Transformers: Deep Space Exploration Team

by TcogArchitect

Chapter Twenty-Seven: Brawl

Published December 4th, 2013

Chapter Twenty-Seven: Brawl

Dark Lance flung Sharpedge out through the main hatch, finally clearing his ship of Decepticons after throwing Harvester and Crosswire out through the roof portal, and having Fireburst and Bloodwing follow them on their own. Bloodwing had just gotten out of his holding cell, and he had no intention of giving his long-time rival a chance to put him back in. After Sharpedge impacted a tree and fell to the ground, Dark Lance flew out, turning over and bringing up his shield to defend against the sneak attack he had predicted from Fireburst, standing on top of the vessel. The force of the blast pushed him back, down into the ground, so he flipped back over, skidding to a halt several meters away. He stood up, and looked around at the assembled Decepticons surrounding him as he readied his lance. Bloodwing scoffed.

"Oh, please, Dark Lance. Do you honestly think that you have any hope of beating all of us by yourself?"

"Who said he was alone?" Bloodwing turned toward the new voice, and saw a flurry of small missiles headed toward them. He took off, quickly followed by Fireburst and Sharpedge. Harvester and Crosswire were not as fast, however, and were blown back as the missiles detonated. Bunker stepped out of the brush in his robot mode, and looked up at the Decepticon leader. "You still think you'll win this fight?" Bloodwing's optics narrowed.

"I still think I have a good enough chance!"

"Well, then, how about we make that chance zero?" He once more turned, up this time, as another voice sounded, and saw Firefall diving towards them with another Autobot in her talons, who was clutching what appeared to be a bomb in either hand. He flung the explosives down at Fireburst and Sharpedge, and the orbs exploded before they could clear themselves of the blast radius. Firefall released Detpack from her grip, and he landed heavily, but unharmed, next to Dark Lance. She then activated her flames, and aimed right for Bloodwing himself. He put up his shield, but the force of the impact sent him careening back to the ground. He clambered back out of the hole, looking around at his team. In mere moments, his greatest victory had already turned sour. He huffed.

"Fine, Lance, looks like you won't be terminated today."

"His medic might be, though." All heads turned toward the ship, to see Burnout, with Fangcrusher holding her up and his rifle at her throat. "Don't move, Autobots, or I send her to the slag heap." They all froze, unwilling to risk her safety. They didn't have to, however, as a shot rang out, hitting Fangcrusher on his hand and causing him to drop his weapon.

"Or maybe we'll just send you packing!" Skybreaker called as he swooped down, giving a swift kick to the Decepticon's face and knocking him away from the ship. Bloodwing growled as Fangcrusher picked himself up, and another Autobot revealed himself from the trees. He was white, with what looked like a unicorn horn on his right arm, and his pony head making up his upper left. His forelegs were folded against his back, pointing straight up, and his rear legs were split three ways down the middle, layered over each other to form wide, stable feet.

We don't have enough time or power left to win this fight.

"Decepticons... Fall back. We'll finish this later." He transformed, and took off as his subordinates did the same, the whole group disappearing into the forest after him. Once they were sure the Decepticons were out of sensor range, the Autobots all slumped in exhaustion, except for Detpack and Crackshot. Dark Lance looked around, and decided that Burnout's injury was highest priority. The others didn't have any immediate problems, and the new sparklings could be introduced later. He transformed, and trotted over as Burnout slowly slid down the doorframe, obviously low on Energon.

"Come on, Burnout, let's get you fixed up." She nodded weakly, and let him carry her over to the auto-repair tanks. He gently put her in one of the ones that didn't have a gaping hole in it, and turned it on, leaving it to do its job. Returning to the ship's bridge, he surveyed the assembled Autobots before he transformed. The area was much more crowded, now. "Alright, so now that we have a moment, let's do some planning. First, you two. What are your names and functions?" The two newly-activated sparklings looked at each other before Crackshot swept a hand forward, inviting Detpack to go first. The blue Autobot shrugged, and turned back to his new commander.

"The name's Detpack. I was designed for demolitions and explosives mining. I can use my environmental absorbers to make bombs anywhere, anytime." Dark Lance nodded, and turned his attention to the other new arrival.

"I'm Crackshot. Designed for long-range combat scenarios, overwatch, and guard stations. I actually only have one weapon, but I can switch out the core with other cores to have different effects." Dark Lance nodded.

"Yes, I remember. An experimental weapons system designed to outmatch every other. You were equipped with it as a last resort option, should a situation involving a planet's natives become violent."

"Hold on a nanoclick!" Firefall shouted as she stepped forward. "You mean to tell me that you knew he was on the ship? You knew that he had a purpose-built weapon, and you never activated him? Why not?! You could have scrapped the Decepticons by now if he had been with you!"

"Put simply, because I didn't want to risk any of you falling into their hands as well. I didn't want your first experiences in life to be war."

"Yeah, well, you sure accomplished that, didn't you?" She turned and stormed toward the exit. "I'm going on patrol." She opened the door, and took off once she was back in her beast mode.

"Skybreaker." The now-senior scout snapped to attention. "Go with her. Just keep her out of trouble, though, alright?" He nodded, then jumped out the main hatch and transformed, taking to the sky as he did. "You two, familiarize yourselves with the ship. Bunker, give them the tour. I need to think." Dark Lance walked away as Bunker began his lecture of the ship's systems. He headed down to his room, and locked the door behind him. He opened a concealed panel on the wall, revealing a board filled with pictures and news clippings from Cybertron, and from his time in command of the Star Runner. He focused in on one in particular; an image taken just before their departure, when the Decepticons hadn't even been formed yet. There were six total members of his crew, then. He was standing in the middle of the group, an obviously excited young 'Bot who was doing his best to look professional. To his left, Bunker was standing with his arms crossed, his face unreadable due to his helmet. To his right, Burnout was standing with her hands folded in front of her, just out of medical school. On the other side of Burnout, the team's original scout, Torque, was striking a pose for the camera. He was fairly large for a scout, one of the effects of having a three-wheeled alt-mode. The two front wheels were embedded in his forearms, while the third sat vertically on his back. He had on the same confident smirk that Dark Lance remembered. On Bunker's left, the team's senior medic was standing with his arms behind him, and his legs close together. The spitting image of professionalism. And probably the only professional the original team had. Weld had been tasked to be the team's chaperone, consultant, teacher, and head medic when things went awry. Finally, hovering behind Lance and just to his right, was a red Cybertronian, with a jet cockpit making up his left shoulder. He had his arms up in a flexing pose, and a huge, confident smile as he kept himself floating above the rest, having been the only way to be seen due to his short stature. Dark Lance stared at the picture for a long while, wondering how he had ever thought himself capable of leading this team, and how he had never been able to keep Bloodwing from turning traitor, all those years ago. He closed the panel, and returned to the med-lab. Upon entrance, he found Wingshift sitting on one of the examination tables, watching the repair pod Burnout was still in. The mutant looked up, and nodded in greeting.

"How's she coming along, Wingshift?"

"Adequately. The repair pod is doing its job, and she seems to still be conscious, so she should be fine." Dark Lance nodded limply. ".... Sir, if I may, I might not be able to fix your problem, but I might be able to give you insight that will help."

"What makes you think I have a problem?"

"Your actions are slow, dragging, and unenthusiastic. I was living as a Changeling for some time, and I learned how to read body language quite well during that time. You'd be surprised how similar the body language of different species is." Dark Lance sighed, considering if he should divulge the information to possibly the only ally he had who might be willing to try and take his position. Eventually, he relented.

"You remember, of course, how paranoid Skybreaker was of you when you first joined us, correct?"

"Of course."

"He was like that due to an incident that took place just a couple weeks after he came online. He was doing a basic training routine, which I had ordered, with our original scout, Torque. While they were out, they found Sharpedge, the Decepticon scout, wandering around. She told them that she had decided to defect. We hadn't really had much time to learn about her or the others at that point, so of course we all welcomed her right away, happy that at least one of them had been willing to make an attempt at peace. The next morning, both she and Torque were gone. We checked the security cameras, and discovered that she had allowed the other Decepticons into the ship, and they had taken Torque hostage. We mobilized immediately, unaware of what they had done to him by then. Skybreaker and I went to search by air, while Bunker and Burnout searched on the ground. We found out where they had him first, though I sometimes wish we hadn't. Crosswire had given away his position with a power spike, and we homed in on it. When we arrived, the Decepticons had already fled, leaving Torque behind. He was strung up against a wall, with his parts hanging from various stands around him." Wingshift's optics widened in horror. "He was still alive, but just barely. Crosswire had removed every single major organ from his body without disassembling him, and without actually taking him apart. Everything was still attached. Only problem was, his Energon levels were critically low, and we didn't have any to give him right away. Skybreaker wasn't as fast as he is now, and he was still faster than me, but not fast enough to be able to get back to the ship and return with the Energon needed to keep Torque alive. Neither of us had the medical expertise to put him back together, and he wouldn't last long enough for Burnout to get there."

"So you had to pull the plug." Dark Lance nodded.

"Yes. Skybreaker was in no mental state to do it, so I had to. His last words were, 'See you around, boss.' I shot him point-blank, right in the spark. He died instantly. Painlessly. But neither Skybreaker nor myself have been able to totally get over it. As you found out." Wingshift nodded.

"That does explain his attitude towards me. And I suppose this is also why you weren't willing to activate the other protoforms yourself, correct?"

"Yeah."

"Certainly a reasonable precaution. However, you can't protect them all, certainly not from the Decepticons. I would recommend not worrying about it at this point. What's done is done, and you can't change that." Dark Lance shook his head.

"Maybe, but it's not just that. I've made a lot of mistakes, as commander of this ship. And honestly, I don't think I'm cut out for this job." Wingshift stood up, setting a hand on Dark Lance's shoulder for a moment as he passed.

"If you're not capable, then none of us are. And no one's tried to usurp you yet, right? So you must be dong something correctly." He removed his hand, and left the med-lab. Dark Lance considered his words for a moment, then sighed again.

"Thanks."

Author's Note:

So, with the holidays coming up, and me working retail, this won't be getting updated until probably January. For those of you wondering why the hell this story isn't updating very often anymore, though, the reason is that I am currently working on another Transformers crossover, which is still in its infancy. It'll be short, fortunately, but I haven't really planned it out like I did this one and Stolen Minds. Oh, and for those of you who noticed that this chapter seems a little different from previous chapters, that's because I did this one with my laptop, on the site word processor, instead of using my Ipad's notes app and copy/pasting it in. If you feel that I should keep doing it this way, let me know. Also, if you think I should go back to using the notes app because you prefer the style that has, tell me. So with that said, I will bid you all Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Joyful Kwanzaa, or whatever else you might celebrate. I don't look this stuff up first, I just post it. Until next time!