Ratbat's Crush
Chapter 7: Almost Over
Megatron was very irritated.
His troops were kidnapping enemy troops without orders. His TIC was apparently developing a system's glitch. Worse still were the three Autobots glaring at him from the monitor that he apparently couldn't shut off. Prime looked angry. The creator, Blaster looked like he wanted to reach through the screen and dismantle the tyrant with his bare hands. The Autobot second looked faintly disapproving and nothing more. Slag, he couldn't even gloat properly because he didn't have Eject, didn't know where he was, or even why the cassette had been taken in the first place.
The only decent thing about this entire situation was that Starscream was in the brig and had nothing to do with it. Pit, the only reason the Autobot Third in Command wasn't on screen was because he was probably off prepping the tower brat to come get the cassette.
And in stumbles Frenzy and Rumble, who had better have a good explanation for their behavior or they would find themselves the latest addition to the scrap heap. The cassette twins bowed to their leader, correctly interpreting his mood to stay groveling until Megatron motioned for them to stand.
"Empty your subspaces." Megatron ordered.
Before the twins could do little more then glance at each other, the tyrant pressed a button on his throne dispersing their subspace fields for them. As spies, the cassettes never kept much in their subspaces since they needed to empty them for each mission. Naturally the only thing that popped out this time was the data disk they had just been viewing. With casual ease, the tyrant reached down and picked up the disk, making sure to display it for those watching.
"And what do we have here?" Megatron plugged the data disk into the slot on his throne.
"Porn," the twins answered in unison. Someone in the background snorted but the tyrant kept his focus on the cassettes.
"A likely story. If you don't answer my questions correctly, I'll show your little recording to everyone." Pause for dramatic effect and of course to give the twins a chance to see just who was in the audience. "Now where is the Autobot cassette named Eject?"
"We don't know."
"We didn't do anything."
"The Autobots have proof that you were involved."
"They're lying."
"Last chance," Megatron waited a moment with his hand over the button. When the twins made no move to answer he pressed play. Then he pressed stop but not quick enough to stop the breathless moan from playing across the command deck.
"That was porn." The tyrant said needlessly, wondering if Soundwave knew his creations were running around with this...material in their subspace.
"Press play again," everyone on the command deck of the Nemesis and those on the Ark looked at Prowl as if he'd lost his chips. Prowl though didn't even shutter an optic at the sudden attention. "I believe it showed Eject partnering with Ratbat."
With a will of it's own, Megatron's servo pressed play again. Knowing who was on the screen certainly didn't make it any easier to watch, especially when the Autobot swapped positions with the bat declaring for all to hear that he wanted to be pitcher. His servo was a little slower then he would have liked pressing the stop button once he had confirmed just who was on screen.
Slowly he turned to the cassette twins who had the decency this time to look guilty.
"Where are they?" Megatron asked wishing the Autobots weren't so slaggin' quiet. Where was Prime's moralistic speech when the slag maker actually needed time to think?
"Between E and D." Rumble answered.
"They were just napping last time we looked but they might be doing it again." Frenzy added trying to be helpful and failing epicly.
"Go, get them. Bring the Autobot to the flight deck, I'll deal with your punishment after this situation is dealt with." Megatron ordered.
"What are you planning Megatron?" Optimus asked because it looked as if the footage had blown something in Blaster's processor.
"I'm in a benevolent mood Prime," Megatron paused for dramatic effect as he withdrew the data disk and held it between two fingers as if it were something vile, and truly it was. "I will return your autobot in whatever condition he happens to be in, on the condition that we never discuss this again."
"I agree."
"Good," the data disk snapped into pieces and finally Megatron was able to shut off the connection with the Ark.
Blaster was a mess of mixed emotions.
On the one hand he was relieved that his creation would be returned to him soon, one of the Decepticon flyers was mere moments away. Then of course he was worried about what condition Eject was in which was why Ratchet was there though from the brief glimpse of the footage it didn't look like he had much reason to worry. Of course the thought of the footage was in itself a mix of amusement, embarrassment, and maybe a bit of pride knowing his creation handled the situation. Then again the possibility of the footage ever being destroyed for good was impossible knowing the Decepticon cassettes had been the ones to record it in the first place.
A black jet appeared on the horizon and was slowing down for a landing. The rest of the Autobot party shifted uneasily trying to spot other decepticon flyers that just weren't there. Apparently when Megatron didn't want to talk about the situation anymore, he wasn't willing to put the thought of an ambush over it either.
Skywarp transformed before landing in front of the Autobot party looking like he'd rather be anywhere else at the moment.
"Do you have Eject?" Optimus Prime asked taking a step forward from the rest of the party.
"Yeah, in my cockpit." The jet answered and slowly opened the cockpit. It didn't stop the ball of cassettes from tumbling out though.
"Eject!" Blaster was surprised. Sure he'd hoped his cassette had had a good first time despite who he'd had it with but seeing him still entwined with the Decepticon was not good.
"Blaster, oh uh, we're there already?" Eject jumped up accidentally throwing Ratbat off who squeaked in surprise. "Oh sorry 'bout that Ratbat."
"Yeah, sweet, like sugar in a gas tank. Go over there already." Skywarp said reaching down to pick up Ratbat. He was tempted to punt the Autobot cassette over to his side but he had a bit more survival instinct then that.
"Are you alright?" Blaster asked as Eject stumbled over to his creator.
"I'm good, in fact I'm better then good, I'm great! I mean, you said interfacing was fun but you never said it was that fun! It was better then scoring a grand slam in the World Series, better then getting a hole in one on the final green of the World Golf Championship, better then intercepting the ball and running for a touchdown in the Super Bowl. It was better then sports!"
A few autobots tried to cover up their laughter as Blaster reached down and picked up his overly excited creation. The boom box cringed when he looked over the cassette. He was covered in dents and paint transfers, something quite common after a vigorous interface, things that Blaster was expecting. What he wasn't expected was the scabbed over energon lines along his neck and the dried fluid on the cassettes thighs that was usually washed off before going into public. Eject looked like slag but at least he looked happy about it.
"That's...nice." Blaster said debating whether he would rather put the dirty cassette in his clean tape deck or try hiding him in his hands.
"Whelp, we'll be going now, Starscream's been volunteered to give the cassettes the nuts and bolts talk and I've gotta get a recording of it. Oh and TC told me to tell you that you'll want to check him out since it didn't look like they used any grounders." Skywarp said as he tried to stuff the struggling Ratbat into his cockpit and close it.
"Oh yeah, I knew I forgot something." Eject said finally looking sheepish.
"What's your problem you little glitch, we have to get back to base and watch Screamer make a fool of himself...What do you mean you never exchanged comm. numbers? You were fragging each other for most of the solar cycle... Too late now." Skywarp said finally managing to close the door on the bat before taking off.
"So how's everybody doing?" Eject said nervously from the mixed looks he was getting from the rest of the Autobots. Some looked like they were about to burst from keeping their laughter in. Others looked mortified.
"Alright you glitch, let's get you checked out." Ratchet said plucking the cassette from his creator's hand and walking back to the Ark.
ONE MORE CHAPTER TO GO
And it'll be posted on Monday, maybe sooner. Loved it, hated it, thought I should've added something else to it, or made a glaringly obvious grammatical mistake that I need to fix in paragraph whatever.
Review and tell me.
