LibriumArcana.Games

Their origin is lost in the depths of time, but their wars are known on countless worlds. Only the origins of the last is known as Megatron rose up to lead an army of dispossessed and bring all of creation to its knees. None could stand against him until the day that Optimus Prime did and on that day their world was doomed. Some said Megatron was a hero of the previous war, betrayed and cast down by the leaders of the cause he served. Others say he was once just and great, but fell to corruption and power lust. Many say he and Optimus were once brothers in steel. Others say that Optimus was the last of a great line and still others that he was a once humble 'bot that rose to the heights because of necessity. The truth is lost, perhaps forever.

What is known is that Cybertron's last and most terrible war was between Megatron's Decepticons and the Autobots lead by Optimus Prime. The war devastated and depleted Cybertron and scattered many Cybertronians to distant worlds. One of these worlds was Earth and there Optimus and Megatron fought again. Eventually the Decepticons were driven off Earth. Megatron collected the plunder of a dozen star systems and marshalled an army on ravaged Cybertron while Optimus gathered his own followers while planning to take back their homeworld.

Megatron attacked Optimus on Earth, but after that both leaders fall into darkness with their true fates unknown. Starscream claims both to have fallen when he seizes power on Cybertron, but his reign is brief. A dark and deadly foe, the mythical Unicron the Destroyer, reveals himself and attacks Cybertron. Both Autobots and Decepticons fall, but Unicron himself was destroyed.

Now there is only ruin. Both armies have been decimated and decapitated. Many have been lost on both sides and the armies have disintegrated into factions and small armed camps. There is no society, no peace, no order. Megatron's Empire and Optimus's Prime Golden Age are both ash. Cybetron is a haunted ruin. Will any light shine in this, the darkest hour?

A small, lithe figure lead three larger beings through the ruins. A city had once been here but that had been ages ago even as the larger three measured time. The mightiest buildings had fallen or pulled down and then covered in plants and sediment. The vine encrusted remains of a few structures still stood, vainly resisting their inevitable defeat.

The three were autonomous robots, products of a civilization that had scattered its populace over the galaxy. They were asymetrical, but roughly humonoid. The smallest of them stood over seven meters tall, the largest ten. They were armoured in thick slabs of metal that gave them a clumsy, blocky look that was deceptive. Compared to the machines of other civilizations they were fast and agile, as their guide had discovered to his woe. Blades, weapon mounts, and sensor modules protruded from their forms. Orange, dark brown, and yellow paint decorated the machines in aggressive, angular patterns. They were bad news and wanted everyone who saw them to know it.

"Nothing but background rads," said the smallest. "Though background is hot by local standards."

"Maybe squishy lied to us," said the median. He was spikier than the rest and his blades were not just for show. He carried a double barreled particle beam blaster rifle that was designed for anti infantry work. Anti infantry by Cybertron standards.

"If he did he dies," said the largest. "He gets to prove himself first."

"Thank you thank you," hissed the quivering organic. He (and unlike the robots he cowered before for whom gender was more of a personality quirk or design artifact; he was definitely male) was a three meter tall reptilean, a genetically engineered super soldier designed to spread the reign of the Cadronian Monarchy over his home world and the stars. That dream met Cybertronians and died hard. "It is this way."

The Cybertronians let their slave-captive lead them through the tall grasses to a clearing. At the center was a shattered pyramid that must have once been a breath taking monument of steel and glass. Now it was a corroding broken metal framework with a few surviving, much covered panels. "See see?" their slave said eagerly.

"Countdown?" asked the largest.

"Nothing Skullcrusher."

Skullcrusher strode through the side of the ruin, smashing through corroded metal and sending glass falling to the ground to shatter on impact. The remains advanced technology could be seen inside. Dead monitors and displays were not quite overgrown by moss and fungus. At the center of the monument was a pile of stones. A cairn, sized for a giant.

"That's it!" said the slave.

"There's a lot of metal under there," said Countdown. "Mag readings consistent with Cybertronian alloys."

"Slice 'N Dice transform and start digging," said Skullcrusher. The Cybertronian's body shifted and reconfigured itself into a nightmare combination of an excavator and a dentist's tool kit.

"I can go free now?" said the slave hopefully.

"Yes," said Skullcrusher. His right arm transformed, turning his forearm into a rapid fire ion blaster. He fired once. The body toppled. "We have no more use for you."

Slice 'N Dice rapidly cleared away the stone with his spiked pincher arms. "Hey, there is a 'bot down here. Along with some local junk tech."

"He's in pretty good shape for a corpse," said Countdown as he sent a scanning beam over the Cybertronian Slice 'N Dice had unearthed. "He'll do. I wonder who he was. His memory banks are probably intact. I can just pry him open-"

"Don't waste your time," said Skullcrusher. "His name was Breakout."

"You knew him boss?" asked Countdown.

"Yeah, from way back when I was young and stupid. I wised up. He didn't. Ended the way they all do. Get him back to the ship with the others. We get paid for intact bodies, not for kills. We get paid the same for him as the 'bots we scrapped over the last few cycles."

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The ship had once been a long range cargo hauler, two or three iterations back. Plates of armour had been welded to its hull and heavy cannons grafted to its body. Thrusters had been added and cargo space sacrificed for the sake of larger rebuilt engine mass. It was an ugly, hunchbacked vulture of a craft.

The bounty hunters threw Breakout's body down on the floor. A half dozen other 'bots were restrained on slabs. Countdown methodically worked over the fallen Autobot warrior, excising all special and weapon systems. He then lifted the dead warrior up onto a slab and closed the restraint systems on his limbs and activating the monitor and shock system. All the 'bots were disabled, but the bounty hunters weren't about to take unnecessary chances. He left the room, taking the parts with him.

Soon the ship began to rumble as the engines came online and then, with a roar, the bounty hunters blasted off. The battered ship shook and groaned as it headed out of the atmosphere by means of pure brute force. As the air outside thinned, a single hatch opened in the ceiling of the prison cell.

A slender limb gripped the ceiling and a small head on a flexible neck scanned the room. An mechanical being roughly the size of a large cat clambered over the ceiling and down the wall. It pried open a panel on the security panel and probed the insides. Then it replaced the panel and hopped and skittered over to the prisoners. It began to go to work.

Relays were reattached. Bipasses were jury rigged or activated. Memory systems were brought online. Dormant sparks were reconnected. Power flowed from the shock systems of the security monitor to the captured 'bots' systems. Not much, but enough. Slowly systems came back online.

A low moan was the first sound to be heard, from a gray-toned female. Her arm moved, felt the restraints, and the bright blue eyes came online, taking in first the ceiling, then her head moved to take in the area around her.

Not good, Shimmer. That's Medicon, there, so however I got here it was after I left his place. Don't know the little one, don't know the one next to him, ... no, that can't be Breakout. Breakout's been scrap for .... well.. for a long time.

Movement was noted, as the small mechanical being, much smaller than even her hand, scuttered over the 'Bot that resembled Breakout. "Well well," a faint whisper from the female Autobot, "What are you."

The metallic centipede/weasel clicked its mandibles. "Designation Lifeline, adjunct of Gamma Secondus." It was clearly not an independent Cybertronian intelligence, but a smart support system. The name Gamma Secondus meant nothing to Shimmer, but it was a big galaxy.

Flamebringer's systems were sluggish in responding. His fusion core was nearly empty, and his secondary power systems had never been upgraded like they should. With the core offline, his engines and flamers would be near-worthless. His body was clumsy, tugging at restraints. "What hit me.." A groan. "I need water.."

"Keep it quiet, Red..." Shimmer warned, keeping her voice low. "Whatever we're doing here, someone is not wanting us awake."

Recharge rate is slow. Estimate time.... scrap, we'll have to keep quiet if we want a chance to get out of here. Weapons systems ... Shimmer had a moment of sheer outrage as she discovered weapons and special systems were not just unresponsive, but gone. Those slaggin' excuses for scrapheap monitors! They removed everything!!

After a bare cycle spent cursing the sitution, Shimmer turned her head back to the little AI drone. "Lifeline, thank you for your aid so far. Do you know where our weapons systems have been taken?"

"Armory," said Lifeline. "Their buyer just buys the bodies. The parts they keep for themselves." Orange photoreceptors glowed softly. "With what they take from you they will grow stronger."

There was no discrete moment when Hornet woke up.

This was not normal. Transformers, despite being unquestionably alive, were still mechanical beings, with all that this entailed. Electronics either had power or did not. A system was active or it wasn't. At the base level, everything was binary. Yet as always, Hornet seemed built specifically to violate all normal convention.

This might well have been literal truth.

He came into awareness slowly, groggily, his systems starved for power, his internal scanners beginning to start the process of figuring out, as best they could, what the heck had happened, and where he was now. Proximity sensors indicated that there were restraints buckled over his wings and legs and around his waist, and his transformation systems seemed to be either entirely offline or missing entirely.

They were not the only system for which this was true.

He could hear voices, vaguely, though his transcription protocols were still booting up, and he couldn't tell who they were nor what they were speaking of. It sounded like a calm discussion, but he caught the words "buyer" and "parts". Hornet might not have been a hardened veteran, but even he knew that sounded bad.

"H... hello?" He asked with a gulp, and his voice sounded about as nervous as he felt, which was to say, very. "Is... any- anyone there?"

Shimmer's optics narrowed in anger. "I see. Slavers." Inwardly she was steamed. Obviously Cybertronians, if they kept the parts for themselves. No curses were strong enough for this. "Lifeline, how many of them are onboard."

Information was everything, the more data she had the better. She could see six Autobots on slabs, and Lifeline for whatever reason was there to prevent more 'bots from getting captured. Gamma Secondus, whomever it was, did not want these slavers to succeed. She put that thought to a back processor to work out later. No information wasted.

"When you're finished reconnecting those wires, Lifeline, would removing my restraints trigger an alert? If not, remove them."

The smallest 'Bot finally spoke. "Keep it down, Tiny," Shimmer told him in a low voice. "We're in a cargo hold, prisoners of Slavers. Lifeline is a AI, here to help us out. Lie back, suck in the Energon, and once the rest wake up we'll have a plan."

With great slowness, yellow optics lit up within a darkened faceplate. His startup sequence ran through quickly, alerting him to many missing components - but he was still functional.

His form was large, with black as his main coloring, and varying shades of grey as other primary colors. There were few hints of his alternate form as he was now, though the front of a human-designed, rather than Cybertronian-designed fighter made up his lower chest and abdomen.

As he regained consciousness, at first he was confused, because the readings, as well as how they were presented to his internal software was different than he was used to. However, soon enough, he looked down to his chest, and saw the red emblazoned symbol upon it.

He stared at it for a few moments, as his database of recent experiences helped remind him of the last time he'd been awake. He stared unblinkingly at the symbol, almost absently rotating it in his vision's graphics software so that he could view the Autobot symbol etched into his chestplate properly.

Trying to sit upward only to be prevented by restraints broke him from his reverie, he then engaged his passive scanners to rapidly map out and define the contents of this room. An internal diagnostic rapidly highlighted several missing tactical components, prompting his internal relays to reroute power around them for the time being.

As the diagnostic finished, he found that he was mostly functional, though the main components that drove his weapons systems had all been removed by what appeared to be a crowbar. Nonetheless, he began to process what his passive scanners had found.

Hearing the sounds of other Transformers regaining consciousness, his internal database and passive sensors matched some to names and dossiers, but not all of them - the ones who did were ones he hadn't met in his present form. Even so, it appeared that they were all in a similar situation, as he observed similar tears and gaps in their superstructures that matched his, suggesting they too had weapons and other components forcibly removed.

He did recognize the smaller, female Autobot, but felt like it was from a lifetime ago, well before he'd come back online as he was now. He was careful to show no reaction as he looked around, though as he spotted Medicon a short distance away, he focused his passive scanners on the still-unconscious medical Transformer to check carefully for damage.

Giving the others a brief glance as he saw them from his prone position on his back, and giving them nods if their optics met, he nonetheless moved his gaze to where Medicon lay. His voice was deep, though at a low volume. "Are you functional, Medicon?"

(EDIT: changed from SR-71 description to Su-47)

"I hear you, Hornet.. Try to be calm." Flamebringer spoke softly. "Just relax, we'll all get loose. It'll be fine." Calming, friendly, familiar. That's how he's talking. He's loopy, he knows it. "...Lady.. There -any- hydrogen I can take in? I might lose consciousess.."

On the one hand, someone was there, and that someone seemed to be friendly, or at least not hostile. On the other hand, the message she had for him was hardly the most re-assuring thing.

His systems confirmed that he was being fueled, at least, and as his energon reactor turned over, his systems, or at least most of them, began to return to full power. Other people were beginning to speak, people he didn't know and couldn't recognize in his database. He lay as still as he could, forcing himself not to tug and pull against his restraints, which were obviously made for someone larger than he was. His systems were reporting damage of an indeterminate sort, and all of his weapons seemed to be offline or... missing?

Somehow that made him even more nervous.

"What-" he whispered, too afraid to say anything louder. "What happened? How did we get here?"

"The monitors for this room and the restraint system have been subverted," said Lifeline. With a clank the restraints opened. "Beyond this room I have no influence. The ship is hostile. I cannot divert more than a tiny trickle of power to your systems." Lifeline's head drooped. "I have repaired you, but that's all I can do. I'm sorry."

"You've done well, Lifeline," Shimmer reassured the little AI as she sat up, wincing at the damage done to her chassis. "Medicon just fixed that..." she muttered, looking over at the still-silent medic. Finally, she could take in all of the room, and she recorded everything she saw.

'Tiny bot' was a fixed wing... although the wings had been torn up, probably removing weapons. Probably a Cassetticon model. 'Red' was a larger bot, although she had to wonder why he was asking for hydrogen. Outside of Fission/Fusion weapons and engines, it really was of little use. From the conversation so far, Tiny and Red knew each other. "Tiny, help Red find some hydrogen. Keep quiet about it, we don't know how many enemies are out there."

Next, the large black 'bot with the nosecone for a chestplate. Shimmer tensed, but the blue brand proudly stenciled on it relaxed her a little. He'd been the one calling to Medicon, so possibly he was the one Medicon had been keeping hidden in the back. Finally, the little burn of curiosity in the back of her processor would stop, as she had studiously tried to not delve into Medicon's secrets. With her, he'd earned that privacy. She only hoped he was functional, even if he wouldn't fight.

The bot on the last table...
"Primus... it IS Breakout!" she exclaimed in a hushed voice, and swung her legs off the table to get to the HeadHunter. Her first two unstable steps showed just how badly she'd been worked over and how little Energon she'd gathered, but she walked over to the slab to look down into Breakout's face.

"Scrap you, Breakout, where have you been?" Shimmer said, her voice full of surprised joy at seeing an old friend functional. It was clear he'd been in a nasty dust-up, however he had wound up aboard. "Wake up, old friend, we need you functional." She turned to the slab with the old medic. "Medicon, get up, we need your skills here."

Red optics came to life as Medicon ran through his self-diagnostic check, finding several systems missing. With a soft groan the bot sat up and opened several panels in his arms to find that all of his tools were missing. "Disconcerting..." He muttered to himself, taking a look around the room.

The thick helmeted head turned to look at Shimmer. "They have taken all of my tools, what work I can do is very limited." He turned to look at each bot in turn. "Are there any medical emergencies that require my attention?"

Static raced across my optics. My view of the... Ceiling? Hull? Settled and normalized. I clutch my hands feeling my systems turn on slowly. I can't access the date. I can't even access the time. I must have out a long time. Maybe even 4 or 5 vorns. I'm on the deck... floor? That's not normal for repairs and if I had been found by hostile forces they would not have reactivated me. Simpler to tear me apart and hack my memory banks. Primus where am I? I hear voices, it takes a minute for the audio receivers to stop buzzing though.

"Primus... it IS Breakout!"

I just about see her. Shimmer, information specialist. A friend. She does not look in the best of shape. This is worrisome data. Odds of this being a Autobot or allied recuse has dropped to 32.45%.

"Scrap you, Breakout, where have you been?

This question puzzles and alarms me. If this had been an recuse/salavage mission, wouldn't they know where found me. Unless they're not running the mission in which case... Odds of hostile action now 83.45%

"Wake up, old friend, we need you functional."

Rust and slag. I begin to move more, I need to get up.

"Shimmer... I remember... I was stasis locked... Where are we? Who is doing this?" I try to reach over to my leg hostler where my knife should be.... Whoever it is knows me... The Defective Prototype has taken my knife!

One by one, the others in the room, all of whom seemed to be Autobots, began to wake up, even as the restraints that locked Hornet to the table retracted into the table that he was stuck on. His systems continued to broadcast all manner of alerts and warnings to him, but he did not read any of them, too afraid to know what was wrong with him to dare find out.

As such, he had no idea what the extent of what had happened to him was until he sat up and found that someone had torn his wrists open.

A professional would have appreciated the workmanship. Whoever had disabled Hornet's systems had known what they were doing. A laser scalpel had sliced through Hornet's metalo-ceramic forewing and peeled back a flap of it sufficient to work with. Once inside, they had deftly disconnected and removed Hornet's gattling laser blasters, normally mounted just above his wrist, unplugging them at their connector points rather than simply ripping them out. What reason whoever had done this had had was unclear, perhaps they simply wanted Hornet (or his guns) intact for resale, but it was clearly not a slapdash operation, but one done with workmanlike efficiency.

All of this analysis was lost on Hornet however, who was approximately as professional as he was physically imposing. He froze on the spot, sitting up on the diagnostic table, staring down at his torn-open wings and at the gaping void that sat where his blasters should have been. Hornet was no stranger to damage. He'd been hurt much worse than this before. Yet the very fact that someone unknown to him had opened him up and taken out part of his systems while he was unconscious struck his spark like a sledgehammer, took all the energy right out of his lasercore, and set him to quivering softly.

But at that moment, what was perhaps the best possible thing, given the circumstances, happened.

"I hear you, Hornet.. Try to be calm."

Hornet's voice analyzer had finished loading, and it told him instantly who had spoken, not that Hornet needed the reminder. In a nanosecond, Hornet forgot all about his slashed wings and missing lasers and spun around so quickly that he nearly fell off the workbench. "Flamebringer!" he chirped, paying no attention whatsoever to the other bot's instructions to be quiet. In half a processor rotation, he jumped off the table and bounced over to where the larger jet was laying. Fortunately, what with Hornet's lightweight construction, there was a discrete limit to how much noise he could make in doing this.

Hornet did not hear Shimmer's instructions that he help Flamebringer, for he was already trying to figure out how to do just that. And while he did hear the ridiculous nickname she had bestowed upon him (why did they keep giving him those?), even Hornet could judge that this wasn't the time to argue about that.

"It's okay, Flamebringer," he said to the red Sukhoi jet, "we'll find some water... somewhere." Hornet knew that Flamebringer's power systems were different than his own, and somehow ran on water. While he didn't understand how that worked (the one time he'd tried to emulate Flamebringer by pouring water into his fuel tank had not gone well), this was also not the time to ask.

At the moment however, he had no idea where they could possibly find water, something closely associated with the fact that he had no idea where they were. Hornet's own engine did not include a water-injector (such things being un-necessary for Energon engines), and even if it had, he wouldn't have had enough to make a dent in Flamebringer's larger power requirements.

Thinking as best he could, Hornet turned to the AI that had set them all free. "Um, Lifeline?" he asked, "Do you have any water for Flamebringer? He needs it to burn."

As always, Hornet was oblivious to how odd that sounded.

If there was one thing that Breakout could count on, it was Shimmer having information. "We six have been captured by slavers, and are onboard some kind of cargo hauler. We were released by Lifeline, a support AI working for Gamma Secondus. Hopefully the name means more to you than it did to me." Her voice was wry, but it was clear she was concerned about not knowing the name. "Lifeline has subverted the systems in this hold, so the crew has yet to discover we're awake and moving. The slavers have removed all weapons; Lifeline reports that they keep the weapons for themselves and just sell the bodies. Besides you and I, there's Medicon, and two new 'Bots and a Cassetticon I don't recognize."

She knew Breakout recalled Medicon, the Decepticon medic who refused to fight, but who would heal any and all.

"Also, Breakout, you have been MIA for ..." she stopped, calculating the ages. " ... 120.48 Vorn, give or take a few." She gave him another wry grin. "You've slept though all the fun. We found the Optimus and all on the Ark intact, the 'Cons found the Megatron and the Nemesis crew. We had yet another War on yet another Planet, this one called "Earth" by the natives," Shimmer gave a shrug as to the wisdom of someone naming their planet "dirt".
"Then things went to hell as Prime and Megs are rumored to have finally destroyed each other," She added with a shake of the head. "Of course, those same rumors say Hot Rod took over as Rodimus Prime, and that Cybertron was attacked by Unicron the Destroyer. Oh, and Starscream became King of the Decepticons."

Right now, Shimmer would not be surprised if Breakout started laughing. Each rumor was more outrageous than the last.

"Right now, Earth would be a welcome relief." Flamebringer was slowly sitting up, conserving energy. He kept the connection to the shock systems. "..Gods. Less than five percent fusiables left. I think I can top off my batteries, but I do hope we find hydrogen." A smile to Hornet. "I think I'll make it, brother. You alright? Got your weapons, but is the rest of you okay?"

"I have no water," said Lifeline. "The thrusters are a fusion torch design. If Deuterium is needed, the fuel tanks of this ship should have it. I have only subverted the monitors in this room. The computer will notice if the tanks are tapped."

"I'm not a Cassetticon!" exclaimed Hornet. Shimmer might be responding to his size, but Cassetticons were Decepticons, and he was not one of those, no matter how small Wheeljack had built him. "My name's Hornet. I'm an Autobot."

When the talk turned to Earth however, Hornet fell silent almost instantly, indeed he even seemed to stop moving. Though he contributed nothing to the rumors that Shimmer was speaking of, some of which he had first-hand knowledge of, the mere mention of Earth had plainly been enough to rivet his attention. Shimmer spoke the planet's name like it was an absurd thing to call a planet. Hornet's opinion went unstated, but dirt or not, he clearly didn't regard Earth as a joke.

Flamebringer snapped Hornet out of his thoughts by sitting up and proclaiming that he was at least partly mobile. Back on Earth, Hornet had always felt, not precisely jealous, but perhaps a little bit envious of Flamebringer's capability to turn water, one of the most abundant elements on the planet, into energy, rather than having to rely on Energon as Hornet (and everyone else) did. It wasn't until they had all left Earth that he realized just how much of a liability it could be.

Flamebringer asked if he was all right, and Hornet almost reflexively glanced down at his slashed-open wings. They didn't hurt, his pain sensors had not been active when the damage had been inflicted, and had interpretted his wings' present situation as "set", meaning no further need for pain. There were advantages to being mechanical.

"I'm okay," he said, sounding only partly convinced, and he held his wings behind his back almost sheepishly, unable to stop himself from running his fingers over the jagged edge of the incision. He had to force his computer to not run diagnostics on his flight characteristics like this. Even if he was a billion miles from the nearest atmosphere, even if he was locked in a spaceship run by hostile aliens or Decepticons, he didn't want to know that he couldn't fly.

"They took my lasers," he said, "and the rest of my weapons." The missiles and bomb were incidental, Hornet could use any ordinance that conformed to Autobot standard, and he didn't even remember what missiles he had last been carrying now, but the lasers were much more of a worry. Hornet's lasers were hand-made by Wheeljack, rapid fire gattling weapons designed to give the little bot a fighting punch in his humanoid form, specially designed to fit into Hornet's frame. While there existed other lasers of the same approximate size, none of them would work with Hornet's systems, at least not without a massive overhaul that nobody but Wheeljack knew how to do. But beyond the physical importance of the weapons to Hornet, was the symbolic one. Wheeljack had built those lasers. Built them for Hornet. That made them important, regardless of their function.

Lifeline informed them that there was no water on-board, and Hornet had no idea what Deuterium even was, and had no desire to look up the definition in his encyclopedia. He blinked nervously as he looked from Autobot to Autobot, keeping close to Flamebringer. "What... what are we gonna do?" he asked, unsure of who it was that had the answer.

"Can't say if it was something called Unicron, but something hit Cybertron, and hard. Worst time of my life." The medical bot got to his feet, his head pausing as he did a visual scan of each bot.

"I don't see anything of immediate concern relating to injuries. All weapon systems are missing, but given the materials and time I believe I can solve that problem. I believe our primary concern at this time should be escape." He looked over at the small bot that was apparently called Lifeline. "Where are our weapons and equipment being stored at this time?"

Getting slowly to his feet after the restraints were removed, the larger darkly-colored Autobot looked over the others calmly as they began to discuss their situation. He saw that all were Autobots, Medicon aside, though he smiled slightly when he saw Breakout regaining consciousness. Even in the present, Breakout's indominatability had seen him through to the here and now. This time, it would be to his and the others' benefit, he thought.

He watched the others speaking with one another, and the small one's indignation at being considered a Casseticon amused him. The little one was certainly the size of one; Novawing had thought the same at first; that perhaps the Autobot Blaster had survived as well, and this small one was his ally.

He nodded once to the small robot that had freed them, that looked more like a drone than a Transformer. "Thank you for freeing us and helping us to refuel, Lifeline. Who do you answer to?"

(edit: fixed verbeage in last paragraph)

"I was adjunct to Gamma Secondus," said Lifeline. "Gamma Secondus is no more." He skittered anxiously. "Your weapons are probably in one of the secure rooms near the bridge."

"Getting out of here is the problem." Flamebringer grunted. "Getting into a secure room is harder. I could probably burn through them, but it'd drop me to battery power until I can tap the fusion fuel."