The Diego Diaries: Uh … (dd7 61) Hope it makes sense. Very tired and didn't edit yet. :D:D:D
=0=The Pit Stop
Everyone sat down in their usual spots as waiters hovered. Prowl himself glared at Optimus as the big mech chatted with Hercy. It wasn't going well.
Ratchet smirked at Prowl. :Hey, Granny:
:WHAT!?:
:Dial it in. People are going to talk: Ratchet said with a dazzling smile.
:Frag you, Loon. How long have you known this and where would you like me to kick you?: Prowl sat back with a forced calm facade. No one was fooled. Most of them sat prepared for a few table flips.
:I just found out as well. Hold on a moment: Ratchet said, then eyeballed Ironhide who was holding Halo as he chatted with Sun. :Ironhide:
He glanced at Ratchet. :What?:
:Are you going to play football as well and WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME if you are?: Ratchet gave him a dazzler.
He stared at Ratchet with amusement. :You're one mercurial fragger, I give you that. Yes. And for obvious reasons. The entire team is going to play football this season:
"Everyone?" Ratchet asked with surprise. "All of you slaggers?"
Everyone turned to the two of them, then Ironhide. He stared back, then frowned at Ratchet. "Ask Prime. He's the mech. I'm just his go-to right servo mech, slag it. I AM IRONHIDE! Ask Optimus. Slagger can't find his peds without me along to point."
Optimus snorted, then smirked at Ironhide who smirked back. "Give me that baby."
Ironhide did minus smirk.
"Give us the details, slagger, since most of the fam is conspiring behind my back," Ratchet said.
Prime glanced around the several tables, then grinned. "They are expanding two more teams in both leagues, here and on Cybertron. We are going to make up the bulk of the Crater Comets."
Everyone stared at him a moment, then Springer smirked. "Sounds like a high school on Earth."
"Maybe you can letter then in varsity sports. You can get a letter man sweater and I can be a cheer leader," Ratchet said as he batted his optical ridges coquettishly.
Prowl made a retching sound.
Ratchet grinned at him. "So you want to be the cheerleader? Maybe we can be co-captains on the squad. We do, after all, possess a squad."
Prowl smirked, then glanced dagger optics to Prime who wiped his grin immediately. Food came next.
Mercifully.
=0=The Hourly News at 1200 on the TMC
"And in other sports news today, the Martian and Cybertronian Football Leagues have announced the expansion of both with two more teams apiece. They are the Tersis Tyrants and Cobalt Blues on Cybertron. On Mars, the new teams will be the Crystal City Crushers and the Crater Comets of Crater District 1. Jacx talked to Password who heads the Martian League and the Sports Commission here."
It cut from Lim-Lee to Jacx outside the Sports Arena in Retriades where he went to check out the semi-final games in basketball that would happen shortly. "Password, you're adding two more teams both here and on Cybertron. That will make it 14 teams in both leagues. Why?"
Password: "We want to give more players a chance to play. We have a lot of amateur leagues cropping up with talented players. It seemed reasonable to have more adult league possibilities for them to aim for."
Jacx: "Are there going to be any surprises with this move?"
Password: "There's always surprises. We'll be playing half schedule on Cybertron and half here. All of them will be televised and there will be an effort to showcase Cybertron and the big camps there. The play will take place in open spaces around the big camps as the stadiums get rebuilt along with everything else. We're using holographic projections of the games to allow everyone world wide to see them as if they were there. Its done here and it'll be done there."
Jacx: "I imagine the number of those wanting to play will be interesting."
Password: "Not as interesting as the entire Iacon basketball team signing up to play for Crater District 1 on the Crater Comets." (Huge grin) "That includes Optimus Prime."
HEADLINE HEARD AROUND THE WORLD!
=0=Elsewhere
The news always played everywhere that humans were. It as a way to keep up with the colony's exciting environment. When the news hit that two more football teams would be fielded in what would be Earth's September, that was exciting enough. That it would include Optimus and his team, that was even more exciting.
Consensus opinion among the humans:
First: "OH MY GOD! SQUEEEEE!"
Second: "Oh my god. PROWL WILL BE SO PISSED!"
=0=ESPN Sports, Sports Central, MCA HQ, Earth during the normal sports news broadcast
"In other news, Password, President of the Martian Football League just released information about the upcoming football season which will start about September 16th our time. There's going to be an expansion of both the Martian League and that on Cybertron.
"The Cybertronian games, half of the league play, will be played there in specially constructed areas. It will be broadcast down the MCA again with the consortium sportscaster pool being drawn from sports organizations world wide before each game.
"The leagues are expanding to include two more teams each. The names for Cybertron are the Tersis Tyrants and the Cobalt Blues. The two new teams for the Martian League are the Crystal City Crushers and the Crater Comets," the leader of the panel stated.
"I love their names. They sound like roller derby teams," someone on the panel said as everyone laughed in agreement.
"Apt description, Mark," the panel leader said. "But there's more." He looked at the note in his hand. "The Crater Comets will be populated with the entire Iacon Invaders basketball team and filled in with other players to meet the roster. That includes Optimus Prime himself."
Bedlam a moment.
"What the hell? Can you imagine Boris Johnson playing football?" someone said who was a cricket champion in the day.
"I can't get the picture out of my head of him being stuck on a zip line in a suit waving Union Jacks in both hands," the cricket player said. They played the clip and everyone agreed.
The conversation would take off right away.
OPTIMUS PRIME WAS GOING TO PLAY FOOTBALL! SQUEEE!
=0=Earth2
Jim Johnson, Carlos Ortega and Sam Hedges were sitting around the cafe on First Street waiting until their shift came online. They would walk a beat, be mostly ignored, then retire to someone's apartment to drink beer, eat pizza and play cards for hours with a number of others joining them.
Jim Johnson shook his head. "I don't know why they call it football. It doesn't even come close."
"I don't care," Carlos said. "I like the game. It's like demolition derby. Anything with that much power is a hoot." He glanced at Johnson. "You really need to let your anger go. There's things to do and watch around here that make me laugh."
"You're an idiot," Johnson said moodily. "I wonder when the report on the murders comes out?"
"I don't know. It wasn't me who did it," Ortega said.
It was silent, then they rose to walk out and go to the substation nearby where the Autobot's trained and hired security worked. They would check out the mood of the place, then walk their beats.
They would find out that the mood was fine and dandy now that Optimus Prime and his team had a life beyond basketball.
=0=Teacher lounge in Centurion
Roto walked in to sit and relax a moment before continuing testing on several children who had deficits in hearing but were too protoform impaired to get replacements yet. The twinnies didn't have that problem because they'd never starved. It was a war zone in some of the classrooms with the impaired children that attended.
"Did you hear that the Iacon Invaders are going to join the Crater Comets for football this September on the human calendar?" Nova asked as he sat relaxing with a couple of data experts who were adding a parental contact link for families to see their children's reports in a confidential manner on line.
Roto grinned. "Nope. I'd put my shanix on them, though. What a great idea that Prime is a baller."
"A what?" -nearly everyone in the room.
Roto grinned. "For me, its a play on words. For humans, it means something that's great or someone who is great, too. I think we can all agree that Optimus Prime is baller."
Everyone could.
=0=Outside recess and break at another school …
"Did you hear that Lord Optimus and the Invaders are going to play football, too?" Coros asked as he ran across the playground to join his friends, most of who were high achieving students of all manner of former castes and worker bees in the programs with him.
"What?" Jessine asked in surprise. "THAT'S AWESOME! We better get our stuff together. They can really get hurt with that game."
Everyone nodded. They would troubleshoot their kits and processes for the rest of the recess and run back inside when the whistles blew.
All was well with their world.
=0=RTR Tools
They stared at each other as they took in the news. Ravel shook his helm. "I suppose that Ironhide will play, too. He after all is Lord Optimus's great pal."
Appa Ratchet who was enraptured by his book nodded. "Lord Optimus is holy," he said with a slightly distracted expression.
Ravel grinned. "He is, Our Optimus."
=0=Around the dojo
"THAT'S CRAP! I TRIED OUT FOR PRAXUS AND GOT PUT ON THE RESERVE LIST! I COULD PLAY BALL AGAINST HIM, MAYBE!" Smokey sat back after venting a second, the pouty look on his handsome face a nice distraction for most of the hooligans sitting around the lounge.
They were rotten but they weren't dead.
Yet.
Where there's life, there's lust.
And so it went around the colony and parts out there.
=0=Later at The Fortress
Prowl leaned on the doorjamb watching Prime crank the pile of stuff on his desk to get it done. He suppressed a grin. Rapping on door, Optimus looked up at him. Then he sat back with amusement to watch Prowl fuss.
"You didn't tell me," Prowl said as he flopped down on a chair.
"The bond. I muted it," Prime said. "I wanted to surprise you."
"Well ... CONSIDER ME SURPRISED!" Prowl said with a slight smirk.
Prime laughed, then sat back himself. "Putty in my serv-" Prime began before a half eaten pastry sitting on Prime's desk landed on his face.
=0=TBC 8-13-19
Notes coming tomorrow. :D Too pooped tonight. ^++^
Just so you know, the Crater Comets do sound like a high school on Earth. Mine. LOL! The Crater High School Comets. :D I graduated in the Class of *cough*, *choke*, sputter*.
That one.
baller: it can mean a lot of things but for the story, it means this and is being used to describe something:
extremely good or impressive; excellent.
"this place is baller!"
mercurial: (mer-cure-ee-ul) something that goes up and down, like someone's personality and moods. It goes up and down like mercury in a thermometer. :D
roller derby: Consider fisticuffs and roller skates. I used to watch roller derby in its heyday. It consists of two teams skating in a round track slanted like a biking track beating the slag out of each other as they aimed to 'bomb' their way to victory. Google it. You won't be disappointed. :D It was a really, REALLY tough women's sport.