Chapter 25

Nonsense interrupted

or Winners do journals

The so-called author of this story has been abducted by me, Drag Strip, Stunticon Second in Command and soon to be real leader of the best Gestalt team ever created.

If you ever want to see the so-called author of this story again, you better not tell anyone about what you're about to read. It's top-secret, confidential, private, whatever you want to call it – and most of all, it's PERFECT.

Oh, but if you belong to the FIA, note that I'm ready to return to the Formula One circuit. No, no, no, not only return, but to conquer it.

But let's get back to what I was explaining.

Okay, so I keep a personal registry of my experiences, a journal as some of you flesh creatures call it. Now, I won't show you ALL of it – it's not your business, for example, who I've been fraggin' with. That's for me to know and you to envy – envy them, of course.

So yeah, since all of you fleshbags have slime instead of brain-modules, I'll show you the first entries of my journal, just for you to have an idea how I handle things in there:

Entry 01:

The sphere was big and glossy, as it had to be to welcome me into life. I would have watched it more carefully, but I was far too distracted with my own reflection on its surface.

I was yellow.

I was shiny.

I was gorgeous.

There's no doubt that I was created a champion. It doesn't happen every day that Megatron, yeah, the Supreme Commander of the Decepticons himself, takes the time to actually build someone and take him all the way to Cybertron to give him sentient life.

He did that for me. Some say that I inherited his winning spirit, although I took it to the next level.

I don't even remember what I said when Megatron told me to declare myself to him. Declare? He might be the super leader, but he wasn't pretty. Besides, his gray colour was very distracting, not to mention hideous. Really, who in the Universe would choose gray as his paintjob? It's sterile, it's dull… and it's also the color of the dead.

Oh yeah, Megatron also created another four robots besides me. It turned out that they were supposed to be my teammates, as if I needed any teammates…

One of them was also 100% gray.

Entry 02:

I hate Motormaster.

Entry 17:

Another day ended, another day of being beautiful.

I still hate Motormaster.

Entry 1428:

Wildrider left yesterday.

(Blinking cursor).

Entry interrupted.

Entry 1429:

How many times have I saved the day and no one, absolutely no one, has ever give me the recognition I deserve? Motormaster always takes the credit – I hate him – sometimes leaving a few scraps to Dead End when he's in the mood.

But my team knows who the bravest Stunticon is, not to mention the hottest. Even Motormaster knows it; that's why he beats me all the time – I hate him!

"What do you want?"

"I came to collect."

Skywarp pleases my optics. I wish he would please my spark chamber too.

Thing is that when Skywarp grabbed me it was to collect me as a slave – once again, not the kind of slave I was interested in being.

Yeah, I suppose I gave him my word. But I was hanging like a million yards above the ground. Whose finish would stand a fall that far? I have a force field, but that would have been asking too much from it.

Skywarp teleported, and I hated it again. It felt like if my head was torn off and tossed into a trash compactor. Only it was more than dizziness and confusion this time. This time it hurt, because when we came back to the world my arm was half embedded into a wall.

It hurt really badly.

And Skywarp? He laughed, he laughed all the time.

"Nice move you pulled with Ramjet," he told me. "That's the only reason why I slagged your arm instead of your head, but think about it next time you want to trick me, Drag. You're my slave now, didn't you remember? Where the slag were you hiding? I needed you to polish my air intakes."

That was my cue to beat him to slag. The pain in my arm was killing me, but even with that I wouldn't have had any problems beating Skywarp. I'm the best Stunticon, the only one with natural warrior instinct, superior to anyone. Vortex told me that once. He was laughing when he said it, but that was because he's nuts. And nuts guys never lie. Wildrider—

(Line erased)

Anyway, I wouldn't have had any problems beating Skywarp, but I didn't do it for two reasons. One, it's always a shame to turn such a hot face into slag. And two, two… well, who cares about number two? My teammates knew it too, minutes before it happened. The Gestalt bond was filling itself, like an empty fuel tank reaching its maximum level.

I hate it that I wasn't given the chance to choose my teammates.

I wasn't surprised when I saw Arrr Raid. I started to call him that because of the patch on his eye, and he must have liked the name because he was still looking like a pirate, even though the rest of his frame had been repaired and he didn't have Laserbeak on his shoulder as I suggested once.

So I wasn't surprised, but that doesn't mean that I was pleased. Arrr Raid only reminds me that yeah, the nightmare is real, my team has changed and Wildrider is gone…

There's no way I'll ever consider that renegade Aerialbot as my teammate, no fraggin' way. You can't exchange Gestalt robots just like that. No matter what Dead End says, we're not fraggin' toys that can be replaced.

Frag Arrr Raid. I hate him. I wish my spark wouldn't betray me every single time that I see him. It's as if he had been my teammate ever since creation, as if he, too, was standing before Vector Sigma and lubricating himself as he watched my reflection on the shiny sphere. I'll keep doing my best to focus on the thought that he's the reason why Wildrider is not coming back. That's the truth. How come we can't see it? Even Motormaster plays the idiot and hasn't slagged that Aerialbot on the many, many chances he has had.

Why the slag am I a Gestalt robot in the first place? I'd do so much better on my own, an independent Decepticon like Shockwave or someone like that, with the difference that I'd be much better, the best of them all.

But I'm deviating from my primary concern back when Arrr Raid showed up: my arm.

Yeah, my arm was hurting like hell. I couldn't see half of it, embedded as I said it was inside the wall. I would have thought it had been chopped off, if not for the incredibly severe pain in my fingers – yeah, I still had fingers. I know a guy or two who would love to hear the news.

Oh yeah, and in the meantime, Arrr Raid beat Skywarp. Not that I needed him to do it. I could have done it myself, and I would have done it, slagged arm or not.

So Arrr Raid's first action on returning from wherever he had gone was to steal one of my so many moments of glory… Former Aerialbot and now an opportunist as well… What could be worse?

"Can you stop crying and squirming? I'm trying to free your arm here!" he dared to say. And to say that the fragger was trying to free my arm was huge lie; he was more like trying to break it in two or more pieces. I can understand some guys wanting to keep a souvenir of me, but that was too much.

He also lied when he said I was crying; I wasn't. I was sort of expressing the unbearable pain of having an arm almost severed. Didn't I have the right to do so? My arm was inside a wall! That hurt!

"Where… were you... and what took you so long, fraggit?!" I said, not so loud as to be called a cry. If he expected a nice welcome just because he had come back on his own and not dragged back by Motormaster, he could be slagged up all the way around. Just because the Gestalt bond said he was part of the team, it didn't mean that he was part of my team. Yeah, I never got the deserved right to choose my teammates, but as true as my paintjob is the shiniest of all Cybertron, is the fact that I would have never, ever, chosen him.

Especially when he shot the wall and made it collapse. My arm was free, or whatever remained of it, 'cause the pain got worse.

I fell to my knees, but that wasn't weakness but a natural reaction towards suffering. Any warrior would have done the same, especially one as beautiful as me.

"It's not that bad, stop whining," Arrr Raid spat as he held my elbow – not delicately at all. "It seems that you'll keep your arm attached, but you'd do well remembering next time you teleport that you and a wall can't occupy the same space at the same time."

He tried to be funny, or to pretend that nothing had happened since he left – or since he arrived, or who cares? He's not Wildrider, he'll never be. I know Wildrider wouldn't have mocked me. He would have been worried to see my arm in such a bad state. He would have comforted me.

I hate Arrr Raid. I hated him too when I thought he had abandoned us.

My gravito-gun popped out of subspace and I fired with my good arm, and with 'good' I mean not wounded, because both of my arms are good, supreme actually.

Honestly, I don't remember where the hell I aimed. I would have liked to say that I targeted Arrr Raid's head, eager to return things to their normal status, but the shot hit Skywarp instead, who had gotten up and was ready to stick his incendiary guns into Arrr Raid's aft and empty their charge in there.

Not that I wouldn't have liked to see that, but the fraggin' Gestalt bond stings when some outsider hurts or tries to hurt any of my teammates. Besides, I had to show Arrr Raid that it wasn't him who would save day.

And what a show I put on! It's true that my gravito-gun is the most awesome weapon around, but it would be nothing without my expert handling. That was a lesson that Skywarp will know well from now on, as I made gravity frag him up and propel him upwards, crashing him against the ceiling as if he were made of junk. He was knocked out when he returned to the floor – Knock Out… now that would have been a proper name for me.

Fortunately, Skywarp's face remained intact. Maybe when he returns to online status he will reconsider who is the master and who is the slave. I wouldn't mind having a hot fly boy to warm my recharge berth every now and then.

I gave Arrr Raid my best look of superiority, the one that I have rehearsed before my mirror until perfection, but also the one that everybody has to receive when being addressed by me.

Arrr Raid didn't kneel to me as he should have; the fool preferred to twist his mouth. What an ugly grimace. There's definitely nothing attractive in this slag with wings. If the fraggin' Gestalt bond was going to be a complete glitch and slag me anyway, it should have at least chosen a hot teammate for me. It's no secret that I'm the only one with astounding looks in my team, no matter what Dead End says.

"I didn't need your help," Arrr Raid said, the ungrateful.

"As I didn't need yours," I replied, returning my gravito-gun to subspace. There was a time in which I wondered how his face plates would look spread all around, mixed with the ones of his teammates. Former teammates, that's right… I guess that Arrr Raid is off of my killing list, at least for the moment. That doesn't mean that I don't hate him.

"Shut off the pain receptors in your left arm," he said, noticing when a short circuit made me wince.

His know-it-all stance made me furious. "I know what to do! I've been online longer than you!"

"Well, it doesn't look that way," he snorted. "Now, which way to wherever the other Stunticon slaggers are being pounded? I could find them following the fraggin' Gestalt bond, but I don't feel like flying randomly through this giant tin can you call base."

I don't like his attitude. Had my arm been in a better status, I would've showed him a thing or two. Besides, I didn't have time to lose. I could feel that Breakdown was in trouble and it was my duty to keep my teammates operational.

"That way," I said, pointing ahead.

Fortunately, I was expecting his reaction, otherwise I have to confess that he probably would have left me behind – probably, and only because my arm was injured.

"Let go of me!" he said when I held him by one wing and didn't allow him to transform. It pays to have fliers in the army you have to fight for; I have known for a long time that Seekers don't like it when somebody else touches their wings roughly. Ex Aerialbots don't have any reason to be different.

"You go behind me," I ordered him. "You'll get lost in the Nemesis without me. Besides, I'm your superior!"

Things got bumpy when he pushed me to the wall. "Superior my aft! Thank the fraggin' Matrix that you're damaged, or else you'd see me slagging you all the way back to Cybertron! Don't think even for a moment that I forgot how you treated me when I was first taken here!"

Honestly, I still don't know what he was talking about. How I treated him? He was the one who tore Wildrider out of my life!

"I should have turned you into slag as soon as Motormaster dared to take you to this base!" I cried, fairly.

I was sure that Arrr Raid would agree that we should engage in a good fist fight right there and then, but the uncomfortable reminder of where we belonged rang again.

"As we waste time here, Breakdown and Dead End are in trouble," he spat instead of responding to the punch I gave him. "We can leave them to be slagged, or we can go and prevent Menasor from losing an arm and a leg."

Another leg, I thought.

I made a face. Arrr Raid was right, but only because it was too obvious. You can't be a Stunticon and not feel when your teammates are being pummeled, duh.

"'kay," I had to give in. "But I'll lead the attack!"

"Oh, for slag's sake! And just how exactly are you planning to do that? With your arm like that, you won't be able to ride! I doubt you'll even be able to transform."

When I jumped towards him, his arms moved instinctively and caught me.

"What the—"

"Easy," I hurry to help him in his ignorance. "I'll ride on you. You have wings, use them!"

"There's no way I'll be your ride!"

We struggled again as I tried to position myself on his back and he tried to get rid of me. Funny, when I saw the Autobot twins doing this to Starscream and Skywarp it looked far easier, and they were airborne!

"Didn't you say we were wasting time?" I asked as the fragger kept hitting me against the wall, trying to get rid of me but achieving nothing but scratching my back in the process. Oh, but he'll pay for that!

It seemed that we were going nowhere, until I had an idea – a brilliant idea. Wildrider and I used to go water skiing a lot, him usually being the one driving the boat. So I suggested – no, I stated – that Arrr Raid should play the part of the boat and pull me behind, no matter if there was no water inside the base. He didn't seem convinced, but the urgency to get to Dead End and Breakdown sealed it.

So I ended up skiing with Arrr Raid through the Nemesis. That smirk on my face that the security cameras captured was nothing but a stain on their lenses. I definitely did not feel anything resembling happiness or excitement during that ride. I only felt that way when I did it with Wildrider, but with no one else! Especially not with a fake teammate who I'm forced to address as such.

The rest of the day was not worthy of being registered in these files. Yeah, we joined the fray, we slagged, we got slagged… Quite predictable.

The fight also went on as predicted. We would have beat up Thrust, Brawl, Vortex and Blast Off, but Megatron sent Soundwave to intervene before things got nasty – for our rivals, that is. Brawl will say slag and a half about it, but the truth is that I kicked his sorry aft.

Now, it would be easy to say that Arrr Raid's intervention made the difference, but history should be fair and acknowledge the fact that, if my arm had been operational, I would have saved the day myself and shown that intruder who the real leader of the Stunticons is. He still has a lot to learn. His place, for starters.

Now the real nightmare begins. Arrr Raid will have to declare himself to Megatron and officially become a Stunticon. I don't know what the slag is going to happen now, but I know for sure that Wildrider is not coming back.

P.S. I hate Motormaster.

That's all, ALL, you'll get to see from my private files. Consider yourself privileged, and warned.

Now shut it, the so-called author of this story will be back next chapter. That is, if you still want her. If you don't, I really don't care and I'll still give her back to you. I'm getting tired of whatever she's doing to my dashboard. No matter what she says, it is not sexy, and I'm NOT into humans!

Review if you dare, fleshbags!