Interview with the Intel-pire

Human Lounge

This small lounge is for human visitors to Autobot City. The room is big enough to fit a large Cybertronian, and furniture here is sized to fit both humans and Autobots. Pictures on the walls show events commemorating great moments in Autobot-Earth relations and a door to the east leads to the Autobot's greatest human friend, Spike Witwicky.

The small lounge for the Autobot's human visitors and allies is busier than normal, this morning. Everything in the room is scaled down for human use, so it's strange to see a Cybertronian sitting in a large chair before the entrance. The room has recieved a makeover as well, large ropes have been set up to cordon off the area.. also to bar entry to everyone until they've been happily interogated.

And so, Red Alert and a team of his more-trusted officers run the humans through a series of questions. The Security Director looks bored, glancing about and sighing at the long line of people.

Carly wanders out of the Witwitcky residence, glancing at the line. Perhaps Red Alert has a new book out and is signing autographs. She ponders buying his book, but decides she is pretty busy, what with this big cardboard box full of personal possessions she is carrying out of her Autobot City apartment. "Hi, Red Alert, good luck!" she smiles, as she attempts to duck under the cordon and escape outside

Standing, Red Alert moves over towards Carly to block her exit. "Greetings Mrs. Witwicky." he announces, looking over the box of items. As well, there are a couple of standard gumbie guards in front of the door, checking ID badges and sending people to different interview stations. Apparently there was a school field trip here at Autobot City today.

As such, Red Alert is having all the children intero.. interviewed for security reasons. Eyeing the box of items, "Where are you headed in a hurry?" he asks. I she trying to sneak sensitive intel out of Autobot City in her box of junk??

Carly gives a smile up at Red Alert, hoisting her box up in the air to demonstrate that it's a bit heavy. "Oh, just doing a bit of sping cleaning, don't mind me!" she chirps, trying to slip behind Red Alert's leg. The box is full of all sorts of technological wonders. Is that a sandwich toaster or a TOP SECRET RADAR DISH? Is that a pile of old junkmail or a DOSSIER OF AUTOBOT SECRETS?

"Spring cleaning." Red Alert repeats, giving her a once over. She's hiding something, obviously. If it wasn't for the body language, the sandwich toaster was a dead giveaway.

"Unfortunately Mrs. Witwicky, we're conducting an extensive security check of human allies at the moment. Looking into a couple of cases that have gone.." he scratches his head, attempting to take the light box out of her hands and place it on his interview desk. "Cold. It'll only take a minute."

Taking his own large Transformer sized chair, the Security Director points to a small human sized one sitting across from him. "Please, have a seat."

Carly makes snatching motions towards the box, and then slumps her shoulders, slouching on the chair. "Fine, but..." she wrings her hands together nervously. "If this is about that time Spike put a Canadian cent into the Autobot City vending machine to get a Coke, he didn't mean to! I was surprised as anyone that it worked!"

SO. The case of the canadian penny has finally come to a close! Red Alert makes mental note to update the conspiracy file later, he'd always suspected Spike. "Oh, that? No, that was never a concern really. Well, Vendor was mad that someone inserted terrible Canada coins in him." he mentions, leaning back in his chair. "But he'll get over it."

"So, don't be intimidated by this whole charade. It's more for Prime's ease of mind, than mine." he lies again.

"Oh, that's good!" Carly brightens again and hops out of the chair. "Prime said to me the other day that I was one of his most trusted friends, so I hardly need to bother you, unless you're looking for some advice! Can I have my box back now?"

"No."

Opening up his datapad, Red Alert leans forward and brings up some files on the device while trying to read her expressions. "Just for the record, you are Carly Witwicky.. correct? Current wife of former EDC General and longtime Autobot ally, Spike Witwicky?" he asks, studying her responses.. both verbal and physical.

His other hand moves to slide the box of items back away from her, towards the edge of the desk by his gut.

Carly narrows her eyes at the rather silly question. "/No/, Red Alert," she says sarcastically. "I'm actually a miniature Decepticon pretender shell piloted by Rumble, who has disguised himself as Carly in an attempt to discover the secrets of Spike's sock drawer"

Red Alert seems unphased by the revelation, making a check mark in his datapad. "I know this is hard on you, but just be patient and I can restore your security pass." he attempts to talk her down, optical scanners already checking over her as best they can. Where's a member of medical when he needs the A-OK??

"How is your marriage, Carly?" he asks.

Carly slumps back into the chair with a resigned expression and folds her arms. "Peachy keen, Red Alert," she growls up. "Though if you could ask Wheeljack to check behind the sofa for any bits of Spike's brain he forgot to put back, that would be welcomed! Not that it's any of your business!"

"Peachy keen." Red Alert repeats her words, making sure to write them down. Was it some sort of code? A clue?? A hint revealing the TRUE nature of Carly??? Who knows. "Behind the sofa? Certainly, I'll ask him as soon as this matter is taken care of."

"So, what can you tell me about Volcantis and the attempted murder?"

"Attempted murder?" Carly gives a start. "I'm not sure I recall any of those recently. But Volcantis was that volcano planet, right?" As soon as she stops speaking she realises what an absolutely stupid question that was.

"That's what I've been informed, yes." Red Alert replies to both of her inqueries with one sentence. In fact, he's busy trying to bring up any reports on the matter. "Feel free to start at the beginning of the Volcantis trip." he says, attempting to bring someone up on the channel to deliver documents.

 Red Alert has encrypted this channel.

 Red Alert says, "Blurr, are you busy?"

Carly crosses her legs and swings back on her chair as she tries to remember back to that particular adventure. It was a good few weeks ago, which in a land of space robots might as well be decades. "I was in a shuttle with First Aid, when he detected some strange energy surges on the planet Volcantis, and wanted to investigate," she begins. "We found a crashed Decepticon escape pod. Bonecrusher was also there investigating, but we convinced him to help us find out if anyone was hurt so we could help them."

"So you enlisted the aid of a Decepticon, interesting." Red Alert speaks aloud, taking notes. How was she so easily able to convince Bonecrusher to help them? Does this go farther than just Carly?? Is First Aid in on this conspiracy too? Is that why the Protectobot is trying to misdirect him with reports of Blurr's instability?? "I meant, interesting that he would volunteer to help. Could be a future potential intel source, you know?" he adds.

"What happened next?"

"Well..." Carly waved a hand. "He wanted to shoot us, but we told him that there might be a Constructicon in the escape pod, and he decided to help. I don't think he's very..." She pauses, tapping her head. "Anyway, we got to the pod, but it was empty apart from this strange device covered in ancient Cybertronian. When we entered the capsule, a bomb inside started to count down and the planet began to explode, so we legged it home."

"Interesting." Red Alert says, making notes in his datapad all the while. He'd planned on having Blurr deliver some intel to him personally, but perhaps the speedster was busy winning a race or acting weird again. "That's all I have for Volcantis, really." he lies again. Her story will be cross referenced with reports, First Aid's account, and his own beliefs on what really happened there. "I'm going to do a little word association, just say the first thing that comes to mind." the Security mech says, rambling off a list.

"Family." "Bolt." "Purple." "Truth." "Cup." "Red." "Legacy."

Carly shrugs. "I've still got that device, I'm using it as a paperweight until I can track down Wheeljack to have a look at it, but he's busy doing mad science stuff." She listens to Red Alert's spiel, replying to each word in turn: "Danno" "Silver" "Deep" "Justice" "Two Girls" "Alert" "Death"

Making notes at every response, Red Alert closes the datapad file and rotates it so Carly can look at it. "Okay, almost done. I'm sure you're familiar with rorschach ink blots? We'll do this, a little follow up questions, then I'll send you on your way.. okay?"

Meanwhile, he attempts to DISCREETLY move the box of Carly's crap onto the ground and nudge it back to Crackpot, his assistant. If Red Alert can keep her distracted, maybe he could get a better look at her stuff?

Carly peers at the Rorschach blots. "Butterfly!" she says to the first one. "...bigger butterfly"" she says to the second. Crackpot will find a treasure trove of things destined for the bin. The box includes a sandwich toaster (burnt), some old telephone bills, a broken electric toothbrush, a snowglobe paperweight of Metroplex, hair straighteners, and various other sundries.

Suddenly, an image of Spike flashes on the screen. Well, an intricate inkblot that looks JUST like Spike. If he were an inkblot. Or something. Meanwhile, Red Alert is busy taking notes.

Crackpot sifts through the crap, trying to put two and two together. "Okay, so she reassembles the toaster into a small oven.. using the bills as tinder.. taking out the motor of the toothbrush.. she breaks the snowglobe open and retrieves the Metro-h dear." he gasps, shooting Red a shortwave.

<>

 Corporal Spike Witwicky says, "Carly... I can't turn off the washer."

 Carly Witwicky says, "Not now, Spike, I'm being interrogated"

 Corporal Spike Witwicky says, "But..."

 Corporal Spike Witwicky says, "Why are you being interrogated?"

 Red Alert has encrypted this channel.

 Carly Witwicky says, "Because it's Red Alert"

 Red Alert says, "That was good acting, you two."

 Corporal Spike Witwicky says, "Uh!"

 Red Alert says, "Hopefully the Decepticons think there is a rift between the Witwickys now."

 Red Alert says, "We can exploit this."

 Corporal Spike Witwicky says, "Red Alert, there's no way we can exploit that."

 Red Alert says, "All onsite Autobot allies are being interviewed, not interrogated."

 Red Alert says, "You'd be surprised about the power of deception, Mr. Witwicky."

<EDC> Carly Witwicky says, "More importantly, Spike, have you tried turning the dial to 'off'"

<EDC> Corporal Spike Witwicky says, "Yes I've tried that!"

<EDC> Carly Witwicky says, "Turn it off at the wall then!"

"Yes, very funny," Carly glances up at Red Alert. "They're supposed to be genuine ink blots, you know, Red. I think... hey!" She gets up with a start as she sees Crackpot going through her box. "I don't go through your stuff!"

"Oh uh, I don't know what you're talking about. It's just an inkblot!" Red Alert raises his voice, snatching back the datapad and closing it. "Well, I think this concludes our interview. You have been granted full access again, Mrs. Witwicky. Thank you for your time."

Crackpot looks at Carly, then to Red Alert, then to Carly again. "I was going to take it to the incinerator, it's all trash right? I mean, you didn't plan on moving this junk to somewhere else.. I mean, that'd be crazy right? Moving out??" he rambles, laughing nervously.

"/Thank you Red Alert/" Carly says coldly. "That's very generous. I don't know what we would do without you." She tuens to Crackpot, holding out her hand for her box. "It's okay, I'm going to take it to the recycling, I like to do that myself to... keep down on the carbon footprint. You do understand?"

Adding into the nervous laughter, Red Alert pats Crackpot on the back and takes ahold of the box. "Oh, I'm sure the Autobots would figure something out." he says, knowing full well they would be doomed by giant mecha-slugs if it wasn't for him. "Here, and thank you for recycling!" he smiles.

Crackpot moves on to his desk, sitting down and flipping the card from 'ON BREAK' to 'OPEN'. A little boy sits down, kicking his legs in the chair back and forth. "So, Timmy.. if that's your real name." Crackpot opens up, taking some notes. "How long have you been a Decepticon agent?"