Surface:

Optimus winced as Ratchet prodded his wound. He wasn't the gentlest of mechs. "Where did you think it was going to get you hmmm? Covering up a wound as severe as this. I thought you had more sense than a youngling. As dumb as that damn 'con, you know." Optimus rolled his optics as Ratchet continued to rant.

"Optimus?"

"Yes, Sideswipe."

"Been looking at those openings created when a geyser shoots through the surface."

Optimus waited, "Yes, Sideswipe…," he prompted when Sideswipe seemed to get distracted.

"Oh yes! Well depending on where the geysers erupt, the tunnels they create to the surface are of varying degrees of stability. The harder the rock, the more it shatters. However the softer the rock the more stable the openings are."

"What are you getting at?"

"Well, using ship's scanners I have managed to create a map of the sort of rock consistency you should be aiming for and overlay it over the pre-existing tunnel network."

"In aid of what, Sideswipe?" Optimus was rapidly losing patience.

"Well they would only have a few seconds but I was thinking if my calculations are correct they can ride one of those babies to the surface."

Ratchet butted in, "The temperature of those geysers is below absolute zero. If a mech gets hit by that he could go into system wide shock. It can cause tremors, circuit failure. If the energon freezes and reaches the spark chamber, the spark chamber would destabilize and their spark would shatter."

"You're just a ray of light and hope for us all, aren't you?" Blackout commented sarcastically. He hadn't told the others that Barricade had been hit. He hated the gnawing little nanovirus of worry that started chewing on his attention span. Barricade would be all right, wouldn't he? He'd sounded okay. Kind of okay.

Ratchet merely frowned. "Stating the facts."

Optimus was dubious. "How about the tunnels they're in now?"

"From what I can tell, those tunnels only have a couple of surface routes, none particularly stable. With the tremors what do you think the chances are of either being open and not subject to a cave in?"Sideswipe spoke somberly as Optimus thought over his options. He spoke up once more. "Optimus, Ratchet would have his work cut out for him, not to mention what the temperatures would do to the humans, but this could be their only shot to the surface."

****

"You know," Prowl said, "we are trying to help you." He waved a handheld thermal unit over Barricade's legs. The paint had gone greyish and vague.

"Save me for a fate worse than death," the con muttered.

"FROM a fate," Stokes corrected. He was applying the small point of an acetylene torch into Barricade's knee joint.

"What?"

"You mean 'save you from a fate worse than death.' That's how the saying goes."

"Know what the saying is, fleshsack. Consider being dead preferable to being stuck with you and Prince Perfect. And the only reason he's 'saving' me is because he needs my comm."

Prowl growled audibly this time. "You know Barricade you could at least just accept that some of us don't want to blow your sorry spark to the pits and be silently gracious about it, rather than griping on about how we're all out to get you and I'm just using you for what you can do for me. I have been nothing but civil to you, I don't expect any respect from you that would be too much to ask of your limited social skills." Barricade growled softly at the remark. "But could you at the very least, shut up. If you don't have anything useful or civil to add—before I stop resisting the urge to throw you in the path of the geyser." He glared furiously at Barricade's legs as he ran the thermal unit across the frost-bitten metal.

It was a few minutes before anyone spoke; the tension was thick in the air.

"By the way," Barricade asked, "You enjoy that conversation with your estimable leader, Prime? Was it everything you expected?"

"He trusts me to handle things," Prowl said, stiffly.

Stokes tried to redirect conversation. "So, what's up with you and Nadya, Barricade?"

"Up? Nothing's up, down or any way. Disgusted you allow females into combat, that's all."

"Yeah, well, no one tells Nadya what to do." He laughed to himself before continuing, much to Barricade's irritation. "There was this time at NASA, when we were training. She is one of the best pilots we've got, right? So they put us into this simulation which was actually being tested. It was our final exam before the mission: we fail that and we're grounded. They threw everything at us and I mean everything. So of course we failed."

"Is there a point to this? Or am I supposed to take comfort knowing you're both failures?"

"Well, Nadya didn't like this no win scenario crap, she's one who thinks there's a solution to all life's problems but only if you're willing to get your hands dirty. Anyway she goes to the flight director and voices her concerns. It turns into an all-out tantrum on his part, but she stood there and took it—didn't even flinch and I mean this guy was big, and loud and as dumb as they come but he knew how to fly and he never let anyone question his methods. That is until Nadya. She waited until he'd finished, walked over to him slowly and I have no idea what she said to him but that guy went white as a sheet. We got to do the test again, but I tell ya that woman, has some weird Russian vibe about her, you don't want to get in her way when she's on a mission to do something and you can't tell her, she always does it her way."

"Noticed."

"Besides, the Autobots let females fight."

"Emulating their ideas is not exactly a winning argument, plasma bag. Autobots do a lot of stupid stuff."

"Stupid stuff," Prowl said, frustrated, "like saving your sorry crankshaft." He shut off his thermal. "Try it now."

Barricade heaved himself to his feet. He took a few gingerly steps forward. The servos whined, and he winced, but he could move. And the shaking had stopped. "Seems okay." He picked up the sack of Neptunium from where it had gotten thrown. He looked at the other two. Waiting, no doubt, for gratitude. Fat chance. Barricade had already used his allotment of gratitude for the solar cycle. They'd seen the jet rocket through the geyser and overhead to the left. Once again, the planet had to go to Unicron. "What? Are you coming?"

*****

Ironhide was a little surprised the jet wasn't whining. In fact, he was almost getting worried. The larger mech shivered, hard enough to rattle his frame, curled into a ball. A very large ball, but a ball. Ironhide was doing miles better, himself.

"You okay?"

"I am…marginally functional, human," He flailed his gun in a large circle. "Do not try to attack me, Autobot. My targeting system is still online."

"Not doing so good myself," Ironhide admitted. "Maybe that was a bad idea."

"It was the human's idea," Starscream muttered, as a way of saying 'of course it was a bad idea'." Another shiver racked him.

"Are you in pain, Starscream?" Nadya felt helpless. She should have figured that the gas would affect them. Nothing could be that cold and not have some impact on the mechs. Gently she placed a warm hand on his freezing leg. "I'm sorry Starscream, I should have known better about the effect of the geyser. I grew up in one of the coldest places on the planet. Got lost in a blizzard once, I was found half dead in a snow drift. All I remember is the cold and how it gets everywhere, one of the most painful, scariest things I've ever felt."

"Oh that's some good comforting. Are you trying to make him panic?" Ironhide grumbled.

"I'm just saying that I know how you feel, I wish I could help. I'm sorry I did this to you."

"Unimportant," the jet snapped. His turbines fired in irritation. Nadya felt a gush of hot air wash over her.

"That's it!" Nadya said. "Can you burn your engines hot? If they generate enough heat into the surrounding area, couldn't that help raise your internal temperature?"

The jet grumbled something about 'another' human plan, but he ignited his engines. Ironhide dragged himself closer to the jet's back. Nadya could feel the heat through her space suit. This had to be helping. She watched as Ironhide slowly stopped shivering, and straightened up from his frozen hunch. "Better?" she asked the jet.

"No." He cut off his engines.

"I thought you were supposed to handle extremes of temperature," Ironhide said—the damn jet just wanted to whine again, he thought.

"Seekers have additional heat shielding than other mechs. That makes us able to survive at extremes of temperature, yes. But only in our vehicle modes. I was half-transformed to be able to grab you."

"So this is somehow my fault?"

"And the human's. I suspect that she, at least, is not enjoying my suffering." He made a strangled sound in his throat. The shakes seemed to be getting worse.

"Oh look," Ironhide said, catching the bobbling flicker of headlamps from down the tunnel. "The happy family reunited."

"Can't express my joy at seeing you again," Barricade muttered, limping along behind Prowl. "What sort of perversion did we walk in on here?"

"You wish," Starscream muttered.

"Yeah, I do. Would be a pleasant change from all this misfortune the Autobots seem to drag in their wake. That only splashes on us."

"Starscream got hit pretty hard by the geyser blast," Nadya explained to Prowl, who was at least pretending to listen. "Ironhide too, but Starscream's engines warmed him up."

Barricade crossed over to the jet. "Me," he announced, so Starscream wouldn't—he hoped—freak out and whack him. He recognized the greyish haze of the freeze from his own joints and legs. But several of the lines seemed to bulge, as if the coolant or liquid in them had gone sludgy hard. He tapped his comm.

"Blackout," the copter acknowledged.

"Go hot," Barricade said. "Got a question or two for Dr Slice and Dice."

"What does that blasted mech want now?" Ratchet's voice came over.

"Hypothetical question: suppose a bot got hit good and hard by that geyser stuff. What would happen?"

A pause. "Thought I explained that to you, Blackout. Figured first thing you'd do is chitchat to your little friend."

"Oh he was going to," Barricade said, resenting the 'little' friend bit, "But he got distracted talking about the hot way your aft moves when you walk."

"Cade," Blackout said, warningly.

"Do not call me that! I hate it when anyone calls me that!" He could hear the suppressed snickers from both sides of the line. "Can we get back on topic? Trying to increase my medical knowledge here."

"As I told your galoot," Ratchet said, "Could be anything from circuit-stalls to, well…let's just say you don't want it to hit the spark chamber."

Barricade swore.

"Everything okay, Cady-pants?" Blackout asked.

"Shut up. Got to do something I already regret. About which you will hopefully never learn." He cut comm. with a sharp snap. "All right," he said, "Fire your engines."

"We have already attempted that." But the jet obediently hit his ignition.

"Don't think you've tried this." He tossed the Neptunium pack down by Nadya and, as they watched, walked under the jet's engines. "This, incidentally," he announced, "sucks." He waited until his heat sinks teetered on shutdown, and came out. "All right, flyboy. Let's see your spark chamber."

"What?!" the jet screeched. "I am a nice bot. I do not do that sort of thing! And not with you! And there is an audience!"

"Shut up, crack your chest. Or I'll do it for you."

The jet slumped back, his engines dying down. As they watched, he slowly retracted his armor and secondary systems, revealing a hexagonally shaped chamber. "This," he said, "is the paramount humiliation. I do not think things can go any lower than this."

"Oh, this is a real treat for me," Barricade snapped. He reached up and lay his heated hands and forearms along the length of the chamber. The jet gasped, and, rocking back, snatched the smaller bot, still burning hot to the touch, to his chest, curling his arms and legs around him.

They sat like that for a long time, the jet curled around the smaller bot, like a child with a stuffed animal. Long enough that Ironhide muttered, "Well, this is awkward."

"Is this how they have sex or something?" Stokes asked.

Nadya glared at him. "How should I know?"

"Will Barricade be okay?"

"Barricade," the bot's voice was muffled against the jet's chest, "Is unfortunately fine. His sincerest prayers of dying so as not to have to live with this moment in his memory have gone unanswered."

The jet pulled away slowly, his armor sliding back into place. He still shivered from time to time, but he no longer looked shocky. "Thank you, Barricade," he said.

"Leave me alone," the Decepticon said, sourly, shaking off the jet's hands. "Didn't want to be stuck alone with these fraggin' morons."

"Hey, wait. That's right!" Stokes said. "Where's Dead End?"