The Diego Diaries: Hanging Out in the Prison (dd8 81)
=0=Amidst the howling mob
"Are they really going in there, Ada?" Fireball asked as he stood with gathering foreboding between Prowl and Ratchet.
"Probably," Ratchet said.
"That wouldn't be a good thing would it?" Fireball asked anxiously.
"That depends on your end goal," Ratchet said as he glanced at the tall boy beside him.
Fireball looked worried as he watched Raptor walk toward a cell block. Then he seemed to resolve something inside as he hurried forward toward the big mech. "Appa!"
Raptor and everyone else paused to watch him weave his way toward where they were standing.
"Appa, you can't go in there without me," he said with conviction.
Raptor grinned. "You can't go in there. I draw the line."
Fireball stared at him, then the mechs inside who were watching the show with amusement. At that, he stepped back, placed one giant fist cupped into the other and bowed at Raptor. He turned toward the pen filled with mechs. "I challenge whoever feels they have to fight with Raptor of Praxus."
It became silent a moment, then a few chuckles erupted.
One of them stared at him, though even as a boy Fireball was taller. "You're a kid, right? Raptor, why are you having children do your job for you, you slagger?"
"You are talking to me," Fireball said coldly. Then he retrieved in subspace his gleaming sword.
Ratchet who'd spotted the signs the moment Fireball asked the first question handed Tell to Prowl. "Oh frag. He's fulfilling his function." Slipping forward, Ratchet reached his side. "I think you don't want to do this, infant. You'll hurt them badly and feel it later."
He glanced at Ratchet. "I have to."
"I know," Ratchet said as he ran through the options. There were none. He glanced at the mechs behind the bars. "This child as you call him is an immature dreadnought mechanism. He's defaulted to his function. I hope I don't have to tell you what that means."
The mech behind the bars considered that. "All the more merry then."
"I'm not going forward, Fireball, with you involved. I withdraw from this moment and I ask you to do so as well," Raptor said to the tense anxious kid.
Fireball stepped to one side, then raised his sword to his face. Holding it there, he composed himself. With that, he began to perform a pre-battle kata that was incredibly fast, intricate, showed scary good sword skills and ability beyond his years, one designed to stop fights before they started, an innovation of his Appa Typhoon. When he finally spun to a stop he was as scary looking a mech as any of the adults around him. He raised the sword to his face, then lowered it to the side. "Who challenges? Withdraw or I will defend."
Fireball's voice had a slightly metallic quality to it and as he waited for someone to claim the right to combat tremors could be felt in the ground. They could see them towering in the distance before they arrived, Kappa, Omega and Xantium. At the same time appearing behind Fireball, Metrobon, Victory and Typhoon resolved into view. It was incredibly quiet when they all arrived to stare down at the situation.
"Who challenges this warrior?" Typhoon said.
The mechs in the cages stared at him, each other, then stepped back.
"My beef is with Raptor," the mech said who'd called out.
"This warrior is honor bound to defend his family. Raptor of Praxus is his great grandfather. When you challenge one of us, you challenge all of us. Our honor demands this to be so. It is our function and duty toward our people and our civilization. Fireball is honor bound to fight you. Withdraw or regret it," Typhoon said.
"You'd jump me?" the mech asked.
"No," Typhoon said quietly. "I would have to collect your body when the challenge was over wherever this warrior would have scattered it. Do you know anything of the wolf packs?"
"They chase titan hunters," someone in the back said. "Nothing much is left when they finish."
Typhoon nodded. "This young warrior is a hunter. He is trained to our standard. He bears the same responsibility as an adult as a matter of our frame. He is following his function. You will regret it if you do not withdraw."
It was silent as the mech considered it. "I have no problem withdrawing from combat with a child. Raptor on the other hand …"
"I will defend you, Appa," Fireball said in his strange metallic voice.
Raptor glanced at Ty who shook his helm. Then he looked at the mech. "You and me, some other time. I'm going to honor this warrior by withdrawing." He glanced around. "HEAR ME THIS ORN! TODAY STANDS BEFORE US A WARRIOR! TODAY BEFORE US STANDS A SENTINEL OF CYBERTRON WHO HONORS HIS FUNCTION AND HIS FAMILY BEFORE ALL THE PEOPLE! ALL HAIL THE WARRIOR!"
The crowd erupted. "ALL HAIL THE WARRIOR!" Applause and shouts greeted that.
Raptor turned to Fireball, then grinned. "There is no debt here, infant. I stand down."
Fireball glanced at him, then relaxed his body. He turned to Raptor raising his sword to his face. Then he dropped it, disappearing it into subspace where *APPARENTLY* he carried it all the time. Fireball walked to Raptor and hugged him tightly. "I love you, Appa."
"AND I, RAPTOR, LOVE MY GRANDSON! ALL HAIL MY GRANDSON!"
Huge laughter, hails, hoots and applause greeted that as even some of the prisoners relaxed. The main culprit stared at the show without comment.
Fireball turned to Warden Gee-Gee, Winnie and the extraction crew who were looking at him with admiration and amusement. "Can I help you, Warden?"
"You already have, Fireball," Gee-Gee said. "We can take it from here. Thank you."
Fireball stared at her a moment, then Raptor.
Raptor nodded.
"Alright. You can call on me and my brothers. All nine of us are duty bound by our function to help The People no matter what. We will fight for that," Fireball said.
"And we all know that, infant. Thank you," Winnie said coveting the big kid like she did with all the youngsters she knew. She had a serious motherly streak in spite of her kick ass appearance and manner.
Who knew?
"Have you had lunch?" Raptor asked.
Fireball shook his helm. "No, Appa. I just finished up at the library."
Raptor grinned at the youngster, the youngest and most sweetly naive one of the nine. "THEN WE HAVE TO HIT THE TOWN! LUNCH ON ME!"
"ITS FREE, YOU REPROBATE!" someone in a cell block cried.
"AND I GET TO GO HAVE IT, NOT YOU! WHO'S THE REPROBATE HERE!?" Raptor replied. He clapped Fireball on the shoulder, then slipped his arm through the youngster's. "Come on. Let me tell you tales about slag." He glanced at the others. "Coming?" he asked, then he stepped out with his great grandson and a long line of grinning admiring relatives and friends.
They ambled out, the group as they headed for the train station, a long straight ride to the Hangar District Metro #2 and a short walk to The Pit Stop.
Gee-Gee and the others watched them go, then glanced around at the punters behind bars. "Lunch sounds good. Does it sound good to you?"
The team and Winnie agreed so they began to walk back to the Command Center and the little dining room where the shifts got food. Watching them go, it was a silent and silently fuming group of reprobates left behind.
Kappa and Omega walked off as Xantium stared at the crowd in the cells.
"WHAT ARE YOU STILL DOING HERE, XANTIUM!?" someone hollered to him.
He stared at the mech, then glanced all around. "Memorizing faces," he said coldly. After a second, Zee headed out to blow off steam and give glowing, admiring accolades about 'the boy'.
He wouldn't be alone.
=0=The Pit Stop 02-21-2021
They sat in the room eating and chatting about the prison as the elders explained to the youngsters what had happened there. It was amusing how much the kids listened, asked good questions and filed away what they were hearing.
Springer who was feeding Tell his bottle grinned at Hercy who was explaining various kinds of challenges like the one Raptor was making and how in some situations they could be pursued to a greater good. Sometimes lopping off the head of one rooster saved the hen house for everyone else.
Cock-a-doodle do, slaggers!
"We have a game tomorrow on Cybertron," Ratchet said. "I suppose you have a place to stash Tell or are you two coming to the game with him? Inquiring minds."
"We're going to stay here and move between the stadiums," Springer said.
"Tamed you already?" Blackjack asked.
Springer snickered. "Probably," he replied. "We have someone at the office who's on duty who'll take care of him while we're at the stadiums.
"You could give him to me and I could take him to his ancestral homeland," Ratchet said with a giant smile.
"I'm not as clueless as Ironhide," Springer said to a near standing ovation.
"Fraggers. See if I autograph your copy of MY BOOK!" Ironhide glowered, then refocused on the important things, his sandwich.
So it would go …
=0=Later that afternoon in the officer's office corridor, The Fortress, Autobot City
"What do you believe you were accomplishing doing your fisticuffs this morning?" Prowl asked as he paused in the doorway of Prime's office.
Prime glanced up, then leaned back in his chair with a grin. "I believed my work speaks for me."
"Did you know that mech?" Prowl asked.
"No. Did you?"
"No. Tomorrow is the game."
Prime grinned. "I know."
"I have a number of ideas-"
Prime would laugh a long time.
=0=On Cybertron again
Fireball held the steel beam up as the rest of the crew with him scooped out fallen debris, boulders and the odd interesting but highly incinerated thing. When Blackjack pulled out a helm which was burned but still recognizable, Sun dispatched the youngster to go get a weather report from the shuttle parked nearby the debacle they were helping with. A hurried scramble retrieved the rest of the mech and three others before the big kid came back to tell them that the continued dry spell would last until the next afternoon.
All would continue forthwith as they worked their way northward taking in a number of sites that were nearing completion. It would be a more merry adventure there than it was in this, a deadly barrage site of a brutal war long ago.
=0=At he house
Ratchet hustled in ahead of a delivery of food that he'd ordered online. He hurried through the house gathering the things that would garb, transport and entertain a number of infant children and their genitors for the game in the Iacon Stadium the next orn on Cybertron. Carry baskets, the 'fun backpacks' that held toys and games, soft dollies, extra onesies and soon lots of treats were hung on the pegs by the door as he figured it all out in advance.
A knock on the door signaled delivery time so he let in Speedy Delivery from various places and let them back out. On the table were boxes of food that always made pre-game night (before the game) such a fun event. In two joors everyone would hit the door and the games would begin. Literally.
The Man Cave or Ironhide's Play Pen would host the punters and most of the kids while the Book Club would stay here.
VINEGAR SPRITZERS FOR EVERYONE!
Ratchet put boxes of hor d' oeuvres into the warmers and fridge, lots of food he would claim he made himself just to prime Prowl's pump. He grinned. "Prime Prowl's pump. I imagine you COULD call it that, right, Prowler?"
He took a moment to guffaw loudly, then glanced down at a cat and a cow. "You get to eat here. I intend to get dropsy tonight." He grinned at the two. "See what I did there? Dropsy?"
The two stared at him without comment.
"Rough room," Ratchet snickered as he walked to the door. "Keep guard. I don't want anyone to steal my cheese puffs." With that, he stepped out to do battle with the world.
=0=TBC 02-01-2021
There's a composer who is named Tallis, Thomas Tallis. He composed music during the reign of Elizabeth 1 in England in he 1500-early 1600's. He composed a piece of music that feels like I'm standing in the middle of the sun watching light rays shooting in all directions. You can find it on You tube by googling Spem In Alium (the Tallis Scholars do the best version.) Whenever I want to be elevated, I play it. Apparently as well, it was used in the Fifty Shades of Gray movie. It takes 40 voices to sing it and its a real horror story to do right. You're welcome. :D:D:D