The Secret of Segway Island

Summary: A group of intrepid Decepticons discover a map to the fabled Segway Island! But what horrors await them there?

West Central Pacific

''Huge, ominious cumulus clouds block out the sky in a climate of heavy, year-round rainfall, the brisk winds stirring the gray waters into choppy waves. Lightning flashes, forked tongues of fire reaching down from the heavens to strike at the dull, heaving ocean below. Though, in less than a few hours, the wind sweeps the clouds away to reveal the bluest of skies above, bringing the ocean back to sparkling blue life again. The seas are prolific with sharks, tuna, marlin, rays, and even turtles, attracting deep sea fishing and reef diving.''

Blueshift lands on the boat with something in his hands. It looks like a brush with wheels. What could it be?

Blitzwing isn't too shy to ask. "What's that you've got in your hands, Blueshift?"

Thrust is sitting on the boat, a half-filled cube in his hands. He looks like he's on break from flying around or whatever it is he's supposed to be doing. "Yeah, it looks like a brush with wheels, what's the deal?"

Blueshift holds the device up. "It is the ultimate weapon, Blitzwing. I have had it constructed from ancient human designs. It will revolutionise the world. it is called... 'A Segway'"

Thrust inexplicably takes a bite out of the half-filled cube as if it were an apple. "I'm intrigued. Tell me more."

Blueshift guestures to his device. "This machine will solve all of our transport problems. Watch. As so!" With that, he puts the segway on the deck, and stands on it. It slowly starts moving forwards with a whirring noise, a bit slower than walking speed. "Wheee!"

"You look ridiculous, Blueshift," says Blitzwing after watching him for several long seconds with his hands on his hips. "That's really... wow, you've got no dignity at all on that thing."

Thrust almost drops his cube, and butterfingeredly stumbles to catch it. "That's -- that's amazing!" Thrust says, clearly in complete awe. "/You don't even have to put your feet on the ground!/"

Blueshift steps off it and hands it to Thrust. "Yes, it is like you are walking but not!"

Thrust climbs aboard, and drives himself into the side of a stairwell. He tries to back up and turn, unsuccessfully, several times -- he keeps whacking into the stairwell. "This /revolutionizes/ the way I move on planar surfaces, Blueshift. Not just redefines. /Revolutionizes./" WHONK. Into the stairwell again.

"But why would you want something like that?" asks Blitzwing. "Some of us already HAVE wheels, even."

Blueshift looks worried as Thrust tries to break his Segway. "No Thrust, it does not do stairs. But in the age of the Segway, stairs will be extinct!" Then he turns to Blitzwing. "Do you not see? Blitzwing? Do you not /see/?"

Thrust manages to turn in the segway and rolls toward Blueshift. Then backward. Then he spins in a stationary circle! "You don't have /wheels/, you have /treads/," he imperiously corrects, as if he's so great now because he's wheelborne. "Jealousy doesn't suit you, dear Blitzwing."

Blueshift stands back, mouth agape at Thrust's performance. He is surely a king amongst mechs, so easily does he control this invention. "The possiblities are endless!" he gasps

Blitzwing squints at it. "Maybe I'm just not seeing the appeal."

Compton Xabat emerges from the UNS Supertanker Hephaestus.

Octane soars down into view from the skies above.

Thrust continues to roll around the deck in his gigantic segway, visibly having the time of his life. "This is exhilarating," he says, overjoyed. "You think you're so great because you've got three forms, Blitzwing, but I assure you, this machine definitively makes me better than you, even on several metaphysical levels."

Blueshift points at the Segway. Part of him feels bitter that Thrust has taken it off him, but the other part marvels at Thrust's mastery. "See Blitzwing, it has wheels but does not fall! He glides across the land like a GOD!"

Blitzwing is standing out of the way of the Segway-mounted Thrust, looking extremely skeptical. "I always imagined gods as being more... airborne, not so much rolling around."

Thrust clearly has no intention of giving the segway back, ever. "How would you know? You were too busy getting beaten up by Hot Rod and Kup when we all got to fight a god." Thrust leaves out the fact that Unicron, like, ate him.

Compton Xabat emerges from a hatch on the control tower, and walks out onto the sunny deck, stretching his arms. "Ahhh. Nice big ship, full of EDC technology to peek at. Well, little disappointing, actually--they seriously need to update--" He double-takes at seeing Thrust on a huge segway. "--what?"

Octane comes up from below decks, his gaze fixated on a small digital device in his hand that he was using to record fuel levels with, before he glances up to see Thrust rolling around on the segway. He blinks, looks around to see Blueshift doing the same thing, before turning to look at Blitzwing. "What on Cybertron is going on here?"

Blueshift looks at Octane as he folds his arms watching Thrust. "It is a new age, Octane. A new golden age..."

Blitzwing looks ashamed. It's true, he wasn't there for the god-fighting. "Kup and Hot Rod had really twinky stats," he mutters. "You would've got beaten up too."

Blitzwing explains to Octane, "Blueshift has invented a stick with wheels on it. For those of us without wheels. Or legs."

Thrust zooms around gaily before he wonks into the side of that staircase again. "Dammit," he murmurs as he slowly backs up. "Maybe so, Blitzwing, but at least neither of us are /dead/ like Starscream!" Thrust laughs openly and with disrespect for the dead.

Blueshift nods at this. "Perhaps if Starscream had a Segway, he would not be dead." Perhaps this device could make them kings of all the Decepticons?

Octane keeps walking forward to stand beside Blitzwing, ducking to avoid Thrust as he zooms past, before standing up and keeping his eyes on the two Decepticons are they roll around. "I could run faster then that absurd looking contraption."

Compton Xabat frowns, deciding that it might be safer if he had a bit of protection while the Decepticons roll around in their giant-sized segways. He steps up to his exo-suit, which he had left parked near the control tower, and hops inside of it.

Blitzwing has to admit that Thrust is right about Starscream. Stupid Starscream. He doesn't know why the fangirls all love him so much. "So could Thrust, or any of us, but apparently that's not the point. The segway uses its fuel so you don't have to use yours." He thinks about this for a moment. "Is the segway more fuel-efficient than we are? Just walking, I mean?"

Blueshift strokes his chin. "Just think, we could glide across the land like bronzed adonis towards the Autobots and then be fully battle ready, while we attacked on our mighty Segways..."

Octane rolls his eyes as he responds with a voice containing a double helping of sarcasm. "Yes, and kill the Autobots by making them laugh themselves into malfunction."

Thrust grunts. "You guys are just h--" he starts, unable to finish because he drives the segway over the edge of the tanker deck, falling into the ocean, still standing atop it.

Blueshift leans over the edge of the boat. "I wonder if it can drive on water. I'm not fixing it Thrust!"

From Exo-Suit Fire , Compton Xabat stomps over to the Decepticons, feeling a bit more like he fits in with them in his Zaku/Zagok ripoff exo. "Well, honestly, I have considered fitting some exo-suits with deployable wheels on their feet, so that, on clear terrain such as roads, they may skate along at higher speeds. And it would use less energy than walking per mile traveled."

From Exo-Suit Fire , Compton Xabat watches Thrust fall over. "--but there would be certain disadvantages."

Octane strides casually over to the absent section of the railing where Thrust made his unexpected entrance before leaning down to study the rippling water. "What was that, Thrust? I can't hear you with all the gurgling!"

Blitzwing stands next to Octane, pointing and laughing. "And that's why Autobots suck! Give up the wheels, Thrust!" Falling foward onto all fours, Sixshot stands poised as a winged wolf, claws and teeth at the ready.

Thrust flies up, still standing on the segway on his tiptoes, his jets blaring out of his heels as he breaks the water's surface and soars back up to the deck, soaked. "It saved my life," he says. "It's a floatation device!" It isn't. He used his rockets.

Mucking about inside of the tanker was a hassel as a robot, and Sixshot had no intentions of squeezing himself through the hallways in an uncomfortable manner. The fierce visage of the lupine mech surfaced from the entrance, stepping outside to see...Sixshot paused for several full seconds to take in the sight of some contraption and several Decepticons making a fuss over it. And an Exo-suit, by its mark and voice, pegging the possible owner. "How delightful." He growled out, dripping with etched sarcasm.

Blueshift looks delighted at this... and then apprehensive! "What's that?" he questions, racing to the Segway. For stuck in one of its nooks, is a little bottle with a wedge of paper inside. "It has come from the ocean, the Segway has given us another treasure!"

"Force the human to open it," Thrust says, looking over at Compton. "Or else."

Octane points his best pointing finger at Thrust as the other comes back up to the surface still on the segway. "Oh, right! I guess it just started working the same time your jets did! Gosh, what a mechnical marvel!" He turns to look at Blitzwing before shaking his head and then turning to look over at the three with a glitter in his eyes as the word "treasure" is mentioned.

Blueshift nods, holding out the bottle to Compton. "Yes, open this device, fleshing germ!" He looks to Thrust. "Wait, are we suppose to let humans know they are fleshling germs, or is that still a clever secret?"

"I think, deep down, they know it," Thrust says solemnly. "It must be why they keep coming back and offering us treaties, some kind of... subtle self-loathing."

Blitzwing clears his throat. "I don't think anyone on either side of our alliance thinks it's anything other than a 'marriage of convenience,' but you could at least make some kind of effort just for the sake of not being cannoned again."

Exo-Suit Fire  scratches the chin of his helmet as he considers the "treasure." "How the bloody hell... the odds are astronomical!" the pilot mutters. "Er, what? Oh, well, you see, these hands--" He holds them up and flexes and unflexes the fingers slowly, in a lifeless fashion. "They're just not very, you know... good. At opening things."

Blueshift shrugs at Thrust's words. "Yeah, you're right. I suppose as long as we say 'hey, we promise not to enslave your world /again/ they'll buy it"

Blueshift stares at Compton. "Well someone open this bottle device then! I grow impatient!"

Octane strides over to Blueshift before he snatches the bottle out of the other's hand before reaching for the cork with two of his fingers in the classic pinched position. "Oh, for...I'll open it!" He grasps the cork before pulling out the cork and tossing it to the deck where it rolls some distance away. Octane peers into the bottle. "What is that in there?"

Inside the bottle is...a treasure map! It is very ancient, and shows a crude dotted line to an island, with a picture of gold

Thrust stares at the map. "...it's just a dotted line, what the hell?!"

From Exo-Suit Fire , Compton Xabat smirks inside his exo. Yes, he's very much aware that the Decepticons won't have much use for their allies once the Autobots and EDC are beaten--but he has run some projections based on the industrial capacity of their member nations, especially China, and found that in five years there will be five Protectorate exo-suits for every Decepticon. And that's not even counting tanks, fighters, ships, etc.

Octane instantly switches into Daffy Duck mode as he recognizes the depiction inscribed on the map before he slips inside the bottle again and grips the bottle in both hands as he backs away to keep all of them in view. "Now, I opened the bottle so I get 60 percent of what we find. The rest'll be split up among those who help me out.

Blueshift points at the line on the map. "Look, there is water, and we are in water! If we follow this course exactly, we will find treasure, which is obviously energon! We can do this! We have a ship, we just need to take a detour." He stares at Octane. "Yes, but the Segway /found/ the bottle"

Octane narrows his eyes at Blueshift before he glares in the direction of the Segway and then back to Blueshift. "Oh, so we should give it all to the Segway, Blueshift? What's it going to do, use it to buy bigger tires?"

Blueshift mumbles. "Maybe..."

Sixshot opted to find himself a spot out on deck, laying down with his optics studying the gathered Decepticons. He made no move to participate, and only watched with the kind of expression that bordered on disapproval.

Thrust somehow manages to rev the segway's engine as if it were a motorcycle. "Well, naturally, the segway would want those who drive it best to use the treasure in a manner befitting of its majesty." Thrust has been whining about the gold plating for his nosecone forever.

Blueshift nods at Thrust's words. He has been wanting a diamond-tipped nose for simply ages. "Yes! Let us steer this mighty vessel towards the treasure, whereever it shall be!"

"No way!" replies Blitzwing. "For all we know Blueshift put that in the Segway himself. Furthermore, this ship is far too slow to go look for anything, ALL of you are self-propelled, and the ship and its contents are worth much more than whatever potential 'treasure' is on that island. Go run off and look for your pirate doubloons if you want, but this ship is not deviating from its course."

Exo-Suit Fire  shrugs in a stiff and unnatural manner. "This isn't my operation," the pilot intercedes, "But isn't there a better use of your resources? And this ship?" The exo-suit scratches its "chin" again. "On the other hand... there may be an alternative..."

Blueshift frowns at Compton, striking a pose. "An alternative? Tell me more, human! How can we find this treasure without a suitable vessel?" You paged Hazard with 'Thrust ICly stole my Segway ;_;'

Thrust nods to Compton. "The human's right. Let's break the ship in half. Half can go to the island, half to base."

Octane turns to face his triplechanger brother before he holds up the bottle so that Blitzwing can see it. "Look at it this way, Blitzwing...*he drops his voice to a whisper*...if they get it we get nothing. If we get it then who knows what we'd get?" He looks up at Thrust before sighing and gesticulating angrily at him. "We're not going to break the ship in half, you coneheaded cretin!"

"Just go there!" exclaims Blitzwing, exasperated. "You can both fly! You don't need to ride there on a boat!"

"Excuse me, Blitzwing," Thrust says, snottily. "You clearly are not grasping the full breadth of this situation." He pauses a moment, and then continues. "I'm riding a /segway/ that is riding a boat."

Thrust is then summarily gobsmacked into stunned silence by Octane's insult, looking like Octane just said the c-word at a fancy dinner part or something.

Blueshift jumps up and down, barely unable to contain his excitement. "Come on, make a decision, I am itching to follow this map!" Then he pauses and scratches in between his legs. "No wait, that's just a spot of cosmic rust. Nevermind"

Exo-Suit Fire  raises a finger as if lecturing. "There are several ships attached to this one. Some of them are lifeboats, but there is one oddity I noticed... Apparently, there was an extremely large yacht in a launching bay. I dare say it's large enough even for you Decepticons to stand on without sinking it. I... don't know why it's there, I guess the captain got bored doing all of these long, slow trips back and forth, refueling and such."

Is this slightly realistic? Who cares.

"And you're not grasping the full breadth of my OUTRANKING YOU," replies Blitzwing, getting up in Thrust's grill. "This ship is going directly and as fast as possible back to our city where it belongs, like GALVATRON wants it to, and whatever YOU want is immaterial."

Blueshift clicks his fingers at Compton. "Yes, make it so! Let us ride this yaught device to victory and treasure!"

Thrust scoots backward on the segway, laterally removing his grill from Blitzwing's up in. "Fine, fine. I'm a robot of vision. One day you'll all see."

Octane still holds onto the bottle. One way or another it'll make a cool souvenir and maybe, once the ship gets back to the city, Octane can go on a little treasure hunt...heh heh heh.

Exo-Suit Fire  goes stiff for a moment while the pilot tinkers with something. "And it just so happens that this yacht is easily launched via remote, which I happen to have on my person right now." There's a loud SPLOOSH noise somewhere off the side of the tanker.

Yes, Xabat is really stretching suspension of disbelief, here, but you gotta do what you gotta do.

Blueshift leaps overboard to land with a *SLAM* on the yaught. "Yes, it is like the Segway itself has made this happen. Human, rip off your top and tie it to the mast as a glorious flag for our treasure hunt!"

Thrust is a robot form outer space, and thus stretching it further. "And when the treasure is all mine -- I mean, all the segway's," he says, "I'll be sure to remember all the 'little robots.'" He rolls over the edge again, using his rockets to buffer his fall onto the yacht, and setting part of it on fire.

Blitzwing grunts, satisfied at having averted disaster for now. "That's only the female humans that do that. And you have to give them beads."

Octane is a robot who can change into two difficult vehicles one of which is much much larger then the others...and can hold a bottle containing a treasure map without breaking it. Disbelief is now out to lunch. Octane turns to the yacht as Thrust and Blueshift bored before waving at them with a gesture chock full of false cheer.

Blitzwing asides to Octane, "Do you think they're going to notice they don't have the map? Or are you going with them?"

From Exo-Suit Fire , Compton Xabat activates his jump jets and settles gently on the yacht. "Er, rip the top off of my armor? I can't do that, it would be destroyed. Er. So. Let's start this thing up." He presses a button on his remote, and the engine starts. The yacht rapidly accelerates to top speed. "Oh, dear, we should do something about the fire..." The exo's red camera scans about for a fire extinguisher... "Don't worry. It's impossible for this thing to burn down completely," Thrust says with confidence. "After all, we're on the water."

Blueshift pats his pockets. Or he would do if he had any. "Map. Map... where's the map?" he looks at Thrust. No matter, I have instant photographic recall memory. Observe." With this, he scratches a line into the top of Thrust's cone and puts a big X on the end. "Now we are fine!"

Thrust screams in agony throughout.

Octane murmurs to Blitzwing. "They've not got the brains of a cyberrat between them. Just watch."

Blueshift strokes his chin. "Hang on, I think I did it wrong, turn around"

From Exo-Suit Fire , Compton Xabat smiles. "Ah, there's one.." He stomps across the deck of the yacht, but his exo trips over an exhaust vent and his head smashes through the canopy of the pilot's station. "Ouch!" The yacht pitches about violently in the water as a result, but fortunately some of the water splashes onto the deck, dousing the fire.

Blueshift kicks the engine on with one technical kick of the boot and the boat speeds off, aflame and sinking into the sky. "Human, your head is not an appendage. If you were on a Segway, that would not have happened"

"Good thing they have the human with them," agrees Blitzwing.

Thrust pauses for a long moment... and then reluctantly turns around. "Do it on my wingtips, huh? I spend a lot of time every day waxing my cone."

Octane scoffs at Blitzwing's words as he watches the yacht speed off into the distance. "Oh yes. I'm sure they'll ask for his advice numerous times."

Blueshift starts to scratch what he can remember of the map onto Thrust's wings... as something looms at them in the mists of the sea!

Exo-Suit Fire  pushes itself back up. "Oof... yes, I see." He zooms in on the island in the distance, and the pilot frowns. "Huh. That is rather... ominous. You know, I hear stories of islands like this, shrouded in fog... there are things there that no one has ever seen. And no man who sets foot on them ever returns."

"Lucky for me, then, my feet won't be touching the ground," Thrust says with a triumphant grin. "C'mon, let's go get this treasure already." It's the complete wrong island. They do not know this. There are other islands that will be emitted later. This I command.

Blueshift strikes a heroic pose. "Well human, that is good, for I am NOT a man!" he pauses for a while as the wind whistles. "...I am a ROBOT!" He too looks at this strange land. "Who knows what we may find!"

Segway Island

''An idyllic tropical paradise. On the beach, a crashed plane looks like it has been rotting there for some time. Strange grooved tracks run all through the sand.''

On the shores of Segway Island, a figure washes up. Blue and large, it is Blueshift, as he staggers onto land, panting and soaking. Yes, he only had to move a few metres, but he obviously failed in an epic manner

Thrust continues to rocket-segway through the air. "I don't really want to run this thing on the silicon granules," he whines. "It'll get the wheel wells all... gritty and stuff."

Blueshift clambers to his feet, looking around. "I can't see any treasure!" he whines. "But look!" he points at the ancient plane crash. "Octane got here first!"

From Exo-Suit Fire , Compton Xabat takes the jump jet route, landing gently on the shore. He's not sure why he chose to help out with this fools' crusade--he guesses it'll make for interesting psychological analysis later. He'll call the paper: "Deviant Decepticons: The Disadvantages of Mechanical Brains."

"Yeah, but looks like he's /dead/," Thrust laughs bitterly, making a rude gesture at the plane wreck. "Good riddance. Those triple-changers, man, they piss me off so much." In the jungle, the faint hum and rustle of things lurking can be heard.

Blueshift shakes a fist at the wreck. "Yeah, good riddance /loser/tane" he says wittily, walking towards the jungle, completely oblivious to any hums or rustles. "I wonder what made these odd tracks. Perhaps a beast protects the treasure?" he wonders aloud

Exo-Suit Fire  stomps up to the wreckage. "No... the plane looks far too rusted to have been a recent crash." He decides to screw with the Decepticons a bit. "Maybe... maybe he went back in time and crashed here?" He stifles a laugh, hoping they buy it.

Blueshift nods at this. The island is mysterious for sure. "Time travel eh, it does not surprise me one bit. This whole thing is getting odder and odder..."

Thrust looks at Compton, wide-opticked (or something). "You're blowing my mind, man. Or -- maybe /we/ time-traveled."

"MAYBE," Thrust yells excitedly, "the Segway's /flux capacitor/ enabled its /TARDIS mode/ and /sent us back in AAAAUURRGGHHHHGGH TINY SPEARS/" Thrust is, indeed, knocked off the segway by a barrage of tiny spears from the trees. Well, human-sized normal spears. Tiny to him.

Blueshift leaps back. "Then we must be in the future!" he gasps as spears fly out of the jungle. One of them hits his spot of cosmic rust, causing him to double in pain. "What devilry is this?"

Octane dives lower as he approaches the island and comes within visual range of the one bio-loser and the two mecha losers before he blazes by over head and at full speed, the backwash from his engines causing the sky to waver in a weird way, and causing several trees to fall down before he banks to the left in a steep turn.

Exo-Suit Fire  swivels its torso around, not quite as shocked and horrified by the merciless spear assault as his companions are. "We... come in peace?" he announces loudly over his PA system.

The natives roll out of the trees. That's right -- they roll. All of them ride segways, a crowd of about 60 of them, but only 20 segways (this will be explained). They all look like tiny, nude samoan dwarves, sitting on each other's shoulders to pilot the non-dwarf-sized segways, with another one still sitting on the second one's shoulders to throw spears from a comically long quiver. All of them wear elaborate war paint and tattoos. They glare menacingly at the outsiders.

Blueshift takes a step back in fear, wincing as he pulls the spear from his precious spot. "Thrust!" he hisses. "They ALL have Segways. And are all gestalts! We have no chance, we must run!" It is at that point that he notices Octane flying over. He looks back at the wreck, then up at Octane, then back again. "But... what... no... this curse'd island!"

From Exo-Suit Fire , Compton Xabat peers at the Decepticons. "You... you can't be serious. You're afraid of them because they somehow happened upon Segways?"

Blueshift stares at Compton like he is mad. "We have but one Segway, they have many! How can we prevail?"

The segway Thrust was on falls from the sky in front of Blueshift, as if God were offering him a way out. Thrust, meanwhile, falls to the sand, backing away from the crowd of natives, who roll forward, murder written across their squat, fat faces. "Look at them, human germ! Never have I encountered a species so terrifyingly hideous!"

Octane transforms as he completes his banking turn before turning to watch the scene unfolding below with a smirk. If only Blitzwing was here to see this. He cups his hands on either side of his mouth before calling out to Thrust. "Hey, I bet they're thinking the same about you, Thrust!"

"We're the /same species/!" Thrust cries up, shaking his fist.

Blueshift grasps the Segway as if Excalibur itself was in front of him. With a mighty wrench, he pulls it from the sand, thus proving himself to be king of England or something. "There is only one chance. If I race towards them in my Segway" he says the /my/ loudly "then it might cancel out there power, defeating them!" With that, he hops onto the Segway, and guns it forwards at a mighty 3.5 miles an hour

From Exo-Suit Fire , Compton Xabat sighs. "It's quite simple." He aims his wrist-mounted flamethrower at the natives. "Just have to use a little fire and they'll all run away--Eh? What are you doing?" His exo's red camera swivels to focus on Blueshift. "I... oh geeze, this island is going to drive me nuts. What's next?"

Octane grins annoyingly at Thrust as he makes a loud booming laugh sound. "It's nice that you have such high ambitions, Thrust! Don't let your actucal circumstances get you down!"

The natives roar toward Blueshift like tiny CGI orcs on segways. In five minutes, a few of them actually collide into him, and fall over, causing the entire army to fall over via a domino effect -- like bowling pins. "Blueshift, you've done it!" Thrust cries as they run back into the forests, abandoning their segways in fear.

Blueshift raises his fists in the air as he glides across the ruins of a mighty empire, fallen Segways all around him as his chariot moves slowly into the jungle. "Truely I am destined to lead!" he emits. "A great warrior!"

From Exo-Suit Fire , Compton Xabat sighs in his exo-suit. "I... wow. This is... I didn't expect to see this when I came here. Hm. But this incident will make for an interesting article, too!"

As Blueshift rolls around, there's another rumble... louder. Growing louder still. And then the trees are smashed as a thirty-foot-tall beast on his own giant Segway, made crudely from stone and bamboo and powered by god knows what, crashed onto the beach. "RRRROOOAOOOOOAAARRRR," bellows Seg Kong as he slowly putts toward Blueshift!

Blueshift looks up at this beast, and his face visibly pales. Quickly, he puts his Segway into reverse, slowly moving backwards away from this huge beast. "Run away, run away!" he shouts

From Exo-Suit Fire <Compton Xabat>, Compton Xabat exclaims, "This is absolutely FASCINATING! A giant ape, on an isolated tropical island that somehow built its own makeshift segway? I must take pictures. Gah... Cramped suit..." The torso section slides open and Xabat sticks himself out of it, holding up a digital camera and clicking away.

"He doesn't look so tough," Thrust says, calmly striding toward the beast -- who throws a boulder directly at his face, smashing it inward and causing him to drop like a stone. "Gggkhh"

Blueshift keeps driving away backwards from the ape, really really slowly. "Human germ, you are related to this ape creature!" he shouts at Compton. "How do you defeat your ancestors? A 'bible' or something, I heard that kills apes"

From Exo-Suit Fire <Compton Xabat>, Compton Xabat frowns as he clicks a few more pictures. "Hold on, I'm going to take some video... there we go... What? Defeat them? Why... we can't kill this creature. We have to capture it, so it can be studied. And vivisected. And lobotimized."

Blueshift stares back at Compton " But it is just a large human, therefore more cowardly..." he thinks about this. "Of course, it is six times as big as a human, so it is six times as cowardly and lame!" With that, he revs the Segway again, and heads straight for the ape

Seg Kong roars again, slowly puttering toward Compton and Blueshift, leaving Thrust for dead. When Blueshift decides to take him on in this game of chicken, he really guns it, going the full 3.5 miles per hour with a bestial, braying howl.

The ape has courage, but so does Blueshift. Brow sweating beads of oil, he revs his Segway even faster, at a dizzying 3.7 miles per hour, punching a fist into the air. "Diiiiiieeeeeeeeee!"

From Exo-Suit Fire <Compton Xabat>, Compton Xabat scowls at his camera as a big blue object fills the viewfinder. "Dammit, you're blocking my view! Look, that ape is too slow to hurt anything, except maybe itself. Now move aside so I can take more pictures."

Just as they're about to collide, the ape's head explodes all over Blueshift. In the background, Thrust, face smashed in, holds is arms out, smoke pouring from his missile cannons. "Segway Island," he declares, "belongs to /me/."

Blueshift stands on his Segway, stock still in shock. He looks over himself, drenched in ape blood. "My god..." he stares. "I'm REDSHIFT! This island is mysterious indeed!"

From Exo-Suit Fire <Compton Xabat>, Compton Xabat gapes at his camera, and finally looks up. "Wha... why did you kill it? We could have LEARNED from it! Now... years of research, and perhaps the only specimen... they're gone!" His eyes fill up with tears.

With a calm sneer, Thrust strides over to the ape's corpse, hefting up its stone and bamboo Segway like it were a trophy. "But I gained an island -- and everything else on it." Thrust turns his look of disdain toward Compton Xabat, yellow gaze cold. "Let that serve as field research," he says, "Perhaps now you understand the Decepticons."

Blueshift nods at this. "What we do not understand we must destroy! How else will we achieve progress!" Now he stares at Thrust, jealousy in his chest. Thrust now has an even bigger Segway

From Exo-Suit Fire <Compton Xabat>, Compton Xabat seals himself back up into his exo-suit. "Yes... yes, I understand..." He switches off his PA system, so the Decepticons can't hear. "Yes, I do. Wasteful, stupid, and clumsy. Hrmph."

And so the intrepid explorers left Segway Island, taking Seg Kong's ride as a trophy aboard their cool, kind of scorched yacht. And who knows what else may lurk out there? It's a strange and wonderful world...