Nature of the Beast

One-Shot: Konemq tz'sovallo

*Special "April Fools" upload. I know it's a bit after April Fools when this gets put up, but meh. I'm writing this on top of a bunch of actual papers and a group presentation, guys. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Gimme some leeway here.

*Since this is an established holiday, I'm going to try to avoid explaining it and merely drop as many hints as I can throughout through scenery, dialogue, and behavior and let you guys figure it out.

*I'm also going to be writing another story for Tcsovan that takes place during the d'xrv lom, which is included in the ten days of Konemq as the five darkest, longest, coldest nights. After having Light Brooding critiqued, I'll be writing that one as a kind of...response to the critique.

A sharp north wind rushed through the southern city of Altihex. Wispy clouds of ammonia ice wove a thin blanket poked full of holes through which faint sunlight peered in to the city below. But the mech smiling and dancing to an unsung tune on the walkways barely heeded the sudden chilled winds that brought with it the crisp, somewhat pungent smell of the polar regions. He enjoyed it and the colorful lights that his fellow Altihexians were busy setting up on buildings, but more specifically around the crypts and tombs of past and recent dead. He always made it a point to be there for Konemq, even if he didn't benefit by it the same way other visitors to the city might. It was only right. The guiding lights extended to all, regardless of rank or title. Beautiful, too, not to mention the holiday was a total hoot. Seeing it from the other side wasn't the same as seeing it up close. Even the old fire-breather understood that. There was just something about the twinkling lights that always made them both smile, and the antics some 'bots got up to, online or not, made even the midget crack a grin once in a while.

He laughed, spinning around. Honestly, it was hard to feel down when the cold wind was combated by smiling mechs and femmes, laughter, jokes, sparklings running around in the streets, and colorful lights holding back the long, cold dark. The dance in his step became more pronounced as his burning blue optics shuttered to better hear the city's song. He heard shrieks and laughter incoming, and they opened again in a snap. His smile grew. Two sparklings bounded towards him, their little Triptych lanterns and fresh-plucked Prime-roses in hand. One of the sparklings he thought he recognized, a little racer-style kid with a snazzy spoiler peeking over his shoulders. One of his agents had mentioned a kid matching that description. He nodded approval. Good sense of style, that one, and wonderfully energetic around his friend.

Rather than move out of the way, he merely lifted a trod and let them dart under him to continue on their way. But he caught the one by the little spoiler on his backstrut and lifted him up.

"Whoa there, Indy! Where you off to in such a hurry with those flowers?"

"The Temple!" answered the sparkling excitedly. "Vignette told us Oratorio says Prime-roses were named after Opt'mus, so we're gonna try and show him the way back!"

He held the crystal flowers up, their rounded, tear-tipped pale silver-blue petals glinting and scattering light. Beautiful blooms.

He chuckled. "Well, if ya get lucky an' manage to snag the ol' book-nerd be sure to tell me how it goes, 'kay? I'm an old friend of his."

The sparkling nodded vigorously and promised he would. What was his name though? Chuckling and giving him a sly wink, the mech introduced himself as Hysterus, and then set the sparkling back down. Hysterus smiled, knelt down, and waved him over to his friend. Laughing more, the sparkling raced over to rejoin his friend, a young Seekerlet femme whose armor was a dusky blue-grey. His smile grew. Cute kids, both of 'em. He'd always wanted a kid of his own, but meh – boss had rules about that. Besides, he had the whole city of Altihex to watch over, sparklings included. Just because he couldn't be a genuine Guardian like a regular mech didn't mean he couldn't be the awesome, mysterious uncle.

"Be careful, now!" he waved.

"We will!" they cried back.

Hysterus smiled fondly and went on his way, ambling along at a leisurely pace. He had eternity after all – no need to rush. Pity the kid wouldn't actually remember him. He liked him.

The sound of boosters made him look up at a Seeker busily hanging lanterns from the balcony of a two-story home made his fond smile shift into a slier version of itself. Oh-ho now that was tempting. A furtive glance around him revealed no one was paying him any mind like usual. His once warm chuckle morphed into a mischievous cackle. He slipped into a smaller street adjacent to the dwelling. His metallic frame became fluid, shifting like hard water, until he looked nothing like he had before: rotting violet and tarnished silver held together by ragged, exposed cables. A hanging, dislocated jaw angled up to form a twisted grin.

Time to have some fun.

'Shifter...' a voice warned.

"Oh, calm down!" he argued. "This'll be a hoot!"

The voice sighed, deadpanning curiosity creeping into his spark.

He argued back that, quite simply, he was quality entertainment. Maybe if he gave him his own comedy show he'd get in less trouble...?

The voice sighed again. A wash of disappointment and yearning came over him that wasn't his.

He sighed dramatically in return, "Why? Why you gotta suck the fun outta everything?"

A flash of defensiveness.

"Oh, yes you are. C'mon, it's Konemq! Please? Lemme have some fun! C'mon!"

Nothing. Then, a tickle of acceptance touched his spark. His grin returned full force, and he slunk out of the alley. The passerby and the Seeker above ignored him entirely.

An arm, slender and stylish, was laid over his shoulder. Smiling at the snickering of his friend behind him, he knocked a hand on the simple metal doors engraved with abstract geometric designs twice for politeness and invited himself in. A little hovering security drone zeroed in on him and subjected him to a scan. When the angry red sweeping beam recognized him, it swapped to blue and shut off. Giving a friendly sounding chitter-beep at him, it turned around and floated off like some weird metal cloud. Chuckling, he strode forward in a bouncing, dancing step.

"So this is where you stayed?" Swivet asked.

"Yep!" he confirmed. "Well, one o' many. And I still stay in 'em on and off, y'know! I don't get enough credits outta this gig to have my own place, and eh – I just like movin' around, y'know?"

"Bit of a nomad, huh?" she smiled. "It all makes sense now! No wonder you like hanging around a Blue Moon!"

His smile grew. Fair enough! But these places had so many good memories! It'd been forever since he'd visited this Home for Konemq. Did the little biters still remember him? Welp, there was only one way to find out. Cackling, he hacked into the maintenance and security drones nearest to his position, overrode their sound systems in less time it took him to polish his wheel rims, and gave a relay order to share his message. The one that had just scanned him sung "Oh kiddies! I'm home!" in his voice as it continued down the hallways. There was a weird bounce-off echo as the other drones relayed the message at the same time, but were further away at a ton of different places. He glanced to the side on hearing Swivet giggle at the weird sound effect. Nothing happened for a brief two astroseconds.

Hijinks held three digits up, smirking.

Three

Two

One

He gestured with his thumb down the hall just as ecstatic screams of "BACKDRAFT!" roared in like a mad Draconian, accompanied by the sounds of tiny pedefalls that sounded more like an oncoming avalanche to him. His friend took his cue and disappeared. From around the corners of the two branching hallways ahead came a stampede of rabid cuteness. There were a few familiar faceplates: Jaywalk, Ollie, Heelflip, Hairpin, Frightsmite. But there many others he didn't recognize, and by the time he began to store them into long-term the stampede met him. Some grabbed hold of his legs while their bigger or flier friends latched onto his backstrut or took hold of his neck cables. Swivet was mostly spared but wasn't exactly immune to the cute-valanche. A couple of young femme sparklings zeroed in on her in an instant and hopped around her trods, introducing themselves and spouting off accomplishments or news and gossip.

"Are you really an a'almvus?" asked a little Seekerling by his trods.

"Are you really a Seeker?" he countered, grinning.

The look on the kid's face made him double over as well as he could with ten kids on his frame – "identity crisis" was the best description he could come up with. The kid looked himself over quick and insisted he was, in fact, a Seeker. He argued that he never said he hadn't been, leaving him to ponder the intricacies of double negatives.

"So you guys all ready for the first night of Konemq this evening?"

A number of the kids shared puzzled glances, and then looked to him for answers.

"Oh! That's right!" he fake realized. "You guys're new! This is your first Konemq!"

One kid, a rugged but still adorable Cervidoid mech whose rounded antlers were still budding out, asked what that was.

"C'mon and me and Swivvy'll tell ya!"

The cute-mob released him from their adorable clutches and darted off to the rec-room, bouncing and asking him and Swivet more questions – namely whether or not she was his femmefriend. Distracted, the little biters never noticed that Hijinks, a typical mainstay at his side, was missing.

Once he got to there, most of the newbies were perched on furniture waiting for him. Good audience, this group. This'd be fun.

"– so we set up the lights around the city to help 'em stay warm, show 'em around in the dark, and keep the evil Terrorcons away. Neat, huh?"

He leaned back in the seat and kicked a trod up onto the low table, content with his enraptured audience of sparklings. A chorus of "Oooh!'" and "Cool!" was the answer to his story. Kids. Always loved to hear the origin story of the most playful yet spooky holiday on the planet. But one sparkling, an intelligent looking little badger-like femme with big, round blue optics protested that Stopgap had told her Terrorcons were just stories. They weren't real! And she'd never seen a spark in the streets before. So why were the lights really put up?

He grinned a sly grin.

"What makes you think Terrorcons aren't real?" he asked while still grinning that sly grin.

Because they weren't, she argued. She'd never read anything about them in the media other than on conspiracy sites or in the folklore databases of the Hall of Records. Not exactly trustworthy places for hard data.

"Well, we don't put the lights up just 'cause they're pretty, Finesse," Swivet argued. "And the sparks are there; you just have to get lucky and have real good vision. I've seen a few. They're just real hard to spot when they're not emerging from the Well. Those ones are meant to be seen. The ones that're let out during Konemq have to stay hidden or else the evil Terrorcons will get them!" she finished, lunging at a little grounder femme and earning a squeak when she grabbed her, the squeak turning to laughter on her gentle tickling of her chassis.

On one giggle, the lights suddenly flickered and died. The little femme's laughter ceased in an instant. Gasps and nervous whimpers escaped some of the kids. The lights hanging off the eaves outside and those of 'bots traveling around in the budding dark cast an eerie glow into the rec-room, and the little red beam of a maintenance drone scuttling by suddenly seemed a lot more sinister to him. But the little badger femme didn't budge at any of that. She was probably assuming it was just a power surge. His sly grin only grew when a groaning, gurgling moan echoed in the hallway, and the sound of shuffling, dragging pedes growing nearer and nearer. All that did was make them even more spooked. Even Swivet was acting nervous now, holding some of the kids close. His carefree smile faltered. Maybe Hijinks was overdoing it just a bit. Before he could comm. him to ask him to lay off a bit, the gurgling and shuffling pedes cut off. He thought he'd heard the tell-tale sound of a warp, too...

A bright flash engulfed the room and made his optics fritz. The kids weren't a fan of the flash, yelping an squeaking at its sudden appearance. He smiled. There he was! But when the glare and the stars in his optics fixed, Hijinks was nowhere to be seen in the dark. The little maintenance drone's beam swept around at somewhere around his optic level, even, providing some illumination – but no Hijinks in the group.

A gurgling groan came from above. Helms and optics of many colors jerked up. Frightened cries echoed in the dark. He smiled, holding back a laugh.

Clinging to the ceiling was a familiar Canipid form, but it now looked rotten and ragged, and the formerly pale bronze, red, and turquoise was now replaced with gunmetal grey and violet. One optic was missing. Gurgling, the creature detached from the ceiling and dropped onto the table. It transformed in a slow, sluggish grinding of gears and metal to reveal a similarly rotten mech, the jaw hanging lopsided by only a few wires.

It lurched forward.

The kids lost it.

"TERRORCON!" they screamed.

"THEY'RE REAL?!" shrieked the doubting badger femme.

"GROAWR-URRGH!" roared the Terrorcon.

Terrified screams filled the rec-room when the Terrorcon lunged for the badger femme, grabbing her and bringing her close. The other sparklings got as far away as possible from the creature – some even outright bailed from the room as he watched. The hanging jaw opened to bite into the living mesh. Finesse screamed, struggling frantically. But it never bit her or tried to slice her open or anything. It just stood there holding her, grinning a lopsided grin at the kid in its grasp holding her hands over her helm, still screaming. It cast a glance at him and winked. Then it laughed, "Gotcha!"

The screaming stopped as if it were a suddenly paused recording. The hands were lowered. Finesse looked up.

The frame of the "Terrorcon" fizzled and popped and shimmered like a heat mirage until Hijinks stood in its place, grinning from audial to audial and temporarily painted somber grey and violet to work with the hologram projector.

"The look on you guys' faceplates!" he howled in his hysterical, contagious laugh, "I actually had Swivet going for a klik there! Even you, brother!"

"HIJINKS!" Swivet snapped in wrathful relief. "You couldn't have, oh, I dunno, warned me you were going to be pulling a prank like that?! Bad dog! Very bad dog!"

"But where's the fun in that?" he argued with a casual shrug.

He set the kid back down onto the table. She had a smug little smirk on her faceplates now. Well, Backdraft mused, maybe she'd earned it. But she probably wouldn't go dismissing the idea of Terrorcons quite so easily after that jump scare, so mission accomplished he supposed.

"You outdid yourself, ro-bro," he applauded. "The lights going out was a nice final touch to the plan."

But Hijinks's grin faltered at that. He said he thought the lights had been his doing. Hacking wasn't quite his strong suit, and hacking an entire power grid was a little different than hacking security or maintenance drones or the occasional security camera. The encryption was way different.

His smile faltered too. "Swivet?" he asked.

She shook her helm. Hadn't been her. And it couldn't have been any of the kids. It couldn't have been the owner or the staff either, could it? They would have had to have been complicit in the scheme, like she'd been – even if she hadn't been told glyph-for-glyph what the prank was, she said, sounding a little miffed. She'd just been told the verbal set-up for it. But that still left the question of who'd messed with the lights in tandem with the prank. It had to have been someone who'd known about it, right? Right? There was no way in the Pit she was believing that was just coincidence. The timing was too pat.

He agreed.

"Playful spark maybe?" Hijinks suggested. "Sweetspice always told me they could mess with power systems. I mean, I didn't see one but – chance, right?"

"Maybe."

Swivet didn't sound totally convinced.

"What's going on in here? I heard screaming!"

Stopgap herself appeared in the doorway, a big, somewhat rotund femme with powerful limbs. She took one look at him and Hijinks and pieced the puzzle together.

"You!" she cried. "Oh, I shoulda known!"

Her field lit up like a forge fire. She was ~agitated~ and if she got in trouble for smacking the ~Shifter's~ little ~tricksters~ for scaring a bunch of new Foundlings then so be it. Making good on her threat, she stomped over, grabbed him and Hijinks, smacked them both upside the helm, grabbed him and his friend by the audials and began to drag them out. Well over half the kiddos gave disappointed noises while a few of them laughed alongside Swivet at how calmly they took the attack and the audial-dragging. When they reached the door, Stopgap slung them forward. Swivet joined them, and the instant she did the doors slammed in their faceplates.

"That went pretty well, huh?" the biker mech surmised, smiling.

Swivet and Hijinks burst into laughter.

Snickering, a bland form slunk out of the Home through a back entrance into the play-field. No one gave him a second glance, no one greeted him – but that was the price he had to pay for visits. Meh. It came with some upsides. Stifling his snickers, he slipped back into the flow of the outside world seamlessly. The sun had set and the cold wind was blowing. Some of the early arrivals sang to him in greeting before whirling away towards the lights on the buildings and the ones bobbing on handles in the streets. One of them whirled up to him, twirled around a bland arm that shifted to another form in its presence, and flew off, leaving a faint trail of starlight in its wake. He quickly shifted it back. Little devil he cursed humorously to himself, flinging a rude gesture at it.

Now, where to next...?

Author's Note: You guys are spot on in noting the similarities to Dia de los Muertos, but there's also similarities to the Indian holiday of Diwali, the Festival of Lights. :)