As Springer's team was in for a long ride, Silverbolt put the ship on autopilot and Springer told everyone to enter deep space stasis lock. The Hammerhead's dark matter drives made quick work of the journey. However, as they approached the planet, the ship got caught in some debris, damaging some of its sensors, specifically it's gravity assist sensors. So as the ship approached the planet, it could not detect the planet's gravity and didn't accommodate accordingly. The Hammerhead began to entire a nosedive headed straight for the ground, proximity alarms blaring. Eventually, the ship woke Springer from stasis, who groaned before realizing the situation.
"Scrap!" Springer shouted. He then quickly woke up the others and explained the situation, causing them all to immediately rush to their stations.
"Silverbolt, get us out of this nosedive!" Springer commanded.
"This ain't gonna be pretty. Hang on tight guys!" Silverbolt called out.
Silverbolt pulled back as hard as he could on the control stick, which pulled the Hammerhead out of its nosedive. However, it couldn't correct itself fast enough, as soon a line of organic spires appeared in the path of the Hammerhead.
"Brace for impact!" Silverbolt shouted just before hitting the spires. However, instead of the rough collision he expected, the Hammerhead barreled straight through the spires, knocking them out of the way.
"That was...anticlimactic." Bluestreak said in his bored tone.
"It looks like our ship is too durable for these strange spikes," Springer said, "Silverbolt, land us in the nearest open field."
"Sir!" Silverbolt responded. However as he began to fold out some landing skids, the ship shook slightly as several loud scraping and tearing noises were heard.
"What in the name of Solus Prime was that?" Minerva called back.
"That, Red, was our landing gear." Silverbolt replied.
"Scrap," Bluestreak said through gritted teeth, "Springer, what do we do?"
Springer looked at the instruments in front of him in hopes that one would reveal something. Lucky for him, one did.
"Silverbolt, are you slowing down the ship?" Springer asked.
"No sir," Silverbolt replied, "Do you need me to?"
"No no. These weird spires all slowing us down plenty, just keep lowering her steadily, and we should be free to land."
"Are you crazy?!" Minerva shouted, "The patient can't be jostled around and-"
"I know, Minerva," Springer interrupted, "but our landing struts are nonexistent. Our best bet is to land on the hull and let friction do the rest of the work."
Minerva growled, then sighed, "Yes sir."
"Silverbolt, on my signal, kill the engines." Springer ordered.
"Right!"
"3..."
Bluestreak hurried over to Minerva to help tighten the ship's hold on the stasis pod.
"2..."
Silverbolt began shutting of instruments as to make sure certain unnecessary alarms wouldn't go off.
"1..."
Minerva began pressing several buttons on the pod in an attempt to stabilize the pod before the crash, but before she could finish...
"NOW!" Springer shouted. Silverbolt cut the engines, and the ship hit the ground around the spires with a loud thud as it began to skid along the ground, leaving a rather large ditch in its wake.
Due to the sudden drop, Minerva lost her balance and hit a button she was told to never hit.
"Scrap." She winced after hitting the emergency shutdown button.
"Uh, big bot? We got a problem here!" Bluestreak shouted as the stasis pod began to vent its cold air. The plea for help was to no avail, however, as Silverbolt and Springer had an issue of their own.
"Springer, there may be a slight problem."
"What is it, Silverbolt?"
"We're running out of ground."
Springer then looked ahead as he saw the quickly approaching cliff.
"Blast it all to the pit. Silverbolt, open the rear hatch. I'm gonna try to stop this thing before we plummet."
Springer nodded and opened the rear hatch, which Springer quickly dashed out of before transforming and quickly flying to the other side of the ship, where he transformed back and planted his feet against the ground and his arms against the nose of the ship, but he wasn't doing much. Once he realized this, he half-transformed so that his propeller blade was on his back, and began spinning it as fast as he could to slow the ship to a halt. The ship slowly stopped only several centihics away from the edge. Springer sighed, then walked back to the rear hatch, which was still open.
"Everyone okay?" Springer called out.
"No new dents." Bluestreak replied.
"Just a little shaken up, we're fine." Silverbolt called out.
"Springer, we have a situation here!" Minerva shouted. Springer looked to her direction to see the stasis pod was cracked open slightly. Springer rushed over and helped her up before ripping the door open, revealing a crimson, gold, and purple bot.
Springer gasped in shock, "H-Hot Rod?"
Hot Rod opened his eyes very quickly, but something was wrong.
"Uh... Big Bot? Why are his eyes pur-" Bluestreak started.
Hot Rod growled as he jumped at Springer, rage filling his vibrant purple eyes.
"Whoa! What's going on?!" Silverbolt shouted.
"His eyes... Bluestreak, the tranq dart!" Minerva shouted. Bluestreak nodded, then ran to the armory and grabbed a syringe full of glowing bright yellow liquid and threw it at Minerva, who caught it and attempted to jab it into Hot Rod's neck, only for him to turn around and grab her by the neck, causing her to drop the syringe. Springer and Silverbolt both tried to pry Hot Rod off of Minerva, but to no avail. Suddenly, Bluestreak slid underneath Springer, grabbed the syringe on the ground, and jabbed it into Hot Rod's neck before anyone could even blink. Hot Rod loosened his grip on Minerva before letting her go and passing out.
"You...couldn't...have...done that... earlier?!" Springer exclaimed while panting.
"I didn't want to risk hurting one of you." Bluestreak replied.
"Well he hurt me plenty, Bluestreak." Minerva shot.
Springer then rolled his shoulder as he looked at Minerva, "Okay Minerva, I know Percy and Ratchet swore you to secrecy, but I think I'd like to know why Hot Rod's got Dark Energon flowing in his veins!"
"You think I know?! Ratchet and Perceptor only told me his identity, what happened to him, and that they used volatile energon to fix him!" Minerva shouted.
"I hate to break it to you, Red," Silverbolt interjected, "but I don't think injecting his spark with Dark Energon is 'fixing' him."
"By Primus, they did it." Bluestreak said in shock.
"Did what, Bluestreak?" Springer asked, clearly aggravated.
"The Nitrous Procedure. The only known method to successfully revive a bot without making them a terracon."
"The what?" Silverbolt asked, confusedly.
"The Nitrous Procedure is a procedure invented by Shockwave that can revive a 'bot by first injecting Dark Energon into the spark to reignite it, then flushing it out quickly with Red Energon."
"No way," Minerva denied, "Ratchet would never approve of such a procedure being done on one of our soldiers."
"Not unless ordered to, Minerva," Springer argued, "Prime was with Ratchet when they gave me my orders. Considering how close those two were, even while he was with the Wreckers, it's safe to assume Boss Bot was gonna do whatever he could to save him."
"Even if they did perform that procedure, clearly Hot Rod's still got some dark energon in there. He wouldn't have tried to snuff us if he didn't." Silverbolt reasoned.
"Maybe that's why they put him in stasis, Silverbolt." Bluestreak interjected, "Maybe Ratch' and Perceptor didn't know if they had fully flushed the dark energon out, so they put Hot Rod in stasis so that the dark energon wouldn't kick in mid-flight."
"It doesn't matter why the Docs put him in stasis. What matters is that we figure out what to do now." Springer stated.
"Why not just put him back in stasis?" Silverbolt questioned.
"There's no guarantee that will solve the problem, Aerialbot." Minerva said condescendingly to Silverbolt. "If Bluestreak is right and Ratchet and Perceptor did perform the nitrous procedure, then leaving him out of the stasis pod may be more beneficial."
"What!? Why?! So he can try to snuff us again?!"
"No, Silverbolt. If the dark energon is still affecting his spark, then putting Hot Rod back in stasis will only make it take longer for the dark energon to be flushed out." Springer answered.
"But what if he wakes up before that can happen?" Silverbolt pushed.
"Then we use another tranq, scout." Bluestreak countered, sounding a little annoyed. "Minerva is in charge of the patient, making her decisions involving him surpass even Springer's command. Even if Springer wanted him back in stasis, it's not his choice."
"I- fine. But don't run to me when he rips your spark out before your eyes and sucks the energon out of it." Silverbolt conceded, then walked back to the pilot's seat to run a diagnostic on the ship.
"Alright then, now that we've all calmed down, we need to figure out a few things. Bluestreak, is our fabricator up and running?" Springer questioned.
"If it isn't I can make it run." He replied.
"Good, we need new landing gear. For now we're gonna stay here until we can figure out more about this planet. Minerva, make sure Hot Rod wakes up next time as a normal bot."
"Yes, sir!"
"Silverbolt, after that diagnostic I want you to send out our drone so we can get a map of what's around us. A radius of 6 kliks should be plenty."
"On it."
"Alright team, let's get this done so we aren't sitting ducks for our entire time on this rock!" Springer commanded. Everyone shouted a "yes, sir!" in response, clearly feeling the same as him, not wanting to find out if there were any threats nearby.
A/N: Hey guys!! I am so sorry for taking this long to upload this one! I've been extremely busy with school and when I wasn't doing that I was working or just too tired to want to write this. I have every intention of continuing, so don't worry! This story will have a conclusion. I will try to get the next chapter out soon! Also, HAPPY VALENTINES DAY!!