The Diego Diaries: Bang (dd7 260)
=0=The Club
Prowl wouldn't be.
Almost immediately a brawl broke out across the room. The music covered it a moment, then everyone began to run. Prowl turned to face the noise and found himself on the floor as half a dozen femmes decided to make a break for the door. Ravel spun and fell down sitting hard on the floor. He rolled under a table to free himself from a trouncing as the dance floor which was filled with civilians and the odd soldier began to run for the exits. They stampeded and as Ravel huddled under the table tugging on Prowl's servo as he did, the rush was on.
Joon, Bron-E and Edict ran toward the bar followed by Neo and Laret. Kestrel and Miler stood up, glanced around swiftly and felt themselves being pushed to the doorway in the rush. They disappeared with the fleeing crowd almost immediately. Corr and Docker crawled under the table and clung to each other as the mad dash of peds flashed past in a stream. They glanced around to see Madura and Laslo find a table next to theirs which they would share with two youngling girls and their beaus.
Where anyone else was they didn't know but it was a grisly thing to watch the crowd stampede over Prowl who lay on the floor in a fetal position with a terrified Ravel trying to pull him to safety. Given the panic, no one dared move over to help him.
Elita and Arcee along with Lancer and Chromia stood up, glanced around for the rest of the squad, then ducked down to spy most of the squad under the tables. "Lancer, Arcee, get them out of here!" Elita said as she stood up and with Chromia in tow ran into the crowd to make their way to the fighting just out of sight.
Ratchet who was jingling around in his drunk dance in the crowd suddenly found himself alone on the highly polished floor. He looked toward a fight nearby and got a chair in the face. He went down like a ton of bricks.
Nighty-night, Ada.
Chromia and Elita leaped out of the crowd and landed on their peds next to a couple of other brawlers. Ammas Delphi and Turbine were bashing helms so they joined them, cutting through the slag as the rest of the gangsters in the room rushed at them. Making a circle, they met them coming and dispatched them rather easily. That is, they did until a gun appeared.
With a roar of rage and a swiftness that would surprise even Sun and Jack, Delphi grabbed it, squeezed it hard, then back slapped the kid who had it across the face with his own pistol. He went down, two others jumped Delphi and it was on again. It would remain on until the Watch came in force including Drift and Springer who were alerted to the 'squeal'.
And what a squeal it was.
=0=Up there
"So, you lived there," Raptor said. "I remember that place. It was a den of thieves. Most of the Internal Revenue mavens lived there. They could afford it. They stole everything that wasn't nailed down."
Rockwell stared at him hotly but didn't say a word.
Raptor grinned. "You know, you have a captive audience here. You really should unload. When will you ever have another chance?"
Rockwell considered that. "You're a disgrace, Raptor. You belong to the highest of the castes in The System but you treat it like its nothing. If my family had your caste, there would be a whole different world."
"You don't though," Hardie said with a slight grin. "Your family and the rest of them didn't have the foresight to do it, nor the integrity. You weren't the soldiers who freed everyone. You didn't do the organization afterward to put the culture and planet on track. You weren't among the Immortals who put The People first and devised the caste to make sure that you slaggers didn't have free rein to hurt them. I would shudder to think how fast we would've risen up to destroy you if you had. At some point in the choke hold, you either die or your rise up. Every single time, we rose up."
"The Functionalists were criminals but they had good ideas. Form does meet function. How would it be if some of the different formats suited for other things were allowed to dictate to everyone how it was to be?" Rockwell said.
"They did. You slaggers did it. Frankly, I'm still trying to figure out what your family was good for. Consider the mechs who live and work here. Semi and No-A are huge. They'd be relegated to construction when they're first class legal processors here. The waste would be catastrophic. There's all manner of mechs and femmes doing what they want to the highest degree of excellence that wouldn't be able to do so if your slagging system was still criminally in charge. Consider those who were in charge … the Quintessans, the Functionalists and you slaggers. Consider that The People handed you your asses each time. How do you explain that?" Sun asked.
Rockwell stared at him. "They were led by weak mechs who didn't do what was necessary to maintain good order."
"You mean like Sentinel? Your cousin or uncle or whatever?" Sun asked as he reached for his beer. "That slagger?"
"Sentinel was a great mech. He was a great leader. He was the best of the best," Rockwell replied hotly.
"So you've said," Jack replied solemnly. "But did you know that he used shadow play and empurata during his reign?"
Rockwell stared at him. "I doubt that Sentinel sanctioned it but if it was used, those who got it deserved it."
"Shockwave got it. That's why he's a one-eyed slagger," Raptor said. "He got it because he tried to change things in the Senate and because he hid dissident scientists who didn't want to be used to create torture for the regime. That's empurata. His meanness, his sense of vengeance and cold sparked murderous behavior came from that. Tell me again how that was EVER necessary?"
"Shockwave was a cold blooded killer who deserved everything he got," Rockwell replied darkly. He didn't care that he was practically alone here. He felt free and good.
"I will tell you that I knew Shockwave before he was tortured and disfigured. I liked him. He was a stand up mech with passion. He had a face and he had morals," Jack replied as Hardie nodded. "He was tortured to give up scientists that Sentinel wanted to use for actions against The People. He never gave them up and he lost everything. Everything."
"Say what you will about what he did since that moment," Sun said. "He was a good mech before with guts and I liked him. He was a radical in support of The People and it cost him everything." Sun leaned closer to Rockwell. "Sometimes when people don't know anything they end up talking out their aft."
"You'd defend him," Rockwell countered.
"Nope," Sun said as he sat back and grinned at the fudge on his plate. "I do find it a good tactic to know everything about the enemy that I can. Shockwave was once one of the few Senators to stand up against the bullshit. He did so and paid with everything. I don't have to like what he turned out to be to admire what he once was. It wasn't completely his responsibility how that turned out. Under Sentinel's misrule, if you had scruples you paid a price."
"Sentinel had a thankless job. He needed to take hard measures," Rockwell said.
"He extended and intensified the stupid mess that led to the war," Blackjack said. "He was the source of suffering. Megatron is a symptom. Sentinel was the disease. No matter how you spin it you won't be able to fix this slagger into a hero. He was a callous, selfish, self serving coward who put his own interests over the well being of the world. He killed a lot of people and your caste helped. I don't claim membership in the high castes and I never did. I'm a Praxian Elite and we stood against you. Its just too slagging sad that we didn't put all of you slaggers in jail."
Springer stood up. "I got a call. Save my place here. You coming?" he asked as he glanced down at Drift.
Drift rose and glanced at Ironhide. "Save our place."
The two walked to the door and left. It was silent a moment, then Hardie glanced at Rockwell. "You need to ride with the Watch sometime. You need to see what life is really like. Not even Cybertron and all the orns we've spent there has taught you to love our people."
Rockwell stared at him without comment.
=0=The Hot Spot
They drove up to see a lot of mechs and femmes milling around, a number of slaggers sitting on the ground, all manner of vehicles related to rescue and the Watch as well as a few familiar faces. Transforming, they glanced at each other. "Its like a magnet. They find it without even trying."
Drift grinned. "I wonder what the damage is this time?"
The two walked into the marked off area, got the short and sweet from the local cops, then entered the club.
Predo was beside himself in the foyer as he talked to Hauser who had come at the call. "This is the second time, Hauser. These fraggers shot up the bar last time and now this? What are we going to do?"
"Yeah," Springer said as he paused beside the two. "What are we going to do?"
Hauser smirked at Springer. "We got a plan, Chief. You might want to go inside and look at the train wreck. A few of the passengers are family."
Springer grinned. "Okay." He looked at Predo. "We're going to end this, Predo. We need to get the scene down, then you can have it." He walked onward into the bar as a sympathetic Drift followed.
Predo watched them go. "I hope so."
Inside, the carnage was pretty good. There were bullet holes in the far walls from a gun that had been rescued from the kid who brought it by his Amma Delphi. Springer walked to a table where everyone sat. He pulled up a chair. "Well, don't you beat all? Tell me why I don't throw all of you in jail? You aren't a squad. You're desperadoes."
Ratchet who had sobered almost too fast when his sensors took in the violence and triggered the cure was patching up Prowl who looked like he was covered in footprints. "You're funny, slagger. You must take after your old dad."
"We're going to need statements. Is everyone okay?" Springer asked as he glanced around the group. They looked shaken and a couple looked stirred but he could see no physical damage.
"We crawled under a table," Kestrel said. "It was very violent."
"Good thing," Drift said. "I don't want to think about any of you getting hurt."
"Thanks for the concern," Prowl said with great affront and sarcasm.
"There, there, Prowler," Ratchet said as he held back a grin. "Your boo-boos are taken care of. That'll teach you not to listen to my ada."
Grins rounded the group.
"Amma Delphi and Amma Turbine took care of the gunmen," Chromia said. "Elita and I took care of the rest."
"I can just see the official report now," Springer said as he sat back with amusement. "At 2200 joors, two armed assailants were put down by my Amma Delphi and Amma Turbine while my sisters took care of the rest. My ada was there to patch up everyone including Prowl who was covered in footprints by a stampeding crowd of mechs and femmes, none of which are related to me."
Prowl startled, then glanced at his body and arms. He looked poleaxed, the fastidious slagger.
"Don't worry, Prowl," Miler said with a bit of anxiety. "Maybe the twins can detail you."
Prowl stared at his ada and quashed all the invective he was prepared to say about *THAT* SLAGGING IMPOSSIBILITY! NEVER! EVER! *EVER*! happening.
"You should. They do good work, private parts included or no," Ratchet said with a gigantic grin. Then he winced. "I was told I got slagged in the face with a chair."
"You did," Turbine said with a chuckle. "You fell like a sack of cement tossed from the penthouse."
"Why, thanks, Amma Tub-Tub," Ratchet said with a smirk.
=0=Night at the Watch
The night delivery aide pulled a gravity cart into the main office of the Superintendent of Security and Commandant for Mars, Cybertron and the Empire. Pausing to look at the mail in the gravity device, she pulled out folders, letters, evidence packets, court schedules for cases, data pads and a rather nicely wrapped box. Placing them on the table next to Springer's desk, the one that was a catch all for this sort of thing, she walked out and the door closed silently behind her.
It was 0400 joors in the morning.
=0=TBC 4-20-2020 4-27-2020
Everything about Shockwave is canon the IDW universe. The only change in his stuff here is that he's getting slagged under Sentinel's reign and not the Functionalists where he actually got hurt. :D:D:D Given the dickishness of Sentinel, I'm sure he used torture himself.