It was once a cave. Native Americans had often camped here, saying that the butte and its sister were the spirits, watching over them. The great Thunderbird was said to make his nest here, and Kokopelli and Coyote were said to often come to work their mischief in this place. Later, the white man would come in the late nineteenth century, and drive the natives away. They said that the rock formation and one of its sisters resembled a giant pair of mittens. The cave served as shelter from the great heat of the desert to many travelers as they headed west, hoping to strike it rich in the gold mines of California. It was somewhat forgotten until the mid twentieth century, when someone looked to the cave and said that it would make a great place for the deployment of missiles to protect the nation against its greatest enemy. The eighties came and went, and the Berlin Wall fell. The USSR disintegrated, and with it, the Cold War ended. The missile silo, like many others of its kind, was surplus and considered obsolete. Its personnel were moved and its contents removed. It sat unused for twenty years until someone looked to the cave once again. This time, it was its walls that were impermeable to radio waves, and the large, tall hallways that attracted attention. It was the perfect place for the race of tall, mechanized, alien visitors who had brought their war to the humans' planet. The base was hastily "cleaned" and presented to the Cybertornians, whose leader deemed it satisfactory. It became Autobot Outpost Omega One, and once again, the cave sheltered people. The only problem was that the extraterrestrial visitors were not the only ones who called this place home.
Ratchet hated the place. Everything in it was secondhand, passed down, with unwanted and outdated equipment. The newest human computer systems in the base were from the late eighties and early nineties, and it had taken a lot of work to update and integrate them with the Cybertronian components. The end result was a glitchy, touchy system that crashed at least twice a day. It seemed that for every glitch or problem he fixed, another five appeared to take its place. The base was musty, dusty, and moldy, which irritated intakes and clogged air filters, which Ratchet had to take care of, being the team's only medic. The washracks that had been installed for the Cybertronians worked only when they felt like it, and most of the time, the water came out a dirty brown color from rusted pipes and smelling like the inside of a human sewer. Organic vermin infested the base-spiders and rodents were in every corner, and gnawed on wires and got into the energon stocks. Dead rats could often be found floating in uncovered or partially covered energon cubes, and one decomposing body would render an entire cube useless, which was not just an inconvenience, but a disaster to the energon-strapped Autobots, who didn't have enough to start with . Primus only knew how they got there.
Other, stranger occurrences would happen. Tools or other items would go missing and maybe turn up later in strange places; computers glitch, machinery malfunction, or fuses blow for no reason; mysterious power surges or outages with no known or traceable cause; strange noises and voices that would come from the depths of the base that had no discernible source; or the strange thunderstorms that would strike the base when there had not been a cloud in the sky moments before.
Ratchet had more experience with this phenomenon than the other Autobots. He was often fixing new problems that cropped up or operating the groundbridge, which led to him spending extended amounts of time in the base alone, especially while the others were on patrol and the children were in school. It was on one such day that Ratchet could be found on the top of the silo, replacing and fixing the proximity sensors that were located upon the top of the butte the base was located in. They had malfunctioned for the umpteenth time, which had led to a surprise and very unwelcome visit from Agent Fowler, who was angry at Prime for "pancaking a mini-mall" yet again.
Ratchet snorted as he worked. The irritating agent didn't seem to realize how many lives had been saved that day. So far, none of Team Prime had accidently stepped on or damaged any of the fragile organics that called this planet home, and all the human could do was complain about property damage. Humans seemed to take for granted that Team Prime would protect them from the 'Cons, and treated the Autobots like they were the unwelcome intruders. The resources they allowed the Autobots were secondhand junk, and even the junk was handed out in a miserly manner. "Ungrateful wretches," Ratched muttered angrily. One of the sensors he had just replaced abruptly sparked, and then blew out, giving off a small trail of smoke. "Of all the...!" Ratchet snarled. The sensor was brand new, and now he had to replace it again. This sensor was located on the far side of the butte, next to the small spire of rock that formed the "thumb" of the butte's mitten shape. The spire had a large, saucer-shaped divet in the top, almost like the nest of some giant bird, as Miko had once commented.
As he hiked back over to replace the faulty sensor, it abruptly started to drizzle. "Stupid organic planet with its unpredictable weather. Why can't the humans develop the technology to control it?" Ratchet griped to himself. "We're in the middle of a Primus-forsaken desert anyway. Why is it even raining?" Thunder rumbled ominously in the distance. A strong wind gusted over the top of the butte, almost knocking the unfortunate mech off. The rain began to come down harder, and the thunder was almost deafening. Ratchet hunched over the faulty sensor. "It's always something, and always me having to fix it. Things never go wrong for anyone else, and if they do, it's me having to fix it because I'm the only one who knows how." So immersed in feeling sorry for himself, Ratchet never noticed the immense shadow of the pitch black cloud that fell over him. He did notice when the lightning struck him.
Ratchet could not see, hear, or do anything as his body jerked in spasms from the electricity and all of his systems sent back warnings and failures that scrolled by his optics. Massive electrical overloads on all the systems, more than could be safely routed by the natural biology of his frame, ravaged his body. The emergency backups did the only thing that could be done: they shut down everything to protect the delicate circuitry and Ratchet fell offline.
The first thing he thought as he came back online was that being on top of one of the tallest natural formations in the area coupled with the fact that he was metal during a thunderstorm was probably not the smartest idea that he had ever had. The second thought was that he was lucky no one had been around to see him make such a stupid mistake. All systems seemed to be okay, which meant the backup systems had done the right thing in shutting him down. They were booting up one by one, running through various checks. Audials were one of the last systems to come online, and when they did, Ratchet could hear voices. Scrap, he thought. It would appear he had been out longer that he had thought, and the others had come back from patrol to find him passed out on top of the butte. Optical systems came online next, and Ratchet opened his optics. The sight that greeted him made him freeze in terror.
Two enormous birds, ones of such a size that could eat Optimus and Team Prime for lunch and probably have Megatron and Starscream for dessert, sat conversing with each other not but a few feet away from him. Wicked, curved beaks and sharp talons made them appear to be some sort of giant raptor, but one such as Ratchet had never seen. One was standing over two chicks that were in the saucer-shaped divet on the "thumb." Odd, Ratchet thought. I could have sworn by the Allspark that those younglings were not there a few moments ago. The two young birds didn't appear to be capable of flight yet, which only deepened the mystery. How had they gotten there? Had the parents carried them there while he was out? Highly unlikely, but the most plausible explanation. I would have noticed if they were there before. I've been up here, what, a hundred times over the last human year? I would have seen them.
As his systems booted up fully, Ratchet moved ever so slightly to a more comfortable position. Immediately, the two birds swung their heads around to look at him, and hissed angrily. He immediately froze. Ratchet watched in disbelief as electricity seemed to gather around the wings of the smaller raptor. The bird lifted its wings, and then brought them down in a sweeping motion towards Ratchet. Thunder boomed and lighting shot towards the unfortunate 'bot. "Scrap," Ratchet muttered right before the lightning hit him a second time that day and knocked him offline yet again.
"Ratchet." A deep voice sounded in his audials. "RATCHET." The voice sounded again, and groggily, Ratchet realized it was Optimus Prime speaking to him. "Unnngh," was the only sound he could manage in return. He opened his optics, and sat up. Somehow he had ended up at the base of the butte. "Why are you lying out in the open old friend?" Optimus asked.
"I'm not sure...I was up on the top replacing proximity sensors when one of those storms cropped up. All I remember was getting hit by lightning. I must have fallen off..." Ratchet trailed off. He thought about mentioning the birds, but decided they must have been a hallucination brought on by being struck by lightning.
"Are you all right?" Optimus looked at him in concern. Falling several stories off a butte and being struck by lightning would damage even the toughest Cybertronian.
Ratchet was about to answer when Arcee rolled by in her motorcycle form. "I understand that we're strapped for parts and you're devoted to the Cause Ratchet, but acting as the lightning rod that you mentioned we needed to protect the equipment is a little extreme."
Ratchet seethed as the kids and the rest of the team laughed as they went further into the base. "Hey, don't take it personally, Docbot. Who knows, maybe being zapped and falling on your head fixed your 'I'm perpetually grumpy' glitch!" Miko chimed in, which made everyone laugh even more. Why she enjoyed baiting him Ratchet couldn't even begin to fathom, and being who he was, he just couldn't let it go. Trying to ignore Miko was also futile. He still didn't understand how the others could put up with her.
"I'm going to go fix the groundbridge," he snarled and made to stalk off, but was stopped when Optimus laid a hand upon his shoulder. "Perhaps a rest would be more in order, old friend. After all," Optimus said with the barest hint of a smile, "it is not every day that our medic decides to emulate a Seeker."
Ratchet snarled to himself even more. Even Prime was laughing at him. He moved angrily towards his quarters. As he stomped down the corridors, he heard someone screech, "Watch where you're putting your great clumsy feet, you stupid oaf! "
Ratchet nearly jumped through the low ceiling. At his feet, two small, serpent-like creatures with horns glared at him. "What in the Allspark..." he trailed off as the creatures continued on their way. "Why do I even bother?" one snarled. "It's not like those stupid great celestial morons can hear or see me anyway. I'll have to ask Koko or Coyote if they can slip more rats into that blue liquid poison that they drink. Maybe that will make them leave..."
"The thunderbirds nearly had that one find their nest this morning. It almost crushed their chicks," the other commented. "Toarrk got it but good, and twice too. The only problem was it lived."
" Too bad it survived when they zapped the crap out of it-I would have thought that would have finished the wretch, being made of metal and all," the first one answered. " Maybe Unhcegila will have some better ideas on how to get rid of the pests when we get together for the monthly community meet."
"Yes, but I will admit that it is nice to have humans in the caves again though. And not those ones who were always scurrying around talking about killing the others too. Young ones who really bring the place to life. It reminds me of the old days, when the old humans would camp here and we would hear stories and songs and such. It's the only decent thing those star travelers have brought here."
"Oh yes, I will give them some credit for that," the first horned snake replied. "But the fact of the matter remains that they do not belong on this world, and we must do what we can to evict them from our home, even if it means losing the humans. By the way, which one did Toarrk get?"
"The angry red and white one, the one that always runs around the cave fiddling with things and cursing and complaining about everything upon our world."
"Excellent!" the first snake crowed. "That one deserves it. It is so irritating to listen to, and it is always poking its nonexistent nose where it doesn't need to go. Siessa had to move the hatchlings again just the other day because it nearly discovered our nest yet again.
"One thing I don't understand though," the first snake continued, "if the creature hates our world so much and yearns for its own, why doesn't it just return there and leave us alone?"
"Beats me," snake number two replied. Ratchet watched speechlessly as the two creatures slid into a grate near the floor and disappeared from sight.
"Alright Ratchet, it's just a hallucination brought on by falling on your head and getting zapped from that storm. A little bit of recharge and you'll be fine in the morning," he told himself as he staggered into his quarters. Ratchet quickly locked the door and dropped a crate over the grate in the floor though. Just to be safe of course, he silently told himself. Even if the creatures don't exist, which they most certainly don't, it never hurts to be prepared. He fell into recharge with a wrench in hand, ready to smack anything that dared touch him while he was out.
A/N-I'm pulling mythical creatures from different tribes that are in America, and not all of them from Nevada or even the southwest. The horned serpents are called Avanyu, from the Hopi and Pueblo tribes (or so the internet says, please correct me if I am wrong because we all know that the internet never lies :)). Thunderbird is pretty self explanatory, I hope.