Nature of the Beast

One-Shot Series: Tcsovan Niv A'anoth

Chapter 2: Veterans' Affairs

*I'll have a new set up for this rewrite. An overarching plot and more individual plots spaced between. Kinda like how Avatar: the Last Airbender did their story.

*Note to Tigerhawk: Glad you like the new start to this! I'm personally much happier with this version than the old one, for various reasons. Pro-tip: winging it is fun, but pre-planning is your bestest friend for episodic storytelling haha. I literally have a list of "episode synopses" in my notebook. X)

Whenever Sentenza was feeling particularly down, it was always sobering to look through old cases she'd solved. Camber always jokingly called it a "cold shower" to knock her out of the mental ditch she'd fallen into. Reading those cases while idly listening to Kaonian news was one of the few ways she could relax after stressful nights – though Camber did rib her that that was technically working. But Sentenza was a busy femme. Being privately employed meant she didn't have the steady stream of jobs that cops did. Clients didn't always come to her, after all. Sometimes she had to be proactive and look for problems to solve herself. Police radio chatter was a handy way of finding any funny business since it was their job to be nosy. Journalists could be equally nosy, sometimes more so than cops, and in many occasions she wound up favoring them most of the two. They had a certain tact that cops sometimes lacked.

On hearing a polite knock at her apartment door, she put her datapad aside and lowered the volume of the news cast.

"Come in."

"Well, yer in a better mood this morning," Camber observed amiably from the entryway.

Sentenza looked back over her chair to find her landlady beaming at her. Unimpressed, she went back to her reading.

"Were ye expecting someone else?" the older femme wondered as she ambled in.

Sentenza couldn't decide whether to say yes or no. She settled for a noncommittal shrug.

"Ye've got that bored look on yer faceplates," Camber noticed after letting herself in. "Is Kaon actually safe today?"

"Crime doesn't sleep here," she reminded her, "but a good detective can catch it sleepwalking."

Camber chuckled. "Poetry, that! Ye'd not make a half-bad poet if ye ever decided to go that route."

Sentenza smirked. "It took me all night to think of that one. Don't flatter me."

"Up all night again?" tutted Camber. "Sentenza, honestly! It's a wonder ye manage to function! Give yer poor processor a rest at some point. It'll be no good at all if ye suffer a burnout!"

"I am taking a break," she argued weakly, glancing sideways at the news cast. "...Sort of."

Her landlady put her hands on her hips and made an expressively disbelieving face at her. After one last friendly scolding about her poor power down habits, Camber cordially saw herself out. It was a lucky break, Sentenza thought, that it was so easy to fool her. She hadn't really been up all night; her "special batch" was making very certain of that. Camber would be all over her case if she found out what was in it. Her supplier was actually starting to get a little suspicious about why she needed such a steady supply of medical grade sedatives all of a sudden. She didn't have the spark to tell her the real reason, and her cagey non-answers were starting to wear a little thin.

Sentenza pushed that little problem from her mind and returned to the news cast. She didn't so much watch as she did listen to them, but when the lower third graphics flashed red she looked up, and promptly swore. The text read "BREAKING: War Veteran Found Dead; Third in Four Orns" while the footage showed a home in the northwest quadrant of Kaon where a swarm of reporters and officers had arrived.

"Frack, not another one," the black Seeker hissed.

Some fear was briefly assuaged when the reporter on the scene clarified it was not one of the War heroes memorialized near the Well, but that didn't make this death any less frightening or tragic. This death was not isolated; it was a case Kaonian precincts were frustrated over for lack of evidence. All evidence they did have, the reporter said, indicated a serial killer was on the loose.

"Yeah, no duh," she huffed at the screen. "I told the precincts that after the first two."

But it did get her thinking. All the victims were War vets, and all were Decepticons thus far. Either a War-time 'Con had gone rogue and was attacking his or her fellows, or an Autobot was on a vendetta. And killers like that, in her experience, always started small to get their methods down pat and build confidence. If they kept going unchecked, they might very well expand their operating sphere and go higher up the pecking order of prestige. Considering some of those types were in important positions post-War, it could cause a real chaotic furor if one of them got taken out.

Sentenza tossed the datapad aside and hurried outside.

She knew Grimglimmer's precinct was the main one looking into this particular case, so it was towards his precinct building she flew. The building itself was a two-story, sleek thing with a slanting roof that swept down over a small flier's balcony, and hexagonal convex "bubble" windows on its walls, both designed to shrug off the acid rain that plagued Kaon in the spring and winter seasons. It wasn't the prettiest thing ever designed, nothing like the sweeping, intentionally artful designs in Kalis or Tyrex, but it got the job done; that was the important thing to Kaon. A thing didn't need to look fancy if it was practical.

She strode in through the doors.

"Hey, hey, look who it is!" purred a suave voice. "Haven't seen you in a while. How's it hummin' sweet cheeks?"

An arm fell around her shoulder. Sentenza shot the owner a warning glare. The owner himself, smiling back and ignoring the warning, was a lithe, athletically gangly mech colored red and black with over-the-top fiery decals running up his arms and legs and a spoiler peeking up over his back. Bright pink-ish red optics glimmered on silver faceplates. When he refused to remove his arm, Sentenza jerked her right wing up into his faceplates.

"I'm busy, Lowrider. Slag off."

"Alright, alright. I'm just sayin' hi. Cool yer jets," he insisted. "You're here about the serial case? The one with the War vets?"

"Good. You're not so distracted that you forgot your job," she snipped. "I take it you've already got the case files prepped?"

"They're on my desk. Boss knew you'd be coming."

Sentenza knew where that desk was, swept by it, snatched the datapad, and swept away again. The most recent file folder, labeled sk-3, was still having data input by investigators. She wasn't that surprised when one update revealed the victim, like the other three, was a Decepticon; the badge gave him away. Whether or not he had actually fought in the War like the other three hadn't yet been determined. One investigator, apparently aware someone was reading the input, opened a live chat and started typing:

We'll need to ask around to see if he actually did fight in the War. If he did, that might be our matching variable across cases.

Someone with a grudge, I'm guessing, she typed back.

Looks like it, Low.

It's Sen, btw. I stole Low's case file dpad.

Oh, hey! It's Highbeam. We're still canvasing if you care to join us out here. Address has already been input into the file if you didn't see it on the news. Journalists are still here though. Beware.

She had no problem with that. A journalist was probably what they needed, and if there were some still there, then that meant they were actually bothering to hang around to get more detailed information rather than get their breaking news headline and go home. Datapad still in hand, she sprinted back out the doors, transformed, and headed for the listed address.

On drawing near, she cloaked and descended onto the street. No one saw her weave through the tiny huddle of reporters and the officers busy keeping them corralled, though the door opening and closing of its own accord probably drew some confused stares. Inside, she found a small, rather disorganized and cluttered home fit for a single 'bot, like slightly roomier apartment. The small foyer she stood in had a simple bar counter build into it, to entertain a handful of guests. A small study and a bedroom branched off from it. Officers had cordoned off the bedroom with energy beams and a guard for good measure. The guard jumped when she materialized out of thin air though he quickly brushed off the alarm for some amused annoyance.

"I know Highbeam told us you were comin' and all but slagging 'ell, femme, at least give a guy a warning first!"

"Jumpy, Hubcap? Not like you," she observed.

Hubcap jerked a thumb back into the room. "You'll be jumpy too when you see this one. Medical examiner is gonna 'ave a toughie figurin' out what exactly did 'im in."

Sentenza ducked into the room. She was met with a grisly site: a body on the floor, their face scratched and slashed almost beyond recognition; his neck was carved open; his spark chamber was cleaved open so deeply it nearly sawed his chassis in two; what looked like electrical burns marred random points on his frame; an arm had been wrenched out of its joint, and one of the mech's scutes – the blades of what would have been a helicopter vehicle form – had been snapped clean off. The body was currently under scrutiny from the precinct's medical examiner, a grim-faced and stocky grey mini-bot equipped with scanning drones and a toolkit to measure and analyze the wounds.

"Yeesh. Someone didn't like this guy," she commented flatly as she knelt beside him.

"Obviously," the examiner agreed, briefly glancing sideways at her. "The other bodies were beat up, too, but nowhere near as severe as this one. Tell me frankly, detective. Do you still think we're dealing with the same perp here, or...?"

"I think it's the same perp, Tumulus," she conceded, "but the ferocity...look how deep those wounds on his face are. I think this one was personal in a way the others weren't."

"Mm. Exactly what I was thinking. Takes force to get injuries like that. Passion helps to get that force."

"Yup."

"I'll finish up here and get him to my exam room," grunted the grey mini-bot. "Feel free to look around. Highbeam'd appreciate the help, I'm sure."

Sentenza took to slinking around the room in search of anything that might help in identifying the victim – not that there was much to look at. The victim hadn't been the sentimental type; there were no images of themselves or anyone else. They were an art lover, though. She counted three digital landscapes done by the Sky Painter, Vignette – her style was unique, somewhere between blurry fantasy and stark reality. One of Velocitron depicted the capital of Neon lit up by lights and by a brilliant, sand-swept sunset; one of Aquatron showed a sandy beach at night. The third she couldn't readily identify; it depicted a strange, lush place with huge geode crystals erupting from the rocky surface of the world, and a warm gold light among the spiraling flora hinted at civilization existing below the treetops.

"Do you recognize that place?" she demanded of Tumulus.

Tumulus looked up and arched a thick brow ridge. "Can't say I do. Why? You think it's important?"

"Might be..." she muttered.

She used the datapad to take an image of the piece and made a note to ask the artist if they knew of the world. Vignette, she knew, lived permanently in Altihex, unlike her eternally roving Painter kin, so getting in contact with her wouldn't be nearly so difficult as with other Painters. A small blessing in the overall scheme of things; it was one of the few leads they could actually follow for the case.

She stalked around the room one last time. Hidden beneath the berth, a gleam caught her focus. On pulling it out, she found it to be a tiny, partially broken device that looked like a holographic projector. Out of curiosity, she magnetized it to herself and tried to activate it, but the device spluttered and sparked and refused to do so. She updated the file with the find, though made certain to note that she wasn't sure if the device belonged to the victim or the killer. Sentenza then gripped the broken projector in a clenched fist and slipped back out into the foyer to meet with Highbeam. The tall, bright yellow and blue officer was busy looking over the room for any hints.

"Anything out here?" she asked of him.

"Nada, same as the other two," Highbeam admitted. "We're dealing with a slagged professional here. Doesn't leave anything that can be traced back to them."

"No sign of forced entry?"

"Nope," Hubcap shook his head.

"Not even a spill or part of a weapon?" she wondered, surprised. "I find it hard to believe they didn't fight back considering how violent the attacker was."

Highbeam shrugged. "...Maybe they couldn't?"

Sentenza eyed him sideways. "Drugged?"

"That or tied up. Tumulus'll be able to tell us which."

"Tied up..." she mumbled.

Something about that rang a bell. Sentenza went back out onto the streets where the three reporters yet lingered. One happened to be a fairly familiar face: Slate, a classy looking femme colored a dark grey with dazzling blue glowing highlights and equally dazzling blue optics, was busy jotting down shorthand notes on a datapad while chatting into her comm. link. Slate happened to be one of her contacts that she had gained in her Academy years, and was an investigative journalist to boot. No surprise that she was on site; she had been at the second one, too.

Sentenza only uncloaked when she pulled up beside the reporter.

"Hey," she prompted, tapping Slate on her arm.

"Hey," Slate greeted back, unfazed to see her appear out of thin air. "So how bad was it? The guys out here aren't talking."

"Uh...not pretty. Let's leave it at that for now," she answered cagily. "Besides, Toomy has to run his exam before I could even tell you what killed him exactly."

"Fair enough," smiled Slate thinly. "Did you need something from me? I take it you're not just saying hello."

"Yeah," she admitted. "You're in good with some 'Con War vets, right? I remember you did a story on some of 'em a while back."

Slate confessed that she was. She was planning to go visit one in short order, a Seeker mech named Thundercracker, to warn him and update him that it looked like the killer was specifically targeting 'Con War vets. Thundercracker was a good mech even if he'd served a tyrannical warlord. If Sentenza wanted to tag along for the interview, she was welcome to. Her presence might get him to open up a little more than if Slate were to go alone. There was a slim chance Thundercracker possibly knew something about these murders, especially if this was as "vendetta-y" as it appeared to her.

"Do you think it's a fellow 'Con doing this?" Sentenza asked as they traveled.

"I'd be hesitant to assume anything at the moment," Slate replied slowly. "Taking a stance without corroborative data? That's a no-no for both our fields."

Sentenza chuckled. "Point."

"But if you want my opinion, then," the reporter continued, "well, it is a known fact that Decepticons had a tendency to 'eat their own' as the humans say, especially if they stood to gain something significant in doing so. Starscream in particular was downright notorious for his coup attempts and reckless backstabbing. Why Megatron never offed him after one too many, no 'Con I've talked to seems to know."

Sentenza mentally shrugged. History surrounding the Autobot/Decepticon Civil War alone was complicated enough, as Slate knew; individual predilections and war-time decision making tended to be even more so. She personally couldn't fathom the decision of keeping a known backstabber as a second-in-command for the entire War. In her experience, betrayal was a chronic problem; if someone attempted a backstab once, they would absolutely do it again when the opportunity (whether by design or chance) came. In that respect, a betrayer and a serial killer were the same.

Slate eventually pulled to a stop outside a modest two-story, single-occupant home clearly designed for a flier. Slate gave a polite ra-tat-tat on the indigo-painted door and was greeted by a tall similarly colored Seeker who seemed suspicious at first, only opening the door a little ways to peer out. But upon spying Slate he smiled and beckoned both her and Sentenza inside. He offered them a seat at the little bar-counter in the foyer. Sentenza couldn't help but notice the regulation fire-arm magnetized to his hip.

"I take it from that suspicion you're aware of what's going on, then," Sentenza guessed dryly, nodding her helm towards the weapon.

"That someone's picking off 'Con upper officers like it's open season?" Thundercracker grunted. "Indeed."

"Glad to see you're being careful, TC," Slate smiled thinly. "Hopefully Sen will have this wrapped up before another friend of yours goes dark."

Thundercracker chuckled derisively. "You should know that 'friend' was something of a taboo subject among Decepticons during the War, girl. Friend meant attachment. Attachment permitted for an exploitable weakness. And weakness of any kind could get you killed and replaced overnight," Thundercracker paused. "Well, if you were daft enough to openly show said weakness, anyway."

Slate nodded grimly. "Knockout said the same when I interviewed him."

"Mm. Heard about what happened to Breakdown. Slagged pity, that," Thundercracker admitted. "He was one of the few 'bots I could hold a conversation with without it sounding like he was gathering intel to off me later. So who got offed this time, then?"

"Haven't ID'ed him yet," Sentenza answered, "but something Highbeam said, in conjunction with one of Slate's interviews, might be of use in putting a name to him. I think you might help there, too. Correct me if I'm wrong here, but 'Cons had resident interrogators, didn't they?"

Thundercracker confirmed. It had been part of the hierarchy to have interrogators on hand to viciously extract information from enemy prisoners. Oftentimes when they were done extracting they either killed the prisoner or, if they were feeling particularly sadistic, they would cripple them in any number of ways and then hand them back to Autobot forces as a gruesome message meant to sap their morale. Starscream and Shockwave had served as interrogators on top of their other duties, though once Shockwave had invented the Cortical Psychic Patch – a cruel bypass to ensure a captive wasn't lying – those interrogators and their vicious tactics had become less needed in day-to-day operations. But before that point, some physical interrogators had developed quite a reputation for creative torture tactics. He remembered one such individual vividly: Vortex. One of his favorite tactics had been tying helpless Autobots to his scutes and taking them for a deadly ride, and if that failed, using those same razor-sharp scutes to slice them up until they talked or bled out.

Slate eyed Sentenza sideways. "Do you think...?"

"Might be," conceded Sentenza. "He was certainly 'sliced up' by something, and that he didn't fight back..."

"...probably means he couldn't," Slate agreed. "Someone's got a vindictive streak against this guy. It's possible the killer is a former captive of his using his own technique against him. Or, part of said technique at least."

And that could be why other 'Con officers were being targeted, Sentenza mused privately. Either they were involved with the victim directly somehow, or they had had something to do with prisoners and captives that the victims had either hid or the killer had purposefully removed evidence of to conceal connections.

"Autobot, maybe?" Sentenza asked.

Thundercracker shook his helm. "Not all captives were Autobots, detective. Megatron had a very simple 'if you're not with us, you're against us' policy. He routinely targeted neutrals as well. He even targeted colonials. He was furious when both Aquatron and Velocitron gave him a resounding 'Slag off' in answer to his invasion attempts. I personally admired them for that, not that I dared say so aloud."

Sentenza noted that in the case file datapad. There was a chance an angry unaligned was taking out those who had wronged them, though why there were starting now rather than years earlier wasn't clear.

"Were the other two victims interrogators, too?" Slate pressed.

Thundercracker thought for a moment before replying, "Not to my knowledge. Blast Off and Barricade were high officers that mainly participated in front lines fighting and troop coordination. Those two were good for smashing through enemy lines and fortifications, but not much else. I don't ever recall any captives of mine being sent their way."

"Did they take prisoners themselves?"

The indigo Seeker mech shrugged, "If you were lucky enough to survive an encounter with them, I suppose, though I wouldn't consider it 'lucky' to survive if it meant winding up in Vortex's clutches later."

The black Seeker rose. "Finish up here, Slate. Get as much info about this 'Vortex' guy as you can for me. I need to check in with Toomy."

"You think it's him?" Thundercracker demanded. "Someone finally did Vortex in?"

"We're about to find out."

She swept out of the door and back into the sky, then headed for Grimglimmer's precinct once more.

The doors to the exam room hissed open. Sentenza strode in to find Tumulus mid-analysis, the body lain on a table under harsh white lighting. Tumulus himself had a holographic projector that could take the shape of various weapons and sharp instruments and was using it to try to puzzle out what had done damage where. On peering at the datapad beside him, Sentenza found he had already identified one weapon: the gouge on his throat had been caused by a saw blade of sorts.

"Ah, there you are," Tumulus observed without glancing away from the cadaver.

"Have you managed to pin a name on him?" she wondered.

"Rather surprised you haven't beat me to that."

"Well...I may have. Slate and I interviewed Thundercracker and we think this victim might be the infamous Decepticon interrogator, Vortex."

At that, Tumulus turned to her. "Really, now? I wasn't even aware he was in Kaon."

"I wasn't aware, either," she admitted. "But I don't think that's ignorance on our part. I found this hidden under the guy's berth."

She handed the tiny projector to Tumulus.

"Hiding in plain sight, were we?" he realized, eyeing the body on the table. "Clever."

"So you think it's his?"

Tumulus inclined his helm towards her. "You would think someone trying to hide in plain sight would take much better care of the item, to ensure their cover was never blown at an inopportune time. So, logically, I think the best conclusion here is that the killer took the item off and broke it themselves."

"Lifting the veil so the cops could see who was actually killed," she murmured. "That's interesting. That suggests whoever got this guy knew about the disguise."

"Indeed. When you head out again, give this to Hotwire and the tech boys so we can tell who this scraplet was pretending to be. That might give us some leads."

"So what you have found so far?"

"The throat injury was what did him in, I can tell you that," the medical examiner told her. "Gouged the alik t'meo line right open and he bled out in minutes. The facial injuries were either made by clawed digits, like your own for instance, or a small knife. The rotor was snapped by something heavy coming down on it, rather than torn off bare-handed. Curiously, I discovered a blow on the back of his helm heavy enough to have probably knocked him silly, but that isn't why he didn't fight back. I found small, faint singes on his chassis, wrists, and heel struts that are consistent with those made by plasma bonds."

"Someone did tie him up, then," she nodded.

"Looks that way."

"Any clues about who did all this to him?"

"None, I'm afraid. But that in itself is telling."

"How so?" she wondered.

"You know about weapons regulations post-War, detective: that built-in weapons are illegal to possess. That could be why we find no evidence of our weapon, and why some of the spilled fuel seems to just...vanish from scenes. Especially here. An alik t'meo breach would have produced much more Energon than what we found."

"They take it with them, the weapon and some of the evidence," she translated. "That narrows our field of search considerably. Anyone who hasn't foregone those types of weapons are in a registry as they wait to have weapon transformations reverted and disabled. Almost everyone on that list is a War vet themselves. I know someone who can get us that registry under-the-table."

"Chop, chop, then," insisted Tumulus.

Sentenza dashed from the room and briefly stopped by the technicians area of the precinct. A jittery pale yellow mech with antennae and an extra two sets of arms greeted her: Hotwire, the resident tech junkie and a freelance electrical engineer from Frazholn. She noticed his antennae were sparking and knew what that meant. Hotwire was a li'kim vizt, a unique individual who could not only tolerate high voltage but needed it to function properly, and judging by the intensity of his antennae sparks he had recently powered up. Rather than hand the projector to him and risk a nasty jolt, she tossed it over to him with a request to fix it up and get it working again.

Hotwire took a moment to examine the item, at which point his bright orange optics lit up even brighter.

"A projector? Aw, neat! I haven't fixed one of these up in a while! You got it!"

He gave her three thumbs up. Sentenza merely nodded and then dashed back to the main precinct room. She logged into one of the consoles and sent a request (image included) to a friend in Altihex who responded back almost instantly:

I'll run this by Vignette for you. ETA for an answer: 1/2 joor.
-H

Now that the image was being properly investigated, she turned her sights closer to home. She abandoned the console in favor of her comm. link and opened up a private, encrypted channel to an insider who worked for the Kaonian Council members. To be doubly cautious, she did not greet them or address them by name – both of Kaon's Councilors were notorious for spying on their own workers, and she did not wish to jeopardize such a valuable insider – and merely asked for a copy of the Disarmament Registry be sent to a particular console in the seventh precinct; if anyone asked or caught them doing it, they were to clarify she (and Grimglimmer) had a warrant.

"I will get this to you posthaste. I hope it helps."

"Thank you," she whispered back. "You'll get a bonus if it does."

Sentenza wasn't content to merely wait, however. She instead headed back for Hotwire's "geek lab" to see how the repair was going. On the way, a call came into her comm. link.

"Sen? It's Slate. I finished that interview like you asked. Milked as much info as I could out of TC for you. He pinged a friend to fill in any gaps he didn't know."

"And?" she asked as she kept walking.

"Turns out, Vortex and Blast Off were both part of an elite unit that attacked Nova Cronum near the end of the War on Cybertron. Their unit name was the Combaticons, and they also happened to be an artificial gestalt created by Shockwave that he called Bruticus. Apparently these guys razed the city and laid siege to it to taunt the Autobots into attacking them and engaging in an uneven fight. When things went south for them, the afts started massacring 'bots in the city. Barricade, however, wasn't part of that unit, though he was absolutely involved in the attack."

The dots started to fall together. "So our killer could be a survivor of that attack who then got handed off to Vortex, somehow escaped him and the War, and came back for revenge."

"Oh, I'm not done yet. That friend TC called? He happened to know who the other members were: Swindle – at large still; Brawl – at large still; and Onslaught, who was killed by the Wreckers during the War. That's why Bruticus stopped being a massive pain the aft after a battle at Tyger Pax; a gestalt can't combine if they're missing a member, and Shockwave never found a 'bot to replace Onslaught."

Sentenza hastily noted that down in her datapad, it and the possible leads they could follow.

"And for the record, in case that little summary didn't make it obvious, all of these guys are wanted by the Council to face trial for war crimes. There's a reason the history data-pads call Nova Cronum a massacre. That was a neutral territory full of scientists and philosophers, like Crystal City; almost nobody there had anything to do with fighting or weaponry. They didn't stand a chance against a full-blown attack, much less against a colossal murder machine like Bruticus."

Sentenza paused to soak the information in. The killer being a Nova Cronum survivor would explain the heated passion of the attacks on Vortex and Blast Off, and how they were so intimately aware of Vortex's interrogation methods: they'd been subject to them. That Nova Cronum had been a city of intellectuals could also explain why they were so fastidious about not leaving readily traceable evidence: they were a thinker who thought things through. Perhaps that was how they had known about Vortex's disguise when no one else had had any idea: they had done their research. After all, how different was it, really, to research a person as opposed to a scientific or philosophical topic? A different subject didn't necessarily mean different research approaches. But none of that explained the built-in weapons theory from Tumulus. What would a scientifically-minded civilian be doing with weapons meant for a soldier?

She updated the datapad:

Civilian most likely
Autobot soldier not out of question; possibly civilian who turned to the Autobot side

"Sen'za...don't take this the wrong way, but..."

"But?"

"...Why can't we let them just...finish what they're doing? Taking these marauders out is doing Cybertron as a whole a big service."

Sentenza's flat mouth curved into a snarl. "Because death is too good for them. They deserve to suffer for what they did to Nova Cronum. Killing them robs the other survivors of public justice."

The reporter heaved a sigh. "...I hate it when you're right."

"Besides, it's not like the public will let them off easy," grinned Sentenza. "A vengeful jury can get colorfully vindictive with their proposed punishments..."

"So what about the killer? Do they deserve punishment, too?"

Sentenza's frown became less aggressive. Her optics became thoughtful. She stopped walking.

"Sen'za?" Slate pressed.

She quietly disconnected the call.

She picked up the pace and rounded into the "geek lab" where Hotwire and his technicians were. Curiously, Hotwire was nowhere to be found. Instead, there was a stranger in the room: a colorful dark green and blue femme about her height who, judging by appearance alone, transformed into a low, sleek ground vehicle that looked a little bit "retro" to her. An Autobot insignia was on her left shoulder.

Sentenza detached her pole and hefted it.

"Woah! Woah, woah, woah! Cool it!" the femme shouted in a distinctly non-feminine voice. "It's just me!"

Sentenza managed a smile. "Hotwire. You just had to take the projector for a test drive, didn't you?"

"Can you blame me?" Hotwire grinned as the hologram fizzled out and his real form returned. "It's a really good one. Any clue who that is though? I got nothin'."

Sentenza prided herself on being aware of virtually everyone in Kaon, and her Network within the city always gave her a heads up if someone from outside came in. She did remember a few contacts a while back mentioning a colorful newcomer, but since there were no illicit activities tied to her arrival and presence they hadn't really dug into her. They had pinned a name to her, however.

"Malachite," she said.

Hotwire tilted his helm to one side. "Who?"

The black Seeker rushed from the room and back to the console. The Registry was waiting for her. Malachite's name was conspicuously absent from the current registry.

"You have an Autobot logo but you're not on here..." she muttered. "Huh..."

She instead tried something different. She used a backdoor into the Kaonian Colonial Embassy that an inside friend had provided and began a search through their logs for that name. She indeed found it listed. Her file said that she was a refugee colonial from the little known colony of Beta Geode, where many refugees had flocked after the Exodus. Not a big place, mostly below the radar of either faction – the perfect place to hide and wait out the conflict. And the name rang a bell, too. Was that image in Vortex's home, the one with the enormous geodes, a depiction of Beta Geode? Vignette would soon clarify.

She pinged Slate again. "Slate?"

"Yeah?"

"Get TC to ring that friend again. We need to figure out who the next target is. That friend said that Vortex and Blast Off formed part of the Bruticus gestalt, and Onslaught did too. Ask him what parts they formed. Torso. Chest. Arm or leg. That might reveal an order, and reveal whether they'll go for Swindle or Brawl next. I need to head back to the scene and see if I missed anything that might provide a reason for why Vortex was impersonating our possible suspect."

"Impersonating? What in the world?" cried Slate.

"Slate. Phone friend. Now."

"Right. Right. I'll call you back!"

Sentenza ran past Lowrider. "Keep an eye on that console!" she barked at him.

"Uh, sure!" he hollered back with a touch of confusion.

Sentenza touched down at the crime scene once again and whirled inside past Hubcap, who was still on guard. Much to his shock, she proceeded to turn the place inside out in a frenzied hunt for evidence – and found, once again, that there wasn't actually find any evidence of a forced entry. Even a sly forced entry by opening the windows or forcing the locks would leave evidence. The killer hadn't busted in; they'd been let in. Hubcap jolted on hearing that.

"You don't think there's a chance the killer is doing visual mind-games, too, do you?" he asked. "Dressin' up as somebody else, I mean."

"Yeah, but it's not like Vortex would have let just any face in," she mumbled. "The killer has to be impersonating someone Vortex knew. Same for Blast Off."

"Other still-live gestalt members?"

Sentenza wasn't completely convinced on that one. Just because gestalt members were closely knit, she argued, didn't mean they wouldn't have interacted with other 'bots. Maybe the killer was impersonating some other high-ranking Decepticon who'd taken part in the Nova Cronum assault.

Hubcap shrugged. "So what about his impersonation gig?"

Sentenza continued to hunt. On an impulse, she took down the images on the wall and found a tiny, hidden safe behind the image of Velocitron. Rather than waste time trying to crack the lock, she merely took a small energy knife out of her subspace and carved the front panel open. Inside were dozens of small cartridges, each with a name scratched onto them, as well as what looked like a burner comm. link. She snatched the latter and tried to get it working to no avail.

She growled.

Hubcap took a handful of the cartridges. "Did our boy have a kink or are these...?"

"Possibly audio of his interrogations. Collected them. Audio trophies," she grunted. "Can't say I'm sad he's dead."

She grabbed the rest and had Hubcap drop his on the floor so she could sprawl them out and sort them. There were some big names in the pile: Jazz. Cliffjumper. Even Councilors Jetfire and Elita-1 (probably proud about those, the aft-headed slagger) back when they had served during the War. But many others awoke no chord of recognition. All save one: Malachite.

Sentenza's frown became a snarl. "He was impersonating one of his own victims. How sick do you have to be to –?!"

[Yo, sweetcheeks!] came Lowrider's voice. [That Painter gal got back wit' you. Image in question is of a colony planet called Beta Geode. She's sending you the digital invoice she sent the buyer, a femme named Malachite. I've sent some boys to look at the address listed, but I'm not halting my fans.]

"Thanks, Low."

[...There's a better way you can thank me...] he insinuated.

"...Goodbye, Low," she answered flatly before hanging up on him.

"I'll run these back to the precinct for you," Hubcap offered. "You can keep lookin' 'ere if you want."

She shook her helm. "No need. I know who the killer is, we just need to find her. Best way to do that is –"

Sentenza's comm. link pinged the instant the door shut. "Slate? Please tell me you've got something."

Slate did. The reporter went on to explain that Onslaught had been the torso of the Bruticus gestalt, which was why Bruticus had stopped being a problem after his death: losing your entire upper body was a lot more devastating to a functional gestalt than losing an arm. Blast Off, the second victim after Barricade, had formed the left arm and Vortex, the latest victim, had been the right arm. That could mean they were going left to right down the body. Ergo, Brawl, the left leg, could be the next victim on the killer's hit list.

"Any leads from TC or his friend on how to find him?" she asked.

[Not directly, and if Vortex was playing pretend I'm wondering if Brawl and Swindle are doing the same thing, too. Though I personally doubt Brawl would be able to do it convincingly. According to TC, Brawl was extremely punch happy and was infamous for picking fights with just about anyone except Megatron himself. He wouldn't know how to play incognito if the word incognito was hunting him down with a pitchfork. Which...I guess actually is kind of happening...]

That lead wasn't exactly helpful. The number of fights that broke out in Kaonian bars alone was enough to keep short-term cells pretty booked. That sample size was too big to waste time figuring out which one was Brawl. For all she knew, that was part of his strategy to stay hidden: blend into the masses. That would also probably ensure the killer didn't strike too soon.

"What about Swindle?"

[That line of inquiry might be a little more helpful...] she teased. [TC's friend even has a lead for you.]

The little pawnshop Slate had directed her to sat on the far western edge of Kaon and was a place Sentenza knew about but hadn't delved into. It wasn't a front for thieves to fence items or any other shady business dealings. It was a nondescript little place that her sources said had a fairly local customer base, and the customers themselves were quite happy with the owner and his employees. Had she not known a former Combaticon was hiding out inside, she wouldn't have even bothered to visit the place herself.

Sentenza ducked in to the chime of a little electronic bell.

"Hello, welcome to – Primus!"

Sentenza barely even heeded the employee's shock at seeing her. Her yellow optics prowled about. She was interested to see that the items for sale were mainly antiques of pretty much anything: furniture, devices, artwork, knickknacks, even a few weapons, though those were firmly bolted to the walls behind force fields to ensure nobody got any ideas. But more interesting, there were items that looked to be from colony worlds: Aquatron and Velocitron specifically.

"Uh, is there something I can help you find, detective...?"

She finally turned to face the employee, a young mech who seemed at once starstruck by her presence and deeply confused by it.

"I'm looking for someone," she told him.

"Oh, do you need to speak to the boss?" he guessed.

A jingle behind her alerted her that another customer had arrived: a somewhat scrawny looking flier with a Decepticon badge on their left wing. The way they were looking around made her suspicious, and when they spotted her and flicked their wings, her suspicions rose further.

"...Yeah," she answered slowly. "I need a word with your boss."

The employee led her back to the manager's office where a 'bot sat at a desk checking inventory logs. He wasn't much to look at and looked like his vehicle mode was a large armored vehicle of some kind. The employee kindly prompted his attention by tapping on the desk and whispering "Hey, boss." When he looked up and spotted her, alarm briefly flashed in his lavender optics. The 'bot gestured the employee back out into the shop.

"Detective," he purred suavely. "And what can I do for Kaon's most respectable –"

"Drop the act, Swindle," she grunted.

"Swindle?" he repeated in surprise. "I think perhaps that you have the wrong person."

"Nope."

His optics furtively went for the door and then back to her.

"...Who told you?" he demanded. "There's no way you figured that out on your own. I was too well hidden. Was it Brawl? He always was a moronic loudmouth."

Sentenza told him nothing. She crossed her arms and stared him down.

"What do you want?" he hissed quietly. "I'm trying to keep a low profile. There's a killer out there taking out my team mates."

"That's why I'm here. I want the location of your former War buddy, Brawl."

Swindle scoffed. "As if I know. And even if I did, I wouldn't blabber about it to the world's nosiest femme."

"Okay," she shrugged, "then I'll let her in and see what she thinks about it."

"Her?" Swindle sounded genuinely puzzled.

She lazily rubbed her thumb and index digit together without making eye contact. Casually, she asked if he remembered someone named Malachite – from Nova Cronum. Swindle wracked his processor for a few tense moments until the information connected. He then jolted, though not from fear. Disbelief appeared on his faceplates. Amused disbelief.

"Malachite? That mineralogist Vortex captured?" he laughed. "You can't be serious."

Sentenza merely arched a single brow ridge. The baffled, disbelieving amusement in his optics transitioned to wary fear.

"I told Vortex not to keep her alive!" he angrily hissed. "Now he's making the rest of us pay for it!"

"So you do know her."

Swindle pointed at the door. "So that 'bot out there...?" he wondered. "But she looks nothing like – Oh."

"You can either deal with me or you can deal with her. What'll it be?"

"I fail to see how dealing with you is much of an improvement," the former soldier observed through narrow optics.

"Simple: I won't kill you."

"And how do you plan to get me past her alive?"

"Even simpler." She slapped a warrant onto his desk. "You're under arrest."

"On what charges?!"

"Impersonation and war crimes."

Swindle sputtered as she dangled a pair of cuffs at him. He eventually groaned and offered both hands, let himself be cuffed, and let her lead him out of his office. The scrawny grey flier they passed looked stunned for a moment before she lunged at him. Sentenza blocked her strike and flung her to the ground. The scrawny flier spun a leg and tripped Swindle before gouging his face with a hidden knife ejected from her wrist. Sentenza quickly swatted the weapon away and stamped a leg onto her arm.

"Relax. He's not getting off easy," she told her candidly. "Officers?! Come get him."

Four officers from Grimglimmer's precinct swept into the doors and took Swindle away.

"Want us to get her too?" Highbeam asked.

Sentenza eyed the scrawny flier. "Let me have a word with her first."

She took her outback into one of the loading bays. There, the flier twiddled with something on her neck and her appearance drastically changed to match the hologram of her Hotwire had repaired. But unlike the hologram, the real Malachite bore telltale scars on her chassis, arms, and legs that looked to have been caused by bladed weapons – or more likely, Vortex's scutes. And there were other marks of abuse she hadn't been expecting: her left hand was missing a digit, her right optic was cloudy and the area around it scorched by either an explosive or acids, and one of her front axles had been snapped in two and poorly repaired.

"Malachite, I take it?" Sentenza guessed.

"...I should have known you'd figure it out," she noted ruefully. "What makes you think any of the Combaticons deserves to keep living, after what they did?"

Sentenza said nothing. Then: "I take it you're not just angry over what they did to your home city."

"You think that was all they did?" she hissed. "No. They did worse. Nova Cronum was around the time the CPP was invented. Vortex himself was angry and bored after that. So when Barricade brought me in as a captive after bringing my lab down on top of me, Vortex decided to hang on to me. Whenever he needed a reminder of the 'good old days' of being an interrogator, he'd use me as his punching bag. 'She's so weak' I heard him say after. 'She won't fight back. It's no fun' and they would all laugh with him and suggest new tactics. They all deserve to pay," she spat.

The black Seeker said nothing. She only frowned.

"I only managed to survive because one of the other officers smuggled me out with him when he went on a mission to Velocitron. He lied and said I was an alliance offering to a local crime boss. He instead handed me off to some friendly racers who I stayed with for a while. They eventually pooled their credit winnings and got me a shuttle to Beta Geode."

Curious, she asked: "Who was it? The one who helped you?"

"Some Seeker captain. Dreadwing, I think?"

Sentenza nodded. She knew something of that name. A few history datapads recalled him as a 'Con with a deep sense of integrity – a rare thing late into the War. What exactly had happened to him was still something of a mystery to War historians. He seemed to have simply vanished at some point near the War's end, never heard from or seen again. Some thought he had been killed and his death never reported. Others thought he had deserted.

"What made you wait to come back?" she asked her.

"Timing, mostly. Beta Geode was one of the last colonies to get alerted about the War's end, and I had to do some snooping to find out if the Combaticons had somehow survived. That some of them tried to live normal lives after what they did to my city, to me..." she snarled. "A cruel joke. But I had the last laugh. Those types never expect their victims to fight back once they have the means to. It was easy enough to fool and ambush them, once I knew where to look."

The battered green femme unsheathed the hidden knife from her wrist. She then tapped what looked like a simple pole or possibly walking stick on her leg. Sentenza knew better, owning such a disguised weapon herself. Another tap saw the lower end sizzle into the head of an axe. That explained why she wasn't in the Registry, she realized: they weren't transformed weapons, they were carried ones. The kit on her left hip, Malachite explained, carried her tools of the trade, which included a saw and a drill and a hammer to extract mineral samples. Who in their right mind would confiscate her trade tools?

"They were 'creative' with their methods. Well, I was creative with mine," she spat.

Malachite's vitriol faded and she lapsed into silence. She awkwardly eyed the door behind her.

"So?" she asked quietly. "Are you going to arrest me? That's your job isn't it? Arrest killers?"

The flint in the black Seeker's yellow optics softened. Her crossed arms lowered. "No."

Malachite stared. "...What?"

"I'm not going to arrest you," she reiterated softly. "You've been through enough."

"...But what are you going to tell the police? I don't think I could bear someone else taking the blame for my actions."

Sentenza flashed her a wry smile. "That won't be necessary. Once Brawl is in custody, I take it that all of the 'bots on your little hit list will be handled. Therefore, the killer has no need to keep killing. They'll vanish into thin air. The case will be dropped as inconclusive – technically solved, but no suspect was captured."

"You...would lie on my behalf?"

"It's not a lie, not really. Though if you want, I'll tell the chief and my journalist contact. Just so they can make the press report and case file believable enough."

The battered femme's jaw dropped.

"Go," Sentenza urged, "before they come back."

Malachite reactivated the disguise and ducked out of the door. Sentenza followed her out and flew back for the precinct.

Two Weeks Later...

"–both of the former Decepticons are expected to see trial and imprisonment in the coming deca-cycle," Slate went on, "though who exactly killed their compatriots remains unknown. Despite the uncertainty, Precinct Chief Grimglimmer issued a statement that he doubts the culprit will kill again, and as of yesterday has lifted the reward for further information."

Sentenza smirked and lounged on her sofa. Slate had conveniently failed to mentioned that a handsome donation had come to the precinct a few days ago from a visiting Velocitronian racer celebrity named Hot Rod, with the request it be sent to the Kaonian colonial embassy – which not coincidentally had just gotten a new employee. It didn't take a genius to figure out the connection there.

"Pity, that," Camber observed as she tidied her messy bar counter. "Well, not really, I s'pose. I'm mighty glad at least two of those marauders will see trial and conviction. I even heard tell they'll wind up on the Alchemor. Might as well be in like company," she snorted in contempt. "By the by, what do you think happened to the killer, miss?"

"I'm sure they've found something else to occupy their time," she replied slyly.

A beep came from her console. In it was an attached tip of fifty credits and a message from the Embassy:

I showed no mercy, yet you showed it to me. Thank you, Sentenza. If you ever need my help, call me.

-M

Sentenza smiled.

Thought I'd characterize Sen as such. She helps uphold laws, but she also isn't heartless. She can see grey, not just black and white.