Disclaimer: I do not own Transformers, nor Red vs. Blue or Halo. That's Hasbro, Rooster Teeth, and Bungie/Microsoft/XBOX/whatever respectively. I'm only borrowing the characters to play with them in an entirely fanon setting.

A/N: No. This fic isn't dead, what are you talking about?

Here's a long overdue update for ya. Like I said, I have more chapters outlined, but I haven't had time to write, really. I blame my recent inspiration on the new season of RvB, my reviewers, and Beast Wars: Transformers. :D

At the bottom of this are A/Ns that clear up a few things from previous chapters that I noticed while rereading them! I'd like to make a few corrections, but before I go back to edit, I summarized the changes below.

PS - The Australian Decepticon...sounds like Bruce from Finding Nemo. xD

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The slim pink form of Donut's Audi alt mode paused at the end of a tunnel, which opened up into a small alcove. Beyond this point, the walls vaulted to form the ceiling of a bigger tunnel.

"You see anything?" Simhack asked from behind him. He only whispered because they didn't know if the Cons would detect their radio signals should they speak privately.

"Not yet."

The scout pulled out into the tunnel, his scanners inspecting every inch around him for a sign of cameras or alarms or anything that would give them away. He was also looking for rooms, or hiding places, because the tunnel's rugged walls offered no protection against being spotted. So far, however, the place was quiet. Except for the couple times the pair had gotten lost, there'd been no encounters. It was almost boring.

To liven up the situation, the rookie started to hum the beginnings of a personal spy theme, but Simhack opened his passenger door and hit him.

"Shut up! You'll give us away!" he hissed, panicked and straining to hear the angry advance of a bloodthirsty enemy. Nothing happened, though.

"Shh! I know what I'm doing!" Donut hissed right back, but he kept his silence afterward.

The pair slithered on ahead, covering about a half mile of tunnel little by little. The way probably would have been faster for bots who'd been professionally trained to do this sort of thing, but neither had the official skills – one was still learning to be a warrior instead of a scientist, and the other was still a sparkling. But they were good enough to pass Sarge's favorite war exercises with crudely made silver medals, and slipped along the passage with relative ease despite these limitations.

During their journey so far, they'd come across an intersection of multiple pathways, which made them wonder how extensive the system was. With no doors or rooms or even security to speak of, the bots wondered if this was really a Con hideout or a mining facility instead. It was hard to tell, as the markings on the walls could have been made by large human tools, or Decepticon drills (according to Simhack). But rather than follow these other paths, like they'd tried earlier in their trek, they stuck on the straight one, which seemed to be leading in the right direction.

Eventually, the tunnel became even bigger and they heard the unmistakable sound of conversation. The bots speaking sounded like they were coming from inside one of the six chambers that lined the walls ahead.

"Voices," Donut whispered, his tires almost squealing as he halted.

Simhack stopped just short of running into the younger mech's bumper and listened.

"I hear them," he said, his voice small. His mind supplied visions of the size of the footprints they'd looked at earlier and suddenly he found himself afraid. "We should probably transform while we're far enough away to not be heard."

"Gotcha!"

If the humans had been around to see, they might have thought that a slow transformation was more unnerving than a quick one just because it looked weird, like an explosion in slow motion. Honestly, for the bots it was also more difficult, considering the momentum of each piece being rearranged usually kept a bot upright and helped them stand when they were finished. To be stealthy, they had to sacrifice this help, and struggled to keep themselves from rolling around all over the place. Soon, though with some trouble, they were finally in primary mode and they plastered against the wall as the sound of light footsteps reached them. There was the wishing sound of a door and a looming shadow filled the hall, framed by a dim yellow light, a hundred yards from their position. Blue and red optics exchanged a worried look.

"Never saw me comin'!" a booming voice laughed from inside the room, as if finishing up a story. It had an accent which sounded Australian. "Bam! Right in the aft!"

The shadow sank, as if its owner sat down, before disappearing from sight. Donut and Simhack heaved a relieved sigh – it seemed they were safe for now. With a few silent signals, the pair carefully made their way forward. Just beyond the open doorway was a cathedral-like cavern that seemed to be used as a storage facility and that's where they'd have a better time hiding and gathering info.

"Had time to scan a tank, though, didn't it?" another Decepticon's voice replied. It was the jesting voice of a spectator who liked the show and wanted more. "Where'd it find one, anyway?"

"Aghh, some dank little army base to the south. Flew right over the thing in the dead of night and crashed somewhere in the 'ills, she did. Musta scanned a selection on the way down. Some human found 'er first, but it scrambled before I reached the clearing. Gave 'im a good scare, I did."

"You left it alive?" a rumbling voice spoke, different from the second. He sounded smaller than the previous two, but his voice was deeper, and he seemed to be moving around.

"Yeh. I was more concerned about turning in our little Autobot infiltrator than trackin' down a tiny man, though. Brought the sheila straight 'ere… Pft, slagger. Ran right into me on the way through the atmosphere and was probably gonna wreak havoc on our energon shipments if I left 'er in one piece when I got 'er. I wasn't gonna have that!"

The Cons had installed mechanized doors in this region of the tunnel system, probably on the most important rooms. But the sneaking pair had no time to look around. The only door that was open anyway was the one leading to the room the Cons were currently sitting in. Lock-picking their way into another room would make too much noise and possibly set off alarms. Their only way was forward and they had to pass the door without getting caught.

Donut counted four Decepticons as he encountered the room, which looked like a rec room of some kind but way bigger than any he'd ever seen. Peeking in, he saw that everything was scaled to suit the giant mech whose back faced the hall, including the hover-seats the other two were sitting on. The giant was most likely the one who left footprints near the crash site, although seeing him in person Donut couldn't help but feel overwhelmed. He'd seen Cons before, but no one this tall. The mech looked like a chopper of some sort, his black blades lying down his back and his dull brown and grey paintjob hard to see in the low light they were using. The two sitting didn't look dangerous, one of them engaged in listening and the other brooding over something that looked an awful lot like a cube of brightly colored fuel. Lastly, there was a fourth bot walking around attempting to fix what looked like an energon dispenser that sat on the back wall.

Simhack poked one of the pink scout's doors to encourage him to move, and Donut complied, making it across the doorway unseen by leaping and rolling forward. Not a sound was made but the move did cause Simhack's hands to fly around in panic, warning him to shut up in sign language. When the pale Autobot noticed, he simply shrugged and bounded his way into the main cavern. The maroon soldier made to follow.

As Simhack made it past the door, however, it occurred to him that the story the flier inside was telling was about how he'd captured the Blue. It made perfect sense and fit the evidence left at the clearing – the footsteps, the tire tracks, the trace mech fluid trail. The Blue Team member should be around here somewhere, probably held in a makeshift brig.

It also struck him that the mech had said 'energon shipments.' Were the Decepticons mining for energon? Was that was this cave system was for? It had taken Donut and him a good hour to traverse the tunnels without tripping security (although, there didn't seem to be any security), and during the journey, they'd gotten lost twice. If these were mines and not a horribly intricate base, then the many tunnels that seemed to spiral downward forever made a whole lot more sense - although how they were getting energon out of the planet was a mystery to him. He froze, listening for any more clues.

There was a panging sound as the cyclocraft slapped the shoulder of a smaller mech, the third that had so far moodily kept to himself.

"Anyway, End of story, until I get 'er to Megatron. Oh, he'll be pleased. Megatron likes makin' examples of those pests, so we'll give 'im an example, yeah?"

There was the sound of general enthusiastic agreement at the mention of a reward, and the chopper continued.

"…Speakin' o' that, I bet I haven't told you 'bout the time I rescued that lost platoon on Hearth Six."

"Oh! Tell it!" one of the voices spoke, the lighter one. The deeper voice consented somewhat reluctantly. The third Con kept his silence, but the brash chopper launched into a story of some daring heroics and the subsequent 'rewards' he received from Command as a result.

Simhack doubted he'd ever received anything he was saying he'd gotten, seeing as energon was nearly nonexistent and anything like credits or trade material was almost worthless. The only thing that sounded plausible was the brand new cannon modifications he said he sported, evidence of which was found in the forest.

The ex-Con shook his head of the conversation, saving only the important bits, made his way into the large cavern as soon as it was obvious the Blue's tale was over.

First, he noticed the markings on the walls, which looked like they'd been carved with the blades of a skilled miner class Decepticon. He'd had a tough time telling if the cave system was manmade or not before, but now he knew the truth as he was faced with the smooth lines and intrinsic patterning only a Cybertronian drill bit would make. Or, at least, that's what Simhack thought, considering the sudden difference between the walls here and the rest of the place. He didn't know much about mining, but he could use common sense. Perhaps the Decepticons here had simply made a base by drilling into a preexisting mine and then used the tunnels to carry out operations.

Said operations were, as far as Simhack knew, mining for Cybertronian fuel. The thought seemed ludicrous, seeing as planet-side raw energon deposits were incredibly rare. However, Sarge had pointed out earlier that no one on the List lived in Iowa, and it was a location that was quite out of the way for someone trying to capture the Witwicky child at his school over in Pennsylvania. This lead the logic-inclined soldier to hypothesize that the Decepticons had far more planned than just taking hostages and killing Autobots during their invasion. If they were mining for energon, then they had reason to believe that the Earth possessed that precious source of energy somewhere in its crust. They would not expend energy on a useless endeavor.

For a moment, he wondered if the base had a terminal where he could access delivery records on these 'energon shipments' and anything else the Cons were doing here. He'd really like to know what they were planning, seeing as updates from the Con frequencies were not forthcoming, and it was getting increasingly fishier that this place didn't have a security system.

The main chamber was indeed a storage facility, towers of metallic pods that functioned as Decepticon built crates stacked nearly to the ceiling in some places. Most crates were closed, but a few stood open with what looked like uncharged weapons and equipment. Beyond the stacks was the wide-mouth entrance he and Donut had spotted outside. The frail white wooden house that had been abandoned years ago could be seen where he was standing. Why the supplies weren't protected in a secure facility underground instead of up where anyone could walk in and take them didn't quite make sense. But, then, low ranking Decepticons frequently took the easy way out if they thought they wouldn't get caught by more meticulous higher ups. Keeping supplies right next to the main entrance made loading shipments and take-off easy. Did they think they needed zero security because no one was supposed to know these mines existed? The lack of alarms or traps was strange in itself, but if these bots were under the assumption that this place had gone completely undetected, and they were willing to scatter these supplies and possibly the 'energon shipments' willy nilly like this, then he supposed it made a lazy Decepticon sorta sense. The dark red gunner passively recognized that this 'operation' was exactly the sort Gruffwheel would endorse, the lazy ass. He knew that should someone from Decepticon High Command come down here and find one of their top secret mining facilities in such messy condition, heads would be rolling.

Simhack suddenly relaxed, the mission becoming clear to him. His team had the element of surprise. No one here knew Donut and he had sneaked in, leaving them free to raid the place as they pleased as long as no one walked in on them. Because of the rigid No Talking rule on the Cybertronian airwaves, no one on the outside would know this place was doomed either. The extremely rural location of the place would play a part as well, seeing as almost no humans lived close enough to investigate or hear the sounds of battle. He felt satisfaction settle over him. They were safe, and those heads would be rolling soon anyway once Sarge was through with them.

The mech slinked forward, intent on looking through the crates before what would surely be a deadly battle. Still intent on putting the rookie in his place, he was sure that getting info from the crates would again put him in good standing with his superior officer. Not that he wasn't already the favorite, but there was nothing wrong with ensuring his future as leader of the team.

"Pssst! Simhack!"

The lanky Con spun in alarm, having been caught up in his own thoughts. He spotted the rose colored shaped of Donut in the very back of the chamber crouching next to a big lump of twisted metal.

"What is it?" he whisper-yelled back.

Donut just waved him over with nervous hands. The Lincoln left the crates to investigate with a sigh, disappointed to be pulled away from what could be valuable intel. However, what the sparkling said next took him by surprise.

"I think it's the Blue!"

"What!"

Simhack's sharp, angular face turned towards the lump. With a second glance, it wasn't so much a pile of scrap as it was a ripped and mauled body. He shuddered as he stared at a set of claw marks that tore into the treads of the offline bot.

The pink rookie's tone became concerned. "He's hurt pretty bad, Simhack. Take a look. You're better at this stuff than I am... Do you think they've reported possible Autobot invaders yet?"

They traded places and the maroon science officer did a quick scan while looking over the injuries through his visor. He made sure to keep his voice low.

"I don't think so. They wouldn't want to report anything over the airwaves right now, so they were probably keeping him for later. I think they were going to trade the Blue in for credit with Megatron."

"Repulsive," the small car grimaced with distaste. He pointed to the damaged Autobot, his face changing back to concern. "Well? Is this who I think it is?"

The ex-Decepticon found the bot's Autobot symbol under a layer of dirt. It was displayed in sky blue over a slightly darker blue hawk-like creature. The design was the Blue's version of the Autobot sigil. He sighed.

"I think it is...and judging by the size, I'd say it's the Blue's tank."

"Uh, oh."

The tank was perhaps the most intimidating Blue there was. She was tall, wide, and packed artillery that made even Sarge wince. Unusual for her breed, she possessed a military alt mode, with a natural inclination for destruction. She was Decepticon programming with Autobot mentality, and sometimes her morals were called into question (there was one time she blew up her own team leader, and she didn't seem to feel too bad about it). But she wasn't unreasonable and the few times Simhack had found himself in alliance with her over the years, for one reason or another, she could be helpful and valuable in a conflict. She drove a hard bargain when she wanted to and was a dangerous adversary on the field for her sheer firepower. That deserved respect. But now… It was hard to tell if she'd lost the fight with the chopper because her skills had gotten rusty or because the flier was more powerful than she was.

The rookie looked rightfully worried. "We could sure use her help, I bet. Can you patch her up?"

"Did you not hear what that 'copter guy was talking about?" The other snapped. "The Blue ran into him on the way down and totally blew her cover. They must have had a firefight but he got a good shot in…If she's built like the Decepticon tanking classes, this area here is right near her spark chamber and CPU. Tanks are really hard to kill because their brains are inside their bodies, but she must have suffered some serious damage when she hit the ground - the equivalent of falling on her head, at least. At some point, she must have shut down, but I can't tell if that did any good…" He frowned and assessed the damage again.

The turret was twisted sideways, the hull was covered in deep dents, and there was a gaping hole in the back where the engine had been blasted clean through. But that wasn't the worst part. He sighed, distressed about what he was about to say. He grew hesitant.

"Frag. Okay, I'm not a medic. All I can do is infer what's wrong based on what I've observed and what little I do know about bot anatomy... But Donut? I'm doing a scan here and…Primus, she's got some serious damage to her neural processor. Possibly permanent damage. We've got to be careful when we move her."

"She's brain damaged?" Donut's optics were displayed at maximum width.

"Yeah, kinda. I dunno how much, and I'm not qualified to even attempt to fix this…" he trailed off uncertainly. Sarge was the only one of the team who could do it, and he had questionable medical practices…

"I wonder if the other Blues know?" the Audi pondered.

Simhack shook his head. "I'm not sure. But we need to get moving. We need to find the security room, if there even is one. It could be anywhere in this place but I bet its nearby –"

"Oh! I know where it is! Follow me! It's not much, but I think it's what we're looking for. You won't believe what they've got underground!"

As if he hadn't just heard devastating news about the Blue's health, the scout turned and jogged eagerly down a seemingly random tunnel that gave no indication of whether it actually held the hub of all systems in the base or not. Simhack followed with a twinge of annoyance at the younger's apparent knowledge and his gaze drifted to the crates again. Donut just kept showing him up! First the secret entrance, now he'd scouted every chamber in the vicinity and discovered the Cons' mysterious operations in the time it took him to walk down a hallway! And, knowing Donut, he probably already had the jamming device primed and ready to plant – he was just innocently awaiting an order from his elder teammate to set it down. If Simhack was going to one up Donut on this mission, he'd need something good to report to Sarge and now was the time to get it.

On second thought, however… He glanced at the bleeding lump of an Autobot, a powerful foe turned to scrap that was barely alive, possibly damaged forever, and his ambition was immediately dampened. There were much more important things to do right now. He'd get his chance.

"Ugh…I'll just have to prove myself later," he half-snarled aloud with reluctance.

As he turned, he made sure the coast was clear and the hall empty, and then he hurried after the rookie.

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Gruffwheel's 'war paint' turned out to be a bulls eye pattern on the mech's chest plates and back. He wouldn't have drawn it on himself but Sarge threatened something in Cybertronian the humans couldn't understand and the orange bot complied by doing some mental magic on his paintjob. It was only one of the 'highlights' of the early morning round of arguments but soon the group had split and gone their separate ways. Half the 'Autobot' team had gone in, and the other half was waiting outside.

The scene was an empty farm lot, the buildings still intact, sitting on the edge of a hillside field of some crop that had been overgrown with weeds and tall grass. There were no chickens in the coop, or horses in the stables, and the dull green shutters of the house were crooked and cracked. At the end of a wide dirt road that cut right through the establishment sat two piles of rock and a yawning cave that crouched in the darkness of pre-dawn like a monster.

"Cons built that," Sarge stated with confidence, the CXT sitting just out of sight in the woods. He was parked in the middle of a dried up river bed, the mossy banks making a perfectly formed trench for the commander to hide in. But he remained in alt mode, the humans lined up right next to him trying to see what he saw. Slowly, ever so slowly, the sky was turning gray with morning.

"Are you sure?" Judy asked in a whisper as she squinted. She assumed he meant the tunnel that she couldn't really see at the moment. It was too dark for human eyes, still. All she could see was black on black in the distance.

"Yep. The width and height of that opening, plus the cut of the rocks around it, suggests Cybertronian drill equipment," the truck explained, his sight zooming in on the rocks for a long distance visual scan. "Either a large drone or a miner. Let's hope if it's a miner, he's not still around. Mining equipment on the battle field does a real number on the enemy. I've seen some truly destructive strategies that make use of them! Inspirational!"

"Not when we're on the spirally spinny end…" Gruffwheel whimpered, crouching in robot mode just behind the humans. Luckily, the makeshift trench was deep enough that he could remain in primary mode without being seen. "Hey, Sarge? Remember that house with the elderly couple in it a couple hours from here? The ones with the Ford we stole?" He pointed to the white and blue pickup that now stood parked in the ravine with them. Mikaela sat in the driver's seat, both dogs inside and quiet.

"Yeah…" Sarge replied, his cautious voice indicating he had some inkling of what the orange Autobot was about to pull.

"Shouldn't the humans have stayed with the old timers? They'd be safer there. We should take them back. I'll take them. And I'll stand guard!"

"I don't think so!" Judy piped before Sarge could deliver a retort. She hit Gruffwheel in the knee with a handkerchief before wiping her face of chilly morning dew. "We're stayin' right here!"

"Especially after stealing their only car," Maggie agreed softly, feeling incredibly guilty. There'd been a huge American flag outside the small wooden cottage, and a hand carved POW MIA memorial statue in the garden. Every possible American patriot memorabilia she could think of had been piled on their front lawn as decoration, and a veteran's plaque had been tacked onto their mailbox. So not only had the group stolen the sole transportation two old people had, but they'd stolen from war veterans who might have helped them out if they'd been told their country and home planet were in danger.

Then again, considering the whole alien thing and the super top secret nature of all knowledge related to the alien thing, the elderly couple probably wouldn't have believed them.

Oh, well. They'd decided they needed the truck when Gruffwheel and Sarge had realized they couldn't convince the humans to stay anywhere hidden. To the small organics, being alone out in the cold dark woods without a light and armed only with jackets as defense meant possible death, no Decepticons involved. They were also determined to come along and help somehow. (Sarge just did not understand this suicidal altruism.) But the bots were planning to go into battle, and the humans needed to have some sort of protection, at least a way out. So after an extensive argument, the group agreed that the humans would get a vehicle they'd stay in and stand watch just outside the intended 'arena.' Should things get hairy, the humans were to turn the truck around and vamoose south to somewhere remote.

The current plan was in effect for now, though. They waited for their spies to break radio silence to begin the assault. Then the humans would pop into the Ford while the Autobot (and Decepticon commander) ran in to kick Con rear. Then if the bots for some highly unlikely reason needed the humans' help, travelling over the hundred yards of empty farmland to the cave wouldn't be a problem (This part of the plan was to put in to appease the humans, as Sarge thought they were a useless liability on the battle field).

Two hours passed in relative quiet.

Ron had eventually needed to pee as badly as the dogs did and had made a trip into the bushes an hour ago hoping the small canines would keep their muzzles shut. Judy took the time to touch up her make up (She insisted that if she was going to kick ass, she'd do it looking pretty, dammit). Maggie had, at some point, climbed some old roots so she could keep her eyes on the farm and the surrounding forest, while Mikaela had gotten tired of sitting in the truck and joined everyone else in the cool morning air. Sarge hadn't said a word in that time, except to tell the humans to wake Gruffwheel from his noisy napping three or so times.

The stars were gone and the clouds were slightly pink by the time anyone felt the compulsion to speak and when they did, it was with a tense air of impatience.

"Where are they? Shouldn't they have done their thing by now?" Ron said impatiently, poking his head over the river bank while trying not to dislodge Maggie from her perch.

"Not sure," Sarge answered thoughtfully. "Depends on how intricate the tunnels are, and the Cons inside. Our bots might have been captured and are currently bein' tortured for information -"

The earthlings all shot him a dismayed look. Sarge continued, unaffected.

"- or they're fine and just takin' longer than we thought they would. They ain't exactly Spec Ops super spies, you know."

Gruffwheel gave a longwinded sigh, his fear having quickly waned in light of his increasing boredom, and settled back on his haunches while blinking wearily. If they were taking their sweet time, there was no need to waste his energy being afraid. "Hm…Well, they need to get it over with in there. I don't know how long I can stay awake at this rate. A nap sounds really nice."

"You've already taken a nap," Mikaela pointed out a little snippishly. His show of sloth was both disheartening and annoying when everyone else was ready to spring into action.

"I'm due for another one," Gruffwheel replied in a childishly mocking imitation of her tone.

Sarge growled, "Can it, garbage muncher. No breaks, no naps. Wake up! As decoy, you need to be ready to move at a moment's notice!"

The Liberty did the robot equivalent of rolling his eyes, and rubbed at his bright red bullseye with his fingertips. It looked suspiciously like he was pouting.

"Hey, I have a question," Ron piped up from his position on a rotten log. His hands were holding into the clay along the lip of the ridge, his head just high enough to see the barnyard in the distance. "If your rival squad is called the Blues, what are you guys called?"

"Reds," Sarge answered simply, like it was the most obvious fact in the world.

"We're Red Team, they're Blue Team," Gruffwheel elaborated somewhat needlessly. He brought forward an arm, baring a previously unseen symbol that was scuffed and hidden in his alt mode's intricate 'tattoo'. It was dull red, almost brown from dirt and neglect, an Autobot symbol superimposed over an outline of a diamond and a dark cobra-like creature. Maggie's searching blue eyes moved to Sarge, but his sigil wasn't visible.

"So, you're like a subfaction?" Ron pressed, raising a brow. "Our militaries split into color teams sometimes for, like, exercises or whatever. Is that the case here?"

There was a pause in which Gruffwheel looked to the taciturn form of Sarge. This questioning had dangerous 'prying' potential that the Jeep wasn't sure he was supposed to supply answers to. However, the Decepticon CO wasn't forthcoming with what seemed to be harmless answers, so he went ahead and said, "Well…While the main part of the war migrated over here, there are plenty of bots still scattered across the galaxy in lotsa small fighting groups of their own…"

All eyes were on him and he clammed up for a moment, but he went on, knowing that telling half truths was his best option at the moment. Before he continued, he wondered briefly how the humans would react if they saw Sarge in battle, and then it occurred to him that maybe his hide-the-humans-at-the-old-people's-house wasn't such a bad tactical decision after all. Somewhere in his polyalloy gut he felt something twist and he shifted on his laurels.

"…Sooo, while we were fighting our own war in the outer reaches of space, we called ourselves Reds and the other guys called themselves Blues. There's probably, like, Greens and Yellows out there, too, or something…Fighting with each other…and also against the, uh, common enemy and stuff," he finished awkwardly.

His answers must have seemed good enough, and three pairs of eyes looked away with the satisfied light of having gained more knowledge on their strange guardians. The only problem was that one pair, belonging to Maggie, narrowed thoughtfully before they turned away, and the carrot hued Liberty's gut twisted further.

He'd had an inkling that it would be her or the brunette to figure it out. They were the crack whip observant types. Madsen, in his own observations, had been the one to pick up on the subtle slip ups his teammates had given over the past twenty four hours of their disunion with the Autobots. No one had meant to intentionally give their secret away, but it was hard remembering to not mention that their leader and second were Cons when such a fact had been public for eons. Red Team had never hidden the fact as they fought in the boondocks of space with another team of crazy hooligans – Blue Team knew it, Sarge proudly mentioned it, and any visitors to their private conflict quickly found out. Being told to keep it a secret for a change was a huge effort, and since picking up their four wards it just got harder. The humans were intelligent beings for all their gross organic squishiness, and it seemed to him that the ruse was about to be discovered. There would be some major explaining to do soon.

Gruffwheel was curious to know if Sarge had already thought of this. Either he hadn't and he was about to transform and rush headlong into battle displaying his mighty Decepticon physique, or he had and he'd already decided that the humans were going to find out the hard way.

Before he could ask, his radio crackled out loud. The humans had asked him to keep it open so they could hear the cue, seeing as Sarge insisted on keeping his cabin to himself and now the sound of their teammate's voice filled the ravine.

"Simhack to Sarge. Jamming signal in place. Security is nonexistent on the upper floors, but the lowest part of the mines are where the main operation is taking place. It's heavily guarded down there by automatic features, but I'll fill you in later; it's irrelevant to our current strategy. We counted five Decepticons - the one managing the security room is already dead, the other four are in a nearby rec room, one of which is the Giant from the clearing. There are two miners underground but they won't hear a thing. The Blue has been found injured and in need of medical attention. She's ready for transport."

"Excellent work, you two," Sarge replied, sounding pleased. He was curious what operations were being done but he'd find out soon enough. He couldn't wait to see the Cons faces when they found him kicking in their door. "Do we have your mark - ?"

"Oh, and the main entrance is a storage facility that might be holding explosives. Be careful not to trip – other than that, you have my mark. We're ready to go!"

The throaty sound of Sarge's engine rumbled almost lustfully and it shook the sleeping birds out of the surrounding trees. The Jeep shrank back – Sarge was a little scary when it came to a fight he was sure he'd win. And it came with extra explosions this time, too.

"Gruffwheel, transform and stay on my tail," the scarlet truck barked. "We're goin' in!"

"I have a bad feeling about this…" the orange mech lamented as he did as ordered.

"You four, get in the Ford and take my place over here." Following this direction, the humans moved in sync to leap into the truck. After checking all belongings were inside and both dogs were present, Maggie and Ron leaped into the bed of the truck with the luggage. "Keep your radio tuned to 98.1 AM, that'll be where I can reach ya. When I give the all clear, you come out. If I tell ya to scram, get the Pit outta here. Otherwise, you keep yourselves invisible."

"You got it!" Mrs. Witwicky agreed with determination. She closed the driver's door and clutched the wheel in both hands. Mikaela, next to her, somehow looked more frightened of a rampaging Judy in the driver's seat than possible capture by Decepticons.

For a moment, it was surprising, to both bots present, how calm she and her ilk were given the circumstances despite their obvious trepidation, but if they knew the extent of their up close and personal involvement with the Autobots and their conflict, the Reds might not be so taken aback.

Sarge's voice cut through the air like a gunshot. "Let's roll out, dirtbag!"

Clumps of dried silt flew everywhere as the sergeant tore out of the trench and onto the farm, racing forward with an ecstatic roaring of his engine. The Jeep followed at a more reserved pace, though he made sure to stick close to the larger warrior. As if battle against four Cons wasn't bad enough, it seemed Sarge didn't really plan out the whole 'reveal' very well. Gruffwheel very much doubted that the fight would stay inside the caves, and he was sure the humans would be watching. He only hoped they wouldn't do something stupid.

As the opening of the cave loomed closer, he felt the vibrations of a grenade going off through his tires and he knew the battle already started.

His gut just got tighter.

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A/N: Uh ohs. Gruffwheel has picked up on some bad vibes. I don't think Sarge forgot to keep his Con-ness a secret, but I don't think he's making any more than a superficial effort to keep it under wraps at this point. We'll see what happens next soon!

Their sigils come from Red vs. Blue season 3 or 4. I recall the symbols for the teams being on their shoulders, the reds having a cobra on a diamond in magenta, and the blues having a splayed falcon in blue. These are easy to see in Episode 44, We Must Rebuild, although I don't remember them being there in later episodes. These symbols are the same as on their bases, I think.

I would like to take this moment to say "HIYA!" to my sister, who is reading my fic and enjoying it, too. :D HIIIIIIIIII BUDDY! :3

IMPORTANT NOTE: I was rereading the first 5 or so chapters and noticed a few discrepancies.

First of all – spelling errors and format errors are in need of fixing, so I'll be going back some time to fix those.

Secondly, in the chapter "Sarge" I made Sarge seem like he doesn't know how to work with internet and software. The thing is that he knows how to use internet and such, but his specialty is more hardware based and some programming. He's not a hacker though. I made it sound like he's completely internet illiterate, but he's not. It's that human internet is alien to him, he's more comfortable with Cybertronian interfaces, and doing stuff like "surfing" it is more of a Simhack thing to do.

And thirdly, while Sarge, Simhack, Gruffwheel, and Donut were in space and during their early time on Earth, they have gathered enough info from the internet to conclude the following: A) the Autobots are on Earth, they know this from Prime's message, but because there's no info in the 'net, they rightfully assume the autobots are a secret from public society. B) Analyzing the poor cover story for the events at Egypt, the leftover footage of the world wide announcement of the Fallen's, and looking over pictures of suspiciously Cybertronian looking debris from the battle in Egypt, they rightfully assume a major battle happened not too long ago at the Pyramids. Sarge thinks it's a Decepticon weapon.

Other than all this, Sarge and his Team do not know the details of the first two movies. Just wanted to clear that up because the way I wrote Chapter "Sarge" it seemed like he knew about Egypt from the internet, but no. All they know is what's been revealed to them through the In Story dialogue I've written so far with the humans. I'll be editing those earlier chapters soon.