FANFIC!!

[Mako Crab]

So after reading a couple threads here about fanfic, I've decided to post this old piece. According to the file, it was "last modified" back in 2006. It may have been written even earlier than that, I can't recall. This was my attempt to insert my own character into the RID universe while avoiding all the most obvious Mary Sue/Marty Stu tropes out there. I wanted it to feel as much like a legit episode of RID as possible. Criticism is always welcome. I can take it!


Transform, Mako!
By Mako Crab


Predacon headquarters: dusk. Within the reinforced hull of the mobile command center a mechanical crab skitters through the corridors, hurriedly finding his way to a tiny room illuminated only by a handful of dim lights. Situating himself in a chair at the center of the room, he taps on the darkened consoles around him and the room comes to life, lighting up completely!
The crab, Mako as he is known, sits in a sort of cockpit, his mechanical crab claws working controls while his legs manage multiple consoles. A visor lowers down over his gloss-black crab eyes and seals over his face. In an instant Mako sees through the eyes of his remote-controlled battle mech. Through lines of video resolution he sees Darkscream, a Predacon like himself, SkyByte the second in command and Gigatron their leader.
The stark white face of Gigatron, framed by horns and frills, looks over his troops, stopping on Mako. “Training simulators are one thing, but fighting live Autobots is another. Darkscream, I want you to keep close to Mako during this mission.”
“What am I, a babysitter?” a perturbed Darkscream asked. “If the kid can’t handle the real thing, maybe he should go back to the academy.”
“Don’t worry about me- it’s not like I have to actually worry about getting shot,” Mako replied, his voice being relayed through the voice synthesizers of the remote-mech.
“So who’s worrying about you?” Darkscream shot back. “We’re the ones risking our necks out here. There’s no reset button for us, you battle-sim junkie.”
“Silence, the both of you!” Gigatron’s short temper wasn’t mere rumor it seemed. “We’re leaving now and I don’t want to hear another word out of either of you until we get back, understood?”
“Yes, Lord Gigatron,” the two Predacons meekly replied.
“Not one word! Now move!” The four Predacons leapt off an extended flight deck of the base and took to the air, heading for the city.

The setting sun basked the city streets and skyscrapers in a warm, orange haze. On any other day Optimus Prime would have marveled at the beauty of planet Earth; so unlike his home world, Cybertron. Today though, missles screamed past him impacting the nearby power plant as laser blasts scorched his fire-engine red armor.
Optimus brought his left forearm up, speaking into a built-in communicator. “T.A.I., I could really use some back-up out here.”
A voice came back over the comm. link, “Skid-Z and Midnight Express are on their way, but it’ll still be a couple of minutes at best. You have to stall the Predacons until they get there!”
“Four against one,” Prime considered, “Not good. But then, when has it ever been?” Aiming his sidearm, Prime fired three shots at Gigatron, figuring on taking out the mission commander first and foremost, then watching the other Predacons scramble in confusion. All three shots found their mark, bringing Gigatron out of the sky and crashing hard into the asphalt below. Reverting to his robot mode, the Predacon commander rose out of the small crater his impact had created to face his attacker. Darkscream and Mako landed behind Prime while SkyByte remained patrolling in the air. They had him surrounded now. “Got yourself some new help, have you?” Prime asked, referring to Mako.
“Ha! Not that I’ll need it to finish you off,” Gigatron laughed.
That’s right, get him talking. Just gotta’ stall him a little longer, Prime thought.
“Darkscream, Mako; secure the generators and prepare to depart. I’ll handle Prime myself.” Without a word, the two Predacons hurried into the smoking husk of the power plant and quickly located the generators. It was difficult to stay focused on disconnecting the machinery while his leader and Prime fought outside. Their battle cries and the resulting explosions threatened to send shrapnel their way or worse.
“Eyes on the job, kid. If Gigatron gets in any real trouble, SkyByte will step in to help.” Darkscream said. It was the first thing he had said to Mako since the mission began.
“Right, I get it. He’s acting as a decoy so we can complete the mission!” Mako was most impressed that his leader would use himself as live bait.
“Yeah, sure, if that’s what you want to think.” Darkscream knew Gigatron was dedicated to destroying Optimus Prime whenever the opportunity presented itself. The mission first, of course, but a bonus on the side never hurt.
The generators had been freed of their mounts and now Darkscream and Mako hefted them outside. No sooner had they exited the power plant than SkyByte was yelling at them. “More Autobots!” he shouted, and sure enough Midnight Express and Skid-Z emerged from a portal of white light that hovered slightly above the ground. “Darkscream, you’re with me. Mako, get moving with those generators!” SkyByte commanded.
“All right, I’ve been wanting to kick some Auto-butt all day!” Darkscream cheered. The light-blue Predacon hefted his generator over to Mako’s battle-mech and drew his sword. In an instant he was beside SkyByte and engaged in melee combat with Skid-Z.
From inside the Predacon base Mako directed his remote warrior to vacate the area when the voice of Gas Skunk came from behind him. “What’s happening now? Who’s winning?” Gas Skunk anxiously wanted to know.
“I’ll put it up on the monitor for you,” Mako replied, transferring the video feed from his battle-mech to a large screen at the front of the room. Gas Skunk could see everything including some impressive maneuvers from his leader, Gigatron. But Mako was already vacating the area, determined to bring the generators back to base and complete the mission before anything had a chance to go wrong.
“What are you doing?! You’re missing all the fun!” Gas Skunk exclaimed. “But SkyByte ordered me to,” came the reply. Gas Skunk couldn’t believe it. “First thing you need to learn around here is that there’s always another power source to be stolen. It’s no biggie. But if you ditch your team in the middle of a battle, then they’ll never let you forget it.”
“What are you waiting for, Mako?” SkyByte yelled.
“See,” Gas Skunk pointed out, “He’s waiting for you to get in there and mix it up with the Autobots.” Mako considered this possibility for a moment when he saw Optimus Prime combine with his spare armaments to form an even larger, more formidable version of his already capable robot mode. Without hesitation Prime activated his primary weapon in this form, the blizzard blaster, and shot a concentrated stream of freezing water at Gigatron. The mighty Predacon commander was forced back against a tall building, the force of the water tearing into his armor. SkyByte and Darkscream had their hands full with the other Autobots. Mako knew the mission had to wait!
To Prime’s shock, Mako’s remote warrior leapt on his back in crab mode and wrestled the blizzard canon away from him, directing the water stream high into the air. It was enough to allow Gigatron the chance to recover. In the next instant Prime had Mako by his crab arms and hurled him across a city block!
“Predacons, we have what we came for. Fall back!” Came the order from Gigatron. Mako checked one last time to make sure the generators were still secured within his battle-mechs’ storage compartments and they were. Midnight Express and Skid-Z approached their leader, but there was nothing Prime could do now except watch the Predacons vanish over the horizon.
Back at the Predacon’s mobile base Gas Skunk was cheering Mako for jumping into the fight. Mako was both grateful for the applause and uneasy that he had disobeyed SkyByte. He really hated the notion of going against his commanders’ orders, but perhaps he wouldn’t be in trouble. He saved Gigatron after all, right? Within minutes the returning raiding party was entering the base.
“C’mon, let’s go see what kind of haul they got,” Gas Skunk said.
“Just as soon as I dock my battle-mech in the hangar,” Mako replied. With everyone secured, the flight decks and hatches sealed back into place and the ship descended beneath the dark currents of the ocean. Mako disengaged from the cockpit and headed down to the hangar where the others now gathered.

Mako entered the hangar and immediately made a bee-line for his battle-mech. The other Predacons had already unloaded the generators from the mechs’ storage compartments allowing Mako to inspect the damage his remote controlled warrior had taken from Prime. Gigatron and SkyByte stood off to the side conversing about what, Mako couldn’t hear, nor did he especially care.
“Not too bad, actually,” Mako observed of the scratches and dents in his battle-mechs’ armor. “I can have this fixed by morning.”
“Yeah, those Autobots talk a mean fight,” Darkscream said, “But it takes more than words to put us down!” He and Gas Skunk laughed. Their laughter and good cheer was interrupted by the rage of Gigatron.
“You are my second in command, SkyByte, and I will not tolerate your lone crusading anymore! Time to start performing the duties that come along with your rank!” Gigatron bellowed. Darkscream and Gas Skunk fell silent. Mako peeked out from behind an open panel on the hull of his battle-mech, hoping to see what the commotion was without being spotted.
“But Gigatron, all I said was,” began SkyByte, but Gigatron wouldn’t let him finish. “Predacons, fall in line!” Gigatron yelled. Gas Skunk, Darkscream and Mako bounded from their work and lined up before Gigatron. Hitting an intercom button on the wall, Gigatron ordered Slapper into the hangar bay as well, but the infuriated leader wasn’t about to wait for the toad to begin his ranting. “I have no patience for Predacons that would rather abandon their team than function as a vital part of it.”
“Lord Gigatron, I never said that!” SkyByte pleaded. Gigatron continued as though he hadn’t heard his second in command, “SkyByte seems to think you’re in his way and would like nothing more than if you all stayed here while he went out on missions. What do you have to say to that?!”
“Actually, that doesn’t sound too bad.” Darkscream retorted.
“Yeah, be seeing you around, SkyByte. Don’t forget about us when you get a heroes’ medal.” Gas Skunk added.
Gigatron was floored by what he was hearing. “Are you Predacons or aren’t you?! That does it. SkyByte, I want you to run them through basic drills. You will take your place as a commander.”
SkyByte grumbled under his breath. “All right then, let’s get moving. Two laps around the room!”
“Only two?” Gigatron asked, now fully criticizing SkyByte’s lax workout.
“You heard me, twenty laps,” SkyByte corrected. Gigatron smiled a bit. The three Predacons were running laps, Mako making the rounds on ten legs rather than two, when the side entrance to the hangar opened and Slapper entered. “You too, Slapper, twenty laps!” SkyByte commanded.
“Since when, tuna breath?” Slapper asked.
SkyByte’s jaw dropped and he glanced behind him just momentarily enough to see a look of displeasure on Gigatron’s face. Displeasure or shame, but it was a look SkyByte knew meant trouble if he didn’t assert himself right away. “Now look, you good for nothing toad, I’m your superior officer and you’ll address me with a little respect from now on. When I say twenty laps, you do twenty laps!”
“Geez, what’s your problem?” Slapper didn’t stick around for an answer and began on his laps. Even in his robot mode he retained a spring in his step thanks to his alternate toad form and easily caught up to the other three Predacons. “Hey, what’d I miss,” he asked.
“You know how it goes. Gigatron yells at SkyByte. SkyByte yells at us.” Gas Skunk answered.
“I told you to run, not chat,” SkyByte ordered. Twenty laps later he ordered them all back into position. “Allright, stand at attention and salute.” All the Predacons straightened up and put their right hands to their chests.
“This is so ridiculous,” Slapper whispered to his comrades, “I haven’t had to do basic drills since I was in the academy.” Mako didn’t quite understand the shame of the whole procedure, but then he had been transferred straight from the top of the Predacon War Academy’s VR combat program to Earth less than a month ago. Though looking straight ahead of him, he soon realized that he had caught the evil glare of SkyByte.
“In robot mode, Mako.”
Mako was confused. “Uh, what?”
“You will salute me in robot mode.”
Again another moment of silence, then, “This is my robot mode!”
“What?” SkyByte was astonished. “You’re a crab right now, not a robot. Transform to robot mode!”
“I can’t get any more robot than this!” Mako replied. SkyByte thought he heard a groan from Gigatron and knew he had to stop this mockery quick. “Is that right?” SkyByte asked slyly, a plan forming in his head. “Let’s find out.” Heading over to a nearby computer terminal mounted in the wall of the hangar bay, SkyByte coolly ordered the computer to bring up Mako’s War Academy application form, which would undoubtedly list all of his forms, alternate or otherwise.
“No robot mode, eh? Then what do you call this?” The computer monitor depicted Mako’s alternate form. It looked robotic enough: two legs, two arms, a head: definitely a robot.
“That’s my alt-mode” Mako replied.
Stunned by Mako’s continued defiance, SkyByte looked closer at Mako’s profile and saw in fine print that the crab had registered his robot form as his alternate mode and his crab form as his primary robot mode! “No, no, you just checked the wrong boxes. This,” SkyByte said pointing at the humanoid form, “is your robot mode.”
“How do you know?” Mako challenged. Darkscream, Gas Skunk and Slapper snickered, trying to keep the laughter from bursting out.
“SkyByte…” Gigatron growled. A look of panic formed on SkyByte’s face for the briefest moment, his optics going wide, then demanding one last time, “You won’t make a mockery of the Predacon elite forces! Now transform and salute me in your robot mode!” Mako raised a claw firmly to his crab chest, and it was all SkyByte could do to keep from lunging at the new recruit. Gigatron stepped forward and shook the floor with his thunderous footstep.
“How very disappointing, SkyByte. How do you expect to command respect from your troops when they won’t obey even your simplest orders?”
“I’ll straighten him out, Gigatron; by force if necessary.” SkyByte assured his leader.
“You had your chance. Now step aside and see how it’s done.” SkyByte shrunk back a few steps, sure that his rank was about to be stripped from him thanks to this insolent crab. Gigatron stepped within inches of Mako, using his size to intimidate the recruit. “Tell me, Mako, what makes you think this beast mode of yours is your true, robot form?”
“It’s kind of hard to explain…” Mako searched for the right words, “It’s like, do you feel like you’re something else when you transform into a car or a dragon?”
Gigatron pondered the notion for a moment, “Go on,” he said.
“Well, when I’m in my robot mode,” he said, still referring to his crab mode, “I don’t feel like a crab or anything else. I feel like myself. And besides that,”
“Oh, there’s more,” Gigatron said amused.
“Besides that, we’re a race of machines with the ability to take just about any form imaginable. And there have been plenty of cybertronians in our history that had robot modes with four legs, wheels, and all sorts of stuff. Where’s it say that our robot modes must all be bipedal?”
Gigatron waited a moment. “Anything else to add?” Realizing that he was still in trouble, Mako meekly shook his head and remained quiet. “Well as interesting as that all is, the fact remains that you do have a robot mode, and this isn’t it,” Gigatron stated flatly, waving a hand at the crab before him.
“Oh man, he is so dead,” Slapper whispered. “Wouldn’t want to be him,” Darkscream added.
“Transform now, Mako, before I lose my patience.” Gigatron turned back towards SkyByte to instruct him on the finer points of leadership when he noticed his second in command’s optics were still fixed on Mako. Gigatron turned around only to find that Mako had still failed to transform. The look on their lords’ face said it all, as though he had been slapped unexpectedly. The other Predacons gasped through wide grins on their faces and began backing away from the lineup. They were all too aware of Gigatron’s short temper and Mako had just crossed that point of no return. There was no way this was ending peacefully now.
With a deathly grim expression Gigatron stated incredulously, “You defy me by refusing to transform. Perhaps you think your beast mode is comparable to the advantages of our robot modes?” Mako shrunk back, the looming form of Gigatron drawing ever closer.
“Here it comes!” Gas Skunk whispered.
“Very well then. A duel should settle this.” All the other Predacons cheered, even SkyByte. “Beat me in hand-to-hand combat, and I’ll let you remain in your beast mode,” Gigatron smiled, “Lose, and let me assure you that you will lose, and you will obey me by transforming.” Mako considered his options for a moment. “What do you have to think about, Mako?” Gigatron asked. “It’s no longer a debate. Get ready.”
Mako brought his claws to bear.
“Oh, and just to make this a fair fight, I won’t use any of my alternate modes.” Gigatron tossed his sword over to SkyByte as well, relying only on his fists now. “Go!” But no one moved. Gigatron stood confident, waiting for Mako to do something. Mako stood defensively, sure he was about to be crushed. “Fine then, if you won’t start this fight, then I will!” Gigatron lunged towards the tiny crab and brought his fist down in an arc, but Mako was quick on his ten legs and scuttled to safety.
A roundhouse kick from Gigatron caught Mako. The force of the kick picked him up off the floor, but Mako clamped both claws onto his leaders’ leg and held tight. “Get off me,” Gigatron snarled as he grabbed Mako with both arms and hurled him towards the battle-mech. Mako landed on the back of his crab-shaped mech and rolled once, falling off the rear of it.
“If only I were as big as my battle-mech, I might stand a chance,” Mako thought. He knew there was a cockpit within the crab-mech itself, but what would he prove by beating his leader unfairly? Then it occurred to him; just because Gigatron vowed to fight fair didn’t mean he had to! Finding renewed energy, Mako skittered underneath the crab-mech just as Gigatron made his way over. Disengaging the locks, a hatch opened on the underside and Mako disappeared up into the mech itself. Gigatron heard the air being forced out of the hatch as it sealed shut and stepped back. “Ha! Now you’re thinking like a Predacon! Victory by any means,” Gigatron was pleased.
The hulking blue crab hummed to life, purple lights accenting the hull as it rose on all eight legs. It’s two gleaming black claws extended and opened as though hungry for something to crush in their powerful grip. With surprising speed the crab whirled around on its legs to face Gigatron.
“SkyByte, my sword!” But before SkyByte could react, the battle-mech swiped at Gigatron with its’ right claw. Gigatron ducked and leapt away into the air where his ankle was caught by the left claw. With one powerful tug Gigatron was brought crashing into the floor. “So it’s a real fight you want, eh? Let’s see how you like my cutter beam!” A yellow jewel mounted in Gigatron’s forehead radiated and sent out a burst of focused energy that cut into the joints of one of the mechs’ eight legs, rendering it useless. The crab backed up a step when Gigatron heard the scraping of metal on metal and saw his sword sliding along the ground to his waiting hand. Charging forward, Gigatron parried a strike from the left claw and got under the beast, slicing at the damaged leg with his sword. An explosion of sparks showered Gigatron as the leg fell to the ground.
Instinctively Mako commanded his battle-mech to leap back, but Gigatron was already in his face again and attempting to hack off more legs. It took all his piloting skills to keep out of range of the flailing blade, but noticed the procured generators still sitting in the center of the hangar bay. Mako dodged another attack, turned, dodged, turned and was in position to grab one of the generators by both claws. The battle-mech held it out front as a shield, and it would’ve worked except for one thing; like Gas Skunk had said, there would always be another generator, another power source to swipe. Gigatron activated his cutter beam once more and cut the generator in two straight down the center, hitting the crab-mech in the process.
The cockpit inside the battle-mech was flickering with sparks and filling with smoke. The head of the mech had been hit and he’d been effectively blinded. Before he knew what was happening Gigatron had chopped off another two legs with one swipe of his sword. Not even thinking, Mako fired off a salvo of energon-seeking missles, two of which honed in on Gigatron and five more that targeted SkyByte, Darkscream and the rest.
“He’s gone crazy!” Slapper shouted as they all ran for cover but found none. A cascade of explosions ripped through the hangar, and even Gigatron took both missles to the chest. It wasn’t soon before he was rising back to his feet though, using his sword as a crutch. “He’s flying blind,” Gigatron noted, seeing the battle-mech traipse about aimlessly. “Heh. This fight is over.”
Gigatron charged once more at the crab-mech and leapt up onto its back. Stabbing in with his sword, he pried open a corner of the hull. He discarded the sword and continued ripping the hull open with his bare hands. Punching through hardware and circuitry, he dug his way through to the cockpit where a very surprised Mako awaited him. With one hand Gigatron pulled Mako out of the mech and held him high. Still full of some fight, Mako wrapped his crab legs around Gigatron’s arm and clamped on with his claws, attempting to penetrate the armor to no avail.
“You’ve lost, Mako! Now admit defeat!” Gigatron backhanded the battle-mech, pounding Mako in the process. The crushing blow loosened his grip and sent Mako falling to the ground, his optics dizzy from the pounding.
“Ughhh…” Mako managed to wheeze, “Okay, y-you win.” Mako the crab transformed into Mako the robot.
“Aren’t you forgetting something?” Gigatron admonished. Without a word and still sprawled out on the ground, Mako shakily saluted Gigatron before his strength gave out. “That’s better. See how I defeated you and your crab-mech using only my robot mode.”
“Yeah, I get the picture.” Mako coughed out black smoke that he had inhaled from the cockpit. “Oh, that hurts.”
“Good. SkyByte, you’re in charge of cleaning up this mess.” Having restored order among his troops, Gigatron left the hangar bay. SkyByte sent Darkscream over to scrape Mako off the ground while Slapper and Gas Skunk cleared debris from the duel.
“What’s the big deal anyway,” Darkscream asked Mako, “It’s not like anyone cares what your robot mode looks like.”
“I think he just needed some of the stupid pounded out of him,” Gas Skunk retorted. They all laughed.

Gigatron’s personal quarters some time later: The door slid open allowing the victorious Predacon commander to enter. He stood motionless in the center of the room for a moment, making sure that the door had shut behind him. He then called out his activation code and transformed to dragon form; one of his many alternate modes. His three dragon heads swiveled about, examining his claws and tail. Something Mako had said earlier kept repeating in his mind.

“It’s kind of hard to explain… It’s like, do you feel like you’re something else when you transform into a car or a dragon?”

Gigatron considered the notion while going over his dragon form. After a few moments he reverted to what he considered his “robot mode”. With so many different forms, how could he be sure which was truly his standard, original form? The thought tugged at the back of his mind. Could he command his troops while in car form? While in bat form? Did they think of him as Gigatron when he was transformed or was it the face of his robot mode that they considered “Gigatron”?
“Bah,” Gigatron swatted the air as though to dismiss the thought altogether. “Who cares?”

THE END

[Dominic]

On a purely shallow level, one of the things that amused me about the first season of "Beast Wars" is that there were more than a few scenes involvning a gorilla giving orders to a rhinoceros, a velociraptor, a rat and a cheetah. And, of course, there were scenes involving a tyrannosaurus and a team of large bugs and dinos.

[Gomess]

Fun. Wouldn't have been surprised to see a lot of those spots in the real deal.

My BW comic was set in the 50s and framed like a B-movie where monstrous intelligent animals start plaguing mankind.

Also there was a reason why Megatron was purple. =| One of my greatest sins as a writer is being unable to leave threads dangling.

[andersonh1]

Mako, it's always fun to see some fiction set in the RID universe. And it is kind of amusing: if you've got ten modes, which one is the real you?

I like it, it's a lot of fun to read.

[andersonh1]

Ok, I'll bite. Here's a bit of fanfic written for one of the short story contests on the IDW boards a few years back. Set shortly before the main events of All Hail Megatron #15, Kup is enjoying his recovery and the loss of so many “aches and pains” that go with his old age. To understand what's going on, it's necessary to know that Prowl had, unknown to Kup, installed a means to make Kup his mouthpiece. So if Prowl felt something should be done, he could force Kup to say it since Prowl felt that Kup's opinions carried more weight than his.



“Not Quite Right…”

Kup flexed the fingers on his right hand appreciatively. The squeak from that second joint on the third finger was gone. The wrist rotators all turned smoothly. The elbow pistons and gears all whirred and clicked as they should have, and that annoying wire wasn’t getting caught every time he raised his arm higher than his shoulder. Perceptor and Brainstorm had done a fine job. A darn fine job.

It wasn’t just his arm. Every system Kup had was working more smoothly. Even after all these years, Kup’s memory circuits still worked efficiently, and as the various faults had developed in his systems he had catalogued each and every one. He had long since accepted them as the price one paid for getting old, so it was a nice surprise to find that so many of those faults had been repaired.

And then there was the cy-gar. Now that was a guilty pleasure that Kup never expected to enjoy again. The things weren’t exactly healthy, but Kup figured he owed himself a few small indulgences after all his countless years of sparse living. The old Autobot chomped down appreciatively on the small cylindrical device and turned as metal on metal footfalls sounded in the repair bay. Prowl and Perceptor approached, looking at him expectantly.

“How do you feel?” Perceptor asked, his cool, erudite tones echoing slightly in the expansive metal room. Kup grinned broadly, and patted Perceptor on the shoulder.

“I feel great. You did a good job, kid.” He held up the cy-gar. “Thanks for this too. I haven’t had one of these in ages.”

“You’ve been through a lot,” Prowl observed. “You’re a hero to a lot of us, and this is just a small token of our appreciation.”

Kup nodded. He studied Prowl a moment, a vague suspicion gnawing at the back of his cerebral processor. Such a sentimental gesture was rare for the reserved and logical Autobot unit commander, and Kup wondered if there was some ulterior motive. After a second he chided himself for being uncharitable and he dismissed the thought. “Thanks, Prowl.”

“We’ll need to watch you for awhile,” Prowl went on. “Probably do one more routine strip-down and reassembly in a few days. I’ve asked Perceptor to monitor your recovery, if you have no objection.”

That nagging feeling returned, but Kup dismissed it as irritation at being treated like a brand new 'bot, fresh off the assembly line. Which he supposed he was, after a fashion. “That’s fine,” he agreed. “Probably for the best.”

“Good.” Prowl glanced at Perceptor and turned to go. “I’ll see you later then.”

Kup watched him stride away and then glared at Perceptor. “You can keep an optic on me if you have to, but I don’t want you under my feet constantly. Are we clear?”

“Of course.”

“Good.” Kup answered gruffly. “I’m going to get out of here for awhile. Take a walk. I’d like some time to myself.”

Kup left the repair bay. The feeling that he was overlooking something returned once again. Kup trusted his instincts, but he simply could not put his finger on why he felt like he was missing something here. He ought to be grateful that he’d been rescued from that planet and repaired, not casting aspersions at Prowl.

“Heh”, he muttered to himself. “You’re just getting paranoid in your old age.”

He reached to adjust the cy-gar in his mouth, and then he heard the sound. A very slight squeak in that second joint of his third finger. Barely perceptible, but there regardless.

“Frag,” Kup growled. “Something’s still not right.”

[Mako Crab]

Thanks for the comments, everyone.

Good stuff, andersonh. I always liked Kup and especially his spotlight issue. Always good to see him get a little extra focus. I like what you did with your short scene. As far as I know, the IDW comics never followed up on Prowl's tampering, did they? I heard that Kup died during the Infestation crossover. Did he stay dead? If so, that's a real shame.

[Shockwave]

I'm not usually one for fanfic where some basically injects "themselves" into a given universe, mostly because it usually comes across as heinously self indulgent. But Mako, I gotta say that you really did make it work. And, other than using Gigatron instead of Megatron, I really felt as if I was reading a lost RID script or something. And there were some really good ideas presented in here too, largely made use of by your "character".

Anderson, I liked yours too, it adds certain level depth to Kup's character. Was that something you had come up with for Mosaic? Cause I could really see it working for one of those.

[Mako Crab]

I'm not usually one for fanfic where some basically injects "themselves" into a given universe, mostly because it usually comes across as heinously self indulgent. But Mako, I gotta say that you really did make it work. And, other than using Gigatron instead of Megatron, I really felt as if I was reading a lost RID script or something. And there were some really good ideas presented in here too, largely made use of by your "character".

Thanks!! The Gigatron thing was always my preference. You say "Gigatron" and everyone knows exactly which guy you mean and what he looks like. I almost feel like I underpowered my character too much out of fear of being a Mary Sue, but there's already enough badasses on the team. Ranking him as the top of the VR Battle Simulator was a little self indulgent, but it was more a tip of the hat to my love of video games. I'm a badass as long as I have a controller in my hands!

[andersonh1]

Anderson, I liked yours too, it adds certain level depth to Kup's character. Was that something you had come up with for Mosaic? Cause I could really see it working for one of those.

Thanks! It wasn't a Mosaic, it was a short story competition that was held monthly. There was a topic and a word limit, so there were some parameters. I kept meaning to jump in every month, but this was the only story I actually finished! Even a short story is hard to find time to work on sometimes.

[Tigermegatron]

I am not a fan of reading fanfics. Due to some thinking they know how to write better TF stories than the official liscensed guys.