He sat as the fire spattered and crackled, lightly smoking the fish and small deer fawn. He munched on an acorn to pass time. "Hope those didn't burn," he said.

His comm rang out, "Skorponok to Terrorsaur, report current position and status. Over."

"Go to the pit," Terrorsaur said without hitting the reply button.

"Skorponok to Terrorsaur, report over."

"Slag yourself, I'm busy. Doing important stuff."

A pause.


At the Darkside:

"There's no reply, Megatron."

"Send out Tarantulas to search for him."

"Of course, right away." Skorponok said.


At the Axalon:

"Airazor, give me a complete vector scan of Sectors Cal, Enos, and Demol, please," Rhinox asked the femme.

She punched the appropriate keys, and three holographic topographical maps appeared above the holocom table.

"As you can plainly see, Optimus, the Energon growths are not naturally existing on the planets' list of flora, fauna, or faux lifeforms. It was all brought here," Rhinox explained.

"Hmmm. We'd better study our current position for, if you'll excuse the pun, optimum stability, we don't want any friendly fire missing and damaging any of the crystals."

CRICK-CRICK-CRACK!

The three looked at Rattrap, who was twisting his neck.

"Eh, sorry. Last bout wid' the choppuhface left me kinda stiff. If ya know what I mean," He apologized.

They all shrugged and turned back to the consoles.


Terrorsaur flew in his beast mode, trying not to tick anybody off when his proximity detector said monetonely: "Maximal presence detected."

"Is it Airazor?" He asked hopefully.

"Negative, unit Dinobot in area."

Terrorsaur was discouraged. But then brightened a little.

"Terrorize," he said quietly.


Dinobot caught the scent of cooking meat. He thought it was strange, there were no known sentient lifeforms on whatever pitforsaken backwater planet this was.

"Hello, old friend," someone said behind him.

"We were enemies when I changed factions, Terrorsaur," Dinobot replied turning around. "Shall we begin?"

"Begin what?"

Dinobot grinned a toothy, saurian grin, then transformed, and drew his sword. "You know what I mean."

"I'm afraid I do, but I will not fight."

Dinobot raised an eyebrow; Terrorsaur did not have his blaster drawn.

"I have a favor to ask of you. And I mean so in truth. If you want I will disarm myself so there will be no aggression between us."

Dinobot paused before answering.

"There is no need for that. Now, what is your favor that you so anxiously want to bestow upon me?"

Terrorsaur took in a deep breath, and let it out slowly.

"I need you to give Airazor a message for me."

"Y-yes?"

"Tell her I need to speak with her. Tonight."

"Where?"

"Where? Uh, Sector Demol, I guess."

"All right. Sector Demol."

"But-"

"What?"

"Be discreet with my name."

Dinobot sighed exasperatedly.

"OK. Fine. I will do this one small deed of good, but when we meet again, we will fight for our lives."

Terrorsaur stared at his old comrade solemnly. "Agreed."