Misc.

“Megatron, you wouldn’t believe the complexity of his circuitry,” Hook was saying in passionate fervor. “Are you sure I can’t dissect just a little piece—a finger, even—”

“Shut up! If you so much as scrape a micrometer of coating off his chassis, I’ll take you to pieces,” Megatron snarled, “and I won’t dissect you neatly, either! I ordered you to get him functional again, not give me a technical analysis!”

“I would put it back afterwards,” Hook muttered sulkily. “Anyway, the repairs are already done! The worst thing wrong with him was he’d run out of energon. His engines—ohh, his engines, what I could do with his engines—his engines are gloriously efficient, but even he can’t go to warp in a planetary well on seven percent capacity, even with a forty astroliter tank.”

“He was at seven percent?”

“Yes!” Hook said eagerly. “And I looked up the refueling logs: he was only at twelve percent when he went out, can you imagine, he fought that entire battle on two astroliters—Megatron, please, if I could pop out his fuel pump for just a single sca-aan,” his voice squeaked suddenly higher, and then he was saying hastily, “Yes, of course, sorry, point taken: what I meant to say is, I’ve got him hooked onto a refueling line, I’ll just turn it up a bit more, shall I…”

Megatron was standing at the foot of the repair table glaring ferociously, his arms crossed over his chest, when Cyclonus managed to activate his optics fifteen astroseconds later. Hook was leaning down over him. “There, all better, I trust?” he said brightly.

“Yes,” Cyclonus said. “And Hook, the next time you are tempted to dissect parts of my anatomy, I will disassemble you.”

“Yes, of course,” Hook said, glumly. “I don’t suppose you have your own schematics tucked away in there?”

“Some,” Cyclonus said, sitting up. “But my circuitry requires quantum-etched transistors, which—”

“What?” Hook howled. “Where, how, that’s,” and lunged forward and grabbed him by the breastplate. “Who built you?” he snarled. Cyclonus looked down at him bemused; Hook was nearly dangling off him in an outright frenzy. “Where is—Megatron,” Hook burst out, letting go and whirling around. “I don’t care how great a warrior he is! It’s meaningless! His creator—we have to get his creator here! You’ve got to send someone to Chaar for him instantly—”

“Hook,” Cyclonus interrupted. “He is not on Chaar. He was not a Decepticon.” They both looked at him. “He was…passing through our territory. He made a bargain with our commander.”

“To build you,” Megatron said, his eyes narrow.

Cyclonus nodded. “There had recently been…several casualties. He built me out of their remains.”

“And then your commander just let him go?” Hook said. “What kind of idiot was he!”

“The matter was not under his control,” Cyclonus said dryly.

“Oh…I suppose,” Hook said grudgingly. “If he could build this…” He stared at Cyclonus with avid longing, instinctively drifting closer, his hands coming up as if to paw at Cyclonus’s breastplate. “Do you have any idea where he went?”

“I cannot say for certain,” Cyclonus said. “I have not been in communication with him.”

“We must find him,” Hook said. He turned to Megatron. “We must. Megatron—look, do you have any idea what I could do for your power output if I had this technology? Your cannon—you’d incinerate Autobots with a single shot. Even Prime’s armor couldn’t stand up to it!” He was pleading outright.