Maelstrom Chapter 29
Viper Part C

Author's note: This story is part of a LONG series called Maelstrom. It is strictly Gen. 1 - sorry, but that was all that was out when I started writing back in the late 1980's. It began as a fan-publication so the first chapters are in the form of a comic book! If you have not read the nine original Maelstrom Comics and the preceding text stories, I strongly suggest you do. This is a complex universe. They can be found at http// illmatar. deviantart. com (I have put double spaces between the URL here or FF . Net eats the link.) The comics and art which accompanies this series are there...and believe me I am a better artist than writer.

Most chapters of this series contain strong language and violence. Rated M for adult themes! Really! Transformers characters belong to Hasbro. Critiques adored! This scene contains strong language, violence, and sex. Rated M for adult themes!


Transformers characters belong to Hasbro. Story and OC characters are mine.
This particular chapter is also based on the work of my ex-roomie. KC was her character for the most part. Critiques adored!

Viper Part C

Continued from Part B!

The tunnel got darker as they went down so Lancer provided light for her companions. They had portable lights on them, but conserved them in case they should be separated. Once inside the slaving station they were grimly surprised to see it was even more advanced than they had predicted. They had guessed it was a fairly busy but minor site. Now they knew they were dealing with a major supplier of slaves and contraband of other varieties. Marissa had discovered the tip of the iceberg with the activities she'd unearthed...probably the slaver she'd gotten a lead on was but one of several suppliers. They set about the grisly task of opening KC's reflective cocoons and identifying what chunks of meat were left inside. Those that had suffocated were easier to ID, and amazingly Lancer found one slaver who was not yet dead. He was unconscious, but from the cross-legged position she found him in he had realized his peril early and done his best to relax and control his breathing. That move had saved his life.

Unfortunately for him.

Lancer signaled for Pagan just as her captive was coming to. The Drazi 'ported in and bared her teeth at Lancer in appreciation at being included. The two of them did this a lot and made efficient use of their terrifying faces.

The slaver opened his eyes to find a glowing, grinning she-demon just inches past his nose and a six foot smirking lizard woman on her other side. Rodimus kept himself and the others out of the slaver's line of sight with a huge, nasty grin of his own.

"Who?! Where am I?!" the man cried. He was still disoriented from the lack of air.

"You died!" Lancer growled in her surreal, demonic voice. "You're in Hell! What did you expect?!"

The slaver's eyes widened and he stammered excuses and apologies in a jumbled rush. Pagan hissed menacingly and flared her fins.

"It's too late for that now Damned One!" Lancer intoned grimly. She took care to illuminate her mouth from the inside. The effect was certainly ghoulish since it made the bones of her face show distinctly through her skin. Marissa wrinkled her nose and snickered a bit when Rodimus winked at his mate and blew flirtatious kisses her way. Lancer responded by scowling at Rodimus - they could see she was fighting laughter. The effort it took only made her voice weirder. "Confess your sins and we MIGHT not start your eternal torment by tearing your legs off!" Pagan took a hold of both of the slaver's ankles.

That was all it took. The man started blathering at random...his confessions disgusting and enraging the listeners. It was all Lancer and Pagan could do not to tear him apart right away as he sputtered on and on about how he'd gotten into slaving - first just for money he desperately needed, and then later for the enjoyment of torturing and raping his victims as he pleased. It was a story Lancer and Pagan had heard many times before. Faced with hard times and lacking marketable skills, many men got into slaving through freighter piloting. They'd start off shipping goods as freelance contractors but when jobs got scarce they found themselves courted by mid-level slave runners. "Just for one job..." It never occurred to them that job-shortages were often manufactured to create just that sort of desperation.

That first job was usually a shipment of mutants who looked deformed or of homeless, dirty people.....anyone the new slave runner would be able to rationalize "didn't matter". The perks of being allowed to use their shipments for sexual release was often mentioned in an oblique fashion - letting the new slaver take that step on his own. Usually, it resulted in a sort of dam burst effect - once the first rape (assuming it was their first rape) was committed with impunity the slaver found himself exploiting as many victims as possible at first....as if expecting this new game to be abruptly taken away. There was almost always a period of rampant gluttony during which the slaver would often grow more and more "experimental" and violent with their power to torture and humiliate their captives. Addicted, the least dangerous slavers never made it past this stage. For others, the thrill quickly wore off and while they never hesitated to use captives at a whim, it was not their primary reason for taking slaves. Money, power, safety from competitors, and safety from hunters like the Maelstrom crew took priority.

Those that looked at slave-running primarily as a business were generally the most dangerous because they were they least emotionally involved and were less likely to expose themselves taking risks for "prizes" which inspired their lusts. Nevertheless, they always remembered that first thrill...that feeling of absolute power they felt when they realized the life in their hands was theirs to use, abuse, and end depending on their mood at the moment. If they had any doubts at all about the nature of their actions it would come out at moments like this - when they were at the mercy of those that objected to the taking of slaves.

Lancer and Pagan (and Rodimus to a lesser extent) had heard such yammering confessions before. Rodimus looked to Magnus and Marissa to make sure they noted how Lancer and Pagan handled the questioning, and was not surprised to note they were observing it all intently. Lancer managed to guide the slaver's outburst away from random apologizing and confessions of one atrocity or another and on to more useful information. By barely feigning interest she got him to give her names, dates, locations, descriptions, suppliers, competitors, and buyers. If the man had been anything less than terrified he might have noticed this line of questioning more resembled a police interrogation than anything an actual demon might have wanted. Marissa was practically frothing over all the names he dropped - especially when some of them confirmed suspicions she had been reaching on her own. She even went so far as to whisper a few questions in Rodi's ear for him to send along to Lancer. The mutant met Marissa's eyes briefly and barely smiled - then went on to ask Marissa's questions. The slaver didn't know everything Marissa wanted to know, but he gave her a foothold.

When they had everything they thought they could get, Lancer could not help but be cruel to this helpful soul. She defanged (although it took effort as angry as she was.)

"Do you have all that on record, Robert?" Lancer asked, looking into Pagan's com-eye.

"Affirmative," his not-so neutral voice came back to them. They could all hear him struggling to remain calm. Of all of them, Robert dealt with this kind of thing directly the least - and therefore it upset him the most. The nausea and anger were apparent in his strangled voice.

The Slaver blinked in confusion at this exchange.

"Surprise!" Lancer cried. "You aren't dead after all! I'm a mutie you see. Lancer of the Maelstrom in case you never heard of me, and you just gave us all kinds of help in ridding the universe of scum like you! Thanks so much! As a reward, we are not going to do to you what you have done to people you've treated so kindly of late, and just in case you were disappointed at not really being in Hell, we're going to kill you now. All I can say is I hope the afterlife is exactly as kind to you as you were to mutant merchandise such as myself... kinder even!"

She allowed the man about 30 seconds to think that over and the instant she saw realization turn into hate and outrage on his features she shorted his heart and brain functions. He died instantly.

Marissa sighed, and shuddered a bit.

"Rissa?" her mate asked in concern.

"I know there's no better way to handle that, but I wish there was," she said.

"We all do, Marissa," Rodimus said softly, "But I can't think of an alternative."

"It's not just the killing that bothers me Rodi. It's too quick. I mean, I don't like the idea of executing anyone, but I also think somehow he should have been forced to make retribution somehow. He made so many suffer for so long....!"

Lancer cocked her head at Marissa and brandished her nails, "I believe in Hell, Marissa. I believe in demons who plunge their heads into your soul and feed on what they find there.... He will meet his justice one way or another.... and so will we."

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They made careful haste over the rest of the structure, but found little more of use aside from a list of scheduled stops for the next shipment which helped verify and clarify what they'd learned from the Slaver's confessions. Placing mechanical teleporters on all of the stasis pods let Robert bring the unconverted people onto the Maelstrom where they would be treated, debriefed, and returned to their homes. About 90 people would be given a second chance that day, and it made all of their rescuers feel a bit better. Rodimus in particular took a moment to look into each face, sending to Lancer that maybe it would help him dream of someone he hadn't killed for a change.

A slight balm for losing Snarl.

The rescuees would still have trauma to deal with, and the knowledge that they must ever be alert to being taken again, but they would have a chance. For many the worst part would be having to keep their experiences secret. Slavers and buyers alike would mark them for death if they tried to go public with their experiences. Some would be likely to try anyway and would be dismissed by most as delusional before some freak "accident" killed them or they vanished again. Most would manage though and it gave Rodimus hope - especially since some of them were so terribly young.

They decided they didn't want any of the corpses found and studied since their wounds were inconsistent with a building's collapse. Fire became their cover story. Lancer carefully reduced every corpse to ashes before they left...taking care to similarly reduce other items as well to insure consistency.

Pagan teleported back to the ship with the list and a brief, scaly hug for Lancer who fought for breath a good while after the Drazi was gone. Once she got her wind back she ignited a slow fuse to the slavers' shuttle and they all ran like hell for the upper warehouse. Magnus activated the charges KC had set and the building started crumbling almost silently....as if the earlier shaking it had taken had finally proven too much. Rodimus and Magnus switched forms again and came out yelling for people to clear the area. They had been seen going in - they had to be seen coming out the same way. As the structure crumbled in on itself, witnesses also started raising alarms and calling for help. Cybertron's emergency crews would come running to the spot as if on cue. In the bedlam Rodi and Magnus slipped away to revert to their human selves.

Now perfectly disguised as humans, Rodimus and Magnus stood by and privately evaluated their peoples' time and performance posing as curious by-standers. Even though they had seen to it themselves that the building was unsalvageable, both were still looking for exemplary performance on the part of their First-Response emergency teams.

They found little to criticize. The first crew was there in less than four minutes - seeing to it first that the area was cleared of potential victims. Rodimus was hard pressed not to laugh as a Paradronian crowd controller shooed their little group of saboteurs "out of harm's way". Lancer smirked - try and make her laugh during an interrogation would he?

It was too late of course. The fuse finally reached the fuel tanks and the first explosion shook the region - causing many on-lookers to shriek in panic and press hands to their ears. The emergency crews cursed "those wretched hidden stores of energon", thinking they had encountered someone's secret fuel stash from some earlier war. Such caches littered Cybertron's older sections, becoming unstable with age, and posing a danger to construction workers who often found them by causing them to explode accidentally. Their owners had hidden and shielded them from detection and while many had been found and raided long ago, enough remained to provide Rodimus' group a handy alibi. The slavers' partners might know that a ship had been hidden there, but again the need for secrecy would keep them from saying so....and if they thought it strange the fires would burn so hot and long as to destroy all the evidence it would only be to count their blessings that the slaving station remained undiscovered.

Rodimus expressed regret about not being able to salvage that unknown Decepticon's corpse.

"A funeral pyre's better than rusting Rodimus," Lancer assured him.

He shrugged, and nodded assent.

Less than an hour later, the fire was out, the rubble was stabilized, and Optimus was confronted by a small squadron of Paradronian citizens demanding they be allowed to "do something" with that dangerous site. He approved with little reluctance although he DID want to do something about Rodi's evil snickering as the young Prime and Magnus walked by Optimus' office. Obviously Optimus' partner was less than repentant about causing THIS particular snag in Optimus' day. They didn't even pause to help him - they just kept right on going. Fiends.

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Jazz pulled up to KC's quarters as unobtrusively as he could....meaning he did it like he always did - stereo blaring and wheels skidding fancy designs on the pavement. KC's exhaustion was apparent in that she didn't even stir in his front seat. He didn't worry too much about what the neighbors would think of him carrying her inside. There weren't many neighbors and it certainly wasn't the first time he'd had to carry her home. She had a habit of working herself to sleep in Perceptor's lab until even the Autobot scientist was forced to notice her curled up inside their research. Then he always called for Jazz who would take KC out of Perceptor's cradling arms and exchange amused looks with her mentor. They BOTH found her particularly funny when she crashed.

This time was different. This time Jazz was really worried.

True he always worried to a degree when she fell asleep while she was working. He worried she pushed herself too hard, worried she was missing out on a more normal social life for a young woman barely out of her teens, and worried in a more abstract way that she might somehow get hurt falling asleep amidst Perceptor's arcane projects. Perceptor had a habit of forgetting KC was even there until he needed her.

This time though it wasn't a matter of simple lack of sleep. KC had been under orders to go to bed early the night before...LANCER'S orders. This first mission was something Lancer was monitoring very closely and she was strict with her student. Jazz had been there for some of KC's final training exercises at Lancer's insistence. His presence made KC visibly nervous which Lancer had harshly told the younger mutant was precisely the point. To get those devastating metal shaping powers under control required the ability to concentrate even when her emotions were involved. Having hurt her best friend once already with those powers, confronting KC with Jazz was about the harshest test Lancer could easily devise. Throughout the drills, during which Lancer demanded KC perform specific tasks with her powers that grew ever more complicated even as Lancer insisted they be performed more and more quickly, Lancer also repeatedly reminded her student that she was exercising.

These drills were as crucial as an athlete preparing for competition....and like an athlete KC could expect to seriously injure herself if she wasn't in condition. KC had argued at first that using her powers was a mental exercise that merely required thought - how could she hurt herself by simply thinking? She shut up the instant Lancer reminded her of the weeks she had just spent in enforced isolation - delirious, raving, and out of control. Any sight of anything metal resulted in a hysterical fit and the metal in question being twisted into a unrecognizable mass.....even if the piece in question had been a mere spoon.

She had been completely convinced she had killed Jazz the day her powers first developed and refused to believe otherwise....even when he came to talk to her.

Training her had only begun after this delusional state had passed... and it didn't pass quickly. Lancer reminded KC over and over that while this kind of mental imbalance most often accompanied a mutant's first development of their abilities, it was possible to have a relapse at any time. Using mutant abilities took effort and energy. Overexertion, emotional distress, exhaustion, illness or any other physical or psychological stressers could easily cause another breakdown. Usually these things passed when the chemical imbalances in the brain stabilized and the body toxins caused by exercising mutant talents cleared out, but it was not unheard of for mutants to be permanently damaged by over-taxing themselves. They gave themselves anything from strokes and heart-attacks to toxic shock. Some were even allergic to the very chemicals using their powers produced.

Medical tests after KC's initial illness showed her metabolism had stabilized and she was at low risk for any of these dangers, but Jazz had done a lot of research on the subject during her quarantine...just enough research to be a well informed nervous wreck.

He carried her into her quarters and once again blessed the EDC mandate that all of their personnel on Cybertron have Autobot-accessible apartments. He was able to take her straight to the corner of the basically open flat which served as her bedroom. She didn't even open her eyes when he put her carefully into bed. He pulled up the covers and sat down on the floor. He had plenty to do of course, but there was no way he was leaving.

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Two days later, Vector Sigma received authorization to bring the next group of Transformers into being.....and an additional set of very confusing instructions.

The group of femmes it produced was a defiant challenge to the Autobot High Council. While the super computer followed its orders about random personality traits the body shells reflected its uncertainty about those orders. It had access to Terran data-bases. Rodimus wanted it to understand more about the universe the new Cybertronians would inhabit and Vector Sigma found one legend in particular which seemed to sum up its misgivings. It now felt (correctly) that its survival depended entirely on the survival of its Autobot guardians, but it also had reason to worry about their victory.

Rodimus was making himself very clear...the minute the Autobots didn't need it anymore the young Prime planned to kill Vector Sigma...personally.

A surge in the female population increased the likelihood that day would come, although Vector Sigma kept its fears to itself. It had its own reasons for keeping the female population low.

Infusing the new female lives with random characteristics, including Decepticon characteristics seemed nothing short of suicidal to Vector Sigma. It feared one of these new, unpredictable lives would surely turn on the Autobots, perhaps destroying them. While Vector Sigma surely wouldn't have minded to see the entire council painfully dead, it knew its own demise would shortly follow.

Then it realized...any contingency it ran ended in its death.

All of its plotting to regain domination had distracted it from the obvious. If the Jabez won, it was dead. If the Autobots won, sooner or later, they would discover its final secrets. And it was dead.

........

Well...at least it no longer had to rein in its hatred.

Serpents being the Terran symbol for treachery, Vector Sigma stated its resolve in the only way it could. It ignored the orders for 'random" in one case...and worked a vicious contingency plan into its special project of the day.

If its death was inevitable, revenge was preferable.

It reached out with its mind, found the perfect agent, and went to work.

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Rodimus looked over the new arrivals and grinned in a way that made Optimus want to shake him.

Sometimes Rodi's immature public persona just got into Optimus' wiring, even though the Senior Prime knew most of it was a facade.

The council had been assembled, as had Kup, Chromia, some visiting diplomats from Earth, and a few high ranking officers from EDC. Naturally the Terran news organizations (and the newly congealed Paradronian news gatherers) invited themselves the instant they got wind of the "New Breed of Cybertronians" Their presence made Optimus nervous - he didn't want them bothering the newborns - but Rodimus was gleeful. He intended for this event to make headlines.

"I think someone's trying to tell us something," Rodimus observed sagely in a whisper only Optimus could here.

"Snakes...they're all snakes..." Optimus muttered in befuddlement. "Not that there's anything wrong with snakes, but WHY?"

Rodimus grinned but decided his partner was probably best left in the dark.

The list of names read like herpetologist's wish list. Asp, Adder, Viper, Anaconda, Python, and Boa. All of them had a unique style of armored plating that cover their mid-rifts and joints like reptilian belly scales with thin strips of metal that flowed smoothly over each other.

Asp and Viper were the most obviously serpentine - with long, slender limbs and necks. Their movements were swift and graceful, and both were as likely to twist their heads or bodies all the way around as they were to simply move their feet to face you. Most Transformers were capable of full-bodied rotation but it required the effort of unlocking some mechanisms and then re-locking them later. It usually wasn't worth it. For these girls that didn't seem to be an issue. Viper sneered disdainfully when some of the reporters were a bit dismayed when she turned her head 360 degrees and bent backwards at the waist to inspect them. Asp had a rather sweet, open face though despite her name and the cobra-like patterns on her torso and back. Aside from that single black design she was a study in warm browns and beige. Viper, by contrast was coolly aloof - her smooth visor revealed nothing of her thoughts other than a chilly arrogance. She was painted in dark, mottled khakis.

Adder was all angles and sharp razor-like lines. Her head, her armor, and the diamond-like patterns of her paint-job implied shards of glass. Her colors were cool white and light grey with darker grey accents. Her optics darted nervously and focused on every movement instantly. Then she would stare unblinkingly at the source of motion until she seemed to decide it presented no threat or another motion caught her attention. Her stare was particularly unnerving if it happened to be focused on you . People found themselves apologizing to her for having the audacity to walk by. She said nothing.

Python and Boa were larger than their sisters by over ten feet. They were also bulkier and more obviously built for strength. Their movements remained sinuous though...and at the back of Rodimus' mind Lancer was applauding the whole group - here at least was one bunch of Transformers to whom grace was natural. Boa and Python also stood out in that their body armor was painted almost exactly like the snakes they were named for - in rich browns and blacks in camouflaged patterns from head to toe. They seemed cheerfully amused by all the fuss and were quickly engaged in conversation with those at hand. Boa in particular disarmed the reporters by following their every question with one of her own - sometimes rather personal questions at that. They couldn't help but answer her though...she was obviously sincerely curious and they responded to her as they might an inquisitive child - for all that she was over 50 feet of heavily armored warrior robot.

Anaconda was painted a subdued, solid olive green...which Elita remarked was good because there was just too much body there for a loud pattern too. The shy new femme stood a good twenty feet taller than Ultra Magnus....a fact she seemed painfully aware of. She was terrifyingly strong too - terrifying to herself that was. She was not clunky or graceless by any means, but she seemed that way because she grew self-conscious the minute she felt someone's eyes on her. She became so nervous she tended to stumble or simply crush whatever she was holding. Python seemed to sense this and intervened with the reporters so that most of the questions were aimed at her....and she would answer even the ones that weren't. Chromia and Elita exchanged glances over this - it was almost funny to see poor enormous Ana trying to hide behind her smaller sister.

The entire group turned out to be an odd sort of triple changer. Every one of them had a snake-like mode where the majority of their forms became entirely serpentine but their upper torsos remained unchanged. Anaconda, Adder, and Viper were capable of modifying this intermediate form into a full snake mode. Asp and Viper had jet transforms while Adder's vehicle mode hailed back to the old pyramid aerial modes of Cybertron's past. She was sleeker and more bullet-shaped than the old Cons had been but the similarity was enough to give all the Autobot veterans a case of the surges.... especially when she took flight. That shape had meant death to many of their friends in the past. Boa and Python turned out to be a matched pair of small, sturdy trucks and Anaconda transformed into of all things, a large sleek submarine. Naturally she was unable to make use of that form on Cybertron and listed to the side almost at once - nearly crushing some of the humans and a building.

She transformed immediately and stood there with a blank expression on her face. With a flash of insight Elita realized the poor girl was in a complete panic. She took Ana aside and quietly explained that there was nothing at all wrong with her alternate mode and that she would be able to use it in the seas of Earth. The look of desperate relief this news brought on was too pathetic to be funny. Anaconda obviously had thought she was defective when she couldn't move or even support herself in alternate mode. She very shyly requested if she might be allowed to visit Earth some day. Elita smiled and assured Anaconda that the very minute her basic training was finished on Cybertron she would be permanently stationed on Earth if that's what she wanted.

"And I thought the first batch was trouble," Magnus muttered under his breath to Optimus, sizing up Anaconda. "That personality just doesn't work in that body."

"Viper and Adder worry me more," Optimus whispered. Adder's behavior was unchanged. In the hours since she'd been activated she'd not spoken a word other than her name and continued to stare at every movement. Boa's attempts to talk to her didn't make any difference although Boa didn't seem the least perturbed by Adder's failure to speak. Boa happily continued talking to her sister, politely pausing for Adder to respond now and then, but continuing right along when Adder merely glared. Optimus did note however, that while Boa was talking, Adder fixated only on her instead of locking eyes with one target after another. She even followed Boa a short way when Boa ambled over to talk to Rodimus but held back and stared at their conversation... or rather she stared at their hands while they talked.

Optimus was annoyed to note Rodimus didn't seem perturbed in the least at the way Adder's head snapped to follow every gesture. In fact, as the conversation continued the elder Prime suspected not all of Rodi's gestures were entirely due to the conversation. The young Prime was deliberately drawing Adder's gaze this way and that. The elder Prime sighed inwardly - disturbing as everyone else found Adder's behavior, Rodimus was apparently amused by it.

Viper on the other hand seemed intent on insulting as many people as possible in the least amount of time. She even scorned her siblings - denouncing them as sub-standard in every regard from their markings to their basic construction. Asp was obviously a "dullard", Boa and Python were "clowns", Adder was "a mental case", and Anaconda was pronounced a "hulking moron". The humans were labeled "debris under foot," and the Command staff was obviously "completely incompetent for even allowing the debris to accumulate."

Optimus was forced to take Magnus by the arm and whisper desperately for him to restrain himself in front of the diplomats.

Continued in Part D