Bad literature
Disclaimer: I do not own Transformers and all I get out of this is good mood.
Warning: Dirty limerick.
They were still in hiding, having found a cave that could shield two of then in their ground alt modes and a ledge that offered little cover from anyone who might decide to look down from above them. Except for Topspin and Roadbuster they were all in their alt modes because while a group of vehicles down in the canyon might seem suspicious no one here would know enough to suspect the right thing.
Topspin was walking Roadbuster through some first aid to his system, to seal all leaks that would lead to loosing energon and isolate all wires that might fry him if they came in touch with water. Field weldings would have to do until Ratchet arrived. Optimus Prime had sent an encrypted message to inform them about the back-up they were going to receive and the reactions varied.
"Ironhide is a good gun and Jazz has his uses as well, but Bumblebee is pretty inexperienced and Taser is plain bad choice." Whirl's voice was thoughtful as he assessed the Prime's companions' strengths and weaknesses in his mind.
"Bumblebee may be one of the youngest, but he proved in Tyger Pax that he can keep his CPU in a tight spot. We are the big guns, Prime decided to come to salvage the Autobot-human relations," Springer answered. Not that there were any yet, at least if Ronald and Judy didn't count.
He hadn't commented the part about Taser and Whirl called him on it readily.
"Taser shouldn't be trusted with this, at least. He has been good thus far, but then he hasn't had much chance to do any real harm," he voiced his distrust. The odd, moody con hadn't made good impression on him, despite the information he'd had about All Spark.
"It's not his loyalty I question, it's his stability. It's not been that long since his last self-abusive spell," Scoop stated. Coming actually face to face with somebody from his past just might send Taser over the edge again and they didn't need suicide-by-con in the middle of the battle for All Spark.
"Ratchet cleared him and he is a good medic," Topspin answered, "but I still don't like this." Because while becoming one of Endgame's happies was a reason to want to crush several cranial units, it hadn't likely grown any moral structure to the mech. And there hadn't been any from begin with, he had been a con.
"Decepticons don't just see the light! Who has ever heard of one single case?" he demanded. Springer made an annoying noise, but Whirl beat him to commenting.
"Pincer did, not that he was too bad from begin with. Just misled by his creator." There was a moment of silence during which they all tried to find a reference to Pincer from their databanks.
"He was a fictional character!" Roadbuster complained, the first to search from the right database.
Scoop let out a helpless, stuttering laugh, remembering the mostly low-quality Stormbringer epistle files that had been The Entertainment of the troops in Iacon.
An epistle was a writing directed or sent to a person or group of persons, usually an email and a very formal, often didactic and elegant one. During Golden Age epistles were written in strict accordance to formalized, Altihex tradition, especially the Guardian epistles. This reflected the amount of Altihex influence upon the epistle writers. Any deviancy was not the result of accident but indicates an unusual motive of the writer. After the war begun the new mission report style gained popularity. At the same time the general quality dropped, due to many eager amateur writers, but some could make true art out of the standard form: personnel, activity, location, unit, time and equipment. Inexplicably, Sunstreaker was one of them.
The epistles had been entertaining and Prowl had been clever enough to boost their popularity by making an attempt, that Jazz had predictably sabotaged, to forbid them. Officially because they were high spyware-risk files, all the while implying he thought they were bad influence. Which they hadn't been; encouraging of reckless behaviour aside, the tales had been morally very sound despite the open defiance of orders, disrespect of ranking officers and some shady military contractors included. No bad deed ever went unpunished, no good deed unrewarded in the end, not to mention it had been uplifting to read something where the Autobots won all the time.
"I think Pincer's pretty dull for an ex-con. His sweetspark Jink is a much better character," he mused, wondering whether he still had those tales in some chip.
"Well, the whole thing's pretty unrealistic. No Decepticon is going to defect just because they fall in love. People just like to read cross-faction romance," Broadside pointed out. He had thought that the obligatory interpersonal descriptions had just hindered the finer points of the reports, namely battles and tactics, but the common opinion hadn't agreed with him on this.
"Well, they were just side-blasts," Topspin said. "Stormbringer's the hero without fear. Not that I like him so much either. Woundweaver is the most interesting one," he named the eccentric, spastic lieutenant his favourite. He had mostly starred the incident reports leaning towards comedy.
"Wonder you didn't pick the medic," Roadbuster said and closed Topspin's plating again. He had done all he could for the mess of halfway melted processing tank and the cable and wire mesh. "Wavelength is the only interesting character anyway. He kicked aft like there was no tomorrow."
Springer shook his head half amused, half annoyed. As fun as reminiscing was, this was neither the time nor place.
"Getting back to the original topic, Ratchet says Taser's stable and Prime says he's trustworthy and that's good enough for me for now. On to the next topic: we need a diversion to distract the humans in the base from finding out about Ronald and Judy. They may be generally sympathetic, but I doubt they would fire their own people for our sake," he said little dryly, humming deep in his cooling system absentmindedly. The problem with that was, that they weren't working with professionals there and while distraction would draw part of forces – and the leader's attention – out of the dam base it would also tighten security.
And while they might get in unnoticed as the human's transport, there was no way they could move freely inside unnoticed. Out of all sentient species this one just had to be organic.
Irony was the art of putting together incompatible things, Roadbuster knew.
"If the ruse takes place far enough from here and seems to threaten some other installation they probably wouldn't raise the security levels here, but you realise, that our main problem is that we have to trust three amateurs to do the job for us?" Roadbuster pointed out. "Have you even wondered how they could carry the All Spark anywhere?" The Wreckers and their plan were oil, the humans were water and without something to break the polarity this wouldn't even make irony.
Topspin was a medic and medics were supposed to know what made mechs work, but also what made them not work, especially strike force medics. He groaned. To his defence he wasn't used to extending this knowledge to beings with so different limitations than theirs, but even then, it was embarrassing that it would take literature to give him the clue.
"I think I have an idea," he said slowly, "do you remember The Fort Scyk epistle?" It had been one of the lower quality ones, not because writer couldn't handle the style, but because he had blatantly ignored several scientific facts.
"Topspin, there is no gas that could knock out a Cybertronian, never mind the rumors about what the late Neutrals of Yuss tried. It was cosmic rust and it killed," Broadside said, giving him disbelieving stare. Topspin practically glowed.
"But we aren't dealing with Cybertronians here, are we? Humans have to breath and what they breath gets into their bloodstream and into their nerve system from there!" he exclaimed victoriously and while he might have thought, while bandaging Ronald's fingers, that whoever had designed human bodies should be hunted down, profoundly thanked for fascinating study and then shot for coming up with something so fragile, now he blessed it. He could feel the very air around them electrifying and it was like polarity breaking.
"So in the end we only need the leader's creation to get the gas inside and after that we can handle this how we like, as long as we erase the security footage. Can you create something that takes effect fast, but doesn't harm them overmuch?" Springer asked and Topspin grinned in response.
"Just ask how many concoctions. But I need somebody to go procure ingredients," he answered. They could have this done and over before Optimus Prime and his troops even arrived, which was good. It never hurt to reinforce the invincible public image.
This moment of triumph was when Sandstorm contacted them. The transmission was so highly encrypted it counted as not only caution, but as a tone. A figure of speech that spoke volumes of complications. Not that it was fully surprising: the most devastatingly oddball catastrophes always seemed to seek the Autobots out and Wreckers were no exception.
I have good news and bad news, Sandstorm predictably started. What followed wasn't predictable.
At all.
Something was bugging Judy. Well, a whole lot of things bugged her, but this had come to her mind when they had stopped to buy lemonade and sandwiches to eat during the journey, much to Sandstorm's irritation, but he understood the necessity of fuelling. When Ron exited the department store carrying a brown paper baggage Judy cleared her throat.
"So, what do you use as money?" she asked. "Back on your Cybertron. I mean, you know what money is, right?" You could never be absolute sure about strange cultures, if some people had used seashells as money and they were human who knew what mechs did. But surely they had to do something to trade for food. Or fuel, rather.
"Energon," Sandstorm answered automatically, his attention elsewhere. Ron reached to the back seat to give Reg his chicken sandwitch and cola bottle. It was only then that he remembered they didn't have a bottle opener.
"Hey, do you have any sharp things inside you," he asked their chauffeur.
Sandstorm forced his thoughts away from the disturbingly familiar dream scenes Ron had described and turned his attention to inside.
"Many sharp things, as you call them. Why?" Ron then petitioned for opening their liquid containers and he transformed a shard of plating that would protect a small joint in his primary form, slightly amused, but much distracted. Ron had described battles like he had really seen them, a city long destroyed and he had a friend who was a mother to all those who fought. Mother whose face he couldn't remember…
Judy gave Sandstorm an odd look. She was a bright girl and while she didn't know much about Autobot physiology she had asked about the luminescent liquid Topspin had leaked and she had received an answer.
"Is that what Topspin was bleeding when Brawl shot at him?" she asked.
"That too." It was hard to tell without face, or any kind of non-verbal cues, to be seen and the voice so mechanical, but Judy was pretty sure that Sandstorm's mind was a million miles away then. She wondered whether she should worry about crashing, but then again this was the mech equivalent to running and when had she last run into anyone, even distracted? Surely super advanced robotic organisms had some self control. Ron managed to wrangle her bottle open and handed it to her.
"So, you use blood as money? Isn't that kind of creepy?" Sandstorm thought about it.
"Actually the closest equivalent humans have is food," he answered. Judy's eyes widened and a big, big grin tugged the corners of her mouth.
"So let me get this straight: monetary purposes aside, energon is both blood and food for you." Sandstorm somehow managed to give an impression that he gave her a blank look.
"Correct," he replied.
Judy then crossed her index fingers at Sandstorm and shouted at him:
"Vade retro, nosferatu!" For a small moment Sandstorm was deliciously silent, Ron and Reg snickered and Judy mentally squealed.
"What?"
An explanation that actually wrenched Sandstorm's mind away from the All Spark and Megatron followed, but now it was Ron who was distracted. He had often wished that his life was more interesting. He had read a lot since the day three letters had joined together in his mind and made CAT, and ever since he had lamented how boring it was to be an American teenager in Tranquility. He had never been a vampire fan, an attempt to read Dracula had been aborted by the letter and diary format before he had even gotten into Dracula's castle, but cowboys and Indians had been his favourites and compared to them reality was just plain dull. Except now it wasn't. This fact was coupled with a nagging sense that things were about to go utterly, horribly wrong. Not because of the Autobots, or the Decepticons, not even a secret government agency. No, the problem was the dreams and a vague sense of betrayal. He probably couldn't have put his feeling into words even in a better situation, but he was sure he had been slighted somehow. So he was paranoid? It was probably healthy right now.
He looked over his shoulder at Reginald Simmons, Reg, who had stopped snickering and looked slightly awkward again. He felt even sorrier for Reg than himself; the kind of trouble he and Judy had joked about having gotten with their parents was nothing compared to the trouble Reg was getting into, not to mention he was in this alone. He and Judy might have been there with him, but Reg didn't even know them.
"I'm really very sorry," he felt the need to say, but Reg only shook his head.
"Don't be," he said and he had the oddest glow in his eyes. Ron wasn't sure why, but suddenly he thought that if Reg wasn't obviously a little wimpish he might have been pretty scary guy. But still, they owed Reg at least friendship for this. So, time to get to know him.
"So, what's your favourite colour?" he asked and it was so obvious his best friend was a girl.
"Grey?" Reg made it sound like a question.
That hadn't gotten them very far. And he wasn't going to go for the "what are you going to be when you grow up" and not only because it reminded him of his elderly aunts.
"Do you have any favourite books?" he tried again. At least this time the answer wasn't monosyllabic.
Optimus Prime thought that he should feel more elated as Ark, piloted by Jetfire, neared the blue planet, but the best he could manage was anxiety. They had to win here, but even then winning would stop nothing. Not the war, not the hatred. He didn't regret defending freedom and justice, didn't regret for an astrosecond rising against his brother. His one true regret was that he hadn't changed Megatron's mind. He knew that he'd had influence on his brother, but he could never predict the results of his advice. He would say something, or not say, and Megatron would decide on a course of action. Maybe an unwise course and in the end, the wrong course.
Many of those conversations haunted him now, but two above any other. The first had occurred after the Senate had vetoed their petition for a bid re-evaluation for the two moons stations trade committee. Megatron had waited for his temper to cool off in the huge, dark halls, unwilling to go to public when feeling so enraged. Optimus had then wondered who his brother had been before he had been chosen as a candidate for the Lord High Protector; Megatron could curse like a miner… or a dock worker.
"How can you stand them sucking energon from the poor's cube?" he had asked. Optimus had laid a hand on his shoulder. He hadn't been overmuch worried, Megatron's temper had been no news for him.
"I can't see the future. I can only work with the present. If I'm outgunned I'll get mad, but then I'll re-evaluate. Nothing is ever truly over." Megatron had looked at him silent as void and he had felt uncommonly nervous. Then the Lord High Protector had simply said:
"You are right." His optics hadn't flickered.
He had changed, little by little. The Megatron Alpha Trion had first introduced to him could never have killed a fellow Cybertronian in cold energon and while he had been suspicious of other races, his very function to defend their world from all possible threats, he hadn't considered them inferior.
The second conversation had happened with both of them holding the other at gunpoint.
"If you hate me so much, then why make such a drama of killing me when a simple blast to the Spark would do it?" he had asked. It had been after one of Megatron's… overt plans that tended to fall apart due to their unnecessary complexity.
"One might think you are just trying to get my attention," he had daunted the Decepticon leader, holding his attention so Ratchet could stabilise Ironhide.
"You would not be wrong," had been the answer and Megatron had smirked.
Optimus Prime, supreme commander of the Autobots, was returned to the present by Jazz's tight, almost hungry voice.
"A Decepticon ship at ultra violet, sub-segment two, mark 114/301/22. It is Nemesis." He turned to look at his people under the gentle, muted light of the bridge and his gaze lingered in Bumblebee, mute since Tyger Pax, and Taser, lost and betrayed by his own, however content now. It might seem eternal now, but he wasn't going to dishonour their suffering by letting his weariness cloud his judgement. They were halfway between the asteroid belt and Mars, approaching Earth at full speed.
"We are about to commence offensive action," he told them, "Jazz, hail Xantium! Nemesis can not successfully fight both ships at the same time and time is of value now. Open all gunports!" The fight was commencing in slow motion, both ships rotating to get to the ideal positions.
Ark: approaching, Soundwave told to his cassettes that now controlled the whole ship. Enemy, Buzzsaw and Garboil in the Engineering, Rumble and Laserbeak at the secondary weapons control while Howlback was the main helmsmech and Ravage piloting the ship, their bigger form's, twice as big as their siblings', allowing them to do so easily. He was the communications officer as well as the captain. Ineffective; too few to manage the ship; Starscream's plan inadvisable; risk of getting stranded on Earth: moderately high.
Rotate 115. Propability of Xantium attacking: high. He didn't feel hate; illogical feeling. But if he had hated something it would have been sentient ships.
Objective: delay Ark's journey until dame exceeds class 2A. His words echoed through seven minds and he acknowledged the one that was missing.
Okay, boss! Rumble shouted exited through the comm. line and Laserbeak whooped. He knew they only rued Frenzy wasn't with them to enjoy the heat.
Commence, he ordered.
And Optimus Prime ordered: Fire. And Xantium, who was now reluctantly closing the distance at top speed, leaving Wreckers without back-up, consulted her battle computer.
When I engage Nemesis leave the battle, sir. I can handle the fight, she all but outright ordered. And Soundwave captured the transmission. Nemesis launched an attack, soundless in the dark void, and Ark evaded the best Jetfire could manoeuvre and attacked.
Optimus Prime had a vision of a new Cybertron without war of strife, but he knew no one could force true peace. Just like Megatron could never force absolute order upon life, even mechanical life like theirs. Megatron could advance as he was capable regardless of the cost, kill whoever he wished, there would be no order or peace for faction which very existence was based on the survival of the fittest. And he couldn't force peace, he thought and flinched as both Ark and Nemesis trembled from plasma blasts and numerous alerts went off in a flicker of red and low-sonic sounds, no matter how much he might have wished so.
For peace without freedom was mere captivity.
During their traffic laws abiding ride from Mission City to the canyon the Wreckers were hiding in the weather had changed from childhood sunny to rain. Ron and Reginald had bonded over cowboys, Indians and Spitfires. It turned out Reginald really, really liked Spitfires and the pilots who had flown them in the Big War. Now Judy knew of Douglas Bader, who had lost his legs in a crash and still flown in the war with artificial replacements and George Beurling, who had been called arrogant and crazy and who'd had thirty-one kills to his name. She also knew of elliptical wing design and that a thing called semi-monocoque duralumin fuselage existed, whatever hell that was. Apparently it was good or something. At least they were entertaining Sandstorm, she thought, even though she suspected that the mech was suppressing snorts when they talked about maximal speed and high altitudes.
"Is this going to take a long time? This whole infiltration operation, I mean. And just how you think we will manage?" she asked, little cranky. At first it had been terrifying, the fight Whirl had sheltered them from. Then just scary, then scary and kind of amusing, but now her neck and back were stating to hurt from sleeping in a helicopter and sitting in a car whole day long and she was beginning to really need a shower. Spitfires weren't helping, either.
"It will only take this night. And Reginald Simmons is going to get inside, drop a little gas bomb and walk out, then we will do the rest." It took few seconds for his words to sink in.
"Gas bomb! We are not going to kill anybody!" she screamed at him. Fine, he was pretty awesome big robot, but he wasn't that awesome. Nothing could be.
Sandstorm bristled inwardly as all three inside him tensed. Fine, he was distracted for a good reason, but that was no excuse to handle the situation this badly. He could sweet-talk unaware cons into walking into his team's welcoming arms with weapon upgrades without even removing his badge, but three adolescents he couldn't handle better than this?
"There will be no killing. The gas is supposed to knock the base out so we can do the actual breaking and entering without witnesses. To protect Reginald from his father's ire you two, Ronald and Judy, will have to pretend to be kidnappers, but we will make sure that no one will see your faces. This will be a smooth, safe operation." He made sure his voice was gentle, as human as he could make it and the three children inside him relaxed little despite themselves. This was better.
"And you know what is harmful to humans and what is not?" Judy demanded. She was the one Sandstorm respected most of them, the bravest and most intelligent if he read the signs right.
"We are lacking in cultural information, but your scientific network has giving us enough information to pull this safely," he assured the girl. Judy nodded, reluctantly, but she said no more.
Ron was pretty sure that what Judy had wanted to ask was if and why they should trust Sandstorm's word, but he was still impressed by her daring, little diplomatic discretion or no. Sandstorm was rather intimidating, even if he didn't seem like a bad person, after all.
"You are really something else, you know that?" he told Judy, "I love you." Now he had gotten it off his chest. Then Judy looked at him and he'd had no idea her eyes could be so big and misty.
"I love you too," she whispered and reached for his shoulders. Their second kiss was much like the first one, little sloppy and awkward, wet and very tantalizing. He was suddenly feeling odd tingling in his stomach as warmth spread downwards and the embarrassed blush killed the feeling to the cradle, but maybe it wasn't mutant lizards kind of wrong to think about Judy like that after all.
"And you are going to believe in horoscopes from now on, right?" she teased him. Even her teasing felt different now.
"Well, it was empirically proved," he conceded happily. Not that he really believed, but whatever made Judy happy too.
They drove on, ate their sandwiches and they drove on and if Ron held Judy's hand instead of keeping both hands on the steering wheel, and if socializing with Reg suffered the same as their disguise, it was all right. Reg's mother was bound to get worried before this ended, but it wasn't like he seemed to worry about it any more than he and Judy. And it was all so exiting now and Judy had beautiful hands.
Luckily Mission City wasn't that far from the canyon. The hike up Boy Scout Canyon started in a sandy wash, flanked by willows and tamarisk. At this point it was still drivable, though not easily; especially by the sports car that was Sandstorm's flashy alt mode choice.
"So, now we have gotten to the canyon, but how are we supposed to get into it?" Reg asked, eyeing the landscape suspiciously. Surely they weren't supposed to hike? Then he noticed that both Ron and Judy lifted their feet on their seats and gripped the back rests hard.
"Put your whole body on your seat and don't touch anywhere else," Sandstorm instructed him. Reg obeyed nervously and took a deep breath. Then the transformation began.
Sandstorm had been big for a sports car right from the beginning, but from the seat inside him it was suddenly obvious that the shell of the car was actually twofold. Now it unfolded itself in big plates and mass began to flow from beneath their seats in sharp shapes and moves, and Reg realised with slightly nauseous twist that they would have severed his feet from his legs if he hadn't lifted them up. The mech opened like a flower to the sun, but instead the rain fell on them, and then it built itself again with much bigger space inside. A very differently shaped space too and judging by the noises changes were still going on where they couldn't see them. When silence became he squirmed on his seat, feeling irrationally like he had just seen somebody stranger strip for him.
"Now we go in," Sandstorm said and with a loud, metallic roar they rose from the ground.
"Shocked us too, the first time!" Judy shouted over the noise as they all rose to peek at the slowly narrowing canyon from the windows.
Scoop was posing as a hapless, innocent payloader and keeping an audio on the soldiers inside the base. Ideally he would have kept an audio on the brass, but they were too deep inside the rock and so he had to do with the soldiers in guard. Which was also a reason he was now a slightly amused and a lot more frustrated payloader.
Hey, Springer? he asked. It would have been a whole lot funnier if they were a little more compatible physically, he was sure.
Something to report, Scoop? the Wrecker leader inquired.
Guards number 1, 2, 3 and 4 are engaged in dirty poems called limericks. The response to this wasn't immediate. The fledging information network humans were trying to build was used by governments and scientists only and Springer was trying to find a reference to limericks in vain.
And this is relevant how? he asked eventually.
I just thought I would share. Scoop dutifully didn't fidget and tried to ignore the reciting in favour of something useful. Guard 2 snickered at the latest limerick and judging by the voice she was a female. Then she launched into one of her own that Scoop sent straight to Springer.
There once was a vampire called Mable
whose periods were very unstable
Once every full moon,
She took out a spoon,
And drank herself under the table
It actually wasn't one of the better ones; he couldn't figure it out at all. Periods?
Scoop, Springer said with a piece of coding that basically said "I'm being very patient." Not that he really was, but Scoop blamed the stress.
Yes? he quipped.
Just pay attention to something important.
Springer was slightly frustrated. Roadbuster, trying to not attract any undue attention, was still far from the canyon and they might have to wait for the gas bomb ingredients until the nightfall. On the other hand, now he had ample time to question Ronald and Reginald about their revelations. Logically, it would make Reginald's cover story as being kidnapped and forced to betray his creator much more plausible if the other creator informed the one in the base about Reginald being missing. He wasn't happy about the fact that the boy had volunteered to help them, however much that saved him from difficult explanation later. The boy obviously had no honour at all.
Twin Twist kept an optic on him, uncomprehending. The destructive jumpstarter didn't really understand why he was making such an issue about the morals of a person they would never again had to have anything to do with. Springer could rationally acknowledge his reasoning as sound, but he couldn't really help himself. They all had their quirks. Sandstorm was smooth-talking and could get them just about anything, Broadside's alt modes were an impossibly large jet and an aircraft carrier, while he also happened to be terrified of heights. And got seasick on the water. Twin Twist had odd obsession with the left feet of Decepticons bigger than him, always trying to cripple them in battle by drilling into the left foot. Whirl had decided that insanity made an extremely effective weapon, Scoop pushed so hard for so long that he was prone to overheating, time and time again and Topspin was a passionate hiker.
Whereas Springer happened to be the archetypical hero: good in a fight, brave, confident, always ready with a dead-pan quip to lighten a dire moment and rather moral, all things considered.
It was the arrival of Sandstorm and the three humans that got him to focus. It was time to get the intel straight.
It was a good thing that he had seen the Mega Man in ice before or he would have flipped, Reg thought as they landed. He was very close to flipping as things were; the Wreckers weren't as big as the Sector Seven's robot except for one well and truly huge, but there were so many of them and they were moving. Only the fact that he had spent so much time inside one without coming to harm caused that instead of panicked he felt tired and a little drained. They were playing in a bigger sandbox than even his father could have imagined. Irrationally that thought gave him strength, allowed him to hold his head high. Maybe they weren't safe anymore, but for once he wasn't inferior to his father. It was a heady, heady feeling.
Ron and Judy jumped off Sandstorm little nervous, but not afraid. He took a deep breath and jumped after them. It was time to get the show on the road.
I found-d-d-d it!Frenzy cackled and Barricade rumbled satisfied. The cassetticon might have been irritating, but he was competent at the least. No failure, good for him. Their leader would be free once more.
All Spark would be rightfully theirs.
Time measurements. Some of them vary in different continuities. I took Wreckers from IDW and I decided to be consistent with my continuities.
astrosecond 0.498 seconds
breem 8.3 minutes
cycle (IDW continuity) 1 hour 15 minutes (1.25 hours)
mega-cycle (IDW) 93 hours
deca-cycle (IDW) about 3 weeks
stellar cycle (IDW)7.5 months
vorn 83 years
AN: The vampire limerick is not mine.
The way I see it nothing is forever, not even transformers. They can replace every other part of themselves, but not the Spark crystal, held inside Spark chamber. When it eventually (after maybe a million years or so) cracks they die a natural death. And so, Optimus and Megatron weren't the first rulers of Cybertron.
About the system Jazz used to locate Nemesis: Think about a ball that's divided into four equally big segments: infra red, visible region, ultra violet and X-rays. (They may be machines, but that doesn't mean they have to be dull about this. At first I thought about colors, but that's so Earth.) These segments are divided further into sub-segments where you need three dimension numbers to tell the exact location.
Jumpstarters can transform between modes in 0.4 of a second, significantly faster than most Transformers.
