(Part one of Styx - or Fulcrum would really like to live through hell, thanks.)
"This is madness!"
"Yes."
"Styx was supposed to be safe! He promised-"
"It's war," the other techie said bluntly, and Fulcrum hated them because it was true.
War, yes, but this- this was madness incarnate. A chaos he'd not seen in several gigavorn since Charon had gone up in flames.
"And, he's on the battlefield."
Along with almost every other warrior they had, but that was not the point. The point was this posting was – had been – safe. Away from the frontlines, even if it was heavily fortified because it sat over one of their larger scale energon mining operations.
"Yes, and we lost contact with the outside a cycle ago-" Fulcrum hissed, jumping as yet another shell impacted. If only Soundwave was here, then maybe they wouldn't be trying a fool's errand-
Frag, this was reminding him of Charon, and that still upset him, never mind he'd managed to bring in an Autobot prisoner, and that had been easily the most harrowing experience of his life, thank you very much. He was a techie, supportframed and coded and in no way built for any kind of combat because he was not a fragging warhead.
Though that prisoner had shot him, a notoriously N O P E to combat techie (because he liked living, thank you very much), up several notches in Tarn's optics. He was no ranked alongside Nickle, and he wasn't sure what made an unattached -he assumed because he'd never seen her linx with anyone- Minicon so valuable to Tarn.
That rank was a Good Thing. Still, he'd liked Charon. It'd been out of the way like Styx. He'd been able to do the work given to him in peace, even if it had been challenging and he'd been forced to think outside the cube, and he might have accidentally invented a better way of defragging memories, but.
Details.
And, this was not Charon.
Mostly because Charon did not have heavy artillery shells impacting against reinforced steel with heavy, dangerous booms that bespoke sustained fire with alarming regularity. It'd punch through soon.
Charon had gone up in flames because of some Autobot several cubes to crazy with a death wish, far too much firepower and 'a burn them all' attitude.
Yet, like Charon, the Bunker was slowly turning into a death trap and Fulcrum was doing his Very Best, Thank You, to remain calm. Notorious for Noping out of combat or not, Support or not, he was a fragging Decepticon, and keeping his helm above the surging panic and Oh Slag would keep him alive.
"What about the gunners?"
"Dead," Fulcrum hissed. Dead and the gunner stations slagged into nothing more than twisted metal. "If we had gunners, you think this would be happening?"
"No, Sir."
Fulcrum shook his head as he watched the remaining -probably stressed out and wanting to shoot things- warriors scramble to protect the Support as they attempted to evacuate them as fast as possible, thankful he was one of those trying to re-establish connections to the outside, even though he knew it was a useless task. Unless they could wrangle up a miracle, they were slagged.
Because attempted evacuation was the keyword.
One of the escape ships had already been shot down by an Autobot carrier and another had gone dark - they feared it boarded, the crew dead or prisoners. They would probably never know its fate.
It rankled because along with 'non-essential' Support, they'd pushed as many Cadets as they could onto those escape ships, and if Fulcrum made it through this, he would never take gunner support for granted again.
He also wanted to know how the Autobots even had the firepower for this but that could come later.
Warriors bristled in anger as another hit rocked the place, sending debris showering down on them. It was only a few more hits, and the bunker would crack open. Yay. Wonderful. Fulcrum tried not think of all the snarled insults and threats of the worse calibre spat by the warriors as they paced around the Support that remained, offering a friendly brush of EM-fields here, the heavy calming weight of a hand there. It was all they could do.
They'd thought the Bunker would be safe. That it wouldn't be targeted by the Autobots.
"Listen up, soldiers." Fulcrums's plating fluffed and he dropped the wires in his hand as Grindcore's voice snarled across the comms. Nonono - "We all know the only way out is to fight. Stay close to us, and we'll get you out of this."
Fulcrum found a gun shoved into his hands by a hulking helio. "You ready, Support?"
"Y-Yes!" He stuttered out even as he swallowed, trying, and failing, to keep his terror from bleating across his 'field. The helio scowled, but thankfully, said nothing as it moved onto the next Support.
Yay and not. They had teleporters, yet he knew the only ones remotely close enough still wouldn't make it in time, and even if they could, there was a limit to how many a teleporter could take, how many teleportations they could do before they burned out, and it would not be enough to turn the tide, and even if Soundwave was here, even he had a limit. It sucked, and Fulcrum could only hope the Outliers they had on the field were enough, and that was assuming the field hadn't changed since he'd last seen it a cycle ago.
They were effectively screwed in the evac, and he was suddenly very, very grateful that Tarn and his Unit were out on the battlefield, not here to witness his slow breakdown.
Because He knew Tarn would not, never, ever, be impressed. He had zero patience or tolerance for any form of cowardice; Fulcrum had seen the results firsthand. It wasn't pretty.
Yet, he was D.J.D. Support Unit, and he needed to keep his head, or he was going to dieeeeeeee.
Invent, invent.
They'd have to fight their way out; there was no other choice. They couldn't cloak the escaping transports fast enough to keep them from being attacked or shot down, and all they could hope was some got through.
Hopefully.
And Grindcore's voice filled his comms. "Let's go!"
He couldn't go back even if he wanted to, and stepping out on to the battlefield was a nightmare, even as he followed the warriors that were attempting to herd the frankly terrified Support mechs to relative safety. Trained for combat, yes. He'd seen images and undergone the training, he'd been in oilball fights and Auto-Con and other war games and managed decently enough he could pass muster. He'd had it drilled into him what to do if he ever was in combat, but seeing it and being there, in the middle of an all too real fight for survival that wasn't a game were too wholly and utterly different things.
He faltered, almost tripping, and looked down and wished he hadn't.
It was an arm. Still bleeding, still fresh, not yet greyed out.
His spark hitched, joints locked and froze for several precious klicks as other Decepticons streamed around him.
It was likely what saved him from the shells that landed several metres ahead.
He screamed and ran as fast as he could to the nearest thing that could be hidden behind. His racer frame got there quite fast, thank you very much. He did not want to be here, wanted to be back in the Bunker or in the tunnels or the mines or on one of those escape ships even if there was the risk of getting shot down and he wished they could get ships here faster, but they hadn't perfected warpdrives (and thankfully neither had the Autobots) yet.
Here was bad, here was terrifying. He wasn't built or coded for this!
Something exploded nearby, and the racer let out an unholy shriek and huddled against his makeshift shelter, arms over his head. Primus on Unicron on Pyrovar, he was a data technician with near-magical fix-skills. He shouldn't be out here.
Maybe the Bunker -
His spark lurched at the rubble that had once been the entrance, then again as he peeked out at the field.
There was only one way he had a chance of getting out of this alive and that was making a mad dash across the field and that was assuming safety could even be found.
Invent, exvent. Don't whimper because he was better than that and this was the battlefield and he was a Decepticon. Check the gun-
He made a break for it, firing on any Autobot he could. Somehow, he always managed sparkshots. He didn't know if that was good or bad or what, only that it meant fewer Autobots firing at him - them. Once or twice, he thought he had a warrior by his side, but he didn't know, didn't care.
He wanted to get to safety, or at least something he could feasibly hide behind and be safer than out in the open and why had he even thought this was a good idea-
He stumbled, tripped yet kept going. He saw things he never, never wanted to see again. He heard the plasma fire of canons. Tarn, he knew. The other one -
He caught sight of a silver mech in the thick of things, firing off a fusion canon while swinging swords around in a lethal, lethal dance, while nearby a red and orange frame spun as if they were fire incarnate, slashing and hacking at anything that got too close, and near them dark blur wielded – well. He wasn't sure what it was other than some kind of weird sword. Or was it a gun?
Didn't matter.
Megatron and some of his Unit had been visiting (and he knew the Nemesis was up in orbit engaged against a number of Autobot ships that where, he could only assume, running interference, and if the D.J.D. hadn't docked the Peaceful Tyranny in for repairs, then Tarn's personal ship would have been raining pitfire on the Autobots) and they had two Gestalt Units active on the field, and they were still losing ground, still dying.
He thought he heard a GET CLEAR screamed across the comms as two massive hulking behemoths seemed to tumble across the ground, locked in combat.
Monstructor and one of the Autobot Gestalts.
Carnage followed in their wake and if he looked elsewhere, he could see Piranahacon attempting to ground some of the Autobot carriers while he tore his own swath of carnage. But Pirahnacon was over there and Monstructor was here -
Fulcrum found himself scramming away from it -
and almost face-first into what seemed to be a scene out of his worst nightmares only a multitude worse. He knew the D.J.D. tended to be kept on a leash; that went without saying. Casually terrifying everyone was part of the Job; causally assaulting anyone who breathed a word of discontent or dissent wasn't (though he knew they did it anyway because they were jumped up slaggers who enjoyed leaving a wake of terror in their paths).
Yet when they were allowed off the 'leash'...
He shuddered and scrambled back, praying to Primus the fraggers weren't fragged to the gills on Nuke, that they still had some sanity. Yet, looking around the area, he knew that was a very, very slim chance. Tarn was covered in Energon and he thought he saw a patch of blue on the mech's back, but that could be anything.
Vos leapt from Tarn's hand, transforming in midair to land -
Fulcrum's spark almost gutted in terror before he realised it wasn't a sparkeater but a Stalker – who was tearing into the Autobots with fire and fury and he even used one as a launching platform and -
The less said about that, the better, only that it was messy. Messier than Kaon and her playtime with hooks and she was getting creative-
Slagslagslag - he knew they existed, but he thought Stalkers clung to the shadows and chased away the demons and sparkeaters and other wonderful terrors from the Underdark, not lurked in the ranks-
It explained how Vos always seemed to come out of the shadows at the strangest of times though, and it maybe gave credence to the rumours that the rifleformer was one of Warmonger's many, many offspring, though he was pretty sure if the Phase-Sixer had sired a Stalker-.
But that was not a line of thought to follow on the battlefield, and as the frightened technician looked around he found he could see several other Stalkers, all of them mired in battle, all of them drenched in energon. He'd heard tales of Stalkers, of how they protected their people from the Things that came from the Under.
It was, in a very twisted way, fitting they were in the ranks, but even they weren't invincible and he thought he heard Vos shriek as one of the Autobot's grabbed Vos, and Tarn seemed to take offence to that and Fulcrum did not want to think about what he was seeing.
Because he needed to think about how to get out of here alive.
Hopefully without being drawn into the energonbath that was the D.J.D. and those brave sparks fighting alongside them. Though, they were more herding the sorry sparks of Autobots to their deaths than helping kill.
Fulcrum decided he liked living; he knew what they were like when high on Nuke, and he did not doubt they were high on the stuff. He had seen the results up close and personal, had felt Vos's hands on him while the fragger was high as a kite and about as sane as a shattered Seeker.
Had felt Vos's hands on him a few times and not all of it had been pain and the first time-
He cut that line of thought. Not the time, thank you.
He needed to be out of here. As of last megacycle.
With that thought on his mind, he transformed and gunned his engine, zipping off across the field, and hopefully towards safety.