[ INTRO LOG ]

[robotsatan]

You don't know how you got here. One minute you were walking, sleeping, maybe dead -- then you're here, your feet suddenly carrying you down an empty street. Where's here?

Any Cybertronian would recognize this as their home planet, Cybertron, but it's not a Cybertron they've ever known. It has all the familiar hallmarks, but none of the specifics -- the city isn't one anyone here could identify, and even at a glance it's obvious that no one's set foot on the planet's surface in hundreds of years. The city and its surrounding areas all bear the marks of devastating war, of dust and rust collected over centuries. With no one in sight -- right at first, anyway -- there's plenty to explore. In fact, if you start walking, you'll find that your feet may just carry you in one particular direction.

A) The crater.
On one edge of the city is a massive crater left by some wartime weapon that seems to have taken out a large chunk of the surrounding metropolitan area. At the center of the crater it's broken through the surface of the terrain to reveal what looks like it might be a promising energon deposit. There is some strange but native vegetation growing around the edges, too, that no Cybertronian would be able to identify -- small, metallic, brittle-looking sprouts that bear a curiously organic-looking fruit of some kind that doesn't look like it's intended for consumption by any natives of the planet. In one rocky nook of the crater, light catches on the surface of a pool of water, which seems strangely out of place on Cybertron. On closer inspection, it seems that somehow an underground water source has formed a spring in the crater.

B) The center of the city.
If you follow where your feet seem to want to carry you, you'll find yourself in the middle of the ruined city. It seems that the center of the city was once home to a massive forum, and some of the pillars and structures still stand. At the very center of the forum is a massive, elaborately constructed fountain, although it has now long since run dry of whatever used to fill it. One of the low, inner walls of the forum has a terminal embedded in its surface, although it looks curiously ancient, out of place with the rest of the city, and unlike the rest of the technology still left around, there doesn't seem to be any way to power it on or operate it. There are a few scattered pools of water and a few of the strange metallic plants in the city, too, but they're not quite as plentiful as in the crater.

The planet was obviously once home to a massive network of communication relays, but those have all been long since destroyed. However, with the bits and pieces left behind and a few determined minds, it wouldn't be too hard to build a working, if rudimentary, one...

Comments

THE CRATER

[wreckerscombine]

Ok. Last he checked, the Wreckers didn’t do surprise entrance exams. If you were on the list and you got the call, then…well, you were in. That’s just the way things work. And Springer isn’t the type pull some weird stunt the middle of a mission, it just isn’t his style.

But how else do you explain all of the Wreckers and their ship just…disappearing?

This place sure is hell isn’t Garrus-9, that’s for sure. Not unless it went under some major remodeling.

Rotorstorm’s in helicopter mode – on a slow descent down towards the edge of the crater. The bird’s eye view didn’t really help too much. Or at all.
As far as he can tell, he’s on his own.

“Is this the part where you guys jump out of your hiding spots? Real original.”

B. THE CITY

[rodders]

Rodimus has been having what he thinks he's going to call A Day. It is not the worst day he's had, but it's certainly making the top five. In the past forty eight hours, he's been confronted with his corpse, apparently vanished along with the rest of the Lost Light, had to deal with Trailcutter's death, completely failed to stop Brainstorm from getting away, found out that Brainstorm was a Decepticon agent, and was getting ready to go after him. And came back from being not existing? The details were still kind of sketchy, but he got the idea. Anyway, not necessarily in that order.

And now he's here, which he is going to conveniently blame on Brainstorm. As this is Cybertron but isn't Cybertron at the same time. Time travel? Probably. Or, worse, this is the present and killing Optimus when he was still Orion did this. His head hurts too much if he thinks about it in depth, and not for the first time since finding himself here did he wish Perceptor was around to explain it in words that weren't five syllables long. Also: totally kicking Brainstorm off of Team Rodimus for the moment. Perceptor was a perfectly legitimate and capable choice of replacement for 'the genius' position now that there was a vacancy.

Rodimus stumbles into the forum, uninterested in any of his surroundings - two fingers pressed to the side of his helm as he vainly tries to comm the Lost Light. "Blaster-- Blaster come in, damnit. Not this again. Or if Megatron is telling you not to pick up when I'm calling, you can tell him to go--"

He might not be paying attention, but it's kind of hard to miss the red, orange, and yellow mech wandering around - especially with those flames on his chest. Subtle and subdued are not this bot's particular strength.

[smarterthandad]

Rodimus was in the market for a genius? It turned out Cybertron had one in stock. Travel-sized, even.

Valeria had used some convenient debris to climb to the top of the low wall around the forum, near the broken terminal, and was sitting with her legs dangling, idly kicking her heels against the metal as she did something on her human-sized datapad. When Rodimus walked in, she listened to him for a moment, then briefly consulted her tablet. No incoming signals.

He was totally talking to himself.

"I'm the only one who can hear you, you realize."

[arnhaid]

A Day is probably the best way to describe it. For everyone.

Because going from one abandoned planet to the other is not what Ironhide wants to call a good day, either. There's not even Sunstreaker around. No bugs. It's like the utter isolation he first found himself in, and it's making his plating crawl.

So, of course, when he spies red and orange armor, his mood perks up considerably.

He doesn't even think about it. He all but leaps forward, grasping the smaller frame in big arms and squeezing with a bellow that's probably way too cheerful for the situation at hand:

"Hot Rod! Kid! You're alive!"

Sorry, Rodimus.

[pullingamiko]

Pfff who needs subtlety. Not Rodimus, and not this human girl running around and scrambling over every almost-comedically oversized (from her point of view) structure she can get a grip on, trying to get a better lay of the land.

Having managed to get on top of a particularly troublesome piece of rubble, she spins around at the sound of a voice nearby, looking Rodimus over with some suspicion - and then noting the bright blue eyes (usually an Autobot thing) and bright orange paint (just kind of cool) and deciding he's probably okay. It sounds like he's trying to contact someone, but she can't make out much beyond that from here.

"Hey!" She takes a couple steps closer to the edge of the chunk of rubble, cupping her hands around her mouth to make sure he hears her. "D'you know what's up here, or are you lost too?"

HUARRRGH

[staygoldponybot]

A Day it certainly is.

Sentinel himself was considering going back to the crater and having a PROPER look around, one that didn't involve some prissy buttbaby stomping his hand into shit. He'd slowly decided to follow the noise Rodimus was making after wandering into the city himself, leaving a neat little trail of energon drips.

Oh, well. It's something to follow to get out the city again, at least. Rodimus will probably hear Sentinel's footsteps echoing before he gets into the main forum room himself, anyway.

flexes

[planate]

You know what's easy to spot from a distance. Rodimus is. On account of the obnoxious red paint job.

"Rodimus!" Pipes skids out of a side alley, apparently overjoyed to see his captain. He immediately runs up to him and grabs his hands, "I thought I was alone here!"

[501st]

Well you can join the club, Rodimus because Rex has been having quite the day himself. By now, he had made his way into the city, hoping that something would be of use there. Granted it looks like the Separatists (or whoever) had already scrambled out of the place, but there had to be a transport, a speeder...SOMETHING.

And...well, Rodimus is standing right there. By now, he's had enough of these..."living droids". One was enough. Now two.

And although Nautica hadn't posed a threat, he kept his hands near his blasters at all times, just in case. "Short range frequencies aren't going to work, clanker."

A head tilt.

"Tried it."

The crater

[briefcase]

The intent had been to jump back in time, not across realities, and last he checked he hadn't even begun his trial run. But Brainstorm was pretty sure that he wasn't responsible for this, this time. Maybe. Look, it's kind of hard to be completely sure of things like the ship you're inside of was disappearing around you. He was pretty sure he wasn't responsible for that either.

Okay, he may be the cause a few terrible accidents, like Swerve blowing his face off, but his unfinished work wasn't known for spontaneous misfires. He was much more careful than that.

So here he was, in the middle of nowhere, with no explanation as to how he got here. Brainstorm grips his briefcase a little tighter, looking out at the water in front of him, and nudges the surface with the tip of his foot. This planet was some kind of weird mix of organic and inorganic-- he might be more interested if he wasn't cranky. He hated surprises.
Well, it certainly was water.

Brainstorm picks one of the small fruits nearby and squints an eye at it, scrutinizing it, before subspacing it for later. Wandering around aimlessly around a large area of nothingness wasn't going to get him anywhere. He turns his attention to the city instead, hopping up into the air before transforming into his jet mode and making a beeline for civilization, staying low to the ground to keep a better eye on it.

[quantumechanic]

His flight took him past the energon deposit at the center of the crater, and a familiar purple mech who was crouched over it--at least until she heard the sound of someone flying overhead and looked up to see who it was.

"Brainstorm!" Delighted, Nautica sprang to her feet and started waving before she remembered to switch to radio so he could actually hear her...not that her bright colors would be hard to notice against the desolation of the crater regardless. "Brainstorm! You're okay!"

Well, that wasn't the most reassuring greeting.

[rodders]

Oh no you don't, Brainstorm.

Rodimus has spent most of his time since finding himself back on Cybertron blaming Brainstorm for it in some way, shape, or form. Find yourself on a Cybertron you don't recognize? Blame the guy who's traveled back in time to murder Optimus Prime. It's simple, really, he just didn't expect to be handed the opportunity to punch sense into the bot so soon. But who's he to deny the chance?

'Brainstorm!" Oh yes, this is your captain speaking, and he is angry. They're going to have a talk and it's going to involve his fists. But the jet doesn't seem like it's stopping, and Rodimus realizes his window for acting is increasingly narrow. If Brainstorm time travels again, Rodimus really will lose him and he can't afford to take that risk.

Which is why what follows is simply the logical progression from point A to point B - he's going to get Brainstorm's attention by jumping up and attempting to grab one of his wings. That's within reach, right? And even if it drags the other bot into the ground a little then some of the work of making sure the lesson he's intending to impart is taken care of for him.

Yep. Solid plan. 10/10, would definitely do again.

CRATER

[fuckinstoplights]

Everything hurts.

The world is little more than a solid wall of pain. Static and sparks pop off his plating, rendering him immobile. Nothing wants to move -- all his motion centers are shorted out. Though, whether it's a temporary short of a permanent one, he doesn't know.

Both are terrifying.

He's lying helpless in a patch of vegetation near the crater, wings occasionally shuddering in spasms where they poke out of the leaves. Honestly, he isn't even yet aware of his current predicament. He's too busy trying to calm the raging systems in his body. Trying to recover the ability to move.

And wondering why his friend broke his promise.

Re: CRATER

[warcorrespondent]

Well, now, that fellow didn't seem like he was in a very good condition at all.

Aftermath slows to a stop, standing over the injured mech and taking in his condition. Didn't seem to be of Cybertronian build- at least, nothing that he recognized. Leaking strange black fluid too.

Tilting his helm curiously, Aftermath gingerly kneels down next to the small flier, minding his own injuries. And then he reaches out, and very, very gently lifts and turns the strange mech over onto his back, making sure the wings were out of the way.

"Can you hear me?" the old mech asks once he's set the stranger's prone form down.

[asafepairofhands]

{The Crater}
Ratchet has wandered around for a while, inspecting the energon deposits and the surrounding landscape, but nothing makes any more sense than it did a half-hour ago. This place looks like home, but it's not even the twisted wreck he remembers leaving on The Lost Light--he's crouching down now and lifting the leaves of one of the small plants with his fingertips, peering down at it and the heavy fruit at the ends of its branches .

"What the hell...?"


{The City Center}
Ratchet eventually heeds the nagging call at the back of his mind and wanders into the city. It's both familiar and entirely alien at the same time, and the weird, nagging homesickness he gets from staring up at the ruined structures annoys him more than anything. He tries to shake it off as he maps out where he is as best he can, slowly taking stock of what supplies he can see and looking out for any familiar faces.

CRATER

[auramatic]

Drift's retreated to the crater since his confusing conversation with Rodimus -- confusing and a little devastating, if he's totally honest, although he's intent on not letting it get him down. He doesn't really have a clear idea of what happened, after all, and considering it was Rodimus doing the telling, that's not exactly surprising. But Drift can only take in so much, and with the sudden change in setting and all that missing time, he just...needs to step away from it all.

The crater is a good retreat for now, at least. Drift can stand on one of the higher rocky formations and turn his gaze skyward, studying the constellations in the sky. They're familiar when nothing else is, but even that in itself is frustrating. There's no mistake that this is Cybertron -- but if that's the case, then why does this city look so wholly unfamiliar?

He hears the grind of silt and rock under someone's foot and an indistinct voice and his hand immediately goes to his sword hilt as he pivots, optics searching.

"Who's there?" Even as he says the words, his gaze settles on a familiar form, and surprise overtakes his face. "Ratchet?"

the city center

[kaijugrrroupie]

Okay, so this wasn't exactly how he'd expected his drift to have gone. He was expecting some feedback of the kaiju dimension, maybe some intense memories from the secondary brain at a stretch but this? This isn't right. Waaay not right. Not to mention he can't see any kaiju anywhere.

"Okay, Newt, think about this l-logically," he says, shaking and staring at the war-scarred landscape that's been lain in front of him, not noticing that his nose is dripping profusely with blood. This is too real to be a RABIT. And he's pretty sure he'd not be able to follow a secondary brain RABIT--mostly because it's not his own memory. He'd gotten snippets, of something much greater than just the kaiju destroying because they were wild creatures, several entities all as one--like a hivemind or something--but he'd not been in the drift long enough to uncover anything more than garbled feedback, luminous blue tendrils and teeth.

And now he's definitely not in Kansas anymore. He's standing in the middle of what appeared to be a truly massive rusty street, with broken buildings towering over him and making him feel incredibly small. Which is pretty much exactly how the kaiju make him feel.

Oh shit. Did he die? Did drifting with the kaiju kill him? Not that he believed in an afterlife, but he's pretty sure he did not build a teleporter out of PONS scraps. Or, maybe he did. That would be pretty sweet and totally better than dying, right?

"Hello?"

[scaredybot]

Mayday glances around when he hears somebody calling out. Another bot? Hopefully an Autobot? It very well could be.

But instead of metal and angles, what he spots is something small, dark, and moving. The first thing his mind spits out is 'bug' and he recoils in horror, letting out a piercing shriek.

After a moment, the small, dark object comes into focus and- "Oh, thank the Allspark you're just a human."

Leaning over and propping his hands on his thighs, the giant metal robot who's at least twice Newt's size wheezes in relief as if he actually needed to breathe.

THE CRATER

[targetlocked]

It's yet another uneventful, silent day in the canyon, just like all of the other days these past few years. Lock-On moves through the all-too-familiar terrain to check if anything has happened. She notes, with some wistfulness, the areas where inept fighting took place in the past. Just as she thinks about how much she'd like a change of scenery, though, Lock-On finds herself somewhere entirely new.

"Oh my," she says, scanning her surroundings. This looks strangely like the images and videos she was shown of a ruined Cybertron while she was being trained. But...how did she get here? Is she alone here, too? Investigating the nearby crater seems like a promising start, so Lock-On starts towards it.

"Hello?" she calls out, every so often. "Is anyone there?" It's hard to miss her, given the loud rumbling of her treads on the rocks and soil, and also the fact that she is a god damn tank.

[501st]

There was in fact someone there, someone who' taken notice of Lock-On the moment she was within range. Granted her size made that relatively easy. She had at least 15 feet on Rex. But that didn't mean he wasn't prepared, slowly strafing around a rock as she walks, blasters out of their holsters and in his hands.

Just in case things got messy.

He inches closer, trying not to make any noise--when she calls out. She didn't SEEM menacing...but...

"Never seen a droid that size before..."

THE CITY

[whippingboy]

He swears this is like something out of his darkest nightmares.

It's right in front of his optics: Cybertron, in ruins, again. Under his watch...?

It doesn't quite fit. Everything looks too... old, the cause of the damage done in the long distant past. Still, it takes him a second to get it together, to shake off the rising, familiar anxiety of abject failure. Even then he still feels unsettled to the core.

You'll find him picking through the abandoned buildings, incredibly on edge and looking for answers. Fortunately his new all-red paint job makes him stick out like a sore thumb against all the grey.

[aminerproblem]

After splitting up with Nautica, Megatron finds more recent disturbances in the city. Footsteps in the dust, pieces of buildings moved aside, and eventually the source of it all - Starscream.

Not that he knew who Starscream was, of course. As far as he was aware, this mech was just someone else who was stranded here. Given how strange his day has been, he was just about expecting anything to appear.

The miner's heavy footsteps were likely the first indication of his presence,"You won't find much but more rubble."

CRATER

[lifepersists]

It felt like days before the forcefield finally dissipated, but First Aid knew in the back of his mind it hadn't even been an hour. He recalls the way his spark clenched in its chamber when it finally flickered out, how his hands quivered ashe picked up the remains of Trailcutter's brain, pressing broken transistors and bent metal into place in an obsessive need to fix it.

When he looked up, he was no longer kneeling in the pool of energon. Trailcutter's body was gone. Bluestreak and Mainframe were nowhere to be found. All that was left was the brain in his hand.

First Aid sobbed for hours.

Parts of his visor are shorting by the time he manages to get himself under control, filaments burt from the heat. His vision isn't the best, but he has a clear enough head now to ge bearings of his surroundings. He can only assume he had been transported here, but by who and why he had no idea.

He vents in a heavy vent, rubs his face, and gets to work. "Is anyone here?"

It didn't hurt to ask, though he was certain he had never been here before despite how familiar it felt. Kinda like deja vu.

[gimmicky]

Sorry, First Aid, were you having a moment? Because Trailcutter heard that call for anyone in the vicinity, and...well, he considered himself as part of 'anyone'. It takes a bit--he's not exactly the fastest Cybertronian, but he makes his way across the crater, Towards Peace tucked under an arm.

The voice was certainly familiar, and he'd be lying if he said his hopes hadn't been brought up.

"First Aid?"

He only says it the moment he lays eyes on the medic. And after his journey with Red Alert (or...'red alert'. That's still taking time getting used to), First Aid is a sight for sore optics.

"FIRST AID!"

A smile cracks wide as he hurries over, and in a bit of exasperated joy, he throws his arms around him, lifing him a few inches off the ground.

"I had a feeling you'd be here!"

No you didn't.

CRATER

[taselikeabee]

The first thought Bumblebee had was a question of how long he had been out. Cybertron, the last he knew, was pretty much a barren wasteland - utterly terraformed and there wasn't a true city left standing. All of this... Bee would only be able to confirm that Shockwave had been stopped or he really was dead. That was what happened, right? The searing pain and then suddenly the lights went out? All evidence lead to that conclusion: chest plating still scorched and there's a distinct lack of a badge.

Truth was, Bumblebee had no idea what was going on. The place reminds him of how desolate Cybertron was before all of the crazy nonsense happened. Then again, weren't their lives essentially defined by crazy nonsense? Whatever the case, Bee really did need some answers and that was what created the urge to press on. It was a vain hope that someone would be around, but hey... Again. Crazier things have been known to happen.

Bee did stop at the crater, frowning and shifting on his legs with uncertainty. There were things on this Cybertron growing that likely shouldn't be. However, wasn't that the same for Cybertron right as everyone started to return? The thought occurred to him that Ironhide talked about his vision of the future, but he never mentioned this.

He groaned, hands on his face. "Just once... Just once I'd like something simple to deal with!"

[luckyfaceplate]

Bumblebee had always been one to stand out among the other Cybertronians. Sometimes metaphorically, but this time...physically. His yellow plating was easy to spot in the barren wasteland, and...if Optimus hadn't known better, he'd have sworn he was seeing things. But he's damaged, certainly, and...

How does he approach him...

"Hmm. You're beginning to sound like me."

His voice is soft, as he approaches Bee from behind, looking down at him. Nothing but guilt floods those optics, pain that he wasn't able to save Bumblebee, even more so after he'd done what a Prime couldn't.

"It's good to see you again, old friend. You have...no idea."

[phase6kindofbot]

It wasn't the first time Sixshot has awoken somewhere he hadn't been in before being shut down. He'd wake up in a lab full of scientists. They asked test questions, tweaked some things, shut him down. He'd then wake up later somewhere else, Command calling to announce the next mission he'd been assigned.

It was quiet here.

No scientists, no testing, no tweaking or upgrades. No voices over the radio outlining new mission parameters.

Sixshot takes into consideration his last memories; Earth. The Reapers. Starscream calling out his shut down code and the distant sensation of crashing as his systems blacked out.

Had he been... decommissioned?

Transforming into his quadruped mode, Sixshot looks around at the world he'd awoken upon. A strange blend of alien, vaguely Cybertronian architecture under familiar skies. Was this... Cybertron? He did not recognize this city at all.

[fuckinstoplights]

A quadruped mode is probably not the best mode to keep from attracting attention. Because someone is used to looking out for those things. Used to keeping an eye on someone moving on all fours.

His heart, metaphorically speaking, soars for a moment. He stops short, hovering, and all but dives down toward the shape.

It's only when he gets closer that he realizes he made a mistake. The size, the color... it's all wrong. And he nearly crashes into the ground the sudden storm of emotion is so painful.

No...

He lands awkwardly, and doesn't bother to get up immediately.

crater

[planate]

Pipes isn't normally nervous. He likes to think he can approach any new obstacle with an open mind and excitement - it's who he is at his core. The minibot puts everything he can into everything he does, which is why he'd spent several hours exploring the crater before the deep seated anxiety of being truly alone had set in. Something he'd never felt before. Regardless, he pushes it down. Cosmos never got anxious when he was alone in space, right? Pipes will be the next big name explorer, boldly going where no mech has before! Hubcap will be so jealous.

His little peptalk to himself doesn't help much.

"...Guys?"

Crater

[501st]

Everything was now over. Dogma taken into custody, Krell had been killed, and General Skywalker had resumed command of the 501st. While not exactly what Rex would call a happy ending, it was...just that. Over. That's what he thought, anyway. No sooner had he gotten on the transport than he found himself in this crater.

It certainly wasn't a planet he knew, certainly not Umbara. The sheer shock of the situation takes him for a moment, his helmet frantically spinning as he tries to gather his surroundings. Diagnostics and tracking tries to find out his exactly location, while his comm link couldn't pick up any frequency.

"General. General Skywalker, do you read me?"

Worth a try, he guesses, but certainly not getting any results from it. "This is Captain Rex, if any clones or anyone at all picks this up, I'm in need of a transport, Quick-like." His head turns noticing the river of Energon. "Well...THAT doesn't look friendly..."

...His head turns up to the edges of the crater, taking his blasters out of his holster.

"I've got a bad feeling about this..."

[quantumechanic]

Guess who was picking up radio?

Nautica's head snapped up from her wrench when she noticed a signal. Unfamiliar protocol, but definitely intelligently produced. She rose to her full, towering-by-human-standards height, looking around her for the source--oh, there.

The armor meant that Rex wasn't instantly identifiable as an organic, at least for someone like Nautica who'd never seen one. As far as she was concerned, he was a minibot with a non-obvious altmode.

Yeah, Nautica was kind of clueless.

She jogged up to him, waving. "You can put the gun away. The planet's deserted. ...Well. Obviously we're here, so it's not entirely deserted. But close!"

bout two weeks later

[pffft]

City
Being stranded was far from a first in Prowl's lengthy and eventful lifespan. Evidence of the city being recently disturbed is what draws him to the skeleton of whatever mechanical civilization lay here. With energon in the crater and supplies in the city, its likely he'll be able to carve some sort of camp here until he finds out what just happened.

Continuing his survey of the city, the Earth-based police humvee looks oddly out of place in the very Cybertronian landscape. He decides against emitting an emergency beacon for the time being and instead continues to investigate the signs of scavenging and the disturbed dust on the buildings.

Nothing that pointed to any recent faction violence, but just because the war was supposedly over didn't mean every backwater group of Decepticons got the message. He was alone and without backup. Best to stay hidden for now (radio-wise) and find a more secure location to set up a distress beacon.

---

Some time later, Prowl's wheels grind to a calm stop and folds back into his root mode, one hand clutching his helm. Nothing in particular seems to have caught his attention, but his face is pulled into a barely contained grimace.

He leans against the wall of a decrepit building as whatever it is intensifies. He soon finds the familiar sensation of energon slipping from his optics haunting him again.

"You won't shut up, will you?" he growls quietly to himself.

With a single outburst of movement, he wrenches a bench from its rusted sidewalk screws and flips it right the hell over. Venting with the effort, he calms down as the feeling subsides, and finally covers his face to wipe off the energon. Time to keep moving.

[smarterthandad]

Valeria had been spending most of her time in her decreasingly makeshift lab, but even she needed to manufacture vitamin D--she didn't want rickets, after all--so occasionally she relocated outside to work in the sun. Eventually she'd build a lamp with the proper spectrum and then it wouldn't matter, but for the time being, that was low priority. So many giant badly behaved robots with technical needs, only one Val.

When Prowl rolled by in his alt mode, she glanced up from her datapad to see if it was someone she had any interest in talking to or if she should just casually drop behind the rubble she was sitting on before she got noticed. Then, when his appearance registered, her eyebrow went up. This one was looking very...normal. Which was weird. Everyone else's alt modes came across as obviously extraterrestrial.

"Why do you look like you're from Earth?"

The Crater

[needlefingers]

It took forever before Chromedome could work up the energy to stand up and look around. Everything took forever these days. Things slowed down, or sped up. Time was weird without Rewind around to make things right away. How could one properly measure time when they sat in their room and listened to "I love you" over and over again? But even in Chromedome's depressive state, he found himself somewhat curious about his surroundings. Was this Cybertron? It looked sort of like Cybertron except very much not.

There appeared to be some kind of City off in the distance, so he made his way steadily towards it. There had to be other Cybertronians there, surely one of them could give him an answer. If not, then the universe had finally seen fit to send him straight to hell. It was a lot lonelier than he thought it was going to be.

The Crater

[pharma]

Pharma doesn't even scream. He can't, given that the shrapnel and flaming wreckage that was once his head is now gone and his brain module is scattered on the wall behind him.

Except it isn't.

He blinks. He actually can. This... isn't right. Is it? He doesn't even register his surroundings at first, instead purely focused on feeling around his helm, touching his face and then, very hesitantly, the back of his head. Nothing -- nothing out of the ordinary, anyway. As his hands drop to his sides and he sits at the edge of the crater, he starts laughing, an empty sort of relieved kind of laughing. He's alive. He shouldn't be. Not when he'd been staring down the barrel of that gun and he could see First Aid's hand tensing as his finger tightened on the trigger.

Once he stops, Pharma's awareness finally extends beyond the fact he still has a head, and he stands up with a grunt to look around with a dull sense of curiosity. Where exactly is he now?

Crater

[tenbackpockets]

Fucking robots.

That was Robert Epps' first thought when he woke up next to a massive goddamn crater. Sure, there's no direct evidence that they were at fault (yet), but the odds that they had something to do with this were pretty up there. The giant-ass buildings off in the distance supported this. So who's fuckup was this? Autobot? Decepticon? Couldn't be the King Con himself, 'cause he was good as dead, Optimus tore his ass apart (Good riddance).

Epps is a soldier down to the bone, and wasn't about to sit around here griping about shit when there were things he should be doing. Like trying to figure out where the hell he even was. Obviously, it was an alien world, but a man's gotta know more than that. Annoyed now, he gathered up his gun and started walking towards the City. Any Autobot or Decepticon passing by gets called at, because Epps doesn't have the patience to deal with factions right now.

im sorry

[planate]

Pipes had just climbed out the crater, slowly wandering along to the city and taking in the new situation when he was called at.

He looks around for the source of the voice. Then up. Finally, down. Ah. Luckily he's not one of the robots who would try to step on Epps. That sure probably would make his day even worse. Instead, he's just one of the ones who...

"Oh! Hi, you're small."

...Yeah.