The Diego Diaries: PsyOps 7 -Episode 1, Part 1-
-0-In a editing room in the IntraComm Production Facility, Autobot City, Mars
"This is a good rough cut." Aaron Belcher looked at Jack Mellar. "This is the start of a good three parts where we follow them around without establishing anything more than something about each. Did you talk to Alor yet?"
"Nope," Mellar said. "He's on point somewhere. I asked Jazz to let us edit some of his music into the soundtrack for the ending of the eps and also for some of the scene background."
"What did he say?" Belcher asked.
"He cleared it. We can talk to Alor when he gets back but he's not available right now," Mellar said. "How about we run through this rough cut." He turned to Leonora and a couple of techs they had brought with them. "Mark this down. Time it. We'll get any changes in later. I don't want to pause it because I want to get a feel overall so be on your toes." He turned back and with the Cybertronian techs running the show for the big screen review, the room darkened and the images they had captured filled a huge monitor before them.
(Music eerie and strange softly sounds as swirling darkness appears. As it does it plays over the body of a huge mechanism who is leaning against a corrugated tin wall. He is looking down at them with a dangerous and utterly exotic face. Light plays over him making him appear to be deeply threatening. His beauty is evident and then he is gone. A glyph appeared with the first shot of his face and it morphed to his name.)
Sunstreaker.
(Pan camera to the right. A mechanism appears again, this one red, black and white. A smirk is on his handsome face and he is leaning against the wall staring down at the camera. Amusement mixed with danger featured on his face and he was gone just as the translation of his glyphs faded.)
Sideswipe.
(Pan camera to the left and it passes over a couple who are together, a white and red bot with an unknowable expression and a tall lanky one with a slight grin. Their designs are completely different. Their Autobrands brightly evident. The light passes over them highlighting the planes of their handsome faces, their exotic finials and bright optics. Then it fades along with their glyphs.)
Drift.
Springer.
(Music builds in a tension-causing manner, its strangeness oddly lyrical. A tall figure emerges, one different from the others. A Seeker with dark coloration and a number of details that would become known in time as family and clan markings appears. He is guarded and beautiful, his gaze level and intelligent. The light passes and its dark again.)
Nitro.
(Pan from the left to right. A big bot appears with a hard, guarded expression and a level gaze. His arms are crossed and he's facing the screen directly. He's big and tough. No one to mess with. Then he's gone into darkness with his glyphs.)
Revo.
(The music builds, the cameras pan and pause, shadows casting long and dark across the floor. A camera slowly pans up the body of a big big mechanism, one with a green and gray metallic coloration and scars here and there of combat etched into his armor. He is standing and staring at the camera, downward to the ground. It pauses on his face, a face filled with humor and no nonsense wisdom. His arms are crossed. A metallic device is gripped in his mouth and he doesn't blink looking down. Then he nods slightly and the light moves on fading him into the darkness as his glyphs dissolve.)
Kup.
(In the darkness glyphs appear and transform into English. 'Platoon: On The Ground'. They fade. Then the opening sequence information forms and fades the same way. When they are done, the music fades too. Eerie silence is left.)
End of segment.
They pause and look at each other. "That's great," Aaron says. The others nod. "Let's continue."
The techs oblige.
(Opening shot: Peds are walking and the camera follows. A big yellow and black mech is walking down a sidewalk heading toward a group of buildings that would rival any urban setting anywhere. Entering a big door, he walks to the elevator and goes up. Getting out on the third floor, he continues to the end of the building where a door is open. Entering, he pauses.)
"Where the frag were you?" (Red, white and black Autobot – Sideswipe- is sprawled on the couch.)
"I was busy. We're off duty for a couple of orns. Prowl said he's remaking the duty schedule." (Yellow bot walks to an easel and removed a cover on a painting. Pauses to scrutinize it.)
"Where's Babe?"
"He's with Ratchet." Sunstreaker turned to his paints and began to organize a color mixture.
"That's not good. He gets ideas," Sideswipe said with a grin.
"He does. Go and tell Ada to cut us some slack. He just laughs at me," Sunstreaker said moving to begin more work on the canvas.
(Sideswipe rises and heads to the door pausing) "Sadee is coming after school."
(Sunstreaker glances at his brother, nods.) "Alright."
(Sideswipe leaves. Camera moves to follow Sunstreaker.) "You two are twins, is that correct?" an off camera voice asks.
Sunstreaker nods. "We are. The only ones ever to exist before our daughters."
"In the history of your species?" -voice
(Nods) "That's right." (The little twins escape his processor)
"Incredible. Do you have like mind links and that sort of thing? Twins on Earth sometimes have that." -voice.
(Scary optics turn and look down at camera) "We do. We're twins."
(Camera moves to get better look at canvas) "What are you working on and what are your favorite types of paintings?"
"This is a picture of the Sea of Rust on Cybertron. I like any picture that I like. I don't have time or interest in stuff I don't like. Simple as that." (Long gaze, then looks back at canvas)
"I doubt that there is very little that is simple about you." -voice
(Pause. Glance downward with a small smirk.) "You got that right." (Turns back to canvas)
-CUT TO NEW SCENE: A dojo on the third floor of the Cultural Center
(Flashes of blades, fast footwork and two big bodies sparring)
"Drift is getting slow." (Cut to Kup lounging with his stogie in his servo) "You are going to let that youngling get you are ya?"
(Cut to smirking bot with red markings on his white chassis.) "Slag no."
(Younger bot moves with less grace and less assured gestures. He is Lon, a companion and colleague of the group. He is learning to be a fighter with long blades.)
"I think he's losing his touch." (Cut to big smiling bot sitting in a chair with his peds up, Springer) "Put him out of his misery, Lon."
(Youngling laughs and barely moves away in time.) "I will never be as good as Drift."
"You won't if you believe that, youngling," Kup said. He mused on the camera and then the two sparring. "We're being scrutinized. Makes a mech want to mind his manners."
"You don't have any manners, old mech," Springer said with a grin. "You were put together before they were invented."
Kup looked at Springer with a withering optic. "Sounds like you missed the boat too, youngling."
(Chuckles and grins go around. Sparring ends with bows and tap of blades. Both mechs walk to the sitting area and flop)
"Drift, you don't carry a firearm. Why?" -voice off camera
"I don't need them. I do my fighting with blades," he said the red handles of his brace of long knives peeping over his shoulders.
"What is the third blade for?" -voice
"That's an interesting blade, squishy," Kup said glancing at Drift who grinned at him. "That blade is matched to the spark of the one who carries it. It is very ancient and almost sentient itself. It tunes into the spark of the current owner and is used only as a very last resort. It draws energy from the spark of the wielder and if it draws enough, that bot dies."
"Spark?" -voice.
"Like your heart," Springer said with a grin.
"If you used that blade as a last resort, it could kill you?" -voice
Drift nodded. "It could. They don't get much use. They generate enormous power when wielded."
"Have you ever used it yet?" -voice
"No," Drift said. "Someone who gave it to me did and they died doing it."
"I have been told that all of you were Autobots but you, Drift. I was told you were a Decepticon before. Now you wear the Autobrand and are living here working as one. How did that happen?" -voice
(Big white bot considers the request. Looks at the camera thoughtfully.) "I was a sub-commander on a ship with a very bad captain. I was hard myself. I broke a rule and had to run. When I did I ended up on a planet with a refugee population and city filled with Neutrals. They didn't take a side. Many of them reformed a legendary force called the Knights of Cybertron. They themselves formed a pacifist group called the Circle of Light. They showed me another way and I took it."
"The tattoos on your shoulders all mean something. I was told to ask you to explain them." -voice
(White bot nods) "This one is the tat for the Circle of Light. This one is for my security job here as an Autobot. It is the tat for the Day/Night Watch, Autobot City, Mars. All the policing forces have them including the youngling here," he said glancing at Lon. That youngling looked at Drift with pride and nodded. "The best thing I ever did was joining up with you mechs."
"It was," Kup said drily.
(Pan camera to catch hilarity)
"The others? What are they?" -voice
"My Autobrand and the Wrecker tat. The last one is personal." (Cut to smirking Springer.)
"Do you know what it means, Springer?" -voice
"Yes but he'd kill me if I told you," the big handsome bot said with a grin.
"I would," Drift said with a smirk.
"You are all Wreckers?" -voice
"Most of us. The youngling here isn't. He wasn't in the life as long as us and he wouldn't survive the missions we get," Springer said nodding toward Lon.
"I would go," Lon said.
"We know. We just don't want to bring you back in a sack. This youngling," Kup said pointing at Lon with his stogie, "is one fine youngling. Lots of talent and guts. You have to understand. We have been at this, most of us since your species was sitting in trees peeling bananas."
"You pronounced that word right this time, old mech," Springer said with a chuckle.
"I ain't drunk," Kup said sticking the stogie in his pie hole. He looked at the camera. "We don't waste our younglings. Someday this young mech here will be doing something tremendous for our people. Today, he is learning. Just learning."
"But if you ever need me, I will go," Lon said nodding at Kup.
"You will, youngling. In about a couple of million years," Kup replied.
Hilarity ensued.
-0-Nearby at the same time
She sat in a bouncy seat on the desk of the CMO. He sat with his peds up and a glass of something yummy watching his daughter. She was grinning and looking at her little servos.
:Ratchet:
:Here:
:What are you doing?:
:My job. You?:
:Got a moment or two. Come on over:
:You just want to hold the sparkling:
:Maybe. Maybe not.: The grin came over the line as if Prowl were standing in front of Ratchet.
:On my way, slagger: Ratchet rose and took his daughter into his servos. Turning and walking out, he passed doctors doing things that had fallen only to him only a short time before. Peering into the emergency room, he noted with satisfaction that Knock Out was performing a minor operation with tact for once. That it was a sniffling infant probably helped. Grinning at Breakdown, he stepped back into the elevator and went down to the lobby. Sauntering out, he made his way to the Fortress and Ops Center beyond.
-0-Inside
Prowl sat at the table watching the datapad rolled out on the table. He also monitored seven other major data inputs but that was all background noise in his processor. Ratchet entered and walked over relinquishing his daughter before taking a seat and putting up his peds. "You look busy."
"Just data. I have the plan for the spy job on Soundwave's fort sent in to Optimus for approval. The groups on the other side are progressing without problems. All is well in my world."
"You're bored then," Ratchet said with a smirk.
"I wouldn't say that," Prowl said with his own smirk. He looked down at Hero. "She's really cute."
"She's slagging beautiful to quote a Chaos Bringer of my acquaintance."
They both grinned.
Ratchet leaned forward. "Did you know about Terradive and Roto?"
"I did," Prowl said nodding.
"You slagger. You're supposed to be on my side. How come you didn't tell me?"
"I forgot."
Ratchet stared at his partner in crime and grinned. "Liar."
Prowl leaned forward and grinned. "Whiner."
Hilarity ensued.
=0=TBC
2012 (11)