Smokescreen, MECH, and Shockwave will NOT be part of this story. Keep this in mind. they might be mentioned, but they will not playing a part of this plot. This is Prime/AU, taking place before the whole Omega Lock and ancient relics crap. I realize the whole second season is aimed at that but not here, hence the 'AU'.
Jazz, Prowl, and the twins are the same as their G1 forms just add a Prime-verse look to it. Also I am terrible at describing battle scenes and I'm not too good at describing appearances so don't put me down for that. I am going to try to keep Mistakes and Memories as short as possible while still explaining the back-story of Nightdrift. My laziness takes a toll on me sometimes :P
There wasn't any word to describe Optimus' relief and joy when he and his team pulled all five newcomers safely into their base. As anticipated, the Decepticons immediately released fire upon their foes once in sight. The ex-Wreckers and Bumblebee extracted Jazz, Prowl, and the twins (Bulkhead carrying the latter), while Arcee and her commander quickly explored the rest of the ship finding the injured femme laying in a small pool of energon from her wound.
Ratchet entered Nightdrift into stasis and effortlessly healed her helm. The other members were just awakening from their own stasis by the time the Autobot medic finished his work. "All of them are stable, Optimus. The Neutral was just lucky she didn't lose too much energon," he stated with a slight bite to his tone.
Wheeljack said, "We were just lucky escaping back here without getting torn up by the 'Cons, doc. Besides they weren't out of it for too long before we arrived." As if on cue, the door-winged mech named Prowl groaned, alerting the residents in the room. His systems booted up harshly, letting in the ridiculous light on the ceiling that he happened to be, unfortunately, staring directly at. Blinking away his internal systems' diagnostics, his vision blurred with an all-too-familiar, smirking red/orange-and-white figure. He slowly sat up taking his surroundings; his saboteur laying on an adjacent med-berth, Sunstreaker and Sideswipe laying on their berths in front of some sort of chamber, and to his right next to a platform was his Neutral/former prisoner Nightdrift.
In restraints.
Typical. Every Autobot that has met the femme has tried to put her down for her supposed treachery.
The second-in-command stood up with his optics landing on the three human children and then on six other Autobots, all but two of which stand out the most. "Ratchet, you're a sight for sore optics." His deep baritone (not like the Prime's though) rolled through his chassis like high-grade. "Indeed, Prowl, it has been a while." The two bots shook hands when Optimus spoke with all attention turned to him, "Prowl I see we have reunited once again, though perhaps not in a wanted situation."; his bad humor graced the environment.
Soon enough, Jazz and the 'Terror Twins', as Ratchet bitterly thought, awoke from their light sleep nursing sore joints and limbs from the crash and from being stuck in a forsaken ship for Primus-knows-how-long. That only left Nightdrift in stasis still recovering from her minor injury.
"HATCHET!" The sudden happy shout nearly made him jump several feet in the air. Nonetheless he twirled to his who spoke his rare-spoken nickname (though he already had a hunch). Of course. The twins. Out of pure habit, he took out his favorite weapon - the wrench - and hurled it at the fierce troublemakers.
CLANG! CLANG!
"I believe the human phrase is: two birds, one stone?" Just in case he turned to the humans who were by their guardians' feet when they confirmed the saying.
"Oh, c'mon, doc!," they both complained, "Don't you miss us?" Sunstreaker 'sweetly' asked. In a sing-song voice Sideswipe added, "Your favorite bots in the whole wide universe?" Ratchet's right optic twitched but couldn't deny the fact that he had in fact missed the pranksters, along with Prowl and Jazz, of course.
Jazz was staring at the humans as if they were one Prowl ridiculous equations. "So these earthlings are the life-forms we're supposed to protect, Prime?" Said Prime nodded. "Wow. They look just like us!", the saboteur exclaimed.
Prowl, though, had other things on his mind, like a certain femme. "Ratchet, may I ask why Nightdrift is restrained to the berth?"
Ratchet responded, "Well, why do you think, Prowl? I didn't see an Autobot or Decepticon sigil on her chassis." That mistake made Prowl's doorwings flutter in slight annoyance. Before he had the chance to respond, Jack asked, "I saw that too. Why is that?"
Bumblebee answered in his usual blips and whirls; Raf translated in the form a question, "What's a Neutral?"
"A Neutral is a bot who has chosen not to align themselves with either the Autobot or Decepticon faction," a new voice rang throughout the room. Everyone turned to see a black and gold-pinstriped femme standing as tall as Ratchet, minus the appendages sticking from her shoulder blades (which were the tail fins in car mode that extend in bipedal mode). Her pedes' armor cover the front tires of her vehicle form, legs looking much like Arcee's. At her waist were the back tires, the rims facing sideways. The torso was curved like any normal femme's with two bold yellow-orangeish stripes that point in from the sides then downward toward her interface panel between the legs; pretty much an invitation. The almond-shaped headlights that were slanted downward a little made up the breastplates. Her arms and shoulders swirled with black and silver; they led up to a medium-length and somewhat narrow neck which supported an oval-shaped head. Nightdrift's derma were set in a perpetual smirk that reminded anyone of a confident, aristocratic individual. There were small audio receptors sticking from her helm and a single band of triangular-shaped optic covers that represented an Autobot-blue visor that completed the whole look (TFA Prowl's colors and visor are similar to ND's).
Nightdrift was swinging around the stasis cuffs from her wrists on one finger, and leaning against a support beam. "You must be Ratchet." Ratchet nodded dumbly, "How did you get out of the stasis cuffs?" he demanded.
"Oh Ratchet," Sunstreaker drawled, "there isn't any restraint that could hold her. She's Nightdrift."
"I realize that but they are stasis cuffs!" CRUNCH! Cling. That was the sound of metal getting mangled, specifically the cuffs and then dropping to the floor. As soon as the destroyed cuffs hit the floor two things happened: 1) Ratchet shouted: I NEEDED THAT! And 2) Arcee, Bulkhead, and Wheeljack fired up their arm blasters and aimed for Nightdrift. Sideswipe promptly jumped in front of Nightdrift acting as a shield, with his hands help up defensively. "Wait, guys, she means well. Honest."
"I'll believe it when I see it," Arcee deadpanned. Nightdrift sidestepped from behind her 'protector', stepping towards her fellow femme. "If I wanted to hurt you, Autobot, I would've done so already," she smirked, "Now unless you actually will shoot me, in front of human children no less, put away your blasters." From behind her visor, she looked at her three perpetuators as they slowly and reluctantly did as requested.
Wheeljack didn't remove his gaze from Nightdrift, calculating her every move. "Just know, that if you ever even think about hurting anyone here…"
"I won't even move from where I'm standing." Did she just admit she'll let Wheeljack hurt her? Weird.
"If you are unable to respect a fellow Cybertronian, then you're welcome to leave the room, Wrecker." Wheeljack glared at the tactician. "Why do I have the feeling that we won't get along too well again, Prowler?"
"So there's infighting with Autobots, too, huh?" Jack muttered. He happened to glance at Optimus when the Prime nodded. "Aside from Arcee, Bulkhead, and Nightdrift, we were all stationed at the same base in Iacon. We were part of the Autobot vessel, the Ark, before we split into small teams to go our separate ways for our journey in space to come here, to Earth," Ratchet briefly explained.
"O…..k? So who are you guys?" Miko asked.
Prowl stepped forward, "I am Prowl; second-in-command of the Autobot forces. Optimus' third and my right hand mech, as you may call it, is Jazz," said mech nodded. "He is an expert in the art of sabotage, and is very professional in the field…Most of the time." Jazz snickered.
"Wait, Arcee, I thought you were second to Optimus?" Jack asked.
The femme answered with a shake of her head, "No, Jack, I'm second-in-command of the Autobots here on earth, of Team Prime. Not the entire Autobot army," she chuckled.
Prowl continued, "The red and yellow twins are Sideswipe and Sunstreaker, respectively. And you already met Nightdrift," he finished, crossing his arms over his spark chamber.
Raf shyly spoke up, looking at Nightdrift, "Wh-Why are you a Neutral? And you're not considered a prisoner, according to Prowl; so I was just curious."
She kindly responded…Nightdrift kind? Yeah, right. "Well, I chose not to side with the ones who are responsible, for the most part, of destroying Cybertron. And most Autobots don't take too kindly to me, as you may have noticed. If they choose not respect me as a fellow Cybertronian then that's their fault." There were protests from both of the former Wreckers and the two-wheeler when she said that. "Oh, shut up!" The voices quieted down. "You all know it's true," she took on more of high-pitched voice, mockingly, "Oh, Neutrals are traitors, they are more dangerous, they have no respect or feelings for those around them. You can't trust them because they're worse than Decepticons!"
The humans flinched at the harsh tone coming from the black femme, realizing the common problem with Neutrals summed up in a couple sentences.
Nightdrift sighed deeply. "I'm sorry. I usually don't raise my voice like that," her apology was sincere.
"Autobots," everyone looked the Prime, who has now decided to add in his two cents. "All I ask is that you treat Nightdrift with the respect as you would anyone else. While she may not be a trusted ally, she is not our enemy. She is a fellow comrade as a human can be." The humans and Team Prime nodded in understanding, "But," he looked Bulkhead, Arcee, and Wheeljack, "to settle your processors, I will ensure that Nightdrift will limited privileges at our base." He looked at Nightdrift with firm optics and she looked back with grateful ones. "Nightdrift, you will not be allowed to exit this base for any reason, unless one of us," he gestures to each member of Team Prime, including the humans, "accompanies you through a ground bridge only. I will allow you to inhabit your own berth room as long as you do not invade the privacy of another." She nodded as he continued, "While any of us may be away temporarily, you can assist Ratchet with any in-house projects."
"Also, I will give you the more descriptive rules regarding these projects later. I'm sure that Prowl and the rest would want to use the wash racks and settle in, assuming that they will stay for a while?" He looked at the newcomers who all nodded in agreement. Miko cheered. Optimus and Nightdrift locked gazes and she mouthed, 'Thank you.' He inclined his head.
The Nemesis: 8:53 p.m. Jasper, NV time
Megatron smashed a third computer making Starscream squawk for the third time.
"M-Master? May I ask why you are so upset?"
"Upset?!" Megatron panted with a fake smile, "I'm not upset. I'm just disappointed that only Soundwave, his symbiote, and Knockout are the only ones doing their jobs correctly!" Knockout didn't hide the smug smirk until his Lord gave him a dirty look. "I want to know who are the newly arrived Autobots coordinating with their Prime to find ways to demolish us. Now." Soundwave stopped whatever the frag he was doing on the monitor (not of the computer his leader oh-so-kindly tore apart) and turned to his long-time ally, displaying 5 unknown life signals, decorated with an Autobot symbol for each.
Little did the Autobots know, Soundwave sent Laserbeak to watch from a safe distance of the most recent battle between both factions. Everything was recorded and already downloaded into the warship's mainframe. The silent robo-bird managed to a very good perspective of the crashed Autobot cruiser. The spy officer already started playing the video but fast forwarded to the end where the ground bridge that Ratchet sent appeared.
Only four out of five unconscious robots were visible. Soundwave already determined that Prowl, Jazz, Sunstreaker, and Sideswipe are now considered Team Prime. The last scene showed Optimus and Arcee running together to the groundbridge when Megatron said, "Stop." The recording froze on command, horribly pixilated. The Prime's and blue femme's backsides were facing the camera, albeit fuzzy. Soundwave immediately cleaned the grain giving a clear picture of Optimus holding something bridal style. The only thing seen were two black and silver legs that would be swaying if the video were moving.
"What is the identification of the black one?" Megatron's only answer was a cutthroat buzzer sound. The warlord scowled at the rude sound but otherwise didn't care. He brought up his left servo to chestplates with the fingertips sticking up; he started rubbing them together as he contemplated his next words. "Soundwave, make sure you find out who that black Autobot is no matter what," he avoided looking at his TIC, his voice somewhat quiet but stern. "Let nothing stop you from doing so. We need to find out who that fifth bot is as soon as possible." He finally looked up as Soundwave gave a curt nod. He then turned to leave the main bridge straight to his quarters, ready for heavy thinking.
But there was only one thing on his mind that plagued his processor for the last several hours. Such a tiny detail on such a short video clip stuck deep in his mind. There weren't many black colored Cybertronian. The ones who were had actually been statistically called a dark blue.
Could it be true? He wondered. No, it can't be. It isn't possible. He growled deep in his throat. "I refuse to believe it," he shook his head, as if shaking it would make it go away.
It still didn't.