Somewhere in the American Southwest*, the Ark is situated in a rather remote place and well hidden. Sure, there's a road that leads right to it, but the sign that says, "Road closed" seems to be pretty effective at keeping out any human visitors. Save for the two human guests, Spike and Sparkplug, of course.
Spike is writing in his diary on the side of an exposed slope. Perfect pickings for a Decepticon spy to transform into an innocent looking micro cassette recorder and hitch a ride into the Autobot Ark undetected. We're not sure how he found this place, but some flash of inspiration may pop up later.
Prime is in a private meeting with the top ranking members of the Ark team, discussing the Autobots' next move. One thing is pretty obvious to the rank and file. Earth is probably going to be home for a long while. Too good an energon resource to give up, and too risky to return home, leaving the precious planet in the hands of Megatron, even if his ship is completely wrecked.
*(( After spending entirely too much time trying to figure out where the G1 Ark was located, I found out that it was a mish-mash of shrugs. Though Oregon is the most often chosen state in various TF continuities, and is somewhat close to Mt. St. Helens, the volcano that inspired the location of the Ark, that area looks nothing like the desert that Hound drove Spike around in. So for this story, let's say they're at the fictional Mt. Hilary, near Monument Valley, AZ.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monument_Valley.
https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Mount_St._Hilary ))
This message was last edited by the GM at 22:29, Sat 01 Aug 2020.