Nightbeat, Traitor

Date: 10 Oct 2029

Summary: The Autobots and Decepticons are engaged in a joint effort to save Cybertron from the coming ion storms, but what's Nightbeat up to?

Mia

''Drifting erratically through the Centauri System, Mia has a diameter of 2000 km, slightly smaller than Pluto. Its rich reddish-orange surface blazes in the bright sunlight of Prima Facie and Altera like a red-hot coal, but the color is due to iron oxide, not heat. Pock-marked with craters from millions of years of collisions, it bears a strong resemblance to the planet Mars in Earth's solar system, but minus any ice caps.''

The spacebridges are being built, and shockingly, despite the joint effort, they seem to be more or less on schedule. Here is the location of the Decepticon-built terminal point, but in a joint effort such as this, even with the absense of a truce, it's not entirely unusual to see members of the other faction passing in and out, running orders and information. Or in this case, lurking about.

Now, surely it's pure co-incidence that this Autobot should show his face during a relative lull in the activity. Surely.

Shockwave, for his part, is elbow-deep in the guts of the spacebridge, working on microscopically small computerized widgets with extremely fine motions of his hand and laser arm. He is not letting any of the Autobots see what he is doing, by virtue of stopping whenever they come around and look over (or more accurately under) his shoulder.

Kup has been wandering around the construction site in his usual cranky old man way, giving disapproving looks and growling orders at gumbies that are slacking off or just not up to his standards. Now and then he taps a checklist on his datapad, adding in a score from 1-10. Thus far, the inspection is getting a below-average grade from him, and will no doubt be ammunition for Kup later on as he berates the team leaders for what he perceives to be their sloppiness.

"WHAT THE FRAG ARE YOU DOING!?" Kup yells at one pair of Decepticons that had been tossing huge girders at each other. "You ain't playin' catch! Those things are heavy and expensive! Hand 'em to each other safely! And YOU..." He kicks an Autobot who had been leaning up against a rock, and the poor guy winces and hobbles around. "This ain't break time! Get back to work!"

Nightbeat strolls among the construction, watching the going ons around him. He walks with his customary slouch, and generally appears somewhat supicious of everything going on around him. You know. Like Nightbeat. He starts approaching the general where Shockwave is working. This is perhaps a bit bold, but the way Shockwave keeps stopping his work seems to suggest that he's working on something /important./

Shockwave pauses when Nightbeat approaches and stares at him, his usual method for dealing with curious Autobots. "What do you desire?"

Kup spots Nightbeat, and allows himself a small sigh of relief. Approaching the detective, Kup shakes his head and says, "Geeze, fraggin' madhouse. Rushin' a project like this. It's nuts! I found over 86 safety violations in just the past hour! I know we gotta get this done ASAP, but this is ridiculous!" He decides to follow the Detective for now and let him address Shockwave.

Nightbeat leans up against the side of the spacebridge, still slouched. "To not have to be working with your ugly mug, Blinky," he answers. Oh slag, oh slag! He is going to be found out so, soooo fast... If he doesn't manage a distraction soon so he can make his move, he is going to be caught! None of this shows in Nightbeat's expression or stance, however, not even the ratcheting up of the panic level when Kup approaches. He shrugs when Kup complains about the safety violations. "One way to thin out the dangerous ones, I suppose." Was that too Decepticon? Scrap!

Kup raises his optics at Nightbeat for a moment. Then... he chuckles. "Heheheh, ehhh, I forgot what a morbid sense 'a humor you got, there, Nightbeat. Geeze. But seriously, I got some concerns about how this place is bein' run..." He turns his attention to the purple cyclops. "...Shockwave. Yeah, I know impendin' doom and all that. But I wanna feel assured this place is gonna turn on when somebody throws the power switch. And I ain't so assured, get me?"

"I did not request your presence here," replies Shockwave impassively, body completely immobile. "And unless my dossier on you is incomplete, you are no engineer. If you wish to not work with me all you need do is turn around and walk away."

Shockwave might be addressing Nightbeat or Kup or possibly both at once, although his head is pointed towards Nightbeat.

Your dossier is so incomplete. So, so incomplete.

"Riiiiiiiight," Nightbeat drawls out, arms crossed. "So you can get back to... what are you doing, anyway? I notice you keep stopping anytime an Autobot gets near. Nothing going on that you would happen to /not want us to see/, is there?"

"To the contrary," replies Shockwave in his pedantic drone, "this work is extremely delicate and I cannot give it my full attention when Autobots are hovering around me after the manner of puling protoforms. I will explain it to you if you like, but chances are very slim that you would be able to understand the science involved."

Kup scowls at Shockwave's snarkiness, but assumes he was indeed referring to Nightbeat and lets him deal with it. As for the other issue, though... "Yeah, Nightbeat's got a point. And you'd be surprised how many Autobots WOULD get it. We did reverse-engineer yer tech, didn't we?" Kup smirks.

Shockwave's eye flashes. "I am rarely surprised. Although certain Autobots have indeed proved to be adept mimics, neither of you are among the subset of Autobots who would 'get it.'"

Oh, good, Kup's taken up with his chorus. Nightbeat gives rather a smug smirk as the veteran speaks up. Then Shockwave makes his case. The detective snorts. "Yeah? And where's the 'Bots that can? Why're you working by yourself, instead of with them?"

But blast it all, if he can't get Shockwave away from that panel soon, he'll have to move around to the other side of the space bridge and try his work there.

Kup points a finger at the bulky Decepticon. "I ain't a genius but I ain't stupid, either. Think you might be shocked at just how much I do know." He frowns, and says, "Nah, ya gotta have sumthin' that vaguely resembles emotions to be shocked, sorry. Anyway. Since, as you pointed out, any Autobots that would "get it" ain't here, why don't I just poke my head in there and take a look-see for myself? Worst that'll happen is you end lookin' smarter than me, right?"

Shockwave closes a few things up and steps back. He would totally sigh if he was given to that sort of thing. Instead he just moves slightly faster than he normally does, as if impatient to get back to his work. "I will humor you, as it appears to be the simplest way to encourage you to go away." He directs the Autobots' attention to the nearly incomprehensible collection of black boxes and wiring and microcircuitry and supercooling pipettes he's been working on as he explains his work. "Consider an S-N proximity sandwich (e.g., Nb-Ag). One can show that the proximity effect can make a strong impact on the effect of isotope substitution. Indeed, assume that the thickness LN!j N, where j N5hvF;N/2pT is the coherence length for the N film. Then one can use the well-known McMillan tunneling model."

Nightbeat leans forward when Shockwave steps back, leaning into the panel, one hand resting on the edge, to see what Shockwave is talking about. His expression is serious, as though he's listening carefully to what Shockwave is saying, searching for a slip that indicates the Decepticon is making it all up.

Of course, what he's really doing is watching to see how carefully both Kup and Shockwave are looking, and if there's a moment when the both are not paying attention, he /does/ reach that hand resting on the edge of the panel inside and hooks out the first important looking bit he can pull loose. Preferably a fragile looking bit.

Kup stoops down as he steps up to the exposed components. "Uh-huh," Kup says absent-mindedly as he reveals a pen light, which he shines on the various parts. "That's fascinatin'." He follows the wiring from part to part, checking on things that he does know about, such as welding points and electrical grounding. "Go on." He examines the supercooling pipes at their joints, checking for leaks. So far, as he expected, Shockwave's work looks impeccable, and he wishes he could say the same for the rest of the project at this point. "Yeah... Looks good." He pulls his head out and starts to stand back up...

Nightbeat's head stays inside the panel a little bit longer than Kup's does, and then he straightens up as well.

Nightbeat shrugs. "Guess it looks all right." He frowns suspiciously at Shockwave. "We'll be checking back, though," he adds, warningly. Then he turns and starts to walk off, slouch still in place as he just so happens to head in the direction with the most rocks and the least people.

"Endeavor to restrain your 'checks' to a minimum," replies Shockwave. "The amount of time we have for you to waste is limited." He fits himself back into the hole, rearranging his stiff-jointed limbs to resume working, but almost before he's done he stops suddenly. His head swivels 180 degrees and a stentorian voice barks forth from his chest. "Sabotage! Stop that Autobot!" His left arm withdraws from the panel, reverses its elbow joint, and aims at Nightbeat. "Clear a lane!" Invisible radiation lances out of the aperture with a low hum, and a Decepticon gumby who was crossing between Nightbeat and Shockwave with a box in his arms staggers and hits the ground, sparking from the microwave blast.

You evade Shockwave's Microwave attack.

Kup blinks, mouth agape as Shockwave suddenly attacks his comrade. "What the--what the frag is this?" He reaches for Shockwave's cannon arm, and tries to force him to lower it. "You've lost your fragging mind? Hold your fire! Nightbeat, hold up a minute while I talk some sense into this fraggin' calculator..."

Kup succeeds in grasping Shockwave, throwing it off-balance.

Nightbeat's slouching walk becomes a flat-out run as he bolts the remainder of the distance between himself and the nearest crator that edges the working area, ignoring Kup's shouts. When he reaches the edge of the crater, he dives in.

No one will see that he does not fall as an Autobot would, and anyone checking, even moments after, will see only the rocky terrain that one would expect in this area.

Shockwave fires again and melts a hole in the floor as Kup yanks his arm down at just the right moment. His legs swivel 180 degrees at the waist as he realigns all his parts so that he's completed changing his facing to the opposite direction. "Nightbeat has torn the glass/molybdenum frame of the #18 microcircuitry flat-package! This damage may take up to a day or more to repair. I demand that he be seized immediately... see there, he is escaping!"

Nightbeat is now a rock. A little bit later, he will be a distinctly NOT Fleet-colored Seeker. He won't be Fleet again until he's sure he's alone.

Kup lets go of the cyclops as he swivels around. After listening to Shockwave, and seeing Nightbeat run off, Kup reluctantly grumbles, "Ehh, fine, I'll go get 'em." He hustles off at a good pace for an old man, "NIGHTBEAT! STOP! Stop right now, that's an order!" He pursues him up to the edge of a crater, quickly peers in, and sees nothing but rocks. "Frag, where'd he go?" He looks around the surrounding terrain, seeing nothing but miles and miles of red sand and more craters, and his expression turns furious. "Ghnnn... NIGHTBEAT! Come out here, NOW!"

Nightbeat does not come out. Maybe Shockwave is right, and he really did the damage! Gasp!

Shockwave arrives shortly behind Kup after posting a guard on the spacebridge segment to preserve the evidence. He sweeps his cannon arm across the crater, illuminating it with a brilliant white light like a flare. The hard shadows reveal no sign of Nightbeat. He's made a clean getaway! "Galvatron will demand an answer for this."

Kup clenches his teeth and holds a palm up to his face as Shockwave's words weigh down heavily upon him. "Errrrgh... dammit!" he snarls. "Alright, Rodimus will want to hear about this too. I need to look at the damage." He kicks a rock into the crater. "Blasted idiot! What was he thinking?"

"You are welcome to examine the damage in situ," replies Shockwave, "but be quick. I must start work immediately on repairs." He does not hazard a guess as to Nightbeat's motivations. The motives of Autobots are often difficult for him to understand, and he prefers to leave them unquestioned where possible.

Kup grumbles, walking back towards the space bridge. "Fine... I'll take a quick look. Since I just shoved my head in there, it shouldn't take long to find the damage." He shakes his head, then squints at the Decepticon MilOps commander. "What made ya think it wasn't me that wrecked this thing?"

"I calculated that during the seconds after I observed the damage," replies Shockwave, walking just behind and to the right of Kup. "Nightbeat's deliberately nonchalant posture and sudden withdrawal was suspicious, but more importantly you are old and staid in your behavior. It would be uncharacteristic for you to take a sudden, impulsive action with little likelihood of escape or long-term success. This behavior is however characteristic of Nightbeat, based on my past observations."

Kup frowns as he steps up to the space bridge, "I guess that does sound mighty "logical," though Nightbeat ain't exactly a youngbot himself. But what I guess you were sayin' is... he was DESPERATE to wreck this thing?" He stoops inside the panel, shines his pen light around, then quickly finds and examines the damage. "Ennngh.... yeah, I see it. Geeze." Stepping back out, Kup rubs his forehead. "Alright. I'm gonna find Nightbeat, and I'm gonna issue orders that he ain't to be allowed near ANY space bridge unless it's under armed escort. If I think he did it, I'll brig 'im until we can have a proper trial for 'im."

Shockwave's eye flickers in time with his dispassionate voice. "I will not go so far as to guess at Nightbeat's specific thought pattern, but you know as well as I do that most Autobots and Decepticons have strong feelings regarding their opposite numbers, and strong emotion often makes individuals act in irrational ways."

Kup's face takes on a hard look. "Doesn't matter. When he agreed to be an Autobot, he agreed to follow the orders of his superior officers, and I happen to be one of 'em. And this is our friggin' homeworld! If he can't put the fraggin' war aside for THAT, then he's got no place with us." Walking off towards a personal Autobot shuttle, Kup growls. "I'll file a report, send my orders, and I'll deal with this. Ennh... let me know if you need to send anyone to help fix this damage."

"Send Huffer if he is not otherwise occupied," intones Shockwave. Shockwave might be the only Cybertronian able to withstand Huffer's personality, by virtue of not being capable of being any more annoyed than he already is.

================================= Decepticon ================================= Message: 2/84                     Posted        Author Warning: Nightbeat                Fri Oct 10    Shockwave --

Be aware: the Autobot Nightbeat has defied our agreement, the principles of self-preservation, and common sense. Autobot Kup and I witnessed his sabotage of one of the three spacebridges under construction in the Proxima system, specifically the Mia bridge. Nightbeat escaped after damaging the spacebridge, which was under construction at the time. The Autobots have determined to arrest him when they find him. If you find him first, eliminate him. End of line.

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============================ BB Post in Progress ============================= Group: Autobot Title: NIGHTBEAT! -- Kup's extremely angry mug appears after the spinny. He seems to be seated in a single-passenger transport.

"NIGHTBEAT! Where the fragging hell are you? Shockwave says you damaged the Space Bridge on Mia! And why'd you keep runnin' off when I told you to stop? I'm your friggin' superior officer, slaggit! Can't you follow an order!?" Kup leans into the camera, optics twitching. "And then I called you on the radio... AND YOU DIDN'T RESPOND! What. The. FRAK!?" The old man slams a fist into his control console.

"I am giving you one megacycle to come and see me so that you can explain what the frag you were doing. And if you need to use a space bridge, then you're going to do it under armed escort, get me? I better see you before that deadline is up, because if I don't...." Kup gives the camera the evil eye. "Yer gonna have a whole buncha reasons to make you wish you did."

Calming down a bit, Kup says, "Ehhn, 'nother thing. Shockwave requested Huffer's help to fix the damage. Ehm... seems the glass/molybdenum frame of the, ah, #18 microcircuitry flat-package was torn, whatever that means. So, Huffer, if yer around, head over to Mia, pronto." Sighing wearily, Kup starts to press buttons on his console. "Kup out."

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