Chapter 12 -- Found
Glory giggled as she propelled herself forward through the water, scattering a school of fish. On an impulse she reached out and tried to grab one, but it flicked away, bright silver scales flashing. She scowled briefly, but her annoyance was quickly forgotten as a larger shape caught her attention... a shark! With a grin she kicked out after it, quickly overtaking the giant fish and grabbing onto its dorsal fin. The beast jerked in surprise and rolled in an effort to bite her, but she twisted out of its reach and hung on. It finally wriggled free of her grasp and swam away, looking oddly dazed and most likely deciding that large metal creatures were to be avoided from here on out.
Once the shark was out of sight, she turned and kicked off to explore some more. Water was still a new and thrilling experience for her -- until coming to Earth she'd only ever seen the stuff in jars or test tubes in Daddy's workshop. Now to be on a planet covered in the stuff and to constantly live surrounded by it... it was strange in a way, but still exciting. Uncle T had taught her to swim soon after her arrival -- a necessity seeing as the Decepticon base lay on the ocean floor -- but she wasn't allowed outside very often, so coming out for a swim or to explore was a special treat.
"I'm flying!" she giggled, extending her arms like wings and kicking forward. "Look Wildfire, I'm flying!"
"Glory wait up," groaned Wildfire, and she turned to see the horse-mech flailing to keep up. His equine legs were well-suited for running across land, but in the water his hooves were almost useless for swimming. In desperation he switched to robot mode and tried using his hands to paddle forward, but seeing as his lower legs remained horse-like even in this form it was still slow going.
"C'mon, Wildfire, you slowpoke!" she teased. "Let's go catch a dolphin!" And she kicked forward, leaving poor Wildfire behind. With a long-suffering snort he floundered after her.
The dolphins weren't hard to find -- a pod of them lived around the Decepticon base, and they occasionally swam by the windows of the Nemesis to investigate these strange visitors to their watery home. Most of the Decepticons ignored them, though once in awhile Starscream would bang on the windows to scare off an especially inquisitive specimen, grumbling something about the "wretched flesh aquatics" being smarter than they looked and possibly plotting against them. Megatron found the idea absolutely hilarious, but otherwise paid the creatures no mind. Glory, meanwhile, had wanted an up-close look at them, but hadn't had the chance until now.
Four dolphins were darting and dancing through a stand of seaweed just ahead, their sleek silvery-gray bodies speckled with darker gray splotches as if they'd been in a painting accident. Glory singled out the one she figured had the prettiest markings and propelled herself after it, hands outstretched. The dolphin was too quick -- it was gone long before she reached it. With a frustrated squeak she turned to find it again.
The dolphins, after the initial shock, seemed to decide that this new arrival wasn't a threat, but a possible plaything. The largest dolphin approached slowly, rolling to one side as if asking for a belly rub. Glory reached out to touch it, but it rolled out of reach. At the same time a second dolphin nudged Glory from behind and dashed away with a chattering laugh.
"Hey!" she giggled, turning to give chase.
Wildfire showed up at that moment, optics dim with exhaustion... but upon spotting the dolphins his optics flared angrily, and with a whinnying scream he drew his scimitar and charged. With frightened squeals the dolphins scattered and fled, quickly leaving Glory and Wildfire far behind.
"Bad Wildfire!" Glory scolded, furious at losing her playmates. "Bad horsey! They were just playing!"
"I protect Glory," Wildfire insisted, unrepentant. "Organics threat to Glory. Shockwave's orders."
"They're not bad!" Glory insisted. "They're fun!"
Wildfire opened his mouth as if about to protest further, then shut it again and curled his lip in a deadly snarl instead, his optics focused on something behind her. She whirled, wondering if the dolphins had returned...
No dolphins -- only a tangled, writhing organic mass that most definitely was NOT seaweed or kelp. With a yelp Glory scrambled to hide behind Wildfire as he braced himself for combat, sword drawn and a threatening snarl fixed on his faceplate.
The giant squid drifted closer, unperturbed by the threat, and unfurled its sucker-covered tentacles toward the sparkling and bodyguard. Glory shrank back from their touch, but Wildfire's reaction was far more explosive -- with a shriek he laid into the beast, hacking and slashing. One serpentine arm drifted away and two more suffered deep gashes, but the squid seemed to pay its injuries no heed, instead wrapping several of its remaining arms around Glory and pulling her into its grip. She screamed and kicked at the beast, but to no avail.
Wildfire gave his whinnying battle scream again and slashed at the squid. Two more arms came free, and a deep wound opened up in the mantle, but the creature stupidly hung on.
A shadow passed overhead, and Glory glanced up to see an enormous shark, bigger than any she'd seen before, gliding in to investigate. Then another, and another... dozens of them, drawn by the smell of the squid's blood and homing in like Seekers on an Autobot convoy.
The squid's beak closed around her leg, and panic truly set in. Screaming, she kicked and flailed, arm-spikes out and slashing at both the squid and the gathering sharks. It did no good -- the sharks, worked into a feeding frenzy, were biting and tearing at anything within reach of their jaws... be it squid, fellow shark, or one of the Decepticons who had been unfortunate to be caught in the fray. Wildfire screamed in frustrated rage as he hacked wildly at the attacking sharks, but his efforts only whipped them into a further frenzy.
A huge fleshy snout rammed into Glory from behind, jolting her vents open. A frantic alarm blared in her systems as water hit and short-circuited vital circuits... then all went black.
Break...
Despite it being late March, far too early for proper beach weather, a fair-sized crowd of human onlookers had gathered on the sand, jackets buttoned and zipped up tight against the brisk wind. One might assume that they were gathered to watch for whales or sea lions or some other marine wildlife... but one would quickly be proven wrong as the object of their attentions surfaced again, drawing an unexpected round of exclamations and applause. Cameras flickered and clicked as he gave a bashful wave, then cleared a few strands of seaweed from his rotors and struck out for the Coast Guard boat anchored close by.
"Any luck?" asked the officer on deck, voice raised to carry over the wind.
"Found some wreckage about five klicks to the northwest," Seaspray replied. "Could be our missing fishing boat."
The officer nodded. "Sounds about right. Let us know if you come across it. Maybe we can determine just what sunk it. I'd hate to think Decepticons were attacking fishermen, but we can't rule that out as a possibility."
"Did you find survivors?" Seaspray asked.
"Yes. All hands survived -- thankfully they were all wearing life vests."
Seaspray nodded. "I'll drop a beacon when I come across the boat so you can trace it."
"We appreciate this, Mr. Seaspray."
"Happy to help." And Seaspray ducked back beneath the choppy waters to continue his search for the sunken boat. With Decepticon activity at a complete standstill at the moment, some of the Autobots were taking the time to aid in human projects, such as community service or search-and-rescue operations. Seaspray had volunteered to help search for a fishing boat that had gone down off the Oregon coast -- the Coast Guard was concerned that the boat might have strayed into known Decepticon waters and been attacked, but privately Seaspray thought that a simple fishing boat was beneath the Decepticons' concerns...
/Optimus Prime to Seaspray, come in Seaspray./
/Reporting, sir./
/We've just received a report of Decepticon activity at Mount Rainier. I'm leading a team of Autobots to investigate. Ironhide will be commanding officer at the Ark in my absence, so if you require any assistance, radio him./
/Copy, sir./
/Very good. Prime out./
/Seaspray out./ He cut the connection and kicked deeper, back to the wreckage he had spotted earlier.
Sure enough, their missing fishing boat lay on the ocean floor not far from the first tangle of wreckage he'd spotted, listing to starboard and a large hole blown in its hull. Seaspray dove down to inspect it, carefully running his hands along the edge of the rupture, then gave a hiss of relief. From the way the metal around the edges of the hole was bent sharply outward, it was obvious that the explosion that had sunk the ship had come from inside, not outside. So they could chalk this up to either a severe mechanical failure or possible explosive contraband aboard the ship... and at any rate, this was now the human authorities' problem, not the Autobots.
Clipping a beacon to the bow of the sunken boat, he launched himself to the surface, ready to make his report and prepare to leave...
/Coast Guard to Seaspray, come in!/
/Seaspray here. Just found your boat, and left a sonar beacon so you can find it again. Looks like an internal explosion, so nothing Decepticon here./
/Good to know, but we've got other problems. Just responded to a distress call from another fishing boat -- they've hauled in something that you should probably take a look at./
Well, THAT was enough to pique the minibot's curiosity. He surfaced, transformed to his hovercraft mode, and jetted across the ocean's surface to reach the proper coordinates.
A second Coast Guard boat was anchored alongside the fishing craft, and several humans were gathered around something on the deck, talking animatedly and occasionally bending down as if to touch or prod whatever they'd found. Seaspray pulled up alongside the fishing boat, transformed, grabbed the deck railing, and hauled himself aboard, the humans on board shouting and staggering as the entire craft listed to the side with the minibot's sudden weight.
"Sorry," he said sheepishly, carefully padding closer. "What've you got?"
"Was caught in the nets," explained the boat's captain, a weathered-looking old man in a faded orange life vest and flannel jacket who didn't so much as look twice at Seaspray. "Took four of us to haul it on board. Looks like one of your kind."
"Our kind?" Seaspray stepped closer, the fishermen and Coast Guard parting to give him a look.
His systems jolted audibly at the sight. In the center of a tangled mass of netting, seaweed, and what looked to be huge tentacles was a sparkling. Her left leg had been cut open clear to the struts, severed wiring and tubing poking from the wound, and her body was marred with deep, jagged, crescent-shaped dents -- shark bites, he realized. Netting was snagged in several of her joints and had twisted her right hip completely out of socket, most likely from being pulled aboard the boat. Her optics were the dull-gray of an offline mech, but her face plates were frozen in a look of utter panic.
/Ironhide, come in!/
/Yeah, Seaspray?/ Ironhide's voice was gruffer than usual -- no doubt he wasn't pleased with having to stay behind while Prime and the others investigated whatever was happening at Mount Rainier.
/Remember that 'Con sparkling from the YouTube video?/
/What about her?/ The gruffness immediately became keen interest.
/Human Coast Guard found her in a fishing net off the Newport coast./
/Yer kiddin' me!/
/Not today, 'Hide. She's short-circuited from the look of it and pretty badly hurt.../
/Be there in a jiffy/ Ironhide interrupted. /Gimmie a moment to nab Ratchet first./
/Sure thing. Seaspray out./
"One of your troops?" asked the Coast Guard officer, bringing Seaspray back to reality.
Seaspray shook his head. "This is a sparkling -- a Cybertronian child." He bent down and began inspecting her wounds, first the gash to the leg, then a few of the bite-marks that had been strong enough to puncture the metal. "Looks like her self-repair has taken care of any leakage, but she's still in bad shape..."
"You guys have kids?" someone muttered, but quieted down before Seaspray could identify him.
"Any idea what a... sparkling is doing this far from home?" asked the officer, stumbling a bit over the unfamiliar term.
Seaspray shook his head. "Not a clue." He pointed to the injured leg. "Looks as if she tangled with a squid -- could have been the beak that made that slash. She must have wounded it and attracted sharks too." Here he pointed out the various dents created by the beasts' jaws. "And her vents are open -- probably flooded her systems and short circuited."
"Sort of like drowning?" the fishing captain asked.
"Sort of, except a short-circuited mech can be reactivated without significant damage more easily than a drowned human," Seaspray replied, finally straightening. "We have an officer on his way. Meanwhile, let's raise anchor and get to a dock as fast as possible."
Though it couldn't have been longer than half an hour or so, it seemed to take forever to reach the nearest dock, where Ironhide and Ratchet were already standing in wait for them. As soon as the boat was within reach, Ironhide hurried forward and, without a word of greeting or warning, scooped the sparkling off the deck and carried her off, still trailing shreds of fishing net and clumps of seaweed. Ratchet hollered at the red warrior to slow down and at least let him have a look at her damages, but Ironhide continued on with a determined stride, face grim.
"Will she be all right?" asked the Coast Guard officer. "I... I have a little girl myself, so I'm especially concerned..." he went on, as if he felt a need to explain himself.
"She'll be fine," Seaspray assured him. "Ratchet'll make her good as new." The real question is -- what the frag will Prime say when he finds out about this?
Break...
"I TOLD you it was doomed to fail, Megatron!" Starscream hissed, lengthening his stride to catch up with the commander as he stormed through the halls of the Nemesis. "But you were SO confident that THIS time your fool contraption would work, and that THIS time the extinction of the Autobots was assured..."
"It worked perfectly!" Hook thundered, offended, as he hurried behind. "If that Primus-cursed storm had let up long enough for us to install it properly..."
"It exploded the moment that fool Bluestreak shot it!" Starscream retorted. "If THAT is working perfectly, I'd hate to see if it failed..."
"I would like to see YOU do any better, Starscream!" Hook shot back angrily.
"Enough out of both of you!" Megatron roared. "Hook, I expect that energy collector to be fully repaired within the week! We will have to select a different volcano for the next attempt, as the Autobots will be watching that one, but we shall see success in this venture..."
"You keep saying that..." huffed Starscream.
Thundercracker broke away from the main group at that point, having heard this same conversation or something close to it too many times to count by now. As entertaining as it sometimes was to see Starscream get his comeuppance from Megatron, he had other things on his CPU right now. Like a trip to the washracks to get the dirt and crud out of his joints, a full cube of energon, and a moment of calm to catch up on things with Glory... and that reminded him, he had promised her a flight if she had behaved herself.
"On my way to the break room," Skywarp announced suddenly. "Want me to grab you a cube while I'm there?"
"Sure, thanks," Thundercracker replied. "Drop it off at my quarters, okay?"
"Can do. Say hi to Glory for me." The black Seeker turned down the next hallway, leaving Thundercracker to make his way back to his quarters alone.
"Glory?" he called out as he opened the door and walked in. "We're back. You didn't give Swindle too hard a time, did you..."
His vocalizer trailed off. Glory wasn't in here. Her toys were still scattered on the floor and her recharge berth, but neither she nor Wildfire were present. He fought back the sudden twinge of panic in his fuel tanks and shut the door again. Perhaps she was with Swindle or the Stunticons, or hiding with the cassettes. He'd have a look around before he began to worry...
The Stunticons were scattered throughout Motormaster's quarters when Thundercracker took a cautious look inside -- evidently even something as supposedly calm as a movie night got entirely out of hand with them. The viewscreen was still showing the menu screen for iMaximum Overdrive,/i but a starburst of cracks in one corner of said screen marked where something heavy had been thrown at it. Pieces of a bench and a dismantled recharge berth were strewn about, and streaks of paint on the walls showed where mechs had been tossed about in the fight. No sign of Glory, he was relieved to note.
"You guys seen Glory lately?" he asked Breakdown, carefully nudging the white Lamborghini with his foot.
"Huh?" Breakdown groaned, onlining one optic to glare blearily up at him. "Uh... she came in once at the beginning of the movie... left right before Dragstrip started arguing with Motormaster... don't remember much after that..."
"Thanks." Thundercracker shut the door and hurried down the hallway. He would check with Swindle next -- the Combaticon had volunteered to watch her in his absence, and he was fond of trying to educate Glory in the ways of the "business world..."
Speaking of Swindle, the jeep nearly ran Thundercracker over as he bolted around a corner, violet optics aglow with panic. Upon realizing who he'd almost collided with, his optics flared even brighter before he pasted on a weak smile.
"Hey there, you're back early..." Swindle began.
"Where's Glory?" demanded Thundercracker.
"Well..." Swindle paused a beat, no doubt scrambling for a cover story. "I was just about to go fetch her for her lesson... my meeting ran longer than I planned and..."
"You lost her," Thundercracker said accusingly.
"I didn't exactly lose her," Swindle replied quickly. "She's somewhere in the base, I'm sure."
"Fraggit, Swindle!" Thundercracker snarled. "I put you in charge of her!"
"What did you expect me to do, put a leash on her?" Swindle retorted. "Not like you do a good job of keeping her in one place..."
"Keep the yelling down, guys!" Skywarp advised, arriving on the scene carrying an energon cube. "Megatron's already in a bad mood, ya wanna set him off?"
"Swindle lost Glory," Thundercracker said shortly by way of explanation.
"I didn't lose her, she wandered off!" Swindle defended.
"Same thing," Skywarp replied. "She with the Stunts?"
"I checked, she's not there," Thundercracker answered. "What about Rumble and Frenzy?"
"They're not back from their spy mission in Kuwait yet," Swindle replied.
"So when DID you see her last, Swindle?" asked Skywarp.
"She barged in while I was still in the middle of my weapons deal three hours ago," explained Swindle. "She asked about the humans a little, then I told her to go play outside until I was done..." He abruptly stopped talking, and a look of horror came over his face.
"What, what's wrong?" Skywarp demanded.
Thundercracker came to the same realization that instant. "You meant 'outside' as in 'outside your room,' but she probably took it as 'outside the base.'"
Cybertronians didn't go pale when something shocked them, but color did seem to leech from Swindle's optics. "We gotta tell Megatron. Organize search parties. She couldn't have gone too far, she's only a kid..."
Thundercracker grabbed Swindle's arm in a vise-like grip that shut the Combaticon up in a hurry. "If anything's happened to her," he snarled, leaning over to loom threateningly, "I'll take it out of your scrap. You hear me?"
Swindle squeaked and nodded.
With a shove he released Swindle, who staggered back a few steps before collecting himself.
/Thundercracker to Megatron, Glory is missing. Swindle suspects she's outside the base somewhere./
/She's WHAT?/ roared Megatron. /Who in Primus' name let her out in the first place? Never mind, take Skywarp and Swindle and start your search. I'll organize the rest of the Decepticons./
/Yes sir./ Cutting the connection, he turned to the others. "You two, follow me. We'll start in the immediate area around the base and work our way outward."
"Roger!" Skywarp barked, and he and Swindle hurried in Thundercracker's footsteps as the blue Seeker charged for the exit.
Glory, you'd better be all right Thundercracker thought half-angrily, half-fearfully as he ran. Because if anything happened to you... I'd never forgive Swindle. Or myself.
Break...
Her optics came online to a blurred mess of colors, the receptors activating with great reluctance and taking their own sweet time in properly focusing. She rebooted them a few times to clear her vision, and the ceiling above her finally came into focus... an orange ceiling criss-crossed with seams and a jutting spike of brownish stone piercing it in one place like a giant fang. Strange... she'd never been anywhere with an orange ceiling...
Once her sight was clear she rolled her head from side to side to take in her surroundings. She was lying on a tall berth in a room with walls the same orange color of the ceiling, with several more berths standing empty on either side of her. A few pieces of medical equipment lay on a counter close by, and a stack of crates were piled haphazardly in one corner as if they had been unloaded in a hurry and no one had had time to sort through them yet. A monitor beeped steadily to her right, connected to a port in her side with a thin cable. Aside from the monitor and the steady hum of in-standby equipment, the room was silent.
Curious by now, Glory sat up and looked around a little more. Where was she? How had she gotten here? Was this another Decepticon base under the ocean? If so, who was in charge of this one? She'd never seen a Decepticon building with orange walls, but maybe whoever was in charge here had decided purple was boring...
Voices drifted in from the next room, and she froze, cocking her head to listen closely.
"...some heavy energon loss along with the injuries and short-circuiting," said a voice she'd never heard before. "I've given her a transfusion to boost her energy levels and fixed up the worst of the dents along with her legs. Now we just wait for her to come online and hope for the best." The voice sighed. "It's been so long since I've worked on a sparkling..."
A laugh was the voice's answer. "Don'cha worry, Ratchet, sparklings are resilient. They bounce back pretty easy after takin' a fall." This voice was again unfamiliar, but warm and with a strange accent. "Th' question is -- whadda we do with her once she onlines?"
"I've called Optimus," the first voice explained. "He's on his way back. Once he arrives, we'll decide."
Glory's air cycles stopped, and cold fear flared through her systems. Optimus... these must be...
"My vote is for keepin' her here," rumbled a third voice, sounding irritated at the discussion. "Shame on those Decepticreeps for leavin' her alone, lettin' her get all torn up. She deserves t' be someplace where someone'll look after her..."
"We've heard this argument before, Ironhide," the first voice huffed. "Four times now..."
A door on the other side of the room slid open, admitting three mechs still engaged in conversation. One was a boxy white mech with red hands and red crosses on his shoulders, a black chevron over his blue optics giving him a perpetually grouchy look. The second, black and white with a bright blue stripe down his chest, sported a blue visor in place of optics and a set of black horns that almost looked like the ears of an electro-kitty. The third mech, also somewhat boxy in shape, was red and gray, with a raised crest of sorts on his helm. For a few moments they continued their discussion, the red one adamant about whatever point he was defending, the white one sounding exasperated, and the black and white simply staying back and letting the other two hash it out.
Glory paid no attention to these details. The only detail she was focused on was the red sigil each of these mechs sported -- the fearsome scowling emblem of the Autobots.
The black and white mech was the first to notice the subject of their conversation was online and alert, and the slight smile on his faceplate died immediately. "She's up, Ratchet."
Ratchet stopped talking mid-sentence and turned to face Glory. For a moment he frowned as if puzzled, then smiled and stepped closer, one hand raised in a placating gesture. "Up already, little one?" he asked, his tone friendly. "You gave us quite a scare there..."
The scream that had been clawing its way out of Glory's vocalizer finally forced itself free. Ratchet took a hasty step backward, almost as if the cry had been a physical blow that had knocked him back.
"Whoa, whoa, lil' lady, Ratch ain't gonna hurt you!" the black and white mech consoled. "He's just gonna make sure you got all fixed up right..."
She screamed again, rolling off the repair berth and hitting the floor running. The monitor cord pulled taut before jerking out of her side port, sending a flash of pain through her sensors but spurring her on. They were Autobots, she'd been caught by Autobots, she had to get away FAST before they did something horrible...
"Stop her!" Ratchet shouted. "Somebody catch her! Swoop, grab her!"
Glory screamed again and slid almost to a halt as another mech stepped into the repair bay -- a huge, blue and gray mech even taller than Megatron and sporting immense wings and a towering crest like a dragon. The huge Autobot squawked in surprise at seeing her, then bent down with both hands extended in an attempt to scoop her up. She dashed between his legs and bolted out the open door behind him...
And nearly ran smack into a terrifyingly familiar pair of blue legs.
Optimus Prime drew to a halt, holding an arm out to stop the other Autobots behind him. He stared down at Glory, as if not quite believing what he was seeing. Glory took advantage of that moment of confusion to bolt down the hallway, away from Prime and the Autobots, hoping beyond hope that this hallway led to the exit and escape...
The floor beneath her feet shuddered, and she slid to a stop with a desperate whimper as a hulking form rounded the corner to block the path ahead. The monstrous Autobot peered down with a featureless black face and blocky blue visor, no doubt seeing her but seeming to ponder what to do about what he'd seen. For a moment Glory could only stand there and tremble. The path ahead was blocked, the path behind was blocked, there was no way out...
A hand grabbed her from behind. "Gotcha!"
Break...
Prime hadn't been willing to believe Ratchet's report at first. The last thing he had expected to find upon returning to the base was the Decepticon sparkling. Ratchet was not given to practical jokes like certain other mechs, but he had almost wished that the medic was playing a strange trick on him. Actually returning and seeing the femme with his own optics cleared away any doubts... but only served to raise a whole slew of new problems now.
Grimlock's sudden appearance had made the femme halt in her tracks, and before she could recover enough from her fear to dash off again Ironhide caught up with her and snatched her up in his arms. "I got 'er, Prime..."
The femme shrieked piercingly, then raised an arm and swiped the Nissan across the chest with an extended set of spikes. Ironhide yowled and dropped her, staggering back, and she took off running again. Grimlock came to his senses and made a clumsy swipe after her, but she dodged and kept going. The Dinobot snarled and gave chase, followed by several more Autobots.
"Ironhide, you have a lot of explaining to do," Prime said sternly.
Ironhide glared back, unrepentant. "Seaspray found 'er, Prime. An' she was hurt bad when he came across 'er. What was he s'posed to do, leave her t' rust?"
Prime waved Ironhide away impatiently and jogged down the hallway, after the fleeing femme and pursuing Autobots. When he came across them again, the Autobots were gathered around an open ventilation duct close to the floor, and Sunstreaker was kneeling with his arm plunged into the duct up to the shoulder, face set in concentration.
"Autobots, cease this at once," he ordered.
"But we got her cornered!" Sideswipe insisted. "This is the duct that was blocked off for repairs, remember? She's right within reach..."
"I think I got her," Sunstreaker announced. "At least I touched something that moved... YOW!" He jerked his arm out and cradled it against his chest, staring in horror at the deep furrows scratched into his paint. "She clawed me!"
"That would be her arm spikes," Ratchet replied, catching up to Prime at last. "My fault, I didn't think to disable them..."
"Enough of this," Prime ordered. "No more attempts to capture the sparkling."
"But she ruined my paint job!" Sunstreaker snapped, waving his "injured" arm in Prime's face.
"And that's worth terrifying her into hysterics?" demanded Prime, pointing at the open duct. The femme wasn't visible, but her frightened crying could be clearly heard.
Sunstreaker scowled but said nothing.
Trailbreaker knelt to peer into the duct. "I see her. Aw, the poor thing must be scared out of her processor..."
"But why would we scare her?" Bluestreak protested. "She's got no reason to be scared of us. We're Autobots!"
Prime gave Bluestreak an even look. "Yes, Bluestreak, we are Autobots. And that is precisely WHY she is frightened of us."
"But why?" Bluestreak insisted. "We're not out to hurt anyone, unless they're Decepti... oh." He went silent, staring wonderingly at Prime as if it had only just occurred to him.
Jazz's gaze moved to the duct, a sympathetic look crossing his faceplate, then back to Prime. "We can't just leave her there, Prime. Scared of us or not, she's gotta come out sometime."
"We will let her come out on her own terms, Jazz," Prime replied, having to pitch his voice slightly louder to be heard over the sparkling's crying. "I want a guard stationed by this ventilation duct at all times. Keep a ration of energon handy as well. She has probably been warned to not accept energon from us; however, she is a child and not a trained soldier, so I expect energy shortage to eventually get the best of her. Radio me if she comes out."
"And then what do we do with her, Prime?" demanded Ratchet. "There's no protocol for a situation like this -- we can't just throw her in the brig like a common enemy soldier."
Here Prime hesitated. "We will cross that bridge when we come to it, Ratchet." He turned to Sideswipe and Sunstreaker, the latter of whom was still nursing the scratches to his arm. "You two will take the first shift."
Sunstreaker glanced up sharply. "You've got to be kidding me. After what that little slagger did to my paint? I'm not going to play babysitter to a bratty Decepti-punk kid..." He broke off and whirled toward the duct, where the femme's crying had grown even louder. "Stop crying or I'll give you something to cry about, you little slagger!"
The duct went instantly quiet.
It took all of Prime's self-control to stop himself from facepalming or smacking Sunstreaker. "On second thought, I want Sideswipe and Trailbreaker taking the first shift. Sunstreaker, that's cleaning duty for the next week for backtalking an officer. Ironhide, Ratchet, Jazz, I want a full report on the situation, including what Seaspray has to say. Meet me in my office."
The Autobots slowly dispersed, Sideswipe and Trailbreaker taking up posts next to the duct and Sunstreaker slouching off with a grumble. Prime turned to go, but not without a final glance back at the sparkling's hiding place. This was a delicate situation any way one looked at it, and he only prayed he could handle it without it blowing up in his faceplate... and further traumatizing the child in the process. Of everyone involved, she would suffer the most despite deserving it the least.