It was smooth, no visible buttons.
Then Miko jumped in despite Jack and June’s attempts to close her mouth.
“Proceed!” Pain ruptured through her, but it was worth it.
“Miko!” Jack and Ratchet yelled back as she smirked at the screen, the new iridescent lights becoming something stranger with each swirl passing. Most of the team began glaring at Miko, even Bulkhead’s disappointed sigh joined in. Optimus firmly kept his eyes upon the machine. A projector? For what though was the bigger question. Universal stream? Uniend? It was clearly something of a classification, but even he had trouble figuring how and what they meant.
“It’s listening to me.” Miko pointed out, the group turning to image and seeing the colors looping and forming into an image. “So I think only I can control it.”
Ratchet was about to slam the girl’s arrogance, his fist closely near the edge, but then the screen already went about, cutting him off.
“Alright.” Miko’s voice rang as the noise of a large metal door slowly opening came.
Everyone instantly froze at the sound from the screen. The very familiar sound. Everyone stared at Miko, questioning her very form for a moment. Miko herself was completely frozen at the screen’s showing. Fowler was the first to ask the golden question.
The sounds of steps came, twisting heads and showing them to be coming from a Cybertronian with a rather strange look. They were rather sleek but still somewhat bulky, possessing parts of a muscle car. Two pairs of the wheels were like heels. There was little to no silver machinery, only colored metal of the red and orange variety on the top, all flat and sleek like an armor with techno-flame pattern, with the waist to below being black. The Autobot symbol was on the waist, like a glowing purple belt crest. The head was black and purple, a helm that looked like it was made to race, with a purple face and yellow glowing eyes. There was a strange mark around the eyes, like it was burned. The marking was like the color of steel under heat, the shade of blue, pink, purple, red and orange almost like a place emitting from the eyes.
“What we got Firecycle? Any lost signals?” The Autobot spoke with Miko’s voice.
Everyone’s eyes were on the screen, basking in the sight of the Autobot. That was when Raf came to an epiphany as to where the voice came from. “Is that Miko!?”
“Pause!” At that, the screen froze. Miko smirked to herself for a bit, before looking to Raf. “What!?”
Ratchet himself joined in the confusion. “Yes, what!?”
As he tried to assemble an explanation from what he could gather, the words before the presentation came back. Optimus’s eyes went wide as he recalled the word. Then his thoughts snapped together the truth. “So that’s what it meant by “universal stream”. It must be how the cube categorized them." As the memory of the term swept through the team, everyone began, to their dismay, understanding what exactly was being shown.
Jack laughed nervously. “No way.” He looked to the rest, only to realize that Fowler was currently contemplating the realization, June was sighing while Arcee and Bulkhead were bewildered at the idea. Ratchet looked dead inside at the idea of Miko with a Cybertronian body. Bee looked like he was fearing the end times for that reason.
Miko on the other end became ecstatic. “I have to know! Optimu-!”
“Yes Miko.” The bot surprisingly agreed, baffling virtually everyone.
Ratchet pinched the bridge of his nose. “Optimus, are you sure we should just let this be some kind of-”
Optimus held his hand up. “Ratchet, we must figure this relic’s intentions, and it seems that Miko’s discovery of it makes it serve her or at the very least listens to her.”
A strange silence conquered the very air of everyone’s breaths as they tried to comprehend the very idea of it all. Multiple timelines, alternate selves and a monitor for it all. It felt like the world had crashed on them again. For some, thoughts lurched towards the fantasies that would be foolish to even think of entertaining, for others it was the endless sea of potential.
June was the first to comment on the situation. “So we’re watching alternate worlds? How can you guys even do that? Unless…”
“It’s not Cybertronian?” Bulkhead finished, baffled by the idea. “It was found with Energon!”
An old memory came to the Prime, already allowing him to understand the potential answers. “There was a Prime with dominion over time named Vector Prime.” Optimus revealed, recalling the tale from Alpha Trion. “His involvement is not exactly out of the question. The original location is something that could find a reason to. Until then we must investigate the cube.”
“Can we watch it then!?” Miko looked positively manic. To which Jack groaned. Before looking to the big red and blue for his answer and already predicting it. At his nod. Miko tried to rush. “Snacks!”
Then promptly fell. June sighed and picked her up.
Ratchet groaned. “You’re too lenient.”
Optimus gave his medic a look Miko was a friend and now the key to understanding the new relic.
Bulkhead sighed as he and Arcee began wondering what it was like on the other side, or sides? They might be humans or something else entirely. It was kinda exciting but neither would admit that near Miko.
Within a few minutes, Miko sat down and poured down the chips onto the bowl. While June simply settled for a sandwich with Fowler. The bots haggled near their spot with Bulkhead and Ratchet near the monitors, while Arcee, Bee and Optimus near the stairs. With a few things stacked to hold the cube.
“Resume!” Miko commanded, to which the screen hummed positively.
Walking over to the base, the bot looked around with a smile as she touched her chest, feeling the small ridges and markings as a certain energy washed over her.
The base itself was far more advanced, possessing some more seats, equipment and screens. It was simply more accommodating to the bots. The monitors were large, the wires and computers, while slightly scattered, were still more advanced.
“How do they have better technology?” Ratchet bemoaned, looking at the monitors behind him. Fowler felt somewhat insulted.
"I gave the best I could!"
"Evidently not enough even without this!"
“Nothing.” June's voice came up. The bot was a bulky, blocky hot-rod truck, with the smokestacks behind her bent upwards like wings. Black with blue flames. Her chest was adorned with the grill of the truck, while her legs had two wheels as heels and the last two on the back. Firecycle cracked her neck, the sound of gears and metal creaking with a snap.
“So far? Nothing bad.” The bot wore June’s voice, surprised by the results. “Whatever you got Highbrow to make Nitro, it’s working well. Surprisingly."
“I didn't think it'd work too!”
Nitro cut her off. “Nothing weird here, except, ya know, sometimes I think we should-”
"We're not doing stunts Nitro."
"Doesn't matter because we have a secret t-"
"Don't you wanna have fu-"
"I want to, but right we don't even have the time for-"
Jack and June both coughed on their snacks in their throats. As both tried to breathe, Raf was the first to comment on the names, looking to the medic. “Do you guys know anyone with these names?”
“Hmm… How many Johns are in your world?” Ratchet replied. “I know of an inventor named Highbrow, and I met a fembot that was a medic named Firecycle, but I never even got a face on the former, and the latter is very different from what you’re seeing. So I can see those are just names they have in the same sense of common names.”
Truth be told, it wounded the medic to realize that he barely remembered the medics he worked with during the war. It wasn’t something he didn’t predict, but it still felt bitter to know.
“So is Nitro a name you've ever heard of?”
“On a bot? No. But as a name? I can see it.” Then he narrowed his optics. “Though the optic colors here are weird. Usually Decepticons have red eyes, whereas here it might not be the case? There have been multi-colored optics.” It was strange to now notice how the sides of the war had coded the colors of their eyes, but it was probably a forgotten memory.
Jack then heaved in the air. “Maybe it’s just a rarity? Also what the fuck?”
“At least I look good?” June tiredly smiled. Before taking a bite of a chip.
Arcee herself was baffled by June’s lack of awareness. “That’s an awesome form!”
Miko fidgeted in the scene of her and June's argument. It wasn't them, but it was reminiscent of how they'd meet occasionally.
Nitro then sighed, before laying down on some dirt as a makeshift seat near the stairs. She then grunted. “It feels weird.” She tapped her chest. “I don’t really know what to do now.”
“You call me my full name when you’re not feeling well.” Firecycle instantly intercepted. “Is it all the new things your life brings onto your ass?”
Nitro simply sighed, trying to understand the energy flowing within her as her smile dropped. “That’s life I guess."
"You sound insane sometimes.”
”If everything was sane, we wouldn't be fighting.”
She walked over to her. "Right on." Firecycle began feeling up the chest of Nitro.
“He’s out and about. Enjoying the sights.”
“Anyone?” Raf asked, putting it in his notes. Ratchet shrugged.
“I think he was an Autobot foot soldier back during the war on Cybertron.”
Now that drew in a few eyes. Raf raised an eyebrow at the human name. “The world’s version of Fowler?”
“Or one of us?” Bee asked while raising five fingers beside them. Raf nodded.
“Yeah, you’re right. Nitro, Firecycle, Highbrow, Torque and Blades. Five names, so it has to be human versions of you guys. Sounds weird.”
Nitro sighed, looking around for a moment before giving an annoyed look at Firecycle. “Did you send them all out?”
“Wasn’t hiding it.” Firecycle sighed, grunting as she placed a hand on her shoulder. “Nitro?”
The lie was so obvious that Firecycle’s brow twitched.
“I’m fine!” The glare invited an argument, and for a moment Nitro actually wanted to comply, but instead began opening the chest-plate. The pieces hissed, forming around and folding onto each other, opening the chest to reveal the Matrix of Leadership. Or at least something of it. The green energy glowing came from an orb, a mechanical orb made of gold with no handles.
“How’s the power, Prime?” She whispered as the cackles of energy stung her fingers, skittering at the tips.
“Great.” She sarcastically grunted.
“Pause.” Miko whispered, and the screen did so, leaving everyone to watch a still frame of the reveal.
An unearthly silence dominated the air. Every single person trying their best to process the very scene and the reveal that came right in front of them. Optimus turned to Miko before going to the screen, repeating the action as he slowly understood the very open details of it all. Did fate really see her for that?
There was a slight understanding of the tone between the bots for Miko. Then she jumped in pure, unadulterated joy.
She wasn’t just a cool looking bot, she was a fucking Prime! The boss of the damn show!
Beside her, every single memory of her recklessness flashed back onto his eyes, and Ratchet almost sobbed at the two bountiful pieces of information flashing before his eyes. “Why Primus? Why her of all people?”
Bulkhead, himself twitchy at the whole predicament, simply patted the medic’s back. He found some of it overdramatic (and insulting) but at the same time he could relate. He liked Miko, but she was difficult. Arcee groaned, leaning onto Bee’s shoulder, feeling her very world burn as she looked at the girl with a slight revulsion. Not to her, but to the idea of her with Primacy. Bee himself was groaning in a radio buzz, already thinking of the horrors of Miko as a Prime.
As the tune of the air crashed down onto the girl, the joy was suddenly tempered by the collective disappointment. “C’mon!” Miko retorted, glaring at her friends. She looked to June who sat near Raf on a different chair, only to see that even she found the idea of her being a Prime … unattractive, to say the least, going by her face. That hurt. “Guys!?”
Jack simply asked Raf a simple question tipped with sarcasm despite Miko between them. “How long before she burns the earth?”
June rolled her eyes. “You guys can stop.”
Miko glared. “Hey!” She looked to Optimus for support.
The big bot was quite literally trying his best not to comment on the air with the wrong words. It dawned on him that he sadly had little faith in the idea of Miko being a leader despite liking her. It wasn’t anything against her or any personal negative sentiment really, he was being realistic about her abilities. Unlike Orion Pax, who gained the Matrix for his strength of character in the eyes of the council, Miko was like a fire. Sighing, the bot simply tried to control the tension, to cut it down. “Miko’s potential is something that needs tempering, and I can believe that anyone, even her, can reach such heights.” He didn’t doubt growth, but it did make him almost flinch that he didn’t see her as a Prime.
“Please don’t enable her.” Ratchet groaned. The medic easily saw the flinch, and he didn’t like the attempt of comfort.
“I am merely making an observation.” He defended.
Ratchet groaned, pushing Bulkhead away. “Of course.”
Miko snorted, puffing her chest quickly to meet his eyes looking down on her. “Jealous?”
Ratchet gave her an annoyed look. “Horrified actually.” The medic had more or less little faith in her and seeing the mere idea of her holding such a holy position was borderline nauseating. In his lifetime, bots with little control lived short and unremarkable lives, and Miko easily ticked every trait on the list to spot them. “You would get us all killed.”
"Of course! You constantly leave the base to go "adventures" in dangerous missions and we have to save you from trouble!" He vented.
"Sorry for wanting to have fun! None of you have to save me."
June could feel energy leaving him after predicting that comment. "Okay, let's keep things calm and not-!" She instantly turned to Ratchet. "-Comment on that."
Fowler huffed, sweating. 'This ain't going to end well.'
She scoffed. Her fingers slightly twisted at his stare, his look. But her own rage held back the rest of the flinching. It kinda hurt every time hearing someone tell her that, but Miko wasn’t going to just back down and take the idea of it. Like she was going to obey the down-talking. "At least I'd kill Megs by now."
Ratchet snorted. Optimus raised an eyebrow. “That isn’t everything to being a Prime. Violence cannot be the only tool at hand.” Much like most of the people he met, Miko’s idea of a Prime was still too narrow and childish.
Miko made a snarling grin at Optimus, almost hateful. “Yeah, I forget.” It doesn’t sit on a bit tongue. And there was that high that was begging to explode. It wasn’t even past a blink when Miko gives in, no thought but the sensation as the venom in her voice dripped. June's eyes widened.
“I would not let Elita die for moral superiority, just saying.”
Elita’s existence was something that came up after Ratchet’s drug-high. Optimus’s girlfriend in all but name. It would an understatement if not downright criminal, to call the moment when that was explained to be somewhat uncomfortable.
There’s a slight heave in her breath from letting that insult out, and it comes and goes within a silence sculpted from horror and disgust. It’s a suffocating air, akin to a creature with everyone consumed and in it's maw and sea of teeth, painfully slow with each metaphorical gnaw within an endless abyss of feeling like a fire was about to devour them. Like every bite, every stage was happening all at once. Both Optimus, the gargantuan bot who was chosen by his god to lead the fight against the enemy, was the reincarnation of the thirteenth demi-god child directly from him and Miko, a girl who simply stumbled upon the conflict, were at the center of the room.
Part of Miko saw the struggle over Megatron that ate at Optimus, and that part loathed him. It despised him for letting so many to die over one bot. Part of Miko wondered how she would deal with that. She didn’t like that thought.
Ratchet’s face was pure disgust, nothing but a pure offended disgust. She was revolting to him. A blight upon his world. Bee looked genuinely horrified, a conflict so evident that it was almost comedic. Bulkhead was trying to pull Ratchet away from a crime. Arcee was cowering behind the yellow bot, hoping for his existence to act as a shield. June looked angry. Sure Fowler, Jack and Raf looked angry and she didn’t care as much, but June’s face stung deeper than she thought it would. After Ratchet had mentioned the name during his time under drugs, the group had learned more about the lady, enough to understand the pain that came with the insult.
Optimus looked … strange. He didn’t flinch and simply looked at her, unblinking within the stare-off between the two. As the moments passed, Miko grunted, clearly displeased.
“Let us discuss this later.” Virtually every other person looked indignant at the result, especially Ratchet, but Miko had the show resumed.
“Nitro Prime sounds like ass.” The Prime groaned. “I don’t want this.”
Firecycle hummed, ignoring some of her. “You have a status to uphold. A title that must be seen as what it is; a symbol of strength.”
Nitro snarled. “Like Nova?” The bot got up, her face inches away from the medic. “You want me to valorize him and everything he made the title from?”
“Regardless of his actions-”
At his gesture, Miko halted the showing. Optimus hummed. “Nova Prime? Not a name I’ve heard of.”
Miko paused, and raised an eyebrow. “Do you know any bad Primes?”
“My predecessor was the one who allowed Cybertron to decay. Sentinel Zeta Prime.” Optimus recalled, ignoring the air that was made moments prior. “There was the war in the Thirteen. But even then, I fail to recall anyone with such a name.”
“So exclusive to this world?”
Ratchet was the first to comment. “Are you seriously going to simply just let her off on that!?”
“I’m not exactly proud of it.” Miko snarked.
“Silent!” Ratchet howled. “You can’t just let people walk over you, Optimus! You have to put a foot down when-!”
“Like when you did before?” He replied courtly. There's a filth in his mind from that, but it had to be done.
Ratchet balked at the retort, struggling to form words for a blink. “When I was under the effects of Syn-En!? She isn’t on drugs!”
“Can we settle this later?” June groaned. “I really feel like we have to move with this first.” Optimus nodded, before giving a glare that silenced the shocked medic.
Before Nitro could begin the retort, a beep went out. “Fire?”
Firecyle walked over to the computer. “Signals showing something from the north-end.” She clicked onto the communications tab. “Anyone nearby the Vehicons on the north-end of Jasper, report!” The map showed two pings. HB and TR. And they were outright face to face with the sighting.
The scene went to the familiar bridge, this time with two bots fighting Vehicons, who strangely lacked the Decepticon symbol, being new faces.
“It was when we met!” Raf called out, seeing the name of the bridge the bots fought under, and to them the first time they met a Cybertronian. Jack simply sighed, before realizing something.
“So wait, are we going to meet human Arcee and Bee?” Some eyebrows were raised. “I mean, how different is this world? No one here is an inventor.”
The first was a blue white bot. The bot had a visor with a more glasses shape. His blue chest had a white square with the Autobot symbol on the center. The blue boots that reached to the knees had small jet tail wings on the back out corners of the legs. The thighs, waist and arms to the shoulders were white, with small wings and two helicopter blades on them attached to the side of the bot, but not on any corner. The shoulders had some mountings, just a square. The bot’s head was a grey helm with two squares at the bottom, a thinner square and a larger and longer onto the side of the scalp, with a bowl helm between and a square short mohawk-esque top with the height to the sides on the center. A blue face grunted as he threw the bot into the wall, breaking it and scattering the rubble as the cackle of electricity echoed out of the limping and dying bot.
Another jumped him. As he endured punches, an orange bot pulled out a cannon to the face of another Vehicon. The second one cleanly showed his bulky pick-up truck in his robot form, specifically through his chest being the front of the truck, the lights red. He was pretty simple. Orange fore-legs that held the wheels on the back, white hands, forearms and shoulders in orange while the rest were mechanical silver, boxy, with a crownlike helm and a yellow face with red eyes glaring at the Decepticons.
“Two civilians here!” Fowler’s voice called out. The bot shot one, throwing it across the ground before glaring to the blue one as he shot one off him. The bot endured a few shots before faltering, letting a blaster to be finally pulled out and blowing a hole onto the chest. “Highbrow! The hell were you doing!?”
“So that’s me?” The agent looked surprised. “I look good?” He asked the bots.
Arcee shrugged. “Basic, but that’s not bad. The name’s normal too.” Bee gave him a thumbs up.
“You’re normal! That’s a good thing!” Bulkhead jumped in. While Jack simply patted his back.
The boy chuckled. "And he does look like what you'd be as a bot, so..."
June giggled. “It’s fine, you’re probably not the worst.”
Optimus narrowed his eyes, sensing something not right with the scene. The lack of a symbol could be explained, but whatever it was that came to him, just didn’t feel right at all.
“How would you even possess the computing structure to understand a single iota of my original procedure!?” Jack, or rather Highbrow spoke gratingly with an accent that was borderline aristocratic. “Your limited cognitive capabilities would leave nothing understood!”
The bot then shot the Vehicon again. Dodging the attacks returning, Highbrow continued firing, trying his best to avoid another physical fight.
Jack groaned as he felt the air around him shift.
June snickered, eating her sandwich with laughter making it harder. Fowler just whistled. Everyone gave Jack a small look, before some even began cackling at it. The boy groaned. “So I’m Ratchet? Miko got to be a Prime and I’m some asshole intellectualist? What the hell man.”
"I am nothing like that!" The medic huffed.
“But even worse than him somehow.” Miko chuckled out, ignoring him. To say that hearing him being such a fucking uptight was hilarious. “You sound like a dick.”
Arcee was laughing, but it had now cooled down. “You sound like a fancy nitwit version of Raf. No offense.”
“Like that string of words is beautiful.” Bulkhead chipped in.
“What the hell!?” A girl spoke, completely horrified by the sight. The girl was dark-skinned with a black haired flat mohawk, with another one that was light-skinned and blue short hair dragging her away. The pair both had simple black leather jackets with blue jeans. Beside them, was the smoking wreckage of motorcycles and rubble.
“Ash!” The other girl called out with Arcee’s voice. “We need to leave!” The bots continued fighting, causing rubble and dust to spray.
Arcee was the first to clock in who that was. “Airachnid!? Why am I with her!? Why is she with me!?”
Miko paused the show. “The hell? The spider bot?” She had only known of the Decepticon but meeting her was not something that happened yet. Maybe the universe had different set-ups, but even her being a Prime wasn’t such a big outlier compared to this.
June shrugged. “Must just be the way the world spins.”
At Arcee’s rage, Optimus placed a hand on her shoulder. “You must not judge this world’s version of her for what she is in our world. The fact that the other you is risking her life hers, should be enough.” Arcee glared. “I must ask of you to look at her merely as her own person. Even moreso, your other self seems to trust her.” As she pulled herself tight, Miko continued.
At Bulk's question, Ratchet huffed. "I'd rather not."
“Good point!” Ash replied. As the pair both attempted to flee the scene, another group of Vehicons tried to attack the group. The pitch black machine jumped right at them, pointing a blaster right at the pair with the energy rising. Only for a pair of blades to slip through the drone, slicing it into three. The new bot revealed himself with a mad grin, only for it to turn into a disgusted snarl.
Raf shivered, already not enjoying his alternate self’s weirdly sadistic aura. Even Optimus narrowed his eyes.
The falling pieces revealed a red white bot. Clearly a helicopter. The landing feet of the alt-mode were beside his upper arms, mounted. Red legs, white thighs, red waist and two blasters beside the legs, under the knees. His chest was two red bars and a white bar between. Pieces of a helicopter laid like wings, with the blades behind from the cent of his back. The bot’s helm was more of a pilot’s, but with no visor and a few spikes and markings like scars.
“By the spark of Primus.” Raf’s voice out of Blades spoke, clearly angry. “Lifeless drones. I want real blood spilling damnit! Real blood-pumping action and skinning!"
Another bot tried to jump him, only for Blades to hit the throat in a single spin to his back, slitting the throat and spraying the fuel right onto his metal skin. "That's the sweet spot." He purred, clearly aroused by the murder.
June, Optimus and Miko winced as they realized too late that this was Raf’s alternate. “I’ll buy you some burgers.” June promised.
Ratchet made a disgusted expression. “Raf’s alternate is nothing like him!”
“Like the rest of them?” Bulkhead replied. “It’s not out of the question to have this if Arcee is friends with the spider con.” Said bot shivered with a huff at that.
“If you could, for a moment, leave the deranged bloodlust and walk into the realm of lucidity, I’d appreciate a slight help!” Highbrow barely managed to say the words as three Vehicons tried to gang up on him and Torque. The helicopter bot threw out a few of his knives and hit all three bots. “You almost hit me!”
“Wow Raf’s a dick here.” Miko laughed. "Then again..."
Torque simply slammed one onto the group, breaking both it and the head. He then took his blaster to the head of the second one and shot it right off.
With another shot to the bot, Highbrow bushed himself up. “Now you two!” He snapped to the young girls. “I asked for you to simply set the boxes there! Why would you decide to open them!?”
June raised an eyebrow. “What did you do Jack?”
“Alternate version.” He snarked.
“Aren’t you the smart guy?” The second girl asked. “I thought you were like-” The girl cut herself off, too overwhelmed by the current events.
“Please Anna, don’t allow your comparably plebeian cerebral encumbrance to strain itself beyond endurance, it would be a futile attempt at grasping the intrinsic universal magnitude of my innate mental acuity, and will bear no arboreal reproductive spheres.” The bot snobbishly retorted. “The ultrascopic trans-infinite sublimity of my diurnal ponderances transcend the circumference of most sentient species' entire thought-spheres.”
A silence reigned at everyone, even those on the screen, found themselves completely baffled by the sheer bizarreness of words that formed from the bot. Miko then laughed like a fucking psychopath as Jack simply groaned, his entire soul already bleeding into the void as everyone’s eyes went onto his form. Even the alternate self defense was cleanly no longer working for them. June herself was quite literally chuckling as she ate another sandwich. Arcee was the first to comment.
“I sound like a maniac with a thesaurus in the place of communication skills.” Jack wondered if death was possible at the moment from raw thought. Miko and Fowler patted his back.
Ratchet rolled his eyes. “Some things are just magnificently bizarre.” Bulkhead and Bumblebee simply chuckled at the sight.
The two girls, and even his own allies, looked at him with befuddlement and disgust. “You sound stupid as shit and I’m gonna punch you in the face.” Blades finally stated with a few steps.
“Relatable.” Miko commented. Raf nodded.
Optimus felt awkward, while some of them like Bulkhead and Bumblebee ragged upon the boy, Optimus was willing to not allow himself to blur the lines between the showing of another world and theirs. But it still absolutely broke his mind to see such arrogance.
Highbrow backed up instantly. “I was trying to create signal systems to create a far easier spatial lockpoint for us!” The bot explained. At the confusion, the bot groaned. “To be trapped without anyone on my level is a curse. I was trying to make using the Groundbridge around Jasper easier.”
“Saved by the ability to not be a prick.” Jack sarcastically cheered. “God I hate other me.”
Torque clicked in. “Should we-?“
“BACK TO BASE!” Firecycle’s voice howled into their ears, making all three bots flinch as the radio sound fizzled.
The bots flinched at the idea of such a sensation, recalling Ratchet’s occasional screams.
“Fowler, they got people in danger.”
“Good point.” Ratchet agreed.
The scene then transitioned into the girls inside Torque, with both Highbrow and Blades flying to the base. As the three went through the secret door through the rocks, two bot were awaiting them, but also another human with them.
“To the couch.” Firecycle commanded. Ash and Anna did so, meeting a broad, fit woman with white hair in a pseudo-bowl cut brushed back, wrinkles, black pants and a grey shirt. The shirt had two patterns on the chest, a weird string looping up and down like wings. The woman also had a peach-brown jacket with shoulder pads, and a belt with a skull buckle. Her cane was black, having a clear trigger. Her red eyes looked over to them.
“Hello, I assume you must be a bit unnerved by this.” The lady spoke.
Optimus narrowed his eyes. Something about her rang in his skull.
“This world’s counterpart to Fowler, Dion.” Raf realized. “Wonder if they’re like Optimus or something.”
“A female Optimus?” Fowler thought over it. “Possible.”
“Regardless, she’s cool.” Miko randomly commented.
“And why am I? Chopped liver?”
At Fowler’s joke, June sighed. “No, but she is nice-looking regardless.”
The pair looked around. Anna snorted. “Yeah!?”
“Blades left a small talk for this, and I see it was reasonable.” She sat down and gave a hand. “Officer Dion Margaret. But my friends call me “Megaton” as a joke.”
Ash raised an eyebrow. “Why?”
“Dropped a bomb on some poor schmuck during a gunfight in Idaho.” The lady then chuckled at that memory. “Called in a helicopter to drop a few grenades down on a guy to draw him out. Fires were handled quickly.”
“Pause!” Miko spoke, trying to gather herself as everyone handled the bomb dropped onto them. June herself was the first to comment on it, with everyone completely suffering shock holding them by the throat. And how would it not? Optimus was visibly disoriented, heaving as he tried to see it, the still frame with all of his mental processing, which was becoming harder as emotion overwhelmed him.
“M-Megatron!?” June looked to the bots, trying to figure out the sight before them. “The bad guy!? The one trying to kill you all!? The leader!?”
Ratchet was trying not to simply explode as the scene was frozen, giving him her face like time was shoving it into his eyes. “How?” Was the only thing he could muster up.
“A different world, with differing logic upon its history.” Optimus barely managed to rationalize. “Why it is the way it is, that is beyond our control.”
It stung to see it. No matter the reality and logical point of his mantra about it being a different universe, Optimus found for a moment seeing Megatronus's face through the woman's face. In spite of the separation of gender, species and general visage and even facial anatomy, it didn't allude him that the face staring at the girls was a face he thought about. When nights grew into a slow lurch of silence, he would dream. There was a gladiator with a penchant for poetry, a certain edge of civility in him and a fire for himself and his caste. There was a memory that he would find himself stepping into, an abyss of joy so acidic that it burnt him, the blues of the skies and seas intermingled when he stepped into a time before the tragedy.
He hated himself, and he felt that hatred just looking at her.
As the air simmered slightly. “…So we’re acknowledging the hotness here right?” Miko finally said, quickly whipping everyone necks to her direction, even Optimus’s, in pure bafflement. “What!?”
Jack actually made a strangled noise. “Really!?”
“Miko!” Bulkhead pleaded.
“Look, I’m a very straight woman-”
“Currently doubting that.” June retorted.
“-and I’d plow that gal!” Miko defended. Before turning to Optimus, who was equally gaping. “No offense.” The bot looked like he wanted to say “none taken” but it was blocked by the shock of a human Megatron, one that was a woman, and was also on the side of good. It stacked onto his thoughts like a planet crashing on another.
“...Why would you say that?”
“I’d like to be honest, Jack.”
“Please continue the show.” Bee chirped in, and even without any translation everyone understood him.
At Anna’s question, Nitro popped in. “We’re not robots in the way you think.”
“We are autonomous mechanical organisms from a planet called Cybertron, and even the fauna there is partially mechanical.” Firecycle explained. “We’re a section of soldiers, a makeshift group from the greater army of the Autobot resistance against the current ruling forces of Cybertron, the Exarchon Empire, and their attempts to conquer … well, everything, really.”
Miko paused the show again.
“Ruling forces!? Exarchon!?” Ratchet balked, absolutely stumped by the discovery. “So there are no Decepticons?”
“So that’s why there were no symbols on them.” Optimus realized. “The fight here is against Cybertron. So the planet must be alive in this world. Alive.” Miko gave him a strange look at the bizarre jubilance he showed.
“It’s being ruled by fascists.”
“But alive.” Optimus insisted. Miko sighed. “It’s thriving.”
Jack gave Bulkhead a look. “You don’t think that there’s a chance that … I don’t know, something bad here?” Jack shrugged. “Bad vibes are just running in the waves for me.”
“So we’re rebels against Cybertron?” Arcee found that to be insane regardless of realities. “Wonder how the leadership goes there.” The only reason Optimus was the boss was because he was a Prime, a position given by Primus. “She didn’t call herself the leader of the Autobots, just soldiers.”
“Makeshift, even.” Ratchet spoke. “They have a leader, clearly, but whom? Magnus?”
“He’s probably human if Megatron is, doc.” Bulkhead replied. “Someone like him? I could see it.”
June sighed. Taking a sip of her drink, the woman looked to Miko, who was still bothered by Optimus’s joy. “Optimus’s home is alive, Miko. Let him have it.” Miko shot her a look. The nurse understood it and shot back another one.
Jack sighed. “Look, they have a dead world, let them have this.”
“What makes you think I like this?” Arcee responded. “It doesn’t sound fun if they got Vehicons. It’s still like the ‘cons regardless.” Bee simply sulked at that, with her patting his head. It seemed even when it was alive, it wasn’t a good place.
“We’re here mostly because of the search party that was sent here. Both sides-us and them-have zero communications for the wider galaxy. We’ve been tossed into this world after a malfunction with the Quantum-Generator. An engine that allowed us to jump lightyears across the galaxy. The bridge-tech that Highbrow had you help him with was a … let’s say different version of instantaneous transportation tech.” Firecycle then smacked the bot’s head up.
“Forcing kids to do your work?” She snarled.
“I got the portals to improve!” The bot defended.
“This other you sucks bro.” Miko giggled.
“You can literally stop thinking he’s reflective of me by any margin.” Jack groaned.
“Nah.” Fowler replied. “It’s too funny to hear you like this.”
‘Quantum Generator?’ Optimus had never heard of such a thing, but the use of a human term already piqued his interest.
Nitro sighed, laying down. “You dipshits got anything else?”
“Dunno.” Ash replied. “You guys got here because of a ship crash, and there’s other guys here that kill and hurt others.”
“That and our world has relics from theirs.” Dion, or rather Megaton, added to the shock of the girls. “It’s something called the “Ark”, a ship that has some history as an ancient vessel, like their version of the Odyssey mixed with the space race.” A graph was shown, illustrating the Ark and the number of things within it.
“What!?” Bulkhead balked, eyes wide. “The Ark was our escape from Cybertron!”
“Really?” June raised an eyebrow. "Why did you guys need to leave again?"
At June’s question, Ratchet took over. “Yes. When the war began consuming Cybertron's resources to the point of madness, Megatron had used the Plasma Energy Chamber to poison Cybertron with Dark Energon as a gambit to end the war in his favor, but Optimus removed it. The damage, regrettably, was done regardless and the core of our world told Optimus we had to leave, to let Cybertron heal when it could not bear the numbers at the time.”
Bulkhead then chuckled a bit. “It was called Project Generation One, but Jazz thought the Ark sounded cooler.” The green sighed as he recalled his old friend. “Guess he was right.”
“But that kind of description? That’s kinda wild right?” Fowler asked.
Optimus nodded. “I’ve read about both. The Ark as something of a historical event must imply that the Exarchon Empire was not the ruler of Cybertron from the beginning.”
A sigh escaped Blades. “Hey, who’s the guy actually stalking us-you guys really-anyway?” Anna asked.
“A Liege Imperator. A commander of an army. We ran against a large ship and now they’re trapped on the moon.”
“Liege?” Optimus questioned. That was a name long unspoken, or half of one.
“Roman based?” June questioned.
Optimus shook his head. “Simple coincidence like some names.”
Torque stepped in. “There’s three rare ranks in the high military command of Exarchon unlike how you’d see them from humans. While there’s tons of similarities, there’s Liege Imperator, Liege Preatus and Liege Centuro. Three unique positions. The three ranks have less and less members as you go up by wide margins, with there only being like a handful at Centuro.”
“So who’s the Emperor? This all sounds Roman to me.” Ashe asked.
“The Liege Maximo.” Highbrow began. “A great three-headed beast from the far reaches of the cosmos. It is an ancient aberration from the Age of Expansion. His mere existence is a nightmare for existence.”
The pin drop within Optimus snapped him. “Of course it was him.” Optimus positively snarled, actually snarled, his fingers loudly digging into his palms, and shook the room with with the emotion, forcing a jittering Miko to pause the show for a moment as everyone gathered themselves from the newfound reaction.
The part boiling with fury was old, older than most Cybertronians. And he had that part simmering for a long time. “How is he the one commanding them? And he isn’t Cybertronian?”
“Optimus! Who is the guy?” June asked.
The bot barely managed to ease his rage, to make himself more still. With a sigh, the bot began speaking. “One of the original thirteen primes.” He revealed. “The Prime of Lies and the great manipulator, Liege Maximo. The way they speak of him baffles me as well. In our world, he’s one of the first Cybertronians, born from Primus himself. But here, they speak of him as something from outside of Cybertron’s world.”
“So he’s not like, a human?” Jack realized. “How though? Is a member of the Thirteen different from a normal Cybertronian?”
Arcee snorted. “Like gods, Jack. nearly capital-g gods.”
“But that sounds like a title.” Raf noticed. “I mean, Liege Imperator, Preatus and Centuro? Then maybe he’s not the Liege Maximo as you know him but some monster just using the name as a rank. And he's also the Prime of Lies.”
Ratchet sighed. “Then Optimus might not be a human here then.” The medic predicted. Or at least attempted to. It was mad, all of it. Cybertron under the rule of tyrants but alive. It hurt to know that as the first reality beyond his own. First impressions despite logic, one could suppose.
“So he’s some Lovecraftian monster?”
"A term for monster of eldritch nature, named after the man who essentially codified it." Optimus explained to Bulkhead, then sighed. "He was also deeply bigoted, unfortunately."
A small silence came and went. “Yeah, whatever that is.” Nitro replied within her slump. “Blending that together, you guys got us to protect you. A foot-soldier, washed-up psycho Protectobot, an excommunicated and violent wash-up of a medic, a borderline delusional egoist for an inventor and me!” Nitro exclaimed. “Even I don’t know who I am.”
Firecycle sighed. “Roll call for the kids here. I’m Firecycle, the medic of the group.” She then pointed to the rest of the team. “Torque, the orange bot there is our soldier. Highbrow, who hired you to set up signal systems that he didn’t prepare against natural curiosity is our dipshit inventor. Blades over there is our psychotic rescue chopper. And Nitro-” She pointed towards the laid bot. “-is our leader.”
At her stare, Ash stood up straight. “Ash Willems. And this is Anna Gaillard. We’re bikers that took the job for a quick buck.”
“That’s where you took the fund to, Highbrow?” Megaton remarked. “No problem for me.”
Anna raised an eyebrow when it finally dawned on her. "Why are you telling us about this?"
"You're part of the team thanks to the brains here." Firecycle explained.
She blinked. "Makes sense"
“Such a wild bunch.” Ratchet sighed, already wondering how salvation was even possible with them.
"Who're they?" Miko asked Bulkhead.
“Rescue group during the war. Big question is how did Blades become one of them in the first place? He’d fit right in with the wreckers, but how was he part of the rescue teams? His alt-mode?” Bulkhead asked, baffled by the reality of such a role being given to someone of such violence. When one could think of a person on the rescue teams, the closest Bulkhead got to something close to Blades was Ratchet.
Arcee simply groaned. “Ragtag group of misfits, great chances they are.” Beside her, Fowler laughed with Raf, those storytelling conventions are old for them. Even June chuckled a bit.
Optimus stared at Miko, concerned. He wasn’t blind to the emptiness that plagued her, that ate at her. Though the world cleanly showed itself different, similarities may have already been shown. Part of him wanted to also comment on the closeness between the two, but decided against that.
Highbrow snorted. “I was making the best of our tools at the time.”
The bot sighed. “To make the portal system we are currently using a bit more efficient. The Spacebridge technology requires a massive amount of power to even twitch a spark of energy.” The bot pulled out a projector from his forearm. “Usually, the Spacebridges are considered myth, with Quantum Generators as our normal transportation system when traveling long distances. But with our new access from the Ark we raided, we gained something to work with.”
"I downgraded virtually everything within it. I took extremely precise measures for such." A holographic blueprint was shown, revealing just how complex it was, running from the fact that it looked like fifty maps stitched together, for one.
“Wait, what!?” Ratchet exclaimed, baffled. “Spacebridge technology is a myth!? How!?”
“The rules of this world is nothing like ours if the Liege Maximo is what he is.” Optimus replied.
"They got the whole thing and can't even use it? Damn." Bulkhead sulked.
Firecycle then laid atop Nitro, the two snuggling as the medic tried to comfort the newly made Prime.
“Grand.” Highbrow snarked with a drawl. “If you could halt yourself from dwelling inside your individualized despondency, we could now circumvent the bindings of the banality of this primitive planet.”
"Maybe if you enjoyed life, people would like you."
"Great." Highbrow rolled his eyes.
“Yeah, yeah.” Nitro groaned. “Regardless, you guys can keep a secret, right?”
“Sure.” Anna replied, already feeling the air becoming a bit too sad for her. “Can we leave?”
“Not yet.” Megaton stopped. “Highbrow’s tech is volatile, and we need to make sure nothing happened to you.” Ash twitched. “I get your concern, above all else I get it. But Firecycle is someone that can help you.” The officer glared at the inventor. “Unlike someone here, Firecycle is more than capable of being … human-compatible?” She struggled to fully articulate how things weren’t a threat to the girls, but it just dawned on Megaton that it wasn’t really easy to do at the worst time.
June raised an eyebrow. “Wouldn’t the Ark interest him?” At the raised eyebrows, June explained. “Think about it, whatever the Ark is, shouldn’t it be a massive thing? I’d assume this ship was large right? No way they raided it completely already unless they've been here that long.” She also didn't want to comment on the snuggling, but Jack's eyes were already narrowing.
Ratchet nodded. “Held hundreds of us. It would be the size of Jasper itself statistically.”
Fowler almost felt a headache. “Thankfully it’s not near us right?”
“We lost it in deep space.” Arcee replied.
As Megaton made her attempt to comfort the duo, Bulkhead rubbed his head. “It’s so weird to see Megatron being nice. Even if she’s got nothing of the voice or the face.”
“Agreed.” Ratchet groaned.
Ash rolled her eyes. “Right.” She dragged, looking towards the pair snuggled atop each other. “Megs. They’re a couple?”
“Nitro and Firecycle? Yeah.” Megs replied.
A mild silence came about. Not a true silence with Arcee gaping with some attempt at words failing, Fowler hissing in fear, Raf praying to god for salvation and Bulkhead trying his best to not say some insanely stupid shit while Bee simply became a statue. Ratchet on the other hand lacked any sense of why virtually everything that was shown in the moment was such a striking scene and was not exactly enjoying the pause. Optimus, to his credit, simply looked away, playing ignorance or respect.
Now Bulkhead almost managed to halt his medic’s complaint. Almost. “Miko! What’s the hold up on the scene? Just because you and the Darby nurse are dating in this world-”
”Ratchet.” Bulkhead hissed, his hand on the doctor’s shoulder so uncomfortably tight it sounded like a dent was coming. “Maybe this isn’t the time.”
Miko tried to muster some words, any of them to diffuse the tension, from Jack’s look that drew too many valleys for her to understand to June’s nervousness, she wondered how she should-“I wouldn’t mind it.”
Jack’s eyes went mad. “What, Miko?” His grin and joylessly coy tone was not helping. “Repeat that?”
It was stupid, but Miko genuinely liked June enough to entertain it now that it was shoved into her face. The nurse did something to her. Something that Miko couldn’t really deny even if she tried. June was a lovely woman and Miko didn’t like to think about how, for a short moment, the emptiness that gnawed at her was lesser. June was just … June. A kind hand. And for a moment that feeling that the real her was beyond her, that the inner self that she felt like was hidden from her, was there. It was within reach. Because of June. It hurt to actually think that far.
She had spent time with June, actually felt herself liking time with her.
“Miko.” June began the talk she predicted, her hand already gripping Jack’s shoulder. “I’m not sure the ages would allow that.” Miko nodded.
"Miko." The pity in her eyes made her ache.
“Got that.” She sighed. A look no one could even try to misinterpret. “Would’ve been nice.”
Jack looked like he was about to combust. But June held him back. “Probably.”
“So we’re done there, yes?” Jack spoke, almost far too venomous for comfort. For all the things to happen, Miko professing a romantic interest for his mother was the last thing he needed to experience. Ever. Through fire or winter he was going to cut this shit down.
Optimus wondered, for a moment, if Miko’s criticism of him came from June.
If she had seen her dead, Miko would most certainly massacre them. To feel a piece of your heart taken would be a painful, crushing experience. One he knew too well. Is this Miko’s hatred of him? He could somewhat understand it now. Part of him whispered Megatronus's visage, phantasms of times long gone, another simply whispered “them”. He silenced both.
That part of him growled.
“Robo-lesbianism. Damn.” Ash then looked to Highbrow with a smirk. “You got anyone waiting?”
The bot simply left the base in response to the sarcastic taunt. Torque sighed. “He had a conjunx out there, and thinks he’s still alive.”
“A bit harsh, don’t you think?” Anna replied.
“Feel like shit.” Ash admitted. Then she realized something. "Wait, what's "conjunx"?"
At the question, the bot clarified. “Conjunx is our term for marriage.”
“And!" She raised her finger in opposition. "Brainstorm’s not dead.” She had been somewhat cognizant of the talk around her, but interest didn’t come until now. “He’s a deranged fucker of an inventor, probably made a bomb that warped Space-Time.”
"Shocker." Arcee snarked. Hearing an apology from her was too golden for her.
At the name of the term, she looked to her teammates. To say that such a differing term, for a type of relationship she barely ever saw on Cybertron was bizarre. Even she learned a bit of Latin to understand the word’s translation, and weirdly accurate meaning in English. Optimus narrowed his eyes. Endless possibilities, after all. But it would not erase the strangeness of it.
Meanwhile, Miko happily side-eyed Jack with a raised eyebrow, already enjoying the show again. “So who’s the lucky guy?”
“Shut up Miko.” Jack quickly replied.
“Jack. Miko. don’t fight right now, I'm a bit tired here.” June sighed, already a bit done with the pair. “Also full acceptance Jack.”
The boy groaned. "Are you serious?"
Ratchet on the other end, winced as the name came. He recalled such a person with that name. “That disaster has a husband with someone that uptight?”
Jack spun to face the medic. “Is he a problem?” Who the hell was he married to?
“The madman of an engineer was quite literally breaking the rules consistently, ruining people’s lives and labs with his ideas.” Ratchet blanched, recalling such a maniac. “It might just be a name similarity, but this is honestly weirder for me with the similarities. Either the universe was in a funny mood or something’s off.”
"Damn." Fowler wondered how that happened.
A sound echoed out, a beep on the monitor. Firecycle jumped to the screen. “It’s a new signal. Not just a Vehicon pack. Around the Sierra Nevada, near Mount Whitney.”
Nitro sighed. “Time to fight some pricks.”
“Finally.” Miko took a breath. “We got something new to watch again.”
“We got enough bombs and you think we need more fights?” June asked. Then she looked closer. The tense hand and twitching edge of the eye and lip. June sighed. “Fine.”
The scene changed to a ship on the moon, a gargantuan ship with a strange design. It was shaped like a scorpion, vaguely. The ship’s head was like a shuttle’s head and tip but angular and sharper. It was asymmetrical, the left side putting on its extension, another hull with sharp fangs jutting forwards while the right side was thicker, having only a single longer spike. There was a weird scorpion tail on the back of the ship. The whole thing was insect-like.
“That’s the ship?” Bulkhead laughed. “It looks stupid.”
“The Nemesis is better, just saying.” Arcee added. It was strange to add such a detail, but praising their world suddenly superseded said praise being directed to the Decepticons.
Ratchet on the other hand, hummed at the locale. The moon? He wondered why they never bothered to hide there. Maybe it was just unnecessary? Inefficient? Who knows.
The screen went inside the ship, revealing the bot heralding the ship to be a bot with a grimace. The bot was a jet. His base body being white with the lower chest and waist holding the cockpit, black glass with yellow parts, with the chest being a yellow with white center pad more tiled down that flat, making a converging jut between the cockpit and chest pad. The forearms were yellow and so were the fore-legs with some white calves. The wings on his back and at the front of his legs facing down were green. The two thrusters on his back were red with green inside. The face was ushered from the shadows, revealing a yellow face with a red helm, a small mohawk akin to a spartan helm, a large chin piece with tubes connecting to the lower end of the vents beside the face. Green eyes glared at the bot behind him.
“I’d ask why our attempts to secure the Ark has been in a slump, but that would be redundant now, would it?” A fizzle in his form revealed him to be a hologram.
“It had been difficult to even narrow down the travel lines.” Sierra’s voice spoke, already balancing anger and survival. “The ship is barely capable-”
The second bot was a strange one. She didn’t have a normally seen alt-mode, only the form of long shapes, spread out on the waist from the back to give the look of a coat was there and it gave nothing. It was even stranger to note her face looking like the Decepticon symbol. The triangles came from the side, bent forwards as if holding the mask, lapping over them a bit, the silver mask held a solid line red visor, the mask creating a nose impression with a spike between them. The black headpiece above the eyes was the upper half of the symbol, encompassing even the sides of the helm that held the triangles. The bot also had tube forearms and fore-legs, with kneepads in diamond shape, a chest that was given a flat pad with a few gold markings like a vest and a short silver collar.
“Liege Imperator Soundblaster.” The first bot hissed.
“THE FUCK!?” Jack exclaimed. “Sierra!? She’s the Imperator!?” It was baffling to even hear her as a Cybertronian, but one with that face? It was insane. “She even has the Decepticon symbol as her face!?”
Miko paused in agreement, already baffled by the revelation. “Yeah, what!? Silas is right there!”
“Multiverse.” Raf justified.
“It’s still crazy though.”
Jack sighed. “Fucking multiverse.”
It was strange, for the kids, they knew her as nothing more than a friend, a distant human in their lives, but one that existed nicely within the realm of normalcy. This, despite all misgiving of a world not theirs, was still maddening to witness.
Optimus gave them a pitying look. “I understand it must be shocking, but the worlds beyond ours are not ours to control. If Megatron is an ally, and Airachnid is a civilian, and both are humans, then things could be darker for our friends. Fate is not thinking of morality, it merely is.” It wasn’t something he didn’t anticipate, but it still did make him paranoid to the idea of something like him or the rest, but if Arcee was like this, then it would not be for them. But that would be foolish to hold onto.
“I met her once, but then again what Ops said.” Arcee spoke, agreeing with him. “A bit on the nose for the face though.”
“Yeah, that’s kinda cool looking if you ignore the whole ‘Con part.” Bulkhead sighed. “She’s no Megatron though, so you guys have an easier time here.”
“But what is her alt-mode?” Ratchet grumbled. Bee buzzed up a few guesses. “Nothing like that. It must be something because the coat thing is making it weird for me.”
Fowler shrugged. “Betting you it’s some jet.”
June calmly raised an eyebrow. “Miko?”
The girl narrowed her eyes at the frame, picking out the color from the inside of the shapes. Her mind went to the tube limbs, and later the weird folding of gold. “Satellite.” She bet. “That’s a satellite.” She sighed.
“Megatron flies, Starscream and Soundwave flies.” The agent replied. “And her name is Soundblaster. Winning something good from this.”
“You were marooned here by your mistakes, and the Twilight is a ship beyond instant repair. Pray tell, do you think I would sit idly by while the greatest treasure lies within my reach, Imperator?”
“...No, Liege Centuro Jhiaxus.”
“Correct. You have something here. A makeshift group of nothings as enemies. A planet with no weapon to even scratch your weakest soldiers. And yet, you are failing.” The man then gave her a strange look. “We have little in the way of concern for this, mostly due to the fact that the current state of supplies are directed towards more pressing matters.”
The bot then showed her a series of five symbols. “Do you see these symbols?”
“Those were on the cube!” Optimus exclaimed, recognizing some of them.
“These symbols are clues now. Now not just the figment of old mythologies, but actual clues to the Guiding Hand and the Knights of Cybertron. If that is not enough, the very key to the now potentially real Cyberutopia!” He suddenly screamed, shaking her. “Do not fail me!”
“I … do not know these names.” Optimus realized. “I must admit, this world is stranger than I thought.”
As the hologram fizzled out, Soundblaster walked from the bridge, taking her time walking through the hallways with her steps ominous echoing out. A murderous aura crept through as she slowly made her way onto the prisoner’s space. She stopped at a jail door, revealing a bot. One with the Autobot crest on his face-mask.
The bot’s body was somewhat bulky, with blue jet body parts armoring him. A small flat black cockpit was on the front of his upper waist. Wings two on the side of his shoulders, two folded on the front of them like the one on the side and two more at the back of the legs, around the boots facing down. With forearms, black thighs, and a backpack with two shoulder cannons. The bot’s head was a white square-like helm with a three part segmentation, two sides and a top. Two vents beside the orange face mask, and a third vent on his forehead. A yellow face and eyes looked at Soundblaster.
“Ah!” Vince’s voice came. “To what do I owe the pleasure, dear Imperator?”
The woman merely sighed. “A small bit of assistance.”
“That’s Vince!?” Miko exclaimed. “Dude your bully!” She chuckled a bit at that.
“Thanks Miko.” Jack gave a glare to everyone else. “He’s just some guy alright! He’s not-”
“You are something I need Brainstorm.”
A silence came through. A very un-fun silence came through.
Miko paused. Before wincing. "At least you're-I mean the other you!-isn't a widow? Small mercies?"
Optimus looked confused of course. Then his mind realized the issue. He recalled talks of the boy. Virtually every single soul began looking like they wanted to die. Bulkhead only had heard of Vince, but this was a wild thing to witness. The fact laid bare, they barely could separate the world they viewed and their own. It was strange, but emotions usually went past logic casually.
Arcee looked over to Jack, giving him a small thumbs up. “Hey, something’s nicer.”
“He’s nicer in this world.” June snarked, screaming a look saying "shut up" to the bot.
For Jack, it was already hell for him when Miko admitted her … preference for June, but fucking this? This was a special kind of hell for him right now. He groaned. Bee buzzed in something nice, but Jack barely gave a shit to know. Ratchet looked confused, a bit twitchy and felt way too awkward. Fowler was playing “nothing is happening” and Raf wanted to move past it.
Jack also desperately wanted to avoid thinking about Vince’s beauty. He had slipped from his mind purely because of the war. He became irrelevant and Jack wasn't sure how any of this felt for him.
Another bot suddenly came into view. He was just a jet, basic ideas but also completely strange was his mannerisms. He tripped, brushing himself and rushing sycophantically to the head. The purple head shook. “Imperator Soundblaster! Brainstorm is one of the smarter Autobots! By all accounts you should be-”
“Logos.” She cut off, calm as still water.
“Another Starscream?” Ratchet laughed. “How pitiful. Even across realities, there's a backstabbing sycophant of his ilk.”
“Some things never change.” Miko smiled.
The black jet shivered, his wings quaking.
“Why would you want to sacrifice yourself in my place?”
The jet shivered. “I-I-I m-merely wante-”
Soundblaster instantly slammed her arm over the bot’s head, snapping Logos from his unharmed form into a crushed bot, his head chest down to his waist literally torn by the force and speed into a floral mess of mechanical guts, spilling out the pink Energon into a spraying boom. The raw spill of blood and metal flesh from brutal viscera bloom carved from wiring, tubing, cogs and bars stood there before falling over, scattering them. Soundblaster was covered in pink blood, unbothered by it.
“HOLY SHIT!” Fowler cursed, uncaring of the room as the scene played itself out. His entire body flew almost out of the couch in horror from the quickness of the murder. He didn’t even see the arm move. One moment, the faint sight of a blur and there. The Jet was dead. That wasn’t just ruthlessness, that was just straight up psychopathy.
Something about the scene made the trio queasy. The bizarre detail from the Vehicons never bothered them, especially since they were clones, lifeless even. Logos? He had a name, a personality evocative of Starscream’s who easily was just a pathetic person to them. It was everything within the bloom. The machinery looked far too organized, easily evoking anatomy with its intricate formations, and the blood spilling through.
“It's so ... structural.” June groaned. “It feels like organs, like blood. It's not but also it is?” Jack, Miko and Raf all quietly tried to wonder if Sierra was ever violent as the scene pierced their minds. June moved her seat and sat near the kids closer. “I’m not trusting you near her anymore.”
“Understandable.” Raf replied, eyes glued to the visual.
Optimus flinched. He genuinely flinched. “She just killed him.” No playing, no real banter or even a kind of history. While Bee and Bulkhead were completely frozen with Arcee looking queasy. Ratchet was shivering slightly, trying and failing to suppress his horror. It seems like the girl’s counterpart was more monstrous than previously thought.
Brainstorm’s entire body rattled, metal hitting metal gently and repeatedly. Soundblaster spun with a tilted head. “Mercy for the enemy? Typical. Moving on.” The bot casually replied. “I need you to make me a Spacebridge.” She raised her stained finger. “And before you ask, I already know how to procure something of it. Again, something. I will have a merciful deadline, and a reward.”
"How?" Miko didn't exactly see her knowing the arc alongside the Autobots.
June sighed. "Who knows?"
Brainstorm nervously chuckled. “What would you give me that would even make me accept?” The bot then pointed to the jet’s corpse. “He was the guy that sabotaged the navigation system, which leaves even your empire unable to find you despite the transmissions. So I’m sure you know enough about Quantum Generators?”
“Good, because I’m not so sure you know anyone to fix it. Not on this ship at least.” The bot looked around. “So you’re trapped with no means of even leaving the place, correct?” At the nod, he continued. “I know the idiom “without hope, without fear” and so do you? Well, think of it like this. I can just refuse, activate my kill-switch and ride out your death with luck.” Brainstorm chuckled.
“Damn.” Fowler whistled. “He’s like this in our world?”
Jack shook his head. “No, he’s just a normal guy.” He then gave Fowler a glare. “Don’t try to drag him into this Fowler.”
“Or you hear my proposal and see if it’s up to your standards.” Soundblaster didn’t waste time. “The Ark is on earth.”
“THE ARK!?” Brainstorm exclaimed. “That Ark!?”
“Yes. You are a man who’s put himself through trial and error on both sides for the sake of knowledge. And now? I give you something greater than most discoveries, perhaps the greatest.” Soundblaster gave him a hand. “Let’s actually see where this goes. Hm?”
As the statements went into everyone’s minds, Jack was the first to try and rationalize what came. “No. Even at his worst, Vince wouldn’t join-” Jack groaned, putting it together. “No, but he sounds like he’s going to try to find the ship alone.”
“An intellectual getting carried away and forgetting ethics. How typical.” Ratchet grumbled, still shaken by the murder. “Is he trying to die?”
“Don’t worry!” Miko assured. “He’s Jack’s hubby. He’ll pull something out of his ass. I hope.” She hissed out that last part in worry.
The scene went back to the Autobots. Ash raised an eyebrow, looking at Blades cautiously. “Who’s Primus? Some god of yours?”
Blades chuckled. “Yes, he’s part of a maddening mythology. Multiple really. I couldn’t simply give you a quick rundown now. Later?”
Ash smiled shakily, her apprehension lowering. “Sure man!”
“Disregarding Airachnid-” Arcee shivered. “That’s interesting. Is the Matrix something they got differently?”
“Everything here is different.” Bulkhead summed up. “That’s just the way it goes.”
Optimus sighed. The cruel visage of Logos's corpse came to mind.
The portal then opened, taking everyone to the battleground.
As the groundbridge transported the Autobots across the Nevada, Blades pulled his helicopter spinner and began cutting away at the trees, with Nitro looking to the mountains.
The scene went back to the ship. Soundblaster groaned as she looked over the current crewmates amongst her. “I must ask that you realize that your actual leader, Logos, was willing to happily kill you for power, and while I will not hide my own unsavory qualities, I pragmatically believe that teamwork between us is crucial for survival.”
The few bots under her now was a pretty set. “Bludgeon, Wildwheel. Only you two?”
The first was a bot with a clear tank alt-mode. Except for some fucking reason he was a Samurai. His shoulders were red padding that went to the side, the front holding a tiny turret with a circle core and two tiny barrels pointed to the upper corner, with the first two tank wheels and threads within the shoulder and protruding upwards with the larger wheels rising higher than the head peering front. His other tank wheels were his feet, with some simple armory of green, red on the sides and orange knee pads. He had two cannons on his back pointing up. A green loincloth like armor and above it was an orange demon face armor. The bot’s head was akin to a samurai, red with a white skull face and pitch black eyes. And true to his look, a sword was behind him, around his waist.
The second one was a bot who had a simple brown body, except most of it wasn’t seen thanks to his poncho, and his helm was partially covered by his cowboy hat, with only his face showing something of facial hair, a mustache.
“Holy fucking shit!” Miko beamed. “Samurais and cowboys!? You guys had that in Cybertron!?”
“What? No!” Ratchet replied. “I’ve never seen these two in my life!”
“We only managed to survive the crash. No one else here is a mechanic aside from the Autobot you’ve recruited.”
“Poor Vince.” Bulkhead couldn't imagine handling a repair on a bot like the way Ratchet did, and he was going to deal with a whole ship? “Kid’s gonna die from exhaustion or just straight up commit suicide.”
“No worries Jack!” Miko cheered. “We’ll save your husband from the samurai and cowboy guy!”
Bludgeon raised an “eyebrow”. “And you let him live? He’s one of the most notorious madmen to have ever walked the surface of Cybertron. There are even whispers of the Liege Maximo desires his presence.”
“You do understand that alone does not cover the very fact that we. Are. Stranded?” Soundblaster retorted. “We have only one other medic, and he’s not up to the task.”
The scene snapped to another bot, one who had wheels on the side of his arms and legs, the hood of a car on his chest, front doors on the front of his shoulders, back doors like wings akin to Bumblebee and other car parts littered. Said bot was on fire with his boxy head shaking madly.
“Trailblazer can barely handle himself right now.”
“Wow.” Ratchet could barely contain the disappointment and pity he felt. There was sad things for the enemy, then there was this. “I wonder if they’re better off treating themselves.”
“Barely any of the Vehicon body makers are working, and this is experimental technology.”
Silas’s voice manifested from Wildwheel. “I heard the rumors of this in the wind, but hearin’ it and seein’ it is making me wonder if my optics got fucked with.”
“Silas!?” Fowler needed a minute for that. “Not gonna lie, I’m not surprised.” He snorted.
“This is experimental due to their lack of ability. Decent foot soldiers for ground swarms but you’d need fifty of them to overwhelm five trained soldiers.”
She turned to the computer and began putting orders. “Another jet for us, here. We simply need to secure the spot right here. You will tend to the generator with some leeway into the Vehicons here. But I have orders to secure any attempt from you and I will know.”
“Good.” The bot then opened the door, showing the scenery of the moon’s white plains and night sky. Embracing it for a moment, the silence swimming between her, around her. Soundblaster then jumped with the gravity easily letting her rise up, and began transforming. Her boxy parts and four gold streams forming into the back with tubes for the thrusters, while the coat parts became the bars into a five-pronged satellite.
June chuckled as Fowler groaned, his body like a corpse as he gave Miko 50 bucks. “C’mon.”
“Don’t bet against a master.” She joked.
Ratchet raised an eyebrow. “Shouldn't we be more worried over the fact that Soundblaster is a satellite?”
As the bleak end of the night settled in, The trio of Autobots began slowly inching near the settlement, wandering through the darkened forest. “Remind me why we didn’t just drop on them closer?” Blades groaned as he brushed away another tree.
“They have numbers, but stealth can even those odds.” Nitro replied. “Torque!”
The current settlement was a gaggle of Decepticons Vehicons with the pair commanding things. Bludgeon looked over to the boxes of Energon. He put his finger to the com-link. “The planet’s affinity for Energon is a byproduct of the Ark, correct?”
“Nah.” Wildwheel glared at the mountains. “Call me a crazy tin, but ain’t no goddamn way some ship makes a planet a giver.”
Bludgeon snorted. “You don’t know the secret of the Ark. Nova Prime is borderline myth under most studies and yet the ship was here once!”
“So the Ark is Nova’s? That’s kinda strange to think about.” Arcee felt it to be strange for what it basically revealed. “The Matrix was lost before the war even took place.”
“The Matrix should’ve been taken then, why would Primus even allow such?”
Miko snorted at Ratchet’s comment. “You god sucks, more at eleven.” The medic grunted.
Wildwheel smirked. “You a religious weirdo?”
“What kind of god you followin’?”
Bludgeon simply shrugged. “The Guiding Hard as a whole. To many, they were the first Cybertronians. To others Primus and their siblings were divine arbiters turned to ash by inner conflict with us as the legacy.”
“Brothers?” Ratchet’s optics went wide, sighing as he tried to comprehend the new idea given to him. “In myth, Unicron is his brother, but plural?”
“This means that the history of this Cybertron might be darker than we realized.”
The samurai bot then hummed at him. “I do think if there is a god, it would be in a way that makes all things true and false. Religion is a joke in most of my life experiences.”
“Damn.” Giving his revolver-like gun a spin. “Kinda deep.”
“Not really.” Bludgeon made a few slashes into the air. “The God War was probably some war between old leaders bitter at each other for things that they held onto for petty feelings. To me, the God War must be myth, but evidence of Nova had been deeply scarce and yet!” Bludgeon made another slash, his blade shining in the moon’s light. “It was there. There was once a leader of our entire world, one that preceded a longer line of warriors.”
“The man who carved modern Cybertron into the planet. Crystal City, the idea of Functionism, the core foundations that get leaders that in turn spun the changes to Cybertron. All of the world’s very pillars were sculpted by him. Do I believe in god? In divinity beyond us and by right, rules us? That's a complicated question! It depends on what you mean by "god". You see, I can't say there is a definitive yes or no, even for myself since it helps no one to be reductive of such a unique idea on how we exist and why. I believe that we are here implies to some degree that there are forces larger than us. By the way of history or mythology. Now, we can get into the sementicalities, though the very notion of belief itself can be rhetorically whittled to the bare nub of its meaning.”
The sword-wielder was cleanly parlaying something to the heavens, and Wildwheel simply growled at Bludgeon’s bizarre tirade. “Fucking hell, you’re somethin’. Get your words but fuck.”
“Wise words.” Optimus ruminated on such a perception, except Miko was on Wildwheel’s side.
“Can this guy sound anymore weirder?”
“I’m more concerned about the “God War” thing.” Bulkhead looked to the chest of Optimus. “Anything close to that in your mind?”
“The fall of the Thirteen?”
“That works.” The Wrecker shrugged.
“Will ya’ gut the dirt there?” Wildwheel pointed to a cave. “And leave me alone for an hour?”
“Of course!” The jovial bot then turned from him and went into the cave, only for a bomb to completely ensnare him in fire. “Great.”
“His lack of reaction is concerning.” Optimus noted, already worried.
Despite the lack of any reaction to being set on fire, Torque didn’t really seem to give that much care. “You got something up there making you crazy?”
“I’d ask the same of your leader.” Wildwheel spoke curtly, before drawing and shooting his blaster around while Torque dodged them. “Your boss is a survivor of Garrus 9.”
“The old prison on Cybertron? What happened here?” Ratchet barely remembered the building and zone, only really just recalling during a job.
“I’m more concerned with how still Miko is.” June placed her hand on the girl, who chuckled.
Wildwheel then gave out a chuckle. “To kill the last Wrecker, man. What. An. Honor.” He then began shooting at the pair, releasing a hail of bullets with frightening speeds. With a pull from Torque, Nitro snapped out and dodged it by a hair’s breadth. Nitro returned the fire as she moved, the trio in an uneven duel.
Miko instantly paused, blinking mildly and limply as she tried to understand the statement.
“Last Wrecker!? Last!?” Bulkhead nearly screamed. “How did we suffer that many losses!?”
“And wouldn’t there just be a roll-call?” Arcee rationalized, already baffled by the implications. “How did one incident do that?” Optimus, to her side, looked grave. Bee beeped fearfully. To hear the one group who’d done impossible odds on the regular be destroyed, whittled down to a single survivor, was positively madness.
Jack looked at Ratchet. “Does she show any PTSD signs? Like your equivalent?” June gripped Miko’s shoulder tightly.
“...Something terrible happened.” Was all he said.
As the three engaged in a gunfight, Bludgeon wandered off, instantly alerting her of his intent. “Fuck.” With a click, she alerted Blades.
“Fire!” The gunslinger screamed. Both Autobots instantly bolted as a hail of gunfire thick as a tsunami hurled onto their spot. The fight continued, with both sides constantly moving and firing, each blast and step doing nothing for the other.
Nitro looked absolutely furious. “Stop holding back, shithead!”
The bot responded by throwing a bunch of coins into the air. “You better do the same!”
So for those wondering the lore here. I'll put that out later. Special thanks to @nonsscrapheap for inspiring this, check them and their fics out! Especially Universal Observations! And you and I will both be surprised by the next chapter, hopefully!