Predatory

War Room

My optics widened when I saw the room. It was roughly the size of an apartment, tables littering the room between crumbling stone pillars, lining the walls, and pretty much everywhere in between. Datapads seemed haphazardly thrown around the room. Maps and diagrams of Cybertron and various cities hung from the walls in varying degrees of disarray. Models of ships, war machines and battle plans with different colored pins in them sprawled across a giant map that lay across a giant table that stood in the middle of the room.

Bots filled the room, some sitting on tables, others analyzing the walls or papers, many were trying to recharge while leaning on the pillars supporting the room. The smell of stale high grade and cy-gar smoke hung thick in the stagnant air.

As I followed Tarn to a corner, I glanced around the room. The mechs here held themselves highly, so I assumed they were of high standing. I glanced in one direction, to find Starscream's brothers in arms, Skywarp and Thundercracker. They were surrounded by a group of other seekers.

 I tried to remember my obscure Decepticon trivia and began to put names to faceplates.

 The coneheads were easy, Ramjet, Thrust and Dirge had formed a small group of three behind Skywarp, however the other seekers were less easily identified. 

Bitstream was only identifiable by his blue coloration and the fact that he was tapping away at a datapad, probably hacking his way through an Autobot system, just because. 

Hotlink was reconstructing what looked like it once used to be a gun, now it looked more akin to a flamethrower, his preferred weapon apparently. From what little I had heard about him, he was sort of a pyromaniac. Sunstorm was hovering over him, he seemed to be chatting animatedly and flaunting his perfect golden paint job. Beside them stood Acid Storm, his face plate speaking of a forlorn sadness and slight depression. The other Rainmakers standing beside him, talking amongst themselves. 

Red wing was standing off to himself, seemingly apathetic to the entire situation. And the two femmes, Slipstream and Sandstorm were leaning casually against a pillar, two mechs were seemingly hitting on them, and neither seemed upset about it. One of the mechs looked like  it might be Barricade, but I could be wrong. 

My optics swept over a different part of the crowd, then widened when they landed on a certain pair of twins. Dreadwing and Skyquake were in deep discussion with each other, and analyzing a map on the wall. Probably scoping out battle plans of some sort. Dreadwing and Skyquake were two of the most well respected bots on cybertron, by Decepticon and Autobot alike. Tarn was respected, but he was also deeply feared, as was Megatron. But Dreadwing and Skyquake had been known to sometimes give prisoners a chance, if they took the Decepticon oath. Something that probably got on Tarn's nerves. 

I turned my attention slightly to the right, and was fairly certain my spark actually stopped when I caught a glimpse of the group of mechs opposite us. Sixshot, Astrotrain, Blitzwing, and Overlord all talking and drinking together in a group. Their loud and obnoxious drunk laughter audible even over the din of the crowd. Blitzwing's face rapidly switching as his personalities engaged in what seemed like three different conversations. This could only be bad news. Astrotrain and Blitzwing were known to go out of their way to make trouble, though Overlord seemed to do it without even trying. Sixshot was usually the only mediation, but how he could mediate if he was overcharged was beyond me.  

Tarn must've seen the same thing I did, because he stopped walking, and held out a servo to keep me behind him. He then guided my path carefully through the crowd, far away from the danger zone. We ended up in dark corner of the room, only other mechs were here, one a dark gunmetal gray, and the other a muddy shade of green. They were covered in scratches and seemed to have been bleeding in multiple areas from small cuts (though the green one seemed to be in a far worse state) and both of them seemed too tired to talk. I had a feeling they looked familiar, but I couldn't quite make the connection.