Welcome back everyone and sorry for the delay. I hope the length of this chapter makes up for the wait. Admittedly this is mostly a filler chapter with the task of assigning the new human based Maximals Autobot partners. Just a little disclosure here, I've not had any medical training so if any of the practices I describe in this chapter are off. It's because I'm making it up as I go. So please, enjoy, and review.
"Now remember." Drift said as he looked over the collective Maximals. "Situational awareness is key to any battle. One must be aware of their surroundings, as well as themselves. When one is attacked one must remember ones capabilities to turn said situation to their advantage."
Looking over the top of the group he pointed behind them. "Wheeljack, will you please help me demonstrate?" Nodding, Wheeljack came to stand before Drift.
Turning back to the group he explained. "Now, we are going to demonstrate a few basic diffusion techniques. These are designed to turn your opponents attacks against them and subdue them without killing them." He turned back to Wheeljack. "Wheeljack, come at me."
Giving a nod, Wheeljack leapt into the air and aimed a kick at Drifts' head. With lightning speed Drift caught Wheeljacks' leg and gave a spin. Using the momentum from his kick, Drift spun a hundred and eighty degrees and released his grip. With a yell Wheeljack went flying across the hangar and smashed into the wall.
Turning back to the Maximals, Drift continued. "Now, most forms of diffusion involve turning an opponents' attack against them. Often times debilitating them non lethally." He finished.
"So basically, alien Aikido?" Sierra asked. She was familiar with some forms of martial arts and the techniques seemed similar.
"They are surprisingly similar." Drift admitted. "I believe that, with proper practice, you all should be competent in it in a few weeks." He spun around and grabbed Wheeljacks' incoming fist. The other Wrecker had been sneaking up on him. "In addition, I will be helping you all with weapons training to hone your skills."
Tightening his grip on his opponents' fist, he swung downward, causing Wheeljack to flip and land flat on his back. "Thank you for the visualization for situational awareness Wheeljack." He said, helping him up. "Now, I will divide you into pairs for practice. One of you will try to punch or kick, the other will redirect the attack."
And so it went, Jack ended up partnered with Allison, which proved to be problematic as she seemed to have some problems controlling her Nucleon discharges. Jack ended up twitching on the ground when he tried to catch her foot.
Depthcharge, who was only reluctantly partaking in this course, partnered with Raf. This was mostly due to them being the only bots with similar heights. Depthcharge had Raf on his back after spinning him around. Unfortunately, he got a little cocky and stood over him. "And that is how to beat a taller oppon-" He was cut off as Raf swung his feet up and drove them into his back, sending him flying.
Raf huffed as he got up. "Lesson learned." He replied, offering a hand to help him up. Depthcharge accepted it with a nod.
Miko had been partnered with Sierra, although this ended up backfiring a little when Miko went to do a kick and Sierra panicked. Mid leap Sierra tossed one of her "seed snares" which quickly grew and wrapped Miko in vines. While she was familiar with martial arts, she'd never been attacked before. "Shit, sorry Miko."
With a brief flash of burgundy, Miko teleported out of the snare. "No problem side salad." She quipped. "Good reaction time, just need to get you used to active combat." She wrinkled her brow a bit, she was still kicking herself for forgetting about her teleporting ability when Airachnid had her.
Drift stood off to the side with Vince, the odd Maximal out. Observing the battles, he made note of which Maximals would need further help and mentally connecting them with the bot most able to do so. Looking down he saw Vince pinch the bridge of his nose. "Are you all right young one?" He asked, kneeling down.
Wincing, Vince looked up. "Yes master, it's just, with my hearing, it's hard to focus with so much noise." While his hearing had become more manageable, he still had a hard time filtering noises and speech with it.
Nodding, Drift knelt down. "I think I know just the bot to help. And please, just call me Drift." Standing up he clapped his hands together. "Alright everyone, I think that's enough practice for now. From what I observed, some of you will need specialized training. Rafael, I know you have a lesson with Ratchet in fifteen minutes." He said gesturing to the lift leading to the Lost Light.
As Raf exited, Drift turned to address the remaining Maximals. "Now, everyone except for Jack, Miko, and Depthcharge is to go to the Lost Light to meet with the bot I've assigned to mentor you." He turned to Vince, Sierra, and Allison.
"Vince, once you're in the ship head for communications. That is where you'll find Blaster. He has the same level of super hearing you do and can help you gain control of yours." Vince nodded and went to wait for the lift to return.
"Allison." He continued. "You will report to Trailbreaker, the ships' head of security. His force fields work similarly to your Nucleon and has expert control of it. If anybot onboard can teach you how to master it it's him." Rung had told him in confidence that Allisons' panic attacks were coming under control with his techniques. The next step was control and execution of her powers.
Then he turned to her sister. "Sierra, I want you to find Nightbeat. He is an expert at thinking under pressure and can show you techniques to keep you from panicking in a fight."
Sierra nodded. While she was alright joining in a battle as her performance at the beach attested to. When surprised she tended to strike first, ask questions later. "No problem." She then joined the others at the lift to the Lost Light.
Drift turned to face the remaining three Maximals. "Now, Jack and Miko. From what I saw you two have the most combat experience out of the techno organic Maximals. Considering what I've learned about the popular culture you've been exposed to, I'm not particularly surprised." The two blushed a little at the reminder of their similar childhood interests.
"I will be training the both of you in Circuit-Su, to hone your bodies, minds, and sparks to peak fighting form." Drift continued. "I also believe this will help Jack fully grasp his connection with Vector Sigma."
"In addition to that I will be teaching Jack the art of Crystalocution, that is the use of pressure and stress points to defeat a wide variety of opponents. Miko will be taught Metallikato, to improve your swordsmanship." Drift finished, the two nodding in acceptance.
"That's well and good for them." Depthcharge spoke. "But what am I doing here?"
Drift turned to the former Decepticon. "I thought you might like a refresher course after being resurrected." He smiled a little. "Besides, it never hurts to learn a few new tricks." He replied.
With a sigh Depthcharge nodded. "Fair point, I'm sure my usual combat techniques have been taught to the Vehicons by now." He grumbled.
"My thoughts exactly." Drift replied sitting cross legged on the floor. "Now, if the three of you will join me. I will show you a meditation technique that will allow for a better spark to mind connection and make your training a little easier."
As Drift and the Maximals began their meditation exercises the rest of the Maximals entered the Lost Light.
"Ah Rafael." Ratchet said as Raf entered the med bay of the ship. "Good timing, todays' lesson will be on extracting a foreign object from a previously treated mesh wound. I was able to convince Swerve here to volunteer." He explained, gesturing to the red and white Autobot laying on the berth next to him.
"I keep telling' ya Ratchet, it was only a laser blast." Swerve complained.
"Well, the scanner shows there's something actually in there so hush." Ratchet replied.
He turned to Raf. "Alright, now I've gone over the process for a basic surgery like this with you already. We even tested it out on Vehicon components. Now it's time for your first test."
"You sure the kid's competent?" Swerve asked nervously. He hadn't interacted with the Maximals all that much.
"As competent as I was at that point in my training. We'll have that bullet out of your shoulder in a bit." Ratchet assured. "Now, as you perform the procedure, say each step." He said gesturing to the surgical area. "The bullet is the left eye of his Autobot insignia."
Raf quirked a brow. Strange place to get shot but he had a surgery to do. "Alright Swerve just lay back and try to relax." He soothed.
Raf extended his left pointer finger. "First clean the surgical site." From his finger sprayed a disinfectant that cleaned a surgical area and evaporated rapidly. "Second, apply local anesthesia." He placed his left thumb over Swerves' shoulder. A beam of white light which he learned was a null ray covered the area, numbing it. Raf was really thankful that his medical tools were all built into his hands.
"Third, make the incisions then peel back the surface metal." He continued. Raising his right pointer finger this time, he deployed a small laser scalpel. Making an X slightly bigger than the insignias' eye, he switched out his scalpel with a pair of forceps from his middle finger.
Gently, Raf peeled back the surface metal. "Next retrieve the object." This was the easy part for him. It looked like the bullet didn't go too far in and the wound tract didn't' heal properly. Swerve grunted a bit as the forceps made contact with the bullet, telling Raf that he'd found it and could now retrieve it. Opening the forceps, he gently griped the bullet and pulled it out.
Placing the bullet in a pan next to him, Raf continued. "Next, flush the wound with disinfectant." Reactivating the dispenser, he sprayed it into the wound tract and watched as it evaporated. "Finally, seal the incision."
After moving the surface metal back in place, he deployed a spot welder from his right thumb and gingerly welded the X he'd made closed again. "And for good measure." He placed his right palm over the surgical site and activated his CR pulse. This had the double effect of healing the wound tract and dispelling the null ray.
Swerve sat up and rubbed at his shoulder. "Wow, for a first timer that was pretty good." He got up and shook Rafs' hand. "Swing by my bar some time, first rounds on the house."
"Ah ah ah, big rule for the Maximals is no Engex." That had been nurse Darbys' rule. It didn't matter what they were now. They were still not allowed to have anything akin to alcohol until they'd reached twenty-one Earth years old.
"Eh, we'll think of something." Swerve replied as he walked out of the med bay.
Shaking his head Ratchet turned to Raf. "That'll be all for this lesson today, you passed with flying colors. Next time I'll be demonstrating limb reattachment on cadaver limbs so study up on limb anatomy. And do you remember my triage rule?"
Raf nodded. "Always treat the most life-threatening injuries first. Fix the breached spark casing or punctured fuel line before reinserting the T-cog or reattaching the limb." He quoted.
Ratchet smiled. "Very good, I know you and Bumblebee have a game topside so I won't keep you. Class dismissed." As Raf left the med bay First-Aid and Velocity came up to him.
"Sweet kid." Velocity smiled. "I think he'll have an easier time with his exams than I did." She stated.
"How many times did it take you to pass yours?" Ratchet asked, trying to make conversation with the newcomer.
Velocity sighed. "Ten." Ratchet and First-Aid both stared at her. "I have trouble focusing and medicine isn't a popular field on Caminus." She explained.
Ratchets' brows narrowed. "You're from one of the colony worlds?" He asked. There hadn't been any communications from any of them for years before the war.
"Yeah." Velocity replied. "Lightbright, Nautica, and I are all from Caminus. Simply put, we left because we didn't fit in with the borderline toxic social structures and preforming arts culture that permeated that world. We met up with the Lost Light after a few years of traveling together and found our places on it." She explained.
"Aside from Velocity becoming one of our doctors, Nautica is our head of engineering and Lightbright is our systems analyst. Which is really just a fancy word for hacker." First-Aid explained. "What I'm more interested in is that bullet Rhinox pulled out of Swerve."
Ratchet looked down at the pan. The bullet had a faint blue pulse of light to it. "You noticed it too?"
"I was trained to recognize a data slug the same as you. I just thought it was a laser blast like Swerve said and left it be." First-Aid replied.
"Data slug?" Velocity asked.
"It's how some of our deep cover agents in the Decepticons get messages to us." First-Aid explained. "In that bullet is a microchip with intel on it. Our spies are taught to fire it into the left eye of the Autobot insignia and our medics are taught to recognize it and recover the bullets."
"Right." Ratchet said picking up the pan with the bullet in it. "Now If you'll excuse me, I need to get this to Optimus."
While Raf was prepping for surgery, Vince was making his way towards communications. Along the way he heard bits and pieces of conversations as he passed.
"Now, as you perform the procedure say each step."
"Where did I put my wrench."
"I love you too Domey."
"How did you manage to get access to my top-secret G.I. Joe files!?"
Vince snorted at that last one. He'd have to ask Fowler how he was connected to G.I. Joe sometime.
He arrived at the communications door and was about to knock when he heard it. "You can come in man, I heard you coming halfway down the hall." Came a voice that sounded like it belonged to a radio DJ.
The door opened and Vince was greeted by a red, grey and yellow Autobot with what looked like a clear glass chest similar to Perceptors'. His head sported what looked like a winged helmet crossed with a pair of sunglasses with blue lenses. "So, you're the young Padawan I get to train." He grinned.
Vince quirked a brow. Padawan? How did this guy know about Star Wars? "Er, hi, my name's Vince, but my field name's Nightscream."
"Well as you already know, my name's Blaster. Autobot communications expert and now a Earth pop culture junkie." Blaster said, kneeling down. "Now, from what I hear, you have the same super hearing that I do right?"
"Yeah." Vince replied. He didn't know what it was about Blaster, but something about him made Vince want to trust him. "I can hear almost everything that goes on within a mile or so radius of wherever I'm at. Problem is I hear it all at once so I can't understand most of it."
"That's an easy enough problem to start sorting out, but first." He put his left leg in front of Vince and upon closer inspection, he noticed there were speakers built into it. "Do you mind?"
Confused, Vince nodded. "Sure."
A pules of sound came from the speakers. Not loud but enough for Vince to notice.
"Sorry man, just needed to know exactly what you looked like." Blaster explained.
"Excuse me?" Vince asked, even more confused.
Blaster chuckled and pulled back on his helmet a bit. The glasses retracted revealing two gaping, empty eye sockets. "If you'll pardon the expression Nightscream." He said, sliding this helmet and glasses back into place. "I'm blind as a bat. Using that sound pulse was one way for me to 'see' you." He explained.
At Vinces' silence he smiled. "I'll explain later, but first I have a lesson to teach." Stepping back, he transformed into a red and yellow Hummer with a clear glass hood. On closer inspection Vince saw what looked like a gold engine. "Come on, my quarters are around the corner."
Transforming into beast mode, Vince climbed inside Blaster. Idly he noticed that the speakers in Blasters' legs had effectively taken up the whole trunk space of his Vehicle mode. The trip took a grand total of three minutes, but Vince loved the feeling like he was driving the hottest car in town again.
Arriving at Blasters quarter Vince got out so the both of them could transform. "Here we are, mi casa, su casa." Blaster said leading them in. The inside of the hab suite was sparsely decorated, as seemed to be the norm in most cases. One thing did draw his attention though.
"Is that a jukebox?" Vince asked incredulously. It was alien in design and obviously built for Cybertronians, but it had the overall look of one.
Blaster laughed. "The first thing you need to know about me isn't that I'm blind. It's that I love all kinds of tunes. And that isn't all it does." He pressed a button near the top and the jukebox transformed into a DJ booth. "This way I can spread the joy, anytime anywhere."
"Okay Blaster, enough showing off. We still have to help him with his hearing." Came another voice. This one sounding like a low growl.
"Who said that?" Vince asked looking around. That was way too close to be from outside.
Blaster shook his head. "Well since you ruined the surprise you might as well come out now." He said, turning the DJ booth back into a Jukebox. "Say hello to Steeljaw."
Blasters' chest opened up like a tape deck and from it came a gold-colored cassette that hung in the air for a second before transforming into a lion about half the size of Jacks' beast mode. "Woah." Vince gasped, realizing that this bot was also the engine he'd seen earlier.
"Nice to see I can still inspire awe after all this time." The lion said. "As Blaster mentioned, my name is Steeljaw, and I'll be helping you in these lessons."
"Alright then." Vince said sitting down. "Where do we start?"
"The first step in controlling super hearing is how to filter out unnecessary sound." Blaster began.
"To do that." Steeljaw continued. "You must learn to focus on one thing at a time. When I was taught to control my sense of smell in the rescue corps, that was the primary lesson."
Blaster continued. "That lesson, translated into super hearing, is to focus solely on what you need to hear. So, for starters, focus on something or someone important to you, and listen for it."
Vince closed his eyes. Sierra immediately popped into his mind and he smiled. He couldn't help crushing on her. If only she felt the same way.
Suddenly her voice came into his head. She was talking to someone. "You mean you caught that crab bot once before?" She asked.
"Yes, unfortunately the cons decided to commute his life sentence." Came another voice that put him in mind of Joe Kenda. That must be the bot Drift assigned her. Nightbeat.
"Alright, now to reel in your hearing. As bad as it might sound you just have to focus purely on yourself." Blaster continued.
"There are times in life when you must take care of yourself." Steeljaw added. "That is not selfishness, it is simple self-care and nothing to be ashamed of."
Reluctantly, Vince pulled himself away from the sound of Sierras' voice. "Alright. Reeling in." He whispered. To his complete surprise not only did Sierra and Nightbeats' voices vanish, so did all the other noise that was flooding his mind. "Woah, how did?"
"You put your focus on what is in front of you. That is the first and biggest exercise of our training." Steeljaw supplied. "That will be your assignment until we can meet again."
"Right." Blaster said. "Monitoring for Decepticon activity is a full-time job in itself. Thankfully Lightbright agreed to take over while we have this lesson." He took a breath. "Now, I believe I owe you an explanation." He said hinting towards his glasses.
"You don't have to explain. It seems personal." Vince tried to placate.
"It is, but I've been told talking about it helps." Blaster rebutted.
"I've been telling you to make an appointment with Rung." Steeljaw grumbled.
"You see, before the war broke out, I was actually a reporter." Blaster continued, pretending he didn't hear. "Unfortunately, the news outlet I reported for was government sponsored. That is, we were owned by the senate so a lot of the things that would've been newsworthy, were censored."
"That kind of defeats the purpose of free press." Vince commented. Just how bad was the government on Cybertron before the war.
Blaster laughed. "Tell me about it. As a way to rebel I began hosting a pirate radio show about all the things they were covering up. The story that ultimately got me in trouble was about the smelting pools. It was where they were taking the dead to be melted down and turned into raw building material regardless of their wishes."
"I'm guessing some of them had other preferences then. That's bad but if they were dead." There was a pause, then his eyes widened. "Unless they weren't all dead." Vince said with a sick feeling in his stomach.
Nodding, Blaster continued. "There were several that weren't dead yet, but they were working class bots who would've cost too much to repair. There was one bot there called Scrounge. He was a messenger bot who'd been caught in a gas explosion and instead of taking him to a hospital, they just wrote him off and slated him for smelting."
Blaster took a shuddering breath. "I tried to save him. I hung from a cable with one hand and held onto Scrounge with the other. He made me promise to tell the world what was happening and he let go of me. I watched him vanish in the molten metal." He finished, his voice raising an octave.
Taking a calming breath, Blaster continued. "I kept my promise, I broke the story about those condemned to the pools for not being worth the cost. Unfortunately, my escape wasn't a clean as I'd hoped that night. I was caught on camera and Straxus, the Senator behind the whole debacle, had me arrested. He couldn't have me killed because I was too well known, so he made sure I'd never see any more of the senates' wrongdoing again."
"After they blinded him, they dumped him in an alley." Steeljaw picked up where Blaster left off. "However, the loss of his sight triggered his super hearing outlier ability. When I found him that night he was writhing on the ground on sensory overload. I talked him down and taught him the same exercise we just taught you."
"Once he guided me back to my home I began learning how to operate as a blind mech. One of the first things I did however, was take advantage of a loophole in the law and had Steeljaw reassigned as a 'seeing eye bot'. We've been friends ever since." Blaster finished.
"Wow, just, wow." Vince said stunned.
Blaster nodded. "Yeah. Okay, we've got work to get back to so for now, just keep practicing that exercise and next time we can hone it a little more." He opened his chest and Steeljaw transformed and went back in.
As he was heading out, Vince spoke up. "Hey, do you guys' mind if I come down to visit on your down time? We can jam to some tunes or talk if you need it."
Blaster smiled. "Looking forward to it Nightscream, looking forward to it."
As Vince was being introduced to Blaster, Allison had made her way to Trailbreakers' office.
Entering it she saw a black and silver mech with a blue visor rapidly transforming into a F-350 truck and back again. This went on for a few moments before he shifted back to bot form and greeted her. "Ah, welcome." He greeted. "Sorry, just doing some transform ups to stay loose."
"I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess you're Trailbreaker?" Allison asked.
"Yep, and I'm guessing you're Allison the Maximal." He replied. "Drift told me that you have an outlier ability similar to mine and wanted some help controlling it."
"Well, I don't think it's an outlier ability because the Nucleon is in my bones, but I do seem to have some control over the energy it gives off." Allie replied.
"Alright." Trailbreaker replied. "Not quite like what I can do but we'll see what happens." He transformed back into his truck mode. "There's a storeroom down the hall we can practice in. Follow me."
Allie transformed into her beast mode and the two took off. Trailbreaker was surprised that the young Maximal managed to keep up with his vehicle mode. He commented on it a minute later when they arrived and transformed. "So that's why they call it horsepower." He joked.
"Very funny. Now, how do I keep from zapping people I don't want to in a fight?" She replied sarcastically. The fact that she still had trouble controlling her powers even with Rungs' stress exercises was irritating her.
"Hey relax, we'll figure it out. No need to be snippety about it." Trailbreaker placated, kneeling down to be on an even level with her. He heard her give a self-depreciating sigh that he was all too familiar with. "And I don't need Rungs' training to tell when something's eating at you."
Allie sighed again. "That obvious huh?"
At Trailbreakers' nod she continued. "Sorry." She began. "It's just that, aside from daddy I've always been seen as Sierras' sister. Worse, back in school everyone thought we were friends and I was always shunted to the background."
She looked at her hands. "Now I have a chance to form a whole new me, and I can't even keep from hurting my friends." She finished.
"That sounds close to the problems I got." Trailbreaker sighed, sitting down next to her. "I burn through energon like kindling and I'm probably the slowest Autobot on four wheels. Not to mention the fact that I'm here mostly because I can do this."
He held out his hand and a yellow dome of energy formed over some energon cubes stacked on the other side of the room. "At least you have the chance to change your image. I'm stuck like this." Trailbreaker finished.
Listening to her mentors' words Allie scoffed. "What are you talking about?" She said, standing up to look Trailbreaker in the visor. "You're a rough and tumble bot who could probably go toe to toe with most any bot on this ship. I mean come on you're the frickin' head of security."
Trailbreaker smirked. "I know." He replied. "I just wanted to show you that despite your condition or how you view yourself, you can still become something great."
Allie cocked a brow. "You mean that self-depreciation bull was some kind of reverse pep talk?"
Trailbreaker put his hand behind his head. "A little bit." He admitted. "I do have self-confidence issues that I've been seeing Rung about. But what got me my position was my ability to break up fights via force field. Honestly though, I think our similar outlooks might be what gave Drift the idea to put us together."
"Then let's make a deal." Allie said. "You keep me from going into a funk while training me, and I'll keep you out of a funk and help you patrol." She offered.
"Deal." Trailbreaker laughed. "Now let me show you some focusing methods for how to direct your internal energy."
As the newly minted partners began to work on Allies' ability, Sierra made her way to Nightbeats' office. Upon entering she saw what looked like a cross between a detectives' office and a conspiracy theorists' workspace. Among the various filing cabinets were several boards breaking down several potential conspiracies that had what looked like strings going between them. All around it seemed like a messy spiders' nest.
"Ah, come in." Came a serious sounding voice near the back of the office. Looking over she say that it came from a powder blue and yellow Autobot who was hunched over a desk. Several crumpled cubes of energon reminding her of her dad behind a desk two pots of coffee deep into his work. "You must be the young Maximal that Drift sent me to mentor."
"Yeah." Sierra said, taking the office in. Just what kind of bot had Drift set her up with?
Nightbeat gave a small snort. "Like them? They're my notes on everything that's been happening on Earth and how they're connected to other events throughout the war. Although for some reason I can't help feeling I'm missing something." He finished.
Taking a closer look at the nearest board she saw pictures of herself and the other formerly human Maximals both before and after their transformations. The pictures of Jack, Miko, and Raf all had strings connecting to a picture of Magnaboss with a question mark next to it. She gave a sigh as she looked at the picture of her human form.
"Sorry, that was a little insensitive." Nightbeat apologized. "Now, I believe you were sent to me to learn how to keep your focus in a fight?" He asked.
Sierra nodded. "Yes, apparently, I overreact when caught by surprise and tend to lash out."
Nightbeat knelt next to her. "That's why Drift sent you to me. I made a name for myself on Cybertron as a detective. Unfortunately, I was prone to getting side tracked on cases and loosing focus on the main objective. A good example; I was investigating a cannibalistic serial killer and got distracted by a conspiracy about illegal handling of remains."
He sighed. "I got focused enough on that that Rampage slipped away."
Sierras' eyes widened. "Rampage. Rampage, why does that name sound familiar?" She asked, racking her brains.
Giving a sigh, Nightbeat explained. "He was a serial killer who developed both a penchant for devouring his victims, and a mentality that he's a celebrity. Essentially, he views himself as a cross between a movie star and the fictitious serial killer Hanibal Lector." He finished, using terms he knew she'd understand.
"So where have I heard of him?" Sierra asked.
Nightbeat pointed to a picture on another board, this time with all the known 2.0 Predacons on it. Sierra took a closer look and upon recognizing who it was exclaimed. "You mean you caught that crab bot once before?" She asked.
"Yes, unfortunately the cons decided to commute his life sentence." Nightbeat growled. "It took me almost twenty of your Earth years to track down and arrest him and now he's back."
He gave a sigh. "I honestly feel bad for Drea-, I mean Depthcharge. First, he lost his remaining brother, and now his other brothers' killer is back."
At Sierras confused look, he explained. "Depthcharge originally had two brothers named Skyquake, and Sunstorm. He wouldn't say what happened to Skyquake, only that he died, but Sunstorm was one of Rampages' early victims."
"Eventually I tracked Rampage down and captured him. I argued for the death penalty but they locked him up in the Luna-1 prison. Unfortunately, that's one of the first off world targets the Decepticons captured." He chuckled. "My argument that Rampage should've died actually impressed Depthcharge enough to change his color scheme to something similar to mine."
There was a brief pause. "Think fast!" Nightbeat shouted, training his blaster on Sierra.
Panicking Sierra threw another seed snare. This time it connected with Nightbeats' face and wrapped around his entire head. "Nightbeat?" Sierra yelled. "What the hell?"
Once Nightbeat pulled the snare off his head he looked at Sierra. "That is what our training together is going to consist of." He replied. "I'll begin telling you about various cases or bots I've worked with and at random points, come at you. When you get to the point that your consistent first instinct isn't to panic or freeze, then our lessons will be complete."
"You could've told me that before." Sierra huffed. She was so, going to kill Drift.
"Then you wouldn't've been expecting it." He replied with a smirk. This young one was going to be fun to teach.
As the newer Maximals were getting to know their new mentors/partners, a meeting of great importance was happening
"So, you mean to tell me, we now have a bot on the inside? On the Nemesis?" Agent Fowler asked. He was standing on a table in Rodimus' hab suite on the Lost Light. Around him from left to right were Rodimus, Ratchet, Optimus Prime, and Ultra Magnus. They'd just finished explaining the concept of the data slug that Rafael had pulled out of Swerve.
"We do now Agent Fowler. We don't who he's disguised as though. For all we know he could be transformed into Megatrons console on the bridge." Ultra Magnus explained.
"If you could play the message again old friend." Optimus said to Ratchet.
Nodding Ratchet pressed play on the audio device that now contained the data slug. "The message degraded a little bit being inside Swerve for so long but the 'meat' of it is still there."
"-reporting. I have managed to infiltrate the Nemesis undetected and my cover seems to be holding." The spy reported. "We seem to be heading to a planet called Earth. There are rumors that Optimus and his team are there so if you can, send these coordinates to all available Autobots. I will keep sending my weekly reports every ten days on frequency 1984-0917. The coordinates are-" The message cut off.
"When is the next transmission due?" Rodimus asked. He was both excited to be near Optimus Prime but weary about this new development. If only they'd known about the bullet sooner. They could've been here to help long before things escalated.
"Two days." Ultra Magnus responded. He was more than a little weary about sharing this information with Fowler and Rodimus. After the Dealer incident, he just didn't trust anyone not to be a potential security risk.
"Alright." Rodimus replied. "I'll have Blaster monitor that frequency and have any transmissions sent directly to us." He knew Magnus was weary of almost everyone now, but as the ships' captain he refused to be excluded.
Magnus went to object but Optimus cut him off. "That's acceptable Rodimus. Seeing as your ship is now serving as our base of operations; you will be kept in the know. For now, we shall simply have to wait, and hope." He finished.
Hopefully their spy, whoever he was, had good news.
A/N-Okay so I snuck a little bit of plot in at the end. I hope you enjoyed my choices and takes on the new kids' partners. For Trailbreaker I stuck simply to his G1 version. For some reason I kept thinking of Lt. Joe Kenda when I was visualizing Nightbeat. Blaster on the other hand was my mixing the 80's Marvel comics iteration and the fandoms perception of him and Soundwave being polar opposites. Hence the choice in vehicle mode and his blindness.
Now, the next chapter will reveal who the spy is to the readers. Anyone who guesses it before I post the next chapter will get a shoutout. I'll give you a hint. He has appeared in the story although he hasn't had a large role, yet. On a side note, I hope you all liked my easter egg with the spy's frequency number.
Next time on Beast Wars Prime- The Mayhem Attack squadron vs. The Wreckers. Ready? FIGHT!