"There are that many types of Cybertronian?" Lennox asked, highly impressed.
He, Ramsey, and Arcee were sitting in the human rec room, looking through old pictures she had. Optimus Prime had circulated to his people his rules over what the humans were not allowed to view in terms of technology, so some of the photos had black areas superimposed over sections.
"Hang on, go back one," Ramsey said.
Arcee obligingly went back to a picture made of two photographs. One of a tall, heavily built transformer, the other of a relatively small communications device. "Oh, that guy. I hate his very bolts! And yes, that's the same 'Con in both photos."
"Wow, what happened to all the metal?" Lennox asked.
"Massive abuse of subspace," Arcee said. "If you can disrupt subspace, which is not easy to do, you can force him to transform back to root mode. He's Soundwave, the Decepticons Chief Communications Officer, and he's one of the scariest they have."
"Bloodthirsty?" Lennox asked, studying the face. It had both a visor, and also a mask over it's mouth.
"No, just incredibly competent," Arcee said reluctantly. "That, and his Cassettes. Frenzy is one of his."
"That little freak?" Lennox asked.
"Yeah," Arcee said, shivering. "Wanna see more?"
"Sure," Ramsey said affably. Being decidedly oldfashioned at times, he poured more energon into Arcee's ceramic mug from the hazmat container the base used for the hazardous (to humans) substance. "Hold on, what's that?"
"Oh, that's one of the Seeker types," Arcee said. While the Cybertronian in the photo was clearly a flier (and a jet at that), it was humanoid in appearance, but with massive air intakes reaching above it's head and large wings on it's back.
"So, relatively human in it's motion range," Lennox said thoughtfully. "Are that type 'Cons or Autobots, generally?"
"Their home city was one of the first destroyed in the war," Arcee said, sadness tingeing her voice. "Treachery, I think. I had a good friend there. I think they were the officer caste for the Seeker supertype. If Starscream or Thundercracker were one of them, Earth would have been invaded by a unified Decepticon Cybertron vorns ago."
"They've got better brains, er processors?" Ramsey asked. He was visibly fascinated by all this.
"They're trained from Sparklinghood in tactics, strategy, and what you'd probably call the real Jet Judo," Arcee explained. "They're also more flexible if you get one of Starscream's frametype on the ground, you could tie them down and do what you want. This type are dangerous on as well as off the ground."
"Ooooo, I like them," Ramsey said admiringly. He meant aesthetically as well as functionally. "What do you mean by 'real Jet Judo'?"
"You know how Sideswipe likes to latch onto Seekers midflight and try and make them crash?" Arcee asked. The Corvette was vicious. Ironhide was still making excuses about the missing twin. "Him and Sunstreaker call it 'jet judo'. They're teasing the Decepticon Seekers, making fun of the fact that all the real practitioners are deactivated and the true Jet Judo is lost forever. The Twin's judo isn't related in any way to the real thing."
"Those Decepticon jets are crybabies and prima donnas," one of the NESTS human soldiers said, quite loudly.
"Bull," Ramsey said from his table where he held court in the rec room.
The soldier got up and marched over. "What was that?"
"I said, bullshit," Ramsey said, breathing into the man's face.
"They had to tie the scrapheap down outside ferchrissake," the soldier said. "Claustrophobic my achin' ass."
Ramsey slowly poured himself another shot of Whyte And MacKay, and knocked it back before answering. "You get laid before?"
"What?" the soldier asked, confused by the sudden change of topic.
"Ever been laid? Son, have you ever fucked a woman?" Ramsey repeated.
"Yeah, course I have," the soldier said, still confused.
"Would you voluntarily let someone cut your block and tackle off?" Ramsey asked. "Give up sex forever?"
The man's hands went over his crotch reflexively. "Hell no!"
The mechanic nodded. "Well, son, that's what it's like for the Seekers. You've seen the flightsims that the Air Force use, right? Cockpit mockup, big screens, hydraulics on the big ones? Expensive suckers?"
The light dawned on the soldier. But he still wasn't sure where the hell Ramsey was going with this.
"I've got a brother, works in engineering. I think he's working for a company that makes fuel pumps for petrol station pumps of all things at the moment. Loves flying. He bought a copy of some fancy flight sim program, and then bought a dozen damn computer screens. Bought a secondhand old cockpit from an aircraft scrapper, spent weeks wiring it up to some crappy old interface or something.. He spent even more money on the computer than I did on Silverblack's engine. And when it's all working, him sitting in that cockpit, flying endless missions through the clear blue skies in his monitors, to him it's freedom, it's better than drink. I was visiting when a power spike killed the power supply in his computer, and he was damn near suicidal waiting for the replacement."
"I... think I get what you're saying," the soldier said slowly. "Uh... not everyone thinks the same way I do?"
"Exactly," Ramsey said, pouring the last of the MacKay into his glass. "Ever consider asking a woman to tie you up and whip you until you cry?"
"Hell no! Sounds painful to me."
"Some people do, and they enjoy it. Go sit the hell down."
"You're a man of unexpected depths," Lennox said from where he'd been watching the whole lecture.
Ramsey drank the scotch he'd poured. "People are people, even if their skin is made of carbon steel. Now, you mentioned Jet Judo, there any other Cybertronian martial arts?"
A/N: Yes, G1 is being integrated into this. The additional Seekertype Arcee speaks of is, of course, the G1 Seekers like G1 Skywarp and the like.