The Diego Diaries: War and Aftermath (dd6 108)
-0-Med Bay, Salton Sea
He stood uneasily in the doorway watching the scene within. Ratchet noticed, then stood, pulling plugs out of his various ports as he did. "Come in, infant," he said with a grin.
Partition hesitated, then entered to stand before Ratchet with his servos on his hips. "You made it."
Ratchet nodded. "We both did. I told you, right, recruit?"
Partition nodded. "You needed me. You can't be trusted to do things without help."
It was obvious to Ratchet that the kid was still lingering in the OMG-WTF zone so he grinned. "There is that," he said with a smile. "We have refugees. We need to get on it. Are you up to it or do you want to go to Mars and help at that end."
"No," he said. "I'll help you here. You need me."
Ratchet grinned. "I do." He glanced at Ironhide who was looking at the kid with a slight disquiet. "He's with me. Let's go to the bridge and get the ball rolling, Ironhide." Ratchet grinned at Ironhide. :Shell shock. Its going to take a moment to recede:
Ratchet led the way with Ironhide and Partition following. It was a short ride to the bridge, then a shorter meeting with Prime. Ratchet would go to Phobos to lead the worst case scenario for illness and other misery-laden individuals. They would be sparse on the ground considering the great job that the local doctors had done over the eons. He would stand on the hangar deck watching the ships bring civilians in with Partition hovering at his side.
-0-On the Salton Sea
Raptor turned to go to the command table to check data, then noticed the humans. He paused, then grinned. "You slaggers still here?"
Grins met that. :Raptor, what's the plan now? You pull off the civilians and their stuff, then what?:
"Well, I'm leaning toward putting a torpedo up their afts but that's just me," he said to snickers here and there.
Prime turned toward him. "What about leveling two of the settlements and trimming the first? Cut out the infrastructure that could be used for aggression and leave the rest."
"That was my line of thinking too, Optimus," Raptor said as he sat down at the command table. He was facing Prime, leaning on the table like any codger at a bar. Prime was lounging in the command chair rather casually, something that surprised Harris. The bots doing things that felt familiarly 'human' was a new sight. But then, all of the momentous events thus far were. "I think if we give them a big hole on the farthest planets and let them have the first, then we're ahead. The energy is less stable around the first than the other two."
Prime nodded. "Design a team to take things down, General. Make it comprehensive and strategic."
Raptor grinned. "Will do. It'll let the infant blow off some steam."
Prime grinned. It was good to be Prime."
-0-On the settlement planets just before surrender
The ships began to move off, rising from the building tops to head for space. Watching them leave from their hiding places, homes, offices, shops, and other places in the three big sprawling habitations, it was with dread that the population waited for what came next. They had come out of nowhere and after a skirmish or two that included horrible black acidic monsters, takeover had been complete. The settlements were in an area few ever came so their defenses were mostly automated. It had been swift and they had fallen into fearful obedience.
Then he had called to them in their darkness and despair.
"My name is Optimus Prime."
The entire population would never forget the moment they heard the velvet voice of their leader speaking to them over the transponder communications link all of them shared and which Primes could access. They halted in their tracks to listen.
"We have received your distress signal and have launched an armada to come to your rescue. We have driven off the intruders and are prepared to airlift you from here to safety. We have rescued Cybertron and we have established a city on a colony world where you will be transported due to the destruction and rebuilding happening on our home world. We have reclaimed civilian migrations as large as two million at a time so your numbers are not a hindrance to your rescue. We will do this systematically and we ask that you obey the directions of those who will be landing shortly to help you.
"We know you have been here a long time. We will allow you to take whatever you wish to bring in terms of possessions, databases, art and cultural items as well as any among you who are deceased. We have teams that can help you disinter your dead and bring them with you. It is not your fault that this has happened so you will not have to leave knowing your deceased loved ones are left behind. Our army will protect you. Our air force which is mainly composed of Seekers will help and protect you as well.
"The war is over and the Autobots have reclaimed both Cybertron and our people wherever we find them. We ask that you gather your possessions and families, friends and all others who will come. We are aware of pets and other obligations as well. Teams will meet with your leaders to organize not only your airlift but that of those who are deceased. Elders, the sick and hospitalized, infants, and those with special concerns will be given priority and you will be reassembled as families and neighbors on the other side. I will transmit images of the place where you will be living when we get there so you can understand that you are not leaving a good place to exist in another that is less hospitable.
"We heard you and we came. Gather now and let us help you in the most orderly and thorough fashion. You are important to us. Until all are one. Prime out."
Images of the colony were sent and the population absorbed them in silence. When that passed, messages began to arrive. The population turned almost as one to the task before them. They did so with an almost overpowering sense of happiness and relief.
-0-On the ground in the third settlement
Maelstrom stood on a street corner with Chromia and Arcee. The civilians were busy getting each other and what they wanted to bring with them gathered. They were assisted by a veritable ant hill of mechs and the odd femme from the colony. Ships would land in the middle of intersections waiting for loads. Groups would be checked off, gathered up and taken to the vessels which would lift up making room for the next.
From there, they would go to space and either head through a bridge or be off loaded to the behemoths in space that sat in a row with their running lights glowing. For most of those who saw them, it was an awesome experience, one they watched in whispers. The hangar deck of Phobos was busy with the odd off load of an elder needing something or someone who was sick. Partition took notes as Ratchet dictated. He was intensely focused as he worked.
Sitting nearby on a barrel watching the two, Ironhide felt his mainspring, so to speak, begin to relax. It had been explosively awful, the past few, and he couldn't shake it as fast as he used to. They had too good a thing here, the two of them. Most of the time, things were what they were but now? They were impossibly important. It was a two-by-two world for both of them and when one was out of the picture it was a terribly cold place.
The swirl continued.
-0-Downtown Autobot City
Ravel and Tie Down stood at the corner waiting for the rest of their club to join them. They had closed the shop to help with the immigrants coming. Their own genitors would join them when classes let out. Right now, they waited for friends, nodding to this and that bot walking past who knew them and reverenced their skills. They were a highly esteemed pair in the colony.
Kestrel and Tagg walked up to join them. They had morning classes and were available to assist. Glancing around, Kestrel smiled. "I love new immigrants. Their happiness is so infectious."
Ravel nodded. "I do too. This is such a good thing. More citizens rescued. I was told it was over 100,000."
Tagg nodded. "It is. Orion messaged us. He said that none of us were to get too tired and that the children should go to the Military Day Care Center in The Fortress."
"We can have our genitors get them. We can take a break at dinner, then maybe one or two of us can take all of them home while the rest continue," Ravel said.
"That sounds good, Ravie," Kes said as they stood together. Soon, the rest of their club, an elder social group of individuals from Iacon would arrive and they would join the long line of those waiting to assist newcomers into the world of freedom and authentic Cybertronian life. It would last for one and a half days nonstop.
-0-Nearby, later that afternoon
Inweld and Morius stood on the corner watching the newcomers. They were streaming in steadily, the refugees. Ships landed and groups were taken off, moving with assistance to the long row of immigration and refugee intake personnel that waited for them. They joined lines, waited patiently and looked all around them as they did. It was evident that they saw titan city-formers here, entire square miles of towers, businesses and other sites. The Temple gleamed nearby between towers that glistened in the sunlight. A steady hum of voices could be heard everywhere. The two on impulse joined the line of worker bees, chatting with the others as they moved closer to the front and a chance to give back. Both of them would be surprisingly uplifted by the experience.
Around them on the airfield, ships brought in baggage, equipment and other things that the refugees didn't want to leave behind. Ships would be bearing tagged baggage, essential equipment and devices, databases, mainframe computers, all manner of imaginable thing, along with the dead. They were angry now, the colonists, so they were prepared to bring everything they owned as a big middle finger to their captors. On the colony worlds, the chaos had leveled out to a steady and forthright hum. Entire areas were being stripped down of all that the inhabitants wanted, then packed up and loaded on ships. They were told that a warehouse that handled refugee baggage in Industrial Park City #5 would handle what they decided to bring, so many were the irate elders stripping down their apartments to transport it to the new one somewhere else.
It was often pretty hilarious.
"Those fraggers came and made things more terrible. We were worried about the energy floes and knew it was only a matter of time before we had to evacuate but those fraggers … they came and gave us a good half joor," a little mech said as he chatted up a number of soldiers who were terribly amused by his grim retelling. "If I had been younger I would have done something about it, infants. I used to be a soldier once upon a time."
"I can see that, Abba," Sandstorm said as he listened to someone who reminded him of his old grand atar. "We're here to do that for you."
The old mech sniffled. "That's right, youngling," he said was high emotions and a tear or two. "You came and so did Prime. I KNEW YOU WOULD! Didn't I tell you?" he asked a couple of other little mechs who nodded in agreement. "I knew Prime would come. You infants. You serve the best Prime ever. I knew them all. I knew about everyone from Guardian Prime forward. All of the Primes after Guardian were fraggers until Optimus."
"Well, Zeta started out right but he sorta fell into bad ways," another little old mech said.
The first nodded. "He fell apart, that one, but Optimus. He's true and blue," the little mech said staring up at the soldiers.
They grinned at him and nodded. "We would agree with that," Sandstorm said.
They would listen to the little mechs chatting about things, then help them load up when their turn came. They would continue to do that for another orn, then they would be part of the crew who helped blow up everything that Prime and Prowl told them to detonate. It would be like Christmas and New Years rolled into one for all of them.
Yolo.
-0-TBC 8-25-17 edited 8-28-17
NOTES: For the two people on Earth who don't know what Yolo means, 'you only live once'. It's usually what delinquents say before they slide out onto the top of the Empire State Building to get a selfie.