Transformers: Steel Reign

[LadyTevar]

Crimson looked down that the flailing bot, then up at WideLoad, Shellshock, and OverLoad with a very serious expression on her face.

"No more Vodka Energon for him. Period." She looked hard at Wideload. "If you or Gridlock allow him into it again, I will make sure your still suffers complete system failure, followed shortly thereafter by whichever of you gave it to him. Understood?"

[SirNitram]

"Ah. It's always fun when they get their first guzzle." Overload said, having finished his cube. "Did we learn anything today?" He grinned.

[General Havoc]

Hornet was curled up in a small ball holding onto Crimson's foot as tightly as he could with both wings. He barely heard Overload's words through a haze of static buzzing in his ears. This was unlike anything he'd ever experienced. Half of him wanted to go rocketting through the air. The other half wanted to to scream and hide in the corner.

"C... Could.... could you... please.... put back the floor?" he asked, directing his request aimed at nobody in particular. "Please? It ran away...."

[LadyTevar]

She shouldn't laugh. She really really shouldn't laugh.

Poor little 'bot. "You're on the floor, Hornet," she said softly, carefully getting out of her seat to avoid stepping on him. "Here, take my arm.. try to stand up." Before Overload or someone steps on him, that is.

[General Havoc]

Hornet took Crimson's arm and clutched it as hard as he could, which wasn't all that hard, but the intention was clear. Hornet's gyrocompas was spinning in circles and loops, and without it, he could literally not tell up from down.

"I'mnotonthefloor!" he insisted, his speaker begining to slur as the signals to it became confused. "Thefloor'sonme!"

He slowly tried to stand up, using Crimson's arm as a pivot, lost his balance, and failed. He shut his optics tight and managed, with a great deal of swaying and swirling, to get onto his knees, right before his gyrocompass gave another lurch and he lost his balance completely, as well as his grip, and fell backwards onto the ground, upsetting the stool he had been laying next to which landed on top of him with a loud crash and left him blinking for a second on the floor.

"I think I fell..."

[Charon]

Shellshock nodded to Overload. "Indeed. If we're ever in need of a good laugh hand off some of this stuff to Hornet. Until the boy gets himself a bit of a resistance anyway."

[LadyTevar]

She didn't know whether to laugh, or to get mad at Wideload and Gridlock for doing this to the poor little bot.

So she settled for giving Wideload a glare that could weld steel, then carefully picking the stool off of TeenyBot. "Yes, you fell again, Hornet," she said, unable to keep a chuckle out of her audio. "Take my hand again, I'll help you up."

[SirNitram]

"I think he's had enough. Power down for a bit, little guy, let your system recover from the shock." Overload smiled gently, shaking his head. "As the humans say, take five."

[General Havoc]

Hornet took the news that he had indeed fallen with admirable calm.

"... oh."

Crimson picked the stool up off of him, and he regarded it almost worriedly. "DidIhurthim?" he slurred quizzically, asking (apparently) in regards to the stool.

He vaguely heard Overload suggesting he power down, which sounded like a capital idea... save that Hornet had no earthly conception of how to do that. Unique perhaps among the Autobots, Hornet did not have supreme-level access to his own systems, and could not, as a point of fact, command himself to shut down, nor override his own behavioral programming, much as he would have liked to take a nap right now. Wheeljack could of course shut Hornet off with a command, as could Ratchet, Optimus, and a handful of other senior Autobots (though not Ironhide, to Ironhide's infinite displeasure). Untill one of them shut Hornet off however, or Hornet's own programming decided it was a good moment to sleep, Hornet was stuck online.

... not that he was doing much.

After a fair bit of effort on his part (to say nothing of Crimson's), Hornet FINALLY managed to stand up, blinking and looking around, his vision out of focus as he tried to determine what was going on around him.

"Wh... whahappened?" he stammered to Crimson, visible as an indistinct red blur holding onto him (or was he holding onto her? He wasn't sure).

[LadyTevar]

"You are drunk." Crimson answered, using small words and sentences so the Teenybot would understand. "The Energon was too concentrated. It made you drunk. You never want to drink that Energon again. Understand?"

[General Havoc]

"I'm... what...?" Drunk? Hornet had never heard of such a thing before. Was that like being damaged? A sudden wave of horror came over him as he realized he might be like this permanently. His unfocussed optics had real fear in them as he looked around at the indistinct masses that represented the other bots.

Crimson was telling him that he never wanted to drink this stuff again. Hornet would have agreed without hesitation, except...

...

Except oddly enough, damage or drunk or whatever it was, he actually felt great, like he had just had a massive charge of power surge through his systems. Granted, he could barely see, let alone stand, so it wasn't as though that power was doing much for him, and his gyrocompass continued to spin loops, making him grip Crimson's arm tightly in case the floor spontaniously decided to invert again. Whatever was happening was terrifying, but at least it didn't hurt.

... yet.

"'mIgonnadie?" he asked fearfully to anyone who cared to answer.

[LadyTevar]

"'mIgonnadie?" he asked fearfully to anyone who cared to answer.

So much for not laughing.. Crimson couldn't stop herself that time. She had a nice laugh. "No, Hornet, you're not going to die. It's got your systems screwy, that's all. Now, if you think you can walk, we'll go outside and let you sit down. It's time to start unloading the train, but I don't think you're in any shape to help."

[SirNitram]

"Good thing we didn't plan for the little guy to help. Here we go, Hornet." The tiny flyer was plucked up by Overload as he strode out, apparently none the worse for wear from the alcohol. The littlest Autobot was set against a building, as he moved to start unloading the cargo he had pulled.

[Dark Silver]

"Dah, is time to get to work, break over with Comrades."

Gridlock rose from his seat, and walked out of the building, not even a slight swagger in his footsteps. Wideload was already at the train, having taken over guard duty from Stryke, and before even Overload got there, had begun unloading the train of supplies.

The quickness with which the Autobot builder had worked was astounding, as a good fifth of the supplies, including some of the heavier construction equipment, was unloaded and waiting to be placed into the proper storage facilities.

"Wideload is good worker, makes Mother Russian proud." Gridlock said with some sense of pride, as he began to help offload the train.

[LadyTevar]

"Now we know why you have the vodka around..." Crimson snorted. "Rev up the engines and you can work faster."

She was doing her share of unloading, taking the smaller boxes that contained the more delicate components. The idea of smaller was relative; she was still carrying far more than any two humans.

She was also trying to keep an eye on Hornet so he didn't do something stupid.

[Charon]

Shellshock walked as straight of a line as his Russian fellows. Handling some of the heavy boxes, though nowhere near as heavy as his size might have dictated he'd be capable of. "Bah, that drink was barely as strong as... Overload, what was the phrase, warm milk?"

[SirNitram]

"Warm milk, yes. The humans always said that, back then. Then again, they also said they'd be home by Christmas." Overload reflected, shrugging as he carried large loads.

[Charon]

Shellshock came to a small stop after setting some of the cargo down. "Some of them did, in a manner..."

Shellshock placed a hand over his spark for a few seconds before returning to his job. "So what is all of this stuff exactly for Gridlock?"

[Dark Silver]

"Is for completion of Fort Maximal, defensive equipment, radar, subspace detection, energy weapons, construction of human sized buildings, and factory and energon production facility" Gridlock said, as he hefted a rather large box containing - as marked - unrefined steel.

"Is to complete construction, is very big project! So big, Hoist and Grapple not want project, to important for them, dah. Give to Gridlock and Wideload to get done."

[General Havoc]

Overload picked Hornet up with one hand and set him down against the side of the building. Whether he intended to stay there or not was largely immaterial, as he was presently incapable (effectively) of moving from the spot he had set him under his own power, and so he could do nothing but watch as the others set about unloading the train he had stowed away on. Much as he wanted to be of some help, in this case he didn't mind sitting out. He was not built for manual labor, either physically or mentally, and anyway Ironhide had always insisted he be kept away from anything fragile.

[LadyTevar]

Crimson passed close to Overload as Gridlock was bragging. "More like Hoist and Grapple didn't want around him," she muttered sotto voice to the larger bot.

[Agent Fisher]

Stryke returned to the group, no longer feeling like he was going to overload. He began helping unload the cargo.

[Dark Silver]

Fort Maximal (Under Construction),
Athabasca Tar Sands (Nothern Alberta Canada)
Twelve Hours later

Fort Maximal was slowly coming to life, the previous day spent unloading the cargo train sent up from Autobot HQ in Washington State, then Wideload and Gridlock giving the tour of the base to the new comers, including the temporary C&C with uplink to Teletran-1, the nuclear power facility which was already back to 75% functionality since the incident with Deathstrike, and producing Energon Cubes as well as empowering the drilling rig which was digging into the Tar Sands.

It was obvious the facility was not yet done, many of the buildings were still half completed, or temporary structures still to be worked on and completed. The only other permanent structure aside from the Nuclear facility and the Energon production/storage facility.

Gridlock was in the C&C, Wideload was on guard duty near Maintenance Bay Five, watching the two newcomers, Swiftshot and the turncoat Deathstrike.

The others, under Gridlock's orders as base commander, were told to cycledown for the night, and get a recharge cycle in. They would be expected to power up shortly, and begin the work nessacry to bring the base online and functioning.

"Springer to Fort Maximal. Come in."

"This is Fort Maximal, Springer. Gridlock is speaking."

"Gridlock, Jazz and I are approximatly two hours from the base. What is the status of your guests?"

"Deathstrike is still in Cryogenic Regeneration Chamber, undergoing repairs. Swiftshot is due out after thorough maintenance to all systems. Neither have been debriefed."

"Good, we'll be there shortly."

"affirmative Springer, Fort Maximal out."

----- -----

Warner Robins AFB
Georgia, United States

"Combaticons! Leave nothing standing!"

From the massive form of helicoptor Vortex, the Combaticons and Starscream emerged over the human military base.

Alarms sounded and blarred, defensive weapons were brought up, and just as quickly eliminated at the Combaticons went about their mission. Lasers and particle beams and energy weapons of a esoteric nature rained from the sky.

Starscream transformed the minute he disgorged from Vortex, his sleek F-14 form rocketting through the air, null rays and cluster bombs tearing into human and Autobot constructs. "Pathetic Fools," he screamed as he chased a group pilots running for their F-22's, hoping to get them in the air, "there's no escape!"

Null rays consumed the two pilots, as the cluster bombs tore into the waiting lines of jets and airplanes.

Elsewhere, the Combaticons where performing their work, Vortex remained in the air, bolts of pure devestation raining down, Brawl has transformed into his alt mode, an Abhrams main battle tank, the main cannon and machine guns tearing into the human vehicles. Screams of soldiers resounded in the air as the cybertronian steel treads crushed their bodies.

Onslaught, the Combaticon leader would have smirked at how easy this was, as he blasted apart the hangers he handed near. Swindle was close by, the Decepticon conman gleefully blowing apart human vehicles, and calculating the salvage value he would get after.

Blastoff remained airborn with Vortex and Starscream.

It was a beautiful slaughter, interrupted only briefly as a group of Autobots, enroute back from a deep cover mission, responded to a heavily scrambled distress call.

"Combaticons! Unite!" Onslaught called out before the small group of four autobots got within weapons range.

The sound of transformation resounded as the Combaticons forms twisted, compacted, then expanded out, the component parts merging together into the truly massive and destructive Decepticon Superwarrior, Bruticus.

"Bruticus hate Autobots!"

Starscream cackled as he strafed the Autobots, Bruticus running through the decimated base, towards his new targets.

"Bruticus hate humans! Bruticus crush enemies!"

Photon lasers and bombs exploded from Britucus' form, the Autobots did their best to fight off the beast, but found themselves hopelessly outgunned, their weapons doing nothing to the Combaticon gestault.

An hour after it had started, it was over. The human base was in ruins, the corpses of the would be Autobot saviors were grey husks of metal. Starscream simply smirked as he landed, and the Combaticons disassembled from their gestault form.

"Good work my Combaticons..now spread the Autobot parts, and let us be gone before reinforcements arrive."

Ten minutes later, the Decepticons were in the air, flying back over the Atlantic, their mission complete.

[LadyTevar]

Crimson had powered down briefly, but not for that long. About the time Gridlock was hearing from Springer, the she-bot had stepped outside to take a good look at the TarSands themselves.

Long experience told her that there was a lot more and better oil-bearing strata below, but getting to it would be a problem. As she made her own survey, she absently started humming to herself, a habit she'd picked up in her long exile from Cybertron.

[Agent Fisher]

Stryke had noticed Crimson walking out on her own. He followed her, stopping about 20 meters away, as not to disturb her. His audio sensor picked up the humming.

"Nice." He said. "What is it?" He asked, referring to the tune.