No Repaints Allowed: An Eradicon Fic - WIP

[jefferson]

A lil somethin' I got inspired to write. It ain't perfect, nowhere near that, but it was a fun idea, so whatever.

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No Repaints Allowed

An Eradicon Fic - Rough Draft

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A little Oneshot in which Eradicon pet owndership is threatened, Pokemon hit the Nemesis, and Jeff meets something scary in the Engine Room. Uses ideas collected from Cbox and RP. Time units probably inaccurate.
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Jeff was completely offline, as far as recharge would let him, and he usually recharged up until the last possible moment before his shift began. Rest was good, rest was natural, rest...was peace. He'd always sleep in, just to grab that last bit of recharge from a free cycle before a long orn's work, but one tiny factor held him back often enough that he really should consider transferring to another room.

"For the love...of Primus," a loud, edgy voice called out nearby. It pronounced each word with a bite that was unique to this one voice alone. A bite that every Eradicon in Jeff's shared quarters knew was not a good thing to wake up to. "What... did I tell you about leaving your dirty aft animal #$%^ all over my #$%^in' berth?!"

Leonard.

Jeff groaned as Chris replied with almost as much acid, "It's not even out of its cage, Leonard. I just needed to put it there for a moment while I cleaned the - "

"Do I look like I care? I really hope not, because if you think I do, then there's something seriously wrong with your visor. I don't give a slag what you were doing, the fact remains - there is an animal on my berth leaking its filth onto my sleeping space."

"How can it leak anything when it's not even out of its cage!?" Chris retorted, his tone making it apparent he was quickly going beyond incensed - and completely mystified. "It's made of glass, it's designed to hold liquids inside, and I always keep him clean - Mr. Piccolo is not a threat to your cleanliness!"

Jeff didn't know if they knew he was online, but then they wouldn't care. Or, at least, Leonard wouldn't. He pitched a fit about any, even the tiniest, infraction on his personal belongings without consideration for his fellows. The particular berth he was talking about, two down from Jeff's own, technically belonged to anyone who chose to recharge on it. But Leonard didn't see things that way. He was perhaps the most possessive and protective vehicon on the ship. Sure, he had good qualities, like some serious (if underdeveloped) leadership skill and a sense of empathy sometimes, but for the most part he was a rather volatile person. Personally, Jeff thought the guy held secret feelings of inadequacy that made him push everyone away, but that still meant he was caustic, cold, and sported a short fuse. Luckily, his temper was usually lost only when dealing with idiots and infringement on his territory. Territory such as that berth. Otherwise, he usually let things slide.

The current problem probably only had him in a bigger knot than usual when it came to invasions of personal space because he had a strong aversion to anything organic. In fact, of all of his brethren on the Nemesis, Leonard was the one least interested in human media, because he found them so gross, and so it went without saying that he completely missed the Dragonball Z reference in the animal's name and went straight for the throat.

"Mr. Piccolo is a disgusting piece of living $%^& that has no place on this ship. Get it offa my berth or I'm throwing it out the airlock and into the mines," Leonard hissed.

That's about where Jeff took his cue to leave and stood, quietly heading for the door. Chris was a realist, a realist who frequently helped keep Jeff grounded in the figurative sense, by giving him advice or putting Jeff's fears into perspective for him. He nevertheless absolutely loved the little hamster he'd managed to sneak into the ship.

Jeff could remember the day Mr. Piccolo arrived. The Eradicon had just gotten off shift and arrived at his quarters to find seven other Eradicons piled atop Chris's berth. They were all quiet, watching, staring at something and whispering amongst themselves. He thought he heard Stacy coo, but dismissed it as a glitch in his audios. When Jeff managed a look through the dark appendages blocking the way, though, he found a large glass container filled with toys and houses and some kind of debris. And at the very center sat a teeny tiny animal, peach-tan with a black stripe of fur on its back, looking up at all the attention with tiny moist eyes.

"That's Mr. Piccolo," Chris had said, suddenly standing next to Jeff. "Isn't he cute? He looks just like Pikachu!"

Mr. Piccolo went on to be something of a celebrity among the Eradicons. Some even got creepy and made daily visits that came off as being awfully close to worship sessions (Walter and Dwight came to mind). About a month after his arrival, some of the others even got animals to keep them company. Stacy got herself a tadpole and grew herself a pet toad. John, stony guy though he was, managed to snag himself a bearded lizard. The most unusual pet on the ship so far was a chicken named Camilla, reared and raised by Mary. No one had seen Camilla since she lost her yellow chick feathers, but sometimes one could hear cluck-clucking in the walls of the ship, and, recently, Knock Out stepped on a particularly juicy stray egg. (The yolk had gotten on his newly polished leg and, not knowing what it was, he'd thrown a tantrum. Everyone had thought the ensuing tirade was funny until the same thing happened to Megatron.) As a fun bonus, according to the rumor mill, Breakdown had adopted a dog, though he didn't keep it on the ship.

These pets were the Eradicons' only belongings, in many cases, and each prized their little friends with varying degrees of possessiveness not unlike Leonard's and his berth.

So in the rare circumstances that an animal and Leonard crossed paths, a fight usually broke out. Everyone knew Leonard would never report the animals (Dwight would tell one otherwise.) but they also had no idea what harm Leonard could or would do to them. So they kept them out of the way. Obviously, Chris didn't think Leonard would notice for some reason that his precious Mr. Piccolo was touching the other's precious Mr. Berth, but he'd thought wrong.

Chris was one of those who didn't back down from Leonard, and Leonard didn't back down from anyone who wasn't a superior officer, so this was surely going to turn into a fist fight.

Jeff wanted no part of that, and his shift was starting soon anyway. He exited the room and turned right, leaving the quickly escalating yelling behind closed doors.

This was the hall reserved for the Eradicons' quarters, simply called the 'Barracks' or 'crew deck'. It was a corridor lined with large rooms where the vehicons recharged until their next shift. Each room was large and occupied by up to eight Eradicons at once. At one time, the place was so full of vehicons every mech on the field, in the mines, or at their stations were replaced one for one every shift cycle. Now, however, the Autobots had picked off many and several rooms were empty.

Walter liked to say that in every room left unoccupied, a ghost of one of their brothers took up occupancy and liked to harass the living for the unfairness of being sent to fight mechs much stronger than them. Knowing they had no chance of scaring the bots in charge, they resigned themselves to haunting their brethren.

Jeff didn't believe him, but it was hard to shake Walter's words when he was walking alone in the dimness of the Nemesis walkways and having to pass by open, dark rooms on his way to the lift.

By the time he'd reached the elevator, he was facing the hallway and palming the controls for the lift open without looking, unwilling to glance away in case something might come at him when he blinked. Yes, he saw that episode of Dr. Who. And Weeping Angels made better sense than ghosts did.....Walter said so....Fragger.

The lift hissed open behind him and he took hurried steps backwards into -

"YIPE!!!"

With a horrendous start, Jeff dove to the side of he elevator and plastered himself against the wall, visor blindingly bright with fear.

But it wasn't a Weeping Angel that greeted his optics, nor a ghost, but the tall, dark, angular, and statuesque frame of Soundwave. The mech's glassy face looked was staring quietly at him, and Jeff felt no judgment, no amusement coming from the mech. He was simply observing, and Jeff was filled with both relief and great apprehension. He'd just made a fool of himself in front of the very mech who went around recording everything. Jeff wondered if Soundwave ever compiled his favorite clips and watched them in secret, silently laughing at the utter inane happenings around him.

Jeff had his theories about this guy, and they mostly involved Soundwave's flawlessly composed facade being a cover up for the biggest internet troll on the planet. If Soundwave suddenly spoke up just now and said, "PROBLEM?" Jeff wouldn't have been the least bit surprised. As it was, the mech merely looked calmly back out into the hallway, that unreadable face seeming to turn towards Jeff's quarters. With a blink, the Eradicon suddenly wondered if Megatron's Favorite, being the spy he was, knew about Mr. Piccolo and the others...

Managing to get himself under some control, Jeff peeled himself from the wall as the doors finally slid shut and took up a spot quietly next to the dark spy. He reset his vocalizer.

"Sorry, about that, sir. I'd, uh, thought I saw somethin'...um...So, uhh... See anything interesting lately?"

The mech's face turned towards him again, blank of any visuals, but Jeff could feel that gaze on him. With a significant sounding clack, the mechs chest plats detached, transforming ever so slightly into a lightly built flight model - Soundwave's little ... Oh no. The small glider sprouted tiny claws and perched lightly on the edge of Soundwave's arm, folding its wings enough to sit comfortably. Like a bird.

Like a pet bird.

Still, Jeff felt nothing through EM fields or any other means that would indicate what Soundwave was thinking. He could have been amused by Jeff's horrified expression, sending a calculated message about illegal guests on the ship, or maybe this was completely unrelated to the pets. Maybe the bird-thing (that was rumored to be named either Laserbeak or Ratbat) simply chose that moment to come out and sit on its master's arm. Jeff didn't know, but he was feeling pretty concerned.

The elevator was swift and within a few moments it was stopped. The doors opened near the ground bridge controls, and without a word, as usual, Soundwave walked away.

The elevator shifted to close and Jeff shook himself of his frozen state to stumble forward, get chewed by the door, and then fall into his seat at his usual console.

"What happened? Did he do anything?" a voice to his right said, and Jeff turned to find Stephanie, Gunther, and Gerhard staring at him, the former from their seats and the latter from next to Jeff. He was why Jeff was here at all - it was Gerhard's rest cycle, and the seat Jeff just took was probably where he'd been sitting.

The newly arrived Eradicon just blanked for a moment before shaking his head.

"Nah...no...He didn't do anything," he said, and it was the truth. He leaned forward and logged into the system. He had to, or Gerhard, their unofficial task master, would have his hide. Couldn't have the Cons' slave force slacking off... "He just...Well, I just think everyone should hide their pets extra well for a whi - "

Stephanie gasped, his deep baritone voice rocketing skyward with dread. "No! We gotta tell everyone - "

"Don't use comms!" Jeff interrupted, leaning forward a bit enthusiastically. Stephanie leaned back. "I didn't even know - Soundwave probably monitors those, our comms. I can't believe no one thought of that before they brought in animals - but he sees everything! I had no idea."

"I zought he only spied on ze Decepticons, not us," Gunther supplied from behind Steph's shoulder. He'd practiced and practiced for that German accent. "Vehicon activities are trivial compared to ze rest of our 'crew.' Zere is not a zing ve do against ze cause - a few pets should go unnoticed."

Gerhard was shaking his head. "I think that's what we all thought. We're all under the radar, but I guess that's not true."

"What was that? What are you talking about?" a quiet hiss of a voice reached their audios and suddenly Dwight was upon them, looming into the group with interest. He had a habit of speaking quickly, and with the hushed tone of a conspirator. He was kind of paranoid, and frequently spouted information no one else could confirm was true or not. He'd taken a liking to office comedies of late and changed his name to honor a favorite character. Something about the name just seemed to fit him. "Are you discussing...theory?"

The others exchanged a glance. Gerhard, not liking the strange mech much, decided to leave. Jeff couldn't blame him. Dwight seemed to think Gerhard had some kind of authority and went out of his way to suck up when he could, even though everyone knew it wouldn't work. There were a few betting the guy had some kind of crush on their impromptu boss, but not everyone bought it. He was likely simply a creepy snake. The task master had just spent an entire three day shift on ground bridge duty both staring at Earth coordinates as busily as he could and, more intensively, organizing the next fortnights shift schedules for over four hundred Eradicons alone. He had no patience for Dwight's antics.

"I'll go down and spread the word, Jeff. See ya'll after shift," he said, turning towards the lift.

Dwight looked torn between going after Gerhard and staying, but ultimately he slid up next to Jeff and looked expectantly around the group.

Gunther sighed. "Soundvave seems to know zat some of us have pets."

"I told you he did," Dwight interrupted, looking offended. "From the very beginning, I told you guys, no pets cuz they'll find out. But you went and got them anyway - none of you listen to me, do you? Soundwave spies on us constantly, monitors us to make sure there's no dissension in the ranks."

Jeff gave a critical look that exactly mirrored Stephanie's.

"No, really. You don't believe me?" Dwight continued. "Let's use some logic, in here, all right? Soundwave is the most observant mech on this ship. He not only sees everything, he understands what he sees. That makes sense, right?"

Gunther nodded.

"So it stands to reason that he knows that you and I are fully aware beings, brand new sentients they never meant to create, and therefore he knows its possible we'll become unhappy with our..." He inched forward, glancing about for Soundwave's spies. His voice dropped to a whisper. "....situation."

"What situation?" Stephanie whispered in return, his bassy voice making the air vibrate.

Dwight's visor took each of their faces in, then slowly backed away, shaking his head slightly. "You're not ready yet..."

And then he was gone, just vanished.

Gunther was the first to turn back to the ground bridge controls. He didn't have an animal to guard so he was safe as long as he completed his shift here and didn't get in anyone's way. Jeff also returned to his station, ready to haul a 72 hour long shift of boredom. There was always the chance the higher-ups didn't mind, or that Soundwave hadn't meant anything in the elevator...And he'd stick to that hope for now.

Stephanie was the last to let his work consume his attention. He didn't have a pet either, but he liked to take care of them sometimes, and he liked having something to take care of that liked him back. He'd been wanting a kitten for orns, but to keep one on the Nemesis would have been impossible. Because he was on shift, and Soundwave could be anywhere, he'd have to be careful in spreading the word, and spread the word he would. It was kind of his thing. He could only hope Jeff was wrong. Besides the Television and other Eradicons, there really wasn't much in the universe that factory built cannon fodder slave workers could own happily.

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End of Part 1

Any suggestions would be great. Always looking to better myself.

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[Skein]

That was a very amusing read. And rather intriguing. I esp. liked the idea no one even intended to make Eradicons on par with other Cybertronians, physically or mentally, and their improving intelligence would be a surprise factor. Please, do write more )))