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

Chapter 35: Autobot Book Club

After dropping off Annabeth's father and getting the information about Nemo from Nightprowler, the Autobots landed the Ark-27 somewhere in Kentucky.

The day after all that, Chromia found their new recruit outside the Ark-27, currently swinging his sword around in the open air.

"Getting some practice in?" Chromia asked.

"I've been asleep for at least two hundred years," Nightprowler answered. "I need to make sure my skills are still sharp."

"Probably a good idea then." Chromia noted. She watched Nightprowler swing his sword around. His movements were a little slow and shaky, most likely due to still recovering from his long nap, but there was a swiftness and elegance to them she hadn't seen in many other sword-wielders on Cybertron.

Still, she couldn't help but feel something was missing from his arsenal.

"You got a gun?" she asked.

"Gun?" asked Nightprowler.

"You know that thing I tried to use back in Atlantis that didn't work due to stupid refraction?" Chromia asked. "That's a gun. It's a ranged weapon basically."

"Like a bow and arrow?"

"Yeah, exactly," Chromia said. "We got plenty to spare. I'd be happy to donate one for you."

"Thank you, but no thanks," Nightprowler said. "I prefer the sword approach."

"Besides," he continued. "If I ever need to fight at range, I can do this."

He turned around, stomped on the forest floor, and a huge pillar of earth rose from the ground. Nightprowler kicked the pillar, propelling part of it forward a considerable distance.

Chromia silently awed. "I've never seen anything like that," she said.

"Seen what exactly?" Nightprowler asked.

"A Cybertronian who could control rock like that," Chromia replied.

"It wasn't uncommon among the guardians of Atlantis," Nightprowler said, confused. "Most of us had power over the elements of the Earth. You didn't have anyone on your... Cybertron capable of doing this?"

"Well, some Cybertronians have some crazy gadgets that allow them to do similar tricks," Chromia explained. "My friend Ironhide has a gun that lets him shoot different kinds of liquid, but full power over the elements? No."

"Perhaps it's something different with the way the Atlanteans built us compared to you Cybertronians." Nightprowler proposed.

"Yeah maybe…" Chromia muttered. "Look, I didn't just come out here to be impressed, by the way. Prowl wants you to help out with the research on Captain Nemo, so I'm here to get you."

Nightprowler gave a shy look. "Does he really need me?" he asked.

"Well, considering you talked to the guy, yeah, he kinda does." Chromia pointed out. "Look, Nightprowler, I know it sucks being the new guy, but you're a part of this team now. Like it or not, that means you have to get to know everyone and work with them."

Nightprowler sighed. "Yes. I suppose you're right," he murmured before walking inside with Chromia.

Nightprowler walked into the briefing room where most of the Autobots had gathered again. All of them had their eyes hooked to various datapads as they read the books featuring Captain Nemo.

Thalia, Luke, and Annabeth were also there, reading together, but Annabeth appeared to be the only one truly enjoying it.

The only one absent was Ratchet.

"Any luck finding anything?" Nightprowler asked

"Not much," Hound muttered. "This Nemo guy loved his secrets, it seems."

"Probably doesn't help these books are secondhand accounts," Optimus murmured.

"Where's Ratchet?" asked Chromia.

"In his lab, seeing if he can dig up anything on the internet," Optimus explained.

"So grab a datapad and start reading new guy," Sunstreaker ordered playfully.

Nightprowler shrugged and picked up a datapad and started reading 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.

Everyone was silent for a couple of minutes until Nightprowler finally spoke up. "I must admit, it's quite a sobering experience knowing what Nemo did after he disabled me."

"I bet…" Hound agreed.

"Yeah, this Nemo guy seems real whack." Hot Rod muttered, frowning.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Prowl asked suspiciously, looking up from his datapad.

"I mean, he's a terrorist, a kidnapper, and a murderer." Hot Rod said. "He's whack."

"He's a genius who built the first fully manned underwater submarine." Prowl pointed out.

"Who happens to be a murderer." Hot Rod pointed out.

Prowl put down his datapad and sat up. "If you've got something to say, Hot Rod, say it!" he ordered.

Hot Rod glared at Prowl. "He hurt innocent people," he pointed out. "People who were just doing their jobs transporting cargo and manning ships."

Prowl glared back "Those people just so happened to belong to the nation that killed his family!"

By now, everyone had stopped reading to watch the argument between the two.

"Hey guys," said Luke. "Calm down!" he urged.

"Sounds like you respect the guy." Hot Rod said sitting up and ignoring Luke.

"He's out to avenge his family and fought imperialism," Prowl admitted. "I can't hate a guy for doing that."

"See a bit of yourself in him?" Hot Rod said, giving a mocking laugh. "You know that's actually kind of rich. Prowl the rule stickler liking the outlaw!"

Prowl was silent, but he gave an angry sneer.

"You know he could have done anything with his brains and his technology." Hot Rod said. "He could have helped people; saved the world. Instead, he chose to waste it getting revenge on people who had nothing to do with it. What kind of freedom fighter is that?!"

"I'm not saying he's perfect," Prowl said. "I'm saying I understand him! I don't think he was a bad person; he was just…" Prowl trailed off. "Confused and hurt."

"And in case you didn't notice, he did take the time to help people if he could." Prowl pointed out. "Remember the Indian Sailor he helped rescue? The people on the Mysterious Island?"

"...He did do that." Hot Rod admitted but he winced as he did it.

"The point is that Nemo is more complex than just being a simple outlaw."

"You can tell that after just one day of studying him?" Hot Rod asked.

"Yes," Prowl answered.

"Well, I guess you would emphasize with him." Hot Rod scoffed. "People who lose family have to stick together, right?"

Prowl looked angrier than he had ever been before and scowled.

"Prowl?" asked Annanebth nervously.

Hot Rod's anger and frustration vanished. "Wait. Prowl. I'm sorry! I didn't mean it like that!"

Prowl didn't seem to acknowledge Hot Rod or Annabeth. He advanced toward Hot Rod, but Hound stepped in between them.

"Hey, calm down!" Hound said. "Look, Prowl, you're right that Nemo had understandable reasons for doing what he did." Hound turned to Hot Rod. "Hot Rod, you're right that Nemo mishandled it and could have done better. But none of that matters now. We just need to figure out where Nemo could have possibly hidden the Allspark. Alright?"

Prowl and Hot Rod were silent. Then they looked at each other and nodded.

"Good. Can we get back to this?" Thalia asked. "The sooner we don't have to read anymore, the better."

"Are you gonna stop complaining about this?" asked Chromia.

"No, not really." Thalia scoffed in frustration as he turned her attention to the book again.

"You know maybe we could watch one of the movie adaptations instead?" asked Luke.

"Yeah, can we do that?" asked Thalia. "It'd be way easier on my eyes."

"I don't know…" Optimus said. "I'm concerned that it may be more of a filtered version."

"But it will be easier on my eyes!" Thalia begged.

"Thalia cut it out," Sunstreaker muttered. "You're sounding like me."

"Yeah, it's really not that bad," Annabeth said.

"No!" cried Thalia.

"Protoform…" muttered Sunstreaker.

"What did you call her!?" asked Hot Rod.

"I said she's a—"

"Quiet!" ordered a fed-up Optimus.

"Yes sir…" Thalia, Hot Rod, and Sunstreaker muttered meekly.

Nightprowler looked upon all this with a confused look.

Chromia sighed. "Sorry about this being your first day, Nightprowler," she said.

Nightprowler shrugged.

Just then Ratchet walked into the room. "I found something," he said.

"What?" asked Prowl.

Ratchet walked over to one of the tables in the briefing room and placed a datapad on it. Everyone turned to look. On the datapad's screen was a picture of an old newspaper.

Prowl picked up the datapad and looked over it carefully. "Three men mysteriously rescued off of the coast of Norway," he read out loud.

"That's the climax of 20,000 Thousand Leagues Under the Sea!" Annabeth exclaimed.

"I know," said Ratchet.

Prowl looked over the newspaper some more. "It says here the men, Pierre Arrnox, Ned Land, and Conseil, were found in a small boat after being missing for over a year. The men claimed to have been held captive by a guy in an underwater ship."

"Okay, is this a prank?" asks Hot Rod. "This has to be a prank, right?"

"No, I checked," said Ratchet. "The date on the newspaper is a couple of years before Jules Verne published his novel."

"But this doesn't make sense." Luke pointed out. "If there are old news stories like this in the past, why isn't it common knowledge that Nemo is real?"

"I might have an answer for that…" Ratchet said.

"What are you talking about?" asked Prowl.

"I found this newspaper on an old site archiving them," Ratchet explained. "But this one was tricky to find. It had fallen through a hole in cyberspace."

"What does that mean? What's this... internet?" Nightprowler asked, confused.

"It's hard to explain," Luke said. "Basically, it's this huge information storage and communication system everyone can access and is used for... well, pretty much everything these days.

Nightprowler looked like he didn't fully understand.

"We'll explain later," said Thalia.

"The point is, this archive of this newspaper was... hidden for lack of a better term." Ratchet continued. "It was there, but incredibly hard to access. Buried underneath meaningless data, redirects, and other stuff. I had to call Chromedome for help accessing it."

"Why would it be that hard to access?" Sunstreaker asked.

Prowl sneered. "Because someone doesn't want anyone to know Nemo was real," he theorized. "They've probably gone out of their way to suppress evidence that Nemo was a real person."

"Great… So now what?" asked Thalia.

"I might have a solution," Ratchet answered.

"What's that?" asked Optimus.

"Well, if Nemo was a real person, then everyone involved with him would have had real families," Ratchet answered. "Real descendants, in other words."

"Wait, are you saying you found a descendant of Captain Nemo?" asked Hot Rod.

"Not quite," said Ratchet. "I found out the next best thing."

"Well, what is it?" asked Chromia.

Ratchet pressed several buttons on a remote control, and the briefing room monitor displayed three images of three individuals: two men and one woman. All of them appeared to be of Chinese descent and had black hair. Below each image were their names: Jiang Land, Calista Land, and Galen Land.

"You found the descendants of Ned Land?" guessed Prowl.

"It's amazing what certain ancestry sites on the internet can find," Ratchet stated.

Thalia squinted as she looked at the images. "Wait," she said. "I thought Ned Land was a white guy. Why are his great-great-grandkids Chinese?"

"It's been several generations, Thalia," Ratchet said. "More than enough time for the Land family to intermingle with other ethnic groups. In this case, it seems Ned's son married a Chinese immigrant, and the family has been part Chinese since."

"So where are these three now?" asked Optimus.

"Well, according to my research, the Land family eventually came over to the United States to form the Land Insitute in California." Ratchet laid out.

"What's the Land Insitute?" asked Prowl curiously.

"Some sort of educational facility for marine-based careers," Ratchet answered. "It seems Jiang and Calista are teachers at the school, but not Galen curiously enough…"

"Where's he?" asked Optimus.

"In South Carolina," Ratchet answered again. "Apparently he's doing well for himself because he got elected governor recently."

"What's he doing all the way on the other side of the country from his family?" asked Hound.

"That, I don't know," Ratchet admitted. "All I could dig up was that he worked at his family's school too for a time before he left out of nowhere. Just packed up and went to live on the East Coast."

"Maybe he doesn't have a good relationship with his family." Annabeth guessed.

"Like us…" Luke muttered bitterly.

"Possibly," Ratchet murmured.

Optimus put his hand to his chin and thought about it. He turned to Nightprowler. "Any suggestions, Nightprowler?" he asked.

Nightprowler looked confused. "You're asking me?" he wondered.

"You're the newest member of our team," Optimus said. "It seems fair to ask your opinion on our next course of action."

Nightprowler thought about it for a few moments.

"I don't know much about this new world I've woken up to…" he began.

"Don't worry." Hot Rod said, "We're still learning about it too."

Nightprowler smiled. Hearing that seemed to help him feel a bit better. "But I do know this. It may be advantageous to have some leaders on our side. I assume that's what a "governor" is?" he asked.

"Yeah, they're basically like kings... except over a state," Annabeth explained.

"And a whole lot more bureaucracy," Luke added.

"Right," Nightprowler said. "Therefore, I propose we try approaching this Galen first. We can get an ally for our cause and information at the same time."

"Sounds good to me," Prowl said.

"I'm game," said Sunstreaker.

"Sure," said Luke.

"Eh, I don't care either way,' said Thalia.

"Me too," Annabeth said cheerfully.

"I don't see anything wrong with it," said Ratchet.

"Why not?" said Hot Rod.

"Okay," said Chromia.

"Fine," said Hound.

"Then it's settled," Optimus said. "We'll set a course for South Carolina right away," he turned to Ratchet. "Ratchet. Start seeing if you can find a way for us to approach Governor Land."

"On it," said Ratchet; he turned to leave, but then, as if remembering something, he swerved back around to face Nightprowler. "Oh, Nightprowler. I just remembered. We need to get you a proper alternate mode."

"Alternate mode?" asked Nightprowler.

"We all can change into vehicles and stuff," explained Prowl. "You'll need one to blend in on the planet."

Surprisingly, Nightprowler seemed to understand, but she shrugged. "No thanks," he answered. "I'm quite attached to my beast mode."

"Beast mode?" asked Thalia.

Nightprowler gave a sly smile. Then he started to shift and change. He fell forward, and two things hanging off his back came to his front and became front legs; his back legs shifted and bent the other way, and the cat head on his chest moved forward.

When Nightprowler landed on the ground, he was a robotic snow leopard. Everyone gazed at it in amazement.

"Whoa!" said Sunstreaker.

"Nice!" said Hound.

"Impressive," Optimus noted.

"Do they not have alternate modes like this on Cybertron?" Nightprowler asked, his cat mouth moving as he talked.

"Talking cat!" laughed Annabeth.

"It's not unheard of, but it's extremely rare," Ratchet said, answering Nightprowler's question.

"All of the guardians I knew could shift into beasts," Nightrprowler said.

"I guess that makes sense; they wouldn't have had vehicles way back in ancient Greece." Luke pointed out.

"Yes, what are vehicles exactly?" Nightprowler asked as he shifted back to robot mode.

"Modern-day chariots with no horses," Luke answers.

"Fascinating," Nightprowler said.

With that, everyone began to disperse. As Hot Rod walked to his chambers, he noticed Nightprowler following him.

"You need something?" Hot Rod asked.

"Yes," said Nightprowler. "I have one more question."

"Shoot."

"What's Cybertron like?"

Hot Rod shrugged. "I don't think you'd like it. It's a whole lot of metal. Nothing like Earth."

"Still, if what you're saying about the great cube is true, it's my ancestral homeland." Nightprowler pointed out. "I want to learn about it."

Hot Rod smiled. "Well, buckle up, Nightprowler; it's a long explanation…"

So for clarity to those who haven't read Daughter of the Deep yet. Galen and his siblings are not from that novel. They're original creations of mine (and I'm also aware I'm probably dating this fic instantly if Rick ever decides to make a sequel...)

Anyway, thanks for reading, and don't forget to leave a review!