What Makes No Difference Is No Difference (WMNDIND 26)

=0=Out in the desert

A bridge sounded nearby so they glanced that way. Prime was walking out of it and continued toward them to halt beside Bulkhead. "What have you found, Bulkhead?"

"That," Bulkhead said as he pointed toward the ground.

A shiny object with a rectangular shape lay face down on the ground in the desiccated scorched earth of the desert around them. It shown with an almost unholy light so bright was its construction materials, a sort of alive appearing silver.

Optimus leaned down to pick it up, turning it over to look at its hidden side. The three with him instinctively stepped back while Miko who sat on Bulk's shoulder leaned forward for a better view. He considered it, looking at both sides, then glanced at Bulkhead. "This is a portal portrait. The mech in the image is Guardian Prime."

"What's a portal portrait?" Arcee asked as she stepped closer to look. When she did, Guardian Prime's optics shifted to look at her. Fully creeped out, she stepped back with a shudder. "Portraits with features that move are common, Optimus. Why does this one feel weird?"

"This one, Arcee, is connected to the spark of Guardian Prime. Not only does it move, it comprehends your presence," Optimus said. He glanced at the three bots. "These are extremely rare and extremely important. A Prime can consult them for information and advice. I am incredibly lucky to have this image. Guardian Prime's wisdom is now in my reach. Of all the Primes besides Prima, this Prime is the one I respect the most. He was a genuinely decent mech."

"You can ask questions of the image and Guardian Prime's spark will answer?" Devcon asked with surprise. "What sort of questions?"

"All manner," Prime said as he stared at the face of the first Prime in his existence and someone he reverenced as a good mech and a good Prime. "This is very important and its a miracle that we have it."

"Are there others?" Bulkhead asked.

Prime nodded. "The last one that I heard that was made was for Sentinel. The process is guarded by the Temple priests and by now perhaps lost. These are the property of Primes and no one else should have them. Its too dangerous to allow them to be lost. We must redouble our efforts given the quality and type of relic this represents." He glanced at Miko, then smirked slightly. "Miko, you cannot go on these missions. The Decepticons are looking as well and there could be trouble. Bulkhead, Arcee and Devcon cannot focus and stay safe themselves if they have to worry about you being there."

"But I'm the one who thought to ask the ball thing where everything is. Without that we wouldn't know where this stuff is," Miko responded.

"She has you there, Optimus," Arcee said with a slight smirk of her own.

Optimus glanced at Bulkhead who vouched for her to him off line, then nodded. "We must continue. I will take custody of this now. I have to go to Africa. Springer has another relic. Check in with Ratchet for new coordinates. Well done, all of you." With that, Prime called for a bridge, stepped through it and was gone.

The others would follow behind him to return to base for another relic pursuit.

=0=Serengeti Plain, Africa

Optimus Prime stepped out of the bridge onto the confoundingly beautiful landscape of wild Africa. The sky was cornflower blue with puffy clouds that seemed miles tall. Mountains seemed far away in the distance as heat mirages shimmered over the landscape. Animals in untold millions stood around, migrated slowly or lay in what shade there was. It was unbelievably hot and water holes all over the place were ringed with herd animals. Watching them from their own languid repose, any number of predators were also in abundance.

He saw his party so he walked toward them passing groups of lions and the odd leopard who inhabited trees or lay under them in this, the hottest part of the orn. It was incredibly beautiful to listen to the sound of thousands of animals and the call of birds here and there. He paused by the group.

"What do you have there, Optimus?" Bee asked.

"I have a portal portrait," he said as he showed them the image.

Guardian Prime appeared to be staring at them with a remarkable degree of relaxation and informality, something in keeping with his personality when alive.

"That's great. Guardian Prime?" Bee asked as he leaned closer. As he did, so did Guardian. Bee leaped back startled. "WHAT THE FRAG!?"

Drift laughed. "Does your mama know you say cursing things, sparkling?"

Bee grinned at him. "Frag you, Mama."

"What is that? It mimicked Bee," Springer asked as he stared at the portrait with wariness.

"It is a funerary portrait that links the image in the frame with the spark of the individual shown there," Optimus said. "This is a direct link to Guardian Prime in the Matrix. It is also highly likely that every Prime who is deceased and we must presume all of them are has a portrait missing somewhere."

The three of them stared at Prime, then the portrait.

"That's great, Optimus. Can you turn it around? I don't think I like dead mechs staring at me," Springer asked.

Prime subbed the portrait, then glanced into the hole before them. "What did you find?"

"It zapped me when I touched it. I don't know what it is," Springer said.

Prime nodded, then knelt down. Reaching into the ground, he began to loosen the object from what looked like sandstone. After a moment, he pulled it out, then stood up to brush the remaining soil from its form. Prime studied it, then glanced at the others. "This is a Primal artifact. It appears to belong to Micronus Prime."

"It looks like a cup," Drift said as he studied the inscriptions upon its shiny beautifully elegant copper form. They were Primal Vernacular and very ancient, yet the cup looked brand new.

"It is a cup. A very special one," Prime agreed, then he tipped it. Blue energon poured out of it to splash to the ground.

"That wasn't in there all this time was it?" Springer asked with surprise.

"No," Prime said. "It is in there when I hold it. This cup creates or materializes, I am not sure which it is, energon for whoever holds it if they are a Prime."

"Then … you never go hungry?" Drift asked. "What about others?"

"Anyone may drink from it. Only I can make it perform its function," Prime said as he examined the writing. As he did the cup filled again.

"May I?" Drift asked.

Prime handed him the cup.

Drift studied it and the luminously blue liquid inside, a bluer appearance than any energon he'd ever seen before. He sipped it, then glanced at the others with surprise. "This is high quality, higher than I've ever tasted." He handed it to Springer who sipped.

"Whoa," Springer said as he considered the drink. "There's a lot of power in that stuff." He glanced at Prime. "This is at least Class A or A+ energon. Right?"

Prime nodded. "It is."

Bee took the cup, then drained it. For a moment he savored it, then he glanced at Prime. "This is something … its powerful. I feel like I can climb Mount Everest in five minutes without stopping."

"Its powerful in its purity," Prime said as he took the cup from Bee. "It is a good thing to have when energon is such a trial to find and dig out."

"We won't starve then," Springer said with a grin.

Prime grinned back. "No."

"Good thing, then," Springer replied. "We have a communication link to Guardian Prime, the Star Saber and the Never Ending Cup of Micronus Prime. Pretty good haul so far."

"We must get them all. Some of these may seem like trivialities given our situation but they will confer advantages to those who can manipulate them into their service," Optimus said. A call came to him so he listened silently a moment. Glancing at the others, he considered the hole. "You might fill that. Animals have enough problems without breaking a leg in an unexpected hole. Then return to the fortress for a new assignment. We must be tireless in pursuit of these relics. I have to go to Brazil."

"Sunny must be having a stroke over the rainfall there," Springer said with a chuckle.

"We shall see," Optimus said with a grin. A bridge came and he walked through it to disappear. When that was accomplished, it shifted and the three of them entered to leave the remarkable extraordinary beauty of Africa behind.

=0=Brazil a little bit earlier

They walked a long time through rain-dripping forests, over moldy logs and past the most egregious array of 'creepy-crawlies' ever devised. It was bitch, bitch, bitch all the way.

"If I never see another spider again it'll be too soon," Sunstreaker crabbed.

"I liked the ants until they began to crawl up my leg," Bluestreak said with a chuckle. "Some of them are pretty big for ants."

"Frag the ants. Frag the spiders, the frogs, the weird shit everywhere," Sideswipe said as he stared into the hole they'd dug out at the site of the relic's location. They were waiting for Optimus to come.

The sound of a bridge opening was heard as they turned toward it in time to see Optimus walk out of the swirling green water-like energy field of infinity. He crossed the broken trees to paused before the hole.

"We found something in there but we're, uh, sort of unwilling to get bug zapped or whatever," Sideswipe said with a grin. "We heard about Springer."

Prime nodded, then knelt. Down in a wet hole was a square shaped unknown which appeared jewel covered. Reaching down, he gripped what appeared to be a book, then brought it up. He rose to look at it. Incised into the metallic cover which was set with jewels in what Prime knew was a mathematical formula of some ancient design were words in the Primal Vernacular. He read them, then blanched slightly.

"What?" Blue asked with foreboding.

The others looked equally wary.

"This is a book of formulas that belongs to Quintus Prime," Optimus said as he opened it to look at the pages. "He has the power to create life and there are many different things here that are worrisome in the extreme. This cannot fall into the hands of the Decepticons. Quintus had interests in other creative things besides life itself."

"Great. He left his slag laying around for anyone to find," Sunstreaker said with a frown.

"I think there's more at play here, Sunstreaker, than carelessness. I am concerned about the types of relics we are finding. This has an intelligence behind it beyond hiding important things here from the war. There is something here that we cannot fathom at the moment but with every discovery comes a brighter light of understanding." Prime subbed the book, then turned to the three.

"We need to expedite this. What there is on the Earth, we must find. There's something that feels urgent to me about this, something that's trying to bring up an old memory perhaps. Until all of them are safe, all of us are in danger," Prime said. "This system is certainly in that category."

A bridge was called and they left, the trio to hunt more and Prime to go to the base to try to remember what the possibilities were trying to present.

=0=Jasper

They drove into Jasper, Nevada about lunch time. Finding a diner, they sat in a booth, made their order and tried to relax. The drive from California had been uneventful and hot. Arrival here was the same. Jasper was a small town with little to recommend it to visitors who usually kept driving.

Food came and they ate hungrily while Shane scoped out local camping with the waitress. When they were finished, paid and filed out, they jumped into their cars, then began to drive to a campsite four miles out of town that was maintained by the Bureau of Land Management, or BLM. There would be free camping, facilities and an unabridged view of the stars.

They disappeared down the straight road that cut the high desert in two.

=0=Later that evening nearby

He sat in the smeltering room where they made energon out of ore. Empty energon boxes were stacked to the ceiling as he held one on his lap. Tipping the cup, energon flowed into the transparent cube, then he would tip it back to refill. Over and over Optimus Prime, the Prime of Cybertron and the leader of the Resistance against the tyranny that destroyed their civilization was filling energon cubes from his cup.

It was amusing to Drift and Springer who stood at the door. They walked in and sat down on crates across from him.

Prime grinned at them and they at him.

"You look like an infant doing that, like a little kid filling a bucket with water," Springer said with a chuckle.

"In a way I am. Only I can do this and its Class A+ energon according to Ratchet and Perceptor," Prime said.

"It was mighty tasty. I didn't get hungry all orn," Springer said as Drift nodded.

"The best part of this beyond the entertainment value to the both of you is that Perceptor and Ratchet know how to distill this cube to create at least 200 more from each cube that does not dilute the quality, taste or potency of the energon," Prime said.

"No kidding," Springer asked. "We can have Class A+ energon all the time then?"

Prime nodded. "That part is a miracle. All hail, Micronus Prime."

"Hail," Springer said with a chuckle. "Well, something good has come to us from this."

"There is more, Springer. I have a ghost of an idea what this is and why. When I have all the pieces I will tell you. Until then, can you fetch more cubes?" Optimus asked with a grin.

It would be a peaceful interlude in the room as they chatted away the night creating from a few things enough bounty for a couple of years.

=0=Elsewhere

"There's My cup."

"That will teach you and Quintus to leave Your things laying around."

"Don't tell Me, Solus, that they won't find something of yours," Micronus Prime said as he hovered in the air beside His sister, Solus the Maker.

She grinned at Him. "Don't ask Me questions and I won't tell you any lies." Their laughter would be heard long after both faded away.

=0=TBC 01-28-2021 01-28-2021

Given all things being equal, I will post one of these every other day until further notice. All hail the Muse Gods. :D:D:D