(Author’s Note: This fic takes place during the last week or so of the previous fic, “All Washed Up.” So the Transformers in that fic are still missing and unaccounted for at this point.)
 

 “Knock knoooock…”

 “Who’s there?”

 “Buzzsaw.”

 “Hold on, let me run a signature scan to confirm your identity, as per Scourge’s instructions.”

 Buzzsaw sighed. “You’re supposed to say, ‘Buzzsaw, who?’”

 Buzzsaw expected at least a snide retort, but he wasn’t granted the privilege. The ‘bot on the other end- Buzzsaw guessed it was Strika from the voice- said nothing, and conducted the scan. Half a minute later, the door to the outpost opened, and the enormous fembot walked out, scowling.

 “Buzzsaw, you didn’t tell me you had brought someone with you.”

 “It’s just Terrorsaur, Stingwing, and Bazooka,” Buzzsaw said, pointing to each one of the three Predacons behind him in turn. “You know ‘em. Now c’mon, let us in- these satellite parts are heavy.”

 Strika moved to block Buzzsaw as he took a step towards the door.

 “Hey! C’mon, you know we’re the real deal already!” Buzzsaw said, flabbergasted. “Now let us IN!”

 “Buzzsaw,” Strika growled, the aggravation evident in her voice, “You KNOW that you are required to tell me EVERY Predacon that is with you when I ask for your identification. It is for security measures- Lord Scourge has commanded it.”

 “Lord Scourge needs to take that crown out of his aft once and a while and quit turning the Predacons into a bureaucracy!” Terrorsaur blurted out.

 “Be careful, Terrorsaur,” Strika warned, “Your words border on treason.”

 Turning back to Buzzsaw, the Vehicon continued, “I will let this pass this one time, Buzzsaw. But be warned, if the next time you do not follow the proper procedures, I will turn you away. You may proceed.”

 Strika stepped out of the way and let the four Predacons through, her optics boring into theirs as they passed.

 “And be careful with that equipment!” Strika called to the Predacons as they hauled their satellite pieces into the heart of the outpost building. “We need everything to be working perfectly when Lord Scourge arrives tomorrow!”

 “Lord Scourge can…” Terrorsaur started, but he quickly trailed off, for fear that Strika might hear him again.

 “This is the room that has been cleared out to make your temporary quarters, soldiers!” Blastcharge told the four Predacons as he unlocked the door.

 “…This place is a dump,” Buzzsaw stated. Judging from the stains on the wall, this must have been a storage closet of sorts, since the rest of the outpost was incredibly well-kept.

 “As I said, it was just cleared out, and it’s only temporary,” Blastcharge said, his optics narrowing. “You will only be here until mid-afternoon tomorrow, when Lord Scourge will arrive and personally transmit our SOS message to Cybertron. We want to make sure you didn’t screw up on anything.”

 This only drew scowls from the other Predacons.

 “Obsidian has told me that you are expected to be up at dawn tomorrow to make the final touches on the satellite construction! I hope that won’t be too much of a problem, soldiers?”

 “No, it won’t,” the four Predacons mumbled under their breath.

 “Good. I’ll see you tomorrow, then, ladies!” Blastcharge declared, turning about-face on one heel and marching out of the room.

 “Story of my life…” Bazooka grumbled once he was sure Blastcharge was out of audio range.

 Stingwing merely nodded, picking out the least dusty of the four corners of the room to call his own for the night.

 Closing the door behind him once all four had chosen their sleeping spots in the cramped quarters, Buzzsaw sat down and started to speak in a low tone.

 “Guys, I know I can trust you- we’ve been comrades ever since we were activated on this blasted planet. And I know that all four of us are getting sick and tired of ‘Lord’ Scourge and his slagging Vehicons running the show and treated the rest of us Predacons like slag.”

 “Darned right,” Bazooka said.

 Stingwing nodded vigorously.

 Terrorsaur wasn’t too fond of the idea, though. “I’m all for rebellion, Buzzsaw, but we don’t stand a chance against Scourge and the Vehicons! Believe me, guys, I’ve been on this planet longer than any of you have, and I know how hard it is to wrestle power from megalomaniacal morons like that. I tried several times with Megatron, and Scourge makes even Megs look like a child’s toy!”

“I understand your point of view, Terrorsaur,” Buzzsaw conceded, “But, reading some of the datatracks from that period of the Beast Wars, it seems to me like you were too direct. You are correct in that there is no way we could take out Scourge by simple combat or even by rallying the other Predacons- many of them are still very loyal to Scourge, as I’ve found out. They’re still scared of him because of what he did to Bantor, Megatron, and the original Scavenger.”

“So then why are we even havin’ this conversation?” Bazooka said. “We can’t win, you just admitted it yourself.”

“Because,” Buzzsaw said, grinning mischievously, “We need to wrest Scourge’s power away from him… without him even knowing it.”

“And how the slag do you propose we do that!?” Terrorsaur screeched.

“Shhh! Keep your voice down, Needlenose, or the Vehicons might hear us!” Buzzsaw hissed. “Now, Scourge is coming here tomorrow to send a SOS message to Cybertron, correct? He’ll be there when he first starts sending the message, but the satellite tower will continue to transmit it indefinitely until help arrives.”

“Cut to the chase,” Bazooka yawned, transforming into his ankylosaurus mode and curling up on the floor. It was clear that he was losing interest.

“What I propose we do,” Buzzsaw said, smirking, “Is that, after Scourge and the Vehicons leave the satellite control center, one of us sneaks in and alters the message slightly. We still keep the basic SOS portion of the message the same, but we also include an extra little white lie on the end that tells about Scourge- who we’ll just label as a renegade foot soldier- being the one responsible for killing the mercenary the Tripredacus council had sent earlier- Ravage. And we’ll include a ‘desperate plea’ for them to bring this ‘rogue Predacon’ to justice. The Council will no doubt capture Scourge after they send more help here—or, if we’re really lucky, they may even kill him on sight!”

“Now you’ve got my attention,” Bazooka said, standing up and leaning closer towards Buzzsaw. “So… whaddaya want us to do?”

 Sigma Prime stepped out of the CR chamber, looking over his new beast mode.

 “Hmm… interesting…”

 “Does everything seem to function okay? No beast mode optic problems, anything like that?” Rhinox asked, wheeling up to Sigma.

 “None that I can discern,” Sigma Prime said. “Still, being on all fours is rather… disconcerting at first.”

 “Yeah,” Rhinox said, his mind clearly on something else as soon as Sigma had admitted he felt fine. Rhinox wheeled back to the console he had been working on and interfaced with it again to examine the experiment readouts.

 “Hmm… yep, it seems that Nighteye’s procedure worked flawlessly,” Rhinox said, his face now appearing on the main monitor, as it always did when he interfaced. “Your organic lion ‘skin’ is of the same quality as all the other Maximals’.”

 “Well, that’s good. I’ve been needing a beast mode for a while,” Sigma Prime said, transforming into his robot mode. “Nothing seems wrong with the transformation process, either.”

 “I’ve also added a tertiary ‘flight mode’ to give you aerial capability,” Rhinox said. “Even though I have to admit it looks a bit goofy- it essentially consists of your mane spinning like a helicopter blade- the Maximals could really use another flier. We need all the advantages we can get, otherwise the Beast Wars could go on forever.”

 “Still, I wish you had told me about the flight mode before you had modified me,” Sigma Prime said, his voice a little stern. “I don’t like being in the dark about anything as important as that.”

 “Well, I probably wouldn’t have had to if Silverbolt hadn’t run off,” Rhinox said bitterly. “Without him, Prowl and Ironhide can’t form Magnaboss. If only we had Silverbolt, we’d have someone to stand against Tripredacus…”

 “… Not to mention we’d have Silverbolt’s friendship again,” Sigma Prime said, casting a glance at Rhinox to see if the former rhino-bot would add anything.

 “That reminds me. I haven’t heard a report from Prowl or Ironhide recently. They should have finished their project by now… Sigma, take Cybershark and go to coordinates 3, 56, 91. That’s where I sent them to establish a satellite outpost.”

That wasn’t what I wanted to hear from you… Sigma Prime thought bitterly. Whatever happened to thinking of our troops as friends, too, Rhinox? Visibly, the lion-bot just sighed, nodded and exited the room.

 “Lord Scourge, welcome,” Obsidian said, bowing deeply. “We Vehicons have eagerly anticipated your arrival.”

 “Thank you, Obsidian,” Scourge said, passing by the copter-bot and entering the outpost’s interior. “Let’s hope that everything goes well. Oh, and I brought Tripredacus along to give this base a little extra protection in case there’s a Maximal attack during the transmission. I hope you don’t mind.”

 “Not at all, Lord Scourge,” Obsidian said, hovering back in front of his leader to show him the way to the transmission tower. “Spystreak, make sure Tripredacus is comfortable outside,” the copter-bot commanded his close-by subordinate. “Lord Scourge, please follow me.”

 “Buzzsaw, Bazooka, Stingwing, Terrorsaur! Atten-HUT! Here comes Lord Scourge!” Blastcharge said as Lord Scourge and Obsidian entered the transmission tower. “Look your best, soldiers!”

 All five Transformers saluted as Scourge and Obsidian walked past to the control console.

 “I hope everything is to your liking, sir,” Buzzsaw said, in a voice that sounded entirely too eager-to-please.

 Scourge activated the monitor, quickly ran a system diagnostic, then turned back to his assembled subordinates. “Everything seems to check out, Predacons. You are dismissed while I encode and transmit the message.”

 All six Transformers bowed and left silently, leaving their leader to his work.

 The four Predacons slipped into their makeshift “bedroom”, then made sure the door was shut.

 “Alright, ‘bots, we don’t have much time,” Buzzsaw said. “Terrorsaur, do you have the arachnoid ready?”

 “Sure,” Terrorsaur said, taking the little six-legged, lightbulb-faced drone out from his subspace. “I stole one of these little wonders from the base's storage room, like you said.”

 “And you have the camera and control pad linked to it?” Buzzsaw asked.

 “Well, I’m not the tech-whiz around here, but Stingwing assured me it was operational,” Terrorsaur said, turning to the aforementioned Predacon.

 Stingwing nodded in affirmation.

 “Alright then, ‘bots, this is it,” Buzzsaw said. “Stingwing, activate the arachnoid and let’s do this. Bazooka, activate the camera and control pad so we can see and control the arachnoid as he makes his way to the transmission console. Let’s hope all goes well!”

 “Bazooka, turn left so we can see the entryway. Left!”

 “This thing’s hard to control, Buzzsaw, especially when it’s slaggin’ hanging from the ceiling. I think I’ve got it steady, though.”

 “Guys, there’s Scourge! He’s coming out!” Terrorsaur interrupted, his optics locked onto the television screen they had in the room, which was directly linked to the miniature camera on the arachnoid’s head.

 “Alright, good, he’s done. Bazooka, quickly- get the arachnoid inside before the Vehicons post a guard.”

 “Will do, Buzzsaw- I’m goin’ in.”

 All four Predacons watched with baited breath as the ankylosaurus-bot ushered the arachnoid on into the control room and onto the console.

 “Alright Bazooka, start the link up! Let’s change that broadcast!”

 “Linking up- now.”

 The four Predacons watched the screen anxiously as the input fed into the arachnoid, showing up in a small window in one corner of the monitor.

 “As soon as it’s done loading, Bazooka, start the edit pro-“

 Buzzsaw stopped in mid-sentence as he read what the satellite was transmitting. All of the other Predacons were also speechless. This COULDN’T be true. There HAD to be something wrong with the data feed.

 Buzzsaw voiced his concern to Bazooka, who promptly unplugged the arachnoid from the socket, linked up again, and started to download the information a second time.

 And yet, even before the message came up again on the screen, reading the exact same as it had before, Buzzsaw knew it wasn’t a data feed malfunction. A malfunction of that sort would have elicited random numbers and letters in the message—not a coherent plea like this.

 “Holy slag…” Bazooka breathed.

 “This isn’t a message to Cybertron!” Terrorsaur shrieked. “It’s a message to Vexora!”

Physical Destination: Vexora, Nexus Zero, Coordinates 24,190,258 x 156,004
Time Destination: 2367 AD
Code: Transformer Binary, English variation; Please decode to Vexoran after transfer
To: High Guardian Zaknos
Re: SOS

Greetings, Most Esteemed One.
This is Lieutenant Scourge of the Alphon Fleet, which was under the command of General Tarad when it left Vexora 10 stellar cycles ago. As you may recall, we were sent into Transwarp space to deal with a race called the Transformers who had contaminated the Project on Sol III, which would interfere with future events. We were sent to contain and destroy these Transformers, but they proved to be more of a threat then we realized. Our ship was destroyed, and only myself and my fellow lieutenant, Scarem, have survived. Nighteye, a Vexoran also on the ship, has betrayed us and sided with the Transformers. Scarem and I have managed to play the part of Predacons, a sub-group of Transformers, but it is clear this war will go on forever if further intervention is not acquired.
Thus, I humbly beg you to send a full fleet of warships to Sol III, with a Time Destination of 2,102,347 BC. We must eradicate these Transformers immediately, and thereafter move to their home planet, Cybertron, with a Time Destination of the present, and destroy this unusually powerful race of beings before they can contaminate any other time streams. According to the history tracks I read a few days before our ship was destroyed, this would be a most opportune time period to attack, as not only would it not upset any past time streams, but the planet is currently in a state of unrest. We could eradicate these Transformers before they even know what hit them!
Please send help as soon as you are able. I thank you deeply and humbly for your oversight on this matter.

       -Lieutenant Scourge

 “W-what do we do?!” Terrorsaur said, panicking.

 “I… I don’t know…” Buzzsaw whispered, his voice full of dread.

 “I’ll tell you what we do,” Bazooka said, typing away at the interface pad again, “We erase that message and send a REAL plea to Cyber-“

 Bazooka stopped in mid-sentence, namely because his visual feedback suddenly flickered out and went to static.

 “Slag! Someone’s found the arachnoid!” Bazooka cursed.

 “We’ve gotta get out of here, immediately!” Buzzsaw cried. “Stingwing, open the door, quickly!”

 Stingwing got up and ran over to the door, but before he could touch the knob, a huge claw penetrated from the other side, and pulled the door out by its frame. On the other side was Spystreak, with Tankor, Obsidian, Strika, and Mirage right behind him.

 “We thought you cowards might be hiding in here,” Spystreak said, tossing the door further down the hallway. “Trying to sabotage our SOS to Cybertron, eh? I never did trust you guys.”

 “Predacons, attack!” Buzzsaw commanded, his voice in a state of panic.

 The Predacons complied, but it didn’t do much good. Tankor, with his nearly impenetrable hide, rushed in front of Spystreak and barreled into the small room, knocking over Stingwing and Bazooka, who were closest to the doorway. He crushed the monitor under his huge foot, picked up the two Predacons, and smashed them into each other, sending them both into stasis lock.

 “Tankor smash good! Now Tankor smash other two beast-bots!”

 “G-guys, you’ve got to listen to me!” Buzzsaw cried as he and Terrorsaur backed up against the far wall, their guns pointed shakingly at an advancing Tankor. “That message wasn’t to Cybertr- aaaacccckkk…”

 Buzzsaw stopped in mid-sentence because Tankor had grabbed him and Terrorsaur by the necks tightly, choking them. Buzzsaw tried to stay online as long as he could, but after a few more seconds of the intense pain, he went into stasis lock.

 Scourge smirked as he looked out over the assembled Predacons. Nearly all were there, except for a skeleton crew left at the base. It had been a close call, but luckily, no one would believe Buzzsaw and his comrades. The plan would continue as he anticipated. He couldn’t risk any more info leaks, though, so he had to make sure he made an example of these four.

 “My fellow Predacons,” Scourge said as he motioned to the four Predacons that were, literally, welded to a large vertical metal slab behind him. “Let this be a lesson to any of you who have even thought of betraying me. If you dare to interfere with my plans- especially one that is so important as requesting help from Cybertron- then you WILL end up like these two. Unlike the former Predacon leader on this planet, Megatron, I will not tolerate treachery just because we are at a standstill. Forty-two loyal Predacons is better than forty-six treacherous Predacons.”

 “D-d-don’t lishen to him!” Buzzsaw said, his voice slurred slightly from the extreme amounts of pain his systems were registering. “He’sh a Vexshoran! He’sh trying to signal hish friendsh back home!”

 Scourge laughed, as did all the other Predacons present.

 “Now really, Buzzsaw,” Scourge said, walking over the Predacon and looking him in the face. “Do I look like a Vexoran to you? Oh yes, I’m one of the eeevil aliens. Quit trying to save your own hide with lies. Thrust, remove his voice box.”

 “With pleasure,” Thrust said, wheeling over to Buzzsaw and clasping his claws together. Before Buzzsaw could react, Thrust quickly clawed a huge chunk of his neck out, as well as his vocal processor.

 “You see, how if you tell lies, you will be silenced?” Scourge said, turning again to address the assembled Predacons. “If you side against me, there is no such thing as victory. And you will suffer a MUCH more painful death at my hands than you possibly ever could at the Maximals’. Vehicons, torture them until they’re dead. If the other three scream too much, remove their vocal processors as well.”

 Unbeknownst to the gathered Predacons, a pair of glowing orange eyes watched the public spectacle from behind a cluster of trees, about a hundred meters away.

 “Hmmm… most interesting, teeheehee…. The satellite transmission is indeed to Vexora, as I had anticipated…. I think the Maximals will be most interested in this, teheh….”

The End

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