Co-Authered by Ultra Rodimus Prime and Omicron Of Ice

Guardians' Quest

It was a dimmed cavern, darker then the last time that Ultimus had seen it, either with his own optics or in a vision. The Oracle's chamber lit only by a small energon stream in the middle of the bridge for any stray traveler that wandered lost to the place. A soft hum from the ring made crystals chime out of sight in the darkness as energy curled over molten metal patterns on the massive ring.

"Oracle." The big mech inclined his head respectfully, approaching the ring. It had been a long time since the Oracle had last spoken to him; if she was speaking now then what she had to say would be very important.

"Hello again child of my brother," The femme like voice said, echoing with repressed power, and a trail of energy lifted off to reach out and curl affectively around Ultimus' closer hand.

Ultimus hummed softly, reaching out to lightly rest a hand on the ring. "It's been a long time."

"Ages and not a klick," The Oracle chuckled, and reminded. "Though it has been long since you and your brothers once guarded me."

"That is true." Ultimus nodded. "Though there are fewer threats to you these orns, since most of Cybertron seems to have forgotten you."

"And I am in Primus' grip," some of the trails of light flickered down the ring to under the bridge, as well as to something 'new.' Veins of metal had twined around the ring at points.

"It will be much harder to move you unwillingly, then." Ultimus traced some of the markings on the ring, running his fingers over the engravings. "Things are falling apart, aren't they? Vector Sigma is gone, the life pools are dried up, the Wreckers and the Insecticons are missing from the levels..."

"Primus has sent his young sparks out to the stars, until he can heal himself." One of the traces of energy brushed against the side of the mech's helm and face. "That means you and your brothers, and the tiny sparks under your care must leave as well."

"We figured as much. We've been gathering all the supplies we can find, from our own territories and from neighboring territories that have already been abandoned, or where the guardian has been killed." Yellow optics dimmed slightly as he thought of Longsight and her three tiny charges.

One of the light trails touched his helm a gain, giving flash image of contented sparks resting within Primus' own once more, and three tiny new ones being given to Vector Sigma again.

The blue and coppery-gold mech hummed softly. "It will not be an easy journey out of these deep levels, will it?"

"No, but you will make it," The Oracle said, and Ultimus sudden knew where somethings were going be when needed, though it wouldn't be until he was there looking around at the place. "But there is a new duty for you, the Life Guardians."

Under his helm, Ultimus' audial panels perked up. "A new duty?"

There was a sense of the Oracle nodded, "Yes, Vector Sigma, as you said is gone, but not gone. My brother is protected, but will need all the aid possible, for he, unlike I, has never left Primus' grip until now."

"What is it you want us to do?" All of Ultimus' attention was on the ring, waiting for the answer.

"Find the Fortress that holds Vector Sigma," The Oracle said, and she was there, in a way, wrapping arms around Ultimus from behind and pressing a forehead that was and wasn't there to his helm. "You must find the way on your own, but I have given you, my children, an aid. When you walk the surface again, remember your old songs, and the old Hope will descend for you. You may remember it. There is a new world to seed and protect in the vorns to come for you."

That information was carefully filed away in Ultimus' processor and given the highest priority tag. He leaned into the embrace, optics dimming slightly. "We will find our way, somehow."

"I know you will," the deity hummed softly, fingers brushed over the mech's shoulder before the arm, white and without shape for now, curling back around him, "And I will watch you the whole time, but though the shell is dying it and those inside are not all dead. Be careful."

"We have sparklings and younglings to protect. We will be nothing but careful," the big mech murmured in response.

The Oracle chuckled, "One more thing," she held up one white digit for him, "It will be a very long time before Primus uses me, so like before. One question and truth if you wish to ask. When you are ready," The Oracle added.

"I will save that question for later, then, since I have nothing in mind right now that has not already been answered." The redhead leaned against the ring, humming softly.

The Oracle wrapped her energy around him in as close to an embrace as she could with the body form fading. And she was reluctant to see him and the others leave Cybertron, but couldn't do anything about it.

"We're as reluctant to leave as you are to see us go, but there's no other choice," Ultimus murmured. "It's been so long since any of us have left the deep levels."

"A long time indeed, though you will get used to the stars again." The Oracle's tone had a sad smile to it, "Time for you to wake up now Ultimus, your youngling is about to fall off your berth."

Ultimus had to chuckle at that. "She always was a squirmier... That's the reason I got into the habit of piling pillows on the floor around the berth. So she won't get hurt if she does fall off." He ran his hands over the ring once more, then reluctantly pushed away, stepping back. "Until we meet again, Oracle.'

The last traces of energy pulled back, and the ring itself hummed before the scene of the chamber dimmed and darkened. Fading like a dream to let the real world come back, though missing the early riser Pinion.

As soon as he was partially aware, Ultimus' hand shot out to catch Jack before she ended up on the floor again, drawing her closer to his frame, the big mech lifted his head and yawned hugely, blinking to clear his optics and looking around. The swimmer femling yipped, starling awake and automatically clung to her sire. Jack stared around for a moment, realized what happened and ducked her head.

"Hi..."

The big mech chuckled. "Need to be a little more careful there." His gaze swept over the other sparklings and guardians, making sure everyone was accounted for,

His and Pinion's where still clicking in their recharge, while the black at red mech had paced soundlessly to check on the oldest one. The mechling shifted around and fell over Ultimus to land on Jack with a playful blurp. That caused Jack's fins flushed a startled orange and a 'hey!' slipped out.

Ultimus snorted softly, carefully moving the other mechling aside and running a gentle fingertip down Jack's back. Yellow optics watched Pinion, then glanced over to Outrack.

As the two youths eyed and poked at eachother to see if they liked one another, Jack arched into the pet happily. Outrack was still in beast mode, semi curled up with not only his but Nightspin's and the one 'stray' sparkling curled up either on his head or hiding in the pouch behind the wicked fangs, jaws propped open enough. Anything that was heaver then a sparkling that tried to get the youths would very likely not have a hand anymore.

Pinion looked up from the other berth, humming, "Hello again Ultimus."

"Hello again." Ultimus checked around himself for strays before carefully stretching, armor standing on end briefly before settling. Resting his chin in his palm, he looked over at the other mech. "The Oracle spoke to me."

"To me as well," the black mech nodded coming over to lean against Ultimus' berth, "She was very sad."

"She doesn't want to see us go, but she knows there's no choice." Air gusted from the redhead's vents in a huge sigh.

Watching Jack pounce the mechling with a trill, Pinion smiled, "Looks like there's a new set of friends." He paused and added, "Yes... she said that Primus will rise again."

"And that there will be a new world to seed and protect," the blue-and-coppery mech added, nodding.

"A new world?" Pinion looked surprised, "The Oracle didn't mention anything like that to me."

"She told me that there will be a new world for us, a new place. Though she didn't say where or how long it would take to reach." Ultimus shrugged. "I guess we'll have to wait and see."

"And find Vector Sigma first," Pinion purred, he had been told of the new duty as well, "If there is a new world, then we have to find the Sigma, I think it is going there."

"The Oracle said that once we reach the surface, the old songs will call down a ship for us," Ultimus commented, going over the information he'd been given. "Hopefully then we can find out where Vector Sigma is."

"Old songs?" Pinion considered, then hummed a lullaby thoughtfully that he had use nearly his whole term of being a Guardian, even before when he comforted fellow prisoners in the fighter rings. Even Ultimus at one point after a visit to a tentacle adorned 'doctor.'

The blue and coppery mech hummed in response, part of an even older song from his gladiator days. "She said I would know, when the time came."

"We can also just teach the little scraplets the songs we know," Pinion shrugged, paused and his optics widen, "Oh Primus..."

An optic rim went up at that. Ultimus tilted his head slightly to the side, waiting for the other guardian to elaborate.

"Scraplets," Pinion turned, blue optics meeting yellow, "Remember them, in the arenas, the Quints bred them to eat the dead, and didn't care that when a swarm got big enough to eat a mech of our class? Cybertron was never rid of them, with all the dead now..."

Ultimus' armor flattened. "With all the death and destruction, it's going to be a feeding frenzy for the wretched pests."

"We'll have to be very careful... and if we think we hear them," the black and red mech nodded at the massive cyber-croc, "We should get Outrack to hold the sparklings for all of us, scraplets never bothered him, and he has swam with and ate them before."

"We'll discuss that with him when he wakes up." The former gladiator nodded firmly. "On the way up we should recharge in shifts, so that someone is always awake and listening for danger."

Pinion nodded, already pulling up memories of the rebellion before the Metrotitan's stood up, memories he never could get rid of even if he wanted to, "Yes... just like when we watched out for Theta Five while she hacked the doors..."

Ultimus reached out to tap on the side of a crate under the berth. There was a chittering sound, then a small black head poked out. "We'll have some help."

Jack trilled at the thing, half dangling off the berth and flashing random colors through her fins.

"Tame scrapmetals. Handy for keeping out the pests and distracting half a dozen hyperactive bitlets." The yellow-eyed mech grinned slightly sheepishly at the black and red mech.

"As good as maneto-lizards," Pinion mused, missing his once collection of glowing gecko-like mecha beasts that used to nest in his home.

Ultimus shifted, reaching out to lightly touch the other mech's shoulder. "Hopefully, if we find one of the Old Ones, there will be some lizards swarming around in them. Maybe you'll have them again."

"Didn't loose them all," Pinion smiled, opening a panel of his armor and extracting a stasis container he'd gotten from some Wrecker, but inside was at least a dozen small eggs.

Sulfur-yellow optics brightened. "Hopefully we'll find a safe place for them to hatch."

"Until then they can stay in here," The black mech put his little treasures away, then blinked and looked over and sleepy sparkling protests as Outrack tilted his head to deposit those in his jaws and on his head onto the ground.

The big beast-former stretched and yawned before transforming. Kneeling he gathered up the huddle of sparklings into his arms and moved to put them on the berth. "Stop complaining, you start pulling my teeth and you're out."

"At least they can't actually pull them out," the redhead wisecracked, sitting up. "Recharge well?"

"As much as one can with non-dreams, and one of your sparkling's pulling at my teeth," The rusty shaded mech stretched again, checked around his feet, watched Jack and the new mechling bound off the berth and case each other around the rest of the shuttle. His tail twitched on the floor thoughtfully as he considered what to say next.

Pinion arched an optic ridge at Ultimus in amusement.

"Now you know why I don't recharge in my wolf mode." Fangs gleamed in Ultimus' grin as he shifted over to give Outrack some room to sit. "Did the Oracle speak to you, too?"

"In a way, though if there was a conversation I do not remember it." The croc-mech tilted his head, "Not yet." he added sitting on his tail beside Ultimus as Pinion leaned back against the spare berth.

"What did you see?" the black mech asked.

"...something none of us have in a long time...an energon sea."

Ultimus reset his optics several times. "She didn't show me that... She did tell me there will be a new world and a new duty for us. But nothing about a new energon sea."

Outrack unfocused his optics, re-building the memory in his processers, not just in his spark, "There was... red earth, dirt under my paws and a yellow star, sun...and... and a city I think I know... It looked like the first lay out of Crystal City almost."

"An organic world," Ultimus mused. "That will take some adjusting to..."

"Not exactly," Outrack shock his head, "There were two worlds...one is a charge, foster I think. Like how the space travelers use to do after we resettled Cybertron from the Quints."

The blue and coppery mech digested that. "The future is going to be interesting, to say the least." He glanced toward the side room where Nightspin had been placed, tilting his head and listening for any sounds of movement.

Pinion touched his fangs with his glossa, looked around and started counting, not minding Jack climbing up to his knee to jump over her new friend's head. "How many sparklings do you have Ultimus? I have three, Outrack the two, the stray from Longsight and Nightspin's four... that's eleven so far not including the two bigger younglings."

"I have three bitlets," the former gladiator answered, pointing out his trio from amid the pile. Three pairs of small optics blinked up at him.

"Waking up are you?" Outrack chuckled as he reached back to run his fingers over tiny helms, "Makes fourteen... we can work with this. Yours' and Pinion's trailers will come in handy, but I estimate we should get to the surface before the energon runs out."

"And they'll be begging for energon once they finish booting up." The redhead peeled himself off the berth to fetch enough sparkling cubes for everyone, as well as a clean feeder for the rescued sparkling. "And Pinion brought up an important point we hadn't considered yet while you were still recharging."

"Hmmm?" the rusty mech carefully picked up the smallest and thinner of the sparklings, cradling it in his cupped hands and purring to it. Lifting it up and out of the way of the coming tussle once the kreels started.

"Scraplets," Ultimus answered bluntly. "With all the dead mechs that will be lying around, and all the destruction, it'll be a feast for the wretched little things. We're going to have to be on guard at all times on the way up, and most likely on the surface as well. You might find yourself with all the sparklings to guard if a swarm spots us."

"I can carry more than fourteen," the mech considered, not looking away from the sparklings as Pinion moved to check on the last guardian. "And..." Outrack dug into his subspace into pull out a large can and hold it up for Ultimus to see, "It might be worth staying here long enough to make more of this."

Ultimus peered at that can, making a curious sound.

"What counts as repellent for Scraplets, but it only works once they bite you..." Outrack admitted, "Bite, bite run away."

"That does sound like a good idea. Though it doesn't make the thought of scraplet bites any better." Ultimus fluffed his armor briefly, recalling his last run-in with the pests.

"Nothing short of a mech with magnetism field manipulator can keep them away and not biting. But this here," he shook the can with a liquid slushing inside. "is only enough for sparklings, but its not too hard to make enough to give you, Pinion and Night' a good three coats."

"Sounds good. There should be enough materials around to make it. The time it takes might give us a chance to check other abandoned territories for any forgotten supplies." Ultimus glanced over at Pinion, tilting his head slightly.

Pink optics were looking back over Pinion's dark shoulder, the oldest of the guardians shook his head but seemed far more aware, alert and generally Nightspin was alive again.

"Look who's up, in time for feeding of course." Pinion grinned, flashing his fangs.

"Welcome back to the land of the conscious, Spin." Ultimus waved the other mech over to join them. "Feeling any better?"

The silver mech rolled his shoulders, the tank barrel on his back shifting and settling once more, "Yes...though I do not know how I got here Ultimus," The old mech admitted slowly, not liking it.

"I heard you a klik before you pinged for entrance, but you were pretty out of it," Ultimus told him. "It took us a few kliks to get you to let the rest of your little ones out so we could feed them. We've been wondering what it was that drove you out of your territory. All we could get out of you was mutters about the Oracle and stars."

"Sire!" The mechling ran over, wrapping his arms around Nightspin's right leg, then trilling as he was picked up before snuggling against the bare silver chest.

Nightspin rumbled as he ran one hand over his mechling, "Good to see you again too little shark." The Guardian purred, and only after a snuggle did he look back up again, "Stars…yes. I- we are going to find the future of our race in the stars."

"The Oracle has been busy tonight... She spoke to all of us, telling us what we need to do, and hints of what the future holds. A new world, an energon sea... But first we have to get to the surface and call a ship." Ultimus stared distributing energon as small creels started rising from the sparklings.

Outrack took the feeder for the littlest of the near clutch, holding it between two fingers. "We should make a list of things to do in order," he said sensibly while Pinion fetched energon for Jack and the mechling.

"Otherwise we're going to be running around in a disorganized mess." Ultimus snorted his amusement. "The making of scraplet repellant and the searching other territories for supplies can be done at the same time, I think..."

"At this size the little ones should doze off after the energon," Outrack said, "When they do I'll look around and make a list."

"Then to look at the other territories," Pinion nodded, "There should be not far, the other side of the planet's level may not be in reasonable range."

"Going too far would be dangerous... Staying to the nearer territories would be best." The former gladiator nodded his agreement. "Pinion and I might be best for that, since we have the most cargo space."

"If there is a collapse, I can check it out," Outback motioned to the ground meaning his lower ground clearance in beast mode, "But yes it would be best for two of us to stay here."

"Two to guard the little ones and prepare the repellant, two to search for supplies. That sound good?" The redhead looked at the other three mechs.

They nodded in agreement. Then Jack poked at her sire's leg, "I'm hungry too Ulti."

"After feeding the littles," Pinion laughed.

Ultimus chuckled. "Of course." Fishing out an energon cube, he passed it to Jack, settling down to the task of feeding the sparklings. His femling took the cube and climbed up into Ultimus' favorite chair, waiting for him there. She was used to their normal routine after all, not having grasped that it was going to change just yet.

The big mech smiled warmly and followed, settling into the chair and picking up the youngling. Humming softly, he watched her drink. Halfway through the cube, the girl offered it up to Ultimus, "Want some?" Jack asked.

"That cube is all yours, brightspark," the quad-changer replied. "I've already eaten."

"You gave her good manners," Outrack praised from where he was watching, the mech smiled as he tucked the small sparkling in his hands into an armor pocket to let him sleep. Fairly sure the 'stray' would just be doing that for a while, eating and recharging.

"I do my best to teach them all manners in the time they're with me," the redhead replied, looking up. "Some take to it better than others."

"I remember one little biter that came from you into my charge," Pinion spoke up, remembering and smiling, "First time I saw him he was attached by biting Ultimus' finger, and didn't let go for a whole bream."

"I still have scratches on that fingertip," Ultimus replied with a laugh. "Spunky little bitlet."

"I have marks as well," Pinion laughed himself, "I think Gunhide had the worse, that mechling was bigger by the time he got there."

"Never lost the biting habit, eh?" That got another chuckle.

"Some of them never do," Nightspin said, pink optics bright as he watched one of his charges try and chew on his armor. "Though that is not always a bad thing."

"It's usually only a bad thing when bad habits pair with a bad temper," the blue-and-coppery mech replied. "I've had a few like that..."

"Ta-da!" Jack held up the empty cube, paused and tried to eat it. She blinked in confusion as the adults busted into laughter, giving one and all an odd look.

Ultimus grinned. "The cubes aren't edible, bitlet."

"Uh-huh!" Jack tried again, and then pouted as her latest attempt to eat the cube failed yet again.

The big mech laughed at her expression, tugging the cube away from her. "Not even I can eat that cube. It's not made to be edible."

"Not our old ones," Outrack chuckled coming to lean over and run a careful finger over one of Jack's fans on her helm, "Maybe when we're in space... she's so cute keeping those fins. Not many sparklings keep them after coming out of the Pools."

"Jack loves to swim. She was in the pool as often as she could get away with, splashing about, daring me to catch her." Ultimus smiled slightly. "Hopefully she'll have the chance to swim again."

"Sire said rusty pools are bad," Jack piped up, head tilting at Outrack.

"For you, that is very bad, but my armor and systems were made to deal with rust." The croc-mech gave a playful bubbling sound, making the girl giggle as the mech held an ingredient list for Ultimus to see, "This is what we need for the repellant."

Ultimus looked at the list, scanning the ingredients. "There should be a fairly large supply of assorted items in the storage area. We'll see what we can find while we're out, too."

"Good, once I have everything it should be less then an orn to make and coat the rest of you." Outrack nodded, his tail twitched as Nightspin's mechling pounced on it.

"Probably more than an orn, since we both know the little ones won't be able to leave you alone," the quad-changer pointed out.

"There's an advantage of being taller though," The rusty colored mech pointed out. "And selves out of their reach."

"Keep your tail twitching and they'll go after it instead of the rest of you," Ultimus advised. "It works with my wolf alt's tail."

"Works with any tail. More so if the young ones have one of their own," Pinion put in with a grin.

Ultimus laughed. "Always fun watching them chase their own tails... They just keep going until they get dizzy and fall over."

"Or run into a wall," Nighspin said in dry humor, remembering a few cases like that over the ages.

"That, too." Fangs showed in Ultimus' grin.