Transformers #6 - Lost and Found

Transformers #6

"Lost and Found"

Written By Karl V.

"Prowl, was that guy just leaving in a black Porsche?" Ambassador Cullen had seen the race car zoom out with the radio blaring, as he entered the main bridge of the Ark.

Prowl lifted a few faceplates, the equivalent of a human smile. "Yes, that was Jazz. And, he had one of the mutants with him {Bishop #4 for details-KV}. The mutant may have a lead on one of our missing comrades."

The Ambassador couldn't help the opportunity. "Ah, I see. Interesting how you use that Russian colloquiums. I suggest you update your speech program before General Preston thinks your being controlled by the Russkies."

Prowl laughed, while surprising Cullen by doing so. "Your language seems to take words from several different others, sometimes modifies them, and claims it as it's own. A rather inefficient use of language if you ask me. And, I already uploaded data about your old 'Cold War' so I got your joke."

"That's simply amazing. Anyway, I came not as the Ambassador of your people, but as one of Canada."

Prowl detected Cullen's serious demeanor. "If it's bad news, don't bother. I doubt the Decepticons would follow any restrictions placed on us by any human government."

Cullen nodded. "I know, it's not that. I've been asked if you would be willing to update the current Weapon X project. I haven't been told much, except it's yet another thing that uses your stolen technology for it's own purpose."

"Your wars and the weapons you use are your own business. However, I can not condone the use of Autobot technology for the express use of killing humans. I'll dispatch an operative as soon as one is available to retrieve this Weapon X and any other Autobot technology." Prowl tapped a few buttons on the console, which gave orders to the unidentified agent.

Cullen bowed his head and gulped. He knew the possibility of losing trust would be a risk. "For what it's worth, I'm sorry I had to ask."

"No offense Ambassador, but I know you are just the...messenger boy. I still place a lot of trust in you, because you seem to be the only one not trying to gain something out of or from us." Prowl's audio sensors picked up a radio beep.

"Thanks, I appreciate it. Is that your phone?" The Ambassador was at a loss for the proper word.

Prowl nodded. "In a manner of speaking, it's much like your cellular phone. Except the frequency we use isn't potential harmful to any organic creatures."

Prowl put up the visual screen, as it displayed Wheeljack, Ratchet, and five huge oddly shaped metallic creatures.

"Dinobots?" Cullen mused.

Prowl looked down at the human. "How's that again Ambassador?"

"Oh, those metallic things look like Robotic Dinosaurs. I'd bet Steven Spielberg would love to get his hands on them."

Wheeljack overheard Cullen's voice on the communication link. "Well, inform Mr. Spielberg that the Elite won't be available to him at all. We need them first."

Prowl tried to hide his great elation. "I'm sure it was another figure of speech by the human Wheeljack. What's the news on the Elite's condition?"

"We don't know quite yet." Wheeljack euphemized as much as he could. "We need to get them to the repair bay as soon as possible. We need a giant trailer hitch to pull the Elite back to the Ark, so as not to arouse human or Decepticon suspicion."

"Ambassador, do you have any further suggestions?" Prowl wanted to make sure the plan was completely flawless.

Cullen smiled ear to ear. "Yes, just make sure that you have signs on your vehicle. Something that reads: 'Spielberg Productions'. "

Another beep came over the console, as Prowl acknowledged it. "Brawn, report."

"I have bad news. I didn't complete the mission as ordered. The human flame thrower attacked me and I had to respond. He had help with the one Gear's encountered. {That would be Human Torch and Spider-Man respectively...and all this is in FF#6}"

Prowl hit his head, while thinking of the worse case scenario. "What happened?"

"Well, as I said they attacked...I guess they thought I was a Decepticon. I responded in kind, chasing them back to their base. Then, I...uh...decided that I was acting like a Decepticon by the time I got to their base. So, I left before the situation got completely out of hand."

Prowl knew Brawn was covering his tracks, but it was of no consequence. "I'll send Bumblebee out there once his mission is done. He seems to have a knack for human logic processes. Get back to base as soon as possible, we've been rather busy lately."

"Will do, over and out."

Prowl looked down at the human. "Sorry Ambassador, everyone is reporting in as scheduled for a change. Can we continue this later?"

"Sure thing." The Ambassador left the main bridge.

Prowl went back to Brawn's frequency. "We need to get everyone back to replenish the Cybertronium. I didn't want to say that in front of the human."

"I understand. I'll report back as soon as possible." Brawn's face disappeared from the screen only to be replaced by Mirage's.

"I have good news. The hero team known as Heroes For Hire will help us out. It seems apparent that some enemies of theirs are using our stolen technology."

Prowl had a dark look on his face. "It seems these humans have frequently used our technologies for their own purpose. But, nice going. There are a few exceptions to these humans, and some even to seem analogous to Autobot programming. Report back to base for Cybertronium replacement."

"I will do just that. Mirage, over and out."

Ambassador Cullen had overheard the last of the statement, as one more question entered his mind. "Uh, Prowl."

The Autobot quickly tapped on the console to cut communication hoping the human didn't hear the last part. "Did you forget something Ambassador?"

"I just wanted to ask if you gave that mutant papers. Humans require papers to prove that they own their machines, and to prove that they have insurance." Cullen's query made Prowl shake his head.

Prowl's tone was curt and irritated. "I already gave Jazz the appropriate things for the human to identify his "possession" of Jazz. I have studied your ways extensively Ambassador."

The Ambassador took a step back. "I'm sorry, but you are alien to this land. Little things like pieces of paper for proof of ownership and insurance might slip by you."

"We can't afford such oversights. I appreciate your concerns though. There may be other things that we might not know about humans." Prowl heard yet another beep.

"Thanks, just one more thing." The Ambassador seemed to pause for emphasis. "What is Cybertronium?"

In an effort to think of an explanation the human couldn't understand, Prowl called up the screen. It was Optimus Prime.

"Cybertronium makes us work better, quicker, and we don't have bad things happen to us."

If Prowl could, he would have slammed his head against the console. But, he had a more logical process than that. "As you can still see Ambassador, our leader is still delusional."

"Yes, it's a pity really. Well, I better go give your answer to my government." The Ambassador turned and went to walk out of the giant ship.

Prowl turned back to the screen. "Optimus, now that you're done fighting mutants, it is time to come home. You need the good Cybertronium to make you feel a little better."

"I understand Prowl, and I appreciate your concern." Prime's optics blinked out again. "I will come back because good Prowl said so."

Prowl seemed almost thankful for the childlike glitch in Prime this time. "Very well. You need to have the others follow you back."

"ZOWIE! We got him free! Now what?" Warpath was covered in icy mud, but it didn't hamper his enthusiasm.

"I'll tend to his reactivation. My scientific expertise should be adequate enough to do so." Perceptor began work by lifting a panel, then drying out circuit boards.

"Those Decepticons are getting closer. The geographic shifts are increasing as we speak." Beachcomber reported as the others shifted nervously at the news.

Powerglide grew anxious from the fear of being captured again. "Come on Perceptor. Let's get this guy awake and get him moving us out of here!"

"I am attempting to utilize my technical knowledge to the utmost efficiency." Perceptor soldered more circuits together.

The Decepticon clone seekers appeared as the Autobots began to fire away.

"Perceptor, you better get this plane jetting us out of here and fast. I don't know how long until the real deals come to rain on our parade."

Perceptor finished his task. "Well, then let them produce moisture in little droplets. I have activated his main circuits."

With a proud gesture, Perceptor pointed to the jet. It became a pot of water being watched for the start of boiling.

"No Whir! No Clank! Not even a Kapow!" Warpath announced.

Perceptor scratched his cranial unit. "I don't understand. I have made all the necessary repairs. He should activate."

"Well, it doesn't matter now." Blaster reported. "They're here."

To the surprise of the Autobots, only Shockwave had arrived.

"So, you found what I could not. The Lost Cybertronian, as I predicted." Shockwave pointed his laser appendage toward Perceptor.

Perceptor shook his head. "Have him if you want. He hasn’t even activated after I successfully repaired his systems."

"Did you compensate for moisture condensation?" Shockwave queried.

Perceptor hit his head with his hand. "I knew there was something."

"Hold on a minute. This doesn't jive. Why would you need this guy?" Blaster pointed to the Lost Cybertronian.

Shockwave gave a monotone reply. "I will not go into the specifics if you can not figure it out with your own defective processors Autobot."

"Obviously, none of the Decepticons are effective enough to get Cybertronium, except the most recent ones that crossed this Space Bridge. And, even now some of their systems are being effected." Perceptor explained.

Shockwave tried to carry on, but hesitated. A shock went through his systems. The Autobots took the advantage and drew their weapons. Shockwave fired a huge fireball from the laser attachment. All the Autobots ducked, as it passed right by the Lost Cybertronian.

"You missed." Blaster pointed his weapon at Shockwave.

Shockwave fell to the ground on one knee. "The Cybertronium has effected me more than I thought. I made an illogical decision in coming here, so you may terminate my laser core for my mistake."

"I'm sorely tempted to do so...", before Blaster could finish he was cut off.

A myriad of machine noises permeated the tunnel, as the Lost Cybertronian transformed. The huge white robot with red accents took the gun from Blaster's hand.

"And, I will rid you of your temptation." It replied in Cybertronian language.

Blaster was more stunned by his gun being taken away. "Hey man, he's a Decepticon! I need that back!"

The Lost Cybertronian was perplexed by what came out of Blaster's vocalizer. "Can you say that again, in Cybertronian?"

Before Blaster could switch his language program, Shockwave responded. "They meant to kill me when I was fragile and weak from a Cybertronium deficiency. I was attempting to free you, when they came down here."

"That's not true!" Beachcomber shouted at Shockwave.

"Will someone please send me an update of this language they are using?" The Lost Cybertronian got a radio signal from Shockwave containing the necessary information.

"Thank You." The Lost Cybertronian finally replied in American English.

Shockwave nodded. "You are most welcome."

"I care not who did what, all I care that a fellow Cybertronian may be endanger from a variety of parasitic, symbiotic, or other mechanical specific viruses due to his loss in Cybertronium. As a Scientist, it is my duty to help those who need aid. And since this is a war which I obviously missed during my deactivation, I pick no side but the side of a good deed."

"Uh, what did he just say?" Powerglide spoke up for the rest.

Perceptor sighed. "He means to help Shockwave carry out his plan of getting Cybertronium."

The trip back to the Ark seemed pretty harmless. There was a lot of gawking and wide eyes as the Elite traveled on the trailer pulled by Wheeljack. Fortunately for Wheeljack, the humans were paying more attention to the big metal dinosaurs, then the fact that a race car was the one that had the hitch to the trailer.

"I don't get why these humans are so attracted to these big overgrown lizards." Wheeljack blared through his communicator to Ratchet.

Ratchet, who followed close behind the trailer, replied. "Well, according to humans these things were more closely related to what the humans call birds. Of course, there's a bunch of other evolution theories that humans have. It's all pretty confusing programming, if you ask me."

"We're coming up on the base." Wheeljack reported.

The soldier saw the race car, the Elite, and the ambulance behind. He realized this would be a long day. "Oh man, not again." {See Bishop #4 for details}.

"I'm not a human. Obviously, you should get your optic circuits, er...eyes checked." Wheeljack announced to the soldier.

The soldier simply saluted, and waved them on. "Just go ahead. Thank god all you damn good robots chose cars, or else we'd be hung."

"The human brings up a good point. We do seem to stick out a little more than the Decepticons. Perhaps we should explore other human vehicular mode options." Wheeljack rolled forward.

"I'll bring it up to Prowl." Ratchet followed. "Besides, we still look like the human vehicles, even if we do cater a bit to their transportation models."

Wheeljack sighed. "Well, that's a good point. But as the human expression goes, you shouldn't put all your eggs in one basket."

"We're here." Ratchet announced, as a familiar green Jeep roared right next to their side.

"Hi guys!" Hound yelled with his vocalizer.

The General, still in the driver's seat, took one look at the Elite. "What in the hell are those?"

"I believe Ambassador Cullen called them Dinobots. I guess he just shortened Dinosaur Autobots down to one word, for easier language use. Although, I'm sure they would still prefer the name of the Elite." Wheeljack told the General.

The General rolled his eyes. "It figures Cullen would come up with something so obvious. Well, I suggest you get your friends there in your ship. We've had a lot of trouble with mutants lately."
"The Decepticons! Did they attack?" Ratchet quickly asked the General.

"I said mutants, not those other Transformers you call Decepticons. And, "

Hound interrupted the General. "Mutants are humans with special defensive and offensive capabilities. I saw them in action. Some of them could be capable of taking us off line, from what I've seen."

"There's something else to add to our report. Well, let's get the Elite in, we need to repair them as soon as possible." Wheeljack revved his engine, and began pulling the trailer into the Ark.

"That's the Elite!" Hound scanned the five metallic Dinosaurs. "I guess they had no choice but the organic forms."

"Yes, they did Hound. Follow us to the repair bay, so you can help load the Elite on the platforms." Ratchet ordered.

"Let me out first, robot." Preston released his seat belt, then hopped out of Hound.

"That's Hound, sir."

Preston ignored the Autobot, as the General walked off to his office.

"Let's go Hound." Ratchet urged his fellow team mate.

Hound followed Ratchet's lead, as they followed Wheeljack into the repair bay.

"So, what's the situation with the Elite?" Hound was silently hoping they could be immediately brought back on-line.

"Not good." Ratchet responded. "I had to rewire their logic circuits to keep their laser cores and necessary functions going. If we were to try reactivation before full repairs, they would be barely able to operate their speech programs."

"Does Prowl know yet?" The inquisitive green Autobot checked his scanners to see if the said Strategist was behind them.

Wheeljack finally reached the repair bay, which was thankfully before the bridge. "No, and we intend to inform him once we see if we can make full repairs."

"Yeah, that makes sense." Hound transformed along with Ratchet and Wheeljack.

Hound helped place each of the Elite on the beds which extended out from the Ark's walls. Ratchet began with the flying Elite known as Swoop, since Swoop was easily recognizable even in his Earthen form.

"Well?" Wheeljack asked after a couple of minutes.

Ratchet looked up and smiled. "I can do it. But, I better replace my Cybertronium before I even start a delicate procedure such as this."

"Great, let's go tell Prowl the good news!" Hound quickly ran toward the bridge.

The very gold and black colors of the Ark seemed to shift in movement with them.

"Uh...hello?" His first words were filled with worry of what may come. The small red robot cautiously continued down the halls of the Nemesis, with no other Decepticon to be found.

He continued to the bridge, where he finally found his keeper, for lack of a better term.

The tall blue robot turned to see the short red one. "Frenzy, explain current absence and structural damage."

"Uh, I wish I could Soundwave. I don't even know what happened. I just activated inside this place, and all these weird humans started to attack me." Frenzy attempted to scratch his head to find a piece of his cranial unit missing. "Oh, man..."

"Implement repairs, and I will access your memory data banks for the necessary information."

Frenzy didn't reply, but he seemed to zone out. "I don't think you want to go and do that to Mad Dog, big fella." Frenzy grabbed his guns from his back and swung them out toward Soundwave.

Soundwave ducked for cover and activated his weapons. There was no doubt that there was logic chip damage, but he could not completely take Frenzy off-line. Soundwave began firing at Frenzy on Stun, as the little robot pulled off acrobatics which his programming did not have.

"Ha ha, that's more like you big fella. I've been hankerin' for a little scrape after I tangled with that big ol' War Machine. {That would have been in War Machine #4}" "Mad Dog" continued to let loose with his laser lead upon Soundwave.

Soundwave pulled off a serious of flips and somersaults to avoid getting shot. Soundwave looked around, as the damage to the computer consoles was tremendous. Soundwave knew he had to do something or else face repairing everything for himself. He saw a piece of mirrored glass left from a damaged monitor, in matter of mere seconds his logic circuits predicted the precise trigonometry figure in order to hit "Mad Dog" in the back. Soundwave fired, as the blast hit dead center on the back of Frenzy. Frenzy yelped in shock, as his red eyes blinked out of commission. Soundwave paused for a moment to assess the damage. Numerous monitors and various terminals were damaged to certain degrees. He got up and walked over to the off-line robot. Something caught Soundwave's optic sensors, but it was too late. A black overcoat seemed to grow over Frenzy as he hopped up and blasted Soundwave.

"Well, lookey here. I'm the new sheriff for the town." 'Mad Dog' rubbed the gold star badge on his front chest plate. "I've got to rustle up the rest of the posse, so we can all be one big happy family."

Epilogue:

"You are an utter fool Straxus." The giant black robotic form walked around a tube, which contained a robot's head percolating in a chemical bath. "I should have fully deactivated you."

"Lord Scorponok , I beseech you to let me correct my errors." Then take your laser core off line for this embarrassment, Straxus thought to himself.

Scorponok shook his head. "You had your chance. Even though we have limited resources, we still have main control over Cybertron. You let one squad of Autobots defile the very sanctity of our headquarters, let them destroy a good portion of it, and let one of their leaders make you look like a standard drone bot in the methods of fighting."

"It was Ultra Magnus, Scorponok . Even he has had a victory against you." Straxus didn't care this would make Scorponok take him off line, just as long as he didn't have to endure being in this condition.

Scorponok almost did pull the plug, but he would not give Straxus the satisfaction. "No, perhaps your tenure here will help remind you that we are the ones meant for warfare."

By the pits, do not let me exist like this! Straxus would have struck something down, if he had arms.

"No doubt the Autobot rebels have had time to repair themselves. The next time they try such a bold attack, they will meet death by my hands." Scorponok clenched his fist.

Straxus tried once more. "Lord Scorponok , I would do better as a fully functional warrior than this..."

"I will do no such thing, until you have proven that you not make another large mistake like this again."

I will have my revenge for this, Scorponok . But, I must coddle to your pedantic miserable logic circuits to do so. "I accept your punishment for my failure, leader."