Chapter 9: Kaon, where his spark hurt part 2

"I am honored to meet you Titan," Hercules replied. "I am Hercules and this is- Arcee and Tek."

"Now that the presentations are over, state the reason of your presence here," Titan asked.

"Understood Titan," Arcee replied. "We are sent here by our leader Ultra Magnus."

The Insecticons talked loudly among each other's. Titan raised his servo and the silence was back.

"Ultra Magnus is a Wrecker. We do not really like Wreckers. During the war against the autobot, they offline a lot of us, but at least Hardshell offline a lot of them to avenge us," Titan grunted.

"This isn't good Arcee," Tek whispered.

Hercules looked at his queen a little nervously. He knew he couldn't bring her to safety is something bad happened. Hercules tried something: "It was during the war. The war is over."

"This isn't a big argument you present here Insecticon!" one beside Titan said.

"I'll do the talking," Titan warned. "It is true that the war is over, but we know your kind wants to destroy the Insecticons at first sight just like we want to destroy you. I'm not like the other Hive Master. This is why we didn't attack you. It's not necessary."

"We were send here to enter in communication with you only. Our mission isn't to fight you," Arcee said.

Titan nodded before crossing his arms: "Why would a wrecker tried to communicate with us?"

"Ultra Magnus. Because there is a potential risk for you," Arcee replied.

"Risk? Are you threatening us?!" the Insecticon by the side of Titan shouted.

"She didn't mean that!" Tek replied moving his hands. "As you know, Cybertron will soon be repopulated by those who escape during the great exodus."

"When they come back, it's guarantee that some of them will return to live in Kaon. The problem is what they will do if they know you are living here? Since Megatron is gone-"

"Even if Megatron was still here, that's too bad for them," Titan replied, cutting Arcee. The three looked at Titan who jumped from his place and landed in front of them. "We made this underground our home. Everything in here is our territory."

"It's really big," Hercules commented. He gasped: "More Insecticon will come here or made here?"

"Made. We are preparing ourselves for sparklings," Titan replied.

"We might be 20, but soon, there will be thousands of Insecticon here! Kaon was the base of the decepticon! But now it's ours!" an Insecticon shouted.

The others agreed and shouted repeatedly: "Ours! Ours!"

Titan raised his servo and it was quiet again.

"We are aware that the predacons have their own territory. We were here after the Exodus, guarding Kaon as Megatron ordered long before the predacon were online. Since the decepticons are gone, we made Kaon ours. We suffered starvation and pain! We were thousands of Insecticons at the exodus and only 20 of us remains! We deserve this place! Even if the autobots won, this is our rewards! With the war, many Cybertronian are offline anyway so there is place elsewhere," Titan concluded.

"We didn't come here to ask you to move elsewhere," Hercules said. The Insecticons looked at him. "Ultra Magnus wanted to warn you about a possible situation that will happen eventually. It's possible that those who want Kaon back will come here and ignored that it is yours."

"We can talk with Ultra Magnus about it and determine the best course of action," Arcee replied.

Titan stood up and turned his back: "I'll think about it. I can assure you that we will not expand our territory over Kaon. You didn't talk about it, but it might cross your processor. You can leave now. We have other things to take care off."

Titan walked away to a tunnel with most of the Insecticons. Only a few remained and looked at the three. One of them jumped down and looked at Hercules. He looked similar to Hercules; except he was a little smaller and less bulky He also had purple paint on his body instead of green.

"Look whose back? I finally recognise you," the Insecticon told him.

Hercules twisted his helm and crossed his arms: "I don't recognise you."

The Insecticon gasped and grunted: "It's me! Shellshock!"

Hercules raised his shoulder plates: "Not telling me anything."

"ARGH! I have a designation! I'm important enough for you to remember me!" Shellshock shouted enraged and insulted.

"Guess not," Hercules concluded.

Shellshock had electricity passing between his mandibles and grunted: "You dare insulting me!" He calmed down and started laughing at Hercules. "Forgot it was you! It's normal you'll forget about me."

"What do you mean?" Hercules asked.

Arcee and Tek spark warned them that something bad was coming.

"You are not a usual Insecticon," Shellshock commented. "You are a very dump Insecticon."

Hercules glared at Shellshock and grunted.

"Don't listen to him Hercules. We are done here anyway," Arcee told him. She was about to continued, but she was cut.

"Don't get mad at me. It's the true. You think slowly, you are very naïf and often wants to believe what's in your processor is true when it's not the case. You have problem with your memory bank. So many things...It's a miracle of Primus that you are still online even now."

"It's not a miracle. I'm the strongest Insecticon," Hercules replied.

"Don't listen to him buddy. He's jealous of you," Tek replied behind Hercules.

"Jealous? Hahaha! Jealous of him? The strongest Insecticon? Sorry, but Titan is stronger than you and I can beat you without trouble like I always did," Shellshock said.

"He wasn't aware that Titan was existing," Tek replied.

"Maybe, but in the end, you are just an Insecticon who lived in denial and with your stupidity," Shellshock replied with a grin.

"WHA-LA-LA-LA-LA! I am not living in denial!" Hercules shouted furiously.

"Yes you are. You think we accept you in our group when the War was going on. You were never in the front line or in a real battle during the Civil war! You're Hive-master knew you were too stupid to survive a battle against the autobot, so he made sure you stay behind," Shellshock explained with a mocking tone.

Hercules dropped his head for a second before he raised it and glared at Shellshock: "He asked me to protect the Hive! I never let him down! I didn't fail this mission."

"It's because no one knew where to find it. Do you know why you were on guard duty?" Shellshock asked.

Hercules didn't reply.

"It's because you were too stupid to do anything else. You always fail at everything else except when you are supposed to guard something when it's useless!" Shellshock shouted with a grin.

"WHA-LA-LA! SHUT UP!" Hercules screamed.

He was about to charge, but Arcee put her servo on his way. Hercules looked at Arcee and didn't see any emotions in her optic, it was just emotionless. Hercules contained his anger and gave a murderous glare at Shellshock.

"That's enough Shellshock! I've learn a lot of things important while on Earth, One of them is that when anyone opened their mouth too much to say that someone's inferiors, they are inferior themselves," Arcee said without emotions.

Those words hit Shellshock right at the spark. He looked at her silently; no words could come out of his mouthplate.

Arcee smirked internally at his reaction. Hercules calmed down and gave a mocking smile.

"I..." Shellshock finally started talking. "I'M NOT INFERIOR!"

Shellshock suddenly transformed his arms into a blaster and shot Hercules right at his chest. Hercules was surprised and lost his balance. He felt on his back and grunted in pain. He raised his optic and saw Shellshock firing at Arcee.

"NO!" Hercules shouted. He tried to stand up and protect her, but he was too slow.

Tek pushed Arcee away and the blast hit on his chest plate, right on his spark chamber. He felt on the ground and energon felt out of his chest plate.

"Tek!" Hercules shouted and ran near him and checked on him. "Tek! Say something!" Tek optic lighted weakly. The vehicon could only grunt. Hercules looked at his queen and shouted: "Q-Arcee, behind me!"

Arcee pointed her blasters at Shellshock.

Shellshock was about to fire once again. The Insecticons with him were ready to fight when a loud scream made them gasped. They turned around and they all bowed.

Titan was back and infuriated.

"What did you dare do Shellshock?!" Titan shouted furiously.

"What do you-" Shellshock was cut when he saw Titan glare. Shellshock put his servo on his helm and grunted in pain.

"I know what you did already. It's against my will!" Titan looked at the autobots: "Bring your friend to safety. I'll punish Shellshock for his insubordination myself," Shellshock gasped and tried to back away, but Titan grabbed his helm and lifted him in the air.

Arcee put her servo on her communication device.

"This is Arcee. I need a bridge now! Warn Ratchet and Knock Out that we have an emergency!" she said to anyone close by.

"-This is Ratchet. I have your coordinate.-"

The groundbridge opened. Arcee saw Hercules gently grabbing Tek and held him against his chestplate. They passed through the bridge and at the other side, Ratchet and Knock Out waited for them. They saw Tek critical condition.

"Bring him to the med bay now," Ratchet and Knock Out said at the same time.

Hercules followed the medics with Arcee behind him.

"Hang in there Tek," Hercules told his friend.

They reached the med bay and Hercules put his friend on the berth. Knock Out and Ratchet immediately started operating on the vehicon.

"His spark chamber is greatly damage and his spark is exposed partially. Tek is also in emergency stasis right now," Knock Out said.

"Arcee. What happened back there?" Ratchet asked.

"One Insecticon called Shellshock shoot Hercules before he tried to shoot me and Tek took the blast at my place. The Hive master Titan came back and told us to go while he deals with this insubordination," Arcee explained.

"His spark is getting weaker," Knock Out warned.

Ratchet focused back on his patient.

"Is he gonna be alright?" Hercules asked with his voice box glitch when he said alright.

"I am not sure," Ratchet replied.

Hercules didn't take the answer well. He grabbed his helm and shook his helm left and right: "No...No! No! No!" Hercules turned around and ran out of the med bay. "Wha-la-la-la-la-la!" he screamed in sadness.

Arcee ran at the corridor, but the Insecticon was already gone.

"Where did he go?" Arcee asked. She knew something was wrong and he needed someone to talk to him, but he chose to run away. She started looking for him in the base. Except the medics, there was no other cybertronian in the base. "Hercules! Answer me!" Arcee activated her communicator: "Hercules! Say something!"

No response. She continued searching the Insecticon for a while, but he wasn't in the base.

"-Arcee. I have some good news. Tek is stable for now and he's not in danger to go offline. Did you found the Insecticon?-" Ratchet asked.

"No. I haven't found him," she replied.

"Hope he's not destroying anything I need," Ratchet said.

Arcee was hoping Hercules was doing that, but she heard nothing.

"He must be outside," Arcee said.

She ran and was outside of the base. She looked to her right and saw nothing. She looked to her left and saw Hercules pointing his blaster at his faceplate and said: "It's the only thing I'm good at."

To be continued.

AC: It took a while but it's done. This chapter was difficult with the writer block, but I finally overcome them.

Only one chapter before the epilogue.

Final chapter: To offline or not offline myself.

Yep. The next chapter is not a funny one like this one. It will start from the moment Hercules ran away.