Disclaimer: I do not own Transformers, Hasbro does. The Efforts and their story, how ever, are mine.

Chapter 11: Kobano

The streets of Kobano were of dirt with tin and brick buildings, most without intact windows, lining the streets. People herded cattle, goats, and chickens through the dirt streets, around stands of people selling meat, spices, clothe, gems, some weapons, and even just random baubles they happened to have. If one looked closely, they would see a vehicle or two, often a truck or a jeep of some large caliber, hiding with in the shadows of the alley ways. At first, it would seem off that a vehicle would be in such a low-down town such as Kobano, until the looker saw the strange symbols tattooed along their sides, or imprinted on their wheels. These were Transformers, the rough types who had fallen in some trouble in some other place and had come here in Kobano to hide until the heat died down. Mextron noticed this as he, Smartmouth, and Shadowleap hid behind one of the buildings on the very edge of the dusty town.

"We'll be noticed the instant we step out there," Smartmouth growled. "This mission can't go through."

"Oh yes it can!" Shadowleap said happily, appearing beside his comrades with some bundles in hand.

"What do you have, Shadowleap?" Mextron inquired.

"Just some stuff I'm borrowing from a local stand," Shadowleap said easily. "Toss 'em on and we'll be just another face in the crowd. Come on, the time's a-wasting!"

"You can't be serious," Smartmouth said with a disdain sneer as she hesitantly took up one of the bundles with the tip of her fingers.

"Shut up and wear the stolen garments, Smartmouth," Mextron ordered sternly, "Unless you want to explain to Megatron why we failed to scout this place out."

"I hate you," Smartmouth growled.

A few minutes later, with some dirt-to-face smearing for an extra touch, two teenagers and one young boy exited the alley way dressed in the town's fashion of shirtless canvas trousers for the boys and a loose, thin, brown, shapeless dress with a small rope tied around the waist for the girl. The girl wore a floppy straw brim hat. They all wore thin, crude leather and rubber sandals. Each had their true outfit hidden away in a canvas bag that each carried with them. What was strangest of all, though, was that these disguises were the first outfits they ever wore other than the grey and white uniforms.

"Ugh, this is disgusting," Smartmouth said in disgust, brushing her fingers through her long red hair and picking at her dirty, rough dress shiftily. "This thing smells like sweat and god knows what!"

"Aw come on, Smartmouth, sometimes you gotta get a little dirty to get the job done!" Shadowleap said with a huge grin.

Without hesitation, Smartmouth struck at Shadowleap with her elbow between his shoulder blades, knocking him onto his stomach in a small explosion of dust in the dirt.

"There," she said with satisfaction as Shadowleap coughed in the dirt. "You should get the job done very well."

"Hey! I don't think we've ever been this dirty!" Shadowleap exclaimed happily. If he had a tail, it would be wagging.

"Shut up and keep your voice down," Mextron hissed to the two, looking around. "We have to start asking around. Be careful that people don't look too closely at your eyes. Split up, but meet back here an hour before sun down. If one of us doesn't show up on time, go on towards the Seeker rendezvous point."

"Yes, sir," Shadowleap said with a proud salute before bounding off into the crowd. He appeared to have always been a dirt dog of these streets.

"Fine, Master," Smartmouth sneered to Mextron, "What ever you say."

"Thank you, Smartmouth," Mextron replied smoothly.

He earned a slap to the face for his reply before Smartmouth stalked off into the streets away from Mextron. He opened his mouth to laugh.

"And if you so much as giggle, I'm laying you out flat across this street!" Smartmouth warned loudly over her shoulder.

Mextron covered his mouth and smothered the chuckles.

Thus their day began. Shadowleap found a way to question about mines and energy supplies without being questioned; he claimed that he was a run away tourist's son looking for work. To distract people from his eyes, his hands would make a sudden dart for anything shiny or valuable with in the facility so that the person he was questioning had to look down at his hands or keep an eye on their things to keep a track of them.

Smartmouth pretended that she was looking for her brother who had ran away to "some mine or factory of one kind or another" to follow his best friend, who had been "recruited into some sort of secret militia or weapons smuggling business", and questioned heavily on the location and conditions of the mines and factories. Even when her story proved somewhat holey, all she had to do was cross her arms across her chest and press up, or cross one leg, skillfully hypnotizing with her femininity.

Sometimes, she approached a couple of men and asked something random just to twist the boys around her little finger. She had seen hints of this ability on TV before, but had never realized that it could work with her. She enjoyed the power of manipulation and seduction.

Oh, I like this, she thought with sly amusement as she watched two men break into a fight over her.

Mextron went around with the same excuse as Shadowleap; he needed work. But he did not add any back story. The sun was passing past its high point and he found himself strolling the streets, looking for another inn or bar to walk into and begin questioning. Suddenly, he heard the sound of metal sliding on metal and a massive metal hand darted out of an alley way he was passing by. The hand caught him around the waist and pulled him into the ally. Wire-filled, metal-covered bands wrapped tightly around his waist and he found himself looking up into the custom, block-helmeted face of an average Transformer.

"Hey!" he yelled, kicking and struggling in his captor's grip. "What's the big idea!?"

His captor was a Transformer; the first he had ever seen in real life other than the Decepticons. The color was yellow and black and, judging by the scratched up logo on the front of his metal chest and the license plate hanging from one shoulder, this Transformer's alt form was a massive jeep of some sort-- probably army issue. His shoulders were broad and his build was that of a barrel-chested football player. His round orange optics flickered quickly over Mextron as his yellow and black helmet glowed dully in the shadows. Sand encrusted most parts of him and even fell out in small rains from his joints. Many scars criss crossed his body and many parts of the armor were even severely chipped.

"What are you?" the Transformer demanded. "I spotted you and your friends earlier and your bio-structure is making my sensors confused! At first, I see human. Then my sensors argue 'Transformer'. Are you a Transformer in a hologram, maybe a Minicon?"

"What's it to you, rusty?" Mextron snapped.

"I want to know!" the Transformer yelled, his electronic voice rising in demand. "What are you??"

A shadow passed by over head so quickly that one may have assumed that it was a vulture or condor of some sort. But Mextron caught a glimpse of red and silver metal under brown hologram feathers overhead; Laserbeak. He was keeping an eye on the hybrid children. A small buzz in Mextron's ear signaled that someone was opening a link to him. Soundwave's deep monotone spoke in to his ear.

"Laserbeak detects obstacle Transformer on mission. Assistance required?"

"Alright, big guy, what's your name?" Mextron asked the Transformer, seizing upon an idea.

"Mash," the Transformer replied, "Just Mash."

- - - - - - - - - - - -

"What is he doing?" Megatron growled, watching the scene through Laserbeak's optics in one of the scientist's enormous screening rooms that had been rigged into a temporary, crude surveillance station.

"Why isn't he requesting Laserbeak to just blast the mech off unless-"

He stopped short, optics opening wider in realization. Soundwave, standing near by with his hands clasped behind his back, tilted his head to the side curiously. Effort 137 stood in the shadows beneath them, using his technopath abilities to rewire and reprogram the numerous large screens. He glanced up out of curiosity from the corner of his hidden goggle-covered eyes.

"He isn't really thinking…?" Megatron muttered, trailing off.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

"Well, Mash, why are you so interested in my affairs and my origins?"

"Because I hate not knowing who or what the people around me are," Mash replied. "I always need to know who or what the people around me are that way I can find out what I can do to them in case of an emergency."

Laserbeak circled overhead again before landing on the edge of one of the buildings making the ally. The fake condor's brown feathered head tilted to the side as it listened down on the conversation.

"A tentative mech, eh," Mextron asked. "What made you that?"

"Rough life," Mash said, shifting his shoulders nervously and drawing Mextron's attention to the pale metal scars there.

"You're too old to be born after the end of the Autobot-Decepticon War, and I see no insignias or scars of them, so let me guess," Mextron suggested. "You were a bounty hunter and a soloist. Now you hang out, bored and without a means of getting energon except what ever odd job you pick up."

"One of the mines has me employed as a guard; for every hour I guard the mine, I get a galleon of energon," Mash objected weakly.

That confirmed Mextron's suspicions.

"There are better employment opportunities than guarding fleshies for pocket change out there, you know," Mextron informed cryptically, crossing his arms across his chest.

"Like what?" Mash asked, a hint of desperation penetrating his voice.

"Good thinking, boy," Megatron suddenly said into Mextron's ear piece, "Installing the first seeds of the Decepticon expansion with in the community, I like that; very clever. But let him off at that. Laserbeak?"

With a mighty screech, the disguised condor suddenly plunged down from the roof, flapping at Mash's face until he dropped Mextron. Mextron hit the ground running and sprinted away from the preoccupied mech.