The dice bounced across the table and landed in front of Bluestreak. Jazz looked at where his roll landed him and smiled at the game board.
"Energon Depot," Jazz announced, full of hope, and moved his game piece five spaces ahead. Maybe after landing on Decepticon Ambush and getting sent to jail for a turn, and not to mention all of the other squares of misfortune he landed on prior to that, his luck would finally turn around. He crossed his fingers and reached for the deck of cards. "C'mon, Lady Luck."
Jazz tipped the top card of the deck and looked hesitantly underneath. Across the table from him, the suspense teased Bluestreak as he tried to read Jazz's expression for some clue as to whether the card was good or bad news.
"Well, what is it?" Bluestreak inquired anxiously.
Jazz raised his optic visor to gaze at Bluestreak. For a frozen moment, Bluestreak worried that his advantage was about to disappear. But at last, Jazz flipped the card over and slouched back into the couch.
"Major repairs," Jazz resigned, looking at his dwindling assortment of energon chips. "Pay two hundred credits."
Bluestreak snickered. It felt good to be winning. The excitement of the game brought a whole new angle to the edge of uneasiness he often felt, something that made him feel almost normal. This was indeed good stress.
"I don't get it, 'Streak." Jazz began as he reluctantly paid the game's fee. "How come you're gettin' all the luck and I'm just gettin' skunked?" He mocked a look of concern and rubbed his chin. "Could be those dice."
Bluestreak missed Jazz's feign. On the edge of an emotional knife, the excitement overshot into fear and he reacted defensively. "Oh no, Jazz. I didn't do anything to them." He shook his head emphatically. "R-remember, you brought them…?"
Jazz chuckled and put his right arm up on the couch. "Hey, chill out. I'm not sayin' it was you."
Bluestreak looked mildly relieved.
"I just think I'm not rollin' them properly, or somethin'," Jazz figured, casually tapping his hand on the couch arm. He looked elsewhere in the room, ending that line of the conversation.
A true grin returned to Bluestreak's faceplate. He enjoyed Jazz's company. The black and white Autobot never laid heavies on him and never criticized him. In fact, now that he thought about it, of course Jazz would not accuse him of fixing the dice. He had only jumped to that conclusion. Feeling better, Bluestreak picked up the dice and began to shake them in his right hand.
Jazz turned to look over his shoulder as someone approached the lounge. "Hey, "Mirage," Jazz greeted. The blue and white Autobot entered the lounge, but continued across the room past Jazz and Bluestreak, uninterested in the game they were playing. "You guys just leavin'?"
Mirage stopped and crossed his arms. "We will be if the others can get the lead off their rear axles." He gazed off through the doorway, back down the hall.
Mirage was looking forward to the upcoming competition. He and several other Autobots were preparing to leave for a few days of special racing on a closed track down south. The one rule of the race was to win, and that meant that the participants were free to use any ability to assist them. Jazz suggested the idea to prevent a bunch of stir crazy Autobots from making trouble while Prime and Prowl were gone for a week at a national conference. The concept was appealing to many, which was a good thing, Jazz knew, because any trouble makers looking for action would be away from the Ark. Jazz's job of caretaker would be easy during Prime's absence.
As he continued to shake the dice, Bluestreak's attention was caught by someone else coming quickly toward the lounge. It was Smokescreen. The red, white and blue Autobot posed in the doorway, showing off his racing stripes as he regarded Mirage on the other side of the room.
"You calling me full of lead, Mirage?" Smokescreen taunted. Already a rivalry was beginning.
Mirage laughed, aloof. "I did."
"Just wait until I beat you to the track," Smokescreen responded, not really upset, but playing the part well, nonetheless. "Then you'll eat those words."
"If you want to beat me," Mirage haughtily challenged Smokescreen as the glowing rectangular frame of his electrodisrupter powered up, "you have to see me." Encasing him within its boundaries, the prism then vanished, taking Mirage with it. Now invisible to the others in the room, Mirage transformed and peeled his tires on the metallic floor before speeding away.
Smokescreen ran a few steps after him then stopped to engage Jazz and Bluestreak. "He forgets that he needs to see where he's going." The diversionary tactician chuckled. "I have a few aces up my own sleeve, so to speak." With a sly smile he also transformed and raced from the room after Mirage.
Jazz chuckled to himself. "You sure you don't want to go too, Bluestreak?" he asked, wondering if the silver Autobot across from him might change his mind. "It's your last chance."
"Nah," Bluestreak focused on the modified Monopoly board in front of him, still shaking the dice. He already knew that he was fast and did not want to prove it. Besides, he was not keen on the idea of other Autobots using their abilities against him. His only defense was his weaponry, which was morally off bounds to him and did not count as a special ability that he could use. "I'm more interested in playing this game."
Jazz's smile tilted to one side. "More like you want to win this game. Hey man, that's cool. You're giving me a run for my energon."
Bluestreak returned the smile, and placed his left hand over this right. With the dice cupped in both hands, he concentrated. Maybe he was doing something special to bring himself a streak of luck. He shook the dice one last time to add that special something to his roll, then released them to scatter back across the table.
Whatever he did, it worked. Again, his roll brought him fortune. "Like magic," Bluestreak gasped, astonished at his own luck.
"Lucky you," Jazz sighed through his vocalizer as Bluestreak moved his game piece ahead eight squares to stop on Big Falls Dam. It was probably good for Bluestreak's morale to have the game turn out so well for him, Jazz thought. Winning did not matter so much to Jazz. It was just a game.
Looking at his considerable stack of energon chips, Bluestreak rubbed his knee, considering what he wanted to do. "I think I'll start with three energon compressors." He already had four compressors installed on Bonneville Dam. "And…it's time to put up an energy silo at Bonneville." He smiled from auditory receptor to auditory receptor as he placed the three energon compressors on the first facility. "Jazz, this game is great."
Jazz rested his head against his hand. "Yeah, I'm sure you're havin' the time of your life."
Bluestreak leaned across the game board to place the energy silo on the game square. Without warning, he felt the room tilt ever so slightly. Feeling disoriented and out of balance, Bluestreak knocked over the four compressors. He set down his game piece and regarded Jazz with wide optics. This was unusual.
"You shakin'?" Jazz inquired as he looked around the room, not trusting his own balance control either.
"I don't know, I mean, I hope not, I mean, I really don't know," Bluestreak sputtered. "Are you?"
Bluestreak followed Jazz's gaze over the table between them. Both Autobots observed the game board where Bluestreak's game piece, a mini Sky Spy replica, had tipped over. All of the game pieces had shifted.
"Weird," Jazz decided, shaking his head. "Like my balance control just got funky."
Bluestreak instinctively grabbed the arms of the chair. The fear of something unseen trying to control both of them gripped him. Optics struck with panic, he held perfectly still.
Jazz was unfazed by the event and stood up to test his own equilibrium. "Hmm. Everything's normal now. How 'bout you?" He looked down at Bluestreak. The silver Autobot stared at the far wall, paralyzed.
After a moment, his optics darted up to Jazz then froze again, locked onto the black and white Autobot. He tried to speak quietly without moving his mouth. "I don't know." He fought the urge to look behind him.
At that moment, Jazz's communicator status blinked urgently as someone tried to reach him. Bluestreak almost jumped out of the chair, spooked by the flashing lights. Coolly, Jazz opened the line. It was Cliffjumper, obviously excited about something.
"Did you just feel what I felt?" the red minibot asked suspiciously.
Cliffjumper's concern, coupled with Bluestreak's paranoia, alerted Jazz that maybe something was up, after all. "Oh, you mean like a little bit of shakin'?"
"I mean-" the minibot began, but was interrupted when a larger tremor jolted the Ark. At both ends of the communication channel, everyone braced themselves. "That!"
His survival systems triggered, Bluestreak flung himself out of the chair and produced his beam rifle. His chromed, shoulder-mounted missiles gleamed under the overhead lounge lights as he swung around, pointing his weaponry at anything and everything in search of a target.
The blind panic in Bluestreak's optics now indicated a very real threat. Jazz ducked, knowing that when the gunner was this spooked he could shoot at anyone, friend or foe. "Hey, cool it, Bluestreak! Calm down!" Bluestreak jerked his rifle in Jazz's direction, aiming everything he had at the other Autobot. Jazz tensed with his arms raised to protect his faceplate. "Hey, cool it, man! Don't shoot!"
After a moment, the gunner's optics cleared and he recognized Jazz.
"One day, you're really gonna do it, 'Streak," Jazz laughed to alleviate the tension. "And I'll be Autobot confetti." He checked his communicator link with Cliffjumper but the line was closed, so he clicked the screen back into place in his forearm.
Bluestreak lowered his rifle and disengaged his missile targeting system. "Sorry, Jazz. I didn't mean to," the gunner stiffened for a moment. "Hey! The shaking, it stopped! What could have caused it? Maybe…it was a weird group experience induced by a disruption of our cerebral circuitry. Or maybe, it was…oh no, it wouldn't be that because Teletraan I would have alerted us. Well, maybe – maybe it's one of Wheeljack's inventions again! That was a pretty big explosion. I sure hope he's okay because-"
"It wasn't caused by Wheeljack," Jazz interrupted in an even tone. Once Bluestreak got started, there was never a natural pause where one could get a word in. "He's probably already left for the race. I don't know what it was, but I better go check it out. Wanna come?"
Bluestreak shook his head. There was no way he was going to go anywhere near the source of something that could disable him like that.
"Okay…" Jazz turned to leave. "Hopefully this won't take too long."
With no one else in the lounge for company, Bluestreak realized the alternative was waiting alone while something unknown lurked out there. "On second thought, maybe I better come along." He smiled self-consciously.
Bluestreak kept a firm grip on the handle of his beam rifle. The gunner frequently spun around to make sure there was nothing following them as they made their way through the Ark to Teletraan I. Jazz knew the source of the shaking was probably no big deal, so he tuned out Bluestreak's antics. They were just a couple of little tremors, after all.
Without anyone actively monitoring the main computer, the lighting in the control room was left at a soft level. Rather than turn all the lights back on, Jazz preferred to leave the lights down low to briefly check on security status before getting back to the lounge and the game he was most definitely going to lose - unless a miracle happened. As he viewed the history log, the light from Teletraan's main screen washed over Jazz's features. Behind him, Bluestreak kept guard, mindful of anything disguising itself in the shadows that flashed across the room as Jazz moved between readout screens.
"Teletraan One says all surveillance communication was disrupted at precisely the same time that we felt those two tremors," Jazz read aloud.
"What does that mean?" Bluestreak asked, coming closer.
Jazz faced him. "It means that we just felt a couple of little earthquakes."
Bluestreak's frame relaxed. "Little earthquakes?! Hah! And I thought it might be some Decepticon intruders!" He laughed heartily at himself as his high-strung anxiety melted away into grateful relief.
Jazz puzzled over the rest of the report on the screen. Although the earthquakes were small, the epicenter seemed to be located right beneath their feet. He crossed his arms and held his chin, pensively. "I think," Jazz considered carefully, "we better go see what Beachcomber makes of all this."
At ease now, Bluestreak followed Jazz below the ship to a cavernous hollow where their resident geologist had set up a seismic monitoring station. Sure enough, the blue and grey minibot was already there, reading the output of his machinery.
"Hey, Beachcomber," Jazz greeted the geologist. Beachcomber, who was facing away from him, must have been lost in his own world since he responded after a lazy pause.
"Did you guys just dig that rhythm?" Beachcomber asked in a smooth, relaxed voice. "I mean, that natural Earth beat?"
Bluestreak looked to Jazz, hoping for an interpretation.
"Yeah," Jazz quipped with a big smile, "it had us rockin' without the rollin'."
A casual smile spread across the geologist's faceplate.
Jazz continued in his usual cool demeanor. "I'm in the groove for the lowdown on what's down below." Jazz finished with a stylish flick of his head and slouched back onto one leg.
"It's deep, man. I mean…rrreal deep," the blue minibot slowly bobbed his head.
Bluestreak bobbed his head in synch with Beachcomber, mesmerized by the motion. He was not following what either Autobot was talking about.
"I dig it," Jazz answered, and tilted his head to the other side. "But what kind of vibe is this for all of us up here?"
Beachcomber hooked his thumb back at the seismic reports on his equipment. "Hey, it's all groovy. You can trust me 'cause I'm tuned in to the Earth. Just be one with it and ride the wave," he finished, complete with hand gesture simulating the motion of a rolling wave.
Jazz crossed his arms, attentive.
"I'm in the zone," the geologist continued with confidence, persuading Jazz. "…this thermal hiccup won't give us any negative energy."
Bluestreak suddenly interrupted. "W-what are you guys talking about? What's this about a thermal hiccup?"
The other two Autobots smiled knowingly and changed their register for the benefit of Bluestreak. Jazz translated their conversation.
"Beachcomber says it's no big deal, but we might feel some more small tremors."
"It's this volcano, Bluestreak," the geologist calmly explained in plain terms. "The rock plates of the Earth underneath us are shifting all the time. We've got a bit of magma happening below us just now, but don't worry. It's all just part of nature."
"Magma!" Bluestreak sputtered. "Jazz, isn't magma bad?!"
"Hey, no, man," Jazz replied. "Take it easy."
"A little heat reaching up from the Earth's core is what a volcano's all about, Bluestreak." Beachcomber paused to mull something over. "I bet the geothermal energy compressors are extracting a ton of energon right now."
Jazz beamed at Bluestreak. "See? It's all cool. So let's just chill about it."
"Yeah, sure," Bluestreak accepted, glancing over at Beachcomber. Bluestreak did not understand geological mechanics. He scanned Beachcomber's faceplate for any hidden anxiety, but found none.
"Relax, Bluestreak," the geologist replied in a soothing tone, "I'm on top of it. There's nothing to worry about."
Bluestreak crossed his arms and pressed his lip components together in an accepting grin.
Jazz's communicator lights blinked again.
"Sorry, guys," Jazz apologized and turned away to take the call. It was Cliffjumper again.
"Jazz, I'm in the lounge. You gotta get down here!" the minibot eagerly instructed.
"Someone better not be finishing my game for me," Jazz frowned.
"Nah," Cliffjumper dismissed with shining optics. "We're about to get turbo charged!" Cliffjumper panned his communicator away from his faceplate to show Jazz the scene in the lounge.
A bunch of Autobots were congregating in the room, gathered around the energon dispenser. Sure enough, someone found that the energon pumps were running at full capacity, brimming with a fresh surge of energon from the recent seismic activity, and quickly spread the word. A couple of pans lay on the floor, brimming with energon that overflowed through the dispenser nozzle. Jazz saw Ratchet in the role of what humans would describe as a keg master. The medic scooped cups of energon out of the pans and handed them out. Brawn, with a cup of energon in each hand and a huge smile splayed across his faceplate, walked in front of the screen.
"See?" the minibot asked excitedly, bringing himself back into view. "What are you waiting for?!"
As Jazz turned to the others, the image on the screen blinked off. Jazz chuckled. "I guess you're right, Beachcomber." He laughed at himself for not figuring it out. "Looks like the others figured it out first. There's plenty of energon to go 'round."
"Then what are we waiting for? Llllet's go!" Beachcomber quickly entered a code into his monitoring equipment before the three left to join Cliffjumper and the others.
With the energon flowing like water as a result of the volcanic activity, it was hard for any of the Autobots to mind a few small, periodic tremors. The aftershocks were minor and, over time, it was easy to confuse the energon buzz with the disorientation caused by an occasional tremor. Jazz and Bluestreak each received a cup of energon from Ratchet and resumed their board game where they left off. Jazz forced a toast with Bluestreak to lift the silver Autobot out of any remaining concern so that he could relax and just enjoy the moment. When Beachcomber received his cup brimming with the radiant pink fluid, he held it as if it were liquid gold. The energon glow reflected off his silver optic band as he meditated on the drink clutched in both hands before his faceplate. Jazz shook his head. Only a geologist could appreciate a cup of geothermal energon like that.
On a rocky slope outside Autobot Headquarters, Air Raid kicked a chunk of rock free, sending it tumbling below. "This stinks," the Aerialbot complained loudly, fists clenched, as he watched the rock smash itself smaller and smaller as it rebounded off other rocks on the way down, "we shouldn't be stuck out here on guard duty and have to miss the party."
Slingshot turned in the direction of the other Aerialbot standing atop a mound of rock to his right and huffed in agreement.
Silverbolt was staring at the rock between his feet when he saw the remains of the rock smash against a large flat of the slope below and finally come to rest. The destructive image jarred him out of his moment of complacency and he radioed Air Raid.
"Hey up there," the tall white and red Aerialbot leader addressed Air Raid, as small stones continued to crumble away beneath Air Raid's feet. "Remember that you're not the only one out here, so be careful."
Air Raid laughed into his communicator. "We are the only ones out here. We are the Autobot defenses."
"Yes, Air Raid. We, meaning your fellow Aerialbots." Silverbolt paused, but kept his optics on Air Raid. Slingshot must have been able to hear the conversation as the Autobot's orange optic band turned down toward Silverbolt and he put his fists on his hip plates.
Sure enough, Slingshot joined the conversation a moment later. "Yeah, Silverbolt. What exactly are we doing out here? I don't see anything happening. They don't need us on guard duty."
Silverbolt sighed. "The point is that while we're out here, nothing will happen. You see?" Silverbolt could see their point, but knew that if he gave in to their complaints, he would lose their dedication to guard duty for sure. The others closed the radio channel with the Aerialbot leader. He leaned back against the rock behind him and scanned the skies above him for Fireflight.
Silverbolt squinted against the bright, overcast sky to see the red F-4 Phantom fighter jet. Fireflight circled the volcano and rolled his wingtips back and forth as he flew past the other Aerialbots near the entrance to Autobot Headquarters and up the valley again. Fireflight appeared unstable in the air, but Silverbolt knew that the Aerialbot was only wrapped up in whatever he saw below him, which was what he was supposed to do when he was on patrol. Nevertheless, Silverbolt hailed Fireflight over his radio to check in with him.
"Fireflight, do you see anything of interest up there?"
"Do I ever," came the overwhelmed response. "You ought to come up here and take a look for yourself."
Silverbolt turned and craned his neck to observe the mouth of the volcano high above and behind him. A stream of white steam vented high into the sky above. "Uh, no thanks. I think I'll stay down here." He did not know anything about the inner workings of the Earth, and was concerned about the information relayed to him regarding the source of the tremors. Somehow the idea of an active volcano so close to home, even if the volcano was not predicted to erupt, spelled trouble one way or another.