The Diego Diaries: Farmin' (dd6 403)
-0-On the way out
They hit the airlock, then walked out into the slightly beige sunlight of the world post touchdown. The sand had swirled away leaving a lot of bedrock, then it swirled back and plastered the side where the airlocks were located. As they began to climb up on the concrete-like mound in and around the front of the door, they looked upward toward another nearby. Ratchet was standing on it waving madly. "OO-HOOO, SLAGGERS! HI!" he said, then stepped forward. The crust underfoot broke and he fell forward rolling down the incline to land on his back. Staring upward, he sat up. "I think I'm going to do that again." He smiled brilliantly at the others who grinned at him on the ground.
"OLD MECH! GET UP!" Ironhide said around his laughter.
Ratchet staggered up, then slipped his arms through Springer and Drift's. "Where are we going, handsomes?"
"To a bar. So I can get drunk," Ironhide said with a grin as he followed a laughing Prime and the others.
"GLAD I COULD ENTERTAIN YA!" Ratchet replied as they walked toward the dirt track that was going to be an eight lane highway from Unidad to Industrial Park Cities Highway 1 in the distance.
Prime laughed, glancing back at his party. "Last one to The Diner On The Corner is a Decepticon." With that, he transformed, put the metal to the peddle and blasted off.
It was a mad scramble as the others joined the rout, with Ratchet shoving Drift and Springer aside and off their peds as he followed. Drift and Springer landed on their afts, jumped up, transformed, and gave chase. It would be a slow pursuit as they drove through the sand dune disaster that was the highway back toward town.
-0-Moments later in town
They transformed, then walked down the sidewalk to the door of their 'home away from home', some of them, entering The Diner On The Corner. Pushing tables together, they sat, ordered, then smirked at each other.
"I'm claiming sparkling abuse, Ada," Springer said to Ratchet who dazzled him with a smile as he leaned against Ironhide.
"Poor widdow baby," Ratchet said with a chuckle. "After all the decaorns I selflessly gave you, it comes to this?"
"Yes." -all of them including Prime.
"Slaggers," Ratchet said with a grin. "Maybe I won't tell you the gossip that I was told by various and sundry humanoidal insecticon-lets."
Perceptor glanced at Wheeljack from their booth next to the table. "What is he talking about?"
"Humans, from the sound of it," Wheeljack said with a chuckle. "Do tell, Ratchet. Even if you don't get respect from them, you won't get it from us."
Everyone stared at Wheeljack, then Ratchet, then Wheeljack. Then Ratchet snickered. "AND A BIG FRAG YOU TO YOU, TOO, 'JACK!" He looked at the others. "Well, someone told someone who knew someone who was a friend of two people who were sort of related to several others including a guy in New Jersey who'll do anything for fifty bucks-"
"SLAG IT, RATCHET! TELL US!" Ironhide said with a laugh. "NOW!"
"I don't know how you do it, Ironhide. It would be like living with a giant toddler," Prowl said with a smirk.
"WHOO HOO! Prowl said a funny. Good one, slagger," Ratchet said with a smirk.
"Ahem. Gossip?" Optimus asked because behind the dignified holy facade was a snoopy slagger just like the rest of them.
Ratchet grinned. "There's going to be a big barbecue in Unidad today with Sciences, The Family and Earth 1. Earth2 isn't invited. Only some of the Consulate is. Some would be invited from Earth2 but it might cause trouble so they weren't, which made some unhappy about it. It's need to know. They're going to have a visitation for those who they can trust and apparently, Harley and Omar along with Merlie are spectacular cooks. It pays to live on a farm, I guess."
He then leaned in rather conspiratorially toward everyone who leaned in automatically to hear along with several strangers in a booth next to Wheeljack and Perceptor. Everyone waited as Ratchet made a show of looking around for spies. A cuff to the back of the helm by Ironhide and Prowl menacing him with a dinner fork spilled the tea, so to speak. Rubbing his helm after glowering at Ironhide, he looked at Prowl with a smirk. "Assault with a dead weapon, Prowler?"
"Anything you want to tell us, Optimus?" Springer asked Prime with a smirk.
Huge laughter. Especially Prime.
"Earth2 is livid with this new development. They're afraid that the spotlight will go off them and they won't have leverage or opportunity. New kid on the block and all. They want to join up as much with Unidad as they can. They want to dig in and figure out what you're up to, Optimus." Ratchet grinned. "Apparently, you're working some grand strategy here that has future ramifications or some such slag. If they only knew."
Prime snickered. "I do like cows."
Huge laughter.
Prowl stared at Ratchet as he tapped his digits on the table. It was the usual appraising cool gaze of a mech deciding to take on someone with whom he was out of his depth. "Is that all?" he finally asked.
"NO!" Ratchet dazzled Prowl. "They want to go on mineral expeditions, our Earth2. They want to work on collecting gem stones, gold and silver. They want to start a jewelry business for Earth. I don't have a problem with that, but they want to hook up with the 'fashion and artisan community' here to partner in the project with Cybertronian designs for all manner of jewelry."
"What's wrong with that?" Springer ventured. "Dare I ask?" he also ventured.
"Needlenose is our leading designer in gems and jewels," Ratchet said.
It was quiet a moment, then Springer laughed. "Serves them right."
"How has he deported himself, Prowl, since getting paroled?" Optimus asked.
"I haven't heard about infractions," Prowl said as he looked toward Springer. "Anything on the legal front?"
"He likes to cheat at cards," Drift said with a grin. "He likes to cheat at everything. He and Owen Harris are meant for each other."
Everyone agreed with that, then turned back to Ratchet.
"Soooo … more?" Ratchet asked.
Another cuff to the helm.
He glowered at Ironhide as he rubbed his helm, then grinned. "Hurt me, baby. Why the other night in the berth-" Ratchet began before laughter and revulsion shut him down. He grinned at a frowning Ironhide. "Cuff me again and I'll show movies."
"You have movies?" Drift asked with a grin as Springer snickered.
"An entire library," Ratchet said. "I think I'll upload them to the library and have them posted under 'fragging' and 'sports'."
Near upturning of tables at that one.
"Tell. Primal decree," Optimus said as he sat down once more laughing all the while.
"In that case, O Holy One, I was told that the teenaged girls of the leadership of Earth2 are forming a clique to dig into the 'way things are done here' so they can tell the world. Its not about intel, so to speak but the fame game. They want to be playahs."
"I doubt that includes the Nast kids. They don't seem the type to honk their own horn." Prowl smirked. "Unlike some exhibitionists we all know who are sitting at this table in medical drag."
HUGE snickers.
Ratchet eyeballed Prowl, then grinned. "What was that, Prowler? I was reviewing a 'facing tape of me and Ironhide-"
HUGE MAYHEMIC-STYLE MAYHEM!
Waiters loaded down with trays grinned nearby as they watched the show, then everyone sat down to be served. For a moment, it was all about the food, then Ratchet grinned again. "I forgot one item that I know you'll love."
"I shudder to ask," Prime said as he glanced at Ratchet.
"Shudder away, Optimus, because the Scout Jamboree in Alaska is in two orns," Ratchet said as the place exploded into chaos.
-0-Unidad Terra 1
They stood by the big hatch waiting for the atmosphere to even out. It was almost instantaneous for obvious reasons. Then they slid open. A mass of N.E.S.T. trucks towing heavy duty segways pulling enclosed trailers that bogged down on the way off the highway were waiting to come inside. The first pulled in, then slowed to stop beside Robert Merritt "Omar' Epps and his father, Harley. "Where do we go from here?" Sargent Trevor Smith asked as he leaned out the window of his jam packed vehicle.
"Follow us," Harley said as the two walked to their segway and climbed upon it. Driving toward the far end of the immense installation, a distance so far away that things there weren't clear to see, they followed the segway. Vehicle after vehicle, some towing big segways filled with cases that held food and drink followed after the two men. They drove across an immaculate space with roadways painted into the floor. It would keep driven vehicles on a path that pedestrians would be able to avoid as traffic went about the immense gigantic facility.
It rose up several hundred feet and felt as tall as the Basilica. There were upper floors and all of them were open to the front where the giant windows allowed them a good vantage point of the Terra Hub and the Mall of the Tri-Cities to the northwest of them. There was a real honest to goodness appearing downtown area with shops that were spaces to be filled, some of them two and three story while lights and signage signaled much more. They passed side streets that went into the facility with sidewalks and traffic lights, signs posting street names and at intervals, wall mounted monitors that were going to allow access to the news, weather, web pages of the citizens, a community bulletin board of everything including the bots as well as a directory to contact anyone in and outside of the building.
They drove for what seemed a mile or so before they reached the common area for entertainment and recreation. There was a spa, a big exercise facility, a barber and hairdresser shop, a huge swimming pool with tables and chairs, lounge and otherwise, set around it. Nearby, a pair of big grills from N.E.S.T. HQ and that of The Family Tower were going great guns. Merlie was waiting with a smile as the vehicles began to park in a neat row in front of the windows facing outside.
Everyone began to pile out, looking around, chatting and hugging. Then they began to pull their food and drinks, heading for a long table where they would be placed for the barbecue. Lots of it was being brought from the different locations and The Resort, chicken, ribs and brisket, given the size of the crowd. It was a great secret, this party, between those who were trusted and those who weren't yet. Some of them were too new to know and others had proven themselves suspect. Today was a celebration and everyone wanted to be here to have fun, not censor what they had to say.
Nearly 900 people were here, all of them bringing food, dogs, drinks, dessert, gossip, funny stories, and their best cameras. It would be a great, great day. It would be even better when the bots came back after their lunch break.
-0-At the Diner
"And then he said, "I have diplomatic immunity."
Everyone laughed loudly at Drift's story of a high caste drunk who went home to someone elses house and wouldn't leave so he was arrested. Everyone laughed at the high castes who persisted. Some of them were genuinely funny in their delusions. Then Drift glanced at Ratchet. "How are Partition and Lancer? I haven't been seen them in a bit."
"They're working," Ratchet said. "No sparklings yet but the bondage is new."
Prowl who was glaring darkly at Ratchet along with Springer and Ironhide leaned closer. "Evil. That's what it's going to get for an amma. An evil slagger with no shame nor redeemable features."
"Let me see … the five stages of grief … denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance … I think you're stuck in the name calling stage, Prowler," Ratchet said as he felt a sharp kick to his shins. "Think about it. You may be the power behind the mech, but you need a turn in the spotlight."
Everyone stared at Ratchet, then Prowl, then Ratchet.
Ratchet smirked. "You poor little femme, you. Poor picked on slagger. You get to go and help little kids be happy. You get to be famous. You get to just stand around and look … uh, handsome." (Another kick) "You can't handle little kids?"
"I'll have you know, slagger … little kids are my thing," Prowl said. He leaned back to stare at Ratchet. "You're evil. You're a satanic force for evil and all that is … evil comes from you."
Ratchet grinned, Prowl smirked, Springer shook his helm. "We never had a chance," he said glancing at Drift.
"Nope," Drift said with a big smile.
-0-Half a joor later at the airlock of Unidad Terra 1, Interplanetary Habitat of the Prime of Cybertron, Mars and the Empire
They entered, let in by the Ops Center crew who had been on duty since joor one. Walking in, the entire group of mechs from before along with several others and most of the soldier femmes including one trailing a smirking Maelstrom headed for the swinging party down the way. The place was stunning and short of the apartments of the locals and other places of work and storage, most of it was big enough for all of them to wander.
They nearly reached the site of the party, one with food, dancing, laughing and talking, swimming, lounging, and overall joie de vivre when someone shouted Prime's name. Before the bots reached the party, the party reached them. It would take a while for the applause from the humans and the barking of dogs to die down in the facility.
-0-TBC 7-4-18 edited 7-5-18
-0-It should be known that as of now on Mars, there's a sand storm so vast that it covers one quarter of the planet and reduces visibility down to midnight up a polar bear's backside. Our little devices there have powered down and will check periodically to see if it has enough solar power stored to power up and call us. For now, our devices are on sleep mode. SNIFFLE! THEY'RE SO CUTE AND LITTLE ON THAT BIG PLANET! (just me loving on the rovers) :D
HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY FOR THOSE WHO CELEBRATE AND HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY FOR THOSE WHO DON'T! AND HAPPY FIFTH OF JULY FOR EVERYONE AND HAPPY SIXTH OF JULY FOR EVERYONE AND … ;)