Chapter 35

{Zero-four-six, three-four-one is now online.}

{Perfect, thank you AI. My toeing the line XO? REPORT.}

Shadowdancer scowled at the medic's back plates, but gave the tactical uplink more of her processing power. {Anything in particular you want to know about, sir?}

{Oh you know, the ever loving frag you've been up to. I'm keenly interested in your reasoning for it.}

The tactician hesitated, then heaved the Cybertronian variation of a sigh. {Where did you see this little war ending?}

{What?}

{Humor me. Go on and speculate.}

Warcry blinked a few times, giving the data pad Galeforce had left with him another look. Yes, his XO had just asked that. {Well… discounting the Decepticon faction, Cybertronians aren't a very warlike race. They were having trouble defending themselves before we ended up here, for frag's sake a few cities are blatantly ignoring the fact there's a war on and just continued business as usual.}

{Yes, we've seen that with Kaon, Vos, Simfur, and Praxus. Four cities, and what is being done to prevent such a thing from reoccurring outside of one-two-seven's army bots?}

Sideswipe jerked his helm up, catching Sunstreaker's bored optics questioningly. His split-spark twin just shrugged, informing the swordsmech he didn't know.

Warcry handed the pad off to the Prime for his perusal of the conversation, giving his Third's question more of his attention. {I don't think they've had the time-}

{Nothing. There will be nothing done in response, zero-four-six. You and I, and most of the SPARTANs, know this.} Shadowdancer cast a glance to where Soundwave had moved the leadership discussion on Refit's behest, hammering out how the Tarn base would be run between three bots. {They will make all sorts of excuses; we're not military built, we're not soldiers, we're not built for that, so on so forth. This abhorrence for military hardware most Cybertronians have will make them little more than target practice in the end. So far Praxus will probably be the only city to break that mold, and only because the preparations have been done already and they need not to do any more.}

Cinder gave the Praxian femme a confused look of her own. {What about the Autobots, then?}

{How many are there? Four, five hundred? Barely six, if I recall right and predict the recruitment numbers accurately. To protect how many Cybertronians, which I believe at last census was hovering around twenty thousand? Then the Decepticon faction, which have all those bots not taken census of, and they number near three thousand before I did this.}

{The military-no, I see your point.} Galeforce cast a glance over to the leader of half of Cybertron's old military set up. {They're already split, and either report to Ultra Magnus or this Greenlight femme. That would just never end, and foster even more resentment to military bots.}

The tank framed Commander of the SPARTAN-Bot Unit frowned heavily at the points. {So slag will get tricky, I highly doubt Cybertronians as a whole will let themselves be deactivated just because-}

His Third in Command interrupted again. {That's human behavior. Humans will defend the stupidest fragging scrapheap if they think they have a good enough reason. Cybertronian, zero-four-six, Cybertronian behavior and social norms would have them ignoring that unless something happens to change that assumption. Odds are, changing that assumption with either be lethal or scarring to the bot in question.}

Knightblade, who had kept only half her attention on the discussion and more of it on Perceptor's initial layout for redesigning the SPARTANs' very mishmashed system additions, interjected next. {What about my scientist here? Three-four-one, he acquired a bodyguard the same orn it came to his attention he was at risk. Doesn't that upset your hypothesis?}

{Has he agreed to learn to handle a weapon yet? He leaves it up to you, one-nine-three. Again, once your Cybertronian had a solution that doesn't involve him handling something designed to deactivate his fellow Cybertronians he ignored the entire situation. Has Perceptor ever changed his routine, even when you pointed out it would be easy to take him down by such habits?}

{…no. Not even if I beg him to.}

{Enforcers? What about them?} Titan tried next, since he didn't need to keep his full attention on the suspect Wraith was asking questions from. His role was to stand around and look intimidating, as per what Griz had informed him of.

{For Cybertronians, Enforcer is a step above military hardware upgrades. I sometimes wonder what they would think of the human Military Police, if that's what they equate their own Enforcers to. No, Cybertronians would avoid anything violent just simply because for centivorns they have all been force fed about how scary and destructive military bots are. For frag's sake, zero-two-seven saved Simfur, and they want to kick him out for that. A decently successful merchant, and all they can see is the orn he blew up the bots intent on destroying their city.}

{Thank you for bringing me into this, three-four-one.} Nitro interjected sourly. {One-two-seven's old city's been treating me rather well, I'll have you know.}

{Heh, score… but not the point. Praxus was swamped by the virus before the firewall booster went out.} Cinder reminded him, only slightly sadly. {Ruby, recall her? Before the virus infected her she nearly wanted nothing to do with us. After? She damn near punched out some poor medic for questioning her and Flashfire over Hell's Bells' military use upgrades.}

{My point exactly. Question this, why was such a virus created?} Shadowdancer allowed them all to turn that over in their processors a few times before continuing. {Shockwave's notes that far back were all about his paranoia that some bot was after him. That's how he started down his pothole filled road to Decepticon Military Commander. When looking for bots to guard him for that paranoia, he found that most of Cybertron flatly refused to pick up a weapon. All those that didn't find it abhorrent or strange either went into the Cybertronian Military or Enforcers. What defected to Meagtron's side first? Half the military and the Enforcers of two separate cites.}

{Three-four-one, the point please.} Warcry asked for the Autobot's Prime, who looked pretty damn confused over that abrupt change in subject.

{My pet theory for how this fragged up slag started, is that Shockwave encountered the Robo-Smasher first. He then, after adapting to his new programming, brought either a friend or trusted mech he relied on to it so he would have some bot he could trust to help him. The resulting 'Megatron' probably got either a better reprogramming than he did or some other bot figured out what was happening and took advantage. Shockwave got called back to Cybertron while Megatron either went with said some bot or continued to try and figure out how to move the Robo-Smasher back planet side. Then there would be two Quintesson reprogrammed Decepticons, unleashed on the turbulent days of the fall of the Golden Age. On a society that refuses to defend itself, even in the face of a threat of painful deactivation.}

{The virus, three-four-one?} Knightblade prompted the XO after a silent moment of processing that. {What about the virus?}

{The virus was to do exactly what it did. Make it so less Cybertronians would have the moral codes against fighting. Gladiator combat only became popular after Shockwave's return to Cybertron. It started from Tarn, then spread out from here. Tarn was also the first city to fall. That virus took forever to spread, from what zero-seven-zero found. It only infected one bot every cycle, and then those two infected two more, then four bots spread it on, so on. Tarn's destruction spread the virus carriers to other cities, Gygax as their closest neighbor and Kalis as their other. Then on to Polyhex as the northern territory connected to them; then Kaon and Alithex; on to Central, Simfur, and Vos; trickling into Praxus and Tyger Pax. Crystal City, Ankmoor, Iacon, and Yuss are the farthest points not blocked off by the acid sea and the Magnesium Mountain Range, even if they are only a few short kilometers away at some points.}

"That is also the pattern of illegal Gladiator combat popularity." Prowl informed Warcry blandly. "If Shadowdancer's theory is correct, that was just a symptom and not the root of the problem itself."

{Prowl, it's also the upswing in crime Cybertron has been plagued with ever since the fall of the Golden Age.}

The black and white Praxian cocked an optic ridge at that.

Warcry could only shrug in answer. "Yeah, they can hear you."

"Shadowdancer, why?" Optimus asked, expectantly waiting her response on the pad diligently recording the SPARTAN-Bots' tactical uplink conversation.

He wasn't disappointed.

{Cybertron was in the middle of a civil conflict already, well before the fall of the Golden Age. Which is all well and good, civil insurrection like that would have just changed up the worst parts of your society and ensured you could continue for another few centivorns without issue. But your Decepticon faction was too violent, to us anyways. It made more than a few of us confused, because as far as we could see there was no reason for such destruction. They were destroying themselves and what they professed to want to defend. It was more of a madness than simple, mostly peaceful protests a society like yours would have started with. Riot wasn't a word in your language until after Tarn's destruction. What I have here now is what should have been the Decepticon faction as is, mostly prior military bots and those with grievances with the prior governing structure of Cybertron. What's left are all either civilian bots too far gone to be rational, or those that just want to fight for fighting's sake.}

The Prime considered that for a long moment. "All of them are too far gone?"

{More than most of them. Due to secrecy and security concerns we may have missed a number, but after everything is settled here and we have no mass defections from Megatron's side to Tarn what's left won't be much more than drones with sparks intent on sheer destruction for the little it will allow them to feel.} Shadowdancer, even if she wasn't seen doing it, could only shrug. {What happens after that will be up to you and whoever it is that comes out of this new faction as leader. But this way you won't have to destroy everything with a Decepticon faction insignia just to get the fighting to stop, just the bots that will flatly refuse to give up their destructive habits.}

"So what, should we destroy them for the slagging virus that turned their internal coding into glitched up fragments?" Ratchet asked loudly next, glaring at the pad in lieu of the Praxian femme herself.

{Can you fix it?}

Scowling, the medic simply glowered at the innocent machine.

{Soundwave, my pick for the mech in charge here, thinks and has experimented with a reformat on one of those virus infected bots. So far it looks to have worked, but it's still in the early cycles yet so any real issues have yet to occur. Even if it does work, that's still at least two cities of bots to quarantine and reformat. Then, of course, if we do the reformatting option there will be complaints that either faction is reprogramming bots to support them and not just to erase this problem. And that's not accounting for any more bots that got out of the southern part of Cybertron before this and is spreading that virus more. Suggest something else, Ratchet.}

"What about a neutral party, then?" Elita-One asked next, still somewhat uncomfortable by the discussion.

{Who? The Neutrals themselves? They would reprogram bots to avoid both factions and nothing would get done then. We'll be stuck in a civil conflict for vorns until something extreme happens again, then some bot will accuse whoever it was of mimicking Megatron's methods.}

"Alpha Trion." Optimus suggested next. "He reformats the Primes themselves, no bot will argue against him."

{Do you know where he is now? Additionally, isn't he Autobot inclined?}

The questions brought the Prime up short, and he wondered about that himself.

Warcry merely sighed, cursing out his XO on a private channel for the processor ache she had given him. "Well discuss it later. This is it, right? There's no more little surprises you've got locked away just to spring on us later?"

{You did call for a waltz, sir. Now that I've halved the problem, this should go a bit more smoothly.}

{You also added a new dimension to the conflict, ma'am.} Silentforce reminded her absently, ignoring Refit as she took the opportunity to poke his malfunctioning vocalizer system again. {Instead of three dimensions there's now four. Autobots, two factions of Decepticons, and the Neutrals.}

{Five if you add seekers.} Drax suggested dryly, even as Starscream got through defending his actions and tetchily demanded to hear what the Air Commander thought would justify trying to judge him.

{Six with minibots, though they don't normally have much to do with surface bots.} Trickflip tacked on cheerfully. {They are going to want to know what the slag is up with Tarn's underground, now that we're here.}

{But this will no longer be vaguely justified if mostly senseless violence against the old guard of Cybertron. Much, much easier to actually work out accords with than a faction that will only accept their way or none at all. To the bitter end, as is.} Shadowdancer gave her unhelpful and unabashed about it fellows a hard look for making it seem much worse than it should be. {We just need to figure out what the slag to do with the crazy ones.}

(ooo000ooo)

"Starscream, for slag's sake, mute it." Drax irritably informed the seeker scientist, quelling the disagreeable rev of his turbines. "We have enough problems as is, don't add to it."

What amounted to the Decepticon's version of the Air Commander held himself even more stiffly, but the SPARTAN-Bots' trine leader didn't let him continue.

"If you still have the coordinates of your old field mission partner, I'm pretty sure the ATHENS wouldn't mind locating where the slag the target planet is at now. She can do that, you know." Drax waved a hand to where the bridge of the interstellar ship lay, slouching as much as he could in the oddly built chairs. His wing joints got in the way, making him rather intent on finding the ship new interior furniture if they kept using her as a mobile but securable meeting place. "When it's all over, some of us plan on galaxy hopping again. You can come with and find the mech then drag his frame home if need be."

Hesitating, the seeker peered suspiciously at him. "The window of opportunity for effectively rescuing Skyfire has closed."

"If he was stupid and kept himself online until his energy stores ran dry, yes. However, if he's as smart as you made him sound he would have put himself in stasis to prevent deactivation before you could return." The SPARTAN informed him dryly, reconfirming with Knightblade that such a thing was possible. "He'll probably be a little rusty and a bit dinged up from vorns of time spent with his frame sitting there, but he's probably still there."

"How would you know such a thing?" Starscream asked sourly, but even as he considered the possibility he figured if Skyfire had been worried he probably would have done just that. It didn't make the events that turned the seeker to the Decepticons any less infuriating, but less bitterly final for his old friend. "If you are not Cybertronian in nature?"

"Oh we are now, just not way back when. To answer your question, I have a link with the SPARTAN assistant of Perceptor of Crystal City. Who just reaffirmed the fact stasis-lock is an automatic emergency protocol every bot sent out past Cybertron's atmosphere possesses… also standard for military and most of the Autobots by the previous CMO's orders." He thought about it a bit more, then merely shrugged at the bewildered silver seeker. "If you don't wish to inform the ATHENS herself, you can ask Refit to calculate it for you. She's our old navigator, she's still got the programming for figuring that out. It'll just be one more slagging thing to do before we're done."

This had not been how Starscream had expected this to go. His confusion was apparent to his trine if not the two seeker council members and the new Air Commander, which irritated him slightly because Skywarp would snicker over it all later and Thundercracker would snort every slagging time the mech was brought up in conversation. It had been getting to the point the former scientist had wanted to somehow take over the Decepticon faction and simply go rescue his old mission partner himself, but that had been before a Praxian femme with more titanium in her alloy than normal dropped in on him and a handful of other seekers.

Additionally, while Starscream was sure he'd be a vast improvement over Megatron as the Leader of the Decepticon Armada he really only wanted to find Skyfire and protect the seekers from the ground pounders' expectations for their frame set. Which made him distinctly less than inclined to try for a power grab with a mech that was a veteran of the old Tarn gladiator games, because he really had little interest in ordering around the ground bound bots that made up the bulk of the Armada.

Then again, even Soundwave would be an improvement over Megatron. At least the former communications officer wouldn't deactivate his own troops for delivering bad news.

He decided to wait and see.

This seemed better than Megatron's Armada setup, at least more organized even if it was still in the early cycles. Then again, Megatron's Decepticon faction had seemed to be a better option than playing along and ignoring his seeker trine protocols like Sentinel Prime had expected of the newly returned and slightly desperate Starscream. That hadn't exactly worked out as he thought it should.

Drax seemed to be a much better mech than Thunderstrike, anyways. The SPARTAN seeker's trine was badly unbalanced, but they still worked around it like any trine would and seemed comfortable with each other. Compared to a possible Air Commander who deactivated his old trine for disagreeing with him, anything would be.

Starscream had a bit more time than he thought, anyways. He'd use some of it to see what would come of this, then make some plans if it didn't seem to be going his way.

(ooo000ooo)

"Not very typical, is Drax?"

Starscream gave Lightning a flat look, turning back to arranging a regular sweep of the decimated city.

Seekers were less vulnerable to the whims of terrain, and as the flying frame set of Cybertronians it was up to them to ensure their new base was secure against any reprisals from Megatron's faction of Decepticons. The former scientist wasn't too sure what was left of the Decepticon Armada, having seen most if not all the bots he would even remotely trust with a blaster here. Which would mean the ones Starscream would avoid just on principle were left with the ex-miner mech.

Unusually enough, he had yet to be ordered to do so.

"Why should they? You lead the seekers here."

The silver seeker gave the seeker council member another bland look. "That so called Lord Megatron felt it necessary to order such things instead of allowing us to arrange it. There are a few bots from Gygax itself here, I was expecting to be forced to do something to them if they thought they could merely step into that mech's role. I may not have been much of a match for the mech on the ground, and therefore forced to conform to such things, but I am less leery that I would be outmatched now with these bots."

"I have never understood why the frag you went with him, scraplet." Lightning claimed dryly, turning his attention back to the shallowest parts of the Tarn base. The level that neatly housed the seeker frame set was somewhat removed from the main halls of the base, and was built wider than the rest of what the older mech had seen so far. Conforming to the seeker claustrophobia, the ceiling in this part was almost high enough to allow Tigerstripe the helm space to not be able to reach the ceiling if he tried without thruster assistance. "Thunderstrike I understood. My old student was more than a little reckless and aggressive, you on the other servo? Why did you decide to seek refuge with that mech of all bots?"

Starscream set his data pad down, giving the council member his full attention. "Before that, I have a few queries for you. Were you aware Thunderstrike had arranged the deaths of his old trine or not?"

The older seeker's turbines stuttered as the mech gaped at him.

"Thought not. For my next question; had you not been displaced from Vos, would you have bothered escorting the Air Commander out here to meet with us?" The former scientist pressed on, heedless to the reaction his words elected from the other seeker. "I do have to wonder why it was you came out. Is it more than a little cramped in Iacon?"

"Just a bit, sure." Spotter, the slighter of the Air Commander's trine mates, informed him instead of Lightning. "Though it's not so bad now that half of what engineers and construction bots we've got are attempting to carve a new city out of the cliffs over the Iacon/Central highway. Whiteout and Lightning were ordered to come, though, for the point you're trying to reach."

Starscream gave the mech a slight nod, which caused the scout to continue on his way with a half-sparked salute in return. "My point being, you still seem to hold this conflict as merely a ground pounder squabble. It's not. We have just as much problem with the seeker council as the former Decepticon Armada has with the Ancient Council and the Autobot forces that tried to ensure they were unchanging over centivorns. Part of which, we are just as guilty of."

"There is nothing wrong with the seeker council."

"Yeah, there is." Drax refuted calmly as he wandered up to them, alerted by Spotter that the discussion was going on. "Mech's got a point, Lightning. Would you have bothered to come out here if I didn't order you to? Why the frag not? They are seekers, you're supposed to be the council they can go to if there's something seriously wrong. So what if that serious wrong was with either the Prime's orders or the supposed next Air Commander? Still something you should have dealt with… or at least listened to once if at all."

"I never heard a whisper of such things." Lightning defended himself, rather confused over how this had become a problem.

"Why didn't you?"

The older seeker paused, staring at the SPARTAN trine leader.

"Because you isolated yourself in Vos." Starscream informed him bitterly. "In a cage of steel and crystal of your own make, preventing those that should have access to air out problems from getting to you. When Sentinel Prime gave me orders that violated my seeker programming, you did nothing. Five to ten vorns after the fact a seeker that could arrange the deactivation of his own trine was still wandering around, and you were perfectly oblivious to what had occurred."

"I've heard Starscream's grievances, and so did you not a joor ago." Drax unhelpfully reminded the old seeker. "If that amount of gross abuse was allowed to go on, why are you surprised they sought a different way?"

"That's… slag it all." Lightning pressed one hand to his optic, running that view of things through his processor.

"That will not continue, I'll ensure it." The SPARTAN continued blandly. "You may not like it, but there will be changes. Starscream, I'm only halfway through talking to your seekers. It'll be another few joors before I'm done."

"Very well."

"Get together any extra you bots need, I've already placed an order for the oil and lubricants our frame set requires. But since it seems as if there will be a third supply run, Holdout agreed to ensure any frameset specific items are sent along. You can get it transmitted from any of my trine and the other SPARTANs if need be."

The Decepticon's seeker commander acknowledged that with a nod, getting up to seek out the other trine leaders for the bulk of what they would want requested.

\V/

Nitro hesitated, casting a glance to the general location Jackknife knew Simfur was in.

"Well? What's the score?" He prompted after a long silent moment, regaining the demolition specialist's attention.

"Simfur, as a whole, has decided as long as I conform to a few restrictions I may return." The SPARTAN informed the mech blandly. "More notably a tracking chip implanted in my systems, so every bot will know where the frag I'm at. Then a whole lot of other slag I'm sure will get me deactivated in short order, so… no."

The once former thieves' enforcer blinked at him, wondering if he was slightly horrified at the demand or pitying the city as a whole.

Ignoring his reaction, the Praxian twisted slightly to scan over the bots grouped together in a bar they pretty much single handedly kept running themselves. "Hell's Bells, you still want to enlist in the Autobots?"

The black and silver femme darted over to the cohort unit of Rook's, beaming at the mech. "Yes, why?"

"I'll take you there, then I've got a bit of traveling to do myself." Nitro informed her with a small smile. "If you have anything you want taken on to Trickflip or one-two-seven, I'll need it before we get you enlisted."

"Are you just going to abandon them all?" Jackknife asked, morbidly curious.

"Abandon? Frag no. They have decided they don't wish me to return, but don't have the alloy to claim it outright. Like Clearsight, I've decided it's not worth it." Giving him a small, dismissive flap of his doorwings, the Praxian picked up his cube of energon again to drain it. "I've got a friend there that will pack up my stuff, then I'm going to pitch in with a few others in their little plans."

Silverbell took only a short moment to realize what they were talking about, a disgusted rev of her engine informing both mechs of her opinion on the subject. "Well, screw them."

Nitro gave an almost unwilling laugh at that. "That's what Clearsight said about her city, too. Frag it all, femme, you've been hanging around us too much."

"You say that like it's a bad thing." The Autobot hopeful claimed airily, in a very good imitation of Rook. "I don't see the problem."

"The silver lining of this slag is, if I go replace Cinder out there she may get permission to come back quicker than we thought." The SPARTAN mech gave his drinking buddy a gamin grin. "Then you'll only have to deal with two moping Praxians and not three."

Jackknife gave him a flat stare. "You're a whole lot slagging better than that Enforcer mech or his brother. I'd rather deal with you grumbling than his depressive airs. He still glares at me for the fragging illegal things I used to do."

"Sucks to be you then, mech." Nitro slapped him on the back plates, getting up to follow Silverbell's route to her creators so they could give their goodbyes.

(ooo000ooo)

Axel gave the femme a shrug. "Why the slag are you surprised, anyways? Would you go along with all that they demanded of him?"

Roulette stiffened up, but after a moment she gave him a frustrated gesture instead. "The council said he could come back though, why not? I thought he was waiting on that."

"He was waiting to see what they would decide on, then if reasonable he would decide on what he wanted to do." Tossing more components into a shipping crate, the once former bounty hunter kicked the full bin over to the back of the store and dug out a new one to be filled from the stack of collapsed ones near the front. "Nitro, and the rest of those SPARTANs, wanted Simfur's measure before any decisions were made. Obviously, they've decided Simfur can managed themselves rather than submit one of their own to such… slagged up frag."

"Okay, so it's bad. I know it's bad, but they wouldn't listen to me when I tried to tell them that." The Enforcer scowled at him, stepping around the mech's work so she wouldn't be in the way. "But if Nitro doesn't put up with it, how are we supposed to know they won't do something-"

"Do something what? Like deactivate half the city in one off-cycle?" Axel asked, vocalizer setting dry enough to evaporate the acid sea. "He hasn't by now, why do you expect him to do it after all this? He was assigned Simfur to defend, not be discriminated by."

"It's not dis-"

"Yes, yes it is. You know it Roulette. This is what's wrong with Cybertron." Shoving an armload of parts at her, the mech snagged the crate closer to fill it up. "The fact bots think that's the proper response to a bot that has the loosest ties with the military living among them. You wouldn't put up with it, why expect him to?"

"Nitro's a war built."

"He never asked to be."

Roulette blinked at him.

Axel gave her a hard look of his own. "And you know what? That's why I became a bounty hunter in the first slagging place. My mech creator was prior military, he never managed to find respectable work after leaving the Cybertronian Military. The few options left to him was as a fragging junk sorter or something not strictly legal, and the not strictly legal option paid better."

"…not even the Enforcers?"

"Nope, he was too heavily programmed for military use for them."

She frowned slightly at his back plates. "I highly doubt-"

"Don't even. You were built for civilian function, so you never encountered that." Axel dumped the last of the Praxian's stock parts, idly wondering how the mech would have it all transported. SPARTANs, though, they tended to pull stupid slag and get away with it just because no other bot thought about it first. "When the Military was called back to Cybertron's surface, they found themselves stuck and without any bot willing to give them honest work for a decent wage. Why do you fragging think they all went to the one mech that gave them something to do in response when you all didn't even slagging bother to care?"

Roulette wondered, even after she finished helping the mech pack up the last of the SPARTAN's stock components, how much of that was true.

She wondered all the way back to her station, and reported the fact Simfur was about to be sans one military bot to her superiors.

Their reactions to her news was less than… ideal to her.

"Good," sniffed the Government worker that had asked her to attempt getting Nitro's answer out of his shop assistant, "one less thing to worry about."

"Excuse me sir, but we now have more things to worry about." The Enforcer femme corrected slowly. "Without Nitro, we're a little less than prepared for another Decepticon attack."

"I highly doubt such a thing will happen again." Rhodium gave her a less than impressed look for that. "Such things are now in the past, Enforcer, concentrate on your work."

Roulette gave her Station Chief a wide-optic look, causing him to heave a sigh.

"I know." The mech informed her lowly as they exited the conference room the bot had absconded with for his visit. "Any chance this Nitro mech left more explosives lying around?"

\V/

Although they sometimes kept to strange schedules, normally between cases the forensic teams usually held mostly stable habits.

Griz noted that Titan had been more than a little distracted already, but since the SPARTAN Enforcer kept up with what he and the rest of his team needed the lead investigator had ignored it. Once they had finished up with the little tasks needed of them until the next crime scene they needed to process, the older mech called Titan over.

The former SWAT Enforcer gave him a long look. "So far as we know, Simfur or Crystal City are next up as Decepticon targets. Simfur has also decided they didn't want their SPARTAN, as well. If something happens, I'll be called out to support either one. So will Quickgrip, but he'll likely be asked to try something for Simfur while I'll go to Knightblade's aid."

Wraith nearly tripped over the benches set up to prevent bots from tripping over each other, spinning around to get a good look at Tyger Pax's SPARTAN. "What?"

"Simfur and Praxus are still standing after Megatron's Decepticons have decided they need to fall. The mech's not going to ignore that they're still standing in defiance of that." The anti-armor assault specialist informed them both slowly, looking puzzled. "Why, if that's rather obvious to any bot with halfway working processors, would the bots in charge of Simfur decide to set unrealistic demands on Nitro if he wanted to return to their city?"

"Why wouldn't Praxus be attacked again, then, if you're sure Simfur will be for the same reason?" Griz asked instead of answering the mech right away.

"Rook trained up an army to respond even if she's not there." Titan shrugged, resuming his efforts to clear a streak of unknown fluid off his armor plating as he turned the issue over in his processors. "Additionally, those army bots are still there and don't look to want to move any time soon. Any attack would have to go through those bots first, and while they had the element of surprise the first time that's probably not going to happen again."

"Point." Acknowledged the older mech thoughtfully. "To answer your question, I do not know. Perhaps they feel safe enough now that their attack is over to not want a military built mech in residence?"

"But they're not." Titian insisted. "They might even be a high priority target because they survived an attack."

"That may not be how they see it."

The SPARTAN gave him a still confused look, but eventually shrugged. "Slag it all… I hope Quick's got a plan, then. Or Simfur's going to be the next city to fall."

Griz thought about that, even as Titan left for the cycle to pick up the youngling he was Guardian to.

Socially, he supposed he could see the point.

Not a lot of bots were comfortable with the SPARTANs, but the general take of Tyger Pax was more of an out of sight, out of processor type thing. Their SPARTAN Enforcer was less seen since he switched from SWAT to investigative criminal service, meaning most civilians of their own city didn't have to deal or have a way to deal with meeting the mech himself. Coming face to faceplate with Tyger Pax's own military built was less an orn to orn risk and more of a risk taken by bots less than strictly legal. Therefore acceptable, in a twisted kind of way Griz had been taking advantage of in their rare interrogations.

On the other servo, Simfur's SPARTAN had picked a civilian job class to work at. Nitro might not have lied, but learning the mech had the characteristics of a war build and you had previously dealt with him would be more than a little disturbing. It would explain why the backlash of the SPARTAN-Bot revelation was much worse for the Praxian SPARTAN there rather than the Enforcer one here.

Perhaps he should quietly spread word to Titan's old boss, to get the problem actually looked at instead of tolerated. At the very least, to get something set up for the eventuality of the next attack.

\V/

Refit couldn't keep them all contained, seeing as a few of the SPARTANs merely needed small repairs and only the two that had been in Gygax the longest needed major ones.

Galeforce had darted out to check on the seeker contingent, and hitch a ride with the ATHENS back to Central just to help both Holdout and Nitro load the ship for her next supply run. The 2IC of the SPARTAN-Bots had left Sunstreaker in charge of ensuring the little former AI's safety while he was gone, something the gold twin was content to do… or at least not complain about.

Trickflip, Cinder, and Orpheus had split off to check on the settling Cybertronians either making use of the new Tarn base or taking stock of what they still needed.

Sideswipe was faced with a choice of either getting impressed as a medic's aid or finding something else to do for the time being, and the silver swordmech chose to run while he could.

Which left Silentforce, as they had yet tracked down what system was slowly leaking and left it up to his auto-repair for the short term until Refit had a handle on the repairs needed to be conducted on the old military bots, and Shadowdancer as the only SPARTANs that still required repairs.

It was once Kynaite had decided to try figuring out where the red and black bodyguard was still leaking from that the Praxian femme spotted him. Leaving her youngling to the former bar bouncer's care, the tactician very calmly made her way across the busy med bay to where Hook had been corralled and impressed in helping the bots affected with rust rash treat their metals.

"Hook, right? I've a question, mech."

The Constructicon, who had many questions posed to him so far, responded in a bored tone. "Take a compressed crystal of oxalic acid and place it in water, wait for it to dissolve and then use it to remove the rust buildup."

"Not quite my problem, thanks."

Hook turned to brush off the bot talking to him, but ended up gripped by the throat cables and smashed into his worktable by a very irritated looking Praxian femme.

"Now that I have your attention… you wouldn't happen to have done a few illegal upgrades to sparklings for a few extra credits, right?" Shadowdancer gave him a very pointed, red optic look, then gestured to the youngling currently halfway into Silentforce's systems. "Like say the sparkling of a gladiator mech named Granite?"

"Sounds familiar?" Trying, and failing, to remove the claws currently buried in his vulnerable neck, Hook attempted to get some bot's attention who would take the femme's attention off him. "What's the problem, anyways?"

"You screwed up, that's what." She informed him blandly. "He's retained a bit of processor damage from the bot that decided he was better suited to tinkering with a sparkling's systems than a medically programmed one. I have an issue with that."

"Then it couldn't have been me, I don't screw up." Hook sharply informed her in return, a bit more than just annoyed. "If I would have done something like that, I would have taken the time to do it right. I'm not the bot you're looking for."

"But you did upgrade Granite's sparkling for him, yes?"

The Constructicon hesitated at that question. "Err… yeah?"

Shadowdancer nodded almost pleasantly, but her claws tightened their grip on him. "And since said sparkling later came into my care, with said processor damage from an illegal upgrade, that would mean whatever resulted was in effect something you did. Right?"

"…possibly?"

"Glad we could clear that up." The Praxian claimed, then slammed him helm first into the slab of metal he had been working off of.

Then she did it again, rendering the mech unconscious.

"Shadow'! Stop knocking the bots I have helping me off-line!" Refit scolded as she made her way over, frowning at the tactician. "There are only so many of them, and I fragging need the help."

"Very sorry, 'fit." Shadowdancer claimed cheerfully, dropping Hook's insensible frame to crash into the ground with indifference. "But we had a bit of a difference of opinion about sparklings and the proper working order of their processors."

The medic blinked her optics at the 3IC, then glanced to where Kynaite was happily busy with the defensive strategist's systems. "Oh. Well… you solved it, yes?"

"Sure, as long as he doesn't do it again."

"Good, then stop making more work for me."

Shadowdancer gave her a shrug-flap of her remaining doorwing. "Very sorry, again. By the way, Nitro's coming down to help. He's not much better trained, but at least he'll make up for Hook being… incapacitated."

\V/

The first signs of whatever Megatron would do in response was a number of the mines Nightstalker had scattered on the very edges of Tarn's ruined city limits going off.

Greenlight, fresh from hammering out how this Decepticon faction would be run, was less than pleased to hear that. "They can't have known where the slag we went, unless some bot's stupidly helping them along."

"Before we start hunting for a traitor that may not be there, among a number of bots that might as well be called traitors in the first place," Orpheus interjected dryly, "let's be sure they're headed this way and not just testing the outer limits. Give these bots time to sort themselves out, it'll be easier to hunt through them that way."

"Point." The former Ancient Council member acknowledged, scanning the third level of the Tarn base and the still confused sprawl of bots finding their way to assigned quarters or where their usual partners in crime were located. "Now, who to send."

"Seekers. They're faster than any bot over land and can remain out of range if need be."

Grimacing, the femme cast a glance upwards where the seeker contingent was thought to be. "I hate dealing with seekers."

"Allow me." The assassin offered easily, a grin as slick as oil plastered across his faceplate. "I know a few."

"Be gone, then." She informed him, already distracted from his presence. "Barricade! I would like to speak with you."

Orpheus blinked at her back plates, but did take the excuse to leave the press of the third level even if he didn't have to move just to talk to his fellow SPARTANs.

{What, exactly, am I looking for?} Spotter asked of their 3IC as he headed up to reach the surface.

{A concentration of bots waiting for further orders. If it's just scouts that ran afoul of Nightstalker's mines, there should be spots of avoidance around the old city limits.} Shadowdancer informed him slowly. {Aren't you a recon scout? You should know how that goes.}

{Yeah, but after you taking the CO to task about Cybertronian not human methods, I'd figure I should at least double check.}

{…do Decepticons have standard operating procedures?} Galeforce asked idly, double checking the ATHENS' systems for another supply run to hit Central and Simfur. The stealth shields were already enabled, but if it looked to be a raiding party and not merely bots looking for them he would take the ship into the sky to lead off any pursuit. {It never really seemed as if they did up in Iacon.}

{Not so much as SOP as you're expected to fulfill whatever order to the best of your ability.} Orpheus informed them all, as the still sole Decepticon in the SPARTAN-Bot unit he had the best experience with Decepticon orders. {So think… moronic, half-trained scouts. What would they do?}

{Preferably, run into a few hundred mines and leave us the frag alone.} Spotter suggested dryly as he took off to observe the bots teasing the edges of Tarn.

Shadowdancer sighed heavily as she took that into account. {That will not stand. I refuse to be part of a military outfit with no slagging clue how to conduct at least the basics of another job class.}

{The old military bots could probably do with a refresher course in a few things too.}

{You are not helping, one-four-four.}

Sighing as Silentforce took over for her in the argument the assassin wanted to pick, the Praxian femme turned to Soundwave. "How did it go, anyways?"

"Unit Greenlight: Base Commander. Unit Starscream: Seeker Commander. Unit Bludgeon: Director of Base Services. Unit Soundwave: Military Commander."

"Mmm, interesting." She considered it for another moment, tapping a half recalled rhythm on her repair berth. "You may wish to add one more to that, to break any stalemates that might occur. A CMO, probably, once we actually have one."

Soundwave inclined his helm to where the SPARTANs' medic was fluttering around, rapidly going through what wire she had on her to repair a few of the worst off old military mechs.

"She's not Decepticon. Furthermore, 'fit's still got a few more vorns on her apprenticeship to go. Until then, she's based out of the Iacon med bay as the senior apprentice of the Autobots' CMO."

"Inquiry: Distance from Iacon?"

"We're her medical mastery project, outlining the differences between human and Cybertronian and how our systems translated over." Shadowdancer informed him, giving a half a shrug for his stare. "What? She's SPARTAN and it's being done with our approval. It needed to be done, anyways. There was also a bit of a programming error she went out to deal with in us, but that's pretty much dealt with now."

(ooo000ooo)

The second sign was near Crystal City.

Knightblade was less than impressed at getting their latest direction for research interrupted for some other scientist's questions, and even less amused when the first alerts rang out.

This couldn't have been a planned on raid, given that neither Shadowdancer nor Orpheus knew of it before they absconded with a large number of Decepticons last cycle. Meaning probably badly led, directionless forces with very little coherence of whatever reasoning this attack had.

Perceptor cut his conversation with the other mech short, turning to see what was going on.

Since his living quarters was part of a crystal tower complex, they had a very good view of the surrounding landscape through the thinner parts of the opaque outer walls. Due to the height, they also could see as far as their optical pickup stretched.

Wheeljack was pretty sure Knightblade's optics picked up detail much farther than his own, something he had never asked about because Perceptor's living quarters sometimes cause him vertigo when he didn't watch where he was going. He turned to ask her about how many bots that was, but trailed off when he realized she wasn't in the room anymore. "Err… Percy? Where's Knight'?"

The scientist turned again to locate his assistant, who came out of her berth room carrying a very long, very sleek looking rifle. "Here, 'jack. Do me a favor and stay in, yeah?"

"You're not actually going to go down there, are you?" The inventor questioned nervously, glancing back to where the supposed Decepticon forces were amassing.

"Nope. I don't have to." She informed him dryly as she ensured her sniper rifle was loaded and she had extra acid pellets. "I'm a sniper, and we live in a tower. Those bots are already in my reach, there's no reason to go and wander into theirs."

"Knightblade-"

"They get three warning shots, Percy."

"Be that as it may, I must request non-lethal shots if at all possible. If what you have reported from the conversation between your fellows is accurate as Shadowdancer strikes me as being, then a solution would be easily worked out if we have the afflicted subjects at servo. Bearing that in processor, if we are to find a solution to the question your cohort sister has posed we require them still functioning."

His assistant considered that and him for a long moment. "Percy, in order to get them to stop if they are as heedless to the risks as suggested I'm going to have to shoot them. It's easier to shoot once through the helm or where the spark chamber is located than trying for two or three shots to render a bot immobile, especially in this number. If they get in the city, it will be harder for me to safely snipe them. Instead I'll have to risk my own spark getting in close range, and I'm not the best at close-quarters combat."

"We have Enforcers, Knightblade, who should take such burdens on themselves as long as the number of threats are reduced to a more manageable scale. Are you professing you cannot do as I asked of you?"

Knightblade gave him a flat look for that slight dig. "I can, but I wonder if you know what it is you're asking for. Ponder this Percy, who's going to fix them once it's over? Or will they be ignored, to deactivate as they will on the outskirts of the city as long as they do not threaten it's civilians at all? So far as we've seen, the latter is more likely than the former."

Wheeljack rubbed the underside of his battle mask as he watched the door close behind her. "Err… Percy? She didn't seem all that… pleased."

"I am aware I have somewhat impaired the relations between us," the older mech informed him rather tartly if the inventor was any judge of the mech, "and my request was both impertinent, due to my lack of interest in military expertise in refuting invasion attempts and being not of the armed command she normally adheres to, and insulting to her personally. Beyond that, my request was more for the aid of their publicly accepted opinion. They, and the rest of the military inclined fellows across Cybertron, will not perceive mass deactivation as a deterrent; the less inclined will protest such views. When she returns, I will clarify the reasoning I have for such a request."

"And you heard her, she's a sniper." Wheeljack pointed out just to be annoying, because she was a friend of his too. "If those bots get into the city, she'll go to help the Enforcers round them up. Long distance she might have the advantage, but in close-quarters she's more likely to come to harm."

Perceptor flatly frowned at him. "I am aware of that, and that my request has a marginal chance to impair her significantly."

(ooo000ooo)

Knightblade spent most of the short breem running up the tower Perceptor lived within cursing out stubborn scientifically inclined mechs, then reached the balcony spot she knew would give her the greatest range with her rifle's scope. She might have to move eventually, there were taller towers around, but this would do for now.

Alerting Titan and Quickgrip was matter of fact, they were the closest cities with SPARTANs nearby. Shadowdancer, probably bored out of her processor waiting on the parts, poked for a view of what she was up against but thankfully remained silent. Warcry acknowledged the warning and started connecting to bots on his end, ensuring the sniper would have some assistance from his own city.

Epsilon was the current Enforcer Chief of Crystal City as a whole, and knew the femme herself slightly if not personally. She did appreciate the helms up before the sniping started in order to warn her own bots so they didn't panic.

It was the first time Knightblade would be using the acid pellets in her 99D-S2 sniper rifle that wasn't short range accuracy testing. She might have the Cybertronian variation of sniping protocol, but her human habits persisted. Those also proved correct, as human habits compensated for gravity's pull and not the Cybertronian ones unless you had them patched for such things.

There were drawbacks to kicking all the military bots off planet, a slight adjustment phase needed for space developed tactics included.

Knightblade had three shots to true her sights, and while her first shot pulled too far down her second one neatly clipped the rocks nearby the lead bot in charge down there. She waited a beat, but when it seemed as if the lead mech was content to ignore it as a random if close shot she instead shot out the guts of the battered Neutron Assault Rifle the mech held.

If the acid splashed across his finger joints… oh well.

There was finally a pause as the ragged Decepticon group took in the fact some bot with a sniper rifle and acid pellets had no problem with shooting at them, during which Knightblade sighed and reloaded both her clip and set up a few more within easy grabbing distance.

When the Decepticons charged, intent on getting within the city's glittering gates and off the open plains of crystal studded rock formations, the sniper started shooting in earnest.

Half her processor on her almost automatic acquire target, shoot, and change target; she counted down the number of pellets she had and compared it to about how many bots she had yet to deal with.

She might have had enough… had Perceptor not asked what he did of her.

(ooo000ooo)

"What the frag is Megatron processing?"

"Is he processing? There's a question for you." Trickflip answered the Praxian femme that posed the question.

"I know it's tempting to simply label the mech cracked up the wrong way, but that will just get us all killed so can it. He is smart, smart enough to split Cybertron in half with a few vorns of work." Shadowdancer reminded him sourly. "But we've got a large group of bots milling about up there, and there's a section of bots storming Crystal City's gates. That's… probably all of Polyhex between us and Knight'. One, where is the Gygax contingent? And two, where in the fragging Pits is Megatron himself?"

{Did we not plan on a reprisal for this?}

"We planned on a few cycles of confusion first." The tactician corrected Silentforce, scowling off in the direction of Gygax itself. "Simply because the sheer amount of bots we just made away with is partially some of his command chain."

"Think he's trying to cover any mass defection up?" Cinder posed after a long, silent moment processing that. "If the Gygax bots question where their bots are, he can just say they got deactivated and not be forced to admit they refused to follow him anymore. Same would be true for the Polyhex bots."

Shadowdancer merely allowed her engine to hum as she considered that. "Or maybe… what's the closest city to Polyhex? Central?"

"Err… yeah. If you discount Kaon and what remains of Vos." Processing that, the infiltrator gave her a strange look. "Are you thinking distraction?"

"Why not? It's not like Megatron ever really cared for the sparks of the bots that looked to him. What would he care for how many are deactivated as long as he could bring down one of those cities that are thought to be able to stand against him? If it just so happens to cover up the dissention in his ranks, so much for the better."

"Wouldn't he go after Simfur or Praxus in that case?" Countered the saboteur, still going stiff even as she suggested her old city as a possible target. "Not an Autobot held…"

"Fortress, like Central City or Iacon itself?" Shadowdancer finished for her dryly. "What would be a better target for a mech that just got dissed by what he probably assumes are Autobot sympathizers?"

There was another long moment as the SPARTANs tried to counter that argument.

Finally, the Praxian femme sighed. "Sideswipe, Sunstreaker. I'm afraid this is it, mechs. Take Refit up to Galeforce and the ATHENS, when you get to Central City leave the ship in Nitro's servos and join with the Autobot base there. If nothing happens, or after everything is done with, report back to Warcry for further assignments."

The medic in question spun around, ready to protest, but the femme who ordered her removal shook her helm.

"Don't, 'fit. You've already overrun the time limit set by Ratchet for this already. Although we appreciate you tackling the worst of the repairs, we should be able to muddy through without an actual medic for a few decacycles. If you can, get Ratchet and Xenon to help and select us a semi-competent medic to send back sometime soon. We'll greatly appreciate it."

"Who's going to install your doorwing if I leave, Shadow'?" Refit demanded, rather irritated at getting the boot this late into ensuring the bots her SPARTANs had saved would treat them right.

"Nitro's done installs and un-installs for at least a vorn. My frame brother probably won't mind fixing me up the rest of the way, and you can peer over his shoulder joints even better on the up-link than you could trying to peek over his doorwings." Shadowdancer informed her dryly, giving her a slight push to where the twins were waiting on her. "Go, or you'll delay Gale' and by association Hold' next shipment."

Drax, who had opted for listening into the conversation via the tactical up-link rather than go farther underground that he was comfortable with, spoke up next. {Three-four-one, do you want us to go or not?}

{If you are done with your seekers, then yes. You've got the best range in case of the worst, next to the ATHENS herself. Just be careful not to allow two-six-zero to be spotted… or those two others you brought with you.}

Shadowdancer then gave her youngling a considering look, where he was perched on Silentforce holding his leaking secondary valve pump together, but opted to refrain from adding that stress on top of her fellow SPARTANs for the time being.

If a Decepticon base wasn't ideal for raising a youngling, neither was an Autobot base. Nor would she ask Clearsight to care for him for a bit, given the rather ugly mood her city had to anything SPARTAN so far. Given how it worked out, she would either be forced to ask Cinder to take him to Praxus and allow him to develop there… or more preferably ask Knightblade to take him in for a vorn or so.

Titan was a possibility, but heaping another youngling on him when he already had Bumblebee wouldn't be nice of her. Additionally, the mech was very evasive over his city's reception to him and that might just happen to go the same way Simfur decided on going in response to their SPARTAN in residence.

Besides, if the scout femme formally got asked to leave Shadowdancer had another request for her instead of allowing the socially shy femme to keep slinking around the edges of Cybertronian city life.

Where was Alpha Trion, anyways?

To make it worse, if that mech had something quite like a book file that predicted the future and a reality bending writing stylus then what the ever loving frag were SPARTANs doing on Cybertron… and why in the Pits did that mech not show up in the last vorn to meddle or lecture or whatever an ancient Autobot archivist did when their home was invaded by formerly alien creatures of another galaxy?