An Exploration Mission (Closed; Att'n Vallermoore)

[Vallermoore]

Mining World #55/Domina Fascista
Loading/Unloading Docks


The cargo bot was incensed not only that a biological had climbed in there and could not be blasted or even thrown out with robotic arms-he felt it like a human would feel a fly on him-but that it was a slave using him to fly to freedom, leaving him as a slave. He inwardly cursed the counterfeit game that had enslaved him three years ago, but cheered up slightly when he found where he was flying to. For now at least, the nation of Domina Fascista and the Decepticons were as close as friends as biologicals and robots could be. Like Vallermoore, the rulers of Domina Fascista knew one day the Decepticons would invade, but their nation was even lower then Vallermoore's on the Invade list and quite low on the Raid List, as it could defend itself well and was no threat if not attacked. It was a proudly Fascist nation, although it's biggest genocides had been done decades ago and it had slightly mellowed since then. The escaped slave, unless he had some very good skills, was likely to get very unpleasant attention from the warlike populace.

Like the Victorious Decepticons, the nation encouraged it's full citizens to bear arms, even guns. And the only aliens they truly respected were robots. The nation, although he didn't know it, consisted of humans and ponies-but the ponies were very different from the way the ponies of Equestria had been before their takeover by the Decepticons. They were Fascist ponies and each had a swastika cutie mark with a symbol below it that was their talent. Whilst the pony was not utterly restricted to the job that it's mark indicated-doing that would cause needless instability and dissent amongst ponies that would be otherwise loyalist, any pony that did not gain a swastika as part of the cutie mark, if discovered, was either executed or enslaved. There were two rulers-the pony Herd General, and the Marshal of the humans, and they had as much power over their own people as the pre-Divine Megatron had over the bots of Cybertron. Dissent amongst both humans and ponies was rigidly squashed-but at the same time, coupledoms were tolerated and even encouraged as they were needed to grow the Nation and besides, any ruler who tried to interfere with everyone's coupledoms would be thrown out due to insanity. The humans were also Fascists as well.


Rurik, for such was the escaped scorpion-person's name, decided to go and see if he could get a job somewhere, and came across a pony on his way to work. The pony was a grey unicorn and had a loaf of bread cutie mark, with a swastika below it. Rurik gave the pony a bow. He had encountered ponies on another planet before and they had been friendly enough. Surely this pony would be the same? "I'm looking for a job," he told the mare in front of him, not knowing what the reaction of citizens of Domina Fascista towards unwanted aliens was. This pony had been taught from foalhood that only three races were any good-humans, ponies, and robots. Any alien that was not one of those was inferior at best and fit only for death at worst.


Carjack Biofuels


In this case the events that led to this battle-on both sides-were not considered narking, that was treason, but corporate espionage which was fine as long as both sides were Decepticon. Foreign corporate espionage was entirely different. High General Carjack refrained from calling the deadly Genocide Battalion or the divisions of regulars he controlled to his aid, and Leader Megatron didn't use the Decepticon Military, nor did he use his divine powers either. On both sides there was restraint. Having the Military fight itself in a civil war might fracture the unity of the nation. And Megatron liked Carjack and didn't want to kill him and knew Carjack felt the same way about him. It was somewhere between a play fight and an outright fight to the death. Carjack took several wounds, but used booby traps such as gun turrets and an artificially created hurricane to defeat his foes. He was both angry and amused that they had taken the chance to leg it, despite another branding if they were caught (except for one, the one who had brought his freedom.) He had to get back to his body in case someone nicked it for a laugh or sold it to a foundry-which was legal even if it were a High General body. He got to it just before the ICC did, and they bowed low. He set off to look for his slaves, who had meanwhile split up so at least some might get away.

[Victorious Decepticons]

Domina Fascista

The unicorn pony looked shocked for a moment when she heard the unintelligible foreign babbling being directed at her, but this expression was almost immediately replaced by one of pure hatred. How dare this...THING!...think it was a good idea to get so out of his place as to speak to her?!? Her lip curled in unadulterated disdain, and her horn began to glow.

In an instant, she delivered a searing rebuke in the form of a single magical lash-like strike, knocking him onto his butt with the sound of a crack of energy. She then put her nose up in the air and strode past him. She would have done more to rebuke him, but figured that his owner might not have another slave. After all, most people used less hideously ugly servants than that, so surely his owner had to have barely afforded him. The thought that he might not be owned by anyone didn't even cross her mind.

Rurik looked at her receding body with a "wtf" expression, but didn't say any more. Obviously, she was not going to be helpful at all, and might get even more violent if he persisted! He quickly got up and ducked into an alley for a while, giving her plenty of time to go away before he went back onto the street.

The next person who was coming was a human, wearing an arm band with the same design as the national flag over a military-esque, but not really military, uniform-style shirt. He was tall and muscular, though he had brown hair and eyes, unlike the "perfect specimen" German fascists of Earth. His eyes immediately went to Rurik, and they followed a similar expression change as the mare's had: Surprise, and then extreme disdain and hatred. He marched right over to Rurik and barked out, "what are you doing on the street!? Who owns you?! Where's your brand!"

Alas, his language was totally foreign to Rurik, who couldn't make heads or tails out of what this hostile human was barking at him. All he could tell for sure was that this guy wasn't friendly either. Now he had to decide on how to respond...

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Carjack Agriculture

Carjack did a quick head count of his slaves, and to his relief, realized that only five were missing. He then sealed the window, this time using his blaster on low as a welding tool, before taking off to try to find the runaway livestock.

It was simple for him to find the first two slaves thanks to his thermal vision system, which was a standard part of his body since he had to be ready for war at all times. He also had many other anti-cloaking upgrades as a result of his military status, but for now, the scorpion-shaped heat patches he could see hiding in what was left of his nearest cornfield gave the two away. He landed and grabbed one in each hand without difficulty.

Then, after tossing them back into the barracks, he went out again. Before long, he found another, who was trying to hide his own heat signature by sitting in a creek. The creek was actually decently effective at camouflaging his heat, but the gator hastily crawling toward the water - as if after prey - was more obvious. A closer look, now with night vision, revealed the head of a scorpion-person just barely sticking out of the water. Carjack landed, taunted him about almost being gator bait, and then grabbed him just before the big reptile was able to secure the kill.

"You gotta watch out for those things around here," Carjack chastised the ex-escapee, who saw how the gator's jaws banged shut with tremendous force just as he was pulled up. "Those aren't like the dogs. They're wild, and to them, you're lunch."

After dumping this one back into the slave barracks, Carjack went out once again. This time, he didn't see anyone obvious, nor notice any wildlife acting strangely. He began to circle slowly, even occasionally turning off his jets and gliding so he could listen better.

Down below, one scorpion-person pressed himself next to a large boulder that had been heated in the sun all day, its big heat signature hiding his smaller one. In front of him, a thick stand of scrub oaks (like wild bushy things) blocked the view from the night vision optics. He watched the General circle silently like a giant, mechanical bird of prey, over and over, coming lower each time, until finally he had to fire his jets to remain aloft.

The escapee figured he was pretty safe now, but almost immediately, he once again saw the silhouette of the General's plane mode against the light of the full moon. A pit formed in the biological's stomach as he heard the sound of transformation followed by a fairly soft landing. After a few footsteps were heard, the General's hand appeared nearby, fishing through the scrub trees and undergrowth as if certain that his quarry was in there.

"Come out, come out," Carjack called softly. "You're not getting away that easily! You may hide from my sensors, but you can't hide your life energy from my telepathic detection system!!"

Saying this produced exactly the effect that Carjack had been planning on: A burst of shocked/amazed energy. He homed in on it better than a missile, and in a flash, the metal hand closed around its source - the hiding slave - like a giant clamp.

As soon as Carjack left with the fourth captive, the fifth and final escaped slave jumped up from his nearby hiding spot and ran. This, however, wasn't just wild running. He headed directly to the place where Carjack stored most of his grains.

By the time Carjack came back to search again, the last escapee was well hidden. The General quickly picked up his energy trail thanks to the fact that most biologicals leave a bit of their energy behind wherever they go, and this trail was fresh - and even tracked it into the grain warehouse. Once inside, however, it disappeared.

Carjack scanned, telepathically, trying to find the creature. However, with literally trillions of seeds - all with the potential for life - filling big barrels throughout the building, it was like trying to find a distant channel through a bunch of signal jamming. ALL of the lifeforms and potential lifeforms had energy, and there were so many of them, that the much-stronger field generated by the fully-mature and sapient scorpion-person was still drowned out.

He began to stalk through the warehouse, trying to use his heat sensors, night vision, and even turned-up hearing to detect the escapee. Yet, the first two returned no results, and the super-hearing just made it so that he could hear the 150 mice that he hadn't realized were roaming the building and eating his seeds. Carjack made a mental note to put out a gajillion traps to take care of that.

Next, he stomped up a catwalk so he could look down into the seed barrels. However, the escapee could easily hear him coming across the metal mesh of the overhead walkway, so it was a simple matter to pull his head under at the right time, similar to ducking down in water. If it had been water, this wouldn't have worked - but the wheat grains were opaque and hid him well. Luckily for him, Carjack didn't stay standing still long enough for him to have to surface in time to give himself away.

After at least four hours of checking, Carjack finally left the building. He locked up every entrance that seemed openable, though, in hopes that the escapee would finally have to reveal himself in order to get water. To make it even harder on the slave, Carjack turned off the main water line outside so there would be none available in the building except for the fire suppression system, which was fed by a different pipe.

Grain, surprisingly enough, was outright explosive in silos and similar storage conditions. This was due to the extremely flammable dust that came from its seed coats. In home-sized bags, this was barely noticeable, but when grain was stored by the tons, it was a huge hazard. Because of this, grain elevators and the like ran sprinklers every so often to wet down that dust, but that wouldn't provide enough water to cause the grains to sprout or rot. It also wouldn't be enough to water a scorpion-person, Carjack reasoned, so he left that part on.

Then, finally, he ordered his security forces to keep an eye out, stationed a few dogs around the building as extra sets of eyes and ears, and flew away. "I know he's in there," Carjack grumbled, "and thanks to my little yappers, as soon as he makes the wrong move, so will everyone else."

[Vallermoore]

Domina Fascista


The unicorn pony was shocked when this strange, ugly, clearly biological alien jabbered away at her in a strange language that was neither Equestrian, that had survived as a language even after the fall of Equestria, (much like Latin had survived in places on Earth for centuries after the Roman Empire) nor the human language of Domina Fascista. He was surely a slave, probably belonging to someone who was only rich enough to afford one slave-not a human or pony slave which sold for higher prices on the auction block. She didn't want to kill or permanently maim someone else's slave without the owner's permission-not only was that an offence that meant if you got caught you had to pay the owner for the damage, but she also didn't want to smash up the property of some stranger who had never bothered her anyway. Her lips curled back in disdain revealing her pony teeth, her eyes rolled in anger, and her horn glowed brightly, then led out a magical lash hard enough to knock him over before trotting away. He let her leave, not wanting to fight a pony with such powerful magic. The next to come by was a human in military-esque clothing. He had already done his term of National Service in the armed forces, and was first shocked, and then angry to see this oversized insect. "What are you doing on the street!? Who owns you?! Where's your brand!?" he asked, and then reached for a pistol on his belt. Rurik's tail flashed forward and impaled the human, killing him on the spot. He took the human's money pouch but found he could not fire this pistol with his pincers. He got out of there, realizing nobody here was going to be friendly in the least, and saw a Megatronist Temple a few streets away. Perhaps the acolytes there might help him as a fellow Megatronist? Or he could pray for guidance at least although he certainly didn't expect any divine help. Megatronism was tolerated as long as it obeyed the Leaders of Domina Fascista. The Acolyte there was a human (no biological could join the Decepticon Priesthood in a biological body, but they could be acolytes) and he said to the Acolyte a few words that could be understood across the universe amongst Megatronists, that let him know he was one. This didn't guarantee friendly treatment by any means-most certainly not-but it did at least be an understood appeal for help, from one Megatronist to another.


Much like Decepticons, biological Megatronists might harm or even kill each other, but tended to help each other out against outside forces much like all wars between Decepticons stopped if, for example, Cybertron was threatened or the Decepticon People were all summoned against a foe from outside. In this case, either xenophobia would win out or this Megatronian tendency to help fellow Megatronists or at least not to outright nark on them.

Carjack Agriculture


High General Carjack went searching for his slaves nd found four of them quickly, who were tossed back into captivity to await branding later. The last one hid in a grain barn, where neither Carjack's mind boards or even his magic could find him. Fustrated, Carjack cut the water off, locked him in and put dogs around the area. The scorpian person found a small pipe that had some water in it, broke it with his pincers and had a drink, but he still had the problem of getting out of there. He started probing the floor with his tail looking for a sewer. If there was one and he could somehow break into it, then it might be his way out of there and away from those nasty yappy little dogs.

[Victorious Decepticons]

Domina Fascista
Megatronist Temple

The human acolyte first assumed that Rurik was a slave who had been sent there on an errand, perhaps to deliver something. He was obviously amazed when Rurik spoke the secret words, as was the runty-looking pony slave who was clearly his attendant. The pony glared at him as if he was some kind of massive traitor, but he was too weak - and lily-livered - to dare to attack him.

This human's expression made it clear that he really didn't think that such a being should be calling himself a Megatronist either, but unlike the prior one, this one took note of the sharp tail and then gave Rurik an appraising look. Maybe he was one of the Strong after all...

Soon, he went over to a shelf - without once taking his eyes off of Rurik, who he knew could be a pretender just looking for a chance to attack - and pulled down a sheet of paper. He then showed this sheet to his visitor.

On it was printed, in seemingly 100 languages, "do you speak this language?" Apparently Rurik was to point to the one he understood. Alas, none of them were the main language of the Xamarchan Empire, but there were several common "interplanetary" ones present, including Binary, English, Equestrian, and even German and Japanese. As he waited, the acolyte got out a small, round computerized gadget - an automatic translator that could work with any of the languages on the sheet. If Rurik couldn't speak any of them, though, they would be limited to crude gestures unless it turned out that the human actually understood Xamarchan with his own brain.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Carjack Agriculture

The moment the escapee broke the water pipe to try to get some of the residue, the dogs went off like fire alarms. They instantly ran to the outside of the wall just opposite of where they'd heard the noise, and a moment later, the doors banged open and security personnel rushed in.

When they entered the building, they expected to see their quarry - but instead, they saw nothing but huge bins of grain. The dogs practically flew in after them, and ran around sniffing frantically. Lhasas, alas, were not bloodhounds; their short noses had less than half of the olfactory sensors of a long-snouted breed. Because of this, they weren't even trained to search by scent, instead having been taught to listen and look for their quarry. Still, they tried, surely due to residual instincts, but to no avail. Soon, they were rushing around in circles, being no threat to anyone.

The security team tried to get the dogs on track, and finally succeeded in catching their attention long enough to get a "listen!" command through. Soon, the dogs were looking around intently, trying to pick up the sounds of an interloper. However, even with their great hearing, they couldn't detect their quarry's quick, quiet breaths over the roar of five Decepticon engines and each other's panting. After several minutes, the dogs and robots all left, figuring that eventually, their target would have to come out or die of dehydration.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Now, the escapee said a quick prayer of thanks to Megatron, and for the first time, Megatron actually noticed that he existed as an individual instead of part of the never-ending background data stream. It wasn't often that an enslaved "wild" biological, thanked him! Clones did, but they were trained to do that. This one was doing it on his own, and a quick check showed that he was a slave. Megatron began to telepathically watch what was going on, but did not interfere beyond continuing the already-bestowed Megatronist Blessing.

Quickly, the scorpion-person began to look for a sewer exit. To his dismay, though, buildings on Earth didn't really have huge sewer pipes attached to them - at least, not ones built by those who were from the USA. The only outgoing pipes were from the sinks and a toilet. Sink drains were too small to even get an arm down, and the toilet hole was only a few inches around. Both of these also had sharp bends in the pipe to keep septic gas from burping back up through them. These connected to a 6-inch main line that went to the septic system.

There were no municipal treatment systems here. Not only would no Decepticon take a job running something like that, it frankly wasn't needed in a farm environment. In fact, the only reason there was a toilet at all was in case General Carjack had been showing some biological prospective customers around and they needed to go. Carjack's own waste removal was handled by a used oil tank buried underneath a workshop, and that setup was in Carjack's big mansion far from this warehouse.

While the scorpion-person had gone ahead and broken into one water line, he realized that he really didn't have to have another drink all that soon. Just like his relatively tiny distant biological cousins, Earthian scorpions, he would be able to handle desert conditions if he had to. Still, he wanted to get away, not just live the rest of his life in a warehouse subsisting on raw wheat berries and trickles of water! He would have to think of something else...

~~~~~~~~~~~

Suddenly, the scorpion-person heard the shrieks of the other four, who he now knew he had been captured. They had obviously been taken right outside the loading doors of the warehouse for their second round of punishment. One by one, he heard them scream as new brands - this time, in the form of numeral "2s," were applied deeply into their chests and backs.

"Try a third time and it's Rendering for you!" Carjack shouted after finishing with the last one.

[Vallermoore]

Domina Fascista
Megatronist Temple


The slave pony had a pair of shackles as his cutie mark and no swastika above it, and he glared at the scorpion-person when he heard the magic words but didn't dare to attack him. The human acolyte glared at him too, but noticed the segmented tail with it's long and deadly sting-a tail that would have been chopped off if it were not for the successful escape. Perhaps this alien was one of the Strong after all? It turned out that the scorpion-person knew English and he told the Acolyte his story and how he had escaped from a mine rather then have his tail cut off and found himself here. "I ask you, as one Megatronist to another, is there a way to get to a planet less hostile towards aliens like myself?" He hoped that the Acolyte could help him, but didn't expect it. At the very least, he hoped to be allowed to make a short prayer in the Temple and not to be narked on. Every Megatronist learned early on that narking was bad, and narking on one of their own was even worse.

Carjack Agriculture

Rather then give way to despair, the scorpion person decided that he would have to wait for a while until someone, hopefully the slaves rather then a bot, came to open the barn to get the grain and he would try and make an escape then.

[Victorious Decepticons]

Domina Fascista
Megatronist Temple

The acolyte was, it seemed, glad that this alien THING was intending to get out of his precious Nation, yet torn with a desire to put him in irons at the same time. However, after a long pause in which he thought of an answer, he responded civilly enough.

"No one will do business with you here. That means that you'll have to hijack a ship. Or, perhaps you have a more friendly method of transport. You did manage to get here, after all, and since you don't have a Black Sun Brand, I presume you came illegally. In fact, that in itself is one of the only reasons I believe that you might actually be a colleague-in-faith. It takes some wits to get into the mighty Domina Fascista without going through Customs, and also without chains." Usually, he would say "brother-in-faith," but he wasn't calling this 'lowly' being any brother of his, same faith or not.

"There are many planets that accept all sorts of riffraff as asylees," he said, pointedly snooting up his nose at the very idea. "However, they are all liberal-infested hellholes. Degenerates, all of them! We invade them whenever we can. So far, we have taken over 10 such worlds, and put their devolved inhabitants to hard labor. If you go to a planet like that, you'd better make it far from here, or you will likely find the Fascistan Army rolling in sooner rather than later."

"If you want any more assistance than this, it will only be on the order of Leader Megatron. If you dare, come stand before the Face, and be judged."

With this, the acolyte pointed towards a large stone Face of Megatron on the back wall. To even his surprise, the eyes instantly appeared to glow, though faintly enough that some might think it was just an illusion, or perhaps light coming in through a stained-glass window. Currently, the hue of the eyes and the expression on the Face remained neutral.

At the Megatron Mansion, Leader Megatron waited to see if this biological, Rurik, would actually approach the Face he was now consciously keeping tabs on. He figured that he would, considering he was being told he might get more assistance if he did.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Carjack Agriculture

Carjack heard the commotion at his warehouse, but to his irritation, his guards soon radioed that they'd had no luck. The General continued on his way to the slave barracks, intending to get everyone out and march them to the black walnut warehouse for the night. When he got there, though, he was met at the door by the one who had paid the oil bribe.

After apologizing for leaving him in there for another day, Carjack reminded him that while he was off picking up the payment, a militia had shown up in full battle rattle and he had to deal with that! Then a bunch of losers had sneaked off on him, and one of them was still gone.

"Still, you did pay, and I make it a point to be an honest dealer whenever possible. Most from Cybertron don't get that, but it's really better for business in the long run. Customers buy more when they figure they're not going to get screwed. You wait here, while I get the others into the work area."

After several minutes, Carjack actually came back, to the bribe-payer's relief and delight. "You will be taken to the edge of my cultivated property. Once there, your freedom is yours. However, you'll be on your own in wilderness. If you try sneaking back onto my active lands to raid food, water, or shelter, then you'll be staying - and working - forever." Carjack warned with full seriousness.

"Now. According to my records, you are one of a few Megatronists who are among my unpaid laborers. This means that you may have a chance for citizenship. If you want to try for that, it's typical for a biological to have to go through a 3-month survival test right here on Earth. However, this usually comes AFTER a battery of psych tests, a background check, and maybe some new bureacracy they've come up with. In order to make sure you don't have to do it twice, announce to several birds that you want this to count for your Survival Test Requirement for a citizenship application. Yes, birds. At least one of them will be Domestic Intelligence, and get the message to the right people."

With that, Carjack silently marched the bribe-payer to what seemed like the lot line of his farm, and gestured over the border. In reality, Carjack had secured rights over ALL of Earth's wilderness, but he didn't say so. He only enforced that if some Decepticon got the idea to start developing, at which point his Asset Protection Force would come out to "dissuade" them.

In an instant, the bribe-payer headed for the thickest brush and disappeared within it. It could be possible to find him again, but it already wouldn't be easy. Within an hour or two, it would be almost impossible. He wasn't about to hang around and give Carjack a giant opportunity to change his mind!

~~~~~~~~~~

Grain Warehouse

As the escapee figured, eventually the normal operations of the agriculture company would require this warehouse to be opened. Unfortunately for him, though, Carjack Ag was a wholesale dealer, which meant that any buyers would be ordering tons, not mere pounds, of grain.

Suddenly, the big doors opened wide, and in an instant, the escapee climbed the back of one of the 5-story-tall barrels and sneaked himself inside. To his dismay, the next thing he heard was the sound of two engines. One was clearly a Decepticon's, but the other sounded like it was coming from some piece of factory equipment.

With a jarring yank, the escapee felt the barrel he was in get lifted up. It was then moved onto something solid. Not long after, the clunks of several more barrels were both heard and felt. Finally, the barrels were lifted again, only now, they were on some sort of platform at a very slight tilt. After some more motion, each barrel was taken off of this platform and set somewhere else. Then, the sound of other large doors was heard - and this time, they were closing.

Before he could get his courage up enough to pop his head out and take a peek, he was thrown against the inner wall of the upper part of his barrel. Now, he and the grain seemed to be...in flight? The sound of a large Decepticon's jets coming to full power confirmed it.

It was a short flight. Only about 20 minutes later, the plane landed, still in plane mode, and the cargo doors opened again. Once again, the escapee heard and felt the activity of being moved somewhere. Soon, he could tell he was in a building - the smell of exhaust spiked tremendously. It had to be a large, active, Decepticon installation of some sort.

After a bit more motion, the escapee's barrel came to a halt. Now, a deafening noise was all around him. It sounded like...grinding. Not the metal-on-metal grinding of someone with a bad engine or ruined joint, but something that was meant to grind. He could hear small, hard things whooshing through some kind of a chute, and the softer sound of a finer material further down.

With horror, the escaped slave realized that he was now in a giant flour milling operation. He would have to get out of that barrel and fast, whether or not he ended up getting busted doing it, or he would soon be nothing but a weird taste in some mine-slave's flatbread.

[Vallermoore]

Domina Fascista
Megatronist Temple

The acolyte was very pleased that this strange creature wanted to leave. He wanted to enslave him or worse, but Megatronists in circumstances such as this were supposed to help each out when in genuine danger from outside threats-just as Decepticons might fight like rats in a sack in times of peace, but if the Empire, and the Metal Planet in particular, were ever threated from outside they forgot their quarrels-even fights to true death-to do battle against the common foe. And the government and people of Domina Fascista were most certainly an imminent outside threat at this moment.

"No one will do business with you here. That means that you'll have to hijack a ship. Or, perhaps you have a more friendly method of transport. You did manage to get here, after all, and since you don't have a Black Sun Brand, I presume you came illegally. In fact, that in itself is one of the only reasons I believe that you might actually be a colleague-in-faith. It takes some wits to get into the mighty Domina Fascista without going through Customs, and also without chains." Normal Megatronists were brothers or sisters in faith, but this thing was no brother of his. He had a sneaking admiration for the way it had got in and remained uncaptured. He stuck his nose up snootily in the air. "There are many planets that accept all sorts of riffraff as asylees. However, they are all liberal-infested hellholes. Degenerates, all of them! We invade them whenever we can. So far, we have taken over 10 such worlds, and put their devolved inhabitants to hard labor. If you go to a planet like that, you'd better make it far from here, or you will likely find the Fascistan Army rolling in sooner rather than later.If you want any more assistance than this, it will only be on the order of Leader Megatron. If you dare, come stand before the Face, and be judged."

Rurik had absolutely nothing to lose and went to the face and bowed in the Megatronist Way. He considered himself a true Megatronist, and that had been one of the reasons for his escape from the mine. Megatronists if captured were supposed to escape-even from Decepticon captivity, if possible. He hoped that his God would not forsake him on this dangerous planet, as he had always been loyal to his Faith. He wondered how the face would react.

Grain Warehouse

The scorpion-person sneaked in a barrel, intending in that way to get past the little yappy dogs to somewhere else and then climb out and make a successful escape from Carjack Agriculture and from his slavery. Unfortunately it quickly became clear after he was flown somewhere quite far away that he was in a flour mill and he stood a good chance of being put into the milling machines and milled to death. Not wanting to die like that, he got out of the barrel, not caring even if that got him caught. Even being recaptured would be better then being crushed whilst still alive and possibly torn apart. He hoped very much that he had not been seen, or a huge metal hand would be reaching for him very quickly, and his sting was no use against solid metal.

Carjack Agriculture

Unlike many Decepticons, High General Carjack preferred to free those who payed their ransoms-because that way there would be more ransoms from other captured aliens in the future when the news got out, rather then it being a one-off thing. This meant more Energon for him. He explained the delay as being because of a Decepticon v Decepticon battle, followed by a slave escape. Still, you did pay, and I make it a point to be an honest dealer whenever possible. Most from Cybertron don't get that, but it's really better for business in the long run. Customers buy more when they figure they're not going to get screwed. You wait here, while I get the others into the work area." Soon he told the now free scorpion-person You will be taken to the edge of my cultivated property. Once there, your freedom is yours. However, you'll be on your own in wilderness. If you try sneaking back onto my active lands to raid food, water, or shelter, then you'll be staying - and working - forever. Now. According to my records, you are one of a few Megatronists who are among my unpaid laborers. This means that you may have a chance for citizenship. If you want to try for that, it's typical for a biological to have to go through a 3-month survival test right here on Earth. However, this usually comes AFTER a battery of psych tests, a background check, and maybe some new bureaucracy they've come up with. In order to make sure you don't have to do it twice, announce to several birds that you want this to count for your Survival Test Requirement for a citizenship application. Yes, birds. At least one of them will be Domestic Intelligence, and get the message to the right people." He let the scorpion-person keep the phone so he could if he wanted call a friend to take him off the planet.

As it turned out, the scorpion person decided to try and become a true Decepticon, and called his friends to announce that. He later found a flock of birds and told that to them, feeling somewhat silly, and then decided he would need to do some hunting. He had no gun or bow and arrows, but he did have his instincts, and his pincers and tail-a tail with a fearsome sting on the end that could bring down most biological creatures with ease if he could get close enough. And eating something like a deer would feed him for two weeks before he needed to eat again.

[Victorious Decepticons]

Domina Fascista
Megatronist Temple

Leader Megatron would normally make someone show his wits by mostly leaving him to his own devices, but he was well aware of how obvious Rurik was on this hostile planet, and not only that, there was already a detective task force actively looking for the one who had brutally killed a human with a "strange, poisonous, stabbing weapon that was not a knife or sword." One look at Rurik's tail would be all the detectives needed to know they had found their murderer, and due to the nation's speciesism, there would be zero chance of a fair trial. Rurik would be before a firing squad before a week was out...if he got caught.

Even so, Megatron didn't want to just warp him to a safer place. It was, after all, Rurik's fault that he had stowed away on the cargo-bot without first trying to find out where he was going. While getting off of a dedicated mining world was very impressive, he would have to do a bit more adventuring to prove that he had more going for him than the Megatronist's Blessing.

After considering this for less than a second, doing calculations that it'd take humans many minutes to complete, Megatron went ahead and put the full light into the eyes of the Face at this distant Temple.

~~~~~~~~~

Rurik was amazed when the eyes lit full red. He had seen that before, they were just stone, like any other big sculpture. He was even more amazed when the stone mouth began to move on its own! A smile formed, showing that so far, Megatron was pleased with him. Behind him, unseen, the acolyte looked grumpy. He had been hoping for a scowl, which would have meant that he could overpower this insect-dude and sell him for 10,000 marks! Alas, his plans for an instant windfall were thwarted. He didn't dare attack Rurik when Megatron's spirit was clearly right there and able to see everything.

As all of the biologicals were taking in the scene, there was a sudden "thud" noise just to Rurik's right. He turned to see what it was, and was speechless when he saw a leatherette bag the size of a women's purse. The style was a bit different, but it had the needed holding capacity.

Then, the Face did something that these icons almost never did: It spoke. Megatron's voice came through at clearly and at a proper speaking volume.

"Keep the items secret - look at them later, in private. For now, hide in the Temple until 1AM, when the bars here close. Then, go by night to the Location, while the cops are busy dealing with the drunks. Do not tell them I sent you. If you are asked your religion, claim to be Christian. A 'nice, good' religion. I'm sure you've heard enough about that one to answer any basic questions about it that you may be asked..." The face looked as if it didn't believe for a moment that Christianity was either nice or good, likely because the One behind it knew of all of the backstabbing, connivery, and other rot that came from so-called "Christians" that didn't actually follow its tenets at all.

Then, the Face addressed the acolyte. "See that no harm comes to him, either while under this roof, or from you or yours once he leaves here. Also, be sure to give him some bio-Energon so he can keep operating at full power."

There was a slight twitch in the Face, and in another instant, it returned to its usual state. Rurik was left staring at the blank, neutral expression on a 100% stone sculpture, and wondering how Megatron managed to bring it to its previous state of quasi-life. Even the acolyte was impressed, for he had never seen it come to full animation, much less with audio. Usually, inductees got a smile, with only the best even seeing the eyes light up.

~~~~~~~~~

The acolyte was not happy about having to keep this guy around at all, and he was secretly mad that he had been ordered to feed the thing. Like a proper Decepticon himself, he obeyed the order in the technical sense but did as little as he could. Rurik was presented with a bowl of lukewarm porridge and a grunt. Whether or not he could actually eat that wasn't even asked, though the acolyte hoped it would be incompatible with his unwanted guest's species. Then Rurik was ushered to an unused storage room and told "you can stay here until you go."

Once inside the room, Rurik planted himself under its one bare light bulb and looked in the sack. He noted that it was leatherette, not actual leather, but that made sense since there were no biologicals on Cybertron and Megatron likely made it out of whatever molecules he could accumulate from somewhere around him.

Inside, he found several papers. One was a small stack of money, but the other one was a map of his current city with a big X on a particular spot. There was a strange icon, which looked sort of like a subway train. Another paper appeared to have been printed by a very precise writing machine.

"Upon arrival at the next Location after this, quickly use the money to go far from there. You will have time to choose a suitable place to go, but not until then."

~~~~~~~~~~

At 1 AM, like the Face had told him, he took off from the Temple to the happiness of the acolyte. The acolyte felt strange. For the first time in his life, he was seriously tempted to "drop a dime" on someone. He found himself praying to Megatron now, but this time, it was for the strength to refrain from turning this strange creature in. For many minutes, his sweaty hand caressed the phone in his pocket, knowing that if he called Slave Control, he'd get a reward of 1,000 marks. To his shock, his prayer for help resisting that temptation was answered, but not in the way he'd hoped. His phone suddenly got extremely hot, and just as he yanked it out of his pants pocket to throw it, it ignited into open flames.

"No narking for ANY REASON!" A voice boomed from the Face, which now had darkly-glowing eyes and a scowl. The urge was definitely extinguished then, and the Face returned to normal once again.

~~~~~~~~~~

After an adventurous trip through many back alleys and far out into the sticks, Rurik found himself coming up on the back door of what seemed to be a poor person's farmhouse in the middle of rural acreage. It was now just starting to become dawn. He was shocked - this wasn't a subway station at all! He was pondering whether he had really read the map right when a voice came out of a tall hay field.

"Hey, boy, this is the spot for you! C'mon in quick!"

A hayseed-looking human, just now entering the age where one could be called "elderly," approached on stiff, but surprisingly fast, legs. He grinned and kept on beckoning at Rurik as he backed toward the farmhouse, but his eyes were constantly watching all around him. "Hurry up! Ya don't want to keep workin' for free, do you?!" Now the old guy was looking a bit frantic. He was clearly worried that someone might see him with Rurik.

Rurik finally decided to trust the human - after all, this was the location on the map! He began to come, and immediately, the old guy turned and began to run for his house, frantically beckoning over his shoulder for the alien to step on it and run in after him. In less than a minute, the were at the door, which the man threw open and nearly jumped through before grabbing Rurik by a pincer and yanking him in after him.

"Welcome to the Underground Railroad," the man said, only after firmly closing the door.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Carjack Agriculture
Milling Facility

As it turned out, several Decepticons saw the strange creature jump out of the bin, quickly scuttle down its side, and run off behind some other stock that was waiting to be milled. However, unlike those who worked on the farms, these were quite unfamiliar with what was, and was not, normal Florida fauna. They looked at each other with a bit of wonder and made some small talk about the creature, and came to the conclusion that this planet was just full of crazy stuff. Since the creature had just made its way down the tall barrel and hid, which many types of non- and semi-sapient beings might do if suddenly exposed to a loud environment like the mill, they had no clue that this one was of a more-advanced species than usual.

Though their attention spans for considering weird things was far longer than most humans' was, they still didn't come looking for the being. They had lots of grain to mill to fill the latest order from Interstellar Minerals, which had over 1,000,000 slaves to feed, so they soon got back to work.

From his hiding place, the scorpion-person saw that, just as he'd guessed, his barrel didn't last for long. It was soon picked up by a guy driving a machine with a giant mechanical pincer arm. With the arm, he grabbed the barrel, moved it over a huge hopper, and dumped the contents in. At the bottom of the machine, a conveyor belt took seemingly endless empty sacks, all set up in holders, underneath a discharge chute. When each bag got under the chute, a set amount of processed flour came out. The belt moved again when a scale underneath sensed that the right amount of flour had been dispensed. By the looks of it, each bag weighed about 100 pounds - and this was tiny compared to the size of the rest of the equipment.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Outlands

This ex-slave felt foolish talking to birds when he made his speech, but to his absolute shock, one of them made a very deliberate bow by stretching its wings out slightly and lowering its head. It then went back to pretending to search for buried insects, as the others in the flock were doing. The biological noticed that the birds in this group were all crows, a species known not only for high general intelligence, but for activities like theft and for being one of the few kinds of birds that were also capable of deliberate connivery. A fitting species for a Decepticon agent to imitate, the bribe-payer thought, though he knew that an agent wouldn't always be lucky enough to be able to use such a fitting cover.

Soon enough, he decided to go hunting. Unfortunately for him, the beasts he would find here wouldn't be nice, mostly-tame ones like deer. Instead, he began to hear a weird grunting/snuffling sound off in the distance. When he quietly went closer to investigate, he found a full-grown wild boar.

The boar instantly lived up to its reputation as a bad-tempered beast not to be messed with. It adjusted its head so its massive tusks were in the "ready to gore" position, and with a single loud grunt, began to charge.

(Edits: A couple of minor fixes)

[Vallermoore]

Rurik was not a human or a pony or a changeling, but a six legged, tailed, scorpion person who was the only free example of his kind on the entire planet, on a planet that hated biological aliens, with the police actively searching for him and no chance whatsoever of an acquittal at trial, either fair or otherwise. Even though he had escaped from Decepticon slavery, Megatron had a less hard spot for escapees, especially loyal Megatronist ones, and wanted to give him at least a small chance of escaping certain execution. Someone like this, if he had the right mindset and luck, might one day become a new Decepticon immigrant. He briefly turned his mind boards back to the distant past and dredged up an old memory from many centuries ago-the very first biological allowed this privilege-one who ended up rising to be a High General, the only High General of the Decepticon Military to be born rather then built in a factory. His mind boards held many centuries of memories, but most were kept dormant. He activated the Face at this particular Temple.


Rurik was amazed when the eyes glowed a fiery-and bright-red, and the mouth moved by itself. There was a thudding noise and a small leather bag suddenly...appeared next to him. Megatron's voice spoke. "Keep the items secret - look at them later, in private. For now, hide in the Temple until 1AM, when the bars here close. Then, go by night to the Location, while the cops are busy dealing with the drunks. Do not tell them I sent you. If you are asked your religion, claim to be Christian. A 'nice, good' religion. I'm sure you've heard enough about that one to answer any basic questions about it that you may be asked..." Then it said to the human acolyte who stood there "See that no harm comes to him, either while under this roof, or from you or yours once he leaves here. Also, be sure to give him some bio-Energon so he can keep operating at full power." Even the acolyte was impressed as he had never seen this before and it reminded him why he had first been drawn to Megatronism in the first place-the power of the Decepticon God.


Rurik put on the purse. The acolyte was inwardly seething with concealed rage at having to shelter and feed the thing that he hated, but he dared not go against his God-an unforgiving God to those who displeased Him, even more so to Megatronists. Non-Megatronists could not be considered to be traitors since they never had held allegiance to Megatron in the first place, after all. Rurik got some porridge that was better then nothing and at 1:00AM he left. Watching him go the acolyte suddenly had a very heretical thought in his mind-the desire to nark on the alien for 1000 marks. He found himself praying to his God to beat the urge and the prayer was answered but not in a nice way, setting his phone alight and nearly burning him. The Face came to life again, but this time the face was scowling and a dim light like burnt out coals were in the eyes. "No narking for ANY REASON!" One thing every Megatronist learned, even those who had no intention of joining the priesthood, was that narking was very bad. Megatron hated narks, although industrial espionage amongst Decepticons was not considered to be narking, and there was a special exception for Domintel interrogations, so they didn't have to hack everyone when just asking would get the truth.


When Rurik reached the area he was just wondering if he had read that map wrong when a human came and told him "Hey, boy, this is the spot for you! C'mon in quick!" Once he was in the barn the man said "Welcome to the Underground Railroad." "Where am I?" asked Rurik, trusting the human as much as a Megatronist could trust anybody but wondering where he was. The barn was full of hay and seemed totally normal. Clearly even Domina Facista had hidden political dissidents.


[b]Carjack Agriculture[/b]
[b]Milling Facility[/b

The scorpion person whose name was Tariq was seen, but luckily for him, was not recognised as sapient and because he scuttled away like a huge coakroach and hid, was left alone as the bots had jobs to do and didn't want to lose them. He decided to wait for a chance to leave and look for any safe way down that didn't get him killed or captured. For now he stayed where he was out of sight and decided to act like an animal if seen and hope the bot who saw him didn't hate non-sapient animals.

Outlands

The ex-slave felt a little stupid talking to a bird, but one showed itself briefly to be an undercover Domintel agent. He went looking for animals to feed on, equipped with his tail. He discovered a wild boar that charged to the attack only to get a deep laceration in the side and a hefty venom dose. The boar dropped to his knees and the ex-slave backed away and hoped the poison would be enough to kill the boar quickly so he could pinch it open and eat raw meat. A fire might alert a passing Decepticon with slaver instincts in his mind-boards. And that was the last thing that he needed.

[Victorious Decepticons]

Domina Fascista

The human looked a bit surprised by the question. "Whoever gave you the tip to come here didn't tell you anything?!" He paused a bit, looking slightly irked. "Well, boy, this here is one of the biggest stops on the Fascistan Underground Railroad. Maybe you never heard the name. Looks like they got you from somewhere WAY away from here! Here's the deal: We who run this little 'Railroad' think that sapient beings should NOT be owned. So, we smuggle you slaves out of here to places where you WON'T be owned. And by your lack of a brand, you were lucky enough to meet someone who agreed with us, before you ever did get sold to an actual slaver." He nodded very approvingly at what he thought had to be a mole in the slave market, likely buying up some stock just to free it. If he knew who was really behind Rurik's present freedom, his thoughts would have turned to ideas of lobster dinners, but fortunately, the human had no clue.

"What y'all do is wait in this barn until our 'engineer' shows up. That's our transport man. He'll show up in a cattle truck marked as if he's a slaver. The ride is harsh. But don't worry about it. If we didn't do it that way, Slave Control would realize what was really happening. You don't want that, because they usually just massacre any groups of escapees they find."

"Now, come over here. We have to mark you up proper-like."

Rurik followed the man around the huge haystack, and was surprised to find a little tunnel-like opening in one side of it. At first, it just appeared as if the hay had just been taken out from that spot in batches, but when the human ducked through, it became clear that this hollowed-out spot went far further than it first seemed. After a few feet of ducked-down walking, they came out the other side and into a huge room. The human put on a dim electric lamp, and Rurik was surprised, and a bit scared, to see several downtrodden-looking beings of many species. There were other humans and ponies, some fur-covered bipeds, some scaly bipeds, and one whose arms ended in thick, callused tentacles. Each one had a Black Sun Brand smack in the middle of its forehead.

He paused, thinking that maybe he'd been led into a trap, and his tail unconsciously readied for battle. However, the others quickly made "stand down" gestures while saying things in the Fascistan language that seemed to mean that there was no threat.

As soon as Rurik relaxed a bit, the 'conductor' came up and smacked him on the forehead. "There. Now don't take that decal off until you're all the way to where the engineers take you!" Rurik reached up with a pincer and could feel the somewhat-sticky sensation of a freshly-applied fake tattoo. A 'Black Sun Brand' that would, eventually, wear off if not intentionally removed. Intentional removal at this point would take quite some doing, especially if the one trying didn't know the trick.

Further instructions were soon given. If the place was raided by any authorities, the conductor said, they were all to pretend that they were property of the farm. Rurik's 'job,' if he was asked, was to use his pincers to cut up old corn stalks. "You might have to actually do that if SC demands to see it," the man warned. "So be sure to make like you're used to taking orders, if that happens! Keep your head down like you don't think you're worth very much. That's how slaves are supposed to act. I know, it's disgusting. But what can you do? There aren't enough of us to take over the country, yet. Eventually, it will come. Just like on the planet where the Underground Railroad got its start. Ironically, we learned of the entire system after the Decepticons sold us some slaves, who soon told everyone how their own ancestors had handled this sort of crap. If those infernal robots knew that they'd spread the seeds of a revolution, they'd probably melt themselves down." The old man looked hardened when he spoke of the Decepticons, and clearly disliked them to the point of not being able to see the humor in this irony.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Later, after realizing that the others didn't speak any of his languages, Rurik finally began to doze off. His anticipated slumber, however, was suddenly broken up by the sound of a loud diesel truck. The engineer had arrived.

A large group of civilians barged into the barn, and rounded everyone up just as if they were slave masters. The other escapees, having also been warned, went along with this. Rurik held back just a bit, giving himself escape room if he needed it, but came along with the others.

Outside, the farm's lights danced across the trailer end of the semi, highlighting the name "Fascistan Meat Packing." It was actually the name of a large, slave-worked slaughterhouse and packing plant that did business across the nation - and which was known for always needing more slaves. At this point, it was impossible to tell if this was a legit Underground Railroad pickup, or a real slave purchase! Still, with plenty of nervousness, Rurik and the others got into the back.

~~~~~~~~~

After a long, long ride through seemingly endless farm fields, visible only through the small slats in the livestock-carrier trailer they were in, the slaves saw the lights of a big city. Then, the truck went from big city thoroughfares out to small inner-city roads before arriving at a large airport. At this point, the runaways were all offloaded, and herded straight to a large, grimy, non-sapient cargo ship marked "Jonas Interstellar Transport." Any who paused to look around were, to their surprise, given a true lash with a large horsewhip. The act was impeccable, leaving even the escapees still wondering if they'd been hoodwinked.

Inside, they saw that the cockpit area was separated by a thick steel grating - this ship was obviously set up for the routine transport of slaves who were still fresh enough to bother to attempt violence. The pilot, a very mean-looking guy, watched the new stock intently through a rearview mirror set up just for that. As soon as the door closed, he pushed on the throttle lever, and the ship began to move. He said nothing, and acted as though no one on board was worthy of being talked to. In reality, this was because he was afraid of government bugs, but he couldn't communicate that, just in case one of the group was stupid enough to blurt out some comment and give everything away.

In silence, they traveled through space - and since they didn't have as good of FTL as the Decepticons, it took 3 days to reach their destination. In the meantime, they found basic food, water, and toilet buckets along the back wall. There was nothing to sleep on except the hard metal floor, but eventually, exhaustion made sleep possible anyway. Oxygen was barely adequate, and they had to make due with this energy-sapping state while the pilot breathed from a mask that gave him his full proper amount.

Eventually, they arrived on an unknown world, during the middle of the night, and the pilot opened the cargo doors. Then, he said the only words on the entire trip: A barked, "Get out," in the Fascistan language. Everyone staggered out the doors, by now glad to leave the ship, its thin air, and its hard floor.

To their surprise, the pilot shut the doors and took off as soon as the last one was out, leaving them standing on the tarmac of a nearly-empty space port on a very foreign plant. No one else was around.

Finally, a human pointed as he saw someone coming towards them in an airport vehicle from a very long distance. After a few minutes, the small cart-like truck arrived, and a smiling man said in broken Fascistan, "Sorry for the weird arrival, but we cannot say anything while a Fascistan is here. All of the talk around their ships is listened to. We can't exactly announce that you are free while they're here. But, you are! Oh, and the pilot was in on it all along. As soon as our planet hits the routing roster at that company, they know what they're bringing and why. But their government can't prove anything."

Cheers went up, leaving poor Rurik, who couldn't understand a thing, quite baffled. The man realized he didn't speak the same language, and in even-more-broken English, said to him, "You free now. Now you come to Customs to stay here. Or buy ticket away, there." He pointed at the nearly-empty, but still lit, main spaceport ticket-buying building. It was huge, and would clearly be very busy come daytime.

Rurik clutched his money sack, remembering Megatron's instruction to use the money to go somewhere else right away. "Choose a suitable place to go," the instructions had said. But where? He would have to think about it...

~~~~~~~~

Carjack Agriculture
Milling Facility

After stealthily looking around, this slave, Tariq, saw that the finished flour was being stacked onto massive, Decepticon-scale pallets near a giant loading door. Next to another loading door, huge canisters of bulk white flour were waiting for delivery to some other place. These barrels had "CARJACK BIO-FOODS - A TASTE OF THE OLD WORLDS" written on them in huge type, but it was in Binary, so Tariq couldn't read them.

Suddenly, the delicious smell of fresh cocoa filled the air. Tariq looked around, and to his surprise, saw that another machine was turning massive quantities of cocoa beans into unsweetened baker's cocoa. The output was going into giant brown containers marked HERSHEY'S BAKING COCOA in English. Another, smaller, machine was milling shiny, perfect cocoa beans into a much finer consistency, and this output went into bags marked "Godiva-Grade" and which even had that company's logo, unlicensed of course. Both of the actual companies were long gone, but Carjack knew the products by these names, so that's how they were labeled just the same. Once these batches were processed, the ground cocoa would be taken back to Carjack Agriculture's main property, where Carjack would turn it into things worth eating, and then eat a whole lot of the product before sending the rest to Cybertron.

For a long time, Tariq had no real opportunity for escape. However, a huge cargo-bot finally arrived, and when that happened, one of the giant shipping doors was opened. It would take quite a while to fill the cargo-bot with the bags of flour, and during that time, the open door would stay that way...

~~~~~~~~~~~

Outlands

Boars were tough animals, and this one was no exception. It shook its head and forced itself back up onto its hooves, aimed squarely at the scorpion-person who had skewered him, and attempted to charge again. However, this attempt was far less sure, and he staggered as if drunk. Despite this, he managed to get almost back to combat range before he finally keeled over - and, even once down, was not quite dead. The hungry alien would either have to wait longer, or sting him again to speed up the termination.

What the scorpion-person didn't know was that eating undercooked, wild swine on Earth was very dangerous due to the threat of catching parasites. While domesticated hogs had been cleared of this problem several years prior to the Invasion, wild populations were never treated. Now, millions of Trichinella spiralis, the cause of trichinosis, awaited ingestion by a new host. Whether they would find a scorpion-person's body to be a suitable habitat remained to be seen...

[Vallermoore]

Outlands

The scorpion-person, who want by the name of Farooq, steped aside and carefully administered another sting, waited a while, then used his pincers like large knives to cut the now dead boar up and fed on the pork with glee until he was nice and full. On his own planet, his kind could and sometimes did eat raw meat without any harm, as their bodies were used to it. As he was to find out within hours, he was very much not on his own planet. He had just imported millions of Trichinella spiralis. Whilst his white blood cells were effective at their job, he was still violently sick out of both ends and was lucky to find grasses to wipe himself with. Feeling greatly drained but still able to know in which direction to go, he started looking for a stream of a river, badly needing a drink, and hoping very much that he would not come under attack again before he had time to heal. He held his tail in a battle ready position. Soon he found a stream and drank from it, and some trees to hide from passing Decepticons. Without either guns or magic, he would be helpless in a fight with a full size Decepticon, and decide to just hide if one came and if seen, pretend to be a non-sapient animal and hope the Decepticon didn't hate non-sapient animals.

Carjack Agriculture
Milling Facility

Tariq knew that Decepticons felt things so if he just scuttled in, at best he would get slung out again and he might very well get blasted. Whilst the cargo-bot might be enslaved it might equally well be free. He would need to hide in a flour bag, if that was possible, get carried on board and escape detection by the internal cameras on their long arms. He knew enough about Decepticons that they hated giving rides, even more so to biologicals.

Domina Fascista

Rurik kept his true Megatronist leanings very secret, which was perfectly ok if done to escape danger. His tail did start rising when he thought he was in a trap and would be enslaved for real, but the others calmed him down. He lowered it and thought how lucky he was to escape from that mine and keep his tail attached to his body. When after a long jouney they reached their destination Rurik decided there were two places he wanted to go-but he could not go to one because of the lack of air. Cybertron would choke him before he ever reached the Immigration Ministry. Instead he chose Vallermoore-a place with growing Decepticon influence, but that still had some laws and the like, so it wasn't massively dangerous. Perhaps there were people there that could find a use for him and his deadly tail. At the least, he woulden't be hated on sight. He got rid of his brand once it was no longer needed, thanked the one who freed him in his own tounge and was soon on an FTL ship to Vallermoore that was nicer then the other one and only took six hours to get there. He looked in the pouch once more to see if anything else was in it.

[Victorious Decepticons]

Carjack Agriculture
Milling Facility

"Hey, keep that thing out of the flour!" Someone shouted in Binary from across the room. To Tariq's horror, the one yelling was pointing directly at him. Before he could consider it more, he saw the foot-tread of a Decepticon coming down straight at him. He jumped out of the way, just missing death by an inch or so, and ran outside. Tariq didn't know it, but he had just been saved from making a very bad mistake. This cargo-bot would be going to a large iron mine, worked by 10,000 human slaves, and its overseers would certainly capture and attempt to train any other kind biological that looked like it could do some work.

Now outdoors, he frantically looked for a better place to hide. The massive cargo-bot was right in front of him, but to his left, there was a big electrical box. He jumped underneath the box, and to his relief, nobody bothered to chase him. They just didn't want the flour "contaminated" with some living creature, lest the customer complain and try to get a discount.

From his new location, Tariq saw several pallets of burlap-bagged flour get loaded onto the cargo-bot, which seemed to talk amiably with the other workers as they went about the task. This chit-chat slowed down the work a bit, but nobody seemed worried about it. Eventually, the loading was done, and the cargo-bot took off into the sky before lazily banking to adjust his flight path towards his destination. Now, Tariq saw that this bot bore no company markings, yet had a perfect paint job and showroom shine. It was definitely a free being, and thanks to Carjack's own opinion of company uniforms, was not forced to have the painted equivalent.

Before Tariq could leave his position, another cargo-bot arrived. This one did have CARJACK BIO-COMPATIBLE FOODS plastered in Binary along his length and even on his rear loading door. He wasn't taking any chances - one of his stops was on Cybertron itself, and he did his best to deter the interest of raiders. His idea was that perhaps if they saw that he only had food on board, they wouldn't bother to attack. He got filled with the cocoa and several large barrels of processed flour before taking off again, and for now, it seemed that his destination was also on Earth.

Finally, Tariq looked around, and started thinking that hitching a ride on one of these bots could be a bad idea. What if they were going to some mine, or some other slave-labor operation? Such a place would be the most likely to want to buy a lot of flour, after all. He decided that instead, he should try to make it to the overgrown, derelict structures that he saw a few hundred yards away...

~~~~~~~~~~~

Outlands

As this scorpion-person drank from the river, he didn't notice the well-camouflaged snout and set of eyes looking at him from a distance down the opposite bank. The gator stealthily slithered into the water, but by the time he had swam across, the prey had already left the edge. Gators were quite capable of land travel, but this one decided to wait in case the prey stuck its head into the water again. It was always easier to catch an animal as it was drinking, because such an animal would have its most important, vulnerable part right within range. Then it'd just be a matter of grabbing on and hauling the prey item underwater until it drowned.

For now, Farooq was no longer thirsty, so he didn't go right back to the water. Instead, he began to set up camp near some trees. Mosquitoes swarmed him, but they were thwarted by his hard exoskeleton.

~~~~~~~~~~

Suddenly, just after dawn, Farooq was zapped awake by a strange-sounding, loud, birdcall. He opened his eyes to see a sandhill crane standing about a meter away from the bed of grass he'd made, yelling away as if sheer volume would attract a mate. Farooq was about to throw some rocks at it to make it go away, when he heard the roar of Decepticon jets coming on his position as if on a mission. In an instant, his view was obscured by bright flashing, and his ears boomed with the sounds of full-powered blaster fire.

Once his vision cleared, General Carjack had already turned around and was on his way back home. The General saw him, tipped a wing a little, and kept going. He actually yelled a comment down, but it was drowned out by the sound of his own jets. Farooq only picked up something about "... wakin' me ..." before Carjack was gone once again, leaving the forested area in total silence behind him. Apparently, the bird had stopped near Carjack's manor before coming here, attracting his ire, and then flown away to what it had thought would be safety. It had obviously been a very wrong thought on the bird's part.

As the smaller birds tentatively began to dare to chirp again, Farooq looked at the ground where the noisy avian had been. He was quite discomfited to find that the small area where it had stood was now outright glassed. There was nothing visible left of the bird.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Spacecraft to Vallermoore

Rurik reached into the bag, but at first, he felt nothing else at all. Later, though, he got the urge to check again, and to his surprise, there was a little pamphlet.

"Living and Doing Business in Vallermoore."

According to the name at the bottom, this was put out by the Interplanetary Commerce Commission. However, there was no information about this mysterious Commission. Rurik couldn't help but notice the shysty-looking Decepticon's face on the cover. This bot was clearly up to no good!

Inside, it had only a few bullet points of information.
- The national religion is Megatronism
- Tourists should be sure to see its First Temple
- Laws were being relaxed by the day, but it's good to be sure of which ones are still in effect before doing any type of Fine Business activity
- Vallermoorian space travel is relatively rudimentary, but those with the funds 'or other means' can get a private spacecraft for travel to Cybertron
- Several Cybertronian Fine Businessmen are in operation, and it is very bad form to out them
- Vallermoore's friendliness to obvious, non-Cybertronian aliens is unknown

Just as he finished reading it, the spacecraft landed, and Rurik was on the ground of the fifth planet of his exciting journey.

[Vallermoore]

Outlands

Farooq was lucky that he left the water when he did, as a large alligator discovered him and swam across, then decided to wait for a couple of hours to see if he came back and into jaw range. It knew better then to leave the water and go after him as it was quite slow on land. As it grew dark large numbers of mosquitos swarmed around him, but instead of finding soft skin, they found hard armour that they couldn't even scratch. They might as well have tried to attack a Decepticon. Even the joints were fluted, and there were no wounds for them to attack. They ended up flying away looking for prey that they could bite. He got some sleep and partly restored his strength but was woken by a noisy bird. He was reaching for a stone small enough to pick up with his pincers when loud Decepticon jets were heard and the bird-but not him-was blasted. Looking up, wondering if he were to be blasted from the air or have the bot transform and grab at him, the bot was flying the seals of the Genocide Battalion and turned out to be High General Carjack himself. The General tipped a wing slightly, the equivalent in this case of a friendly wave. Decepticons had a body language that they could use in plane mode. He caught a couple of words above the noise ... wakin' me ..." before the General flew out of sight. Obviously, this bird at some time had woken the High General and got away with it-until now. The vengeful General had personally tracked the bird down, flying far from his home to do so just to blast it.

He headed on in the opposite direction to the one the General had flown in, looking for copses of trees where possible, watching out for Decepticons on foot so he could hide from them. So far, he didn't see any of them much to his relief, and it would be another day before he'd need to hunt again. He held his tail in battle position, happy that there were no mosquitos from his own planet who had evolved to have fearsome armour-piercing mouthparts.

Spacecraft to Vallermoore

Rurik found nothing but later had an urge to check the bag again and there was a small pamphlet with a clearly up to no good Decepticon on it.

"Living and Doing Business in Vallermoore."
- The national religion is Megatronism
- Tourists should be sure to see its First Temple
- Laws were being relaxed by the day, but it's good to be sure of which ones are still in effect before doing any type of Fine Business activity
- Vallermoorian space travel is relatively rudimentary, but those with the funds 'or other means' can get a private spacecraft for travel to Cybertron
- Several Cybertronian Fine Businessmen are in operation, and it is very bad form to out them
- Vallermoore's friendliness to obvious, non-Cybertronian aliens is unknown

He decided he would visit the First Temple, and politely ask the Priest who would be there for advice. Doing the normal thing-trying to get a job-would be a negative from a Megatronist point of view as well as being hard to get, but he didn't totally rule it out. He wanted to ask if it would be better to take his chances as a domestic raider. If that was just too dangerous, he might well get some kind of job, rest for a short time, increase his strength-and then find a way to get to the Cybertronian Immigration Ministry for an attempt to become the best form of life in the universe or die trying. He was confident that if that latter happened, the Realm of Punishment would not be his lot. He was no nark or traitor and was no heretic either.

When he got there, he got various looks from the humans and ponies there, but most of them were not hostile, and those who were took one look at his tail and left. It helped that this was a spaceport and as such was one of the few areas of Vallermoore that still banned weapons, to avoid hijackings or worse. After getting through, he went into the streets of Grand City, that were filled with humans and sapient ponies with various cutie marks. Some of the pony marks were Decepticon symbols, but they were still in the minority. Out here, guns could not normally be carried in the streets-although on one's own property it was fine-but knives, swords and other such things could, a compromise between the desire to avoid shootouts in the city, and the desire for citizens to be able to protect themselves from most foes by themselves. There were still open police, and there were more laws then on Cybertron, but less then in most countries. Politically, it was halfway in between a democracy and a dictatorship at the moment. An open changeling flew down to Rurik, thinking he was a changeling too. "Hey, if you want to go undercover, you'd be better off taking human or pony shape. You're not going to be able to attract any love in that shape. Where would you like to go? If you're lost, I'll point you to where you want to go." Changelings here could fly or walk openly if they wanted, and many did to avoid burning love fuel. It was pretty much an open secret that of all the biological beings, they were the most Decepticon like. This one had green chitin and green dragonfly wings, and soft glowing green eyes. If this one found he was not a changeling, he or she might be more tricky and less friendly, but they (mostly) avoided targeting their own kind and respected each other.

Carjack Agriculture
Milling Facility


"Hey, keep that thing out of the flour!" It was his quick wits and his Megatronist Blessing that let him avoid being crushed to death and he decided to scuttle to overgrown, derelict structures. He made it there and waited for a chance to get out of this area safely.

[Victorious Decepticons]

Outlands

Farooq assumed that the bird had woken Carjack up a fairly long time ago, but in reality, it had only been about 1/2-hour prior. Carjack had come out of his mansion with his blaster ready, but the bird had taken off and hidden in some trees before he could be properly targeted. Carjack then called in a favor from a nearby DomIntel agent to keep tabs on the aggravating thing, and when it landed, a quick radio call from a not-so-biological "bird" nearby sealed the crane's fate. To Carjack, it was well worth the tiny amount of Supreme that a "planetary monitoring" agent's body could hold.

In the distance, Farooq heard the massive washing sound of ocean waves. After another day of hiking, he found himself on the shore of the Atlantic Ocean, staring out across about 10 miles of water at a huge array of giant oil platforms and an even bigger platform that was set up for aircraft-mode landings. These, however, were devoid of Decepticons - all of the oil had been taken from this area long ago. When Farooq looked closer, he realized that now, each platform was topped with several windmills, which were hard to see due to the bright sunlight reflecting off of the water.

Much closer, there was a big, Decepticon-scale platform that appeared to be set up like a swimming raft. It was made with a vinyl-coated metal grating, and had a set of stairs going down the side and into the water. Off of another side, a reinforced, large - Decepticon-sized - slide aimed at the water appeared to have gotten plenty of use. A sign warned in Binary: "Carjack's Swimming Platform - KEEP OFF!" About 250 seagulls were ignoring the posting, blissfully oblivious to its message. Their waste dropped through the grate, and any that stayed behind was easily washed away whenever a larger wave came and splashed over the top.

"Carjack's probably the only one of them things that likes to swim," A voice drawled. Farooq spun around, tail ready, and saw a wild-eyed, wild-haired human sauntering up. He had no shirt, but the remains of an ancient pair of jean-like pants hung awkwardly across thin hips.

He was clearly on meth, or some primitive direct equivalent thereof, and it looked like he'd recently had plenty of it. This was a "Florida Cracker," or at least that's what he would have been called by outsiders in pre-Invasion times - someone whose family had come to Florida on the first boats from England, and whose ancestors had remained here all of this time. They were a strange (and some would say inbred) breed of humans, mostly dumb as posts and prone to glitches both physical and mental, but they seemed to manage to survive all sorts of bull that would send a regular person to a hospital at least. Living out in the jungle/woods/swamp was no problem for them after the Invasion, because they often already had done it without any electricity, running water, or anything else that required actual money anyway. Except for the noise of the jets, and the welcome lack of police, social services, zoning officers, game officers, and other such unwanteds, not much had changed for the true Floridans. Notably, they were very proud of their heritage and considered everyone else to be tourists or interlopers.

"So, you understand me, or are ya better off on my gri-ill?" The human eyed the alien appraisingly and a bit hungrily, with wild, buggish meth-filled eyes, wondering whether to keep talking to it or have a big fry-up. Either one would be fine with him. The meth's effect made it so that he could try the latter at any moment, so Farooq would have to be careful not to set the guy off.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Milling Facility

Tariq soon realized that these "structures" weren't old Carjack buildings, but instead, the remains of a town that had once been here. Despite all of the Spanish moss all over everything, the structures were clearly made of cement blocks. Faux stucco laid in piles around some of them, obviously having fallen off through the years. No one had bothered to follow him, so he was able to walk right down what was left of the streets, which were now completely covered over in Bermuda grass, which had, as is normal, sent runners far from the original position of the plants. During the winter, these would go dormant and be replaced by awful stinging nettle plants, which awakened when the weather attempted to get cooler.

After reaching an area where the road got wider and it seemed to have been a commercial location, he decided to choose a general direction to travel in...

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Vallermoore

"I'm just looking for the First Temple of Megatron," Rurik said politely, having no idea what sort of creature he was looking at. He had never seen one of these in its true form, and had only heard of them from a few ponies that had worked with him back on his home planet. In fact, it would take him a few moments to even realize that this being wasn't talking about finding a mate when it mentioned "attracting love."

[Vallermoore]

Vallermoore

"The First Temple, you say? It's a couple of miles to the south down that street." The changeling was in fact telling the truth. He had been considering the benefits of trying to steal love, against the very negative points of a public setting, plus that tail and it's deadly looking sting that could clearly punch through chitin, and decided it was not worth the trouble in this case. Rurik found the Temple that was in between services and had two acolytes within-and a Full Priest-a Decepticon in an open body but one small enough to fit into the Temple, with softly glowing, shimmering paint, and, like all open Decepticons, a couple of blasters. It happened to be Fire Eater, the close friend of Loyal Star, although Rurik had no idea of any of this. "Greetings and welcome to the Temple. I assume you are looking for advice? Perhaps you want to stay in Vallermoore a few days before taking the Cybertronian Immigration Test and want advice? I am Full Priest Fire Eater, and Decepticons-In-Spirit exist in what from our point of view are strange bodies. That sting of yours is an impressive weapon against biological foes."

Milling Facility

Tariq decided to head in the direction of the setting sun, looking for a fresh water source, keeping a wary eye out for danger be it Decepticon or otherwise.

Outlands

Farooq walked to the Atlantic Ocean and saw several giant oil platforms-now deserted-and a Decepticon swimming platform and a Decepticon-sized slide and stairs. A sign in Binary warned, just in case any other Decepticons wanted to use it "Carjack's Swimming Platform - KEEP OFF!" It was ignored by the local seagulls.

"Carjack's probably the only one of them things that likes to swim," said a voice, much to Farooq's surprise. Not all the humans of Florida had been successfully enslaved when Earth was taken over. This one had clearly been taking meth. "So, you understand me, or are ya better off on my gri-ill?"

"I'm Farooq." He lowered his tail but inwardly readied it for a swing if he had to. This human most likely had a concealed pistol, or if not that, a machete or some such weapon. He would need to be careful or he could soon end up in a fight to the death, and the human might well have friends or family members nearby.

[Victorious Decepticons]

Outlands

The human was surprised when it spoke, and then looked a bit disappointed. He had started seriously thinking of a giant barbecue, but apparently this really wasn't a giant crawdad after all.

"Oh, you have a name. And can talk. That's too ba...um, well, what the heck are you? I suppose them machines invaded y'all and you managed to get away. My great-great-great grandpappy, he didn't even like seein' humans in other colors. An' he wouldn't have liked yer name. He'd have said you were a terrorist just from that. And yer a freakin' alien on top of it. But no matter. We-all are a bit more relaxed, now, as long as ya ern't made 'a metal. Ya ern't made of metal, are you!? And ya ern't workin' for them, are you?!?" He leaned forward, peering with his buggy eyes. His neck sinews were visible now, too, as was typical for someone under the influence of Florida's favorite stimulant. His hand reached down slightly to his right pocket, as if he thought whatever weapon he had in there might actually be able to do something against a Decepticon agent. In reality, of course, he had nothing that could harm a real agent.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Milling Facility Area

As Tariq would have it, he chose the one direction of no particular interest: West. At one point, this area had been littered with tiny towns, which were separated by miles of cow pastures and citrus groves in between. Now, there were just ruins where the towns were, though a few of the orange trees remained. The trees, alas, were all very overgrown and barely productive thanks to the centuries of neglect. In most places, nature had replaced them with live oaks long ago. The oaks were huge by now, and they could easily withstand the extremes of Florida's weather, including hurricanes and dry seasons.

In some of the seemingly-derelict, overgrown old towns, there were actually a few humans roving around. Most of these were wild bands, whose "humanity" was most notable in their general body shape and their ways of setting up family units. However, there were a few of some better stock dotted around, who retained enough sense and ingenuity to actually keep a few of the old infrastructure systems, such as wells and septics, running. Usually one or two people, direct descendants of a survivalist ancestor, were in charge of these groups. Despite their presence, though, it was unlikely that Tariq would find many - if any - of them. They were all extremely cautious about being seen by anyone they didn't know, lest it be a DomIntel agent or a slaver.

In a few areas, if Tariq walked far enough, he would find stretches of pine trees. These had been planted as parts of reclamation projects after phosphorus mining. No homes seemed to have ever been in these places, though in reality, that land was once ringed by cheap mobile homes and shacks. Eventually, if he walked for about 75-100 miles, he would come to the Gulf of Mexico, and be able to see one of the Decepticons' biggest windmill farms, which was there specifically to capture energy from the Gulf's many tropical storms and hurricanes. These purpose-built windmills could handle winds of up to 200 MPH, so no Earthian storm would overwhelm them. The powering-up of electrically-chargeable Energon took place in a connected facility far below the sea's surface, where it couldn't be blown away.

~~~~~~~~

For now, Tariq was surprised to see the town he was in come to a quick end. He soon found himself in a field, but instead of being relaxing plains grass, it was full of stinging nettles, thistles, and thorns. Scrub oaks grew thickly, and their 1-2 inch trunks were just big enough to make travel a pain. When he looked down, he saw that his legs were already covered in some kinds of insects, though thanks to his exoskeleton, these ticks and chiggers - which humans found quite infernal indeed - couldn't do anything to him. Still, it was obvious that they were all ravenous as they crawled all over his legs looking for the slightest soft spot.

At this point, from Tariq's vantage point, it seemed as though there had been no civilization at all except for the one town he had just left. Still, he continued doggedly on for hours, hoping to find something like a stream. Alas, all he found were marshes (complete with gators), more nasty plants of various types, and similar inhospitable terrain. Finally, though, he noticed that for a long time, he had been able to walk along a stretch where the trees didn't grow as thickly. In fact, they seemed to stop close to, though not right at, the edges of this wide area, which was mostly straight but occasionally made wide curves. Could it be that he was actually walking on the buried, grown-over remains of a two-lane highway?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Vallermoore

Rurik gave a bow, thankful that this priest didn't look like he wanted to deactivate him on sight or throw him back into irons. He was wowed by the paint of a real Decepticon Full Priest, which swirled seemingly by magic.

"I am looking for advice," Rurik said. "The idea of taking the Immigration Test is very interesting. Could you tell me about it? Also, I'd like to rest for a while, and perhaps stay in Vallermoore for a few months to prepare myself. What's the best way to score some Cubes here? The best way for a Megatronist, I mean." Rurik wasn't interested in any regular jobs. He was a Decepticon-in-Spirit - which is why he'd been in the mines on his own planet to begin with - and he wasn't going to chicken out of the criminal lifestyle now. He hoped that this Fire Eater would have some good connects to help him set up a heist, or perhaps, a front operation for some similarly-minded group.

[Vallermoore]

Outlands

"My exoskeleton may look like metal, but it's chitin, the same stuff that your nails are made of, but thicker and stronger. And I don't work for the Decepticons, although I used to be one of their slaves and had no choice but to crack black walnuts for them until I escaped." Now was not the time to say either that he brought himself out or was trying to become a Decepticon unless he wanted a fight to the death. The human might have a gun or at least something like a bowie knife, and whilst Farooq was ready to fight and kill, he would rather talk his way out or even make a possible friend. Also killing the human might bring other humans down on him with lynching on their mind. He kept his tail at the non-ready position, but was ready to use it if need be. He wondered if the human had a family somewhere.

Milling Facility Area

Tariq walked on as the sun set and the insects swarmed out, only to waste their time against his armoured exoskeleton. He looked for somewhere to sleep whilst he could still see clearly, not wanting to bed down in an anthill or somewhere just as unpleasant. Finally he settled down in some grasses after prodding them first, at least a mile from any swamps where gators might attack. He was very happy at this moment to have an exoskeleton. Nettles, ticks, mosquitos and poison ivy had so far done no damage to it.

Vallermoore

The priest grinned and his eyes brightened. "Whilst I don't directly engage in criminal history here-it makes good sense not to needlessly bring heat on the Temple-many Decepticons in Spirit often meet here after the services, and I'm happy to help you out. A human gang that likes breaking into banks by night-bank raids at least for now are still very much illegal here-lost one of it's men to the Law, and whilst he didn't turn informer, they still need a new member to break the locks open and cut a few wires. By swearing in front of them that you are legit and not a police agent or informer in front of a Face of Megatron, they will know you can be trusted. Whilst you'll be a junior member of the gang your haul will still be enough to live well for a while, without needing either benefits or a job, and without the complexity and risk of failure of setting up your own business."

"To pass the Immigration Test-that is one thing we are open about and don't lie about, despite our many secrets. First, bulk yourself up here, then when you are ready, by fair means or foul get a spaceship and fly to Cybertron. Clear yourself with Customs-despite having no police, we do have customs men to keep things like badly secured water out. We don't like rust on the Metal Planet as it's a PITA to clean up. Escape any raiders that will come after you-and they almost certainly will-get to the Immigration Ministry safely and you can take your helmet off-you'll need a spacesuit- and breath as the air there is breathable. Scope and Gatekeeper are the two bots there who you will talk to and if you pass their questionnaire, a marked-marked so he doesn't get shot at by random raiders-Domintel agent will fly you to a location of Earth of your own choice. If you are very rich, you can pay High General Carjack for safe accommodation-if not, choose a desert region near a river, your body will hep you most there. Survive without dying or being captured for three months and you'll be picked up and flown back to Cybertron for one-off mind reading and mind transference-which hurts a lot when it is being done. You get a free body and a single Cube of Energon so you don't at once starve to death and after serving your first stint in the Military, you are free to do what you want except treason. If you don't know if something is treason or not, don't worry, you have a Treason File that you can look at so you don't accidently commit treason. Treason gets you executed and sent to the Realm of Punishment so don't do that."

[Victorious Decepticons]

Outlands

The human didn't admit to not knowing a black walnut from a common acorn, but he looked momentarily baffled at the name. Then he said, "I can see you ain't made 'o metal! But if you were, I'd have to do something." This was clearly a thinly-veiled code for extreme violence. "So you managed to get out of somewhere. That's good and bad. It's good for you, but it means they'll probably come lookin' fer ya. So you'd better stay away from our camp!"

He got out a hand-rolled cigarette and crouched down almost to the ground. With a well-practiced technique, he grabbed a couple of random sticks and started rubbing one into the other. In just a moment, one of them became hot enough to glow. He used this to light his cigarette and then threw the stick into the ocean, where it extinguished with a quick hiss. It was obvious that he did this all the time.

"Ya got anything ta trade? Or are ya gonna be on yer way." This human wasn't about to bring what he thought would be heat to his location. An escaped slave usually had a slaver coming after it, and if a slaver found the camp, he'd try to catch everyone he could. It just made sense to keep this outsider outside unless there was some very compelling reason to let him come closer to the human's secret location.

~~~~~~~~~~~

A Few Miles from the Milling Facility

Tariq planned on sleeping, but thanks to spending so much time working on Carjack's farm, he was wide awake at night. He stared up at the stars, which were very alien to his eyes. He couldn't recognize any of the constellations, and the big whitish moon was much different from the blue one that orbited over his home world. Now, he could really take all of this in, his mind not occupied with the task of cracking nuts or looking for ways out.

Eventually, just before dawn, he dozed off and then fell completely asleep. His slumber was uninterrupted, mainly due to his impenetrability to mosquitoes, which did constantly try to get a bite from him. When he woke up, he realized that it was already afternoon. Apparently, there was nothing and nobody around here to bother him. It seemed as though he was the only sapient creature on Earth, though of course, the reality was that there were just none in the immediate area.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Vallermoore

Rurik was ecstatic to not only get an outright warm reception, but to get so much information as well. For now, the main thing he still needed to know was how to get in contact with this gang, which sounded like the perfect opportunity for him. He also asked about basics like where he could stay and where to get food.

[Vallermoore]

Outlands

"Well, if you have a human foe you want permanently taken care of, I could try and eliminate him for you if it's not ridiculously dangerous in return for either trade goods or being able to hang out in your territory for a bit." Farooq flicked his tail. "A body strike with this, and your foe is dead. But if not, I guess I'll be on my way down the coast and out of your area." He didn't want to fight this human if it could be avoided-not only might the human have a gun in working order, but killing him would bring down the wrath of any family and tribe this human had, but he would fight and kill if he really had to. If he kept moving most of the time except for hunting, eating or sleeping, he should be able to avoid trouble with the other humans along the coast.

A Few Miles from the Milling Facility

The constellations seemed so strange. Gone were the Sack and the Hammer, the Trident and the Eastern Star, and the large Blue Moon twice the size of this smaller white one. He named one of the new constellations the Saucepan as it seemed so much like a huge saucepan with a handle. He would need to keep moving, and avoid trouble, Decepticons, and any wounds that could let the insects and nasty plants attack his soft flesh. As it was, insects were waiting their time on his armoured exoskeleton. The mosquitos of his own world had evolved armour-piercing mouthparts, but thankfully, there were none around here. The next morning he kept moving, looking for the sea.

Vallermoore

"Well, in an hour or so is the next service and you can stay here until then as you are a Decepticon in Spirit and as such I want to help you out . After the service you'll get to make your pitch to the gang with a missing member, and see if you can join them. If so, they'll let you stay at one of their houses and in a day or two they'll do their next raid. Assuming it works, there are a number of mid-range hotel places, neither top of the range nor rubbish and full of cockroaches, where you could hang out pretty well. If you're thinking of just domestic raiding by yourself, first at the moment it's still one of the things that is illegal, and in that body you can't disguise yourself well, and second most adult Vallermoorians at least here are armed, most of them with guns that can certainly pierce that chitin of yours. Even before they became Megatronist, they had strong gun rights for most non-felons. And the one's that are not, like many of the unicorns, have some pretty fearsome magic and telekinesis and are more dangerous then they look. And whilst you probably could get a job at a shop, that wouldn't be very Megatronist of you and could affect your immigration chances negatively. You have a good body, for a biological. It even has a sort of very short range blaster on it. If you get in and become one of us, it'll be great being a bot and as long as you have a spare body and jamming isn't running you can mind transfer if you lose a body to a raid or battle gone wrong or a Decepticon foe. One thing you'll most likely need custom made before you go to Cybertron is some kind of helmet and air tank. The rest of your body will be ok, Cybertron is not a vacuum like outer space."

[Victorious Decepticons]

Outlands

The human reared back, almost as if stretching, upon hearing about what the tail did. "Oh, really? Now that there's a great thing! It'll make it easy for ya ta hunt, as long as yer quiet enough ta sneak up on sump'n. But we don' need any help killin' our enemies. Unlike most of the idiots around us, WE got THESE!" He said with obvious pride, finally drawing a vintage gun from his pocket. "Most them people, they can't use these 'cuz they never learned how ta make 'em. Their ancestors, they thought ours were nuts for learnin' how ta make guns 'n bullets ourselves because ours figured the government was fixin' ta try ta ban 'em. The ban never came, but them metal things did. Now we're the only group for miles 'n miles that can make firearms. Even the ones who kept their old ones are outta luck, 'cuz they always went to The Store for bullets. No store, they might as well be carryin' sticks." He laughed smugly as he slowly turned his weapon in the sunlight, showing it off.

Farooq quickly realized that this meant that the tribe had metalworking skills good enough to fashion bullet casings, though judging by the apparent age of the gun itself, they weren't able to match a factory-produced weapon. In fact, the bullets were probably substandard too, at least compared to what a company would produce. However, he certainly didn't want to find out whether they'd jam or not by having the guy try to shoot him.

"Tell ya what," the redneck said, "what would you want to go and get us a boar hog? We can hunt just fine, of course, but it's always nicer when someone else does the work! Just one thing - you can't be comin' to our camp. We keep its location secret so we don't get any of them danged RO-bots tryin' ta grab us!"

~~~~~~~~~~~

Nothing interrupted Tariq as he kept walking, and he would walk for many days before finally coming upon what appeared to be a derelict town with buildings now almost entirely covered in Spanish moss and vines. He soon came to the center of the tiny burg, where he saw one small building that was made of brick instead of the usual cement blocks. At the top, through a gap in the vines apparently made by some storm, he could see the word "Clewiston" etched into a cement fascia. Carefully, he approached, and could see a commercial-looking counter that was now well-rotted. Broken cash registers were on the floor, but by now, they were coated in both dust and rust. In the back, some faded Priority Mail envelopes were still visible.

Nobody seemed to be around at all, but Tariq could feel an eerie sense of unwelcomeness, as though someone or something was watching with hostility. His tail came up a bit due to the feeling that he might have to use it at any moment.

After leaving the Post Office building, he found one cross-street and then another. Then, to his surprise, he came upon a giant warehouse-looking building sitting back behind what seemed to be a huge empty plain. Its doors had long been crashed down by looters, and foreboding darkness loomed from inside like a horror movie. It was obvious that nobody had maintained it in over 100 years, and it was very likely that its roof had fallen in, leaving only the odd faux-brick cementine material its outer walls were made of.

There had been a big retail sign out front - however, it was not only devoid of its glass marquee, but its pole was bent into a gnarled shape - a victim, by now, of several hurricanes. At its base, a single piece of broken glass with a strange sun-like symbol remained visible, sticking up edgewise from where it had plunged to the ground.

There appeared to be no rivers in this town, or anything else of note besides its ruined structures. Yet, Tariq couldn't get over the feeling of being watched, and that he'd better really watch his surroundings and himself if he wanted to get out of that area intact.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Vallermoore

Rurik was very glad for all of the help, and took a seat for the service so he could meet these robbers afterward. He figured that he'd be a shoo-in since he'd be getting introduced by this fancy-looking Full Priest!

Since there was some time before the service started, he thought about how amazing this new planet seemed. Creatures with powerful magic apparently not only existed here, but were regular citizens! Not only that, Megatronism was both openly practiced and had this huge and impressive Temple to mark its presence!! And did the priest really say the entire country had become Megatronist? A "wow" escaped his mouth before he even realized he was saying it.

[Vallermoore]

Outlands

"How about this? I go out hunting for you, track down a nice tasty boar, sting it and bring it back here for you to get, spend the night here, then move on down the coast along the beach and keep moving so I don't annoy all the other people around me by staying in the same place too long? You get some meat out of the deal, and I don't get shot at. Where are the boar hogs most likely to be found? I don't want to accidently invade your camp." At least the human wasn't shooting on sight. Chitin was strong, but not bullet proof, and even a flesh wound that did nothing worse then ripping a piece of chitin could let the bug bites in later. Farooq really, really didn't need a whole gun armed tribe coming after him.

*****
Tariq raised his tail up above his head in readiness. "I'm moving on looking for food," he said loudly to the unseen watcher or watchers who were glowering at him from where they were hiding. Perhaps they might leave him be, but he was more then ready to use that tail with deadly intent if he had to.

Vallermoore

Rurik grinned. Soon enough plenty of humans, sapient ponies and even undisguised changelings walked in, those with wings landing at the entrance, not wishing to show disrespect to the Temple or to Fire Eater. Not all of the ponies had Decepticon cutie marks, but the young ones who had earned their marks a short time ago often had gleaming metallic Decepticon Seals. The older ones had a variety of marks-hammers and other tools, musical notes, and other such things. Some of the humans were obvious gangster types, but by no means all of them. For those who were gangster types, the Temple was a neutral zone, as there were no fights here. Noone wanted to get on the wrong side of the swirling-paint marked Full Priest and his blasters. The changelings were reasonably sleek, with glowing blue eyes-clearly they were getting love from somewhere by fair means or foul. Many worshippers and not just gangster types were armed openly; such a thing was no problem in the Temple. There were no "No Guns Allowed" signs here. Fire Eater had no fear of being overpowered by some idiot running amok with his mighty blasters and bulletproof Decepticon Steel skin, full of sensors. There was no law on Vallermoore at least at the moment forcing those who lived there to go to the Temples of the country-those here were true believers. Full Priests were very good sermon-makers who didn't bore the heck out of their congregations. As Fire Eater started his sermon, Rurik wondered what he would say.

[Victorious Decepticons]

Outlands

The human's eyes brightened greatly, though he did wonder if the alien was just looking for an excuse to get out of range and then disappear. A whole boar was a lot to pay just to sleep on the ground! Still, he wasn't going to pass up the chance that this could be legit. He pointed to an area a bit inland, and said, "there's usually a whole bunch of 'em that hang out there. Gotta be careful, though, cuz if one sees you, they all like ta charge."

~~~~~~~~~~

There was no response to Tariq's call-out, but the air "changed" as if he had come a bit closer to danger instead of diminishing it. He began to walk quickly, and soon, was at the edge of the area. Just as he was about to leave it, he heard a hideous screeching sound. It seemed...supernatural! He spun around, tail at the ready, only to see a dark shadow dash across the former road - and then dissipate right before his eyes.

An old woman's chuckle came faintly on the wind from an unknown location. Then, barely, he heard, "Ya won't make it long in Florida if ya get spooked, boy..." and another chuckle.

Despite that odd warning, he was now extremely spooked and took off at a run. He didn't stop until he reached a copse of trees a very long distance away, and he made sure to hide himself within the foliage before finally catching his breath. Just as he began to breathe a bit easier, he saw a message carved into one of the tree trunks: "FLORIDA MAN LIVES!" At the base of this tree was a completely inexplicable pile of ancient rubber duckies and a small, rusted, can of propane. The complete nonsensicality of the presence of these things was meant to symbolize the craziness of Florida Man, though Tariq had no way to know this. To him, it was just freaky, and he quickly moved on.

~~~~~~~~

First Temple of Vallermoore

Fire Eater appeared at the head of the congregation and gave a deep bow to the Face of Megatron in the front of the Temple. This Face was not only larger than those at smaller Temples, but it was made of marble or a similar very fancy material. It made no response.

After this obviously-planned part of the ritual, the Priest approached a podium. From memory, he gave the Blessing for Loyalists. After a pause, he began to speak.

Today's sermon was on the fact that - surprisingly, to Rurik - Divine Leader Megatron had taken over the soul-generation equipment of the universe and had been writing HIS Way "upon the hearts" of all new souls. This, Fire Eater reminded everyone, had happened a few years prior. Glowingly, he now reported that the juvenile justice systems in "at least tens of thousands" of nations were already overloaded, with six-year-olds and even younger people being caught doing a variety of things like shoplifting, other petty thefts, schoolyard connives, and playground gambling.

"Right now, this is causing more trouble for the growing Decepticon-in-Spirit population than it is for the establishment, but our Divine Leader has always been thinking of the long game with this. Eventually, all of these youth will grow up. Along the way, they will have perfected their methods through experience and by being oh, so helpfully put into close quarters with other new DiSes. Once they attain the ages of majority in their nations, they will begin to vote. And all of the things that everyone had punished them for, that were illegal when they did them? Those things will become legal. The Decepticonization of the universe is inevitable."

"In places where voting does not exist, the transition from Autobot-spirited rule to Decepticon domination will not go as smoothly. It will be violent and involve massacres and genocides. But regardless of who wins at first, the old beings will eventually die off. When that happens, we will have our victory. This will be the case wherever the soul generator that our Divine Leader controls is in operation."

Rurik expected a murmered assent like at home - perhaps a soft "amen" or an "it shall be." Instead, the entire congregation roared out cheers, very much looking forward to when the Decepticons-in-Spirit would become an unbeatable majority.

After waiting for the cheering and applause to die down, Fire Eater continued. "Even though the effects of Divine Leader Megatron's recode are now being felt, we are far from having won right now, in the present. Our side's youngsters are under constant persecution, as their tenures in various juvies show. They will continue to be persecuted as adults, and many will spend half their lives in prison before we have the majority that we await. Therefore, we must not only be careful ourselves, but work to free our kindred spirits when they are overwhelmed by the existing systems of their nations. Some of this work should take legal forms, such as the provision of lawyers for their defense, publicity campaigns claiming that they are "too young" for the criminal justice system, and suchlike. However, we followers of Megatron should also look for and act on any opportunities for more direct action."

As he mentioned direct action, a giant closed-circuit holovision popped up an image of a story of a man who escaped a high-security prison through a tunnel, and then another one that mentioned someone who bribed the guards for his freedom. He paused just long enough for everyone to see it, and then the image disappeared.

"Hostility against the old systems will grow on its own as every youth finds himself persecuted by them. All we need to do is make sure that these youngsters do not lose their nerve - and ensure that they are properly educated in how to practice the fullness of the Decepticon Way without getting immediately caged. Many of you have youngsters who were born after the Great Recoding of the Souls, and it is upon you to teach them all of the methods of law evasion that they will need to know to remain free. It is always better to not get busted at all than it is to get caught and then manage to get out of it."

With that, Fire Eater ended his sermon, and the service moved on to the "programmed" sequence of singing some hymns to Megatron and the Decepticon Way. Later, there would be a collection of offerings, followed by a reading from the Book of Megatron. Unlike in some Christian services, the sermon was not necessarily connected to the pre-planned reading. This allowed each Priest to discuss things he figured his congregation needed to know, as well as anything that Megatron had directed a particular Priest (or all of them) to disseminate.

After the service ended, most of the people started filing out. Megatronists weren't herd animals by a long shot, so blowing an hour or two on "fellowship" was about as appealing to them as a bowl of cold, sticky rice. Still, Rurik noticed that Fire Eater had corralled a few people to talk to - perhaps, they were the gang he had been talking about earlier.

As he observed this, a very well-dressed human approached him. "I see you are new to the Temple, and perhaps to the planet as well!" He said in an extra-friendly, suspiciously salesy sort of way. "Perhaps you'd like me to show you around!" The human tried to make the last part sound like a question, but it still came across something like a veiled order. Out of the corner of his eye, Rurik noticed Fire Eater looking somewhat disapprovingly at the guy.

[Vallermoore]

Outlands


Carefully , the scorpion-person crept up on the boars that were known to be living in the area, his tail raised and fully at the ready. If he could successfully slay a boar or two, without getting maimed or killed, he could buy himself a space on the ground to sleep without having to worry about the humans of the area sneaking up on him with guns. There were half a dozen adult boars there, with several plump piglets that Farooq thought would look much better roasted with an apple stuffed in it's mouth. He wondered how he could get close enough. A lone boar would easily fall victim to his tail, but several together charging at the same time was a real menace. He didn't want to die here impaled by boar tusks. He wanted to become a true Decepticon, take on a Decepticon name-Farooq would not do as the name of a war robot, serve his first conscription term and then become a raider whilst he decided what to do next.


*****

Tariq got out of there, and decided that one thing he really needed was a source of fresh drinkable water. He needed less water then many biologicals but he still needed to drink. He also had an idea for being better then just a hunted ex slave. He openly declared, to a crowd of birds "I want to become the finest force in the universe-I want the Ultimate Upgrade. I know it won't be easy and may prove impossible but at least I want to try, or die in the attempt and end up in the Neutral Zone." He was a Megatronist and was convinced that he could have a good life as a Decepticon.


*****

Vallermoore


Rurik found that the Full Priest Fire Eater was very good at giving interesting and useful sermons, and was impressive (even though the body he was in was just fifteen feet tall, rather then in a normal size Decepticon body) with brightly swirling paint. He pointed out to those who had or were going to have biological offspring (just as with bots not all biologicals wanted offspring of their own) would be giving birth to new Decepticons in Spirit and they should try and keep their new offspring out of jail, be it legally with defence lawyers or by providing false alibis and in other ways. Things would be changing but change would take time. He was applauded with clapping, clopping of hooves and loud cheers that would be out of place in most houses of worship. Such was the Megatronist way of showing approval, and Fire Eater had never done a dull sermon. Whilst being boring was not as bad as outright being a heretic, it was a no-no and the Priest who bored his worshippers would sooner or later get a negative message from no less then High Priest Warfire summoning him back to Cybertron (if abroad) or if on Cybertron to the First Temple there for much needed retraining.


"Hostility against the old systems will grow on its own as every youth finds himself persecuted by them. All we need to do is make sure that these youngsters do not lose their nerve - and ensure that they are properly educated in how to practice the fullness of the Decepticon Way without getting immediately caged. Many of you have youngsters who were born after the Great Recoding of the Souls, and it is upon you to teach them all of the methods of law evasion that they will need to know to remain free. It is always better to not get busted at all than it is to get caught and then manage to get out of it."

After the service Fire Eater went up to four humans and a middle aged adult pony, who had on his flank a gleaming Decepticon Seal that he had clearly got before Megatron ever became a divine being. This was the gang who had lost a member to prison. When someone else came up, TO Rurik a male human who said "I see you are new to the Temple, and perhaps to the planet as well! Perhaps you'd like me to show you around!" Rurik replied politely, not wanting to needlessly make a new foe "Yes, but first I want to meet with a gang here, prove I can be trusted and after that, as long as they don't mind, I can talk with you. Right now though I'm doing the Megatronist equivilent of job-hunting. I hope to fly to Cybertron when the time is right and earn the Ultimate Upgrade." He knew that even if this human wished him harm, one thing he certainly woulden't do, even more so in the Temple, was to snitch on him to Vallermoore's police. To do so in a Temple might even attract the attention of Megatron Himself, who would see it as on a level with blasphemy.

[Victorious Decepticons]

Outlands

Though Farooq waited a long time, the boars stayed close to each other and a couple of them were always on the lookout while the others rooted around the ground. Occasionally, which ones were looking would change, but the group was never without at least two individuals watching all around them. After over an hour, though, one gave a sudden snort. Quickly, they all looked in the direction as the one that sounded the alarm, but instead of either running off or stampeding, they sort of moseyed further back into the brush.

Farooq soon saw what they had been looking at. A large gator came stomping through, apparently well-fed enough to not bother to give chase. Still, the boars weren't going to hang around and see if it wanted an after-dinner snack, so they had moved well clear of the potential threat.

As Farooq watched this, he noticed that one of the boars hadn't hidden itself as well as the others. It was still visible right near the brush line, though the gator showed no interest in it. Farooq wondered if the others were still close, like one foot past the visible one, or if they'd actually gone further in. He wished he had some kind of ranged weapon, now. Even a bow and arrow would be a better bet than just marching up and merely hoping he didn't get charged by the others, or perhaps something that could scare one of them into separating from the group...

~~~~~~~~~~~~

To Tariq's surprise, these birds just got spooked and flew up into the trees, leaving him to trudge along somewhat dejectedly. Head down, he did not notice the armadillo in the brush, let alone its eye, which occasionally caught the sunlight in the wrong way and gave off a glassine reflection that hinted towards manufacture rather than birth.

Just when he felt like he might bake alive inside of his own chitin, Florida did what this part of the state was known for: It poured rain. Absolute torrents of water banged down, quickly forming puddles in areas where the former road's pavement still interfered with drainage. Fifteen minutes later, as if a giant heavenly fire hose had been turned off, it stopped completely. Tariq would have mere minutes to drink from one of the puddles, which would soon disappear due to both evaporation and the slower (but still present) drainage. There would be no more rain for another day; the afternoon storm was done.

After drinking all he could, he continued on. For many days, he saw nothing but the occasional wreck of a farmhouse, or more often, the foundation of what had been one. Many farmhouses out in the middle of nowhere were made of wood, and in Florida, mold and termites made short work of that when there was nobody around to maintain it. A few, however, had been made of blocks and remained.

To his surprise, he also saw the occasional mobile home peeking out from the vines - and some of these seemed to be in decent shape, based on the few random bits of them that could be seen. As he passed by one, he noticed that while it was vined-over like the rest, the door was mysteriously visible. It didn't take that long before said door opened, revealing a slightly bent-over, middle-aged woman in a homemade dress and sandals. She saw him immediately, and her eyes got extremely wide. Then, she quickly ducked back inside.

Tariq thought she might just be scared, and turn out to be friendly, but it was only a few seconds later when she reappeared holding a big, strong, metal stick. He looked more closely, and as she was raising it into position, he saw that it was a shotgun! She had mistaken him for some kind of mutated wildlife, or perhaps a new species altogether, and intended to cook and eat him right away. All she'd have to do is take him down first! She began to peer down the barrel and line up her shot, and it wouldn't take her long to squeeze one off...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

First Temple of Vallermoore

The human smiled with a gleaming set of veneered extra-white teeth. "Well. Good luck to you then. I will let you know that you shouldn't always be so forthcoming, though. For all you know, I could be a cop..." He turned and walked out, not at a rush, but a little too quickly to seem entirely legit.

Rurik went over to the group where Fire Eater was, and to his dismay, Fire Eater immediately said, "That guy isn't to be trusted. I don't know what he's up to, but the Face has scowled upon him more than once."

Rurik automatically glanced over to the Face when he heard that, and sure enough, it looked just slightly irked. Still, whatever the problem was, Megatron apparently didn't see a need to get more specific. Perhaps he wanted to see how the Megatronists here would deal with this mysterious human over time.

Right away, Fire Eater began to make the introductions, and put Rurik forth as a possible new member. Rurik looked at each gang member as he was introduced, noting that they all appeared to be rather tough, though they weren't the most brutish imaginable, either. They did look mentally capable of engaging in a shootout if one of their robberies went wrong, though apparently, they hadn't yet been associated with doing anything as cop-attracting as murder.

[Vallermoore]

Outlands

Tariq hated the heat-despite the fact that he was used to a certain amount of heat on his own planet. Much to his relief it rained and he could cool down in the pleasant rain and he could drink, which gave him great relief. He carried on, keeping moving. He found a freshwater turtle laying eggs, killed it with a sting, and ate it's eggs raw, not having a means of fire starting and not wanting to possibly bring either armed humans or worse, Decepticons down on his location. He was getting used to Florida by now, when he encountered a woman with a shotgun. Although a shotgun would only be automatically deadly to him if it hit him directly in his head, heart or lungs, a wound somewhere else might break off a leg, or stop him from using his tail-weapon properly, or break an arm. Even a mere flesh wound with no pellets stuck inside it would let the bugs attack it, and his scratching would prevent healing and let nasty microbes in. "You don't want me to come back here in my full sized Decepticon body, do you, and blast and step on that trailer of yours? This small spy-body cost me a lot of Energon." He pointed his tail at her as if it contained a hidden blaster. It was a huge bluff and one that could go one of two ways. Either the woman would back off and let him get out of there, or it would make her even more determined to shoot at him, if she had a real hatred of Decepticons.

*****
Farooq wished very much that he had a gun or a bow or even a spear, but he had to act with what he had. He advanced on the boar, threw a stone to the left of it and then swiped with his tail. If he could make contact the boar would die quickly, although there was a good chance of the others getting involved. If that happened he would have to back up against a tree so he couldn't be charged from behind and trust to his tail-sting and his pincers to hold the boars off until either they gave up or-or until he ended up in the Room of the Three Screens, a place he had no intention of being sent to.

First Temple of Vallermoore

Rurik went over to the group and Fire Eater told him "That guy isn't to be trusted. I don't know what he's up to, but the Face has scowled upon him more than once." The Face looked slightly annoyed but whatever the problem was it wasn't big enough for either Megatron or Fire Eater to take direct action about it. Fire Eater continued "For these gentlemen here, I want you to bow to the Face and tell it that you are not a cop, nor an informant. If the Face smiles on you, they will trust you enough to talk with you. If they like you, they'll let you join them and...earn some money the proper Megatronist way." For a second, Fire Eater turned off the light in one of his eyes, giving the effect of a wink. Rurik went, bowed deeply and said, "O Divine Leader, I am not a policeman or a police informant, and never have been." To his relief, the Face gave a small but unmistakeable smile.

The human leader of the gang said "I'm Chard, the leader of this gang, this here is William, here is Martin and the pony here goes by the name of Wealthy One. Our lock breaker got arrested, he refused to inform and got ten years. We want you to see if you can break this lock bit with your pincers. If you can, you can join us and help us make a "withdrawal" from a certain bank tonight. Your share will be two hundred thousand Chingchings if all goes well and the money is there. One thing I love about the Temple is that it is a place to find new members who are not undercover cops or worthless narks."