Dysfunctional Team: Season 1

An hour later, everyone, sans Misfire, was on the bridge, sitting at the table. Swindle was at the head of table, thinking about they relic found on Espera. He knew already what it was; a data cylinder. The main question was what did it held? Of course, Swindle uploaded to the ship's database and examined it already. He was just here to tell everybody else.

"Hey, cheapskate. You're going to tell else what's in the cylinder," Killshot asked from the other end of the table.

"Yes, I will," Swindle replied back sounding just a bit smug, "if my employee would learn not to insult me. Doing so would be bad for his pay grade." Killshot took that to heart and immediately shut up. "Alright, before I say what's on it, can someone tell me where Misfire is?" At that request, Scavenger immediately tried to shrink himself down in his chair. Instead of making himself less noticeable, it drew Swindle's attention. "Scavenger, you're looking like you know something. Want to tell us something?" Swindle asked with the most comforting smile he could. Scavenger gave a laborious intake before drawing himself out of his seat and explained where Misfire was.

"Uh, yeah. I think it's my fault he's not here. He's locked himself in his room right now," Scavenger explained quickly, hoping to get this over with quickly. Swindle's face stayed the same, smiling at him and telling him to continue. "I was sort of looking in the lab for stuff that is completely not important right now," Scavenger said, trying his hardest to skip over the stuff he was looking for, although everybody raised a eyebrow at that part (except Shockwave, that eyebrow-less Cyclops), "and while searching, Misfire sort of walked in and trip on my tail."

"Wait, hold up," Skywarp interrupted. "He trip on your tail? How's that possible. You're tail is bright-green," he pointed out in an unbelievable tone. "It's as hard to see as a squad of Autobots firing their guns in the air."

"To be fair," Hook pointed out, "Misfire isn't exactly in the right state if mind half the mind. It also doesn't help that he has a attention deficit hyperactivity disorder."

"He has ADHD?" Swindle asked

"Yes."

"…Who the heck would hire him to be an actor if he has that?" Swindle asked him in an incredulous tone. "Generally, being an actor requires some attention."

"I don't know. I'm a doctor, not a director," Hook said with a wave of his hands. Swindle held his head trying to think of why someone would hire someone with ADHD as a actor before giving up. He learned a long time ago that directors and anything movie related was making less sense as time went by, so it was a wasted effort to figure out what goes through their heads.

"Alright, let's get back on track," Dead End said to the group, trying to get them back to the main subject at hand.

"Agree. Tell us Swindle, what does the data Cylinder contained," Shockwave asked in the same monotone voice he always had.

"Oh yeah, that. To put it simply, it holds stellar cartography. For those wondering (Skywarp), cartography is basically maps," Swindle explained to the group.

"Wow, I'd risked my life for something we already have," Killshot interjected from the other end bitterly.

"No, you risk your life for something we partially have," Swindle corrected. Killshot raised a eyebrow at that. "Yes, the map we have of the known universe is already big, but it's hardly the whole universe. Here let me show you," Swindle said, hitting a button under the table. At that, a 3D image came up of the universe on the table. A section of the universe, about 5% of it, was colored red while the other was kept blue. There was also some black patches in the blue. "The red part is known space that we already known, the blue is the unknown part of the universe that's just begging to be explored," Swindle explained.

"Wow, it's that big?" Killshot asked. Swindle shook his head yes. "Wow, didn't see that coming."

"May I step in for a moment and ask exactly what the black part is?" Dead End asked Swindle.

"That? Those would be some space abominations waiting to destroy the universe." The room was in an unsettling silence at that. "Relax, it was just a joke. No need to go crazy over it. It's really nothing, but some coding error. Age has corrupted some of it, leaving it un-viewable to us until we fix that. I'm no computer expert and I know most of you only know how to do basic stuff so we can't fix it, but I know someone who is. I'll send that data to him to try and fix it while we continue chasing after those mercs," Swindle explain to the whole group.

"Good, I've been meaning to tear their heads off," Skywarp seethed.

"You're going to have to wait a little longer for that, so don't go all kill everything mode on us yet," Swindle said to the seeker.

"Why?" Skywarp asked.

"Still haven't located them yet. Once I do, we'll go over there, kill them, impress Megatron, and then go throw a party. Sound good?" Swindle tried to calm down the agitated seeker. Skywarp gave a short scoff before agreeing to it. "Alright, good. I said that today has been a stressful day for most of us, with all the gun-fights and everything, so I said we all just spend the rest of the day doing whatever you want, just as long as you don't break anything," he said, directing that last statement mainly at his employee. "Meeting adjourn." At that, half the room immediately left, those being Hook, Scavenger, and Skywarp. The other three stayed in there seat, looking at Swindle, who was casually ignoring them and walking back to the cockpit.

"Hey, Swindle, come back," Killshot yelled after the arms dealer. Swindle stopped and looked at him, flashing a smile.

"What?" he asked in his cheerful voice.

"Exactly where are we going next? And don't say you don't know, cause I can tell by the fact you're telling us to relax as a sign that we're about to run into bad stuff," Killshot explained. Swindle looked at the other two, his smile going down a little bit.

"Let me guess, you notice it too," Swindle said. The two gave their agreements. "Well, scrap. Alright, I'll tell you," Swindle said, sitting back down in his seat. "You see, a little while ago, just a moment before we left Espera, I intercepted a distress call from a space station."

"So, what? How does it matter to us?" Killshot asked

"If you learn to shut up, then maybe I can continue," Swindle bark back at the sniper. "Now. As I was saying, I got a distress call from the space station. Nothing too special about. Just a Decepticon distress called, figure I'll let someone else take care of it."

"But," Dead End came in, as if he knew this was coming.

"But, I got another distress called from the space station. An Autobot distress call. Now, ask yourself this, what would cause both sides to call for help? Most battles pretty much ends with one side completely dominating the other. It's practically unheard of for both sides to send in distress calls. So, the question is what can happen so that both sides make a distress called?"

"A third-party," Shockwave answered.

"Got it! I'm thinking that the mercs are attacking the space station tight now. I figure, if we head over there, we can go over there and take care of them," Swindle explained.

"Well, I guess that's a good plan," Dead End said, "but what if it isn't the mercs."

"They're still Decepticons in trouble. We go there, take care of the situation, and win some respect points from Megatron. It's a win-win situation, no matter how you look at it," Swindle explained. "So, if I were you guys, I get ready. We'll be there by tomorrow," he finished and got back up from his seat to head to the pilot's seat. The other three looked at each other before getting up and heading to their own places.

XXX

"You let them escape with the relic!" Corpsegrinder wanted to slaughter someone.

"They came prepare, I hate to say it," Goliath said to his captain. He too, had the intense need to kill something, although he had better control over it than his captain.

"Prepare? Why weren't you prepare?!" Corpsegrinder questioned/yelled at his SIC, his fist really wanting to punch him in the face.

"We didn't expect anyone to come here, much less Decepticons," Goliath answered. Corpsegrinder scary expression still hadn't gone away. "But, we do know what they look like. We got a couple of cameras in the hallways to watch the area."

"Where can we watch these," Corpsegrinder questioned/threaten his SIC.

"Tech room, but I already did that and got photos of each one set up for you to look at," the arcaedian said and motioned for a datapad from a fellow pirate. The pirate ran over and gave him the datapad, which he gave to the Corpsegrinder. Corpsegrinder looked through each photo. A walking Cyclops, a commando, a seeker,…

Killshot.

"Him…." Corpsegrinder growled.

"Uh, you're alright," Goliath asked.

"Not in the slightest," he answered and showed him the picture of Killshot. "You see this 'Con. He's one of the reasons I got out of the war. This guy, along with that bastard partner of his, Deadlock, and their CO, Turmoil, slaughter all of my men on Devola. They did it ruthlessly and without mercy. I've wanted revenge on these guys for a long time…." Corpsegrinder stopped paying attention to what's around him and started thinking about Devola. So many dead….

"Sir?" Goliath asked. Corpsegrinder snapped out of his reverie and looked at his SIC before giving orders.

"Mine the rest of the energon and report back to the ship with everyone once you're done. After this, we're chasing after them."