It was supposed to be nearly 98 degrees today, but with the wind and the cloud cover it felt much cooler. The deceivingly pleasant afternoon was merely the calm before the storm though. He had seen the massive thunderhead approaching from over the dunes, and wished no part in the electrical sandstorm soon to occur. Neither did anyone else, judging by the rapidly emptying square, and he pulled his scarf over his nose as sand and dust filled the air. Granted, this was Teluna. Sand always got in the air, in your boots; and, for the biologically challenged, in your gears. But this was getting unbearable even for him.
Hurriedly he entered a low roofed (like everything else) building and lowered his scarf, allowing the smells of food, alcohol, highgrade, and other people to wash over him. Strange….
Usually the pub wasn't as crowded. Even during a storm. People simply waited out the squalls in their homes - after all, they had had ample time to see the dark clouds coming. Besides ships, weather was about the only thing that jutted up from the land, and there wasn't much pity for the ill-timed fool caught in it.
Another odd thing Chris noted was the kind of people crowding the room. Not the usual spacefarers, traders or Telunans (though a few were present). Towards the back a group of mechs with wings protruding from shoulders clustered almost defensively around a table, one or two giving the man a curious glance before losing interest. To one side two fierce looking mechs took turns throwing energon blades at a target carved into the wall. Oooh - housekeeping's not gonna like that.
Two more mechs rested by the bar, talking in that weird, scratchy language of theirs in quiet tones. What were all the Cybertronians doing out here? Where had they come from? Haran wasn't gonna like this.
There was also the usual human patrons, mostly filling up the rest of the bar seats not in the vicinity of the two Cybertronians or being loud and annoying at a cluster of tables near the door he'd just come through. Chris dodged among them to an open spot among the humans at the bar. He ordered a drink while he waited for his friends and started people watching.
The Cybertronians - yeah, something had to be up. I mean, we are kinda close to their known territory...but still. Maybe their ship needed repairs and they had no other choice but to land here?
Not much was known about Cybertronians (besides what knowledge the few encounters with them and Haran's own unique case had to offer). What Chris did know was their general disdain (or was it disinterest? Apprehension?) for interacting with organic sentients - which was practically the whole of Starfleet.
Out of the corner of his eye he saw movement at the entrance, and turned to see Vera enter, followed closely by Haran. Moving gracefully and with shoulder length dark hair that swung with her steps like it was real, Chris found himself again appreciating the engineering that had gone into the Surrogate body's construction. It passed quite nicely for human, if you didn't already know her. Of course, rumor of how she had been so injured as to need a stand in android had blown around the ship within a week of their recruitment.
"Hey." She said with a smile, coming to stand beside him. Chris childishly swiveled on his bar stool with his butt until he was facing her.
"Hey - thought you guys were caught in that sand storm for a moment."
"It hasn't gotten that bad yet," Haran dismissed with a wave of his servo, "It'll probably blow over within the hour."
Haran was at most a head taller than Chris. The mech had black arms and legs with a thin ribbon of neon blue snaking up the side of each appendage. In contrast, his chassis was red, with black over the shoulders, painted like the uniform shirts his fellow crew members wore when on duty. Sorry, but no self-respecting mechanoid was wearing clothing if they didn't have to - he'd insisted they just paint his chest to match the required outfit and be done with it. Idly Chris wondered if Haran would have to get it repainted every time he moved up a rank. Probably.
"Let's move to a table somewhere." Chris said, feeling a little exposed at the bar. More than a few of the Cybertronians were giving them not-so-covert WTF expressions. "Unless you guys want to order a drink first."
"You know I don't drink." Vera punned. Beside the android Haran nodded at the idea.
"Yeah, give me a sec." He turned to the bartender. "I'll have a vuen' dtrargt if you got any."
The bartender - a Vulcan - nodded, disappearing from their side to get some from the back, where special refreshments for the less common species in StarFleet were stored. Normally no place this side of the universe sold or even heard of energon. But because Teluna was the Endeavor's base (the ship upon which StarFleet's only Cybertronian member was stationed) and it was this close to space known to have the occasional Cybertronian sighting (as seen by the current residents of the pub), Grand Admiral Sartor had specifically requested this and several establishments like it to keep a store of processed energon. How nice of them. Chris was sure the aloof robots would thank Starfleet for its thoughtfulness eventually. Like when hell froze over.
Haran handed over some money in exchange for the bottle and included glasses when she came back.
"Did you hear about Lieutenant Jah?" Vera asked neither of them in particular on their way to a vacant table in a back corner. "Haha, oh yeah!" Haran laughed while Chris said "What? No."
"Someone glued all his office furnature to the ceiling. Like, in the exact order it was on the ground. The couch, the desk, the stuff on the desk - everything."
"How though." Chris snickered while Haran grinned at the image, despite having already heard the story.
Vera shook her head while pulling out a seat. "Beats me. But it clearly took effort. He must have pissed off someone with wayyyyy to much off time on their hands."
"Which isn't hard." Chris said. He didn't really like the guy, and not just because he happened to be ugly. And he was pretty ugly. It was a running joke among the privates to call him "Jah Jah", like 'Jar-jar' from Star Wars. A classic movie which Haran and literally any non-human crewmate liked to vehemently argue against the unrealisticness of. Like the humans didn't already know there was no such thing as the Force.
"Good, I hate that guy." Haran snarked, pouring himself a shot of energon and taking a sip. He got a funny expression and nearly choked on it, prompting his friends to demand "What?!" Apparently gagging and laughing were mutually exclusive, but the mech was trying his damned best to do both as he spluttered, "Look! Ha *COUGH* Ha!"
Chris and Vera turned in their seats to see who had gained Haran's, along with several other people's, attention. Oh. It was just Cameron. A completely sand covered Cameron. The dude was a solid tan color head to toe.
Their table burst into obnoxious laughter. Haran loudly clapped his servos together, sucked in a dramatic vent, and gave the poor young man a solid "Boi!" He failed to see the confused looks his (to them) outlandish actions generated on the Cybertronians who were observing him with keen optics.
Many of the other pub patrons were eyeing the sandy cadet like he was a dumbass and the group of traders nearer the entrance yelled out a few catcalls with phrases like "Got 'em!" and "All clear out there!"
Shame-facedly Cameron shuffled to their table leaving a trail of sand in his wake. Chris shook his head. RIP housekeeping. When Cameron lowered his breathing scarf after taking a seat with them a bucketful of the stuff fell to the table, prompting another wave of laughter at his expense.
"And where were you?" Chris demanded. Vera elbowed him. "Duh, outside." She pointed out obnoxiously. Cameron groaned and dropped his head to the table (causing more sand to fall out of his hair and onto its surface).
"My speeder broke down a mile outside the limits." He confessed. "I had to haul ass getting here before the storm. Legit thought I wasn't gonna make it."
"You. Are. An idiot." Haran decided. "And lucky. There was an alert for this storm since yesterday, and you decided the hour before it hits to go out?"
"With the speeder I would've made it."
"There's no excuse for your stupidity." Chris said sadly.
"Yes there is, clearly you are defective."
Chris snorted at Haran's joke. "Defective?"
"Dude, its robot for retarded." Vera enlightened him.
"You would know 'droid."
Then Cameron leaned closer to the table's center, an indication for the others to do the same.
"So," he said, lowering his voice, "You guys notice the mechs in here? They're kinda staring at us. Don't look." He said this while looking at Haran, who just shrugged.
"Don't look at me - I have no idea what's wrong with those guys. But yeah, I did notice."
Chris frowned. "Think we can take them if they start anything?" He asked worriedly. He wondered if it was Haran, Vera, or the combination that was drawing attention. Cameron's glorious entrance probably didn't help in making their group inconspicuous.
Vera and Haran glanced at each other and broke composure when they made eye contact.
"Pffft no!" Haran snickered.
Vera giggled, "Haran and I might have a chance, you two, not so much."
"I'm not joking you guys, I feel like we should get out of here as soon as the storm- oh shit, here comes one now." The whispered warning came too late, as when everyone immediately looked up (despite just being told not to) they saw the winged mech was only a few feet away.
It nervously stopped its approach with all four's attention now focused on it. Haran had a curious look on his face, while Chris and Cameron felt their pockets where their phasers were stored. It was actually shorter than Haran, grey with red/orange (rorange?) highlights. It didn't look like it wanted a fight.
"What?" Haran asked. If he had looked around, he'd have seen that every other Cybertronian in the bar was now watching the exchange with tense, undivided attention.
The mech seemed confused by the direct address, and said slowly, "Hel-lo. You are...neutral?"
Sitting next to Skydive at their table, Silverbolt facepalmed, thinking 'Oh my god Fireflight, you can't just ask people why they're neutral'. When Slingshot had dared the young flyer to ask the stranger - who oddly looked like many of the organics they'd seen - how he could come by some of that highgrade he'd been joking. Damn kid might get himself killed if the guy turned out to be a 'Con.
"Neutral?" Haran repeated neutrally.
"Your paint job…." The mech trailed off. Haran glanced at Cameron who currently wore his matching uniform, sand covered as it was (ooh, dry cleaning's not gonna like that).
"What about it?"
"It matches the pattern we have seen many organics covering themselves with. Why? Also...you have no insignia."
"No insignia," Haran began. "Yes I do. See this? It's the Federation insignia." He tapped the arrowhead shaped badge (that also served as a communicator) magnetized to his chest. His friends and the other cadets liked to play a game of sticking as many of the things as possible to him without being noticed or while he was in recharge, and then paging them all at once.
"Federation?" The mech cocked his head a little. "We know of this federation. Why do they make you wear it?"
"Because, that's what we have to wear." Haran said. "At least everyone at my rank does. The color or pattern is different depending on status."
"Your rank...you are a member of this 'Starfleet'?"
"Well, yeah." Haran said. Duh. That was kind of the point. He took the mech's momentary contemplative silence as a chance to pour himself another shot of his energon, human style. Really Haran was nervous as hell to be talking to another member of his species for the first time and was naively trying to play it off cool, but he couldn't know the action perplexed Fireflight.
Fireflight blinked. What was the point of pouring your energon from a cylindrical container into a smaller cylindrical container before consuming it? Besides, on Cybertron their energon containers were cube shaped.
But what he asked instead was, "I saw you give that organic metal bits in exchange for that. If I gave it pieces of metal, would I too receive energon?"
Haran frowned, starting to think there was something being lost in translation in this conversation. Chris was also starting to take on an unamused expression, and somewhere found the balls to correct it,
"She. The Vulcan over there is a 'she', not an it.
Fireflight focused his attention on Chris. The older bots had told him not to talk to the aliens, which was why he instead was talking to the mech among them (who, to be honest, was a lot more interesting right now than a couple of organics). How should he respond? There was something in the light haired organics tone...was he being challenged? Had he offended it? Best to ignore them for now, as he had no idea a way to make amends if he had.
"Did I somehow offend your subordinates-(word for inferiors)?" Fireflight asked the black and red mech, switching to Cybertronian. "Why do you sit with them, when they have conscripted you into their forces as you have said?"
"What? Conscripted?" Haran said. Yeah, something was definitely being lost in translation.
"I'm not being forced to do anything. I grew up with these people, and we went to Starfleet Academy together." (With Chris and Cameron he did; they met Vera later).
"Yeah, and we aren't his 'inferiors' so lay off." Vera snapped in her own accented Cybertronian. Though to be fair, Haran's accent wasn't much better.
Fireflight gaped in surprise (along with the other Cybertronians watching them in the room). This 'She' could speak Cybertronian? How? Could the other 'shes' at the table also understand him? The Autobots had kept clear of such primitive organic races during the war, and before that Sentinel Prime had had a ban on contact with organics of any kind. Now that things were starting to cool down, their current Prime, Optimus, had sent several scout teams to see if there was any gain (resource wise) in interaction with them. They desperately needed the resources to rebuild Cybertron, and Prime would prefer if they find a way to peacefully barter for them rather than just taking them and accruing more enemies. How then, after such avoidance, did these people already know their language?
"...I do not know what this phrase "grew up" means." Admitted Fireflight. He didn't know what 'lay off' meant either but judging by the femme's tone he probably didn't want to. Chris and Cameron didn't know what was being said as they didn't understand Cybertronian like Vera did.
"It means raised, I guess. Where I've lived since I was young?" Haran supplied, trying to move the conversation back to English.
The robot tapped its metal foot thoughtfully. The pieces were starting to fit together, yet he could barely believe the implications. The stranger's accent, the weird paint job, his familiarity with these organics…-
He commed Silverbolt,
-Are you guys getting this?!"-
His commander immediately commed back
-Fireflight, get back here! We don't know anything about these people, and our mission is to strictly observe for now!-
-But...but this guy- -
-That's an order.-
Fireflight's wings drooped in disappointment (talking to this mech was just starting to get interesting!) but he turned away from their table without another word to go back to his brothers.
" 'Kay bye." Chris said in mock cheerfulness, their group watching him go. Haran turned and gave him, Cameron, and Vera his best comedic WTF expression. "What was that about?" He asked.
Then Cameron started chuckling, which turned into full blown laughter at Vera.
"Did you see his face when you said whatever you did in Cybertronian? *HaHa* Priceless!"
"That was pretty funny." Haran congratulated her.
At the aerialbots' table, Skydive not so lightly smacked the back of Fireflight's helm as he sat down.
"You idiot. And now they're looking at us." He said. Slingshot elbowed him. "So, did you find out how to get that highgrade?" He and Air Raid laughed, but shut up at a glare from Silverbolt.
"That was very stupid." The grey jet scolded. "You don't just ask people if they're neutral. What if he wasn't?"
"He isn't just neutral," Fireflight started, eager to tell them what he had learned in the brief conversation. "You guys aren't gonna believe this, but that mech, he's-..."
At their table, Haran recapped his highgrade bottle for later and put it in the storage compartment built into his chest. "Commander Turak said to head back after the storm blew over." He said. Chris nodded.
"Yeah, let's go."
The others mumbled their agreement and the group of cadets got up, heading for the entrance. They ignored (or maybe didn't see) the stares of the Cybertronians as they left.
Let me know what you guys think! Want more chapters? Spelling errors? What would you like to see concerning a Cybertronian found to be living among the humans as a member of Starfleet? I'd love to get reviews!