I don't own Transformers or the Riordanverse; they belong to their owners.

Chapter 4: New Planet, New Problems.

Thalia's eyebrow raised. "Hot Rod? Why's an alien robot named Hot Rod?"

Even though he was badly hurt, somehow Hot Rod managed to roll his eyes.

"It's the closest translation—GAH," he grimaced and put an arm to his side.

"How badly are you hurt?" Thalia asked.

"Bad." Hot Rod wheezed. "All my internal energon is going to the repair systems. Not enough to keep me online..." Hot Rod's voice got slower.

"What's Energon?" Thalia asked.

"It's...It's..." Hot Rod made one last attempt to answer before his eyes went dark and his body went limp.

Thalia just stood there, looking at Hot Rod's disabled body.

"Thalia, come on!" Luke called. Thalia turned around and saw Luke and Annabeth standing a respectable distance away. "Get away from that thing!" Luke orders.

"We can't just leave it here!" Thalia protested.

"Yes. We can." Luke said, standing his ground. "You know what happens when aliens, especially giant aliens, show up. Nothing but trouble!"

"That invasion thing was seven years ago, Luke." Thalia pointed out.

"Easy for you to say!" Luke fired back. "You were too young to remember what it was like back then, and Annabeth was only just being born!"

"Maybe we should call the police then?" Annabeth suggested. "Or try to get in contact with the Power-"

"No!" Luke shouted, "No police!" Being homeless, Luke had always made it a point for their group to avoid law enforcement; it was one of his strictest rules.

"Let's just get out of here and leave that thing to the experts," he finished.

Thalia looked back at Hot Rod.

"Thalia?" Luke asked.

Thalia walked up to Hot Rod and raised her arms, placing her hands on his metal body.

"Thalia, what are you doing?" Luke demanded.

"Okay...here goes," Thalia muttered. She shut her eyes.

Storm clouds began to hover overhead.

"Thalia stop!" ordered Luke

But Thalia didn't stop; she focused and breathed.

Then a massive lightning bolt tore through the sky and struck Hot Rod. Thalia stepped back as the electricity surged through Hot Rod, and his vital systems started turning back on.

Fast as the lightning that had struck him, Hot Rod jolted up as soon as his systems finished re-energizing.

"WHOA! That was tingling!" he exclaimed. He stood up. "Whatever you did, thanks. Gave me the extra boost of energy I needed."

Thalia smiled. "So you're... all better now?" she asked.

"Not quite." Hot Rod grunted as he held his side again. "I still need Ratchet to give me a proper repair job..." he muttered.

"Okay, you fixed him!" Luke scoffed. "Can we get out of here now?"

"Luke!" Thalia protested.

Luke looked like he was about to say something when Annabeth pushed herself out of his arms.

"Annabeth!" shouted Luke.

But Annabeth ignored him; she ran up to Hot Rod.

"Excuse me, Mr. Hot Rod?" she asked.

"Yeah?"

"Are you really an alien?"

"I guess by your definition, I would be." Hot Rod admitted.

"What planet are you from?" Annabeth asked.

"Cybertron," Hot Rod said.

"Why-" Annabeth didn't get to finish before they heard the sound of incoming sirens.

"Someone must have noticed the 'meteor.'" Thalia muttered.

"Yeah...I don't think I should be here when they show up..." Hot Rod murmured.

"Neither should we," Luke said. "We need to get out of here."

"In the forest!" Hot Rod shouted, and he and the three kids rushed into the nearby woods.

The arriving police had just missed them.

The Nemesis descended to the planet below. It hovered miles above in the skies.

"Soundwave, are the stealth systems operational?" Megatron asked.

"Affirmative," Soundwave reported.

"Good, Bring us in for a landing." Megatron ordered, "Then start going through the public records of this planet. We can plan from there."

"Why bother?" asked Starscream. "We should just start tearing this planet apart piece by piece!"

"Yeah, I agree with Starscream." Quake added, "Let's just start blasting and rip the Allspark from this planet's corpse."

"If there's one thing I learned from the Age of Wrath, Starscream, it's to expect the unexpected," Megatron said. "I want to know exactly what we're walking into."

"Hmph!" grunted Starscream.

Hound took in the sight of the planet from his position on a mountain ridge. Miles and miles of green plant things, some bigger than others, and mountains stretching up to the sky.

It was the most breathtaking sight he'd ever seen.

"Hey Hound, are you done sightseeing?" he heard Chromia ask from behind him.

"Not yet," Hound said.

"Well, finish up! Have you forgotten we have a crashed ship to deal with!?"

Hound turned around and gave a sheepish smile. "Right... of course," he muttered.

"I know you're excited, Hound, but we have a mission to focus on." Chromia pointed out.

Hound shrugged, and the two returned to the mountain clearing where the Ark-27 had crashed. Sunstreaker had found a place to land just in time, but it had been close.

Hound and Chromia got back just as Ratchet finished up his diagnosis of the ship and the area. Optimus and the other Autobots were standing around, waiting for him to finish.

"Well, the good news is that everything is mostly intact," Ratchet reported. "We still have the uplink with Teletraan 1, so we can contact Cybertron. The ground bridge is still working, so we can teleport ourselves to any area of the planet; most of our energon survived the crash, and there's enough ore in the area to jam sensors so nobody detects us."

"And the bad news?" Optimus asked.

"Engines are fried. We don't have the energon to fix them and keep ourselves sustained while on this search." Ratchet said solemnly. "For the time being, the Ark-27 is stuck here."

"Well, that's just great..." Brawn muttered.

"What about Hot Rod?" asked Optimus.

"His tracker is still working, but it's erratic." Ratchet explained, "He's somewhere in a 200-mile vicinity, but that's all I can piece together."

Sunstreaker groaned. "Optimus, do we even know where to start? The Allspark could be anywhere on this spark-forsaken planet!"

"Sunstreaker's right, Optimus," Prowl said dejectedly. "This planet's huge. How are we going to find the Allspark in all this?"

"We must have patience, Autobots," Optimus responded. "If the Allspark has been here for over a thousand years, its presence couldn't have gone unnoticed."

"So what's the first order of business?" asked Chromia.

"Right now, we need to find Hot Rod. Make sure he's alright." Optimus said.

"Before we do that, though, we need to do something else," Ratchet said, pressing a few buttons on his wrist.

The Autobots heard a whirring sound above them and looked up to see one of the Ark-27's scouting drones return to the ship. It returned to its port in the hull.

"I took the liberty of having the Sky Spy scout the area and scan the local vehicles," Ratchet explained. "If we're going to operate with discretion, we need to be robots in disguise."

"I have to get rid of my gorgeous alternate mode!?" Sunstreaker asked.

"Sunstreaker..." Optimus said lowly.

"I didn't say I wasn't going to do it..."Sunstreaker mumbled.

"I'm game," Hound said.

"Yeah, let's see what this planet's got!" Brawn exclaimed.

Ratchet pressed some more buttons on his wrist, and holograms of some of the vehicles the Sky Spy had managed to scan began to be projected from the ship.

Sunstreaker's face lit up when he saw one of them, a Lamborgini Countach. "I take it back. that is the look for me!" He said excitedly, and he started scanning it for himself.

Chromia's eyes locked on a police motorcycle. "Small, but quick and nimble. Just what I need," she remarked before scanning it.

Prowl inspected a police car with interest. "Looks like the primary law enforcement vehicle on this planet," he noted as he scanned it.

"Rough and tough!" Brawn shouted as he scanned a small off-road SUV.

"Can't wait to do some offroading," Hound remarked as he scanned a Jeep.

After he finished scanning a semi-truck and trailer, Optimus turned to Hound and Brawn.

"You can start now," he laughed. "Go find Hot Rod."

Brawn and Hound both saluted. "Yes, sir!" they said, and then they both transformed into their new alternate modes.

"Look out, planet; here comes Brawn!". Brawn took off down the mountainside before Hound could even rev his engine up.

"Hey buddy, wait for me!" he laughed as he followed close behind.

Hot Rod and the three strange creatures who found him ran through the woods for who knows how long. When they made it to a clearing, Hot Rod had to take a moment to get his bearings and rest.

He sat down with a "thud" and leaned on a nearby tree. He started shaking off all the leaves that had attached themselves to him while running through the trees.

"Sunstreaker was right..." Hot Rod murmured. "This gunk does get everywhere."

"Who's Sunstreaker?" Luke panted.

"Friend of mine." Hot Rod said. "He came here with me. Don't know where he is now, though."

Thalia, Annabeth, and Luke just gazed up at Hot Rod.

"What are you exactly?" Thalia asked.

"A Cybertronian from Cybertron. I told you." Hot Rod answered.

"So why are you here?" Annabeth asked.

Hot Rod was quiet. "I don't know how much I should tell you," he said.

"Why's that?" Thalia asked, sitting down next to him.

"We didn't exactly plan on making contact with the locals." Hot Rod admitted. "It could put you in danger."

Luke gave a bitter laugh. "Well. Good to know it won't change much," he muttered.

"Look... Thanks for helping me, but I gotta see if I can find my friends." Hot Rod said. He held his left wrist up and started messing with some buttons on it.

"...Can you tell us anything?" Annabeth asked.

Hot Rod sighed. "Right now, all I can tell you is that it's a mission to save our world."

"Is there any rule that says we can't keep you company until your friends show up?" Thalia asked hopefully.

Hot Rod smiled. "No. I suppose not," he said.

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