Fic - Something to Live For, Chapter 9 of 14
Title: Something to live for
Chapter 9: Preparations
Continuity: G1, Dysfunction AU
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: Just playing in the sandbox, characters not mine.
Characters and/or pairings: Brawl, Blast Off, Prowl, Skyfire, Vortex, Wheeljack, Red Alert, Optimus.
Beta: naboru_narluin.
Summary: Brawl gets into a little difficulty, while Prowl and Skyfire just get more confused.
Notes: cracktastic G1 cartoon metaphysics apply.
[ Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8]
Chapter 9: Preparations
It was 06:10am, and the sun sat just above the horizon. Long blue shadows overlay the arid landscape, cast by cacti and the occasional wind-bowed tree. In an empty parking lot by a closed gas station, Brawl set the last of the explosives and took a few steps back to admire his handiwork.
He hadn’t noticed the ditch.
“Slaggin’ awesom-arghhh!”
It was hardly deep, just deep enough to tip his balance, sending him sprawling in a tangle of limbs and caterpillar treads.
“Frag!” he yelled. Then winced as a flock of birds flapped squawking into the sky. A dog started barking a quarter mile or so to the south.
Brawl glanced over at the explosives. The package was primed and ready to go. Good thing the detonator was with Blast Off; with his luck he would have fallen on it and blown himself up along with all this squishy slag.
Brawl huffed and got to his feet. Or at least he tried to. He managed a crouch, before his right leg slid out from under him and he landed back on his aft. Oh, and he couldn’t raise his head. What the frag?
He gritted his denta, only just noticing the warning flashing at the bottom of his HUD. Lower right treads misaligned. Undue pressure on cannon barrel.
“Oh for scrap’s sake!” He punched the ground, leaving a satisfying fist-shaped dent in the mucky concrete. How in all Cybertron - in all the fraggin’ galaxy - had he managed to get a caterpillar tread wrapped around the barrel of his cannon?
Another warning began to sound, this one a timer set by Onslaught before the mission began. Half a breem until Optimus Prime would be in just the right place to be distracted by a string of these pathetic little gas stations and a few other stupid human things being blown to kingdom come.
Brawl grinned at the thought, but his smirk vanished as he realised that the few astroseconds of inactivity had failed to untangle him.
His lips sloped in a frown, hidden by his battle mask. Various awkward and embarrassing poses also failed to get his cannon free from his leg. He punched the ground again, snarling. Blast Off thought he was stupid enough as it was, he really didn’t want the shuttle to see him like this.
And here he came, their trusty getaway ride. Dead on time, as usual. The whine of his engines was far louder than Brawl’s earlier shout, but for some reason it didn’t set off that stupid organic pet, and the birds remained quiet. Brawl grumbled to himself and made one last attempt to pull his cannon free.
“Oh for goodness sake.” Blast Off landed and transformed, his dark armour gleaming in the bright morning light. “We’re on a schedule, you do know that, don’t you?” He hauled Brawl out of the ditch and pressed his head down. “Just bend over. It’s like you’re fresh off the assembly line. All right, straighten up. That better? Good, now get in.”
Brawl gaped. How had he…? Then he grinned. Freedom! At last! He waited for Blast Off to complete his transformation sequence, then climbed into his cargo hold.
He glanced around. “Where’s the detonator?”
“You may have it in precisely seventy two astroseconds,” Blast Off replied. “And no earlier. Now get your aft in that seat and hold on tight.”
“I’ll give you ‘get your aft in that seat’,” Brawl muttered, but he sat down and braced himself for takeoff. It wasn’t wise to antagonise Blast Off; he might refuse to tell Brawl where the detonator was, and set off the explosives himself.
Brawl didn’t want that; he was looking forward to pressing that button.
* * *
“That’s a very good question,” Skyfire said, his optics fixed on the security monitor. “What is he doing?”
Vortex stood on the berth, balanced on the mounting for his glue gun, his canopy glass shining. The tiny wheels of his landing gear caught the light as he stretched to scratch at something in the top right corner of the wall.
“I have no idea,” Prowl responded.
Then Vortex turned around, facing the camera for one brief moment. Prowl’s jaw dropped. “What in the name of Cybertron…”
“Uh…” Skyfire leaned closer. “Please tell me my optics are malfunctioning.”
Prowl froze the image and zoomed in. Vortex was missing a large chunk of his jaw and a good slice of his throat. The edges of the wound were blunt, as though melted.
“He didn’t do that to himself,” Prowl said. “That's a high temperature wound - from a laser by the look of it. Seems like Red might have been right about a security bug.”
Skyfire activated his comm. link. “Skyfire to Red Alert, how’s it going down there?”
While Skyfire quizzed Red, Prowl accessed the night’s security footage, his optics flickering as he ran through the hours of images at high speed. Nothing. When Perceptor left, Vortex was unharmed - aside from his mangled fingers and missing rotor array. The Decepticon had lay down to recharge, shifting twitchily during the night, and got up with a gaping hole in his throat. Something wasn’t right.
“Optimus to the Ark, Prowl, do you read me?”
Prowl’s head snapped up. Slag, yes, Optimus was due… five astroseconds ago. “Optimus, sir. Where are you?”
Skyfire moved away from the console, still talking to Red Alert; his voice was hushed, Red’s was a little frantic.
“I’m on the Wilson River Highway, heading southeast to Gales Creek,” Optimus responded. “Suspected Decepticon activity.” There was no visual, but the audio revealed the hum of his engine and the background burr of his tires against the road.
“Backup required?” Prowl asked. He flipped the main security monitor back to real-time; Vortex had returned to scratching at the wall.
“Not as yet,” Optimus said. “But be on alert.”
“Yes, sir.” Prowl paused; Vortex had shifted a good dozen feet along the wall, leaving behind a trail of scratches that looked almost like writing… Prowl took a long slow vent and returned his attention to Optimus. “What happened, sir?”
“Explosions, an oil refinery and several gas stations. I’ve alerted the Protectobots, but I thought it best to take a look myself.”
Prowl nodded. Optimus could see him, even if he couldn’t see Optimus. “Always best to be on the safe side. Especially after…” He trailed off; no need to mention what had happened.
“Yes.”
Optimus cut the comm., but his presence remained: a moving red light on a map, brought up automatically by Teletraan One. Prowl followed it for a moment.
“That didn’t sound good,” Skyfire said. He ducked under a stalactite and leaned against the far end of the console. “I don’t suppose the ‘cons are coming after their interrogator?”
Prowl glanced up at him. “Could be. We can’t discount a diversion. Teletraan One, alert all active troops, possible Combaticon threat. Prepare for imminent attack.” He cycled air through the vents in his helm, focusing for a moment on the constant cool flow. “Did Red find anything?”
Skyfire shook his head. “Not yet, but he’s still looking.”
“All right. The cameras didn’t pick anything up, but I think it’s clear that they’ve been tampered with.”
“I’ll tell Red.” Skyfire tapped a few buttons on his arm.
Prowl went back to watching Vortex. “He’s writing something,” he said.
Skyfire shrugged. “Whatever it is, it’s probably obscene. Skyfire to Red Alert, Prowl says the security feed has been tampered with, can you check it out?”
Red Alert’s response was quick, his expression in the little hologram stern. “Already on it.” He flickered out as quickly as he had appeared.
“I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” Skyfire said.
Prowl zoomed in on the brig’s live feed, panning over the scratches Vortex had made in the wall. “I know what you mean.”
“Hey, is that…”
“They’re glyphs,” Prowl said. “Kaon style.”
“Yes,” Skyfire replied softly. “I know.” He pointed at the screen. “Zoom a bit closer, on that one.”
Prowl complied. Tight, narrow lines resolved into the dialect term for possession, aligned with a personal pronoun. “What is it?”
“Go left a bit. That phrase, it’s familiar.” Skyfire re-opened his comm. "Wheeljack, I need you to take a look at something, tell me what you see." He sent a screen capture of the words to Wheeljack's console. The response was immediate.
"What the frag? He's writin’ poetry?"
Prowl gaped. "He's what?"
"Not composing," Skyfire said. "He's transcribing. From memory. With a few errors. But yes, it's poetry of a sort. Song lyrics, in actual fact."
"You what?" Wheeljack chimed in. "The 'copter wrote that? This I gotta see."
"Don't-" Prowl began, but Wheeljack had already signed off.
Chapter 9: Preparations
Continuity: G1, Dysfunction AU
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: Just playing in the sandbox, characters not mine.
Characters and/or pairings: Brawl, Blast Off, Prowl, Skyfire, Vortex, Wheeljack, Red Alert, Optimus.
Beta: naboru_narluin.
Summary: Brawl gets into a little difficulty, while Prowl and Skyfire just get more confused.
Notes: cracktastic G1 cartoon metaphysics apply.
[ Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8]
Chapter 9: Preparations
It was 06:10am, and the sun sat just above the horizon. Long blue shadows overlay the arid landscape, cast by cacti and the occasional wind-bowed tree. In an empty parking lot by a closed gas station, Brawl set the last of the explosives and took a few steps back to admire his handiwork.
He hadn’t noticed the ditch.
“Slaggin’ awesom-arghhh!”
It was hardly deep, just deep enough to tip his balance, sending him sprawling in a tangle of limbs and caterpillar treads.
“Frag!” he yelled. Then winced as a flock of birds flapped squawking into the sky. A dog started barking a quarter mile or so to the south.
Brawl glanced over at the explosives. The package was primed and ready to go. Good thing the detonator was with Blast Off; with his luck he would have fallen on it and blown himself up along with all this squishy slag.
Brawl huffed and got to his feet. Or at least he tried to. He managed a crouch, before his right leg slid out from under him and he landed back on his aft. Oh, and he couldn’t raise his head. What the frag?
He gritted his denta, only just noticing the warning flashing at the bottom of his HUD. Lower right treads misaligned. Undue pressure on cannon barrel.
“Oh for scrap’s sake!” He punched the ground, leaving a satisfying fist-shaped dent in the mucky concrete. How in all Cybertron - in all the fraggin’ galaxy - had he managed to get a caterpillar tread wrapped around the barrel of his cannon?
Another warning began to sound, this one a timer set by Onslaught before the mission began. Half a breem until Optimus Prime would be in just the right place to be distracted by a string of these pathetic little gas stations and a few other stupid human things being blown to kingdom come.
Brawl grinned at the thought, but his smirk vanished as he realised that the few astroseconds of inactivity had failed to untangle him.
His lips sloped in a frown, hidden by his battle mask. Various awkward and embarrassing poses also failed to get his cannon free from his leg. He punched the ground again, snarling. Blast Off thought he was stupid enough as it was, he really didn’t want the shuttle to see him like this.
And here he came, their trusty getaway ride. Dead on time, as usual. The whine of his engines was far louder than Brawl’s earlier shout, but for some reason it didn’t set off that stupid organic pet, and the birds remained quiet. Brawl grumbled to himself and made one last attempt to pull his cannon free.
“Oh for goodness sake.” Blast Off landed and transformed, his dark armour gleaming in the bright morning light. “We’re on a schedule, you do know that, don’t you?” He hauled Brawl out of the ditch and pressed his head down. “Just bend over. It’s like you’re fresh off the assembly line. All right, straighten up. That better? Good, now get in.”
Brawl gaped. How had he…? Then he grinned. Freedom! At last! He waited for Blast Off to complete his transformation sequence, then climbed into his cargo hold.
He glanced around. “Where’s the detonator?”
“You may have it in precisely seventy two astroseconds,” Blast Off replied. “And no earlier. Now get your aft in that seat and hold on tight.”
“I’ll give you ‘get your aft in that seat’,” Brawl muttered, but he sat down and braced himself for takeoff. It wasn’t wise to antagonise Blast Off; he might refuse to tell Brawl where the detonator was, and set off the explosives himself.
Brawl didn’t want that; he was looking forward to pressing that button.
* * *
“That’s a very good question,” Skyfire said, his optics fixed on the security monitor. “What is he doing?”
Vortex stood on the berth, balanced on the mounting for his glue gun, his canopy glass shining. The tiny wheels of his landing gear caught the light as he stretched to scratch at something in the top right corner of the wall.
“I have no idea,” Prowl responded.
Then Vortex turned around, facing the camera for one brief moment. Prowl’s jaw dropped. “What in the name of Cybertron…”
“Uh…” Skyfire leaned closer. “Please tell me my optics are malfunctioning.”
Prowl froze the image and zoomed in. Vortex was missing a large chunk of his jaw and a good slice of his throat. The edges of the wound were blunt, as though melted.
“He didn’t do that to himself,” Prowl said. “That's a high temperature wound - from a laser by the look of it. Seems like Red might have been right about a security bug.”
Skyfire activated his comm. link. “Skyfire to Red Alert, how’s it going down there?”
While Skyfire quizzed Red, Prowl accessed the night’s security footage, his optics flickering as he ran through the hours of images at high speed. Nothing. When Perceptor left, Vortex was unharmed - aside from his mangled fingers and missing rotor array. The Decepticon had lay down to recharge, shifting twitchily during the night, and got up with a gaping hole in his throat. Something wasn’t right.
“Optimus to the Ark, Prowl, do you read me?”
Prowl’s head snapped up. Slag, yes, Optimus was due… five astroseconds ago. “Optimus, sir. Where are you?”
Skyfire moved away from the console, still talking to Red Alert; his voice was hushed, Red’s was a little frantic.
“I’m on the Wilson River Highway, heading southeast to Gales Creek,” Optimus responded. “Suspected Decepticon activity.” There was no visual, but the audio revealed the hum of his engine and the background burr of his tires against the road.
“Backup required?” Prowl asked. He flipped the main security monitor back to real-time; Vortex had returned to scratching at the wall.
“Not as yet,” Optimus said. “But be on alert.”
“Yes, sir.” Prowl paused; Vortex had shifted a good dozen feet along the wall, leaving behind a trail of scratches that looked almost like writing… Prowl took a long slow vent and returned his attention to Optimus. “What happened, sir?”
“Explosions, an oil refinery and several gas stations. I’ve alerted the Protectobots, but I thought it best to take a look myself.”
Prowl nodded. Optimus could see him, even if he couldn’t see Optimus. “Always best to be on the safe side. Especially after…” He trailed off; no need to mention what had happened.
“Yes.”
Optimus cut the comm., but his presence remained: a moving red light on a map, brought up automatically by Teletraan One. Prowl followed it for a moment.
“That didn’t sound good,” Skyfire said. He ducked under a stalactite and leaned against the far end of the console. “I don’t suppose the ‘cons are coming after their interrogator?”
Prowl glanced up at him. “Could be. We can’t discount a diversion. Teletraan One, alert all active troops, possible Combaticon threat. Prepare for imminent attack.” He cycled air through the vents in his helm, focusing for a moment on the constant cool flow. “Did Red find anything?”
Skyfire shook his head. “Not yet, but he’s still looking.”
“All right. The cameras didn’t pick anything up, but I think it’s clear that they’ve been tampered with.”
“I’ll tell Red.” Skyfire tapped a few buttons on his arm.
Prowl went back to watching Vortex. “He’s writing something,” he said.
Skyfire shrugged. “Whatever it is, it’s probably obscene. Skyfire to Red Alert, Prowl says the security feed has been tampered with, can you check it out?”
Red Alert’s response was quick, his expression in the little hologram stern. “Already on it.” He flickered out as quickly as he had appeared.
“I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” Skyfire said.
Prowl zoomed in on the brig’s live feed, panning over the scratches Vortex had made in the wall. “I know what you mean.”
“Hey, is that…”
“They’re glyphs,” Prowl said. “Kaon style.”
“Yes,” Skyfire replied softly. “I know.” He pointed at the screen. “Zoom a bit closer, on that one.”
Prowl complied. Tight, narrow lines resolved into the dialect term for possession, aligned with a personal pronoun. “What is it?”
“Go left a bit. That phrase, it’s familiar.” Skyfire re-opened his comm. "Wheeljack, I need you to take a look at something, tell me what you see." He sent a screen capture of the words to Wheeljack's console. The response was immediate.
"What the frag? He's writin’ poetry?"
Prowl gaped. "He's what?"
"Not composing," Skyfire said. "He's transcribing. From memory. With a few errors. But yes, it's poetry of a sort. Song lyrics, in actual fact."
"You what?" Wheeljack chimed in. "The 'copter wrote that? This I gotta see."
"Don't-" Prowl began, but Wheeljack had already signed off.