"Ramjet, you're listing. Course correct back to our position," ordered Slipstream as her white brother had drifted too far to the right. It happened sometimes with his crooked wing, so she had had to get into the habit of routinely checking on his position.
Adjusting his roll to regain his bearings, Ramjet muttered, "I knew that."
Sunstorm tilted his wings briefly towards his brother sympathetically as the group flew ever closer to their target.
"Ok, there's the location," commed Slipstream, descending towards what looked from the air to be little more than an upset mound of dirt. "Let's just get in there, grab whatever there is to grab, and be done with this. Can't believe Starscream sent us on his errands," she complained without heat.
The three transformed and landed at the hole, Sunstorm leaning forwards to peer curiously into the space and scanning around the entrance. "What a masterfully crafted tunnel, the Decepticons were certainly industrious!" he commented.
Slipstream and Ramjet scoffed loudly. "I don't think they were all that," criticized Slipstream harshly, optics offhandedly roving over the tunnel mouth. Frowning she mused, "Maybe we would've been better off with Starscream, after all. Megatron was pretty useless in the end."
"Guess we should feel bad about stealing from him, then," suggested Ramjet with a grin.
Slipstream gave an amused snort at the comment, before heading into the tunnel, her brothers following behind her. The red light of their optics lit up the side of the walls in vague silhouettes. "I do hope Skywarp is alright. He is as loyal and resilient as they come, but he certainly doesn't like dark, cramped places," worried Sunstorm as he looked up at the ceiling that only allowed a bit of extra room above their heads.
"I'm sure the scaredy-jet is fine," replied his sister with a dismissive scoff. Looking ahead, she said, "We're almost to a room. Hopefully whatever we're looking for is in there so we can get out of here." She stepped boldly into the larger chamber, her siblings following, only to stumble back as the walls immediately began to shake.
"What's going on?!" cried Ramjet, holding his hands defensively above his head.
"Like I know?" spat Slipstream, trying to analyze the room as boulders tumbled down towards them. The ceiling shook, most of it seeming to be concentrated at the entrance of the room. "If I had to guess, the Decepticons probably booby trapped this place as a little 'gift' for any thieves."
"How clever of them," remarked Sunstorm, actually looking somewhat impressed. His expression drained to a thin line as a rock nearly landed on Ramjet. "Truly devious," he tacked on, voice strained.
"Well, what do we do about it?!" complained Ramjet, "I know I just love the idea of getting crushed by rocks."
"I'm thinking!" shouted Slipstream, continuing to look around the cave. "We triggered this when we entered the room. I bet there's a shut off mechanism in case it goes off on the wrong mech. I just need to find it."
"We can ask our knowledgeable creator for help!" proposed Sunstorm, but as he tried to put out an SOS, all that was received was static. They were too deep for a connection, or the booby trap had included a signal jammer. Either way they were unable to call for help.
"Let's just stay here," suggested Ramjet, sidestepping quickly to dodge another falling rock, and optics darting towards the partially collapsed entrance they had come from.
"You two can leave, I'm getting our quarry," gritted out Slipstream, dodging rocks as she navigated around the room, looking for any kind of panel or control device.
Sunstorm darted after her, reaching out to grab her wrist, and argued loudly, to be heard over the rumbling of the collapse, "My brilliant sister, I admire your skill, you are fast and clever, but I humbly agree with our wise brother Ramjet. This is far too well executed a trap." He tugged on her arm towards the door.
Slipstream yanked her hand away from her brother's hold, shouting, "I'm fine! It'll only take a minute, I can handle this. If you two want to be cowards you can just leave!" She went back to her search for the controls, the shaking around them growing more violent and another large boulder falling to cover part of the exit.
The normally amiable Seeker scowled, stepping towards her again, "Slipstream! We can just come back for what's left later! Consider me selfish, but I do not want to be digging out your deactivated frame!"
"I can shut off a stupid trap!" snapped the femme back.
Ramjet shifted on his feet, glancing between the rapidly blocking doorway and the cracking ceiling and shooting at another falling rock. "Well, you have plenty of time," he shouted at his sister.
Sunstorm moved to pull his sister back again, just as a huge chunk of the ceiling, too large to shoot apart, separated and fell. "Look out!" yelled Ramjet, yanking his brother back, their momentum carrying them out into the hall as the slab hit the ground, effectively blocking the doorway.
"Slipstream!" cried out the orange Seeker, arm still still outstretched from where he had tried to reach her.
Ramjet placed a hand on his brother's wing, saying comfortingly,"I'm sure she's probably being crushed by rocks right now." The moment the words came out of his mouth he cringed, regretting saying anything. Sunstorm, despite knowing his intentions, looked ill at the suggestion, and Ramjet considered that he probably wasn't the best mech for being reassuring in a given situation. He tried being comforting with his actions instead, running a soothing hand on his brother's wing, but had to tear away as the orange Seeker shot forward to pound at the slab of rock, taking a few shots at it and calling for their sister.
The femme inside reset her optics at the now blocked exit, grimacing. Now she HAD to get that control panel.
"Slipstream! SLIPSTREAM!" she heard being called on the other side over the ever more thunderous sound of the room collapsing.
"Yeah, ok, I hear you!" she snapped back loudly, returning to her search for the shut off panel. The walls continued to shake around her.
"Don't worry, sister! We'll get you out!"
"I'm fine!"
Although, at this point she was slightly less certain about that. There was no sign of a panel, and another large chunk of ceiling had just fallen, barely missing the stacks of crates in the back of the room. Even if she found the shut off, she'd still have to figure out how to shut it down. Somehow she got the feeling that just blasting it would make things worse. The train of thought gave her an idea, and instead of thinking about the controls, she looked up to find whatever was causing the cave in instead. It couldn't be anything natural, if it had had to be triggered, so that meant there was some kind of device that she could conceivably turn off. And the shaking was consistent, coming in waves, which meant It hadn't simply been a triggering of one and done explosives. Some thing was periodically collapsing the room, and if she could find and turn it off she'd be safe. It was just a question of doing it in time.
"Slipstream? Slipstream, are you still alright?!" shouted one of her brothers from the other side of the passageway, his voice pitched in terror. With no visuals, it became a bit more of a challenge to distinguish between their technically identical voices, but considering Sunstorm's status of professional family worrywart, she safely assumed it was the voice of her complimenting brother.
"Will you shut up?!" shrieked Slipstream back, the panic of the other Seeker getting on her nerves. She was definitely, totally, fine, and the room wasn't a third of the way collapsed already. Finally she saw something, a glint of metal showing where part of the ceiling had fallen. A sonic device? Pistons? It didn't matter, whatever it was she had to act now or she would end up being little more than so much more rubble in the room (and even worse- Sunstorm would be right about digging out her frame). Aiming at the glint of silver that was her whole hope, she open fired. More pieces of the ceiling fell in her attempts, but she was at last rewarded with the sound of an explosion, and a column of smoke billowing out of the cracks in the ceiling. The shaking around her immediately lessened, and she allowed herself a sigh of relief. Though she had paused, the sound of laser fire continued, and following the sound she wasn't too surprised to be looking in the direction of the tunnel outside.
"Will you calm down? I'm fine. I told you I was fine," despite her commanding tone, the sound of laser fire didn't slow as her brothers inevitably tried to clear her an exit. The stone that had fallen must have been sturdy stuff to stand up to even their null rays.
"Right, because you're not trapped in an underground Decepticon storage room," she heard Ramjet (it had to be Ramjet, Sunstorm was never so sarcastic. Not to her, anyway.) retort from the other side, and she swore if her brother was rolling his optics right now she was going to kick him when she got herself out of here.
"But I'm completely unharmed and so are the crates," she replied smugly. "Now back up," she said harshly, "I'll shoot myself out."
"Why do you do that?!" responded a frustrated voice and in the moment she wasn't sure which of her brothers had said it, "I admire your fierce independence, and awe over your many skills," (well, that made it pretty clear it was Sunstorm talking, though an uncharacteristically annoyed sounding Sunstorm), "but not everything has to be done by yourself. Ramjet is a skillful and talented mech as well, and I will at least do what I can. We can help."
"A complete soft spark like you?" criticized the femme with a scoff, "You two don't even have a plan, you're just shooting randomly."
"Ok, fine, we should just sit on our blasters and let you do everything yourself then," sarcastically replied who she was at least 89% certain was Ramjet, though at this point Sunstorm was proving full of surprises. Either way, she didn't appreciate the sass and opted to ignore it, shooting back in kind with false cheer, "Now you're starting to get it!" She settled in to observing the rock before her for weak spots, ignoring the pointed silence coming from the other side.
Several minutes of fruitless shooting later, the rock was pitted with scorch marks and small craters, but was still very much in one piece, and she glared at it hatefully. "Slipstream, why won't you let us help? I know I'm not that skilled, but surely, at the least, having extra firepower would be a wise decision."
On her side of the wall, Slipstream just scowled, too angry at her apparent failure to come up with a sassy retort. After a pause of her sullen non-answer, Sunstorm spoke again,"Dearest sister," he said, his voice saccharine (she was his only sister, of course she was "dearest" there wasn't any competition. Little empty flatterer.), "I would humbly suggest that you step back from the stone. It would be terrible beyond words if you were hurt. I can't stand the thought of anyone doing something that could possibly cause that."
She stubbornly stayed where she was, crossing her arms and redirecting her glare to where she assumed her brother was standing. She had understood his passive aggressive insinuation, and didn't appreciate the attempts at blame. "You can be a real aft when you want to be," she accused sharply.
"An unfortunate and tragic character flaw that I shall have to bear," he replied soberly, though Slipstream was certain he didn't mean a word. His voice became muffled as he presumably turned away, saying, "Alright, Ramjet, my sharpshooting sibling, I may not be the most observant mech but it appears the stone is weakest here and here." Slipstream glared harder at not knowing where her brother was referring. From her side of things the stone didn't have any weak spots.
"If I couldn't do it, what makes you think you can?" she asked harshly, "Neither of you exactly have gifted coding for combat or strategy."
"What's that delightful proverb the humans say?" mused Sunstorm in reply, " 'Many hands make light work'? Or maybe 'two heads are better than one' would be much better fitting?"
"Someone's sounding nothing like Thundercracker," teased Ramjet far less helpfully.
Slipstream grit her teeth, not dignifying the accusation with a response. She wasn't being like that egotist at all! It wasn't that she thought she was the best, she knew others could also be good at things. She just didn't need them to, completely different! "Alright, fine, then, try your big master plan," she scoffed indignantly, at last sidestepping a couple paces away from the wall.
The sound of blaster fire started up again, and little by little a crack developed on her side of the rock. With another shot, the crack became a small hole, and she could peer through it to see her brothers on the other side. At least until it was filled with red and gray as Ramjet pressed his face against the slab to peek through the small space. "Well, goodbye, Slipstream!" he quipped, and the femme rolled her optics and resisted the temptation to poke her annoying brother right in the optic. She was better than that. She instead simply watched as he pulled back away and the cracks and holes spread, begrudgingly having to admit that they were doing a good job. She listened as Sunstorm directed or they debated on the best next action, and couldn't fight a growing sense of grateful admiration for her brothers. She was just so used to doing everything herself, keeping herself at an arm's length from her family. Having someone work so hard to help her, knowing that they cared so much, it was nice. By the time they had cleared out a hole a bit bigger than their heads, her frustration had fizzled out. Some more shooting and a bit of digging later (they all certainly had enough practice after unburying so many rooms back at their base), there was at last a cleared space that the two Seekers could get through.
"Now let's-" Slipstream started to say, moving to turn away, only to be cut off from finishing either action as she found herself held tightly by Sunstorm.
"I am truly glad you are alright," he stated lowly, embrace tightening then loosening again.
"Soft spark," she snarked fondly, but didn't immediately throw him off. She let him cling a moment longer, then firmly pushed at his cockpit to get him to step away. "Like I was saying, let's go check what's in those crates."
She marched determinedly to the back of the room, stepping gracefully over the boulders and rubble that littered the floor, her brothers following behind her. They all grinned as she opened one of the crates to reveal it stacked full of oil barrels, more than enough to fuel themselves and power their home.
"Well, at least this wasn't a waste of time," remarked Slipstream, tossing an oil barrel and catching it a couple of times before subspacing it to take with her. Sunstorm and Ramjet did similarly.
"Our noble creator is going to be so pleased when he sees what we found!" commented Sunstorm happily as he grabbed a second barrel.
Slipstream snorted, "Whatever. Like I care what he thinks. The important thing is that we have fuel now. We'll make a note about this location and tell the others when we meet back up with them, then we can all grab what's still here."
They all took as much oil as would reasonably fit in their subspaces, then at last walked back out the tunnel to transform to jet mode and meet back up with the others.
" *ssshhh* -ones. Come in, clones. Slipstream? Sunstorm? ... Ramjet?" once they were in the air a comm message from Starscream came through. "Are any of you reading me, yet?"
"Hello, glorious creator!" responded Sunstorm enthusiastically, "Your grateful creation Sunstorm reads you loud and clear! How was your mission? I'm sure it went fantastic! We-"
"Ok, comms work again," Starscream cut him off dryly. "And you all didn't die, even better."
"You know, a heads up about the booby traps would have been nice," shot back Slipstream.
"Well, we didn't know either," retorted the older Seeker.
"Oh, so you're just saying you're incompetent and don't think ahead, then?" argued the femme no less scathingly.
"What am I? Psychic?" snapped her creator in return.
Sunstorm boosted anxiously, coming to fly beside his sister rather than just behind her, interrupting appeasingly, "We found oil, oh great and sensible creator." Slipstream tilted to flick a dismissive wing at him, but stopped arguing.
It seemed to work on Starscream, too, because he dropped the bickering to comment,"Finally some good news. So at least this mission wasn't a total wash. Meet back up with us as these coordinates, then we can head back to base."
He transmitted a location to the three of them and then promptly ended the connection. At this point Ramjet had also pushed ahead to fly beside Slipstream rather than in formation, but she didn't feel like bothering to try and put them back in their spots. Sunstorm started flying in a lackadaisical rise and fall as they fixed their navigation to the location of the rest of the group.
"So you finally made it," called Thundercracker on a separate channel from Starscream, "Took you long enough, I thought I was going to have to heroically rescue you all," despite his pompous remark, he sounded worried.
"It was just a few rocks," dismissed Slipstream.
"Well, I'm glad we finally get to go home. The sooner I get to the wash racks the better. The stupid cave in completely ruined my paint," he lamented dramatically. "I call dibs preening with Starscream. None of the rest of you are skilled enough to restore my wings to their proper full glory."
"Well," said Skywarp, chiming into the discussion, "You did save my life, so I guess I can let you have it this time."
There was a heavy pause, and Slipstream then replied, "What? Whatever, fine. Like I'm going to fight over Starscream? I don't care."
"Oh, so that's why you haven't before," remarked Ramjet. She flew directly in front of him to cut him off, making him waffle in his flight as he redirected.
"I do not mind, my noble brother. Certainly your beautiful wings require the utmost care, and I can picture none better for it than our experienced creator."
"Exactly," replied Thundercracker proudly, "See all of you soon. Remember: dibs!"
The call ended before anyone could retort further, and Slipstream enjoyed the silence that followed. Though at the mention of wash racks, she had to admit Thundercracker was right, a shower sounded amazing right now after all those rocks and dust. Not to mention a thorough preening. With Thundercracker's "dibs" she'd probably end up with Skywarp, since there was virtually no separating her wingmates (except for occasionally their creator and his careful,skillful claws, that she definitely never argued to preen with, because that would be ridiculous and childish and she obviously didn't need or want him to do it). Thinking of her wingmates, she surreptitiously looked over her brothers' conditions as they flew, feeling an uncomfortably niggling of guilt when she saw they were covered nosecone to stabilizers in a thick layer of dirt. Sunstorm's normally bright coloring was nearly brown with dark rock dust, and she could barely tell where Ramjet's whites had originally ended and began. It probably would have looked even worse in bot mode, though she hadn't been paying attention to their states then. She had her own share of dust and debris, but she could only imagine how much more they had collected in shooting her out. And they hadn't even complained about or mentioned it once. The peaceful silence that had fallen over the trio seemed to her to grow expectant, and Slipstream fired her thrusters tensely and her flight waffled uncertainly. Her uneasy flight caught her brothers' attention, and they shifted their flight patterns to be back in standard supportive positions. The pressure of the expectant silence grew, and she said sturdily before she could talk herself out of it, "Thanks. For getting me out. I wouldn't have gotten anywhere by myself."
The other Seekers' englines momentarily cut off in shock, but they quickly recovered.
"Of course, my beloved sister," replied Sunstorm, cheerful and proud, "And it was so wise and generous of you to allow us to assist you."
"I would have been fine with leaving you there," added Ramjet.
Slipstream scoffed as though the sentiments were too sweet for her, but her flight leveled out calmly. Nothing more was said on the matter as she angled towards the rest of their family, her brothers beside her.
Hee hee, Sassy Sunstorm. In which we are reminded that Sunstorm did come from Starscream. He's not quite as different as Starscream would like to believe. Exploring Sunstorm and Slipstream's dynamic is fun, but somehow I also found it really hard to write. I feel like it was worth it, though, I'm pretty happy with how this chapter turned out.
Also, poor TC, everyone makes fun of him. His ego just makes him too tempting of a target for teasing, lol. (They all still love him though, don't worry.)
Hope you enjoyed! This "arc" isn't quite over yet. See you next chapter!