The Energon Pub

Autobase Nu - Medical Bay

Once they had gotten Forte set up, Brewer finally answered, trying to think of to right words to say before then. "She's known for losing her temper on simple conditions. Bots that don't know her or aren't close enough to her more than likely don't know that he special ability is the cause of it, though. I'm sure she would have told you if the two of you were alone somewhere in deep conversation," he stared at the fembot's battered face.

With a deep intake of breath, the green mechanoid continued, "Forte use to have control of her Bezerker mode, but a battle knocked it out of whack. None of the medics noticed it, and neither of us thought it was worth the trouble of checking her circuitboard. But is began to grow, and she was more and more easily ticked off at things." A smile grew on his face as a tiny laugh escaped Brewer, "She especially didn't like to be called 'short' in any fashion. I guess her little glitch is really taking a toll on her now."

His optics looked back to Archangel, knowing he understood. All that Brewer needed in response was the action of getting Forte fixed.

Launch Bay

Air Raid returned Skydives glance and then followed him towards the Launch Bay. "Don't worry Skydive I got your back in the air." Air Raid exclaimed.

Autobase Nu - Command Center

From his work station where he continued to compile the far-too substantial list of Autobot losses, Prowl glanced up at Juggernaut. Though he might never be as companionable a mech as Springer nor a paternal figure like Optimus--nor even cantankerously avuncular like Kup or Ironhide--he was not completely oblivious to the needs of those who served under him. He recognized, too, that those needs often extended beyond the requirement for spare parts, energon, ammunition, and direction. His dedication to logic and to the larger picture in general might mean he could never fully participate in those aspects of daily life among the Autobots, but that did not mean he did not understand. Or care.

"No, Juggernaut," he replied. "If there's something else you need to see to, then consider yourself off-duty for the time being. I'll let you know if anything changes."

The incoming transmission from the Repair Bay was about what he had been expecting, too. Minerva was a competent and capable engineer, but as prickly as any other mech that had ever presided over the aftermath of one of Cybertron's seemingly unending string of battles. But at least she wasn't constantly raiding the high-grade energon, like Ratchet.

>>Do you have all the assistance you need?>If your patients are getting unruly, I may be able to scrape together some kind of security detail to make them stay put. And please don't worry. I'm not going to be letting any 'Bot off the base before they've passed a maintenance examination and refueled.<< Honestly. This wasn't his first day on the job, either. What was it about engineers that made them assume everyone else must be only semi-competent by definition?

. . . probably the having to constantly chase down overeager, half-demolished soldiers trying to rush back into the fight, actually. He didn't envy them that job.

Autobase Nu - Access Point Alpha

"Primus' boron compressor!" Kup exclaimed as the enormously broad form of Orpheus walked into the Access Point. "They're making 'em big these days...don't they realize there's an energon crunch on? Well, at least we're going out there with some serious muscle."

He looked around the Access Point and noticed one other Autobot arriving, just as he was about to give the order to depart. "Getaway, you old indestructible brick on wheels. Glad you could make it, in case I need someone to take cover behind," he joked with the strategist.

"All right. Five's a good round number. Transform and roll out, Autobots!"

Transforming into truck mode, Kup headed for the Access Point's exit onto Nova Cronum's highway grid.

Medical Bay

>>Understood, Kup... lousy ol'... oops, com-link's st-->>

"Heh, hope he didn't hear that one," Springer chuckled, turning his attention back to Minerva. He wasn't surprised at all when he heard her question. "Aww, c'mon Minerva babe. You know I'd never hide anything from you. How's the repair going? I can be a pretty patient 'bot, so don't push yourself too much there."

Autobase Nu ~ Medbay

As soon as Forte was placed on the table, Archangel set to work on her injuries, starting with the chest wound that looked to be the root of her incapcitated state. Most of the initial work was finishing up what the field medics had started, but it wasn't long before the serious damage had to be fixed. As he worked, Archangel listened in silence to Brewer, going through what he knew of Forte's history and her unfortunate affliction, nodding occasionally, but not looking up at the S&R Specialist.

However, when Brewer mentioned Forte's dislike having her size mocked, Archangel had to smile, and finally looked up at the green 'Bot before replying "I remember one time Slingshot mentioned something about her height, she almost ripped that blowhard's wings off, and he would've deserved it.."

The young Medic paused as he grabbed a plasma torch from the tool tray next to him "..In regards to her bezerker condition, I was hoping to have a little look around to see if anything was out of place while we were fixing her up, but looking at her now, I think it'll be best to leave that until she's well on the road to recovery and able to talk about it..." Archangel paused once more as he looked to Brewer, tilting his head slightly "..Has she ever said much about getting rid of it altogether, or has she come to live with it?"

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Autobase Nu ~ Access Point Alpha

Orpheus just grinned as Kup exclaimed his surprise at his arrival. He wasn't entirely sure what he meant by his words, but the young warrior did understand the order to rollout, and wasted no time transforming into his truck mode and following his veteran counterpart out onto the highway leading out of the base.

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Auotbase Nu ~ Launch Bay

Silverbolt had arrived just after his 4 teammates at the launch bay, and he was already picking up Kup's signal, telling him that the ground patrol had just left "OK, lets go team, the ground patrol has just left the base, it's time we joined them. Standard formation once we're in the air, and I'm sure I don't need to remind you that this is a simple patrol mission, we are not to initiate any kind of hostilities" Silverbolt finished before transforming and taking off.

From Autobase Nu ~ Access Point Alpha onto Nova Cronum's highway grid.


Seb-Zero looked quickly at Wheelbar, They were going as is. He transformed into his handsome black and silver wolf form, through mass displacement technologies his size was greatly diminished. He could have easily rode in the back of one of his fellow bots. He waited a moment for his new friend to transform and Sub-Zero hoped he would not be to slow in his wolf form. He padded lightly towards the exit tail wagging. As an after thought he silently wished The Medics good luck, especially Archangel’s project. Though he would not disturb them with a silly message. The wolfbot had become quite fond of the diverse crew he had met after the siege. Perhaps when he returned he would share his thoughts with them. He started out the door at a lope, he could feel the lasers beneath his skin of armor pulsing as he moved. Secretly he hoped he would not need to use them, he really did not enjoy going into stasis lock out in the field.

“Wheelbar, do you think we’ll find anything?”

Zero needed to fill the silence as he followed Kup. His metallic paws tapping a rhythm upon the ground.

From Autobase Nu ~ Access Point Alpha onto Nova Cronum's highway grid.

WheelBar transformed into his cybertronian Truck form. He stopped for a second, gazing at Sub-Zero. He had never seen anything like it. His friend's alternate mode looked completely alien to him, but at the same time, really cool!
WheelBar snapped back to reality as he heard his comrade's question.

"I dunno, there's all kinds of things out there, but with all the big guys we got here I bet we could handle anything coming our way."

WheelBar noticed that Sub-Zero's alt. form did not have wheels, and he wondered if he could keep up.

"Need a lift?" WheelBar asked as he skidded up infront of Sub-Zero, letting him have a chance to jump into the bed of his vehicle mode.

Medical Bay

Springer quickly remembered Skywatch. He turned with a snapto face the confused Autobot again.

"So tell me," he said to Skywatch, "do you actually remember anything about what's going on? What's the last thing you have in your data tracks? Minerva, that tickles."

"Like I said, " Skywatch replied "I was carrying a mixed hazardous cargo Polar-bound on the Binary Highway, heading to the Unimatrix reprocessing plant..then...here. This is all very...wrong." The confused autobot pauses then gestures at the room "Everythings so...dingy..patched..not well powered...and my chasis...it's wrong." He gestures at the missile pod on his shoulder "I'm not a combat model..so where'd this come from..and my mass distribution is off. Whats going on " he asks for the third time of Springer and Minerva

Autobase Nu - Medical Bay

Listening and watching, Brewer thought to himself to argue with Archangel's suggestions. Forte hardly talks about her glitch to anyone. I barely know enough. All of my information came from guesses... He was about to grab a tool to begin helping out getting wounds healed faster, but the medic interrupted with a question that disturbed Brewer when the answer automatically appeared in his databanks.

"It's sort of an in-between thing for her. If Forte had learned to live with it, I'm sure she wouldn't get into all this trouble," he couldn't help but chuckle a bit at that one. "But no, I couldn't give an exact answer for either-or on that question." The Search and Rescue Specilist grabbed his micro flat-head screw-driver and a pair of his smallest plyers, starting his work on some other more secondary dangerous wounds. "Let me know if you need any help on that. It looks like you have it, though."

Autobase Nu - Medical Bay

‘If it tickles then it means it’s working, which means your all done Springer.’ Minerva said to the triple changer, ‘Off you go now and play nice with the other robots.’
Prowl’s message came thorugh on the comm., Minerva scanned the room, now clear bar those working on Forte
‘Negative Prowl, all bots are repaired, but just check their energized, the last thing I need is for some young bot to charge into battle without sufficient energon.’
Minerva turned off the comm. link and sat down next to Skywatch the effort of repairing so many damaged bot’s taking it’s toll, truth be told, she didn’t have the power to hold herself upright, now that she was out of patients, she realised she had pushed herself to far.
‘Springer could you get me some energon, I can’t seem to make my legs work’
Minerva smiled weakly on the verge of collapsing.

From Autobase Nu ~ Access Point Alpha onto Nova Cronum's highway grid.


Sub-Zero Grinned,
"Sure buddy. I could use a ride. I'm not quite s speedy as I used to be, before I was 'gifted' with this oh so wonderful alt mode."

Zero didn't say it but there was a hint of his dislike of the shortcomings of his alt mode. With ease he leaped into the bed of Wheelbar's truck mode. Looking quite like a dog going for a ride in his master's vehicle. He did well fighting other beast mode Transformers but as far as travel he was lacking in many ways.

"Roll out!"

Zero laughed, and grinned.

Medical Bay

"Good to know," Springer said, getting up. "Thanks."

The wear on his armor, the toll his body's taken, the fit of his weapons, the peace he's describing... Skywatch must have been knocked back a few, no, countless vorns.

But Minerva caught Springer's attention just after he got up.

"Just, hold that thought, again," he said to Skywatch. "Uh, on second thought, maybe think about letting your cerebrocircuits go on fast forward for awhile."

The triplechanger began making a mess of the medbay as he looked around for some excess supplies.

Energon, energon... where is it?

"Hah, there you are," said Springer, holding up a storage container of some spare energon. "And you thought you could hide from me. See Minerva, I think I could really do this job. Uh, exactly how much do you need? Heh, here, you take it. Anything can be dangerous with me sometimes."

"But I really don't know who needs more help, you or amnesiabot," the triplechanger chuckled. "Really, it seems like we gotta get some tracking system on his memory circuits. Either that, and I hate to break it to you, or you have one last job to do."

Auotbase Nu - Launch Bay

Air Raid transformed into a black jet, powering up his engines a massive sonic boom echoed across the launch bay as he took off into the sky, flying underneath Silverbolt and to the left of him, covering his leg flank as the Aieralbots started there Patrol.

"Roger that Silverbolt." Air Raid exclaimed in response to his orders.

Autobase Nu - Launch Bay

Skydive ran forward, ran straight through the doors of th launch bay to the outside world. He watched as the skies of Cybertron receded into tall buildings in the distance, and tall buildings into smaller buildings. He was plummeting. He stood there, perfectly relaxed, falling. Many of his fellow Cybertronians would panic. Many other Cybertronians would try desperately to get back to the base. But then, most other Cybertronians wouldn't go walking off a high platform either... He closed his eyes and allowed himself to transform into a sleek silver-white jet. After gaining some altitude, he started to fly directly port of Air Raid.

Highway Grid

As the Autobot scouting party rolled along the elevated highways of Nova Cronum, Kup set up his commlink to do what he had described earlier to Silverbolt. Once his was set correctly, he raised his voice to speak to the other Autobots.

"All right, listen up," he called to them as he rattled along in his somewhat dated-looking truck mode. "Synchronize your commlinks and internal clocks with mine and set an automatic radio squelch for five-minute intervals." Hope I didn't lose anyone already... "The Aerialbots have their commlinks set to receive that squelch every five minutes. If they don't get it from all of us for some reason, like a 'Con ambush knocking one of us out of commission, they'll come running."

He waited for the others to do the same. It was a simple task, and shouldn't have taken more than a few astroseconds, but you never knew with these newer models.

Highway Grid

WheelBar set is internal clock to the correct time, setting the automatic radio squelch to the specified time. Seemed easy enough. He was glad that they were doing this, at least he knew someone had their back in case of an attack.

WheelBar spoke to his compatriate, who seemed to be enjoying the free ride. "Did you get all that?"

Highway Grid


“Absolutely …… done and done.”
He had already set his functions according to Kup’s orders.

As he rode he turned on his elite sensory equipment one by one, visuals, Auditories, Tracking systems, Pathfinder, and Tactile sensors within the bottoms of his metallic pads. He was truly the enhanced robotic version of a Dire-Wolf. He scanned the surrounding areas they drove ready to alert Kup to anything out of the ordinary.

As they zoomed along Zero spoke to Wheelbar in a serious tone.

“Wheelbar, if things get interesting I’ve got your back. My sensors are on and I’ll be tuned in to your signal as well as the team’s, OK.”

He was sure that if something did happen his fellow bot could more than handle himself, but it made Zero feel better to voice his thoughts. He continued to monitor the passing scenery. For some reason the optimistic always-cheerful Sub-Zero felt this was going to be more than a simple mission. He could not explain why. Silently he listened to Kup's last instructions.

Highway Grid

"And I've got your back as well Sub-Zero. We all do." WheelBar voiced back to his friend.

The tension seemed to mount as they proceeded on the roadway. He wasn't used to it, so he didn't know how to react. He wasn't frightened, so he figured he needed to just stay cool and keep a level head. At least that's what his training had told him, and so far following the textbook had worked out.

Highway Grid

The open road.

Or at least as open as the road got these days.

Much better.

Getaway would take these clear skies and endless horizons over being couped up in a bunker all cycle any day of the week. He was built to be on the move, it was in his servos and it pumped through his veins as naturally as energon, even if being in the open like this these days meant painting a sizable target on your chassis. It was an acceptable risk however, it was in his spark to cruise the highways, to burn rubber, beside, as Kup had so delicately pointed out, Getaway was pretty much a brick when it came to absorbing punishment.

If anyone could survive out here in No Mans Land it was him.

The Kids in the back were another story.

>>"You sure its a good idea to bring Playgroup along with us Kup?"<<

Getaway opened the private link with the unit commander. He realized of course, compared to the old timer at the front, just about everyone alive today was Playgroup to him, including the veteran Getaway. Still, he imagined the senior mech knew what he was getting at.

Highway Grid

Skydive broke away from his fellow Aerialbots and did a triple barrel roll-dive towards the Autobots moving along the highway. Remaining low over them, his optical sensors focused on the road ahead. Things had been going smoothly so far. Unusually smoothly. What was going on?

Highway Grid

Air continued on patrol, following Silverbolt postioned perfectly on his leaders flank, glancing down below he saw Skydive descend lower towards the grid. Air Raid himself started a slow descent approaching the hard deck falling along Skydives left side. "Alot more quiet than I expected." Air Raid exclaimed to Skydive.

Highway Grid

"I'd been expecting something to happen as well. It's too quiet, knowing the Decepticons." His optical sensors zoomed in on a section of the grid ahead, and then quickly scanned the area around it. "Doesn't look like there's a land-based ambush. But we should probably keep a close check on the air." He had begun to fall near the back of the convoy now. "Hey, Kup, how are things on your end?"

Medical Bay

Minerva smiled as Springer passed her the energon container, she drank gratefully and feeling better, stood up. She stared at the room, Springer’s systematic destruction of the storage compartments had barely made the place any messier. Hearing his opinion on Skywatch Minerva turned to Springer

‘Thank you Springer, I’ll be all right now. I’m going to have a chat with are friend her and see what I can do for him. Now get your behind to the front line and stop anyone else entering this room in stasis lock. Got it?’

Minerva gave Springer a pat on the shoulder then turned towards Skywatch

‘Now tell me everything that happened to you before you blacked out.’