Life Flashing - Chapter 1
Okay folks, here's the first chapter in its entirety, with new stuff added and so on. Be warned for spoilers for the new TF Movie. Story's told from Jazz's POV.
I was bored.
Space was getting seriously dull. I couldn’t sit still any longer and resorted to pacing within a small section of the territory we’d temporarily claimed. Temporary, heh. It was starting to feel more like an eternity. Any longer up here and we may as well colonize the place, I thought to myself.
Of course, with that thought came the realization that we’d need the Allspark to do it, which brought me back to why we were holed up here in the first place.
What was taking Bumblebee so long anyway?
A dull vibration shook the ground and I looked up to see Ironhide blasting a few new craters into the already pock-marked landscape. Clearly, I wasn’t the only one getting impatient with the whole situation. Some distance away, Ratchet looked up from where he was having a bit of a discussion with Optimus Prime, and both of them frowned in his direction.
Gotta give credit to the old warrior; he frowned right back at them, smoking cannons and all.
“How much longer are we going to be stuck up here while the Decepticons are busy having a party down there on the planet?” he asked.
“We have to give Bumblebee time,” Optimus tried to explain to him for what was probably the hundredth time since we touched down on the satellite that orbited our target planet.
“If we go down prematurely, we may end up causing a panic amongst the dominant carbon-based lifeforms. They are not all mentally capable of comprehending beings like us, and mass hysteria may only serve to complicate the finding of the Allspark,” Ratchet reasoned. “Let the scout do his job and report back first.”
“And what if he doesn’t?” I found myself asking. “What if he ran into the Decepticons again, or worse?”
Optimus looked at me for a moment and I could tell he was weighing his options. I knew it wasn’t an easy choice for him. Bumblebee was an important part of our little team, and more importantly, he was my friend. I didn’t want him to think that we felt he couldn’t do his job, but I didn’t want t’see him get hurt either. Bot’d already been through enough.
“We’ll give him one more of this planet’s axial rotation,” Optimus said at last. “If he hasn’t given us the signal by the end of it, we’ll have to assume the worst and go down ourselves.”
Both Ratchet and Ironhide nodded at that.
“Fine by me,” I said.
And it was. He’d reached a good compromise. Now all we had to do was get through this last rotation without Ironhide blowing something up and either way we’d be going planet-side.
“Good call, Optimus,” I said as I passed him.
“Thank you, Jazz,” he replied.
I wandered off to another part of the satellite, one with a good view of that mostly-blue alien planet. What was it like down there, I wondered. What kind of civilization did those dominant life-forms have? Were they a primitive race? Were they even capable of proper speech patterns?
Ratchet came and stood beside me, but his attention was fixed on some type of mechanical contraption that hovered over part of the planet.
“Interesting,” he murmured. “The creatures are at least intelligent enough to construct artificial satellites and launch them into orbit. I believe they may be primitive enough for us to tap into and obtain some vital information.”
His optics glazed over and flickered as he proceeded to do just that. I could just about see all the pages and pages of information flashing across his lenses, but tempting as the offer was, I just couldn’t bring myself to join him right away.
“What if there are things we’re not meant to know?” I asked him. “Personal information and the like?”
“I’m taking nothing that intrudes on any specific individual’s privacy,” he replied. “Besides, don’t you want to know about the abundant wealth of cultures the planet’s life-forms seem to possess?”
That did me in. Of course I wanted to know. We had just about lost ours, and to finally discover a new civilization with various cultures of their own was too much for me to resist. I HAD to know. Quickly I tapped into the primitive device and began to browse.
The dominant life-forms, I found out, were called ‘humans’, sentient like us, but biological instead of mechanical, and incredibly diverse. They all looked the same on a basic molecular level, but that was where the similarities ended. Their lifestyles differed from group to group across the entire planet, and each group had their own customs and traditions that made up hundreds of different cultures.
I hated Ratchet. I hated him for talking me into doing this - it only served to make me even more impatient to get down there and check the place out. I shot him a dirty look, but he simply chuckled and walked over to where Ironhide was, probably to do the same thing to him.
“I take it Ratchet introduced you to what the humans call the ‘Internet’?” Optimus asked from behind me.
I turned to look at him. “You already knew,” I said. “About their information systems.” It wasn’t a question.
“How else do you think we managed to find out about where the map to the Allspark was? We would never have sent Bumblebee otherwise.” He chuckled, too.
“Could’ve told me sooner.” I crossed my arms.
“I’m sorry, but would it have eased your restlessness?”
“Probably not,” I admitted.
If anything, I knew it would have made me more impatient than I already was. Didn’t mean I wasn’t going to hurt Ratchet for this though, I was - provided Ironhide hadn’t already beaten me to it.
… … At last the signal came. It wasn’t much, just a small glowing outline of our race’s symbol barely managing to break the light mass of clouds, but it was enough. I looked at Optimus, waiting for him to give the word, but he seemed deep in thought. His optics flickered now and then as he gazed intently at the planet, obviously weighing something up in his processor. I shifted a little. So did Ratchet. Ironhide’s fingers twitched.
“Why are we delaying?” he asked finally.
“The planet’s rotation has moved our landing co-ordinates closer towards the star it orbits,” Optimus explained.
I got it then.
“Which means we’d have to chase after it. Not only that, the human inhabitants tend to be more active in the daylight hours, and in the light, there’s a much higher chance of being spotted - not just by the humans, but maybe by the Decepticons as well.”
“Exactly,” Optimus said. “We must keep human involvement in this matter down to a minimum.”
“So, more waiting then?” Ironhide asked.
“Just a little longer,” Optimus told him.
Ironhide couldn’t resist a little good-natured grumbling.
Ratchet slapped a hand down on his back. “Oh come on. You’ve waited this long, what’s half a rotation going to do?”
“My cannons are getting rusty,” the old warrior muttered.
“Bah, you and rust,” Ratchet shot back. “Are you sure you don’t have rust in your processor? Perhaps I should give you a check-up, just to be sure.”
Ironhide looked both scandalized and indignant. “You keep your crazy gizmos away from me,” he retorted, batting at Ratchet’s hands and walking off
Ratchet started after him. “Here! Wait a moment. Come back! This is a medical order!”
Optimus and I watched them go. “When all this is over you’re going to have to give them a holiday away from each other,” I said.
“If they don’t dismantle each other first,” Optimus replied.
“They wont. You’d never let them go that far,” I told him.
“No. I probably wouldn’t.” He looked at me. “We’ve all come so far, and such a long way from Cybertron. I’d hate to lose any of you now, but with Megatron on that planet…” He trailed off for a moment and sighed.
I placed a hand on his arm. “Don’t worry about it, Optimus.”
“If the worst should happen and we have to battle Megatron, I don’t want any of you to face him. That’s an order, Jazz. He would destroy you all. Leave him to me.”
I nodded. “You got it.”
I knew where he was coming from. We’d already seen what Megatron did to Bumblebee, and there was no way I was ever going to put my friends in that kind of danger. Optimus was right. He was the only one who stood a chance of going up against Megatron and making out alive. Megatron was a mean fragger, and not the kind of mech you wanted to mess with.
My thoughts were somewhat rudely interrupted by Ironhide who had managed to double back towards us and was now insisting that Optimus order Ratchet to stay away from him. Ratchet himself was not far behind, and brandishing one of his cutting tools. Chuckling to myself I went over to help Optimus deal with the feuding pair.
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Cross-posted at the Padded Cell.
I was bored.
Space was getting seriously dull. I couldn’t sit still any longer and resorted to pacing within a small section of the territory we’d temporarily claimed. Temporary, heh. It was starting to feel more like an eternity. Any longer up here and we may as well colonize the place, I thought to myself.
Of course, with that thought came the realization that we’d need the Allspark to do it, which brought me back to why we were holed up here in the first place.
What was taking Bumblebee so long anyway?
A dull vibration shook the ground and I looked up to see Ironhide blasting a few new craters into the already pock-marked landscape. Clearly, I wasn’t the only one getting impatient with the whole situation. Some distance away, Ratchet looked up from where he was having a bit of a discussion with Optimus Prime, and both of them frowned in his direction.
Gotta give credit to the old warrior; he frowned right back at them, smoking cannons and all.
“How much longer are we going to be stuck up here while the Decepticons are busy having a party down there on the planet?” he asked.
“We have to give Bumblebee time,” Optimus tried to explain to him for what was probably the hundredth time since we touched down on the satellite that orbited our target planet.
“If we go down prematurely, we may end up causing a panic amongst the dominant carbon-based lifeforms. They are not all mentally capable of comprehending beings like us, and mass hysteria may only serve to complicate the finding of the Allspark,” Ratchet reasoned. “Let the scout do his job and report back first.”
“And what if he doesn’t?” I found myself asking. “What if he ran into the Decepticons again, or worse?”
Optimus looked at me for a moment and I could tell he was weighing his options. I knew it wasn’t an easy choice for him. Bumblebee was an important part of our little team, and more importantly, he was my friend. I didn’t want him to think that we felt he couldn’t do his job, but I didn’t want t’see him get hurt either. Bot’d already been through enough.
“We’ll give him one more of this planet’s axial rotation,” Optimus said at last. “If he hasn’t given us the signal by the end of it, we’ll have to assume the worst and go down ourselves.”
Both Ratchet and Ironhide nodded at that.
“Fine by me,” I said.
And it was. He’d reached a good compromise. Now all we had to do was get through this last rotation without Ironhide blowing something up and either way we’d be going planet-side.
“Good call, Optimus,” I said as I passed him.
“Thank you, Jazz,” he replied.
I wandered off to another part of the satellite, one with a good view of that mostly-blue alien planet. What was it like down there, I wondered. What kind of civilization did those dominant life-forms have? Were they a primitive race? Were they even capable of proper speech patterns?
Ratchet came and stood beside me, but his attention was fixed on some type of mechanical contraption that hovered over part of the planet.
“Interesting,” he murmured. “The creatures are at least intelligent enough to construct artificial satellites and launch them into orbit. I believe they may be primitive enough for us to tap into and obtain some vital information.”
His optics glazed over and flickered as he proceeded to do just that. I could just about see all the pages and pages of information flashing across his lenses, but tempting as the offer was, I just couldn’t bring myself to join him right away.
“What if there are things we’re not meant to know?” I asked him. “Personal information and the like?”
“I’m taking nothing that intrudes on any specific individual’s privacy,” he replied. “Besides, don’t you want to know about the abundant wealth of cultures the planet’s life-forms seem to possess?”
That did me in. Of course I wanted to know. We had just about lost ours, and to finally discover a new civilization with various cultures of their own was too much for me to resist. I HAD to know. Quickly I tapped into the primitive device and began to browse.
The dominant life-forms, I found out, were called ‘humans’, sentient like us, but biological instead of mechanical, and incredibly diverse. They all looked the same on a basic molecular level, but that was where the similarities ended. Their lifestyles differed from group to group across the entire planet, and each group had their own customs and traditions that made up hundreds of different cultures.
I hated Ratchet. I hated him for talking me into doing this - it only served to make me even more impatient to get down there and check the place out. I shot him a dirty look, but he simply chuckled and walked over to where Ironhide was, probably to do the same thing to him.
“I take it Ratchet introduced you to what the humans call the ‘Internet’?” Optimus asked from behind me.
I turned to look at him. “You already knew,” I said. “About their information systems.” It wasn’t a question.
“How else do you think we managed to find out about where the map to the Allspark was? We would never have sent Bumblebee otherwise.” He chuckled, too.
“Could’ve told me sooner.” I crossed my arms.
“I’m sorry, but would it have eased your restlessness?”
“Probably not,” I admitted.
If anything, I knew it would have made me more impatient than I already was. Didn’t mean I wasn’t going to hurt Ratchet for this though, I was - provided Ironhide hadn’t already beaten me to it.
… … At last the signal came. It wasn’t much, just a small glowing outline of our race’s symbol barely managing to break the light mass of clouds, but it was enough. I looked at Optimus, waiting for him to give the word, but he seemed deep in thought. His optics flickered now and then as he gazed intently at the planet, obviously weighing something up in his processor. I shifted a little. So did Ratchet. Ironhide’s fingers twitched.
“Why are we delaying?” he asked finally.
“The planet’s rotation has moved our landing co-ordinates closer towards the star it orbits,” Optimus explained.
I got it then.
“Which means we’d have to chase after it. Not only that, the human inhabitants tend to be more active in the daylight hours, and in the light, there’s a much higher chance of being spotted - not just by the humans, but maybe by the Decepticons as well.”
“Exactly,” Optimus said. “We must keep human involvement in this matter down to a minimum.”
“So, more waiting then?” Ironhide asked.
“Just a little longer,” Optimus told him.
Ironhide couldn’t resist a little good-natured grumbling.
Ratchet slapped a hand down on his back. “Oh come on. You’ve waited this long, what’s half a rotation going to do?”
“My cannons are getting rusty,” the old warrior muttered.
“Bah, you and rust,” Ratchet shot back. “Are you sure you don’t have rust in your processor? Perhaps I should give you a check-up, just to be sure.”
Ironhide looked both scandalized and indignant. “You keep your crazy gizmos away from me,” he retorted, batting at Ratchet’s hands and walking off
Ratchet started after him. “Here! Wait a moment. Come back! This is a medical order!”
Optimus and I watched them go. “When all this is over you’re going to have to give them a holiday away from each other,” I said.
“If they don’t dismantle each other first,” Optimus replied.
“They wont. You’d never let them go that far,” I told him.
“No. I probably wouldn’t.” He looked at me. “We’ve all come so far, and such a long way from Cybertron. I’d hate to lose any of you now, but with Megatron on that planet…” He trailed off for a moment and sighed.
I placed a hand on his arm. “Don’t worry about it, Optimus.”
“If the worst should happen and we have to battle Megatron, I don’t want any of you to face him. That’s an order, Jazz. He would destroy you all. Leave him to me.”
I nodded. “You got it.”
I knew where he was coming from. We’d already seen what Megatron did to Bumblebee, and there was no way I was ever going to put my friends in that kind of danger. Optimus was right. He was the only one who stood a chance of going up against Megatron and making out alive. Megatron was a mean fragger, and not the kind of mech you wanted to mess with.
My thoughts were somewhat rudely interrupted by Ironhide who had managed to double back towards us and was now insisting that Optimus order Ratchet to stay away from him. Ratchet himself was not far behind, and brandishing one of his cutting tools. Chuckling to myself I went over to help Optimus deal with the feuding pair.
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Cross-posted at the Padded Cell.