Diversion

Construct an underground base here. Develop a super weapon there. Megatron wanted a mountain base, and what he wanted, the Constructicons would deliver, albeit unenthusiastically. No one said it out loud, but everyone knew the base would just be a temporary one. Seeing their carefully done work undone in weeks or months over-torqued the Constructicons' emotional systems.

It showed in the plans. They were workable and efficient, and the finished base would be well-concealed - a must for a secret base - but to put it bluntly, the plans were hideous. There would be no style or soul to the finished base. The uncomeliness of the installation would make its inevitable destruction a little easier to bear for its makers, just a little.

The Constructicons stood together inside the entrance to the main cavern. They didn't stray too close to the opening. While the entrance was carefully hidden, the Constructicons didn't care to take chances. The hollowing of the mountain was almost done, and they paused now, taking a break, just recently finished with refuelling.

"Did you hear that?" Scavenger asked, turning towards the entrance.

"I don't hear -" Scrapper started. He could make out a faint popping, crackling, hissing noise. "You're right, Scrounge." Scavenger had always had the best sensors of all the Constructicons.

"That noise shouldn't be there, should it?"

Bonecrusher, who had been listening, crossed his arms in thought and said, "It's explosives, but the sound's not, y'know, right for Cybertronian ordinance. Maybe some of that loopy human stuff."

"Megatron said this area was peaceful," Long Haul reminded, not sounding disappointed at all. He'd been itching for a scuffle.

"Tell it to so-so-someone who cares!" Mixmaster said loudly. He'd been carrying on an argument with Hook for some time.

"Be reasonable, Mixmaster. The last time you tried -" Hook stopped, just now noting how the others' attention had to turned to their quarrel.

"Look, there's a strange noise outside," Scrapper said, now that Mixmaster and Hook were no longer absorbed by bickering, deaf to everything else. "To be on the safe side, two of us should check it out. Bonecrusher, you have the most expertise on the subject."

"Got it," the demolitionist affirmed.

"Oh, can I go? Can I go?" Mixmaster enthused.

"But you need to -" Hook started crossly.

"Oh, stuff it," Mixmaster snapped.

Scrapper sighed and conceded, "Yes, Mixmaster, you may go." Perhaps giving the chemist some time away from Hook would defuse the situation. Bonecrusher and Mixmaster seemed ready to set to the mission, but Scrapper reached out and tapped each. "Try to be unobtrusive about it."

"Don't worry, I'll ke-keep Bonecrusher in line," Mixmaster said cheerfully.

"Oh, you'll keep me in line, will you?" Bonecrusher replied, walking out of the cavern.

Outside was night, not that it mattered terribly. Between the dim red glow of their optics and their other senses, darkness didn't bother them much. In alternate form, Mixmaster'd have headlights, but the slope would inconvenience his vehicle mode too much.

The entrance that they left was below tree line and for good reason. A Decepticon standing on bare rock or snow was far more noticeable than one shrouded by trees. Bonecrusher resisted the urge to topple the trees in his way, ignored the little voice that told him that the whole place would be so much more aesthetically pleasing if it were all bare, shattered rock devoid of life.

Bonecrusher's combat subroutines came on alert when a flash of light, accompanied by the popping noise, broke the darkness of the sky. The explosion didn't seem to be that powerful, and strangely, it didn't seem targeted at anything. His subsystems quieted. "It's not dangerous," he decided.

"Then, let's take a clo-closer look! I've triangulated the source of the explosions," Mixmaster replied.

"Said the toaster."

"Toasters can't tri-triangulate!"

"'Sides, anyone can tell that they're coming from the clearing down there." Bonecrusher gestured.

"Then we'll use radio now, yes? It's quieter."

«Arright,» Bonecrusher agreed, switching.

They edged towards the clearing, more slowly than either Bonecrusher or Mixmaster liked. The two pressed closer to the clearing than was really necessary and tried to make sense of what they saw. No Autobots lurked in the clearing, only fleshlings, and a goodly number of them at that. The area from where the rockets were launched was situated a distance away from the fleshlings. Squishies of all sorts and sizes cluttered the clearing. Dimly, Bonecrusher recalled something about juvenile organics being small and helpless, not good for work or warfare. He was no expert on humans, but Bonecrusher realized that their strange expressions, expressions with which humans never greeted him, were ones of joy and glee. The clearing was no battlefield, the demolitionist decided. Maybe he'd have a chance to make it one, though.

The fleshlings clustered in certain areas, areas that Bonecrusher realized were better vantage points. The whole deal seemed fairly useless. The rockets would explode to a chorus of human 'Oooh!'s and 'Ah!'s. Some detonated into starbursts, other rings; others flowing cascades. There seemed to be little sense to the myriad shapes and vibrant colours. Every once and a while, a simple human symbol or letter-glyph would appear. The squishies loved those ones especially. Given the seeming pointlessness of the endeavour, Bonecrusher reached a conclusion and smiled, amused. «Huh. Ornamental explosives. Who'd'a thought the squishies'd come up with something like that?» he commented.

«I could do be-better,» the chemist radioed in response.

«Might make a fun side project.»

«Maybe, maybe,» Mixmaster agreed.

They didn't linger much longer. There wasn't much point, and they wanted to be back to the worksite. The sooner that wretched installation was complete, the sooner they could work on their personal projects. Scrapper awaited their report.

"Eh, just a bunch of squishies blowing stuff up for fun," Bonecrusher explained.

"We weren't noticed," Mixmaster added, "There's nothing to worry about."

Whatever the plans Megatron had for the secret installation, they weren't his only ones. Either he could not or would not devote many personnel to the mountain base. There was a skeleton crew of spook types, long on spy skill and short on combat prowess.

That the Constructicons were assigned to guard duty told them that there was something wrong here. Devastator was powerful, but individually, they simply weren't trained fighters. One inference was that this operation couldn't be of any high importance. A second and more important inference was that they were on their own if it failed.

Bonecrusher wasn't particularly worried by these inferences at the moment. He had just gotten off guard shift and finally had some time to work on his and Mixmaster's project; ornamental explosives, Constructicon style. Bonecrusher mentally reviewed the charges used in his line of work. With modifications, a few of them might work as a starting point.

"Maybe the armoury has something we can use," he mused.

"Li-lithium will make a fine red," Mixmaster said, thinking along some different line.

Bonecrusher rolled with it, suggesting, "Yeah, you do the frilly coloured bit. I'll work on the rest."

They worked on the project on and off when they had time. Once they ran the simulations and finished the first batch, both were itching to test their work. Circumstance intervened.

"Can't give the base away, no," Mixmaster said regretfully.

"There's not time enough to go else. Maybe we can find some place to test 'em later." Bonecrusher cursed his current assignment, and not for the first time.

"Well, the simulations suggest that they should be quite spec-spectacular," the chemist consoled.

"Aww, sims are no fun compared to the real thing." Bonecrusher longed to see at least one of the smallish rockets go up in a radiant blaze. Their ornamental explosives weren't quite his idea of beauty. He preferred the devastation that explosions usually heralded, but the novelty standpoint was enough to engage his attention.

Long Haul stood the night watch. He was used to boring tasks, but that familiarity didn't make him like them. When Long Haul saw about half the Autobot Earth forces on the monitor banks, he felt guiltily glad. Finally, something broke the monotony. Long Haul sounded the alarm.

On the general Constructicon frequency, he radioed, «There's about half the Autobot army coming up the mountainside, and they're not just poking around. Looks like they know where they're going.»

«Frag!» That exclamation was Scrapper's. Then, on the main base channel, he ordered, «As the assigned guardian of this installation, I hereby order an evacuation. There're Autobots outside, too many to defeat. Grab what you can, and get out of here. We'll hold them off. Constructicons - to the main hall!»

Once gathered, Scrapper, who preferred to speak face to face, decided, "We'll form Devastator to stall the Autobots and -"

"Get our tailpipes handed to us while the Autobots capture the base and anything too big for the evacuees to carry," Hook remarked darkly, scowling. He and Long Haul formed the head and torso of Devastator and generally drew the most fire. The transport liked fighting and didn't mind, but Hook didn't like being damaged one bit.

Mixmaster considered something, and after some thought, said, "I can handle the di-di-diversion," he paused, then added, "Bonecrusher and I can."

Bonecrusher shot Mixmaster a look of incomprehension. Scrapper inclined his head, wondering just what the chemist was thinking.

Mixmaster reminded Bonecrusher, "Re-remember our project, yes?"

"Yeah." Understanding dawned in Bonecrusher's optics. "Right. We can give you time to wreck the place. You guys better not botch the demolition work."

"You two are sure?" Scrapper asked.

"Of course," Mixmaster affirmed.

"Got it," Bonecrusher agreed.

Though they were only two, and the Autobots were many, the duo had a few advantages. They knew the terrain better than their adversaries, who had found one of the entrances and were concentrating their attention there. Scrapper had done a bang-up job of hiding that particular entrance, and had Bonecrusher more time, he'd have wondered how the Autobots found it so quickly.

Instead, Bonecrusher and his partner clambered around the mountainside, the salvos of Autobot weaponry covering the sound of their movement. They hurried as best they could, placing their carefully crafted rockets, setting the timers, and moving on to the next rocket.

«Sure is a humdinger of a way to test these things, eh?» Bonecrusher radioed his partner in pyrotechnics.

«Shield your audio and op-op-optic sensors!» Mixmaster radioed back.

The first rocket, as far away from a human firework as a human was from an Aegialodon, went off with a deafening roar and a blinding flash that sent reeling and scattered the Autobots. When their vision cleared, they saw the stars as they were when they left Cybertron, perfect in brightness, magnitude, colour, and position, superimposed over the stars of Earth's sky. Some panicked. Some stared at the sky in wonder. Some were stunned senseless. Some cried out with homesickness. Some, a cool, rational, and determined few, looked not to the sky but to the shadowed mountainside, looking for the cause of the pyrotechnics. Kaleidoscope sprays of light-fire baffled their search, but presented the answer in the end. A pointillist rendition, not a crude outline but a true masterpiece, marked the night sky. Glowing dots in subtle hues of green, purple, silver, red, black, and more combined to form a gestalt image - Devastator! This distraction, now that they saw it for what it was, was the work of the Constructicons.

«The charges are set,» radioed Scrapper on the group channel, «Get ready to go.»

«Eh, I can ride it out,» Bonecrusher replied.

«And I suppose you'd like to be dug out by Auto-Autobots?» Mixmaster chided.

«Aw, phooey. I'm coming.»

Departing from their respective hiding spots, the two Decepticons took to the air, concealed by confusion. Just as they rejoined their group, the mountain blew, giving new movement to multitonne rock sections that had rested for countless aeons since deposition and uplift. Save for the lack of smoke and fire, there was an uncanny resemblance to a volcano doing its very best to become a caldera. Dust, thick like a blanket, hung in the air. Though the Autobots were covered in rubble, it would be too much to hope that they had been crushed to death; Autobots had an annoying habit of surviving.

"Tops our little diversion, that does," Mixmaster said, a bit sadly.

"I could do better," Bonecrusher quoted with a smirk.

Scrapper was difficult for most to read, lacking an expressive face as he did. Those who knew him knew better. Right now, to judge from the cadence of his footsteps, his posture, and the glare in his optics, the subgroup leader was deeply angered. He punched the buttons of the door keypad with an irritated impatience, and once inside the common room that the Constructicons shared, was all too eager to hit the button to lock the door.

"That bad, hmm?" asked Hook, looking up from a datapad.

"You have no idea." Scrapper turned to Mixmaster and Bonecrusher, asking, "Have any of those little rockets left?"

"Nah," Bonecrusher replied.

"Why-why?" Mixmaster queried.

"I'd like to shove one up Megatron's gun barrel. You know why the Autobots found the base? Our illustrious leader decided that the intel return wasn't worth it and arranged for the location to be leaked. While the Autobots were busy with us, the others carried off an energy raid."

"So we had to turn tail like a bunch of mechs fresh off the assembly line while they bagged all the glory?" Long Haul asked, irate and incredulous.

"It makes good military sense," Scavenger offered, trying to soothe his comrades.

"He could'a told us earlier," Bonecrusher groused, looking for something disposable on which to vent his pique.

"Apparently there was no need to know," Scrapper said quietly, a little calmer now, "It was a temporary base. For all I know, what happened may have been Megatron's intent all along. A diversion, and nothing more."

The End