Jazz paced nervously back and forth, his pedes making almost no noise on the floor. He was anxious about going to Oasia, for it has been many stellar cycles since the Cybertronian and Oasians races had met in peace. And for good reason; Cybertronians and Oasians weren't known for liking each other. Many skirmishes had broken out and neither group was innocent of them. He was glad for one thing though; the translator accompanying him to Oasia was his adopted son, Thunder.

Currently, the Cyber-Ninja was going over audio tracks of the Oasian dialect over and over with his audio-receptors. He was sitting in his living room; on a monstrous couch that could've fit even Bulkhead's large girth. In front of him was a giant, rectangular metal table with a variety of things collected on top of it. An energon cube, data-pads that had maps of the Oasia, an Oasian-to-Cybertronian dictionary (the only one he could find) and a holo-scan of his spark-mate, Melody. At the thought of the femme, Jazz couldn't help but smile and momentarily forget his troubles.

His thoughts were interrupted when a certain youngling bursts through the entrance yelling, "I'M HOME!" loudly. Jazz tapped one side of his headphones, shutting off the blurb of Oasian language and turned his attention to Thunder.

The youngling was the approximate age of a fifteen year old earthling, or in Cybertronians years about one thousand, five hundred stellar cycles. The young mech had mostly white armor except for his shoulder plates, which were gold, and his knee coverings which were black. His derma-plating was a dark gray, with the only breaks being thin lines of dingy white on his upper arms. Thunder also donned a visor, similar to Jazz's but more angled at the tips; giving the youth a certain flare. His pedes were similar to Bumblebee's while he was the yellow cop car, but the youngling's pedes had his Oasian name signature.

The symbol that was on the outsides of his pedes was a large circle outlined in a dark shadow. Within it, a thin, vertical, green, line sliced the circle evenly in two. Then in the middle a blunt triangle, outlined in red, was perpendicular to the line. A lightning bolt finished off the symbol for the youngling's name sake. But just to be difficult sometimes Jazz teased him by calling him 'Lightning' instead.

"Hey kid," Jazz acknowledged coolly as Thunder removed his visor and placed it in his subspace.

"Where ya been?"

The youngling doesn't answer at first, for he was smiling wistfully as he still went through his subspace. He lets out a small exhale when he found what he had been looking for. It was a data-pad, from the look of it, but it had an odd shape that the Cyber-ninja had never seen before. It looked like a data-pad, it had a screen and the right buttons but on either side of it flared out and scalloped.

'Almost like those treats humans give their pets', Jazz mused silently as he watched.

"What is it?" he finally asked.

"Ol' memories I put away." Thunder sighed dreamily, his almond shaped optics shuttering for a moment.

He looks up at Jazz, whose helm was leaning to the side curiously; his adoptive parent's face seemed slightly concerned.

"From Oasia, 'fore I came here . . ." The youngling murmured.

Jazz mouthed an 'oh' in understanding; it had been a long while since Thunder last was on his home planet.

Thunder wasn't pure Cybertronian; he was a hybrid . . . half Oasian . . . half Cybertronian. That is why Jazz adopted the youngling, when he and his mother had arrived on Cybertron they had been immediately shunned, Thunder marked as an outcast . . . an abomination. But the Cyber-Ninja had felt bad for the defenseless youngling and adopted him.

Happily sliding over so that Thunder could sit next to him, Jazz watched as he plopped down beside him. Once they were shoulder-to-shoulder, the youngling stared at the data pad for another nano-click. Then a look that was resembling grief on Thunder's faceplate before he pressed the middle of the screen and holo-scan popped up. Then Jazz realized why Thunder had a hard time turning the device on at first.

The first holo-scan was of Thunder when he was only six hundred stellar cycles old with his late mother.

"Ya don't have ta show me if you ain't comfortable," Jazz murmurs, placing a gentle servo upon the young one's shoulder.

"Nah, it isn't that Pops," Thunder sniffed, rubbing his optics. "I . . . I gotta face this 'fore I go back."

The Elite Guard member nodded in understanding as removed his servo from Thunder's shoulder. The youngling immediately flipped through the holo-pic files throughout the data-pad. Slowly he began explaining to Jazz what he would see once they all arrived in Oasia.

"You see that there?" Thunder asks, pointing to an animal Jazz that stuck him similar to an Asian elephant of Earth.

It looked odd to Jazz though, a seemingly seamless fusion of mechanics and organic matter. The creature had a bright white hide with little to no wrinkles at all and instead of tusks like an elephant it had two ebony horns that resembled a bull's horns coming out from the sides of its forehead.

"That's a mode of transportation back at Oasia."

"Crazy," Jazz chuckled, leaning in to take a closer look at the bizarre creature.

Thunder then went on through what other animals of Oasia that they might encounter. Overgrown birds with metallic feathers, reptiles as long as Jazz's arm with glowing eyes; the whole list went on and on!

"But there's one place we have to avoid at all costs," Thunder added seriously, grabbing Jazz's Oasia data-map from the table and setting his own data pad down. He tapped the screen and dialed in some coordinates. A large, 3D hologram of the lush forest popped up with gigantic trees that were taller than even the tallest buildings on Cybertron.

Curiosity getting the better of him, the Cyber-Ninja asked, "Why do we need to avoid this place? Doesn't look bad."

"It's a bad place Pops." Thunder frowned deeply and reached out to grasp the 3D image.

The youngling then rotated it one hundred and eighty degrees to the right and Jazz's optics widened under his visor. The hologram then showed a giant plot of land that was about ten acres big. An emblem with a snake with its hood opened as it was shown. Within its maw weren't any fangs, but there were two daggers that seemed almost real and instead of a tongue, there was a curved scimitar.

"The Serpentine clan still exists out there?" Jazz asked incredulously, whipping around to face Thunder. The youngling tapped the screen again and turned to his parent.

"After the Great War . . ." Thunder explained, getting into historian mode.

He sighed a bit before continuing, "The High Council called out to exterminate the Serpentine clan, since they worked with the Decepticons to try to take over Oasia." Jazz nodded somewhat impatiently, knowing that bit of history already.

"But until recently, no one knew that one of them survived, and started to hire some weapons cartels to help become . . . some sort of anti-treaty group."

"A thousand strong apparently," Jazz murmured; tapping his chin while he examined the known stats of the clan. He couldn't help but notice the size of the territory Thunder had just showed him.

Turning to the hybrid again, he asked, "Where is that place?"

"A couple of miles away from the abandoned docks," Thunder responded, gritting his denta together.

"No one but the High Council's soldiers goes there to try to remove the artillery and supplies left behind from the Battle of the Crystalline Citadel."

"But, those Serpentine Rebels . . ." Thunder growled, sounding like one of those organics from Earth for a second. His growl reverberating through his chassis, making Jazz holds up his servos in a 'calm down' motion.

Taking an intake, Thunder sighed, "But, they keep killing the wounded . . . even their own . . ."

"I'll be sure to pass it along to our Council," Jazz said, taking the map data-pad. He quickly bookmarked the holo-scan and got up. He then turned to the youngling, seeing him still seated.

"Ya comin' or what?" that caused a small smile to escape from the somber hybrid as he sat up from the couch.

"I'll write a note to Mel," Thunder exclaimed as he hustles inside to go and find a blank data-pad to write the said message.

Jazz turns to look outside the living room windows, seeing that the lights were starting to flicker a wee bit brighter. It was getting late, meaning they had to move fast.