Techie

I Don't Need a Babysitter

Decepticon Energon Mine

8:45 PM

A dark, grey being stood near the purple rock. The jet raced into the room.

"Lord Megatron!" he shouted. "Intruders have been detected in the mines!"

"Optimus?"

"Indeed."

This didn't surprise the Decepticon leader at all, though he'd hoped to have more time to prepare.

"Prepare the ships for departure."

Starscream's optics widened in surprise. "But the Energon I've mined, the Autobots will seize it!"

Megatron growled, "then blow the mine!"

While this conversation had been going on, he Autobots had been driving through the mine looking for the source of the strange life signal. Optimus led the entourage, with Bulkhead, Arcee, Bumblebee, and Cliffjumper bringing up the rear. The moment the red truck was sighted the shooting began. Five against fifty didn't seem like a fair fight, especially when the five were looking for something specific. After a few moments, Arcee spotted what looked like a rogue vehicon at taking the other decepticons.

"I have a visual," she stated.

"We'll cover you," was the reply.

She jumped onto a ledge and tried to climb up, only for the rogue bot to come barreling towards her. She could see that it had purple eyes and was leaking something from every crevice on its body. It was no longer truly alive, just a shell with nowhere to go. Determined to destroy everything in its path, con or not.

So she did what she could. She retreated. While she was retreating, Starscream appeared on the top level of the mine. He spotted the red leader.

"Prime!" He then remembered the bomb in his hand. "I'd stick around, but I'm squeamish," he sneered as the threw the bomb down to the first floor.

Optimus and his crew were already driving back toward the Bridgepoint for Ratchet to bring them home.

____________________

Autobot Base

8:45 PM

The swirling vortex closed, leaving four very stunned humans gaping at the spot where it had opened.

"What just happened?" Jack asked.

Ratchet rolled his eyes, "I transported them to the designated coordinates via the groundbridge," he said as if it was obvious to all parties present.

Raf, always the voice of reason, asked what a groundbridge was to which Ratchet replied that it was a scaled-down version of space bridge technology as if that helped any of the non-technological beings in the room.

Victoria sighed, "okay, so if I'm going to use my vocabulary lessons, I'm assuming 'bridge' means going from one place to another whereas 'space' or 'ground' are the specific ranges of said bridge." Ratchet nodded as if this should have been obvious.

"So this is teleportation. Molecular displacement over extended distances," Tori said as she started to climb up the scaffolding surrounding the giant computer monitors. "Wait, no. If it were molecular you would have to put each bot through their own transport. You sent them all together."

She gasped as she came to a realization, nearly falling off the scaffolding.

"That's a mechanical wormhole! Humans have been trying to figure this out for years!"