Sunlight trickled through the treeline as gently as the dew drops dripped from the leaves.
It was a beautiful sight.
Yet it went ignored as Sideswipe put all his focus into writing "BUTT" in the biggest letters possible on the sleeping Grimlock's Dino-aft.
After all, it wasn't that easy for him to use a human-sized writing tool.
He needed to focus, this was totally important after all.
"That's another one" Denny decided to break the silence of the yard, the sudden noise making Sideswipe jump behind a pile of tires to 'avoid detection'.
Denny had clamped the newspaper to his chest and met Sideswipes wide-opticed stare with his own startled look.
Grimlock remained asleep.
"Denny could you not be so loud? I'll get caught!" Sideswipe relaxed slightly as he hissed at the human, slowly getting up from his little hiding spot.
"Oh! Sorry" Denny began whispering "Uh, what are you doing?"
"Uh, duh! I'm adding some much-needed amusement here, there's been no Decepticons in forever, gotta do something" Sideswipe shrugged nonchalantly.
"Like write on Grimlock?" Denny crossed his arms around the paper.
"... He's a heavy sleeper" Sideswipe added another shrug as if it all made sense now.
"Right… well, I think we might have a possible lead on a maybe-Decepticon" Denny held out the newspaper triumphantly "I'm taking it to Fixit to see what he thinks!"
"Ah, I hope you're right" Sideswipe sighed suddenly abandoning 'quietness' as he looked over his horrendously written 'butt', a monument to boredom.
Sideswipe followed Denny to the control point, it was empty as the rest of the Autobots were either performing their patrols or just elsewhere in the Scrapyard.
By the control centre, there was a small cupboard, port-a-potty like thing, just a plastic room big enough for one person to stand in and not attached to the floor, whatever it's original function the inside of it had been stripped out and cleaned.
The inside instead had been refitted with pillows, so they coated the walls.
Denny had made it for Fixit when realising the stuttering Autobot occasionally got overwhelmed, not entirely helped by spikes of self-consciousness for his stuttering and vocal issues.
It was Fixit's personal 'escape' room just for a little relaxation with no one watching over him and soft walls to slump against.
Just in case he'd fallen asleep or something Denny rapped on the door loudly, keeping up to an internal rhythm as he kept going for a noticeable amount of time.
Sideswipe rolled his optics and place a finger atop the little 'booth' and shook it from side to side, given the small nook it was slotted into that was little more than an Earth-Inch each way.
"Sideswipe don't" Denny fruitlessly waved his hand at the Autobots as if he could shove him off the booth.
"Yes, you don't need to prattle-rattle my, uh, private room, I turn the dial on the front if I'm in there anyway…" Both Denny and Sideswipe looked up to the control centre to see a small orange face peering over the edge at them.
"Oh!... Right" Denny looked back at the little room he made and the green vacant sign on the door "Of course"
"Yo little guy, are there any Decepticon sightings or stuff going on? Denny thinks he's got something" Sideswipe stood back up and stretched "Gotta hope it's somethin' need to keep the joints from goin' rusty, am I right?"
Fixit didn't seem to get it and stared at him for a few moments
"I haven't got any Decepticons signals" He finally responded sounding a little confused.
"Well, I have something of interest at least" Denny made a small wheeze, as Fixit had been focused on Sideswipe the human and run around and ran up the ramp, holding the newspaper out in front of him.
"Ah! A classic human news outlet!" Fixit examined the paper in Denny's hand as if it was the object of study.
"Yes, but no, I mean this is the interesting part!" Denny uncrumpled it and turned the pages until he got to his desired section, whereupon he dropped the newspaper onto the control panel as if allowing the two 'bots a chance to look at it themselves.
"There, another campsite found mysteriously drained of energy, even backup batteries! Everything remotely electrical just died, and here's the kicker! This is the second time one of these scenes has reported a-" Denny cleared his throat "A Y-shaped incision into their engines-slash-generators AND strange slime!"
"The energy is interesting but time? Lime? Slime!?" Fixit eventually coughed out.
"Grody" Sideswipe curled his lip-plates.
"Y-yes…" Denny seemed quietly unsure of himself "I mean that warrants some interest right? I mean, last time I checked no human has a device that just drains engines an' stuff of their power, plus, of course, the slime. No footprints mentioned either…"
"Y-shaped incisions are an interesting touch if it were a prisoner, tearing the panels off or just a singular cut to reveal the power source would be e-enough" Fixit grabbed the newspaper and in a clumsy motion took out the page the article had been written on.
"Calling card maybe?" Denny shrugged, "I just kept seeing these reports and thought it was definitely something to bring to you guys!" He looked hopeful.
"Maybe it's not Cybertronian at all" Sideswipe shrugged "Not our deal then"
"Wait, MORE aliens!" Denny's hands clasped onto the control point in shock almost as if the idea of more sentient life forms in space was new before he began to control himself "I mean, there are other races?"
"It's not improbable… impossible" Fixit cocked his head.
"Wait, you don't know if there's life on other planets than ours?" Denny took his turn to look pensive.
"No, I mean for the generators, I mean that's… what we were talking about right?" Fixit instead looked lost.
"Uh, yeah, can we just find out if there's anything interesting about this Y-power-stealer? I mean I HOPE it's a prisoner, got nothin' else to do" Sideswipe tapped the control panel impatiently prompting Fixit to begin typing away again.
"W-well a localised media scan reveals little in the way of reported mechanical life forms, only a pretty bright shooting car, star nearby" His tapping brought several Cybertronian letters and words up, leaving Denny quite clueless as to what kind of sense he made out of such symbols.
"Ooooh, shooting star eh?" Sideswipe grinned "It's the Energy munchers from planet Z!" He wiggled his fingers enthusiastically.
"What P-planet Z? Did I miss a planet when I passed through this solar system?" Fixit - who had been more focused on his screens than conversation - suddenly jumped up to look between his associates.
"What's 'Planet Z'?" Bumblebee had overheard the conversation and advanced on the group.
"I don't know commander! I-I was just basking! Asking!" Fixit warbled.
"It's a joke dude" Sideswipe waved a hand flippantly.
"Not causing trouble again, are we? I know there's not much going on but..." Bumblebee had an optical ridge arched.
"O' yee of little faith" Sideswipe crooned.
"Well regardless of planets and aliens, I think I've found a lead!" Denny steered the conversation back on track.
"Sounds interesting, shoot" Bumblebee turned his attention away from Sideswipe's faux innocent smile.
"There have been MULTIPLE reports of campers losing ALL power! Just gone! The only clue's being a Y-shaped incision and some sliiime!" Denny grinned enthusiastically and wiggled his fingers for extra dramatic effect.
"Huh… Sounds interesting" the hint of curious scepticism evident in his tone "Seems worth checking out, purely for the curious nature of it, and for some activity"
"Tell me about it" Sideswipe uttered to the side.
"Fixit run a check on possible Decepticon culprits while I radio everyone back in, we can scour the forest for clues" Bumblebee finished and ignored his teammate.
By the time the entire team reached the command point the sun had reached its peak in the sky and Strongarm was following Grimlock.
Her optics squarely glued to his rear, her brow furrowed in confused ridges.
"Alright, team!" Bumblebee got everyone's attention, apart from Sideswipe who couldn't resist throwing as many glances at Strongarm as possible, "We have some strange circumstances to investigate, might be a Decepticon, might not be, but it's suspicious enough to warrant a search, just to be safe"
"What information do we have on this possible convict?" Drift had kept himself rigid and attentive the entire time, probably not even noticing Strongarm unusual quietness or the not-so-subtle 'edits' to Grimlock.
"Take it away Fixit" Bumblebee stepped to the side and allowed the Mini-con to head the group, much to Fixit's seeming dismay as he stuttered to life, not expecting the sudden involvement.
"Oh! O-o-oh right-o! Righty-o!" He chirped largely to himself as he clattered about with his instruments before bringing up an enlarged version of the article photo Denny had shown him earlier "This is a photo of what this, uh, customer leaves behind, very distinct Y-shaped cuts, they uh, also leave c-co-copious amounts of slime in trails around the site. All of this with the goal of draining energy, each of these tacks… attacks! Have left the sites completely drained of power! And as we know there is no Earthly technology capable of such feats"
His small presentation caused a small round of muttering from the gathered Autobots as they processed the information.
"Um, Sir?" Strongarm finally piped up, raising a hand up as if trying to draw attention to herself.
"Hey! Yeah! Fixit! So how about the Prisoner profiles, eh? Got any leads?" Sideswipe jumped up and overrode the conversation.
"No." Fixit was flatter than a bad tire.
"Really? Nothing?" Sideswipe was uncharacteristically inquisitive.
"No Prisoners matching this problem, there are a couple who use slime-like substances but their interests aren't in energy and this behaviour would be uncharacteristic for them" Fixit chimed.
"So we're going in blind to hunt down an Energy thief" Drift had somehow presented the line in a way that made it impossible to tell if it were a question or statement.
"Yes, we are!" Bumblebee sounded a bit too chipper "But Fixit has tracked a small pattern to these 'incidents', the first one was close to a lake nestled within this heavily wooded area, and since then they have been moving away from the lake but, naturally keeping close to a camping trail used by humans. After these reports, It seems that no one has gone up there today, so it's a perfect opportunity to comb the area for the culprit"
Wordlessly the Groundbridge burst to life, a thrumming light inviting them all into its vortex.