The Diego Diaries: Analysis (dd8 541)
=0=Ops Center, The City later that orn
Prowl paused a meet up with John Fulton via electronic device to take a data pad from a pair of concerned appearing civilian data analysts from Data Receiving and Review which was part of Elita and Jazz's department through Special Operations and Projects. He read it, glanced up, then thanked them. They walked away looking considerably relieved.
Prowl glanced at the monitor with Fulton's face hanging in the corner of his big office. "John, something has come up. Can I call you back in a few?"
"Sure. Anything worrying?" Fulton asked.
Prowl smirked slightly. "When isn't it?"
They commiserated, then Prowl signed off to rush with the data pad to Prime's office nearby.
=0=Moments later
Prime sat in the big conference room as a number of mechs and a few femmes hurried in for the conversation ahead. They fogged in, military, medical, science and a few special operations individuals before the door closed. Everyone took a seat including Springer who held Tell and Drift who held Tell's toy bear. "Thank you for coming so swiftly. We appear to have a problem before us that could or not be a big operation." He glanced at the Seekers sitting nearby grim faced and tense.
Rainmaker stood, then walked to a control to light up the big monitor on the wall. It came on with the seals of the Primes, Cybertron and Mars, then broke to a frame of numbered video. "We sent out a team to check out an anomaly coming down the Bootes, just breaking free of the Rim. They were scanned by a good team and the data is strange but not unfamiliar for some of it." He glanced at Perceptor and Wheeljack. "Let's look at the video then you can explain the data." He pressed the control and the video began to run.
A vantage point of seven mechs could be seen in a split screen. They had the markers of data Seekers doing an approach to scan something. Lights in the distance appeared to be the running lights of a number of ships. They sped forward, arched to show their undercarriage where their equipment took measurements, then flashed forward into a looming bridge to disappear. The video ended.
"I have more," Rainmaker said as another film played.
About seven enormous ships could be seen down the way. They looked copper colored on their surfaces but that was a mottled effect. The skin of the vessels looked like layers of laminate, rather like plywood where a very thin layer of wood was laid down, then a glue layer, then a layer of wood chips, then glue and all of it stacked up to a thickness, then pressed very very hard. It looked like alligator skin on the sides and surfaces of the ships.
They looked huge and were covered in guns. Guns of all sizes protruded from them, pointing out in the directions of attack that seemed reasonable. They floated along running together like a pod of killer whales, their malevolence almost visible like a cloud about them. Then the film ended.
It was silent in the room, then Rainmaker turned to Prime. "I have seen all manner of ships, Lord Optimus, but this is outside of my experience. They are new to me."
Almost everyone in the room nodded in agreement with him. He sat and it was silent again.
Prime glanced at Percy and Wheeljack. "Gentlemen?"
"We've taken the data and analyzed it, finding it partly Cybertronian and partly something else. There's a faint whiff of an old enemy among the structures we've deduced by their chemist. I do believe that Jhiaxus appears in the mix but most of this is a blend of different points of view, perhaps different aliens and their materials in combination with his poisoned thinking," Wheeljack said as Percy nodded.
"I am well aware of Jhiaxus, having been in his professional circle for a long time. There is no question or venture that wouldn't draw his interest. I am sure that there is a layer of his own tech involved in these ships," Perceptor said.
"We also found that the signature of this technology is familiar. It has markers from the little data that we retrieved from the hurried flight to match that of Crader," Wheeljack said.
It was intensely silent as they gauged that nightmare scenario.
"How? Do you mean they can scan through the ships or do the ships themselves also bear the markers of Crader, too?" Ratchet asked as he pulled the data pad over to look through.
"We didn't get a measure of the crews. We got a measure of the ships. The ships bear the same markers of transformative cellular osmosis that Crader had with his party in their armor," Percy said.
"Oh frag," Raptor said. "All of us could barely hold one of them. This means a ship might have the same features and be as unmanageable and zombie-like as Crader was."
"They can't come here," Alor said as he glanced at Prime and Prowl. "Who knows what else those ships can do. What if somehow they're sentient? What if they can transform?"
Metroplex glanced at Fort Max. "What if somehow they managed to cannibalize or even overtake one of our frame? What if the ships have been manipulated into whatever this is? Was there any data about whether the ships are alive?"
Perceptor glanced at them. "The data is so strange as to be almost impenetrable. We cannot tell from this much information."
"That will not do," Prime said with a flash of heat. He looked at the group. "I need information on this now. They cannot be allowed to come anywhere near us. If they've enslaved titans then we must get them back. If these are just ships that have been put into a process to make them invincible then we must disable or destroy them. I do not know how difficult that may be now, if at all, but we cannot allow them to come anywhere near us."
It was silent, then Prime glanced at Prowl. "I want the unattached titan fleet to be inventoried, prepped for combat or a rescue, then put on Level 4 standby. I want another pass by and with as many deeply detailed sensors as we possess. Take protection with you. If this is Crader's son and a party of those like his father we are in for a fight."
After a moment of organization, the group broke up to go do their part. Prowl sat back with Tell in his arms, watching as Prime prepared to defend against mechs and perhaps ships impervious to conventional arms and tactics. The room cleared, then Prime sat again. "What do you think? I doubt that Crader is any more cooperative than before. It might be detrimental to have him know that his son and confederates are coming this way."
"I agree," Optimus said as he took Tell into his arms. Picking up the baby's toy bear, he sat back to ponder the situation in the company of pure joy. Tell smiled that giant baby smile at Uncle Optimus and Uncle Prowl. It would pass the time until the unit commanders came back to tell him they were ready to go and try it again.
=0=On the deck
Big Seekers gathered with their specialist gear that could penetrate nearly anything. They would fly out with the battle shuttles who were going to guard both them and a science sensor ship that could penetrate the view to the afterlife their tech was so powerful. They would burst from the bridge, make their turn to take data and flee into the bridge. It would take seconds, this highly practiced and choreographed maneuver for the best grasp of data to be gotten short of knocking on their door and asking.
Springer and Drift boarded the latest version of Impactor's Revenge (the fourth) then sat in their usual places. Everyone mounted up, then lifted off to go to the Trigger and free up the downtown to normal traffic once more. They were gone in seconds.
=0=Sub basement Ops Center
They gathered there to go over the maps, assign duties for the planning, then wait for the data bullet that would come through the bridge with the group. It would be unwound at Special Ops Receiving, then sent raw to the Center where Alor, Delphi, Hard Drive and Perceptor with Wheeljack would begin to sort it out. Ratchet would be there to give the odd ball perspective that he was so adept at doing given he was a very unconventional thinker.
It was silent in the room, then Raptor glanced at Ratchet. "How are we with ununtrium tipped tools?"
"I'll check. I know my ada and atar made a lot of them doubling the tips so they'd last. I don't think they make a can opener big enough for ships though," Ratchet said as he messaged his folks and the Master of Metallurgy at the Industrial Parks City.
They had enough and then some.
=0=Out there
They came out of the bridge to begin their huge arcing turn with sensors pointed at a group of ships moving steadily along the Omega Beam toward their sector of space. Just as they began to turn to begin their scans, all of the different groups toward the bridge, a sensor beam struck them as well. They jetted into the space bridge to disappear once again. As they did the sensor ship had gathered the Seeker's data, put it with theirs and sent it in a bullet blast to Special Ops to unwind. They flew down to the airfield, the shuttles taking up places on the Ready-Go Line while everyone else walked off on stand by duty pending outcome.
=0=Nearby
:I wonder what's up now?: Corey McFarlane asked as he drove several of the new soldiers from the U.N. Garrison toward N.E.S.T. They were coming to have lunch, then learn about the limits of communications on a planet like this.
:They're back on the line: a soldier from Spain replied.
:That's the Ready-Go Fleet. They're locked and loaded, ready to go at a moment's notice. If anyone of us goes with them those big shuttles are usually the ride of choice: Corey said.
:Do you think we can go with them some time?: the Spanish soldier asked.
:They don't mind. We have a few seats. I can ask: McFarlane replied. He liked these guys. They loved being here and had the right attitude. Nearly everyone in the N.E.S.T. Garrison liked them a lot.
They continued onward down Cultural Center Road to the N.E.S.T. Garrison Habitat. Lunch would be good, conversation great and the training aces. All in all, a good day to be a human soldier on Mars.
=0=Around the Hub world of the military
Lon and Bezel walked into their hub to get ammunition for their handguns. They stood in line watching the news on the monitor nearby, noting that part of the Ready-Go group had gone and come back from a mission.
:What do you suppose that's about? There's Springer and Drift. They were going to spend the orn with Tell: Lon said.
:I know. Let's get loaded up then find them. If they have a mission we can go. Right?: Bezel asked.
Lon glanced at him, then the monitor. :I hope so: he said.
=0=Underground
They gathered, the leadership, to get a preliminary bead on the new data.
Wheeljack glanced at Prime. "The information we have is that the same process that created Crader is at work in the ships. They seem to have some kind of relationship to titans but they aren't that class of vessel or mech."
The grim faced titans and dreads in the room looked relieved but the Supremes didn't.
Xantium gripped his fists. "Slaggers. They aren't sentient, maybe, but they're our size. Who are these fraggers messing with this stuff? Anything weird about the ships that you haven't told us yet?" he asked.
Perceptor who was reading the data as it came in gasped.
Everyone glanced at him with fear and loathing. "What?" -everyone.
Perceptor read a tad further then looked at all of them. "I don't understand how they did it but those ships aren't sentient like the titans. They also aren't strictly ships. They have some sort of rudimentary ability to think."
The willies went up and down the spinal struts of everyone there.
Metroplex stood up and walked to the data to look. He glanced at Perceptor. "These aren't alive but they … they can transform and have some sensation of thinking if this data is right."
"Someone is trying to build ships that can obey them," Perceptor said with disquiet.
"Someone is making zombies," Ratchet said.
Perceptor glanced at him with a thoughtful look. "Yes. I think that's a good description, if somewhat melodramatic of what it appears this might be."
"Frag," Ratchet whispered. "Why the frag do I have to be right this much?"
Why indeed.
=0=TBC 10-10-2022
For DJPB, my hero. Happy Birthday, my angel.
