Training Center
"Are you done with those yet?" Kade asked with a yawn.
"I would be if you'd help," Heatwave growled at the redhead sitting on the couch behind him.
"I'm taking a break!" He defended, only it came out sounding like "Uhm fafing uh vrake!" due to all the pizza in his mouth.
Being fluent in 'Kade,' Heatwave only rolled his optics and went back to his current task, doing his best to ignore the loud crackling noises coming from Kade's chip bag.
"Cheer up, Heat. You'll get a break in a couple of hours." He took another bite of his pizza. "Doc asked us to go to the lab today, remember?"
Another sigh escaped the firebot's dermas. "Great. I forgot that was today." He glanced at all the paperwork he had yet to finish and ran his servo down his agitated faceplates. "I better hurry."
"Yeah, you better," Kade called from the couch, gulping down his soda.
Heatwave shot his partner a glare, clearly unamused.
"Fine." Kade sighed and closed the lid of his half-empty pizza box. "I'll help." He wiped the chip dust off his hands on his pajama bottoms and sat in front of his own pile of abandoned papers.
"So not how I wanted to spend Saturday." He muttered under his breath and began filling out a few forms.
— — —
Griffin Rock
"Never learn, do you, Don?" The Chief sighed, handing the speedster yet another ticket.
The reckless driver frowned at the yellow slip and slowly drove away.
"Tsk. Tsk. Tsk. That is the third ticket this month." Chase's headlights glowed with every word he spoke.
"Some people never change, partner," Chief replied with another sigh and climbed into the driver's seat.
A comfortable silence fell upon the two police officers as they continued their patrol. Chase noticed his human partner was squinting at the road, fighting to keep his eyes open.
"Chief, if I may. You show signs of fatigue. Have you been getting adequate rest?"
"No, Chase, I had trouble falling asleep last night." He yawned and forced his eyes to stay open.
"I, too, didn't get a full night's recharge, but my energy levels are not depleted." He cocked a brow, confused as to why his partner was tired.
The old policeman only chuckled. "Humans lose energy faster than you bots. We need at least 7-8 hours a night to function at our best." He groggily explained.
"Ah. What do you do if you are unable to obtain a full night's rest?" He questioned.
"I drink a lot of coffee. The caffeine gives me a jump."
"Do you require any coffee at the moment?"
The tired police officer mulled over the suggestion and dipped his head in a nod.
In less than five minutes, Chase had pulled into the drive-through of a nearby coffee shop.
"One Americano, please." The officer ordered.
"One shot or two shots of espresso?" A young feminine voice, probably belonging to a girl no older than 16, asked.
"One." He replied. "That should hold me for another couple of hours." He told the bot.
"May I remind you that Doc Greene has requested our presence for the testing of the upgraded resilience patch this afternoon?"
The Chief sighed for the umpteenth time and turned back to the speaker. "Better make that two."
— — —
Faxian
"Quickshadow?" Dani's voice echoed throughout the large training room. She immediately caught sight of a shiny silvery-white finish and walked towards the femme.
"Blades sent me to—" the brunette stopped dead in her tracks when she noticed the femme was sitting with her peds crossed and her servos resting on her thighs, palms facing up. The serenity she bore on her faceplates seemed to have shattered at the sound of Dani's voice, and her arctic blue optics snapped open.
"Sorry, I didn't mean to disturb you." She apologized. "Blades sent me to get you. We're about to head over to Doc's lab."
"It's alright. I was just about to finish up anyway." she uncrossed her peds and rose to full height.
"I didn't know you meditated." Dani walked with long strides in an attempt to match Quickshadow's long steps.
"Cody suggested that I try it. It helps in clearing one's mind," she explained.
They soon found Blades and HighTide standing in silence next to an orange vortex.
"Let's not keep Doc waiting." Dani said, prompting her 3 teammates to make their way through the portal.
— — —
Professor Barenova's Lab
"Ughh..there's nothing to do!" Blurr groaned.
"You could help me sort these items." Salvage suggested, motioning to the rather large pile of 'junk' he had collected over the past week.
"..Nah I'll pass." he shook his helm at his friend's offer. "Sorry Salv. Besides, I'd probably mess it up anyways." Blurr added with a chuckle.
"Suit yourself.'' The recycling bot lifted his shoulder pads into a half shrug and went back to sorting through his collection.
The speedster had gone back to pacing out of sheer boredom. He had already driven around the lab's perimeter on a narrow, bumpy road about a dozen times. He couldn't accelerate much due to his size but there wasn't much he could do about that.
He was just about to transform to drive around once more when Boulder approached them.
"Hey guys. We're about to head over to Doc's lab to oversee the test." he motioned to Graham who was standing next to his ped.
"We're coming too!" Blurr stated. "If I stay out here one more minute, I'll lose it." Behind him, Salvage gave an amused chuckle and began cleaning up his collection.
"Just leave it there Salvage. We'll come back in a couple hours." Graham suggested.
The yellow mech glanced back at the pile before following the others to the ground bridge inside the lab.
— — —
Doc's Lab
"..No one told me we were having a reunion." Blades glanced at everyone in the room. The entire team, minus Servo was cramped into the largest room in the lab. The playful helper bot had stayed behind at the firehouse to deal with any small emergencies that appeared in their absence.
None of the four parties present were aware everyone else had been asked to be present.
"This is gonna be some test." Kade commented, mentally preparing himself for whatever surprises Doc had up his sleeves.
"Salvage and Blurr were gonna stay behind but—" Boulder was cut off mid sentence. "We were bored." Blurr and Salvage answered in unison.
The other bots, excluding Blades and Quickshadow, gave HighTide questioning looks, awaiting his explanation as to why he was there.
"Had nothin' better to do." The seabot shrugged their looks away, not offended his presence was questioned in the slightest.
It wasn't long till Doc emerged from the sliding door located behind the bots with Frankie hot on his heels.
The 14 year-old's brown eyes searched the room for her best friend and a smile bloomed on her face when she saw him waving her over.
"Hey Cody!" she pulled him in for a side hug.
"Hey Frankie! How was your trip to your mom's lab?" The blonde inquired, returning the hug.
Frankie had been helping out at her mom's west coast laboratory for the past week while Doc experimented on the unstable chemical.
Her smile fell. "I wasn't able to explore much because I was stuck babysitting Cece." She motioned to her nearly one year-old sister who was trying to wiggle out of her mother's hold across the room.
"Yeah, I figured." He frowned sympathetically.
"It wasn't too bad though. Blurr, Salvage and Boulder kept me company." The corner of her lips lifted in a small smile.
The teens looked over to see Doc pulling up his gloves and fastening his goggles over his eyes. The scientist explained the test and the potential risks.
The bots circled the testing area in order to easily restrain the Scrubber if it went haywire halfway through the test.
Everyone was silent for the first half of the test. Everyone except Cece. She kept squirming and fussing so Anna led her out the lab.
The experiment required the utmost precision or the unstable chemicals would have an immediate unknown—but undoubtedly negative reaction with the patch. Doc had on noise cancelling headphones to minimize distractions while he worked.
Everything was running smoothly, much to the surprise of the rescue team who were no strangers to Doc's clumsiness. Still, their guard was up incase of any sudden conflicts but they allowed themselves to engage in small talk by means to pass the time.
The Burns kids began filling each other in on what they had missed in the few months they had been separated.
"You look like you could use a vacation." Quickshadow commented, seeing Heatwave sitting out on the small conversations the other bots held.
Heatwave's amber optics flicked to see her standing besides him before he turned his helm to face her.
"Definitely. Preparations for the Academy have been draining me." He lightly chuckled and tried to make any sign of fatigue vanish from his faceplates.
"I take it Kade isn't much help?" She inquired amusedly, seeing how energetic the redhead was a few meters away from them.
Heatwave rolled his optics. "Nope. He takes 30 minute breaks for every 5 minutes he works."
Quickshadow eyed the clearly tired mech besides her and was about to propose a plausible solution to his dilemma, but the sound of the door sliding open caught her attention before she could open her mouth.
A faint beeping noise grew louder and soon, a small yellow mass had levitated through the entrance.
"Toast?"
The bot's were caught off guard by the intruder and reacted too slow.
"Dither, No!" An army of servos lunged forwards, aiming to catch the troublesome robot but it somehow managed to maneuver around their grasps and flew straight over to the unsuspecting Doctor to offer him his snack.
"Toast?"
Doc, still wearing his noise canceling headphones, didn't hear the helper bot. Dither resolved to nudge his shoulder and needless to say, the scientist was startled at the unexpected contact.
Unsurprisingly, his hand slipped and more than half the vial drained into the patch.
Doc spun around to find the culprit stretching out a piece of toast at him. "Dither-" he was going to lecture the machine but a slight rumble cut him off.
He suddenly remembered the Scrubber and cautiously took a step back from the experiment, unsure how the chemicals would react with each other.
The room grew quiet, awaiting some sort of reaction. The seconds felt like hours but the Scrubber stayed perfectly still.
"Nothing happened." Kade celebrated too early.
The patch's original blue color soon turned yellow and the Scrubber began to shake violently, signaling a negative reaction.
This time, the bots were quick to react and immediately began placing the humans in their cabins.
"Ezra!" "Daddy!" Anna and Frankie yelled from different bots, trying to snap the scientist out of his trance.
Doc grabbed his helper bot and took a few more steps back but clumsily tripped over his feet. Fortunately, Heatwave caught him before he hit the ground and placed him and Dither in his cabin, next to Kade.
The scrubber began switching between its plethora of weapons and gadgets as if planning to attack. Quickshadow instinctively fell into a defensive stance, preparing to neutralize the malfunctioning Scrubber if necessary. She felt a servo grab her shoulder pad an hold her back.
She looked to Heatwave who was staring at the malfunctioning Scrubber.
A subtle glowing light had encased the machine. Apparently, the chemical had seeped into the robot's systems and triggered a morepermanentend to the Scrubber's services.
"It's gonna blow!" Blurr yelled.
"Brace yourselves!" Chief yelled and the bots crossed their arms over their helms.
A bright yellow light illuminated the dim room for a split second and a deafening 'boom' reverberated down the various halls of the lab.
A few seconds of silence followed the explosion. Everyone's ears and audials were ringing from the loud sound.
"Everyone okay?" Heatwave spoke up after the smoke cleared.
Having received a series of affirming nods, he turned to see what was left of the Scrubber.
"So much f'r upgrading its resiliency." HighTide pressed his dermas into a fine line.
"Yeah, this is more of a downgrade." Blurr agreed.
"Ew ew ew! What is this stuff?!" Blades yelped, his faceplates scrunching up with disgust.
The other bots checked the condition of their frames and found the same substance splattered all over them.
"Some sort of..green goo." Salvage replied.
"We should take a sample and run some tests." Graham spoke up from inside Boulder.
"Are you bot's feeling okay?" Chief asked the 8 cybertronians.
A short pause filled the room as the bots assessed themselves for any signs of injury. They all affirmed that they were fine, much to the relief of their human allies.
"Sorry about the mess Doc, we'll help you clean up." Chief offered.
"No worries, Chief. I should be the one apologizing. I'm afraid I neglected to turn off my snack alarm before the test." He glanced to Dither, who was still extending the now cold piece of bread to him.
"It happens." Chief patted his friend's shoulder. "Luckily, we have more than enough help." He smiled up to the bots, eliciting a few groans and sighs from some.
Half an hour of scrubbing later, the lab was practically sparkling. The remnants of the destroyed Scrubber were cleaned up and sent off to be disposed of at the Island of Misfit Tech. Heatwave had hosed down the other bots to remove the weird chemical that had splattered on them.
"Good work, team." A telltale yawn almost escaped the police officer mid sentence but the evidence of fatigue gave his exhaustion away. "We should all get going." Cody suggested, wrapping his arm around his dad to support him.
All four parties agreed and bid each other farewell. They each took a different portal back to their assigned locations to resume whatever they were doing.
— — —
Faxian
It was 6:00am in Faxian according to the 15 hour time gap between Maine and China. Quickshadow went to brief Doctor Szeto on the mishaps that occured at Doc's lab and HighTide was in his chambers.
"It's been pretty quiet lately." Dani commented, referring to emergencies in their area.
They weren't obligated to help out in emergencies but they ran patrols throughout the day just in case. The only emergencies they had were mostly caused by malfunctioning flying cars or an accident at a construction site. They haven't had any calls for the past few days and it was sorta nice to relax.
"Yeah. I can catch up on some action films!" Blades eagerly smiled. "Wanna join?" he asked his partner.
"Sure. Hey, why don't we invite Quickshadow and HighTide to join as well?" she suggested.
"We can have a movie night!" The rotary nodded.
"I'll make some popcorn!" Dani made her way to the kitchen.
"Don't burn it!" Blades jokingly called after her.
"It's not like you'd be able to eat it!" Dani retorted from the other room. Blades huffed in defeat.
—
After a few minutes, Blades managed to convince HighTide to join him and Dani. Quickshadow wasn't in the mood and politely declined his offer. She instead decided to go out on patrol.
The two mechs sat on either side of Dani and picked a movie. The brunette caught Blades sneaking glances at the various snacks she was eating and couldn't help but tease him about what he was missing out on. HighTide was trying to hide the fact he was enjoying the action movie with one of his blank gazes but he wasn't able to fool Blades.
— — —
Griffin Rock
The streets of Griffin Rock were quiet with the exception of the police car patrolling them. Despite Cody's many protests of going home to rest, Chief insisted on doing one last patrol before resting up.
Thankfully, no emergencies appeared and their patrol ended much more earlier than expected.
The old police officer groggily made his way towards the red lift, leaning on Cody for support.
Chase watched from a distance, still not understanding why humans required so much sleep to function properly.
— — —
Professor Baranova's Lab
"Ugh." Salvage groaned.
"What's wrong?" Blurr asked from the couch he was sitting on.
"I found this old watch earlier and I have the part's to fix it..but my digits are too big." the yellow mech frowned.
"Maybe Graham can help you when he and Boulder get back." The racecar suggested, not averting his gaze from the race he was watching.
"It's not the same.." Salvage sadly muttered.
—
"Where exactly did you see it Boulder?" Graham asked the bulldozer.
"Behind a log, just beyond these trees." the green mech whispered.
Boulder had seen some type of animal a few days ago when he had been inspecting the forests for construction. Unfortunately, he had stepped on a fallen tree trunk and spooked the small creature. He had been wanting to find it ever since and asked Graham to come with him once they got back from the lab.
"Whatever you saw, it's probably very timid, so you have to be very—" Graham was cut off by and excited whisper. "It's right over there!" he pointed to a tree stump. Upon it, sat a light brown rabbit, contentedly bathing in the sunlight.
"That's a Jackrabbit." Graham smiled.
"It's really cute." Boulder grinned and prepared to take a picture of it. A loud crunch echoed through the woods and the green mech looked down to see that he had stepped onto another log. The rabbit scurried away from the possible danger.
"Aww." he frowned at the missed opportunity.
"It's okay bud. You'll see it again." Graham tried to comfort him.
"Yeah. It's just really hard to sneak around with ped's like these." he sighed.
— — —
Training Center
Heatwave groaned at all the papers that were messily scattered on his desk.
Kade had a date with Hayley in an hour and was busy getting ready.
The mech was tired of filling out document after document. Quickshadow's words were finally sinking in. He couldreallyuse a vacation.
He tried to stay up but his exhaustion soon became too much.
— — —
All eight bots eventually slipped into recharge, unaware of the drastic transformations their bodies were about to undergo.