Dysfunctional Team: Season 1

Talos Four, City 17, Periphery Heights, Moscow hotel, nighttime

"Wow!" Warmup shouted. "We're guaranteed at least a 100,000 shanix just for him being dead? That's a fragging jackpot!" Cooldown indicated to him with a motion of his hand to quiet down. "Sorry," Warmup apologized.

"It's no problem with me. It's the neighbors I'm worrying about," Cooldown explained, downing another shot of his drink after telling him.

"So, when we're leaving?" Warmup asked.

"Tomorrow morning," Cooldown told him, grabbing the other glass after downing the first.

"That early?" Warmup wondered. "Do we even know where he is?" Cooldown stopped the shot from reaching his lips after hearing that question. How were they suppose to find the guy?

"I don't know," Cooldown answered honestly. "I'm guessing Bombline or his client will have something planned," he theorized.

"Maybe," Warmup said, slumping down in his chair. "I'm tire. I'm going to recharge," Warmup said, standing up.

"Yeah, I'm with you," Cooldown agreed after downing the drink. He got up from his seat slowly and went to his berth, stumbling just a little bit. Both of them laid down on their berths and started recharging.

XXX

The Merchant

Killshot walked into the bridge. Dead End and Skywarp were both sitting at the table, the former reading and the latter drinking some energon. Swindle was over at the cockpit, flying the ship towards it destination. He noticed that everyone in the room was tired, probably needing a recharge soon. He had to admit that he was feeling a bit tired too. He walked up to the cockpit and sat down in the seat next to Swindle. "So, Deadlock ready to talk?" he asked.

"Not yet," Swindle replied. "I've been trying to get someone to answer, but no one's there."

"Ah, so, any idea when someone will answer?" he asked.

"Shouldn't be much longer," he told him. Swindle looked at his employee. "So, I've got information of the location where the distress signal is at," Swindle inform him.

"Really now. What?" he asked the conmech. However, before he could answer, Skywarp asked behind them:

"What distress signal?" he asked. Swindle clenched his fingers into a fist at that. He forgot about Skywarp being there.

"Dead End, please stop reading your depressing poetry and add to the discussion by informing Skywarp about the distress signal." Dead End gave a sigh, before explaining to Skywarp quickly about to distress signal. After he was done, Skywarp asked what was important about the distress signals. "Well, for starters, it could mean that the mercenaries are there." This earned Skywarp's attention. "To go along with that, I've recently figure out that the ship is called the 'Apoptosis,' which is an Autobot space station," Swindle add.

"Apoptosis?" Killshot repeated. "That's a mouthful. Who would name a space station that?"

"A giant nerd, I'm guessing," Skywarp chimed in.

"Yeah, probably," Swindle said, looking at his console. "Hey, I think Deadlock is finally answering," Swindle said, and sure enough, Deadlock appeared on screen, looking at the two cons he could see at the cockpit.

"Yeah, it took a bit longer than expected. It was a full-scale lounge fight," Deadlock told the two.

"Lounge fight?" Killshot asked. "Don't tell me they gave you trouble," he mocked.

"Don't worry, they didn't. I can take care of myself in a fist fight, unlike you," Deadlock fired back. "I can hold Dabola down."

"Ah, good to know," Killshot said, sounding a little slow. "Look, Deadlock. You think you can call me later? Today has been a tiring day," Killshot said.

"Why? You've barely been gone a solar cycle. You've couldn't have run into danger that quickly, right?" he asked.

"Actually, we have. Pirates," Swindle answered for Killshot. Killshot glared at him.

"Thanks, Blabbermouth," Killshot said.

"Pirates?" Deadlock questioned. "Wow, you have some seriously good luck."

"I don't call it good luck. I call it an extreme annoyance," Killshot sneered. Deadlock gave him a disappointing look. "What? I don't do large amounts of people shooting at me in close-quarters. You know that."

"It definitely wasn't like that at Dabola. Last I check, you got your hands really dirty there," Deadlock pointed out.

"Okay, valid point, but it was a one-time thing," Killshot said.

"Un-hun yeah. Alright. Look, give me a call later after you got some rest, okay," Dead lock told him.

"Yeah, sure. Later," Killshot said, turning the screen off. "I'm not calling him anytime soon," Killshot said almost immediately after getting off.

"Not your favorite person to hang out with, I'm guessing," Swindle guessed.

"Eh, he's in the middle, in between 'I'll totally hang out with you later' and 'if you call me again, I'll kill you.'" Killshot clarified. "Overall, there's worse. A lot worst."

"Like what?" Swindle asked.

"Like Turmoil. If I ever have to be in the same room with that fragger, I'm liable to kill him. The only really difficult part is how do I want to kill him," Killshot said as an example.

"Yeah, I've met him a few times. Big, brutal, and a jerk," Swindle agreed.

"Ditto," Skywarp chimed in behind them. "Had to work with once with my trinemates. He was one disrespectful fragger, but he knew what he was doing."

"As did I, but only for a short time on a single mission. Never really met him, just got orders from him," Dead End chipped in too.

"Yeah, well, I'm going to sleep. Good-night," Killshot said to the group. Before getting up, he said one last thing to Swindle. "By the way, you still got Transmission fluid stains on you, might want to wash it off." With that sage-like wisdom given, he departed from the room, leaving Swindle to look at himself. He still had the stains on him.

"Dammit."

XXX

Misfire sat in a corner of his room, covering his head, being in that posture for a unknown amount of time, trying to ignore the dead staring at him. He could still hear Slugslinger trying to get his attention, but Misfire wouldn't have it. He was going to stay here and ignore them until the drugs wear off, and when that was done, he was going to take those drugs and dump them somewhere where so that he couldn't use them. Syk just wasn't for him.

Still, despite the fact that they were hallucinations, Misfire was kind of glad to see them again. They were trinemates and they had bonds. Not as serious as split-spark twins or gestalt groups, but it was there, always lingering. When a trinemate die, you don't notice the absent of a bond much for a while, but it does build up over time. The absence of the bond is just there, pestering you, festering within you, making you feel more pain as time goes on. The grief consumes you and you do whatever you can to lessen the pain. Having another trinemate that was still alive lessen that pain considerably, but by himself? Unbearable. Dugs made it bearable.

Seeing and talking to his trinemates made that pain go away.

"You finally realize it, don't you," Slugslinger said in front of him. Misfire noticed that he was crouched down in front of him now, in a very caring motion, like a brother. "Syk can let you talk to us, help you forget the pain, and let you live," Slugslinger explained to him.

"But it doesn't last," Misfire said somberly. "The effect can only last for so long before it goes away."

"Then take more. Get a batch of syk and analyze it to make more," Slugslinger told him, his voice almost having a fatherly tone, with Triggerhappy shaking whatever was left of his head 'yes' happily in response. Misfire looked at him with an almost disbelieving look.

"Weren't you always going on about how drugs are bad for me?" Misfire asked.

"I'm making an exception, just this once," Slugslinger explained. "I had good reason for making you not taking drugs. It always limited combat effectiveness, same with Triggerhappy with his circuit boosters. Thanks by the way for introducing him to circuit boosters, by the way," he added that last part sarcastically.

"Yeah, well, no offense, but I kinda don't want to look at you're ugly mugs every time I take syk. Seriously, it's very creepy," Misfire said, in a disgusted tone, looking at the holes that allow him to look into Slugslinger's inter-circuitry and Triggerhappy's utter lack of the top half of his head. Walking corpses, in general, were creepy to look at. Hopefully, he wouldn't have to see much more.

"Get over it," Slugslinger said bluntly. Misfire looked at him and couldn't help but notice that he was fading away very slowly. "We don't have much time," he noticed. "Look, this may freak you out, but this will help you. Think of it as therapy with Hook, only a lot more affective. Syk can help you get through this," Slugslinger comforted him, as he was fading away.

"How can you be so damn sure?" Misfire asked.

"Just trust me. I'm the leader of the trine and I know what's best, even though you ignore me every single time." Misfire flinched a little bit at that tone. "But this will help you. Use it, take away your pain," Slugslinger shouted to convinced him, getting more and more transparent. Triggerhappy gave a barely visible thumb up at his comment. Misfire sighed and looked away, thinking about it for a little while, before answering back.

"I guess you make a point," Misfire said. He looked up, only to see he was talking to air. Misfire looked around, slightly disappointed. He got up, shaking a little bit as he made his way up. He felt tired. Very, very tired. He walked to his berth where he laid his syk at. He grabbed it and looked at it thoughtfully. For once, drugs were actually going to give him something besides momentary bliss. They were giving him a chance to live through the death of his trinemates without pain.

With this thought in mind, he opened up a compartment in the wall above his berth. He found it pretty early in his entrance to the room. Inside was a Subsonic repeater, a type of submachine gun, that was already in there, but there was still plenty of room to place the box in there. Misfire brushed the gun aside and put the box in there, before he closed it and lied down on his berth. Misfire felt very little in him missing. Everything was surprisingly well.

That was bliss.

XXX

At megacycle later, everyone was in there rooms, recharging. The ship was on autopilot, heading to Apoptosis. Everyone was recharging, trying to get some recharge. The ship was deathly quiet. Nothing moved… except for a single form moving through the halls.

Scavenger.