Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Chapter One

Qatar - Middle East, 2007

Captain Caliene Meredith sighed as she made her way over to the rest of her squad, she was tired, dirty, and wanted nothing more than to have a warm shower and just sleep on her cot in her shared tent for the next 72 hours (She shared a tent with the only other 8 females on the base, and they were either Medical or Communications personnel).

Captain Lennox was getting everyone ready for the airlift back to base after a grueling two weeks out in the deserts of Qatar looking for any problems from the locals that had been reported in to the US SOCCENT Base they were currently working out of.

She walked over to the Commander of the squad; the sound of incoming V-22 Osprey's cheering her up somewhat. "Hey Lennox, looks like the birds are here, everyone is ready to head on back to base, and I really want to put my baby away clean into the armory, this sand just doesn't help her any." she said as she patted her M-24 SWS, it was possibly the only thing she could stake her life on other than her squad and Lennox.

Lennox looked at her and smiled, "Yeah, well this blasted sand doesn't do much for any of our weapons let alone where it gets into the uniforms, Cali. And don't worry about your baby," he said pointing at her weapon, "I know you'll get the chance to clean her right, but after you help me with the reports for the Colonel, all right?" he asked, a slight smirk on his face as he waited for her response - it was well known that Caliene hated paperwork with a vengeance.

"Yeah, yeah, laugh it up Sir! Just wait 'til I write to Sarah about your jokes on the squad when you're bored out of your mind on a mission. Not something she would want to hear, now is it William?" she replied with an evil smirk on her face now - they were constantly bickering back and forth about stuff (all in the name of fun), but it kept everyone from going stir crazy on these missions, Spec-Ops teams were hard working almost all of the time, and it wasn't unheard of for a few to go completely insane either from the pressure of the job or just because they couldn't handle the solitude at times.

Caliene knew all about solitude, she was the only female in this squad, but she was the best damned Sniper they had, and she was good at hand-to-hand fights also. It didn't hurt the fact that she knew some of the languages of the surrounding areas.

Now, here they were loading up the last few pieces of their gear, she looked around trying to figure out who was missing as she watched everyone else climb aboard the V-22 Osprey. Lennox turned to her and whistled. "Hey what ya waiting for Cali, get in here, they wanna leave and if I don't mind saying so, so do I." he said after she looked at him.

"Hang on a second, Lennox we're missing someone again, care to take a guess as to whom?" she asked him as she turned her attention back to a small patch of hillocks about 10 feet away.

"Oh let me guess, either Fig or Epps. And my money is on Epps, and I am guessing you are betting it's Fig?" came his response.

She looked at Lennox, nodded and walked forward towards the Osprey then looked back and yelled over her shoulder, "Anyone who wants out of this sandbox needs to be here in the next 20 seconds and onboard before we either make you walk back to base with all of your gear or sling you from the undercarriage of the Osprey, your choice!" Both she and Lennox laughed when they heard a yelp and cursing in Spanish, yep, definitely Fig, she grinned as Lennox handed her a twenty dollar bill. But the question remained where was Epps? That thought was answered when she reached the seating area of the bird and saw Epps coming out of the cockpit and sitting on the opposite side from her.

Donnely was sat down the same side as Epps, who now had his iPod plugged into one ear and listening to some of his music, she smiled at Donnely seeing as he was younger than her and the others maybe mid-twenties by her guess, whereas everyone else in the squad was late-twenties to mid-thirties, he was sat cradling his rifle almost like she did her M-24, as if it was the most important thing in his world - to most of them it was, they either lived or died with that weapon, he smiled at her as he pushed his glasses back up the bridge of his nose, she nodded at him in return and settled down to think.

Soon after takeoff a conversation was struck up by Fig and Caliene just sat back to enjoy the ribbing that would happen to him.

"Oh God, five months of this. I can't wait to get a little taste of home. A plate of mama's alligators étouffée."

"You've been talking about barbequed 'gators and crickets for the past two weeks. I'm never going to your mama's house, Fig. I promise." Epps' reply came as he shuddered a little at the thought of crickets being eaten or any bug for that matter.

"But Bobby, Bobby, 'gators are known to have the most succulent meat." came Fig's comeback.

Caliene just shook her head as the conversation kept going, "I understand." was all Epps said as Fig kept on going just this time he had switched back into his native tongue of Spanish. Caliene reached over and slapped Fig on the back of his head as Epps smirked slightly at that and said "English, please. English."

It was after Epps said that that Lennox went on to add, "I mean, how many times have we…. We don't speak Spanish. I told you that." Caliene was trying her damnedest to not laugh, especially since she could speak Spanish, but they all liked to tease Fig about it - it boosted morale for the rest of the squad.

It was then that Fig came back at them with his favorite response: "Why you got to ruin it for me, man? That's my heritage." then he started rattling off in Spanish again, making Caliene snort with suppressed mirth as she understood what he was saying, Lennox looked at her one eyebrow raised in question, and she mouthed back to him that she would tell him later what was said by Fig.

So Lennox decided to respond to Fig's Spanish outburst again, "Go with the Spanish. Whatever."

Donnely decided that he was going to add something to the conversation by asking, "Hey, you guys remember weekends? Huh? The Sox at Fenway; Cold hotdog and flat beer."

Fig answered this time in English, "Perfect day. What about you Captain? You got a perfect day?" he aimed at Lennox, knowing as we all did he was still highly strung about his wife and baby girl back stateside.

"I just can't wait to hold my baby girl for the first time." Lennox said as he tilted his head back and looked at the ceiling of the Osprey. "He's adorable." came Fig's laughing tone closely followed by Epps' "That's too…." just to have Lennox face them and tell them "Shut up!" with a smirk.

Caliene just nodded at him until he asked her what her perfect day would be. She looked shocked but she had to be honest she really hadn't thought about it all that much, the Military was her career since she graduated High School, and after 10 years of service she was thinking of re-upping that fall for another five years, gotta love being in an all Military backed family - Dad was Navy, Mom was Air Force, and her, well she was Army all the way - SpecOps no less and of only a handful of women in the group made her folks proud that did.

"My perfect day…. Hmmm, never really thought on it that much guys, but I guess I could say spending down time stateside with Mom and Dad, go fishing, or even make it home for Deer Season - get that 10 point that's been running around the pastures, maybe give you guys some of the Venison." Caliene replied as she saw their eyes widen at the mention of hunting and the possibility of fresh Venison - men they all think with either their guts or their little heads.

They heard over the intercom from the cockpit that they would be landing in about 45 minutes and to make sure everyone and everything was strapped in for landing. Caliene was so looking forward to that shower now, maybe some real food and not MRE's like the past few weeks - they could get rather boring after a while, so Lennox and Caliene checked over everyone and everything and then strapped themselves back in for the landing. Caliene just wasn't looking forward to the paperwork that was awaiting them once they landed, and apparently, Lennox thought the same thing as he cringed - great minds think alike.

End Chapter One

A.N.: Please read and review... they are the life blood of a writer, any flamers will be used to keep warm during the cold desert nights and roast marshmallows.

Chapter Text

Chapter Two

US SOCCENT Airbase, Qatar

Outside

Caliene's POV

After the landing and disembarking from the V-22's we all headed over to the trucks that had been sent to collect us and take us back to 'Tent City' as it was known. As we got closer you could hear the music blasting in the background, someone had some Rap music playing out of a radio and had it hooked up to the PA system, just hope the Colonel doesn't find out or someone will be on KP (Kitchen Patrol, which is peeling an overbearing amount of potatoes) duty, not something I would want, drives you bonkers it does (shudders).

As the trucks came to a stop we all climbed out and headed to our respective areas, Epps headed straight for the Ball Court and started playing against what looked like a Newbie, boy was he gonna loose, especially against Epps - guy played Basketball in college, but decided to join the Air Force after he graduated, guy could have gone pro, he's just that good.

"Hey I'm ready to do this." he said as he shucked off his jacket, "Hey, any of y'all grow some balls, come see me on the court, man." he yelled to us as he played.

I shook my head and yelled back, "Sorry, Epps, gonna have to do a rain check on that match. Some of us have paperwork and such to actually take care of here, can't all be slackers!" making him miss the basket and making the others laugh, and getting a "Hey, hey!" from Lennox as he glared at Epps.

I watched as Sgt. Burke went to the rudimentary open-air shower and pushed other soldiers aside, by saying "Step aside, ladies." much to their consternation and yelling of "Hey, Man." I laughed he was a great guy to have in the squad, almost as gun happy as I was - except he actually slept with his rifle on his cot, this bit of info coming from Lennox, so the intel should be accurate.

I went and cleaned up, placed my M-24 on my bunk and left a note for the others in the tent to leave be since she was going to be cleaned when I got back from doing paperwork (I hate paperwork!) Then grabbing my clipboard, pen and the report forms to be filled in I headed on over to Lennox, we could suffer this together. On my way there I met up with the young lad that had all but adopted our squad, Mahfouz, "Hey, Cali, have you seen Lennox?" he asked me as I walked up to him smiling, he's a good kid, always willing to do anything for us, even getting our water packs filled ready for our next recon and such.

"Yes I have, Mahfouz, follow me and you'll be able to give him his water pack, alright?" I said to him, he grinned up at me, handed me my water pack and then started to jog in front a little ways, stopping every so often to make sure I was following and that we were going in the right direction. We finally made it over to Lennox and I gently tapped on Mahfouz's shoulder and pointed at Lennox who was busy writing up some of his report, Mahfouz smirked and ran over yelling "Lennox!" that got Lennox's attention as he looked up and smiled.

"Hey, what are you doing?" asked Lennox as he looked between me and Mahfouz.

"Me? I'm just doing some of the paperwork we all despise so much and wondered if you'd like the company." I replied as I sat opposite him on another crate and started in on the essentials of the report.

"Water?" asked Mahfouz as he handed Lennox his water pouch and smiled widely.

"Thank you. Are you gonna help with the gear?" asked Lennox as he stood up and stretched out a kink in his back, then turned to face me and Mahfouz. "You gonna come with us, Cali? If I remember correctly you still have an M-24 that needs some TLC before we turn in for the night." he asked as he took the offered water pouch again from Mahfouz and took a quick swig of the cool stuff.

"Yeah alright, and then once my rifle is clean I'll collect your report and mine together and hand them in to Colonel Sharp at the Ops Center." I said as I too stood up and headed on out with the pair to the tents we called home for now, so that I could do what was needed. It was going to be a long day from start to finish, I just never realized just how long or how bad it was going to be.

Later, after helping Lennox and Mahfouz with the gear for our squad, I went and spent a good couple of hours cleaning my rifle - a clean rifle is a working life saving rifle (the life of me and my squad, anyway.)

After all that I headed over to the tents that the rest of the squad used as a home out here, and collected Lennox's report as offered earlier. Once I had our reports I headed over to the Ops Center beneath and to one side of the Control Tower to hand them in to Colonel Sharp, a fair but strict man who had the respect from almost everyone on his base. As I handed over the reports I heard a (from his number of three arm stripes) Senior Airman say: "Colonel Sharp, we have an inbound unidentified infiltrator, ten miles out."

Colonel Sharp looked at him and then me as I nodded that I understood he needed to see to this as he reached over and grabbed one of the radios.

"Unidentified aircraft, you are in restricted US Military Airspace. Squawk ident and proceed out of the area." he said to the pilot of the aircraft, before relaying a request on another frequency to the airstrip. "Raptors one and two, snap to heading two-five-zero to intercept. Bogie is in the weeds ten miles out, not squawking." This meant that two Raptors were going to identify the intruder incase it was one of ours having radio problems, if not they would be dealt with.

Sharp looked at the radio, nodded and switched back to the frequency used to contact the unidentified aircraft. "Unidentified aircraft, we will escort you to US SOCCENT airbase. If you do not comply, we will use deadly force." After he said that we all waited to see what would happen. Huh… this had possibly been the most action we had all experienced since we set up here.

"Copy the bogie. Tail 4500 X-ray." came the response from one of the pilots over the radio. The Senior Airman had been going over a print out of the details for the identified bogie for the past five minutes before he turned to Colonel Sharp and I and said "Sir, Ma'am, says here 4500X was shot down three months ago. Afghanistan." I shuddered lightly, that had been a bad intel operation, causing the loss of some fine men and one of our Helicopters.

"There's got to be a mistake. Check again, then recheck." said Colonel Sharp as he looked at the Senior Airman slightly bemused, hell even I wished that the crew were alive and well, but since we hadn't heard or seen any indication that they were they were listed as MIA/KIA. One thing I never wanted my folks to go through ever.

"I did sir, A friend of mine was on that chopper." came the response from the Senior Airman, I could see that it hurt him to say this, must have been a close friend to him then.

As we stood, there we heard one of the pilots talk over the radio. "Unidentified aircraft, we will escort you to US SOCCENT Airbase." Colonel sharp then turned to the Airman at the Radar terminal and asked, "Radar, where's the inbound?"

The Airman just looked at Colonel Sharp before answering, "Bogie's five miles out, sir." 'Hmmm,' I wondered, 'that would make their arrival time shortly before dark, which means the flood lights will need to be switched to face the landing area near the Control Tower.'
Colonel Sharp looked between me and the Airman, "I'll be up in the Tower for when the bogie arrives, I want to confirm this thing really is 4500X myself." he said and headed up the stairs to the main room of the Control Tower. I just hoped that it was going to be a quiet evening, but knowing the 'Powers of Worse,' it wasn't to be.

End Chapter Two
________________________________________
A.N. Please read and review... remember Flamers will be used to keep warm and roast marshmallows... maybe even roast Frenzy! *evil smirk*

Chapter Text

Chapter Three

US SOCCENT Base, Qatar

Middle East, 2007

Control Tower

Colonel Sharp was watching out of the observation windows of the Control Tower with his set of binoculars as the bogie flew by to the designated landing area. "4500 X. Something's not right." came the response to what he had verified with his own eyes, there was something not quite right about that Helicopter but he could not for the life of him figure out what it was.

He watched as some of his Security personnel went to surround the Helicopter when it landed. "Bogie's on the deck." came the voice over the PA System. Colonel Sharp watched with interest as the scene played out as trained.

Meanwhile back in the main control room below the Tower, another Senior Airman noticed something weird with the terminals. "Whoa, whoa, whoa. Radar's jammed. It's coming from the chopper." as he turned and picked up the phone next to him to contact the Colonel upstairs. "Sir, we have interference coming from the chopper that is messing with our Radar, we need them to power everything down to stop this." he said as he updated the Colonel on what was happening.

"Thank you, Airman. Keep us posted on anything else that happens." said Colonel Sharp as he hung up the phone and grabbed the mic for the PA System. "MH-53 Pilot, power down now." he watched as the Helicopter blades slowed as it powered it's engines down. "Have your crew step out or we will kill you." said Colonel Sharp over the PA System, as his men readied their weapons.

As soon as Colonel Sharp had said that, the Helicopter rotors stopped completely and suddenly, then with a move he had never seen before the Helicopter started to break apart and rearrange it's parts till it stood up as something he didn't recognize as other than some sort of robot. By now his troops were shooting at whatever this thing was. "My, God!" was all he could come up with as what happened next left him speechless.

The robot-looking thing started firing at his troops and then he heard a high-pitched whine before ducking as he saw a pale blue pulse wave heading straight out in a circle from the robot. Part of the wave hit the Control Tower breaking the windows out, by now Colonel Sharp was heading down into the main computer area of the building and was now trying to evacuate all the remaining personnel that were there.

Just as he was yelling orders to the remaining personnel the roof of the building was removed and a giant robotic hand attached itself to the Base mainframe, he knew this was not good. "Go! Move! Move!" he yelled to everyone there as he paused by one of the computer terminals, what he saw made his blood freeze; the robot - type - thing was downloading files from the DOD Mainframe, he caught a glimpse of a file with S7 on it and looked up as he heard the robot screech something he couldn't decipher.

"It's going after the files! Cut the hard lines!" he yelled to everyone who was running to get out of there. One Senior Airman - probably the same one from earlier, Colonel Sharp's mind suggested - yelled out "I need a key! It's locked!" as he yanked on a huge padlock holding the power lever secure.

Colonel Sharp looked around and grabbed a fire axe off of a nearby wall, running over to where the Senior Airman was standing and having him move out if the way. Colonel Sharp then proceeded to hack away at the main power lines to the mainframe and computer terminals. By this time Caliene had run out of the building to her tent for her weapon and pack and was now looking for Lennox and the rest of her squad.

Caliene's POV

I hoped beyond all hope that Colonel Sharp would survive this attack, he was a great CO to have and no one had anything negative to say about him, he was a fair but just CO - huh, wish all CO's were like that, he must be one of the few decent ones.

I had managed to get back to my tent, grab my M-24 and shoved a few MRE's into my pockets on my jacket and TAC vest, with some extra clips of ammo. Now I was running trying to find Lennox and the rest of the squad, I ducked just in time to see an M-1 Tank fly low over my head and then land on top of a couple of Jeeps, whatever this thing was, was out to destroy our base and so far was doing a damned good job.

I finally spotted Lennox, Mahfouz, Fig and Burke near another cluster of M-1 Tanks, hiding underneath the front portion where there was a slight overhang. I watched as Fig went to grab his gun from his back where he had obviously been carrying it, when I heard "No!" screamed, looking around I spotted Epps with a digital recorder aimed at the thing as he was laid out on the sand between the robots feet, I hope he got enough footage because I doubt anyone would believe we were attacked by a giant robot that had been a Helicopter.

What happened next shocked me as much as it apparently scared Epps, the robot morphed a fricking huge canon out of its chest area. Epps was still scampering backwards away from the robot whilst recording the thing on the digital recorder, I guess he thought that he was done for when I noticed a signal flare hit the robot near its face; good idea that since it was night out the robot had to be using some kind of night vision to see us or thermal imaging, which meant that a flare could screw it up really easy, enough so that we could get the heck out of dodge.

I watched from where I was positioned at and saw Lennox head on over to grab Epps, so to help out I too fried off a couple of flares at the towering robot, the darn thing had to stand an easy 25 - 30 ft tall. I didn't move from my spot till I heard Lennox yell "Epps, let's go!" and all but hauled him up by his shirt collar. As I headed towards Lennox, Epps and Fig who had by now met up again with Mahfouz and Burke, I turned around to see the robot spread what had been its propeller blades on its back and launch something out to hit the sand behind it. I was definitely not going to hang around to find out what that thing was either so I sped up and caught up with Lennox and the guys.

I told Lennox what I had observed before mentioning that since that thing was at the south-east end of our base that we head of to the north end and try and find some sort of safe spot to rest and regroup. We all hoped that others had survived this attack and that whoever was responsible for it was now in for major can of whoop-ass coming their way; failure was not an option for us at all.

End Chapter Three

A.N. Read and review please... *holds Frenzy at rifle point* If ya don't then Frenzy gets a few new holes! *sniggers* Nah I wouldn't be that mean to poor Frenzy, will probably use any flames to heat up Frenzy some Coffee though.

Chapter Text

Chapter Four

Somewhere in the Desert of Qatar - A full day after the Attack on SOCCENT Base.

Lennox's squad had been walking at a fast clip for a full day into the desert of Qatar, and already a few of the squad were complaining about the lack of water and food they had on what packs had been salvaged from the base whilst they were escaping from the destruction that that huge robot-thing had caused.

They were moving between the sand dunes and large boulders, guns at the ready as they tried to find a safe spot to rest, that had some shade and water. Finally after four hours of scouring the sand and boulders they made it to the top of a large sand hillock with an old disused tank sat on it, those who could find shade from its hulking mass did so, whilst Epps, Lennox, Caliene and Burke were talking and keeping watch out around the base of the tank whereas Fig was sat on the top keeping lookout from the high part of the remaining part of the turret.

"I've never seen a weapon's system like this. The thermal shows this weird aura around the exoskeleton like it's cloaked by some sort of invisible force field." said Epps as he finished looking through the shots he managed to get of the robot-thing before handing it off to Lennox.

"That's impossible. There's no such thing as invisible force fields except in, like, comic books stuff, right?" commented Donnely as he glanced down at us from his spot on top of the tank with Fig.

"Hey Donnely? Where the blazes do you think the writers got the ideas from in the first place? Think about it, the Government and Military have been working on secret stuff out in Area 51 since the mid-40's and onwards, how do you think we got the stuff we got now?" answered Caliene as she reached for the camera from Lennox.

Donnely just looked at her slack jawed and then snapped his mouth shut after shaking his head as if trying to grab what she had just told him. Surely she was kidding right? Instead of replying he just sat back down and kept lookout with Fig, whilst trying to wrap his head around everything.

Fig decided to speak up at this point. "I don't know, man. My mama, she had the gift, you know? She saw things. I got the gene, too and that thing that attacked us? I got a feeling that it ain't over."

"Yeah, I understand Fig. I keep getting the sense that we're being watched but we can't see them, who or whatever these things are." Caliene added as she smiled up at Fig, at least until Donnely put his two cents worth in.

"How about you use those Voodoo powers and get us the hell out of here, huh?" Caliene glared at Donnely after he said that,

"Don't joke about Voodoo, Donnely. There are things that you don't wanna mess with and joking about Voodoo and any other type of religious magic is just wrong, it may come back to bite you in the ass." she told him as she reached beneath her shirt and pulled forth her Triquetra and showed it to him watching his jaw drop once again, before he turned away and mumbled something about witches and Voodoo crazy people.

Meanwhile Epps and Lennox were still talking about the camera shots.

"When I took that picture, I think it saw me. It looked right at me." said Epps as he shook his head as if trying to shake the idea from his brain and having nightmares about the big terrifying robot-thing attacking the base.

"All right, we got to get this thing back to the Pentagon right away. They got to know what we're dealing with here." said Lennox as he handed the camera back to Epps for safe keeping.

"My radio's fried. I got no communication with aerial at all, and I bet ya all the other radios are out of commission too." said Epps as he took the camera and placed it in his pack on the sand.

Lennox walked over to where Mahfouz was stood looking around. "Hey, Mahfouz. How far do you live from here?" he asked the boy as the rest of the squad got ready to leave the tank behind.

"Not far. Just up that mountain." was the lads reply, and when Caliene and Epps looked at the direction Mahfouz had pointed in, they sighed, more hiking and climbing to come and hopefully it wouldn't be too much since they were very quickly running low on water.

"Do they have a phone?" asked Lennox, at which point the others smirked knowing that Lennox hated phone calls that weren't to his wife, or friends. "Yes." was the response he got from Mahfouz and Caliene then thought about it…. The military should make Satellite Phones mandatory for any Squad out here for emergencies where radios would not be beneficial.

"All right, let's hit it." said Lennox and everyone picked up what they had brought with them, which wasn't at all much, and headed out on the hike to the mountains in the distance where Mahfouz's family lived and hopefully a working phone to contact the Pentagon with their info of utmost importance.

End Chapter 4

Chapter Text

Chapter 5

Qatar - Middle East, Day three in the Desert

Normal POV

Caliene let out a sigh of relief as they finally stopped near to a transmission tower of some sort which meant some sort of antique phone they could use to contact a nearby base for extraction. Lennox just gave her the kind of look she was now so used to that they didn't need to say anything, she nodded back at him and started to get the rest of the squad into their proper placement for securing the area whilst Epps and Lennox got on the horn to someone on their side.

"Let's hope this telephone line works." said Lennox as Epps stopped and grabbed a drink out of the nearby warm water barrel before proceeding to pour another cups worth over his dark shaved head to help cool down in the 130 degree plus weather.

Everyone was minding their own points on the edge of the area surrounding the communications tower when Caliene thought she saw something moving underneath the sand, she shook her head - the heat and sun must really be playing havoc with her mind.

A short while later - maybe five minutes by Caliene's reckoning everyone but Donnely jumped as something cut through the support struts of the comm. tower and sent it crashing to the ground, ironically just missing hitting Donnely. Caliene and Lennox both shouted at the same time "Heads up! Hey! Heads up!"

Caliene walked quickly over to where Donnely and Fig were standing and as she got closer she heard Donnely say "What the heck was that?" to Fig who just shrugged and started to mutter off into Spanish - at which point Caliene just grinned when she caught on to what Fig was saying. Donnely just looked at Fig then looked away muttering "English, dude. English."

Caliene was about to chew Donnely out for not paying attention to what was going on around him when they all turned to see Epps yell and jump back making Lennox turn and yell from the sudden realization that he was nearly a Ranger shish kabob. By this time everyone was moving around, but Epps looked like his Desert Camo pants were on fire. As everyone was constantly moving and shooting at the sand below them watching for the strange metal spear to rise out of the ground again, they almost missed it as a hump appeared in between the group and there was loud yells of "Watch Out!"

What Caliene and the others saw next was not what anyone was expecting as a giant metal scorpion and Caliene estimated it to be the size of a tank, rose from the sand past them and then back under the sand. As soon as it had disappeared back under the sand, everyone started to fire at where they saw ripples in the sand. Everyone decided at that moment to turn and run down the sand dunes, shooting into it as they went with shouts of "Contact! Contact!" from Sgt Burke as he was spinning around and shooting at the sand behind him.

They stopped as they reached the bottom of the sand dune and tried to catch their breath. Lennox tried to take back control of the situation, "Quiet, settle." he said as he caught his breath and senses back, whatever that thing was Caliene was sure that it wasn't gone and was now twitchy - not a good thing for a sniper to be. Epps was still freaking out if the expressions of "Whoa, mother…." and "What the hell is…" were to go by, nearby the rest of the squad were still looking around the sand surrounding them.

Donnely scanned the sand and when Caliene looked over to him she was wishing she hadn't as she watched in what seemed to be slow motion as the scorpion looking machine exploded from the sand behind Donnely and impaled him on the spear-like tail, then proceeded to swing him around a number of times, before flinging his now dead body off its tail. At the sound of Caliene's rifle firing, the rest of the soldiers just started running and shouting to one another. Lennox looked around for everyone who was alive yet and spotted Mahfouz down on the sand, he ran over to the boy and helped him up all the while saying "Get up! Get up! Get up!"

As Caliene ran to help Lennox and Mahfouz down the sand dunes to the rocky outcropping she watched as the metal scorpion thing erupted from the sand dunes right behind where Epps, Fig and Sergeant Burke before diving back down under the sand it's claw like things spinning. She almost stopped completely to try and see where the monster would erupt from, until she heard Lennox yelling "Go! Move it!" so she turned once again to follow Lennox and the rest of her squad out of a rather dangerous situation in the loose sand.

As the neared the village the Mahfouz lived in with his father, Caliene could see the villagers all screaming and clamoring about in a panic as they saw the squad running up to them and taking cover behind any stone protrusion that could offer any type of cover. Just as Caliene and Epps headed for the same spot, she heard Lennox yell as he hit the dirt behind a clump of old crumbling wall. She shook her head in confusion until she saw the Metal Scorpion erupt from the sand once more screeching as it landed and searching around for them as a few of the squad started shooting at it with the hope of knocking it down.

The only warning that Cali got that the monster was ready to shoot them was Lennox's shout of "Take cover!" So Cali took his advice…. She lay down in the sand and readied her M-24 SWS Rifle and prepared for the shot whilst hoping that the wall she was behind would stand up to the firefight going on around her. She looked through her scope and watched as the monster… scorpion looking robot thing started to shoot back at her team mates. She took a shot that was aimed at one of its claw like weapons which had energy cannons of some kind inside and hoped the shot took out at least one of them.

She heard Lennox yelling to the rest of the squad as she readied another shot. "Fig! Cover the rear! Cover fire! Move it! Fig! Cover the rear! Epps! Cover the rear! Move it!" she smirked internally at the fact that Lennox had to repeat his order to Fig, well she did until he ran up to her and yelled "Come on! Give me a mag!" so she quickly took a spare mag of rounds out of her belt and threw it back towards him without looking. "Thanks and keep hitting the blasted thing, we need to find a phone and get through to the Pentagon and get some Air Support here." Cali just sighed and aimed another round at the scorpion like monster.

"Yes Sir, but just remember, we all need to get outta here and I suggest we get in the 'Hogs' if they can't take this thing out I don't think anything can." she replied as he tapped her shoulder and headed off to find a phone.

She heard Epps yelling off to her left, "Hey, I need a mag! Give me a mag!"

She looked at him and yelled "Here take the last one, all I got left are the rounds for my M-24 so make each one count!" and she threw the last magazine to him.

He waved and loaded his gun and yelled "Fire!"

She fired off a couple more rounds at the robotic scorpion monster and headed on over closer to Epps, as she did so she noticed Lennox yelling into a cell phone. "This is an emergency Pentagon call! I need you to…. Do you understand? It's an emergency Pentagon…."

She sighed and shook her head as she fired yet another round at the monster as Lennox continued to argue with the idiot on the other end of the phone. "I don't have a credit card! I'm in the middle of a war! *sigh* This is frigging ridiculous!" He flinched slightly as Epps yelled near us for more ammo, before yelling out "I need a credit card!" and looked around. Cali shook her head at him and mouthed that she didn't carry one on her. Lennox nodded and turned towards Epps, "Epps! Where's your wallet?"

"Pocket!" yelled Epps as he continued to fire at the metal Scorpion.

"Which Pocket?" yelled Lennox as he looked at the pants of Epps in exasperation.

"My back pocket!" Epps yelled back as he loaded in a fresh clip of ammo.

"Epps you have like 10 Back Pockets!" came Cali's voice over the noise of gunfire and falling stone work and Lennox smirked as Epps looked at her closely and muttered something under his breath about female snipers before yelling to Lennox, "Left Cheek! Left Cheek! Left Cheek!" At this Cali just about cracked up laughing - or she would have done if she wasn't fighting for the lives of herself and her team mates, leave it to Epps and Lennox to crack jokes during a firefight.

Lennox found the required wallet and remarked, "All right, keep shooting! Keep Shooting!" as he headed off to an area of some protection - ironically where Cali was hunkered down and removed the card and spoke into the cell phone. By now Cali was sat behind a low stone wall that had so far survived the Scorpion things attacks and was loading up her assault rifle with the request ammo and placing her Sniper System carefully against a couple of large chunks of masonry where the sand wouldn't interfere with any of the mechanisms. As she sat there getting the other weapons ready, she heard most of the conversation with Lennox and whoever was on the other end of the call.

"Ok, it's a Visa…. No, I don't want the premium package!" at this point Lennox was getting exasperated with the other person he was talking to and just as Cali thought that he was going to throw the phone down and stamp on it he threw it towards Epps yelling, "Epps! Pentagon!" Epps quickly and carefully caught the cell phone as it sailed right at him and Caliene thanked whatever deity listened that he was a good catch.

He had by now made his way over to where Cali and Lennox were squatting and shooting at the Scorpion thing as he talked to whoever was on the other end. "I ain't never seen this in my life! Need gunships on station ASAP!" and Cali and Lennox exchanged a smirk as they heard the tone of Epps' voice behind them - he was starting to panic some. "Unknown, man. I don't… Man, if you seen this shit…" and before he could finish his response we all heard another Sgt. yell out "Hey! Make way!" as we turned to see the building behind us take a hit and crumble debris down on top of people - civilian and military alike, this was in Cali's opinion getting worse and worse as it continued.

Epps had by now gotten most of the info to the guys on the other end and rattled off, "Seven-man team north of orange smoke! Attack direction west! You're clear and hot!" as he threw an orange smoke gas grenade out towards the monster and awaited the attack. As soon as that was done Caliene and Lennox heard Epps yell, "Lennox! The heat's coming!"

End Chapter 5

Chapter Text

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the Transformers or Humans that are recognized from the Movies. I only own Caliene, as she is based off of several people I know well. If I did own Transformers, I would be a very, very happy Femme.

Now on to the story.

Previously in Chapter 5:

Epps had by now gotten most of the info to the guys on the other end and rattled off, "Seven-man team north of orange smoke! Attack direction west! You're clear and hot!" as he threw an orange smoke gas grenade out towards the monster and awaited the attack. As soon as that was done Caliene and Lennox heard Epps yell, "Lennox! The heat's coming!"

And now onto Chapter 6 enjoy.

Qatar, Middle East: Still fighting Scorponok

"Laze the target! We got a beam-rider incoming! Laze the target!" was yelled by Lennox to anyone who could hear him, and Cali sighed as she stopped firing directly at the Scorpion looking robot and activated the green laser on the side of her guns barrel. Beam-riding missiles were difficult to control once they were launched from the planes that fired them a in this case that would be the A-10 Warthogs that had been called in, since they required the beam of light to be sat on the target that was to be hit, if they were just one millimeter off it could wipe out a large area and anybody in it.

For this reason there were more than five laser beams aimed at the Scorpion robot, at least it wouldn't miss the target that way. As all this was going through her mind, that damnable Scorpion robot was still firing on them and the others, taking down walls, homes and the occasional life. Cali decided that the sooner this battle was over with the better, and smirked when she heard Lennox yell "Ready! Heat's coming!" and then she smirked as she heard Epps yell a rather happy "What? Bring it!" as he searched the skies for their air support.

She glanced up as she heard the unmistakable sound of the A-10 as one of the pair fired their 30mm Gatling guns at the Scorpion robot and strafing the area around it as close as possible without hitting any of the troops on the ground, then she saw the other A-10 fire its missiles at the Scorpion robot and she held her breath as she awaited the impact of them, hoping against hope that they had finally taken the menace out.

What met her eyes after the smoke cleared was not a good sight: there still moving but definitely damaged somewhat was the Scorpion robot. Cali heaved a resigned sigh as she quickly thought up a plan. She heard Epps exclaiming that "No frigging way, that thing's still not down."

That was when her idea struck her. Turning to Epps she tapped his arm and gave him her idea, if normal ammunition didn't work and missiles only hindered it a bit, then what about using something that even a ``tank couldn't survive. She was talking about using 105 sabot rounds, definitely not something to play around with at any rate.

She smiled when Epps picked up the cell phone again and contacted the person on the other end by saying "Spooky Three Two, use 105 shells. Bring the rain!" Cali mentally cheered when she heard that and watched for the gunship to arrive and take out the annoyance with some of the best shells that could be fired from a gun, even if they were 40mm high-heat shells.

The squad watched as Spooky Three Two fired upon the Scorpion robot with multiple bursts of 105 shells, they really couldn't tell much since it disturbed a lot of sand and dust back into the air, but once it had cleared enough, she noticed the robot rolling around like it was in agony. She groaned though when she spotted it fleeing under the sand to escape the shelling it was getting, but then noticed that it had left behind some of it's tail… the same tail that she had seen it kill Donnely with. They might finally catch a break with what they could learn from this specimen of the robot that was left behind.

It was soon after that Cali was brought out of her musing by Lennox yelling "Where's Fig?"

At this point every remaining squad member jumped to and started looking for the Spanish speaking goofball they all loved. Lennox was climbing and looking around whilst yelling out "Fig? Fig?" It was Cali who heard Fig yelling "Oh, God! God damn it!" and yet it was Lennox who found him, laying on the ground holding his midsection as if he could stop his internals from falling out, from this Cali could deduce that he had suffered a rather bad gut wound. If he was lucky he might survive it, if not he would be dead within a short few hours. She made up her mind there and then that she would seek revenge on the creatures that caused this to one of her fellow soldiers.

Lennox yelled to the nearest soldier that wasn't Cali, since she had grabbed one of Fig's hands to let him know she was there and started muttering to him in Spanish to keep him coherent. "Get a medic! Get a medic!" Cali barely heard Epps talking into the cell phone once more calling in a Black Hawk Medevac, Lennox was talking and saying "We'll get a medic. Just hold on…" to Fig and then to anyone who would listen to him that "He's got a pulse."

Epps was a constant in the background as he spoke into the phone once more. "We need a Medevac. One man down. Patient care category Urgent!" Now when Cali heard that coming from Epps she was now worried that her friend Fig would die before help got here, so she did what she could: she prayed to what ever Deity would listen to her cries for help in saving a good mans life.

Roughly 20 minutes after the call went out for a Medevac, Lennox was waving his arms to signal to the chopper pilot that he was to land nearby. Whilst this was happening, Cali and the only other person with any type of useful medical knowledge were trying their hardest to stabilize Fig enough for transport. Cali felt sorry for Fig and kept telling him so and that if he made it through all this she was going to drag him back to her home town and take him hunting on her family's acreage and bag a few deer this coming hunting season.

A few hours later - On board a C-17 over the Atlantic

After delivering Fig to the Major US Military Hospital in Europe, the rest of Lennox's squad boarded a C-17 bound for the US. Lennox, Epps and Cali were inspecting the remnants of the tail segment they had managed to salvage from the Scorpion robot.

"It's like a self-regenerating molecular armor." said Cali as she looked at it closely with a magnifying lens and a probe. She was fascinated with this discovery, and was almost total engrossed in it when Lennox decided to get a few words in.

"Look at the scorch mark where the sabot round hit. Melted right through." he said as he peered over the top of Cali's head to look through the magnifying lens as she scraped at the hole in the armor. Turning to Epps he continued his spiel.

"Hey aren't sabots hot-loaded for, like, a 6,000-degree magnesium burn?" he asked sounding just a little bit intrigued now.

"Close to it. It melts tank armor." replied Epps as he too looked over what Cali was scraping off of the tail segment.

"So this metal skin must react to extreme heat." countered Lennox as he looked at Epps for confirmation, as this was going on Cali yelled a "Heads up!" and jumped back about a foot as the tail moved and pierced the tabletop near to where Epps had had his hand just seconds before and when she looked she noticed that it had just missed piercing the USAF Technical Manual.

Cali sniggered when Epps yelled "Oh!" before turning to Lennox and complaining. "I thought you said that thing was dead, man!"

Cali watched it carefully as the tail segment uncoiled from the strike position and helped when Sergeant Burke, Lennox and one other helped to pin it down. The whole time they're holding it Lennox was shouting at someone to "Strap it down! Strap it!" After making sure the others had a hold of the tail, he let go and pointed at it. "This thing is wicked!"

As soon as he had gotten the shock out of his system, he turned to Epps and Cali and said "Get on the horn with Northern Command. Tell them that our effective weapon is high-heat sabot rounds. Recommend we load them on all the gun ships. Go!" Cali punched Epps lightly on the arm saying a cheerful "you're it Epps!" and wandered back to the table to clean up the mess caused when the tail segment attacked, especially since in a few more hours they would be setting down wheels on the ground at one of many Airbases for a debrief before heading to their own base.

2 hours after their 1st debrief - Nellis AFB, United States

Everyone had unloaded and were heading to their respective barracks, most were looking forward to a hot shower and a soft bed after what they'd all been through the past few days, and Cali was looking forward to seeing her cat Magick again, he always cheered her up after a hard mission or a rather longer than planned posting. Between her cat and the firing range she had her stress relief planned out for the next few weeks.

After getting everything placed away in her rooms, she headed back to the C-17 they had arrived on and helped Lennox and Epps grab the remaining duffels and lug them to be sorted through, she cringed when she thought about the letter that needed to be written to Donnely's folks about his death… he really had been a good kid, even if he did tend to drive ya crazy when he went into one of his talks on comic books or, in her case, Baseball… she couldn't stand the game herself.

She was just about to ask Epps and Lennox about what they were gonna do with their request for down time with their families when they all turned to see three or four government issue SUV's pull up and some government suit climbed out of the first vehicle and headed straight towards them saying "Captain Lennox, we need you and your team to come with us right now! Let's Go!" as he finished saying this he grabbed a hold of the duffel Lennox had been holding and carried it to the SUV's. Two other men in suits came over and grabbed the duffels that Epps and Cali were carrying and did the same thing.

Lennox looked confusedly at Epps and Cali to ask what they should do, all Epps did was shrug his shoulders and started walking to the SUV's, whereas Cali just muttered in Spanish "¡Qué maravilla! Este tío es una noticia muy mala!"(1) and then added "Mr. Big: es un viento contrario marrón y muy molesto y toady mirando!"(2)

Lennox just shook his head with a smirk and asked "Cali? Do I want to know what you just said or is it not very nice?"

Cali just shrugged, gave him a smirk that made him shudder, and walked towards one of the black SUV's that were waiting for them. Lennox followed with Epps, who was muttering about those who spoke Spanish needing a swift slap to the back of the head, causing Lennox to laugh slightly as they climbed into the vehicles where all laughing, smiles and such ended as they were taken to collect sergeant Burke and the others before leaving Nellis AFB to go who knew where.

A.N.: I am sorry for those of you readers who speak fluent Spanish, but I am using an online translatory program that helps meh come up with what I need for Cali. I am trying very hard to keep the other characters in as much of their original-ness as I can whilst having enough leaway to make them mesh together better as a unit, just like any Military group there will be ups and downs - I should know since I am a member, both raised and married, let alone served for a time, so I am also pulling on mah own experiences as well as those I personnally know that are still serving in the Middle East.

Please Review and let meh know what ya think... Any flames will be used to roast marshmallows and then smear them over Frenzy before leaving him to the mercy of mah 11 Cats (They love Marshmallows! Go figure!)

Spanish translations:

(1) How wonderful! This guy is extremely bad news!

(2) Mr. Big: is a brown noser and very annoying and toady looking!

Chapter Text

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the Transformers or Humans that are recognized from the Movies. I only own Caliene, as she is based off of several people I know well. If I did own Transformers, I would be a very, very happy Femme.

Now on to the story.

Chapter 7.

(Lennox and his squad are sat in one of two Black Hawk helicopters that are transporting them to where they are to meet with the SecDef about what they saw in Qatar.)

Cali decided to make the most of the silence and plugged her ear buds of her MP3 player into her ears and listened to some of her music, she was bobbing her head along to the beat of 'Highway to the Dangerzone' and smirking as she listened, she knew the lyrics by heart and was gonna have to wait til they got back to base before she could sing her heart out the way she liked… usually after a few beers with a while they landed the Black Hawk helicopters and disembarked into the awaiting black government SUV's.

As soon as they placed their duffels in the back of the SUV's, Cali looked around and spotted a group consisting of a young boy, one blond woman, a brunette girl and a dark skinned chubby guy, 'now what could the government want with those four?' she wondered to herself as she climbed into the SUV with Lennox and Epps. Sergeant Burke and the two other members of the group were in a third SUV and followed theirs.

45 minute drive from drop-off point at the Helicopters

Cali gawped at the sight before her, they were being driven to the Hoover Dam. But what confused her was 'WHY!' She had always wanted to visit this tourist attraction, but she never for the life of her thought it would be with her Squad members at the request of the SecDef. She mentally squeed at the thought that her brothers would go crazy when they found that she had been without them there. She followed the rest of her Squad members to one of the side pylons off of the Dam and stood in line and awaited for the SecDef to arrive and tell them why exactly they were 20 minutes after they had arrived, Cali and Epps noticed the SecDef walking up to where they were stood, she hid the smirk that came to her mind as Epps yelled out "Team attention! Present arms!"

The Squad moved in synchrony as they saluted the SecDef and stood rigid at attention."At ease. Captain's, Sergeant. Got your intel. Excellent work." said the SecDef as he faced the Squad looking at all the remaining members. "Thank you, Sir." came the quick and crisp response from both Lennox and Cali. 

Lennox then decided to ask the one question that was bugging nearly all of the troops. "What about the gunship's?"

The SecDef smiled at both the Captain's as he said, "They're being retrofitted with sabot rounds now. If they hit us again, we'll be ready for them. But it wouldn't do us much good if we can't get world communications back up."

The next 45 minutes was spent traipsing through the corridors of the Hoover Dam following a man, that Cali was sure was related to a rat with his hair and expression of superiority that irked her really badly. She wanted so badly to just wallop him and not have to deal with his snide comments about things that were minor. They finally made it out at the bottom of the Dam and yet again the rat-guy, who she found out was named Simmons, started to talk. "All right, here's the situation. You've all had direct contact with the NBE's."

"NBE's?" asked a bemused Epps, as he beat Cali to the punch so to speak.

"Non-Biological Extraterrestrials. Try and keep up with the acronyms." replied Simmons.

The group slowly walked through a large service tunnel into a giant room. While this was happening Simmons decided to continue with his spiel. "What you are about to see is totally classified." Everyone that was present in the group stared wide-eyed in awe at the monolithic robot-man that was being held in what Cali deemed to be a type of Cryo-stasis. What was said next: "Dear God. What is this?" by none other than the Secretary of Defense, made everyone want to know the answer. A man, that Cali would find out later was named Banachek answered the SecDef's question.

"We think that when he made his approach over the north pole, our gravitational field screwed up his telemetry. He crashed in the ice, probably a few thousand years ago. We shipped him to this facility in 1934." Simmons then decided to add in his two-cents. "We call him NBE One."

By this point Cali really wanted to just punch Simmons and do everyone a favor. She was surprised to hear the young teen respond to Simmons, "Well, sir, I don't mean to correct you on everything you think you know, but, I mean, that's Megatron. He's the leader of the Decepticons." and she swore she could Simmons' eye twitch, damn she was going to buy that kid a drink once they got out of there - non-alcoholic of course.

Banachek responded with, "He's been in Cryo-stasis since 1935. Your Great-great-grandfather made one of the greatest discoveries in the history of man kind." Once again, not to be outdone, Simmons turned to the boy and added "Fact is, you're looking at the source of the modern age, the microchip, lasers, spaceflight, cars, all reverse-engineered by studying him. NBE One. That's what we call it." The SecDef by now was looking slightly pale, but he responded to what Simmons said, "And you didn't think the United States Military might need to know that you're keeping a hostile alien robot frozen in the basement?" When the SecDef was done Cali was mentally cheering the older gentleman. Banachek tried to defuse the situation between Simmons and the SecDef by saying, "Until these events, we had no credible threat to National Security." But apparently the SecDef thought otherwise and the situation quickly went to pot. "Well, you got one now!" came the response from the now very aggravated SecDef.

It seemed that any credibility that either Simmons or Banachek had was now almost non-existent at this point in time, and Cali wouldn't have been surprised if neither of the two men in question had a job by the end of the day. By this point Lennox had decided that he wanted a question answered that had been bugging him for a while now. "So why Earth?"

"It's the All Spark." came the response from the boy as if that meant anything to those in the group stood around the base of the platform holding Megatron. "All Spark? What is that?" came the intrigued voice of the SecDef. Cali also hoped that this boy knew something more than what they were being told by Simmons and Banachek."Well, yeah, they came here looking for some sort of cube-looking thing. Anyway, Mr. NBE One here, AKA Megatron, that's what they call him, who's pretty much the harbinger of death, wants to use the Cube to transform human technology to take over the universe. That's their plan." came the now confident voice of the boy. "And you're sure about that?" came Simmons' snarky remark.

Cali and Lennox shared a quick glance with Epps and the others in their Squad when Simmons said that, it was a look that said that the boy was more forthcoming with the information than the two Government idiots that were trying to hide this from the general populace. "Yeah." the boy said as his eyes turned and looked at Simmons directly as he asked the next question, "You guys know where it is, don't you?" The look on the boys face was one of shear disbelief that these morons were keeping it anywhere near Megatron - this was officially looking bad to Caliene and her Squad mates, you don't keep something the enemy wants right next to them, you make sure that it is far, far away from where ever you imprisoned enemy is being held. Especially an alien who is bent on taking over the world with an army of transformed electronics, Banachek sighed and looked at everyone, "Follow me." thus they left the room containing a still very frozen Megatron and followed Banachek to where Cali guessed this Cube, the All Spark was being held.

"You're about to see our crown jewel." declared a now pompous looking Simmons, that after traipsing through a few more tunnels, opened a door to an observation room. Everyone looked through the small window that had been put in the room to view from, and they could see a massive Cube of metal with scaffolding around it with technicians and scientists walking around on as they continued to study it unaware of their decided to tell them some about the Cube whilst they were still captivated by the beauty of the Cube. "Carbon dating puts the Cube here around 10,000 BC. The First Seven didn't find it until 1913. They knew it was alien because of the matching hieroglyphics on the Cube as well as NBE One. President Hoover had the Dam built around it. Four football fields thick of concrete. A perfect way to hide it's energy from being detected by anyone or any alien species on the outside." Cali was about to ask a question that she knew was going to be asked after that little revelation, but she was beaten to the punch by an Australian accent - the tall, young looking blond woman.

"Wait, back up. You said the Dam hides the Cube's energy. What kind exactly?" she asked looking at Banachek and the back at the Cube.

"Good question." came his quick response as he led them to a small secure room that had a weird lit up box in the center and a technician standing beside it. "Step inside. They have to lock us in." and Cali turned when she realized that Banachek was indeed correct - she watched as the heavy blast-proof security door was shut with a clang and locked from the outside, she winced as she heard the locks slam into knew Cali detested being locked in any type of room that she couldn't see a working handle to open the door with, so he looked around the room and made a quick observation about the walls, especially a few spots that were a good 2ft or more above his own head.

"Oh, wow." he said as he saw one set of particularly nasty claw marks that went through the metal plating, "What's that? Freddy Krueger done been in here or something?" Cali detected a slight amount of awe in Epps' voice when he said that, and looking over where he had been looking she saw why - it had to have been something almost diamond sharp to slash through 6 inch steel plate like a hot knife through butter.

Cali turned and face palmed when the chubby computer-geek exclaimed, "Oh, no, man. Freddy Krueger have four blades, man. That's only three. That's Wolverine!" he made a weird snarling sound crossed with a chomp and laughed a little as he added, "Right? That's Wolverine!" She looked to Epps in sympathy when he caught her eyes looking in his direction, no-one should have to suffer what one of her brothers had termed a 'Geek-asm', well unless it was Military related, such as weapons and such because by then it didn't soon as Epps had made his way over to where Cali and Lennox were standing, Simmons opened his mouth to reply, "That's very funny."

Everyone in the room could obviously tell there was quite a bit of sarcasm in that short response, and even though she thought the Geek was weird, he didn't need to be put down like that as she watched said Geek visibly deflate from the remark and she forcibly restrained herself from hitting Simmons. "Anyone have any mechanical devices? Blackberry? Key Alarm? Cell phone?" he asked as he looked around the room at everyone. The Geek then answered the question reluctantly, "I got a phone" and tossed it to Simmons, who then placed it into the small strange box in the center of the room and shutting the door on it. Apparently Simmons didn't know when to shut up - must have liked hearing his own voice, when he uttered, "Nokia's are really nasty. You've got to respect the Japanese. They know the way of the Samurai."

The blonde Australian, who she found out was named Maggie, who was stood next to Cali as well as the SecDef, muttered so that only they could hear, "Nokia's from Finland!" Cali smiled a wide smile and snorted with suppressed laughter at the SecDef when he responded, "Yes, but he's, you know, a little strange. He's a little strange." She decided that 'Strange' didn't even begin to cover the description of Simmons, 'Crazy' now that was only just touching the surface of Simmons, when her attention was brought back to the present when Simmons powered up the box and they all watched as a probe dropped down from the roof of the box to just above the cell phone. They placed light filtering goggles on over their eyes to protect them, when Simmons decided to tell everyone how they did it as he continued to flip switches.

"We're able to take the Cube radiation and funnel it into that box." They all starred in amazement as the probe pulsed a charge into the cell shuddered as she felt a light tingle crawl across the hairs of her arms and neck before her attention was brought back to the situation at hand, when she heard a sound of moving parts. Looking close she could visibly see the cell phone split apart and reform into a small little robot with red optics. Everyone but Simmons and Banachek jumped as it started to attack and shoot up the interior of the box. "Mean little sucker, huh?" said Simmons as he walked in a circle around everyone keeping an eye on the box containing the robot."That thing's freaky!" exclaimed Maggie as Simmons grinned a manic grin - you know the kind that just screams 'Dr. Frankenstein' and made Cali shudder again, she really didn't like this guy. "Kind of like the itty-bitty Energizer Bunny from hell, huh?" was his response as the little cell phone continued it's attack on it's confines, by this point Cali just couldn't take it, she was getting the feeling that the robot was scared and doing what any cornered and frightened creature would do - try to escape and take down anything that was stopping it.

She ripped open the door to the box and grabbed at the cell phone-turned-robot and held it close murmuring to it to relax and that it would be safe. Everyone just gawped as the little robot retracted it's weapons nodded it's small head and folded down into the form of a normal cell just starred at her and Lennox shrugged as if to say 'You're on ya own this time, Cali. Ya really gone and done it now!' Frowning at Simmons and Banachek, Cali gently placed the cell phone robot in her top chest pocket on her BDU jacket, she figured it would be safer there and the Goddess help anyone who tried to take the innocent little thing away from her - she sighed, where in the seven levels of hell were these feelings coming from? Was it her maternal instincts kicking in or was it something else, she really didn't know, what she did know was that she was now the parent to a cell phone robot that was sentient. Her family were going to freak if they ever found out. Looking around the room, she saw the look of shock on the young brunette lad's face and awe on the girl's face that with him, she nodded at them as if to say 'I had to do something!' As if they understood, they nodded slightly and the lad smiled a timid smile at Cali that seemed to say 'Ya kinda alright for Military!' Cali was about to say something to Simmons about trying to play God when the room shook, she tensed and looked at Lennox who nodded - whatever was going on was bad, really bad!

A.N.: I am doing pretty well. All I can really say is this: Please review! It helps me to know exactly what you the readers think of the story and what you hope to see in later chapters.

I am hoping to combine both of the Bay Verse TF Movies in this storyline so once the first Movie is done there will be a lull in between the chapters as I get the info I require for the second part. Any Flames will be used to cook Ravage's meals.

Chapter Text

This chapter had meh stumped for a while, I knew where I wanted it to go direction wise, but i just couldn't get it to go down right.

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the Transformers or Humans that are recognized from the Movies. I only own Caliene, as she is based off of several people I know well. If I did own Transformers, I would be a very, very happy Femme.

Now on to the story.

Chapter 8.

Everyone was startled when the lights in the room flickered with a groan and banging noises above them. They all turned during a lull in the noises when the SecDef mentioned, "Gentlemen, they know the Cube is here."

Cali turned and looked at Banachek when he clicked on a button on an old intercom on the back desk. "Banachek. What's going on?" She frowned when the response came over the speaker. "Well, the NBE-One hanger has lost power..." She knew that that wasn't good to hear, especially since they had need of the energy made here at the dam to keep Megatron under ice for as long as possible. She all but ignored what Banachek said next until she heard the response. "...and the backup generator is just not gonna cut it."

At the same time as Cali growled about the backup generator, Lennox walked over to Banachek and asked him, "Do you have an arms room?"

They ran from the room with the box, into a chaotic scene right out of 'God of War 2'; the workers were fleeing in terror. Banachek yelled to anyone who would listen, "Get everyone to the NBE-One chamber now!"

Lennox and Cali were bringing up the rear and both were yelling, "Move it! Move it!" to those who were lagging behind. Cali jumped slightly when the cell phone she was carrying decided at that time to morph back into it's robot mode and started to chirp at her as they ran. Trying to run and not hit anyone she cautiously looked at the cell phone 'bot and sighed. "Ya know, you really need a name. One that stands out from all the rest." she said as it continued to chirp at her as if agreeing.

Placing the little robot close to her in her BDU Jacket pocket for safety as she ran, she heard Banachek yell as they continued towards the Armory, "They're popping our generators!"

She sighed as she thought about a good name for the little bot, she thought back to all she had learned whilst practicing her Wiccan ways, and she came up with three possible names: Anubis, Thoth, and Mithra. She weighed up the possible reasons for those names and what went through her mind was relayed to the small 'bot in her pocket on her BDU Jacket as she talked to it/him, she stared as the small 'bot crawled out of her pocket and sat in her open hands as they headed to where Lennox wanted to go with Banachek in the lead.

Anubis: Egyptian; Guardian of Isis. Jackal-headed God of Protection. Call on him to protect both home and person.

Mithra: Persian; Sun God and Bringer of Light. A Soldier's God.

Thoth: Egyptian; God of Reincarnation. Also a Moon God and favorable to Science and Wisdom.

Looking down towards the small 'bot in her hands as she mentioned each name, she weighed up the responses that it/he had for each name. When she mentioned Mithra the little bot brought out his rocket launcher, and she took that as a 'Not on your life, you crazy woman!' so she decided to try one of the other names, when she mentioned the name Thoth he completely shut down and folded into his cell phone form and a text message appeared on the small screen; 'Are you crazy!'

She shook her head as they finally reached the Armory and watched as Lennox, Epps and Burke helped to get the Assault Vehicles loaded up with guns and boxes of ammunition. She went to help but then she said to the cell phone in her hands, "So you want the name Anubis?" As if she had said the right thing, the little phone unfolded and hopped up and down in her hands chirping away. "I'll take that as a 'Yes' then." she replied as he kept jumping up and down chirruping now as if pleased to finally hear it's name.

She was heading over with Anubis the cell phone robot, to help Burke load up the 40mm Sabot Launchers with the ammunition from the secure boxes, when Anubis folded down into his phone mode as the brunette lad walked past her and grabbed Simmons. "You got to take me to my car. You have to take me to my car. He's gonna know what to do with the Cube." Cali noticed that he said 'that his car would know what to do with the Cube.' Was the lads car like Anubis? Was his car... Sentient?

Cali internally groaned as she thought about those questions for a few seconds and decided right at that point in time that she certainly didn't get paid nearly enough to deal with this sort of stuff - it was if she and her Squad had been transported to another dimension completely, where Science Fiction became Science Fact. Yep she would definitely require some extensive vacation time after all of this.

She was about to say something to Lennox about any possible time off, when she heard Simmons respond to the brunette's request to get to see his Sentient car. "Your car? It's confiscated."

"Then unconfiscate it." said the brunette as he got in Simmons' face about it.

"We do not know what will happen if we let it near this thing!" came the reply from Simmons as Cali stood and watched the exchange, with a rather curious 'bot in her hands that was also now watching the exchange.

"You don't know." said the brunette as Simmons kept on ranting now about the kids car.

"Maybe you know, but I don't know." By this point Cali wanted to just slap the man stupid and drag the kid back to his car and get the hell outta dodge, what was said next pretty much made up her mind for her as she placed her cell phone robot back into her BDU pocket and apparently Lennox thought the same as well.

"You just wanna sit here and wait and see what happens?" came the exasperated tone of the brunette, only to have Simmons turn around and respond with, "I have people's lives at stake here, young man."

Lennox grabbed Simmons by the front of his shirt and slammed him against one of the assault buggies whilst saying in a calm voice, "Take him to his car!" Cali stood besides Lennox as the pair drew their own weapons and aimed them at encroaching S7 soldiers as they tried to get to Simmons. "Drop it!" growled out Cali, thus giving the rest of the Squad the go ahead they needed to help out with the remaining S7 personnel. She smiled as she watched Sgt. Burke slam a rifle butt into two agents faces and Epps also took down another soldier not of their close-knit Squad.

"Whoa! Whoa! Whoa!" came the voice of Banachek, to Cali he was sounding a little fearful, but that could just be from the fact that they all had guns pointed at them. Simmons was apparently trying to reason with Lennox as she heard him comment, "Drop your weapon, soldier. There's an alien war going on and you're gonna shoot me?" Cali just shook her head and answered him for Lennox, "Don't tempt me or Captain Lennox right now, Simmons. This could go either way right now and you don't wanna have us all pissed off at you now."

Lennox nodded and added, "You know, we didn't ask to be here."

Apparently Simmons really didn't know when to shut his mouth and just do as the kid wanted, Cali was trying really hard at this point to not blow Simmons' brains everywhere. "I'm ordering you under S-Seven executive jurisdiction." came his smarmy yet slightly panicked reply.

"S-Seven don't exist." replied Epps, as he kept his gun trained on the other S-Seven personnel.

"Right. And we don't take orders from people who don't exist." Added Lennox as he continued to hold Simmons still at gun point. As soon as Cali heard both her fellow soldiers say their words, she smiled she fully agreed with what they had said, they really didn't take orders from people who never existed on paper.

"I'm gonna count to five. Okay." said Simmons, hoping that Lennox and the others listened to him and let them all go.

"Well, I'm gonna count to three." said Lennox as he aimed his gun with the safety off over Simmons' heart. "And I'm gonna count to two and half." responded Cali as she aimed her handgun at Simmons' head, she swore she saw his eyes widen slightly and that she saw a sweat drop form down the side of his face.

A.N.: Sorry if the chapter seems a little short but I had to split it the way I have or it would have been too long for meh to cope with. This Chapter alone was 1457 words long, not one of mah longest since the longest so far stands at 2741 words long without the Authors Notes.

Once again, I have left you with a Cliffy! What will Cali do to Simmons? (shrugs) ya gunna have ta wait and see in the next Chapter, which is when the action starts to happen somewhat.

Once again I plead to you readers -and I know you're there, since I check mah Action reports! Please Read and Review! Reviews make meh happy and they help meh to get the chapters out faster.

Remember Flames will be used to Flambé Frenzy by Simmons, so please no Flames only Constructive Reviews will be tolerated.

Chapter Text

Chapter in Chapter 8: "I'm gonna count to five. Okay." said Simmons, hoping that Lennox and the others listened to him and let them all go. "Well, I'm gonna count to three." said Lennox as he aimed his gun with the safety off over Simmons' heart. "And I'm gonna count to two and half." responded Cali as she aimed her handgun at Simmons' head, she swore she saw his eyes widen slightly and that she saw a sweat drop form down the side of his face.

Now on to the next installment:

Key:

"Italic" = Anubis talk/Text

+'Bold'+ = Bumblebee sound clips / noises

'Italic' = facial expressions / thoughts

"normal" = Normal Speech

As the 'Mexican Stand-off' continued for what seemed like hours but was in fact only minutes, Cali kept her gun trained on Simmons' head. If he said anything further derogatory about her group or the teens that were there she was going to shoot him on basic principles. She was brought out of her musings of shooting the annoyance by the SecDef asking, "Simmons?" "Yes, sir?" came the timid reply as he looked from the two guns aimed at him, towards the at Simmons, the SecDef just gave him the 'Are you really going to be as stupid as I think you are?' look. "I'd do what they say. Losing's really not an option for these guys."

Still looking at the SecDef, Simmons replied quickly and with as much courage as he could muster, "All right. Okay. Hey you want to lay the fate of the world on the kids Camaro? That's cool."Cali let out the breath she hadn't realized she had been holding when Lennox let Simmons go and placed his sidearm back into it's holster. She looked around and noticed the relieved look on the teens face at the prospect of seeing his car again, she smiled slightly at the thought of 'boys and their cars!' and she headed on over to them and decided that since they didn't like Simmons, she was going to protect them incase he tried anything. Catching up to them as they headed to where the car was being held, Cali decided that introductions were in order. "Hey there again, sorry about the tension back there, but the idiot that is Simmons really rubbed meh the wrong way. Name's Caliene Meredith, Captain in the US Army. I work with Captain William Lennox - the guy who held his gun to Simmons' chest.

What are your names and why are you here, anyway? Thought it was strange for the Government to drag in a couple of teens for something like this." she said as they made their way through yet more drab tunnels towards an area that had some really weird whines coming from."Thanks for helping us back there, we really appreciate it, so far we've been given the run around and nobody would tell us anything about a friend of ours, which is why we need Sam's car." came the reply from the leggy brunette walking the other side of the lad. "Yeah thanks for that, Captain. We really owe you for putting yourself in danger against Simmons and his goons. As Mikaela just said my name is Sam, Sam Witwicky, and she is Mikaela Banes. The reason for us being here is in the room we're heading to right now." came the lad - 'No' she told herself 'Sam's' response as they finally reached the they stood outside the door and waited for the others to arrive they could hear what Cali deemed to be metallic whining and groaning sounds, looking down at her shirt pocket when she felt a sharp pinch, she saw Anubis waving his arms at her.

She picked him out of her pocket and held him whilst Sam and Mikaela looked on in disbelief at what was going on between the cell phone-bot and the Captain, "So what is it, Anubis? What is going on in there?" Cali asked the small bot as she tried to calm him folded down into cell phone mode, surprising Cali with what came next; 'Hurt... Scared... Bigger... Guardian... Pain... Help!' came the reply in the form of a text message on the screen. Cali showed Sam and Mikaela the text and all three had a quick moment of understanding, they were hurting someone in there and it was scaring the poor phone-bot to the point where he was shaking as if he was set in vibration mode - whatever was going on in that room Cali was going to try and stop it, she never did like seeing or hearing anyone being tortured and from the sounds still coming from the room next to them they were torturing an even bigger version of as the rest of the group made it up to them, Cali watched as Sam pretty much slammed through the doors and started yelling at the idiots in the room to "No, no! Stop! You got to stop! Stop! Stop! Stop!"

As Cali walked in quickly behind Sam with Mikaela, she was surprised to see Banachek shove past them and he too started to call out to the room, "No, no, stop, stop, stop!" at the same time as Sam was now calling out to the people still hosing the entity on the table in front of her down with Liquid Nitrogen. "Let him go! Let him go!" before turning to the entity as the other humans laid down their hoses and backed away quickly."Are you okay? They didn't hurt you right?" asked a rather worried Sam in Cali's opinion as she watched with awe as the entity sat up and she watched as it flipped some sort of a battle mask down over it's face and powered up some sort of a cannon or large blaster at the other humans in the room. Cali also noticed that her Squad along with Lennox looked cautious and with good reason, after their meeting with the Scorpion robot and 4500-X at SOCCENT in Qatar, it was prudent to be cautious. Cali watched as Sam tried to gather the robot's attention. "Listen to me. The Cube is here and the Decepticons are coming." Everyone watched as the robot tried to get upright completely and looked around the room before looking back down at Sam who was now next to Cali who was still holding a chirping Anubis, who was watching the other larger robot with great interest.

"No, no, don't worry about them. They're okay. Right? They're not going to hurt you." Sam continued to say to the larger robot, before turning to the rest of the group and saying, "Just back up a little bit. He's friendly. He's fine." Then with Cali still next to him he continued to talk to the robot. "Okay, come on. Put the guns down. They’re not gonna hurt you. Here, come with me. I'm gonna take you to the All Spark." Everyone watched as the yellow and black robot retracted his battle mask and blaster to follow Sam to where the Cube was reported to be, what she didn't expect was for the robot to stop by her and pick her and Anubis up. To say that Cali was surprised would be an understatement towards the situation and with Anubis chirruping and whirring at the larger robot to which the larger robot responding in kind whilst walking after Sam, she turned to look to where Lennox was staring at what had happened and she waved as if to say 'I'm fine, don't worry about me.' Seeing Lennox nod in understanding she sighed and settled back for the relatively short trip to the Cube with the others following a short way she was now sat in the robots hands as he walked along, she decided to try and talk to him/it.

"So... why'd ya pick meh and Anubis here up when ya walked by us?" she asked in a confused tone, and for once in her life she really was confused. The black and yellow robot looked at her and then warbled and chirped at Anubis who then flipped down into his phone mode and started explaining via text messages. 'You were holding a sparkling! One who trusted you, that means you are a good person!' came the response, which startled Cali somewhat as she responded in kind, "What exactly is a... Sparkling?" The response came quicker this time, 'A Sparkling is what they call a baby.' shortly after that message was sent to her, Anubis started growling and chirring at the larger robot as if angered. Cali decided to ask what the problem was, "What is going on now?" she asked as she looked between the two. 'He called me a baby! I am not!' came the somewhat indignant response from Anubis as his form vibrated in what she termed to be anger at being called a baby.

"But you are Anubis, at least to him. But to meh you seem rather grown-up. Don't worry, I'll protect ya and hopefully you can keep an eye or whatever you guys have for eyes on meh so I don't do anything silly later on. OK?" she said hoping to placate the cell phone robot, it certainly wouldn't do to have the small robot start shooting things up just because he was upset over a small difference in the mismatched group reached the doors that were the entrance to the room containing the Cube, Cali looked down at Sam and whistled at him to gather his attention. Looking up at her Sam tilted his head in the universal sign for 'What?' thus Cali asked the question that had been bugging her since she saved Anubis from being destroyed. "What is so important about this Cube anyway?" causing the yellow and black robot to look down at her in answered after looking up at the robot that was carrying her in his hands, who nodded at the teen to go ahead and explain it. "The Cube is what gave them and their Planet life, kinda like their God in a way, I guess. At least that's how it sounded to me when they explained the situation to myself and Mikaela."

Cali just sat there and processed what she had just been told by Sam - that the Cube was essentially a God and that it was being held by Sector Seven and that the Government had no idea that it was here. That made Cali blanch just a little at the thought that, essentially the robots were here to collect their God. She was brought out of her musings when they stepped through the doors and she finally saw the Cube up close and was immensely awed by the sight. IT WAS HUMUNGOUS! The Cube took up most of the room and was surrounded on all sides by walkways and scaffolding where scientists were walking along on. All movement seemed to halt when they realized that there was a giant robot in the same room and that it had walked up to the Cube, placing Cali on it's shoulder (to which Cali clung gently but firmly so as not to fall) and was touching the Cube in what Cali deemed to be reverence for it and slight amount of awe itself. Cali couldn't help but smile at the rest of the group as they walked up and she heard Epps state in a slightly nervous and unsure voice, "Okay, here we go. He doing something. He doing something."

Cali turned back and she along with the rest of the group watched as the robot touched the Cube in a specific way and the Cube began to shift into a smaller form the whole time the robot was holding and moving his hands across the surface of the Cube. Cali was paying attention to the patterns and were those glyphs of some kind marked across the surface piquing her interest as a translator, even though the shrinking of the Cube made it difficult to tell thoroughly what they were, maybe she could get a closer look at a later date to see what they were exactly."Oh, my God!" came Mikaela's voice from below where she was on the robot's shoulder, as she looked at the now much smaller Cube in his hands. She smirked when he responded to everyone after moving the Cube around in his hands with a funny Sci-Fi mix of speech: +"Message from Starfleet, Captain. Let's get to it."+ Cali nodded in agreement at his sentiment, they really did need to get out of here and fast, apparently Lennox was thinking along the same lines as herself and the robot."He's right. We stay here, we're screwed with Megatron in the other hanger."

He looked up at Cali who shrugged and let him know with a look that this was going to be his call, not hers, she had a Sparkling to look after right now and she really didn't see the larger robot letting her out of his sight for any length of time due to that reason alone, why she had no clue, she just knew!"Mission City is 22 miles away. We're gonna sneak that Cube out of here and we're gonna hide it somewhere in the city." continued Lennox as he looked from the robot with Caliene on it's shoulder to where the SecDef was standing looking on in amazement at what had just happened. "Good! Right." came his reply when he finally regained his senses."But we cannot make a stand without the Air Force." said Lennox as he started to walk over to the rest of the group, every once in a while looking up at where Caliene was sat. Cali absent mindedly cuddled Anubis close to her as she held on to the larger robot's shoulder and she decided that she really needed to know the larger robot's name, so she asked Anubis to ask him the question via a text message. Confirming her text message, Anubis asked the larger robot what his name was, they were both surprised but for different reasons when they got his reply. "His name is Bumblebee! He is a Scout for the Autobot's. In other words he's one of the 'good guys' as he puts it." Cali tried so hard not to coo at the name given to the larger robot, it seemed to suit the robot well, especially with the coloration of the armor on his body, and the cute antennae on the top of his head and the way his door wings fluttered behind was brought out of her musings when she heard the SecDef respond to Lennox with, "This place must have some kind of radio link! Yes, Shortwave, CB."

Then everyone started slightly when Simmons responded with, "Right, Yes." Caliene almost fell off of Bumblebee's shoulder when she heard the moron respond in the affirmative that there was an older way of communication here in the broke her shock when he turned back to the SecDef and said, "Sir, you got to figure out some way to get word to them." As soon as he had said that he turned and faced the rest of the group and yelled out, "Let's Move!" As soon as those words left his mouth all hell broke loose and everyone started moving with a renewed watched as Lennox led the rest of her Squad away to find the other vehicles that they could use to get to Mission City, preferably some that had some heavy artillery. As this was happening, Caliene had Bumblebee place her safely and gently down off of his shoulder and she patted his hand in thanks, and she crooked a finger at Bumblebee asking him to come closer to her and when he did so she hugged his face as best she could and gave his cheek area a quick kiss in thanks, thus causing the robot to make some sort of an 'Awww!' sound as if he was smiling at Bumblebee, she turned to face Simmons and the SecDef as they continued their conversation about how they were going to get out the required message to the Air Force. "In the Alien Archive, Sir!" came Simmons' voice causing Caliene's jaw to drop slightly in shock - 'They had an Alien Archive room here?' "The Alien..." came the response from the SecDef, before Simmons continued with "There's an old Army Radio console."

The SecDef looked shocked too and then responded with, "Will it work?" Simmons made Caliene smirk when he next replied "Anything's possible! Did you see that..." and he made funny hand motions about what Bumblebee did to the Cube, thus shrinking it down to the size that it was now. She decided that she had officially heard everything, and she didn't think that anything else could surprise her now. She was shockingly her attention back to where Lennox, her Squad and the teenagers had disappeared to, she headed on over and got there just in time to see Bumblebee transform into what she recognized as a brand new 2008 Chevrolet Camaro with the twin black racing stripes down the hood. She nodded to herself, 'yes the name Bumblebee was indeed appropriate.' She started slightly when she heard Lennox call out to Sam and Mikaela "All right, Sam, get into the Car!" before turning to Caliene and telling her "You too, Cali, we need someone with the kids, and you seem to get on well with their robotic friend there. We'll see you in Mission City and good luck Captain!" he said as he saluted her and she saluted him back whilst giving him a warm smile. "Will do Lennox, and ya go careful ya self, ya hear me? Sarah would have mah head if anything happened to you right now after you got back Stateside!"

"I hear ya Cali, just keep those kids and the Cube safe, we'll catch a beer together after all this is over." he added and walked over to the Vehicle he was going to ride in whilst yelling over to the SecDef, "Mr. Secretary! Get our birds in the air. When we get to the city, we're gonna find a radio, and I'll have Epps vector them in, Okay?" The SecDef looked at Lennox and replied with a firm, "Affirmative!"

End Chapter 9.

A.N.: I would just like to thank all who have so far fav'd and responded to this story, remember that reviews make a writer’s life easier if ya tell us what ya think is good or bad about the story. Although Flames will be handed to mah cat Ravage (yes I do have an actual black long haired cat named Ravage) who will use them to fry Frenzy! After this chapter and at the end of the 2007 Movie I am going to be adding in the 2009 movie into this story instead of splitting it up.

Chapter Text

Previously in Chapter 9:

"I hear ya Cali, just keep those kids and the Cube safe, we'll catch a beer together after all this is over." he added and walked over to the Vehicle he was going to ride in whilst yelling over to the SecDef, "Mr. Secretary! Get our birds in the air. When we get to the city, we're gonna find a radio, and I'll have Epps vector them in, Okay?" The SecDef looked at Lennox and replied with a firm, "Affirmative!"

And Now….

Chapter 10

Lennox started calling out instructions to the others that were going to follow the Camaro and it's passengers to Mission City.

"Set a perimeter around the yellow vehicle!"

Driving as fast as they dared the small convoy drove away from the Hoover Dam, the assault vehicles following Bumblebee. Inside the Camaro was a slightly different scene to the one outside.

"The Cube's okay?" came Sam's question as he turned around form the driver's seat to look into the back where Cali was sat with Anubis and the Cube. "Yeah the Cube's fine, Sam. Just worry about getting us to where we need to be." came her response as she held onto both the Cube and Anubis (who was sat on top of the Cube looking at her and tilting his head to one side and then the other as if trying to figure something out.)

Cali unconsciously stroked Anubis' head and jumped slightly as he chirruped in happiness, Mikaela laughing slightly at Cali's slight jump of surprise at the noise from the cell phone bot. Cali glared lightly at Mikaela before shrugging and going back to mulling over everything that had happened to her since she got caught up in this situation, all the while hugging the alien Cube and Anubis close, once again causing Anubis to make a funny purring sound in contentment thus making Cali snigger slightly at his response - she could see Anubis and her cat getting on well if all they did was snuggle and purr like that and smiled as he folded down into his phone mode to sleep.

Outside of the Camaro with the rest of Caliene's Squad and a few others in the assault vehicles, Lennox noted that at the speeds they were traveling down the road at that they were currently 10 miles from the Hoover Dam and halfway towards Mission City. He watched as the Camaro in front of his continued to move at a fast pace, enough so that the assault vehicles were starting to have a few issues with the speed - since the assault vehicles were older and in worse shape mechanically. He was just about to ponder on what was going through Sarah's mind right now whilst she was caring for Annabelle, when the sound of a large Semi's air horn blaring made him jump and stare as the Semi - covered in painted flames, along with blue and red paint, a GMC Topkick, a H2 Hummer Search and Rescue vehicle and a sleek Pontiac Solstice all did sharp 180's and followed the convoy of Military vehicles.

Inside the Camaro, Sam was so pleased to hear the air horn that belonged to Optimus Prime that he just had to let the others in the car know. "There's Optimus." he said and pointed out the large flame painted Semi. Cali looked at the Semi as it passed them and turning around slightly she managed to watch as the Semi hit his breaks and managed a complete 180 degree turn in one smooth move, along with three other vehicles, what caught her eyes though was the sleek sports car that was quickly gaining on the Camaro and was then driving right alongside them as they hit the main Freeway towards Mission City.

She breathed out a steady breath when she realized that it was one of the new Pontiac Solstice's that had been advertised in the media the past few months, she shook her head, whilst it was a nice sporty vehicle and from what she could make out from this distance, that it was a two seater, she knew that she would never be able to afford one even at her Military Pay Grade. She sighed and relaxed back into the rear seat of the Camaro known as Bumblebee.

All was going well until the passengers in the Camaro heard police sirens behind them, Cali assumed that they were getting additional escort from the local police, at least that's what she thought until Sam looked out the rear window and started panicking. "No, no, no, no, no!" he cried out causing Mikaela to ask the question, "What?"

Sam all but cursed under his breath as he once again saw the police cruiser gaining on them, and said, "It's the same cop!" Cali could make out another vehicle with it and identified it as a Buffalo Mine Sweeper, used by the Military.

Cali, Sam and Mikaela watched as the Hummer, black Pick-up and the flamed Semi closed off the road to the two vehicles trying to get to them, Cali shook her head as she heard Sam saying, "Block them, block them, block them." What happened next shocked Cali slightly, she then decided that it was one thing seeing Bumblebee go from robot to car, but to see a large Semi go from vehicle to robot was a completely different thing altogether.

She watched as the Semi hit his breaks, and went into try and block the police car and Minesweeper that were starting to cause problems to the drivers in other lanes on the freeway. She watched as the Minesweeper then transformed into some kind of skating robot that started causing more destruction as it headed towards the now completely changed Semi. She closed her eyes in a prayer to whatever deity was listening to help those who were either dead, dying or injured after seeing the Minesweeper robot slam through a bus full of passengers sending it up into a ball of flame. She fully agreed with Mikaela when she heard the teen gasp out, "Oh, my god!"

After seeing the Semi robot attack the Minesweeper robot they moved out of visual range and headed towards Mission City without any further mishaps, with the Hummer, Pick-up and Solstice, along with Lennox and the assault vehicles in tow. Cali knew she would never forget the scene of the bus exploding in a fireball, for as long as she lived.

After they made it into Mission City she watched as Lennox got the assault vehicles to stop outside of a cheesy porn shop and about 3 minutes later she watched as he exited with an arm full of old Military radios, he first stopped beside the Camaro and handed her one through the window and asked if she would be alright with it, Cali responding that she was just fine with the old style Military radio, since her brothers used to mess around with them at their grandparents growing up, and therefore taught her how to use them.

She watched as Lennox nodded and headed back towards the rest of the Military convoy to hand out the rest of the radios. "Come on, let's go! Mount up!" Smiling as she tuned her radio into the correct communications frequency for the convoy she listened to one of the soldiers - possibly SAW Gunner Burke from the sound of the voice, yelling at the others. "Move out! Move out! Go! Go!"

She was really laughing hard once she heard via the radios what was going on with Lennox and Epps after Lennox handed Epps the radio, and apparently Epps had his hand right over the transmit button as he was talking to Lennox. The resulting conversation made her, Sam and Mikaela laugh for a bit as they listened in.

Lennox: "Here, I got shortwave radios."
Epps: "Wait. What am I supposed to do with these?"
Lennox: "Well, use them! It's all we got!"
Epps: "This is like RadioShack dinosaur radios or something, man. I'm only gonna get 20 or 30 miles out of these things. Are there any aircraft orbiting the city?"
Lennox: F-22 at 12:00. All right, I want planes for air cover and get Black Hawks on station to extract that Cube. You got it?"

Caliene watched through the rear window as they stopped and listened in as Lennox continued, "Air Force has arrived! Pop smoke!"

She cautiously climbed out of Bumblebee's Alt. Mode and stood beside Lennox, and looked towards the skyline to see what kind of air cover they were likely to get. She let her eyes scan the area for any human type interference to this mission and as she did so she heard Epps talk into his radio.

"Raptor, Raptor, do you copy? We have you visual. Green smoke is the mark. Provide air cover and vector Black Hawks for extraction."

What none were expecting was what happened next; the black Pick-up started to transform behind them and yelled, "It's Starscream!" Caliene was now worried, who or what was 'Starscream' and apparently Epps was of the same mind as he asked into the radio, "Please tell me you copy."

A.N.: OMP! I did it again I placed in another Cliffhanger! Sorry if the chapter was short, but the fight scene is coming in Chapter 11 and I wanted the fight scene to have it's own chapter - which is likely to be huge for meh (over 18 pages of hand written stuff so far in a note pad!)

Please stay glued to this site for the next installment, even though it may take meh a while (this chapter was written whilst having a rather bad bout of insomnia!)

Peace out and 'Til All Are One!

Sunstar

Chapter Text

Previously in Chapter 10:

What none were expecting was what happened next; the black Pick-up started to transform behind them and yelled, "It's Starscream!" Caliene was now worried, who or what was 'Starscream' and apparently Epps was of the same mind as he asked into the radio, "Please tell me you copy."

Now Chapter 11

Cali's POV:

We all turned to face a noise behind us as the black GMC Topkick transformed the whole way and started to shoo people backwards whilst saying the whole time to, "Back up! Take cover!" and then he turned to face the Camaro that was Bumblebee and called out his name as if to get him to help, which is exactly what our yellow and black striped friend did.

He walked over to where the GMC was now stood and helped to lift up a 'Furby' truck as if to try and make it into some sort of shield or screen to block the missiles and rounds coming from the enemy. I turned when I heard Will panicking slightly as he said, "No, no, no, no, no! Move!" I couldn't tell if he was talking to the Mech's lifting the truck or if he was talking to us who were standing around.

I soon realized that Lennox was talking to all of us as a group, especially when the black GMC Topkick-now-a-Mech turned and told Bumblebee who was still trying to lift the 'Furby' truck up mind you to "Back up! Back up!" I shook my head and yelled to him, "He's trying to you black bucket of bolts! Now either help him move it or shut the hell up!" As you could probably tell my temper was by now starting to fray somewhat, and Will and the guys knew that was not a good thing, especially during a battle zone like Mission City was starting to look like.

For a quick second or two my mind flashed back to the village in Qatar where we faced the Scorpion robot and I shuddered, there was no way in hell I was going to lose any of my Squad or the two teens that we were here to protect. I came back to the present when I heard Lennox yelling "Retreat! Fall back!" I was about to tell Will in no uncertain terms that I was not retreating for any reason, when I was shocked to hear one word nobody in the Armed Forces wants to hear on a battlefield; "INCOMING!"

Looking in the direction I could see everyone else looking in I swallowed as best I could considering what my eyes were seeing had caused my mouth to dry up. Coming straight at us all were a small group of Missiles - AGM-65's if my guessing was anything to go by (and AGM-88's were for hitting Radar batteries on the ground from the air), and was sure we would find out in a few I remember after the Missiles hit was 'where the hell was the ringing coming from?' and 'I'm alive!' Then the fun thought of 'OWWW!' hit as I tried to sit up, figuring out just where I was feeling the 'OWWW!' from, I touched my head and found a slight bump near the top of the back of my head.

'Great! I have a minor concussion!' I thought to myself as I slowly stood up to look around for the rest of the Squad and the teens along with the Mech’s. I watched whilst I looked around as everyone started to shake off the effects of the explosions and debris covering them. Spotting Lennox and the rest of my Squad, I headed on over to see if anyone required a medic or not; we really didn't need anyone being out of commission right now. As I slowly and carefully made my way over to them I heard a metallic sound, almost like a whining sound, so I stopped and looked around through the dust clouds that were still floating around and spotted Bumblebee trying to crawl towards where I assume Sam and Mikaela were. Therefore, I decided that my Squad mates could deal with anything that came up without my help, thus freeing me up to help the teens if they were injured.

Hearing one of the Squad yelling out to "Clear the area!" and then hearing Lennox call out "Anybody hurt? Everyone okay?" I replied that I was fine and was going to look for the rest of the I got over to where Bumblebee and the teens were, I was appalled at the state that Bumblebee was in; he was missing his legs from the knees down. He was in definite pain if the whining was anything to go by. Almost like the noises he was making back at the Dam when he was being experimented on. Reaching them and squatting down in front of Bumblebee, I pulled out Anubis, effectively waking up the poor baby so that he could help me figure out what was going on with 'Bee.

"What is wrong with Bumblebee, Creator?" came the text I got as Anubis fully took into consideration the scene if front of his mini transformed form. "He was injured in a blast from a missile, Anubis. Now he is in pain. Can you help whilst one of the group finds a Medic or a Mechanic to help him?" I asked, looking from Bumblebee to Anubis as 'Bee whined some more and Sam was now freaking out over the 'Bot's loss of legs. What happened next surprised even me when Anubis jumped from my hands and toddled over to Bumblebee and gently climbed up his arms to check him Anubis was doing this I watched as Sam literally pushed the Solstice backwards, all the while saying to him "Here, back, back, back, back!" then turning to Bumblebee and asking him if he was all right, before asking him to get up. I shook my head at the boy and touched his shoulder effectively getting his attention. "Sam! He needs to see a Medic or a Mechanic to fix his legs, or at least to shut off the sectors of his legs that tell him they hurt." Nodding his head, Sam turned and looking around yelled out "RATCHET!" Who or what 'Ratchet' was, I would find out later.

Turning around to see where the Medic would come from I noticed the Solstice was slightly further back than Sam had had him move. So wandering over, I looked the vehicle over for any dents or scratches from the explosion and was relieved to see only dust laying on the silver paint of the car. I was mentally drooling, as I looked this vehicle over. It was a sports car so naturally it would appeal to me, heck I owned a 1970 metallic blue Camaro with white racing stripes which was a nice smooth ride. I kept that baby as pristine as I could when I was home, although if my neighbor was doing their job she would be the same once I got back and not covered in dust.

Reaching for a clean rag in my BDU pants pocket, I started to wipe the dust off the hood of the car. I jumped when the car visibly shuddered and a voice came from the radio, "Tha' tickles soldier! But ya have mah thanks!" I almost dropped the rag when I heard the thanks coming from the car, that I now noticed had no driver, thus making it one of the 'Bots we were fighting alongside with. Gathering up my courage again, that had been shaken by the Missiles, I asked a couple of simple questions, "Who are you, if you don't mind meh asking? Are ya a friend of Bumblebee's or are ya just a colleague?"The Solstice answered me back, "Mah designation is Jazz, Lil' Lady and I ahm a friend and colleague of Bumblebee. May ah ask the same of yerself?" I stood and watched as Anubis was shutting off receptors to Bumblebee's legs to stem the flow of sparking wires and a glowing blue liquid from the wounds, before I answered the Solstice known now as Jazz.

"Mah name is Caliene Meredith, a Captain in the United States Army; mah job specializations entail Sniper, Saboteur and Linguist to mah Squad. I ahm currently the human carrier of Anubis, who is the little bot currently helping out Bumblebee, but Anubis keeps calling meh his Creator." I shrugged in a way that told Jazz that I did not really mind that Anubis called me that. "Sector Seven made him out of a cell phone activated by a jolt from the All Spark, they then tried to kill him when he was scared and started attacking the box he was in. I saved him and now we're here helping you guys."Turning back to face Jazz, I watched as he rolled back and forth as if he was thinking about something.

I mentally cringed when I replayed the previous conversation with Jazz back in my mind; my accent had come out again. It usually only did that when I was stressed, in a Hot Spot of a Battle Zone or if I was very drunk... usually the latter never applied since I never had as much down time as the rest of the Squad due to my training. I cringed when I heard Lennox call out, "What the hell was that?" Turning to face Lennox to respond to his obviously irate question, I stopped when I heard Epps reply with, "What are you talking about?"

I just about faced palmed and sat down at the same time - thus ending up sat on the edge of Jazz's hood and shook my head as Lennox yell out, "What do you mean, 'What am I talking about?' They shot at us!" Cautiously looking up from my hand I decided to explain to Epps why Lennox seemed pissy about the plane shooting at us and also the reasoning for him looking like he would pull a Vesuvius.

"Yo, Epps! He is tryin' to get ya ta understand tha' F-22 pilots would never fly below buildings. Thus meaning that, that's alien. That ain't friendly!" and getting up from where I was sat I turned and apologized to Jazz by wiping where I had sat down with my sleeve and rag till it was clean. Then I turned to where Sam was as I heard his one sided conversation with Bumblebee.

"You gotta get up. You're okay. You're okay. Come on!" Sighing and nodding to Jazz's vehicle mode I headed over to Sam and gave him a pat on the shoulder whilst looking up a Bumblebee and spotting Anubis as he climbed back down from where he was now situated on his shoulders. Scrambling over to me, I picked him back up, gave the small phone-bot a gentle stroke down the back of his head, and crooned to him with my vocal cords. It was kinda like a mother cat will do with her kittens - and he snuggled up into my hands before folding back down into his phone form and typing out a message.

"Fixed what I could. Needs better Medic than me. Too small for most things! :(" I was shocked at what Anubis had done for Sam's robotic friend and I smiled at Anubis before responding to the text. "Anubis you did really well with what you did, I am proud of you. Also remember that great things come in small packages!" I smirked after hearing a certain Solstice's engine rumble in agreement glad someone understood the meaning.

After placing Anubis back into my BDU shirt chest pocket for safety, I picked up my rifle and racked a round into the chamber, before heading back towards where Jazz was sat idling. I was almost there when I heard a metallic clanging and a spray of debris was thrown into the air by whatever was shot at us. After regaining my feet, since I had instinctually ducked low enough to land on my knees. I looked in the direction from where the noise had originated and spotted what I was sure was an Abrams Tank firing shells at us, it fired off another round whilst driving right over any vehicle in its way causing many civilians to run around panicking. As I watched the Tank continue towards us, I heard a familiar engine rev loud and speed down the road towards the Tank, swerving and dodging around anything/anyone in his way so as to not hit anyone/anything and just behind him was the Rescue Hummer that had traveled with us speeding right along with Jazz.

I was shocked out of my skin slightly when I heard Lennox yell out behind me to everyone else, "Move out! Let's go!" I watched as the rest of the squad headed off to help where they could in the assault vehicles, whilst Mikaela was searching now for something - I'm guessing she was trying to figure out a way to get Bumblebee to a safe area, due to his leg injuries.

I watched as I stood there when Mikaela ran towards an abandoned tow truck, breaking the window and getting the door open before hot-wiring the vehicle and driving it back over to where I stood near to Bumblebee and Sam. Turning to check on them, I watched with a sad smile on my face when Bumblebee handed Sam the Cube that he had dropped during the explosion and decided to hand on over to be kept safe by his friend.

As I turned around slowly to see what everyone else was doing, I could tell that things were about to get rather dangerous - well more than they were now at any rate - and that we may lose some friends to this battle, along with a whole mess of civilians. I was not looking forward to what was going to happen next, since my senses were telling me that something big and evil was going to arrive and no-one was going to safe from his wrath.

A.N.: Well I left a cliffy, and some are gunna wanna shoot meh for it, but i am currently writing the next chappie, thus the action should continue. The only thing is it may take a while, the only reason I got this out when I did, is because I was on one pit of a sugar high and typed up the majority of it in a hour.

Peace out and may primus shine down on all mah lovely reviewers and readers. Please read and review, the reviews make meh wanna write quicker.

Chapter Text

A.N.: To everybody on the Transformers: Transcendence RP Site, I say thanks for all the laughs, tears and pranks... you make my life so much more livable when dealing with my three younglings.

Previously in Chapter 11:

I was shocked out of my skin slightly when I heard Lennox yell out behind me to everyone else, "Move out! Let's go!" I watched as the rest of the squad headed off to help where they could in the assault vehicles, whilst Mikaela was searching now for something - I'm guessing she was trying to figure out a way to get Bumblebee to a safe area, due to his leg injuries. I watched as I stood there when Mikaela ran towards an abandoned tow truck, breaking the window and getting the door open before hot-wiring the vehicle and driving it back over to where I stood near to Bumblebee and Sam. Turning to check on them, I watched with a sad smile on my face when Bumblebee handed Sam the Cube that he had dropped during the explosion and decided to hand on over to be kept safe by his friend.

As I turned around slowly to see what everyone else was doing, I could tell that things were about to get rather dangerous - well more than they were now at any rate - and that we may lose some friends to this battle, along with a whole mess of civilians. I was not looking forward to what was going to happen next, since my senses were telling me that something big and evil was going to arrive and no-one was going to safe from his wrath.

Now on to chapter 12:

"Bold Type" = Yelling/Shouting/Radio Communictaion

"Bold Italic Type" = Anubis texting conversation

'Italic Type' = Thoughts

Cali's POV:

I watched as the Pick-up now robot with huge ass cannons on his arms headed towards the tank that was shooting at us. I watched in awe as he jumped over two incoming shells and proceeded to use his own cannons to help him flip over a pedestrian who just screamed as he sailed above her and landed in a shoulder roll on the other side of her.

I prayed hard to any deity that was listening when I saw Jazz driving towards the same tank. I watched as, as he got closer he transformed into his own robot mode and proceeded to jump up and land on top of the tank. I then smirked when I heard him say, "Come on, Decepticon Punk!" before pulling up on the cannon, causing the shot it fired to go wide of it's mark - namely me and the rest of the small group.

It was almost like watching a car wreck in progress - ya just can't not look. I watched as the tank then transformed into a much heavier built robot, and watched whilst mentally cheering for Jazz as he kicked the weapons from the Tank robots shoulder. I gasped in shock when the tank robot then grabbed Jazz by the leg and proceeded to throw him into one of the nearby buildings, I sighed once Jazz got back up shaking his head to obviously clear out any dizziness the hit had caused.

By now the black Pick-up truck-turned-robot was firing at the tank robot whilst, and I even had to drop my jaw in awe, pulled off a Double Helix Twist in the air. By now Jazz was back in the fight and the Emergency Hummer - I assumed to be Ratchet - were now also shooting at the tank robot. I cheered out loud when the Hummer - Ratchet - used a bi-directional circular saw blade to remove one of the tank robots limbs.

I jumped slightly when I heard Lennox yell out, "Concentrate your fire!" This got me back into the thick of things as I set up my Rifle and aimed towards it's upper torso, making sure that I wouldn't hit any of our allies. Firing at least three rounds - one hitting it in the face, and the other two hitting it in the upper gut area - I listened as the rest of the Squad fired their Sabot rounds at the Tank. We all watched as the Pick-up, Solstice and Hummer all shot at the tank at the same time we did, effectively knocking it down. I strongly hoped that it stayed down, since it was obviously one of the oppositions heavy hitters.

I really had hoped to be wrong about the big, evil thing that was going to arrive, but as per usual my senses were dead on (excuse the pun). I was just getting my rifle back up off the rubble I had been leaning on for my shots, when I heard Ratchet yell out, "It's Megatron! Retreat! Move! Fall Back!" As soon as we all heard that, well Lennox did the only thing he could do…. He called a retreat of sorts, "Fall Back!"

Watching Ratchet and Jazz shooting at Megatron had my heart in my throat. I hoped that they would get out of the way, but it wasn't going to happen. Megatron started to fire back at them and a couple of the hits knocked Jazz off of his feet, causing him to roll backwards.

Turing around I saw Lennox helping a bunch of our Squad out from one of the turned over buggies we had driven here in, so I yelled to him, "Get our guys out of the way, Lennox! Get them outta here!" Facing me, Will nodded and continued to help move them out of the buggy and I listened when he told the others, "Go! Get them out of the buggy! Move out!"

By now Epps was looking rather more worried than I had seen him when we were running from the Metallic Scorpion of Doom, and mentally nodded in appreciation when he yelled, "We need air cover down here now!" and then smirked widely when he muttered loud enough to hear "I really ain't paid enough for this shit!"

I turned around suddenly at hearing the voice of Jazz yell, "That all you got, Megatron?" and froze as Megatron reached over and tried grabbing Jazz who was moving and dodging any attempt from the much larger robot until he was grabbed whilst dodging backwards with Megatron yelling at him, "Come here, little cretin." As soon as he said that mah military training kicked up a notch as I swapped the smaller gun (my M24 SWS) I had been using for a modified M242 Bushmaster (a proven 30/40mm Mk44 Bushmaster Cannon system, that may be set to fire in single shot, 5 round burst or fully automatic modes) whilst I listened to a track on my MP3 that was clipped to my other BDU pocket - "Doomsday Clock" by the Smashing Pumpkins was definitely a good thing to listen to whilst trying to concentrate on my target.

I aimed at the much larger robot currently holding one of my robot allies by his foot as he took off to the top of a nearby building. Watching through the attached scope and waited for my opening, all the while listening as Megatron and Jazz continued to yell at each other, the latter still hanging by a foot from Megatron's clawed hand. "You want a piece of me?" came Jazz's voice as he fired his rotating shield gun at the massive bulk of Megatron, "You want a piece?" he repeated again as he shot this time at Megatron's claw that was holding him upside down, thus causing the larger robot to switch claws and grabbed him with the other.

This maneuver gave me the opening I required and as I watched Megatron finally grab a hold of Jazz in both clawed hands and yell out, "No! I want two!"I fired a shot right into one of Megatron's optics, thus causing him to bellow in pain as the incendiary round worked it's job through the delicate wires behind the front. This in turn caused him to drop Jazz, who was still relatively in one piece except with a gash along his abdominal plating, which would more than likely cause him to be out for the rest of this battle. I hurriedly grabbed up the M242, what rounds I could grab in the ammo case nearby (which had been thrown from the buggy when it was hit) and ran towards where Jazz had landed, I decided that I should protect him whilst he was injured - just like I would for any member of my Squad in a war zone.

Getting over there I watched as the BDU Pocket that I had placed Anubis in moved as he transformed and wiggled out of it and all but jumped onto Jazz's frame, I guess he was going to do with Jazz like he tried with 'Bee whilst I was busy keeping an eye open for any further Hostiles that would try and take us out. "Creator... Need to help silver Mech with visor!" came the message from Anubis as he settled in to work on the injury 'Megadork' my mind finally decided to call Megatron, did to Jazz. Nodding at my partner - since that is what Anubis had become since rescuing him from Hover Dam - I watched the surrounding area once again and flinched when I noticed the same Helicopter robot from Qatar land on a nearby building rooftop.

Grabbing my radio I yelled through to Lennox, "Yo, Lennox! Got some intel for ya! Face North of your position and look at the telecommunications building's rooftop... Do you happen to see what I see? Over" I heard a crackle over the radio before hearing the cussing of my best friend, " $%^&! Oh, we are so dead. Thanks for the heads up Cali, I owe ya a drink when this is over!" I smirked slightly as I responded back,"Five by Five, Lennox, I'll hold ya to that. What I would love to see right now is an AH-64 fully loaded to help us out with these things. I just don't think the REMF's would appreciate the paperwork though."

I was currently sat alternating between watching what Anubis was doing to Jazz and keeping watch in the small area we had - luckily it was far enough away from the main brunt of the battle, that we were safe... for now. I listened closely to the radio incase anything came this way, and I heard Epps place a call out, "Army Black Hawks requested. Immediate Evac for civilian boy with precious cargo. Headed for rooftop marked by flare." Now I understood from that single transmission that they were going to Airlift Sam and the Cube out of Mission City to some nearby Military Base - which one would be up to debate on how much fuel the Black Hawk had in its tanks.

Getting up I walked to the edge of the area we were in (we being: Jazz, Anubis and myself) looking around I tried to spot the tallest building that could be for an Airlift Evac, and spotted an old white building with Angel Statues at the top of it - it had what seemed to be a clear flat rooftop, perfect for an Evac by Black Hawk.

Turning back to head back on over to Jazz and Anubis, I heard the voice of 'Megadork' yell out, "Decepticon's, Attack!" After hearing that I heard the tell tale sound of a tank firing. 'Crud,' my thoughts went, 'that thing just doesn't die does it? I thought we had taken it down!'

Running back over to Jazz and Anubis I slid to a stop, and panting slightly I told Anubis to let Jazz know that I had gone back to help the Squad, since where we were currently was out of the range of the main battle; thus it meant that the two of them would be safe whilst I went and backed up my team mates. Nodding his small head, Anubis text me, "Creator, be careful! Come back whole, please! :'( "

Smiling back at him I gave him a quick hug and then patted Jazz's armor with some form of affection, he had given us time to get out of Megatron's way before he was injured. Then turning and grabbing my weapons, I ran as fast as I could towards the Squad and Lennox. I had a bad feeling that they were going to need the heavy firepower I had at my disposal as well as their own.

A.N.: Well here is the end to Chapter 12. All 3 pages of it! Sorry if it seems short, but I am currently writing up Chapter 13 as this is posted.

I figure that I have roughly 2 - 3 Chapters left of this before I do a small bit between the two movies and then the second Movie itself, I am staying away from the Third Movie Altogether, since it doesn't make much sense in mah mind.

Peace out and may Primus watch over all. Don't forget to Read and Review please, this is what keeps meh writing and willing to work harder to get the Chapters out.

Chapter Text

Disclaimer: I DUN OWN Transformers, they belong to Hasbro/Takara, so dun sue meh! *begs*

Previously in Chapter 12:

Running back over to Jazz and Anubis, I slid to a stop and, panting slightly, I told Anubis to let Jazz know that I had gone back to help the Squad, since where we were currently was out of the range of the main battle; thus it meant that the two of them would be safe whilst I went and backed up my team mates. Nodding his small head, Anubis texted me,  "Creator, be careful! Come back whole, please! :'( "
Smiling back at him, I gave him a quick hug, and then patted Jazz's armor with some form of affection; he had given us time to get out of Megatron's way before he was injured. Then turning and grabbing my weapons, I ran as fast as I could towards the squad and Lennox. I had a bad feeling that they were going to need the heavy firepower I had at my disposal as well as their own.

Now onto Chapter 13:

As I approached where Lennox and the Squad were, I heard Lennox yelling at Mikaela to "Get out of here now!" I ducked when the sound of the tank firing at our position brought me back to what was going on around me.

Watching as Mikaela drove away with 'Bee on the back of the tow truck she had somehow liberated, I turned to face Epps when I heard him say "Oh, no!"

Joining up next to him, I questioned him about what he was thinking when he said that. "Well, if ya care to look in that direction, Cali, there is a fricking TANK SHOOTING AT US!" Nodding at him finally losing his control, I was surprised that all of us hadn't lost it by now, due to stress.

I couldn't help the words that came out of my mouth after he had calmed down slightly, "This is not going well!" This earned me a glare from both Epps and Lennox, which caused me to shrug. As we turned to see what was going on, the tank started firing at us again, causing all to duck and we prepared to fire back at it.

Firing back during a few breaks in-between shots fired by the enemy I was not expecting to hear shots coming from behind me. Taking the risk and looking behind me there was Bumblebee on the back of the tow-truck firing his cannon at the tank as the rest of my Squad and Lennox continued to shoot at it too. Quickly deciding that I should concentrate on the tank for now, I turned back and started to fire at it again, this time we all got lucky when one of Bumblebee's shots hit him right in the chest where it's heart or equivalent would be housed; killing it instantly.

After seeing the tank go down for the final time, I swore I heard Burke say "That tank is definitely dead now." Shaking my head to throw out the irony of his words in a battle such as this, I turned to face Bumblebee and gave him the 'thumbs up' for a great shot, and then I walked over to Mikaela and was about to start chewing her out for driving back into a war zone with an injured ally, when Lennox decided to take matters into his own hands.

"All right, let's go! We got business!"

I decided that I was going to check back with Jazz and Anubis, to see how they were coping and hopefully Jazz would be awake enough to understand why he was left with the equivalent of a baby to them, whilst I was fighting and Jazz was injured. I knew it was a stupid thing to do, but I had thought he would be safer with someone much bigger, heavier, and better armed than me at the time.

Finally making it back to where the two of them were still sat at, Jazz raised his visor slightly and looked at me with his piercing electric blue optics, almost as if he was giving me the evil stink eye for leaving him behind. "Ahm sorry ah left ya guys here, but the rest of mah squad needed meh, and if it wasn't fer meh Jazz, you'd be in two rather messy pieces that yer medic would have one hell o' a time puttin' back together if it hadn't o' off-lined ya first! So dun go giving meh tha' look Mister, 'cause it ain't gunna work on meh!" I said as I crossed my arms and looked at the pair of them but Jazz especially.
"Ah wasn't gunna say nuthin' Lil' Lady, but now tha' yer mention it… wha' yer did was reckless, and if I weren't too sure of yer thought processes, I woulda said yer were glitched in the processor, but considering yer came back in one whole piece, I guess yer did a'ight! But yer did scare the Sparklin' here when yer left him to tend to meh, he is just a newborn spark yer know" came Jazz's reply to my outburst.

Hearing a familiar 'whomp-whomp' of rotors, I looked up and spotted three Black Hawks flying towards the building where Sam was supposed to hand off the All Spark to the Military, who would then extract it to another safe point. I started running once I saw a missile hit the air intake on the lead Black Hawk, and held my breath as I watched to see if any of the crew would bail-out but when I didn't see any of them do so, I prayed to whatever deity would listen and hope that their souls made it to where they were supposed to.

Finally making it to where I could get a clear view of the building, Sam on the edge of the Building's roof by a statue, and the helis that were now circling after the other heli crashed if the spiraling smoke plume was anything to go by. What surprised me next was when I saw the tallest, red and blue flamed robot - I think Sam called him Optimus - was running and jumping trying to get Sam after I witnessed Megatron use what I could swear was a mace to separate the piece of building Sam was currently holding onto causing him and the statue to tumble. I breathed a sigh of relief when I saw Optimus catch Sam in one of his hands and curl him close to his chassis and was trying to find a safe way down for the pair of them, when Megatron decided to make his presence made by jumping down after Optimus and Sam.

I was now starting to worry since Megatron had pretty much slammed into Optimus who was carrying Sam and the All Spark, thus causing them to fall way too fast to the ground below. Because of this I was now running over to where they had all landed and decided to try and keep Sam alive and thus keeping the All Spark out of Megatron's claws.
Getting over there, I grabbed at Sam making the poor lad jump a good foot or two into the air before he turned and faced me with an obvious sigh and a small smile that he was glad to see my weapons and me. We both turned and faced Optimus when he spoke, "Sam? You risked your life to protect the Cube."

"No Sacrifice, No Victory." Came Sam's reply as he looked at Optimus and held the All Spark tighter.

Standing behind him I nodded and uttered a few things in Latin, getting a couple of confused looks from both Sam and Optimus at what I said until I said, I would translate it to them after this was all over. Turning around I spotted Jazz and Anubis a ways back from where Sam, Optimus and I were standing and I sent a quick smile and waved to them before Optimus said, "If I cannot defeat Megatron, you must push the Cube into my chest. I will sacrifice myself to destroy it. Get behind me."

I looked at him in complete disbelief as he started to get up, "Are you completely out of your processor! That is amount to suicide! There is no way in the nine levels of Hell that I will let you do that, once this is over with you and I are going to sit down and have one hell of a long discussion about self-sacrificing. It doesn't do any good to anyone!" Panting hard at the end of my mini-rant, I looked at Sam who had the look of shock, or was it bewilderment, on his face that I had just pretty much chewed out the leader of the Autobots.

I shrugged at Sam, and was about to grab him and find him a safer spot to be than above ground - broken roads and water pipes are a god send in a battle zone - when I heard the familiar 'whomp-whomp' of helicopter blades, turning to see if it was reinforcements for us. I was surprised to see that blasted evil helicopter that had attacked us in Qatar. Looking his direction I noticed that whilst Optimus and Megatron were now duking it out, he had one of his sets of propeller blades - most likely his tail rotor blades, looking at the size of them - and was starting to try and sneak closer to where the two larger robots were fighting.

Using my brain, I told Sam to hide in the debris of what was left of the road and water pipes so that he would be a whole lot safer, and with him nodding and then sliding into a spot just 5 yards from where we were standing, I then headed on back towards where I could make out Epps and the group shining a green laser-beam to target the Helo-bot. What none of them were expecting was for the helo-bot to actually notice the laser-beam, which was kinda hard not too when it's being shone on to your hand, and turning in their direction activated the same chest cannon that had been aimed at Epps back in Qatar.

I watched as it fired at my squad members as they ran into a group of buildings and it followed them, all the while spinning its tail-rotor blades of doom and shredding a nearby yellow car that bore a strong resemblance to Bumblebee's current vehicle form. By now, I was pissed as all hell, decided that I had to do something, even if it cost me my own life in this regard - I ran straight for the helo-bot, and fired off round after round of 30mm sabots at it and yelling at it at the same time.

"Mater tua criceta fuit, et pater tuo redoluit bacarum sambucus!" I yelled at the enemy as I continued to run and shoot, whether or not it understood me though I did not really care, although from the look on the squads faces behind the enemy robot was anything to go by I had confused them enough too, yet they still shot at it.

"Tua mater tam antiquior ut linguam latine loquatur!" Now this got a snort out of Lennox as well as a grin out of Epps, mainly because I had used it once or twice and they remembered the phrase well. Then as we all fired the final shots at it and I couldn't believe that Lennox had grabbed a motorcycle and pulled the most stupid stunt I have ever seen him pull by sliding under the Helo-bot whilst firing up into its underside, I uttered load and proud, "Hostis hvmani generis. Dum spiramus tuebimur!"

I glared at Lennox as he came to a stop not more than 5 ft from me on the ground staring at the Helo-bot as it crashed to the ground, most definitely off-line now and it wasn't getting back up. "Just what were you thinking you idiot!" I said to Lennox as I jogged over to him and slapped the back of his head just enough to get it through to him I was pissed at his little stunt. "You have a family to get home to, and you pull shit like this!" by now I was waving my hands around trying to get the point across, and yet not letting him get a word in edgewise. I was on a roll until I heard Optimus' deep voice say, "Sam, put the cube into my chest!"

As soon as he said that I was running towards Sam, Optimus and Megatron, - Goddess did that sound weird - and I was yelling to Sam now, "Don't you dare do it Sam! There has to be another way around it! You can't kill Optimus!" At that last bit Sam looked at me and seemed to understand what I was saying, although by now I was pretty much back to where he was and as Sam ran over towards Megatron I figured out what he had come up with plan wise.

He was going to place the All Spark into Megatron's chest instead of Optimus'! Now, this was a plan I could get behind, in a weird way. This kid actually thought out of the box in this whacked out situation. I was actually impressed with him. Maybe, once he was out of High School, we could get him to join the military, since he would probably do well with a mind like his.

But back to the matter at hand, I decided to help Sam as much as I could. He was stumbling everywhere and he nearly dropped the All Spark again, so I helped him steady himself and to make sure this venture worked we both held the All Spark up to Megatron's chest and watched in amazement as it started to disintegrate into his chest, the heat that was released was amazing, and I don't know if Sam noticed or not but my arms tingled as the Cube disappeared.

Megatron howled in agony as the Cube destroyed his chest with its limitless energy. Sam and I watched above us as Megatron convulsed, jerked and then made some inarticulate sounds before grabbing at his messed up chest area with a claw before falling over; off-lined by a Cube and two insignificant humans, kinda like 'David vs. Goliath'. What shocked me next was when Optimus leaned over Megatron's body, and said, "You left me no choice, brother."

Then, as I was currently holding Sam up from collapsing, Optimus walked over to us and bent down and said, "Sam, Captain, I owe you two my life." causing us to shake our heads in denial of that, as he continued, "We are in your debt."

Now this caused me to look up at Optimus and I decided to shock my squad and Sam by saying what I did next, "De duobus malis, minus est semper eligendum - 'Of two evils, the lesser must always be chosen.' In other words Optimus, we chose the lesser of two evils, instead of letting Megatron getting the Cube we used it against him."

Nodding as if understanding what I meant he stood up and started talking to the rest of the group around us, Lennox walked over and clapped my shoulder, obviously happy to see I was still breathing, if a little singed. "You and I are going to have a talk about this later, Cali!" he said with a smirk, letting me know that he was joking around now and pretty much using my own words against me.

I was so intent on hugging Lennox, since he was whole, and had always been a good friend throughout our military career, that I completely missed a certain silver car-turned-robot sneak up behind me with Anubis in one of his claws. Feeling a light tap on one of my shoulders, I jumped with a squeal - one that Lennox nor Epps would let me live down - and turned to face the person responsible for making me squeal.

Glaring slightly at Jazz, who was smirking widely mind you, I shook a finger at him and decided to chew him out slightly, "I can honestly say that you really should not do what I say next: 'Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus!' or in other words: 'Never tickle a sleeping dragon!' aka ME, unless you want retaliation and I can be rather creative when riled. Also, why did you try and take on Megadork! That was stupidity at its highest Jazz!" By now the other, 'bots were smirking and obviously trying to with-hold laughter as Jazz got chewed out for his escapades.

In all actuality, he was lucky to be in one piece, let alone alive. It was at this point that Ratchet walked over and started to chew out Jazz too, thus causing me to smirk now, especially when Ratchet brought out a massive wrench from somewhere on his person and proceeded to whack Jazz in the helm with it. "Note to self: Never piss off a medic, whether they be human or robotic in origin." I mumbled just loud enough for the squad and Optimus to hear, this time causing them to laugh out right. Glaring back at them all I pointed out, "Ya'll know that's a true and time proven fact that medics are scary enough when riled to even make Satan himself wanna run and hide in the deepest parts of Hell!" Most of the squad looked at me and smiled in agreement as we turned back to watch the argument between the medic and Jazz.

After listening to the speech Optimus gave about making new allies with us, we all headed off to our separate destinations. Well, me and the squad headed back to base to change out of our uniforms, shower, and possibly rest up for about 48 hours. Unfortunately, that wasn't to be for me, because as soon as I had done everything else and had just flopped down on my bunk, I heard the sound of two familiar engines. Getting up, making sure that Anubis was asleep in his phone mode on the dresser, I moved to look out my room's windows. Whilst trying to look past my cat who was sat there sunning himself, I recognized the two sat outside the building.

Grabbing my sneakers and lightweight hoodie, I walked out the main door, keys in my pockets and wandered on over to the pitch black C4500 GMC and the shiny Pontiac Solstice that were sittingt there in the two parking spots outside the building - coincidentally the spaces that were reserved for me and Lennox to park a vehicle in when we're here and not at home with our families. Patting the Topkicks hood gently and moving to between the two vehicles I muttered, "What are you two doing here? I thought you were supposed to be recuperating after the battle and that the 'Medico of Doom' could get you all fixed up again, especially you Jazz! You were almost ripped in half, if it wasn't for Anubis doing what he did, I doubt that Ratchet would have had any chance at fixing you because you would have been dead! Deceased! Cease to be! Offlined!"

The last part was me getting back into a tizzy because I had almost lost a friend in another battle. I mean, fine, I hardly knew the Mech, but I could count him as a friend since he tried to save us and our planet from being over taken by some Mechanical Megalomaniac. In fact, I counted all the Autobots as friends, after what they did.

A.N.: I have one chapter left of the first Movie to go and then it is on to the Interlude covering the 18 months - two years between the Movies. I will be posting it with this story so as to make it easier on others and mahself. The rating will stay the same unless noted for any reason.

Catch yas all on the flipside

Sunstar

Chapter Text

I would just like to say that this chapter is un-Beta'd. Sorry if there are any mistakes in it. I am truely sorry for the length of time between the last chapter and this post, it was due to quite a few factors - a bout of Writer's Block, then mah three youngling's going back to School, and then an Internet connection problem that has now been sorted out (crosses fingers).

Enough of this and on to the Story.

Chapter 14

It had been a few days since the Battle of Mission City, and everyone was hoping to spend whatever down time we were allowed off of Base. I was relaxing on my bunk when I was alerted to a familiar vehicle outside of my dorm, peering through the window I shook my head with a snigger... there in the empty parking space for my personal vehicle was a very shiny and sleek looking Solstice.

As I turned to let the curtain fall I noticed the flash of the headlights on the car indicating that I had been spotted and giving the car a quick wave from the window I grabbed my shoes, light weight jacket, wallet and Anubis - who was in his phone Alt. Mode sleeping. Gently placing Anubis into my jacket pocket I locked the door to my dorm room and slid the keys into my pocket on the other side of my jacket.

Hopping down the steps three at a time until I mad it to the door and then jogged to greet a very good friend. Reaching the Solstice, I ran my hand gently over the hood of the car and gave the front fender a slight pat before reaching for the door that opened of it's own accord.

"Thanks Jazz, glad ta see tha' da Doc let ya away from his ministrations for a while huh?" I asked as I made myself comfortable in the drivers seat. I looked up from my wallet and jacket that I had placed on the passenger seat when Jazz spoke through the radio.

"Well... ah dun know abou' da Hatchet letting me outta his Optical range, let alone his ministrations willingly... Ya could say tha' I snuck away ta come and see ya and Anubis. I was goin' crazy listenin' ta Ratchet going on and on about how slaggin' stupid ah was fer goin' up against Megatron." He said as we headed out the main Gate and then out towards the National Parks Area where we could go deep enough for Jazz to be in his true form and not scare the crap outta normal folks.

I could pick up in his tone that there was more going on then what he was saying, but I let it be for now as I stretched and yawned. Even after we had gotten back from the Battle at Mission City, I had tried to sleep since I was completely exhausted, but I just could not sleep. I truly believe that the scene of Donnely being killed by that Mechanical Scorpion in Qatar, constantly playing through my mind when I tried to sleep didn't help any, I knew it was just a matter of time before my body decided to take the matter into it's own hands and either 'shut me down' to sleep as Ratchet had said or drive me insane. I truly hoped that it would sort itself out before that ever happened, but I was never going to take the Medication that would be prescribed for the situation, especially after seeing what it had done to a friend in Boot Camp.

Jazz noticed that I had been quiet for longer than normal, and decided to try finding some music to distract from the silence that had filled the cab of his Alt. Mode. After settling for some sort of smooth jazz, which made me laugh at the irony, after a short while I decided to ask Jazz the real reason for his visit to me on Base.

"So why did you really sneak away from the Medico of Doom to see meh, Jazz? And don't try ta lie ta meh, it doesn't belong between friends, and I count us as such after what we both went through at Mission City." I said as I felt Anubis move around in my jacket pocket before he settled back down. I had really connected to Anubis after Mission City, and I would be torn up badly if anything was to happen to the small bot, I could be classified as his 'mother' now since he has attached himself to me and almost refuses to go to any of the others that Jazz and I know except Ratchet and then only because Ratchet spoils the lil' guy and that was probably because Anubis is currently the only Sparkling/Youngling to be 'conceived' by the AllSpark in Millennia which meant that Bumblebee was now no longer the youngest 'Bot on Earth.

"Well... I worried fer ya Cali. Yer may be able to fight off other Humans who wish yer harm, but when it comes to dealin' wit' da Decepticons... Yer still new to all dis, I don't know what would happen wit' meh or lil' Anubis if anything happened ta ya. Ya mean the world ta da both of us Cali, and after speaking wit' Prime abou' it... much ta da Hatchet's annoyance mind ya... Prime has agreed that since Ironhide is the Guardian to the Lennox family that ya too should have a Guardian. Ah offered ta be ya Guardian, Caliene because ah owe ya for keepin' meh alive during the Battle with Megatron, yer didn't have ta but ya did." said Jazz as we drove closer to the National Park and his chance at stretching out his frame.

After about another 45 minutes of driving, we arrived at the National Park and I climbed out and paid the fee to get us in there. After getting back into Jazz's Alt. Mode we drove through the gates and out towards where the thicker and taller trees were at, I could tell from the added bounce that Jazz was using in his shock absorbers that he was really looking forward to being able to transform.

(25 MINUTES DRIVE-TIME LATER)

Getting to the area we had found via shifting through massive amounts of information, Jazz parked his Alt. Mode and allowed me to climb out before he transformed. Watching the process from start to finish amazed me to the point that I don't ever think I will tire of watching them do so. I continued to watch as Jazz stretched out his cables and I swear I heard a few 'pops' from his joints as he twisted and turned to loosen up after being in his Alt. Mode.

Finally letting out a sigh, or what I guess was a sigh for them, Jazz sat down and leaned against one of the tall trees with an arm drapped across on slightly bent leg to relax. I waited for him to get comfy, and after a few minutes I decided to climb up his leg and sit on his knee joint and that way we could talk face to face, without me getting a crink in my neck. Deciding to bite the bullet I asked Jazz exactly what was rolling around my head after his revelation of wanting to be my Guardian.

"So what does being mah Guardian entail? I mean it could be something completely different to what we humans consider a Guardian or it could mean the same thing. So illuminate the situtaion for meh please." I asked him as I cocked my head to the left as if I were a hawk watching my prey from a distance.

"Well... A Guardian ta us means tha' we protect that young 'bot or in this case human aka you, from anyone or anything that would try to harm you in any way with our life. I meant wha' ah said earlier on da way here... ya mean da world ta meh and lil' Anubis and I wouldn't want ta see him orphaned by his Creator because I weren't dere ta keep ya safe from harm. Da 'Cons are gonna be layin' low fer a while since Megatron was offlined, but make no mistake about it Cali, dey will regroup at some point and come after those responsible for his defeat." he explained as I sat and took everything in.

He stared at me and then he proceeded to do something I had never seen him do, not even at Mission City, he flipped up his visor and stared at meh with cool, clear, crystal blue optics. They were such a clear blue that I would have likened them to a brilliant cut Aquamarine gemstone - you know the really pale blue gemstone - He stared at me some more before continuing, "Meh bein' ya Guardian would mean that I would go where ever you went ta make sure tha' both yaself and Anubis were alright and safe. Ah know dat Ratchet would weld mah aft ta a Med Berth if he found out I had let somethin' happen ta either of ya, he may not show it but he has a soft spot fer Sparkling's, Femme's and Younglings. Pit even ol' 'Hide himself cares abou' dem like they were da most important thing in da 'verse, mainly because der are so few ta start wit' I guess." He shook his head as if trying to clear a bad memory and as I sat there I gently patted his clawed hand in understanding.

I squeaked when Anubis finally decided to join us and unfolded completely out of his phone mode to wave his little hands at Jazz, I really wasn't expecting him to awaken as he had, but I guess he really wanted to get to know Jazz better too. So for the next 5 hours we sat and talked about what we were going to do now that we had beaten Megatron and what we could expect in the future, before heading back towards Base and some food for me and then rest. Who knew having an Autobot for a Guardian would mean someone acting 'Mother Hen' like? Certainly not me that's for sure.

(18 MONTHS LATER)

A year and a half has flown by since the day we beat Megatron, destroyed the AllSpark, and ended up with Jazz as the Guardian to me and Anubis. We have moved from California to New Jersey, Lennox was upset when I told him that I was recieving orders for a transfer back to the East Coast, but I explained to him that this way I would be closer to my family then, but that he and the family were welcome anytime they could make it out to us.

Looking around my house... yes I finally bought a place of my own (rank can have some perks), off Base so that Jazz would have some room to relax in his normal form in, I sighed, my home was almost complete. I had bought the old Farm House and Acreage that went with it, with what money I had saved up over the years of Active Duty - Hazzard Pay is a massive bonus, but not always a worthwhile thing, it's not called 'Hazzard Pay' for nothing ya know, ya only get this when ya posted ta a war zone! - and bought the place outright. The original owner had decided to retire and had sold all the livestock he had had and just wanted to sell it for whatever amount of money he could get.

Half of those 18 months was spent looking around for the perfect place off Base for me, Anubis and Jazz to live, and we had managed to find it at the base of a large hilly range in New Jersey - right next to a Wildlife Preserve and State Park Land, therefore very few folks were going to be walking up to the property line uninvited.

Between Jazz and myself, we had set up a sensor net around the whole 400+ Acres making all of us feel so much more secure, we had demolished all the old buildings that we were never going to use and after clearing all the debris up we had rebuilt better buildings that were upto Autobot Standards - according to Jazz that is.

We had built a series of Muntitions Storage Igloos at one end of the property and had that secured with both Human and Cybertronian security systems, we had also built what was dubbed the U.W.R. (Urban Warfare Range) where we could practice together as a team in a Simulated Urban Environment.

The most recent addition to the property was the Helo-Pad about a quarter mile from the house, so that if needed we could either Medivac anyone who needed it back to Base or for Higher-ups to come in and see what we were doing... although they had to call ahead in advance or risk being shot at, we were far out of the flightline for any commercial planes so that made life easier on us.

I had just finished cleaning up the mess in the Basement, when Jazz pinged me on my cellphone. Picking it up I asked him what was going on and was surprised to hear the response. Lennox had been placed in charge of a new group called NEST and he was asking if we would be willing to join them.

I told Jazz to let Lennox know that if he wanted to talk to us about it, he would have to come and talk to us face to face and not over a phone line - even one as encrypted as Jazz's was. Apparently Jazz laughed at the response that came via Ironhide's comm. link, saying that Lennox and his family would be out our way in a few days to talk in person about the request, especially since Ironhide was the one driving them and I had no doubt that he would make it in less than three days.

I decided to jog up stairs and fix up the spare rooms some for the Lennox Family, and then see about Jazz taking me and Anubis to the local village market to stock up on food other than MRE's, which I had been eating on and off since moving here. Whilst working to get the property ready for use, I was living off of MRE's 5 out of 7 days a week (the other two days were spent at my folks place with the rest of the family) and then eating a proper couple of meals those other two days, and only because Jazz would remind me that 'if I fell ill he would get Prime to send Ratchet out this way and then I would be in trouble, and did I really want the Medic to hit my Guardian over the helm with his infamous wrench?' and I replied to that that it all depended on how sick I was as to when the Medic would be required.

After grabbing a snack and fixing up the spare room - which took all of 35 minutes - I picked up Anubis, who had by now fully woken up and was ready to see Jazz some. The lil' 'bot sure had taken to Jazz well after Mission City, although I attribute that to the fact that he was kinda like a brother of sorts or an uncle if I thought about it too much. I headed back outside to where Jazz was sat at in his vehicle mode, and running my hand across the hood of the Solstice I asked him if he was ready to go and get the groceries for when the Lennox's got here. After responding that he was ready, we left the property and headed on into the nearby small town and the Village Market.

2 HOURS LATER.

We had been back less than 20 minutes when we heard the familiar rumble of Ironhide's engine coming in the drive near the house. Skidding to the door and opening it up, I made it in time to see Lennox, Sarah and the adorable form of a now 2 year old Annabelle climb down out of the massive form of Ironhide's Alternate mode. As soon as Annabelle's little feet hit the dirt she was running towards me, at by which my response was to crouch down ready to grab her and swing her up for a hug. It had been way too long since I had seen her last, almost a full 18 months and by Primus she had grown like a perverbial weed and had the energy to match it.

After picking up the squealing form of a two year old, we walked back on over towards her mom and dad. After handing her back to Sarah, I grabbed Will's hand and save it a good clasp with my own and pulled him into a hug, I was really wondering what he had to say to me that would have him coming all the way out here instead of just asking me over the phone or in a letter even. He officially had my curiousity peaked.

After reaching the sitting room of my home, we all sat down on the two couches so that we were all comfortable whilst Will talked through this 'offer' of his. We had mugs of coffee for Sarah and Will whereas I had a large mug of black tea with Acai and Blackberries to help me relax and pay attention to what was being said, if I had been drinking coffee I would probably be jittery and thus not able to pay attention to whaat was being said. (This was found out by Ratchet roughly 8 months after the Mission City fiasco, and thus began my drinking of more black tea and less coffee *sigh* I miss the large amount of caffeine per mug, but it was necessary in his optics if I wanted to work better and live longer.)

As I took a large drink of my tea I listened as Will explained what it would entail with me joining NEST. He even pointed out that with me here on the East Coast with Jazz and Anubis, we would be placed at the NEST Base on this Coast as Commander of the Autobot/Human Alliance when Will was in charge of the Alliance on the lovely Island Base of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean. He told me that I would be in charge of training the new recruits and getting them used to 'bots like Jazz in size before they were shipped out to Will and Epps to meet the other 'bots.

I told Will that this was a rather good idea, as it would pepare the recruits better than just showing them Optimus or even Ironhide, though I said Ironhide's name with a laugh since he could be intimidating without meaning to be, and Optimus' presence just demanded respect because of who he was to the 'bots and him being a Commander himself. When I said this Will and Sarah laughed as they seemed to understand what I was saying, Will nodding and saying that Ironhide would be saved to meet the recruits after they had been acclimatized to being around Jazz and possibly 'Bee when he could make it this side of the country.

Excusing myself I walked out towards where Jazz, Ironhide and Anubis were sitting - well Jazz and Ironhide anyway, since Anubis was climbing all over Jazz and chittering away happily - and waited for them to notice me, which wasn't very long since Ironhide smirked and nudged Jazz's arm then tilted his Helm in my direction. "Ah gather 'Hide here let you in on wha' was being said to meh by Will and Sarah? I don't mind it since we can stay here, but ah would like ta know wha' ya think of da Idea yerself Jazz, considering yer mah Guardian and will also be helpin' with the Recruits." I said as I settled into Jazz's palm when he lifted me up to sit on his shoulder plates.

Jazz looked between me and Ironhide before raising his visor and staring at me as he consideered his response. Letting out a sigh he answered, "Ah'm glad yer like da idea that Lennox and ol' 'Hide 'ere had, dey were havin' a hard time coming up wit' personnel dat could deal with workin' wit' us and da Recruits at da same time. Yer name came up when dey spoke about the situation wit' Prime himself and he was da one ta suggest dat both o' us be da first contact with the Recruits, so as ta not scare them ta da Pit and back, unlike wit' ol' trigger happy ova here." he said pointing a digit at Ironhide who growled a warning a Jazz who just seemed to ignore it.

"I agree wit' ya dere Jazzman and ah'm sorry 'Hide but he is right, yer would just scare the poor Recruits back ta dere momma's, Ah mean ah heard what 'appened when yer met Witwicky, so dun blaim meh for agreein' wit' da Prime on this situation. Ah'm quite happy ta accept the placement, especially since it means we won't 'ave ta leave our home. Plus it means dat both Will and Prime will have two folks dey know holdin' down da fort this side of da world fer them. Now if ya will excuse meh, Ah'll go and tell Will and Sarah dat we both agree ta do dis thing fer them and Prime." I said as I slid down Jazz's shoulder and then scrambled down his back plates to the ground below which was easy considering he was sat at an angle that wouldn't cause a problem.

Making my way back inside the house I thought about what I would tell Will about what me and Jazz had decided. We had no idea as to what was going to happen to all of us within the next six months except that the Decepticon's would become a major pain in our afts.

This is now leading us to the Second TF Movie. What will happen next? Who knows! Remember Flames will be used by Ravage to roast Marshmallows over mah Wood Stove Fire.

Til All Are One!

Chapter Text

Chapter 15

A.N.: I know it's been a while.

Also thanks immensely to those who are reading and following this. *Hugs and hands out Energon Cookies*

Disclaimer: Ah don't own Transformers, dat honor belongs ta Hasbro/Takara. All ah own is mah OC's Caliene and Anubis.

Prime Voiceover:

Earth, birthplace of the human race, a species much like our own, capable of great compassion and great violence.

For in our quest to protect the humans, a deeper revelation dawns.

Our worlds have met before.

For the last two years, an advance team of new Autobots has taken refuge here under my command.

Together, we form an alliance with the humans, a secret but brave squad of soldiers.

A classified strike team called NEST.

We hunt for whatever remains of our Decepticon foes hiding in different countries around the globe.

New Jersey, USA 0914 hrs (13 hours behind Shanghai), September 8th, 2009

I sat watching the news that was being broadcast over one of the NEST Command video feeds as all of us with clearance watched the Op in Shanghai go down on the others. It always amazed me how some Govenrments would do anything to cover slag up, but I had to hand it to the Chinese... "Toxic Spill" that was a rather good cover, but only if we could keep the enemy contained and out of the public view.

-"Newsflash from the BBC. Breaking news out of Shanghai. There's been a major toxic spill in the Shanghai factory district. We're staying on top of this developing story for you. We will bring you any new information as we get it."-

{"Yeah,"} I thought to myself as I watched and listened along with the Communication Techs and Jazz's Holoform. {"...they'll get the information we feed them and hope that they fall for it."} went my brain as it watched as the Black Hawks were told that they could drop off their load of troops.

As the radio chatter merged slightly I jumped when Jazz's Holoform gently touched my arm and asked with a slightly worried look, "Yer feeling a'ight Cali? Yer seem ta be driftin' somewha', and ah dun wan' da Hatchet ta dent mah helm again, because ah let yer get ill now."

Patting his arm, I smiled back at him to reassure him. "Ahm fine Jazz. Jus' a lil' bit tired from all we've had ta do the past few months, especially wit' da trainin' of the newbies before dey meet up with Lennox and Epps. Yer also know da 'Cons 'ave been sneaky 'bout where dey been attacking 'round da world, and this makes the sixth time in a year, that's one battle every two months Jazz, an' it's starting to wear on everyone... includin' meh. Guess we were all caught offguard on da number o' 'Cons here on Earth."

Nodding his head, Jazz hummed a little before giving me a much needed hug of reassurance before he started laughing at what was being broadcast over the main Monitors and radio frequencies.

="Ding-a-ling! Come out and get your ice cream. Any bad robot out there better get ready for an ass-whupping."=

I groaned as I looked over at Jazz who was still laughing hard. "Whose idea was it ta send those two idiots on this mission? They can't even blend in right and are more than likely gonna mess this mission up and no amount of begging is gonna help us or them if this goes pear-shaped." as I pointed to the garish form of a pink ice cream truck with a sticker on one side that said "Decepticons Suck My Popsicle!"

Jazz looked at me and sighed as he composed himself, "If yer must know it was mah idea ta send dem. Dey need da experience, and dat's neva gonna happen if dey don' get ta go on any missions. Prime also said it might be a good thing fer dem ta learn dis way. Although dey coulda chosen a bettah disguise den dat." he agreed as he shuddered at the picture of the vehicle they were supposed to be.

My mind was brought back to what was happening on the monitors when I heard Lennox speak. "All right, Ironhide. We got echoes. They're close. Steel stacks at 2 o'clock."

We all heard Ironhide transform behind Lennox over the radio mics before we heard his deep gruff voice, "He's here. I smell him."

We watched through Lennox's video camera on the side of his helmet as he walked over to where Epps and a couple of others were crouched down with a Thermal Energy Reader.

"Oh, no." came the voice of Epps over the mics and at that I felt a shiver go down my spine, the same kind of shiver that I had had during the attack of our Base in Qatar in 2007.

"What have you got?" came the voice of Lennox as his helmet camera showed us what Epps had on his thermal imaging scanner. "Thermal ripple." came Epps' reply, and looking through the feed from the helmet cameras we all shuddered when we saw the massive form on the scanners screen. Whatever this 'Con was, it was BIG.

"Right, everybody, be steady. We're right on top of it." said Lennox as everyone on his team crept forward slowly and thats when all Pit broke loose.

"Eagle niner! I need an energy proton." came the call from Lennox as he rn to grab a team member that had just missed being hit by one of the steel pipes that were stacked.

"Panther 1, requesting fire mission now!" came the request from Epps as they ran to get clear as the Massive 'Con rolled out of their rifle range and headed towards the main freeway - definately not good.

"Gunships on station. Roll in hot!" came the response from General Morshower and shortly after that we all heard, "Dog 1, now we are engaging. We got a second Decepticon." and we looked towards the screen that had the camera on the underside of the Black Hawk that was providing air support.

"Arcee, twins! Target coming your way!" yelled Lennox through the Comm. Links and we all sighed in relief at the idea of Arcee going after the 'Con , that we now knew to be Sideways according to Jazz.

What the others weren't expecting was for the Twins - Mudflap and Skids to completely frag up their part in this plan. "I got him, I got him!" came Mudflaps response and shortly afterwards we heard him say, "I screwed that up. I'm okay. I'm all right."

What came next made Jazz shake his Holoform's head in embarassment. "This is combat, man. Total brain freeze, man." from Mudflap and then the sudden, "What's wrong with you?" and a slap across the back of Mudflaps helm from his twin Skids.

I truely sighed with relief when I heard Lennox call out over the Comms. "Bring in Sideswipe!"

"Clear a path!" came Sideswipe's voice as we watched the live feed from the Black Hawks circling overhead as their cameras recorded everything that was happening. We saw Sides literally jump in the air do a summersault over Sideways slamming his blade into the hood of the 'Cons Alt. Mode before shooting him with his shoulder mounted guns, landing infront of the 'Con and grabbing his blade before literally slicing Sideways in half.

Jazz sniggered, yes he sniggered when the next thing said by Sideswipe was, "Damn, I'm good!" All I could do was facepalm at the fact that he took my line that was used when I beat Jazz on 'Left 4 Dead 2' and took out a Hunter with a Katana in one swipe.

I appologized to Jazz and the rest of the Techs in the room and walked out after asking Jazz to let me know what happened next as I walked outside for some fresh air before getting a mug of coffee and heading back inside and the finale of the chase around Shanghai. Stress was definately not a good friend to any of us.

A.N.: Ah know dis chapter is short (only 3 pages), but it ended where ah wanted it to, and the next chapter should be longer *crosses fingers in hope*

Once again ah ask dat ya review and let meh know how ah'm doin' and what ya guys think. Just remember dat any Flames will be borrowed by Ratchet ta flambé Mudflap and Skids.

Chapter Text

Chapter 16

New Jersey NEST Base

It was hours later, shortly after the C-17's had touched down here in New Jersey that all Pit broke loose and it wasn't my fault for a change - the 'Prank' with the frilly pink tutu, wand and silly string on Ironhide's Alt. Mode was soooo NOT my fault, I had nothing to do with it… Honestly! *cough* EPPS! *cough* SIDESWIPE! *cough*

I guess I should elaborate on the whole 'Pit broke loose thing', unfortunate for the rest of us NEST members we had to deal with a rather unsavory character named Theodore Galloway, who for some unknown reason hates all of us here at the New Jersey Base as well as the group on Diego Garcia. He classifies us all as "a complete waste of time and resources that could be better used to eliminate the Global Terrorists that plague our way of life." His wording not mine.

The C-17's that landed here did so, so as to unload the caskets of the deceased from the Shanghai Op so that they could be given the burial that they deserved. Those of us who were present stood at attention as they were brought down the ramp and placed onto gurneys for transport.

As this was happening we could hear over the tannoy system the following request: "Autobot twins, report to Hangar Three." This was because I had finally gotten the so called 'Smart Cars' delivered so that the annoying Twins known as Mudflap and Skids could have a proper Alternate Mode and not some garish Ice Cream Truck. We were lucky that there was a Chevy Dealership in the nearby town and had them on their lot and were willing to take a Cash payment for them. The two soldiers that had gone to collect them for me had had a blast driving them back to Base, running them through their paces, so to speak. Unfortunately for the rest of us we knew that these so-called 'Smart Cars' wouldn't make the Twins smarter at all, which in my mind was a real pity.

I decided that since I had paid my respect to those who had died, that I had better follow the two mismatched Twins, just to make sure that they did what they were supposed to do - pick which of the two new cars were going to be their new Alternate Modes. Should have been easy right? Right? WRONG! This is what I heard and observed when I reached Hanger Three:

"Bad-ass ice-cream truck coming through." said one of the Twins as they pulled up to the Screens hiding the new cars from view and going behind it to separate into their separate components. The rest of the situation went like this:

"- Excuse me! Excuse me! Hello!""- No, I don't..." "- Hold up.""- Those are nice." "-Yeah, baby, it's upgrade time." "-Yes, sir. Yeah!""-Look here, it's my booty call right here!"

By this point I had my face in my hands shaking my head from side to side in shear horror at what was happening in front of me, and I could say for certain that I never wanted to be around these two much longer than I needed to be, otherwise my 'Sanity' may be called into question if I grabbed one of Ironhides Cannons and chased the Twins around the Flight-Line whilst shooting them to make the world a better place.

What they said and did next I would never wish upon my worst enemies, let alone the NEST Personnel who were with me to oversee the Twins new Alternate Modes.

"- Time to get my sexy on with the green.""- Green? No, green is mine!" "- I call green!" "- I got the green."

By this point it had turned into a brawl as to who got the Green 'Smart Car' with the black streaks down the sides, by the time they were done arguing this is what we all heard as they transformed into their respective vehicles.

"- That hurt, man." "- It's supposed to hurt. It's an ass-kicking."

It was after this that the Twins left Hanger Three and I followed them back to Hanger One which is where we were going to be talking to the Joint Chiefs of Staff or the 'JCS' by the Techies here in the Command Center. It was here that I officially felt my blood pressure skyrocket at who I saw talking with Will before Will headed off when a Tech announced that "Secure link to JCS is up, Major. Secure line to the Pentagon is now open.", and I gave a sheepish look towards where Ratchet was sat in Vehicle Mode and mouthed to him "I'm Sorry! But he's a Jack-Aft!" As if he understood me he flashed his headlights at me and I continued my way over past Epps who was standing beside Galloway and up the stairs to stand beside Will to talk to General Morshower and the other members of the JCS. Will and I both understood that this wasn't going to be a pleasant conversation, possibly worse than that if Galloway was here. Which got me to thinking, {"Just who gave Galloway the Security Clearance to be here?"}

I made it to where Will was facing the camera that linked us to the JCS at the Pentagon and saluted those there as was appropriate, before Will started this debriefing.

- "General?"- "Will, I saw the Shanghai op. We had a rough day out there.- Yes, sir. We have intel that I believe warrants an immediate debrief. Now with your permission, I can't let you see him, but I would like you to hear from the leader of the Autobots."- "Proceed."

It was at this point in the debriefing that Optimus transformed from his 'Bad-Ass' Semi Alternate Mode into his Bi-Pedal Mode and walked the three steps it would take for him to come close enough for the microphones to pick up his voice without it sounding tinny. He was truly an intimidating presence even after working besides them for going on over two years now, and I still tease Jazz about him currently being a small 'bot, until he points out that because the annoying Twins are here, he is no longer the shortest 'bot on Base.

- "General, our alliance has countermanded six Decepticon incursions this year, each on a different continent. They're clearly searching around the world for something, but last night's encounter came with a warning. "The Fallen shall rise again."- "'The Fallen.' Meaning what?"- "Origin unknown. The only recorded history of our race was contained within the AllSpark and lost with its destruction."

At this point I was mentally screaming that Prime was wrong, that not all of the knowledge had been lost when the AllSpark was destroyed, that some of it was within me, I just didn't have the heart to tell anyone else that, not even Jazz knew but I guess he was starting to figure out that something was different about after this part of Optimus' conversation with General Morshower took place, the idiot that is Theodore Galloway butted in and voiced his opinion. I was still trying to figure out why the frag he was here in the first place, because last I looked he didn't have the security clearance possible for this operation at all, so unless he did some major brown-nosing (which was a high possibility) he should not be here. The man - and I used the term loosely mind you - could never keep his mouth shut, and having him here was making my senses tingle, and not in the good kind of way either. Something was about to go wrong and it would end up being this morons fault I just knew it.

- "Excuse me! With this so-called AllSpark now destroyed, why hasn't the enemy left the planet like you thought they would?" - "Director Galloway, our National Security Advisor. The President just appointed him liaison."- "Well, I guess I didn't get that memo." came the response from General Morshower and I thoroughly backed him on that sentiment, especially since I couldn't stand the idiot, and the fact that the President appointed him out NSA? now that just sounds like either Galloway brown-nosing, or the President just wanted him out of the way and shoved him off onto us. - "Forgive the interruption, General. Excuse me. Coming through. Excuse me. Excuse me, soldier." he said as he shouldered his way past three techs and then proceeded to barge straight past me, it took all I had to not slug him then and there for just that alone, I also knew that Jazz was watching me from his spot below next to Epps at Prime's feet.- "After all the damage in Shanghai, the President is hard-pressed to say the job's getting done. Now, under the classified Alien/Autobot Cooperation Act, you agreed to share your Intel with us, but not your advancements in weaponry." Galloway said in a snide tone that really made me want to correct him about it, especially since both Jazz and myself along with Anubis had been there when they were setting up the Cooperation Act Treaty.- "We've witnessed your human capacity for war. It would absolutely bring more harm than good." Well at least Prime had the right idea about the reasons behind the treaty anyway, even if the idiots in Congress and the NSA didn't. "But who are you to judge what's best for us?"

A typical response from someone who has never seen battle up close and personal, what my father would call a 'R.E.M.F.' or in more polite terms, someone who is desk bound behind the safety of those of us who are fighting for our freedom and lives of our comrades-in-arms. He basically just placed foot into mouth without ever really paying attention to what he was doing.

- "With all due respect, we've been fighting side by side in the field for two years. We've shed blood, sweat and precious metal together."- came the response from Epps as he obviously wanted to chew out Galloway too, and if we ever got the chance to do anything to him - short of killing the idiot we would do so.

- "Soldier, you're paid to shoot, not talk."- came Galloway's snarky response as he turned to look over the railing at Epps, who was now scowling at Galloway in a way that promised some sort of retaliation on his part if they ever crossed paths in a dark alley way at night. The funny thing about that was I really didn't think that anyone would actually miss the idiot.- "Don't tempt me." came the verbal response from Epps as he turned to leave and grab a coffee since he was on duty and couldn't grab anything stronger right now. - "Easy."- Came the silent rumble from Prime to calm Epps down some. I made a mental note to make sure that he had a bottle of the good stuff waiting on his desk later after I got off shift. I wonder if anyone else had this much trouble with Galloway?

- "And the newest members of your team." came Galloway's continued spiel which I was trying so hard to listen to and read between the political bull-slag he was spouting. - "I understand they arrived here after you sent a message into space, an open invitation to come to Earth, vetted by no one at the White House." he continued his face was definitely changing to a rather nice shade of flushed red, either in anger or frustration that he really couldn't do much right now. I truly owed a lot to General Morshower and the rest of the JCS when the General responded himself to Galloway's little rant. - "Let me stop you right there, Mr. Galloway. It was vetted right here. And in my experience, the judgment of both Major Lennox, Captain Meredith and their teams have always been above reproach."

- "Well, be that as it may, General, it is the position of the President that when our national security is at stake, no one is above reproach. Now, what do we know so far? We know that the enemy leader, classified NBE One, aka Megatron, is rusting in peace at the bottom of the Laurentian Abyssal, is rusting in peace at the bottom of the Laurentian Abyssal, surrounded by SOSUS detection nets and a full-time submarine surveillance." he said as he clearly ignored the General and the JCS as he continued to release 'Highly Classified, Above Top Secret Information' over a video communication link-up. Even the most secure video link-up is never truly secure, hence why stuff like this was 'Eyes Only Material.'

- "We also know that the only remaining piece of your alien AllSpark is locked in an electromagnetic vault here on one of the most secure naval bases in the world." by this point I was shaking my head in complete dismay, he had just about given our location to anyone who was able to hack into a secure live video feed. And yet he continued on as if he hadn't just broken every regulation ever made about Top Secret Information and above.- "And since no one can seem to tell me what the enemy is now after, well, there's only one clear conclusion! You! The Autobots! They're here to hunt you! What's there to hunt for on Earth besides that? "The Fallen shall rise again"? It sounds to me like something's coming. So, let me ask, if we ultimately conclude that our national security is best served by denying you further asylum on our planet, will you leave peacefully?" he said as he turned and faced Prime directing the question to him face to face.

I turned and faced Prime so that I could see the full reaction to Galloway's question, {"This should be good!"} I thought to myself as I awaited the answer which came as nothing too surprising really... I mean it was Prime for Pits sake. -"Freedom is your right. If you make that request, we will honor it. But before your President decides, please ask him this. What if we leave and you're wrong?"

I mentally laughed as Will walked closer to Galloway and added in, "That's a good question." And I whole heartedly agreed with him, it was a very valid question to ask, especially since if the Autobots left we here at NEST knew that the Decepticon threat would never disappear like the rest of the Government would expect it to. Sometimes the idiots in Government were sooooo short sighted.

After nodding to Galloway and Will, I too turned back to the video link-up, saluted the JCS along with General Morshower and headed on back to my Office where I had a lovely pile of papers to go through before the next requisition cycle for the Base. It never goes well when you ignore the requisition lists given to you by those responsible for certain areas of the Base that kept everything working. Making my way outside the hanger, Jazz met me near the door after sneaking out from under Galloway's beady little eyes to check up on me.

- "Hey, Cali? Ya a'ight?" asked Jazz as I walked over and ran my hand across his hood. Shaking my head slightly I sat down in the drivers seat after he opened the door to his Alternate Mode and said, "Just drive meh back to mah Office if ya would Jazzy, this idiot is gonna be a bigger problem den we all expected, and ah wanna know who thought givin' 'im Security Clearance was such a good idea? He knows nothing, absolutely nothing about how you DON"T talk about Secure Information over a Vid link-up, even if it is Secure! There is no such thing as being too secure, because there is always someone/something that can hack into it and screw you over the hard way." sighing as I finished my mini-rant I looked over at Jazz's rear view mirror, "Ah'm sorry ah blew up on ya, ah didn't mean ta ya know. Ah mean Galloway just makes meh sooo mad."

"Dun worry 'bout it Cali. Ya know ah know dat ya didn' mean ta take it out on meh. But ah do agree dat dis idiot Galloway is a bunch of bad news, not just fer us but fer ya whole planet if he's not careful." he replied as we finally pulled up to my office. After climbing out, I patted his hood gently and told him that I would see him later, but that I really had to finish up here before we could drive out to my place off Base and relax for the weekend. 

Revving his engine in understanding he drove off slowly back to the hanger to see what else was going on and probably to have a chat with Prime about the moron that was in our midst.

A.N.:

Well here's da most recent update! *cheers happily* I finally made it to posting within a month of the last one. I am currently in the middle of writing up chapter 17 and that should be done some time in the next week or so - I really have to thank mah Nieces fer their laughter at me ta getting it done and fer putting on an excellent version of Aladdin Jr. at their School Gym.

Chapter Text

Chapter 17

A.N.: Hey all! *waves sheepishly* Sorry it's been a while since ah last updated this story, but due to Laptop problems - everything lost when mah laptop decided to do a complete out of the box restart for some unknown reason (possibly mah Younglings doin' something ta it) - ah lost the chapter ah was gonna put up here along with everything else. *hangs head in sorrow* I am currently trying to find all the stuff ah had before as well as write up the chapters ah had done. Unfortuneatly dey won't be as good as the first one's ah had typed up before the incident. Please bear with meh and I will try to update when ah can - ah am a busy Femme Creator of Three Younglings, and ah also have mah Pets to work and deal with, so life is busy, busy here. But enough of the author's Note and on to the Story.

Disclaimer:

I Caliene_Sunster do hereby state that I in no way own Transformers, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. They are owned by Hasbro/Takara and Michael Bay Films. The only Characters I own are Caliene Meredith, Anubis the Cellphone-bot and any other OC's that may show up in this story. I do this for myself and others to read whilst making no Monetary Funds from this.

So Legal can go swing over the Grand Canyon.

Key:

-"Speech"- = Radio Chatter

Previously in Chapter 16:

"Hey, Cali? Ya a'ight?" asked Jazz as I walked over and ran my hand across his hood. Shaking my head slightly I sat down in the driver's seat after he opened the door to his Alternate Mode and said, "Just drive meh back to mah Office if ya would Jazzy, this idiot is gonna be a bigger problem den we all expected, and ah wanna know who thought givin' 'im Security Clearance was such a good idea? He knows nothing, absolutely nothing about how you DON"T talk about Secure Information over a Vid link-up, even if it is Secure! There is no such thing as being too secure, because there is always someone/something that can hack into it and screw you over the hard way." sighing as I finished my mini-rant I looked over at Jazz's rear view mirror, "Ah'm sorry ah blew up on ya, ah didn't mean ta ya know. Ah mean Galloway just makes meh sooo mad."

Dun worry 'bout it Cali. Ya know ah know dat ya didn' mean ta take it out on meh. But ah do agree dat dis idiot Galloway is a bunch of bad news, not just fer us but fer ya whole planet if he's not careful." he replied as we finally pulled up to my office. After climbing out, I patted his hood gently and told him that I would see him later, but that I really had to finish up here before we could drive out to my place off Base and relax for the weekend. Revving his engine in understanding he drove off slowly back to the hanger to see what else was going on and probably to have a chat with Prime about the moron that was in our midst.

Now on to the next Chapter:

It was about 4 hours later, when Jazz's Holoform walked into my Office and plopped himself down in the chair opposite me. Glancing up at him from the papers I was going over that needed my signature before going off to the Pentagon and General Morshower, I asked him what he was doing here and he replied with a rather cheeky, "Ya been workin' in 'ere fer jus' over 4 hours now, ya need a break befer ya go and do somethin' tha' ya may regret later."

Nodding at his common sense - which was weird since I really didn't think that the words 'Jazz' and 'Common Sense' belonged in the same sentence - I signed the last bit of paper, shoved it back inside the file it was supposed to be in, and placed what had been done into my 'Out' Box on my desk ready for the Airman who was my Secretary to collect and mail on out.

Standing up and stretching I felt my vertebrae crack in relief after being sat for as long as I had been according to Jazz.

Switching my headset back on - which I had taken off and switched off due to doing Paperwork without distraction - I was shocked into a halt at what I heard coming over the channel.

-"Black Lion X-Ray, this is Black Lion Tango. We have activation of motion sensors on the western perimeter fence."-

-"Breach at B-14. Go, go, go, go!"-

-"The shard's gone."-

Shaking my head in disbelief I turned to Jazz and tapped my headset making sure he understood what I was talking about before his Holoform fizzled out and I heard the sound of his engine gunning at the door to the building I was in.

Running for all I was worth by this point - whilst managing to not knock over any other personnel that were walking through the corridors - I made it to the entrance and to the awaiting open driver's door of Jazz's Alternate Mode. Jumping in I told him to head to the Command Hanger and to make it fast because something was going down at our supposedly Secure Bunker where the AllSpark Shard was being kept.

After hearing that, I swear to anyone who would listen that Jazz tried to break the sound barrier as we drove. Meanwhile as we were moving at insanely high speeds, I was still listening in through the headset to what was going on.

-"Contact! Take it down!"-

-"Which way?"-

-"Shoot left! Knock it down!"-

By now I was anxious to figure out what had happened, and by some kind of luck - also known as Jazz's insane driving - we made it to the Command Hanger. After getting out and letting Jazz transform to his Bi-pedal Mode, he gently, yet quickly picked me up and plced me down on the gantry that served as the Command Post for my Base as part of NEST.

Reaching the Techs in charge, who were also following the interaction and taping it for future listening at the Pentagon, I asked them to open the link so that I could speak to whoever was in charge of the group engaging the as of yet unknown contact.

"Patch me through Sergent, I want to know what exactly is going on there and they will give me the answers to what is amounting by the second as a Major Clusterfuck."

"Right away Ma'am." came the response and soon I was talking to one of the men on Security Duty around the Shard's hiding place.

"Someone better tell me what in the Nine Levels of Hell is going on here!" I yelled through the mic attached to my head set, as Jazz watched what footage was coming through from the Secure Bunker - and let me tell you right now, what we were seeing was gory, as if we were back in the Middle East and being attacked by Hostiles.

"We have 2 unknown Contacts, Ma'am. One looked like a Mechanical Cat and the other was a Mechanical Mantis looking thing that literally ran and sliced through Petterson's body before he could get a shot off." came the response, which admittedly made me shiver at the thought of what were most definately Decepticons attackingthe Secrure Bunker to get the Shard. Turning to face Jazz, he nodded that he understood and hacked into my head set to talk to the guy talking to me.

"The 'Cons ya describing sound an awful lot like Ravage and Reedman, soldier. What eva ya do, don't underestimate these two, they are sneaky, dangerous sons of glitches and if they are leavin' you alive then consider yerselves lucky. But da fact dat they took da Shard is worrying to meh and everyone else here. Ah'll contact Prime and let them know what is going on, just try to stay alive, if ya can. Jazz Out!" nodding in my direction I nodded back in understanding that he was going to talk to Prime and then come back and get me.

I watched him leave and then continued to get the Techs to record everything that was being said so that Lennox and the others could listen to what happened. As far as I was concerned what just happened at the Secure Bunker had been FUBAR'd from the get go.

I sat down in a vacated seat and placed my head in my hands, this day had gone from bad to fragged up in the worst possible way and I really didn't see it getting any better any time soon. I could only hope that Prime and Jazz could come up with something that would help us with this situation and fast.

A.N.2.: Please Review! It really helps ta let meh know what ah need ta change or tweak or what ya would like ta see happen within the interactions of Caliene, Anubis and the rest of the 'Bots and NEST.

Chapter Text

Disclaimer:

I Caliene_Sunstar do hereby state that I in no way own Transformers, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. They are owned by Hasbro/Takara and Michael Bay Films. The only Characters I own are Caliene Meredith, Anubis the Cellphone-bot and any other OC's that may show up in this story. I do this for myself and others to read whilst making no Monetary Funds from this.

So Legal can go swing over the Grand Canyon.

Previously in Chapter 17:

"The 'Cons ya describing sound an awful lot like Ravage and Reedman, soldier. What eva ya do, don't underestimate these two, they are sneaky, dangerous sons of glitches and if they are leavin' you alive then consider yerselves lucky. But da fact dat they took da Shard is worrying to meh and everyone else here. Ah'll contact Prime and let them know what is going on, just try to stay alive, if ya can. Jazz Out!" nodding in my direction I nodded back in understanding that he was going to talk to Prime and then come back and get me.

I watched him leave and then continued to get the Techs to record everything that was being said so that Lennox and the others could listen to what happened. As far as I was concerned what just happened at the Secure Bunker had been FUBAR'd from the get go.

I sat down in a vacated seat and placed my head in my hands, this day had gone from bad to fragged up in the worst possible way and I really didn't see it getting any better any time soon. I could only hope that Prime and Jazz could come up with something that would help us with this situation and fast.

And now on with Chapter 18:

It was roughly 2 ½ hours later that Jazz came careening up to me in the now quiet but busy hanger as I was listening to my MP3 as it finished playing 'Retina And The Sky' by Idiot Pilot and moved on to 'Fruitcakes' by Jimmy Buffett, at the point where he skidded to a halt, I was doing a small dance to the music and singing under my breath so as to not disturb those working.

I was doing this so as to unwind from the situation with Galloway and Music was just one of a few ways that I dealt with the stress, the other was to shoot up the Firing Range, which at this moment had Ironhide showing off to a bunch of New Recruits.

Turning to acknowledge Jazz and turning off my MP3 whilst removing the ear-buds, I watched as he transformed into his bi-pedal mode and flashed me a grin. I smiled back and then asked him what was going on.

He sat down next to me and gently lifted me up onto his knee and explained that we were going with prime to talk to Sam about asking him to speak to the Government Officials about the Autobots and that they are trying their hardest to protect Humanity from the Decepticon Regime, and that we were to try and see if he would consider it if I went along too.

I nodded my head in response since it made sense to me as well as them, if they didn't listen to those Humans who were working alongside the Autobots then they wouldn't listen to anyone, let alone Optimus Prime who in some kind of Alien way was their version of Royalty and deserved to be listened to, yet we all knew that it was probably never going to happen since the Government was very short sighted, especially when it came to other Races.

Hoping down off of Jazz's knee and brushing the dust off of my butt, I waited till Jazz had folded down into his Alternate Mode, then climbed in and slotted my MP3 into a special slot that Jazz had come up with for either it or Anubis to sit in and filtered the music list I was listening to into his own systems and out through his speakers.

He decided to tell me what we were going to do.

"Well Prime wants ta see if Sammy boy is willin' ta talk ta ya Government on our behalf, 'specially since this Galloway prat seems ta want ta stir up some sorta trouble fer us. Although ah sure wouldn't mind seein' yerself as our spokesperson, ah mean ya get along wit' almost everyone and everybot on Base as is…. Except fer Galloway, but he jus' seems ta rub folks da wrong way is how ah see it."

I responded with a slight blush at what he had said before answering him, "Thanks fer da vote o' confidence dere Jazzman. Ah truly appreciate what ya sayin' about meh an' all, but ah just dun see mahself as a spokesperson to da Government fer you guys. Ah'm just a Soldier who is doin' her duty to her Country and it's something ah happen to like doin'. Ah saw what pressure those who work in the Government does ta folks, mah Father is a retired Brigadier General, and he was stressed wit' all he had ta deal wit' on a daily basis before he retired. Ah dun wanna end up wit' gray hairs befer mah time Jazzman, it just wouldn't look right on meh…. Least not until ah'm in mah 60's anyway." I added with a slight smirk, but I had seen my father have a Heart Attack from the stress he dealt with whilst working in the upper ranks of the Military/Government standings whilst I was younger and just starting out in Boot camp.

With the roads being almost empty at this time of day, Jazz activated his Holoform and sat in the passenger seat. He nodded his head when he thought what I had said over before he responded with, "Ya sound like a Mech both Prime and Ah know, goes by da name of Magnus and he always tells bots that he's just a simple Soldier, and that he doesn't want to have a Commission even though he was a City Commander. He always thought of himself as a Simple Soldier."

Nodding in understanding we sat in a comfortable silence for the rest of the ride just listening to tracks from the Movie 'O Brother Where Art Thou'.

3½ hours later

We had pulled up to a Cemetery a few miles from the University that Sam was attending. We had been here most of the night and I was sat on Jazz's Alternate Modes Hood chatting to my youngest brother via Anubis' phone mode.

I had two younger brothers who were twins, and it was the youngest of the two boys I was currently talking to. He had finally asked his girlfriend of 5 years to marry him and she had said 'yes' which meant that I would be going to a wedding in the very near future.

I ended our conversation when I heard a familiar engine pull up behind Jazz, and turning to slide down his hood I waved towards the Yellow Camaro form of Bumblebee who flashed his lights in return. Asking Jazz to watch Anubis for me, I walked on over to where Sam was getting out of Bumblebee and he did not look happy to be here.

"What are you doing? You won't give me a day, huh? You won't give me one day in college?" said a rather exasperated Sam as he faced Prime and then me.

I decided to give him the bad news rather than lay the fault on Prime, who already was having trouble coming to terms with what had happened.

"I'm sorry, Sam, but the last fragment of the AllSpark was stolen." I said as I stood at parade rest and got into a somewhat comfortable stance for something that could go on for hours.

"Like what? Like Decepticons stole it?" came Sam's worried response, I was about to explain more but Prime decided that he should tell Sam the reason we were here.

"We placed it under human protection at your government's request, but I'm here for your help, Sam, because your leaders believe we brought vengeance upon your planet. Perhaps they are right. That is why they must be reminded by another human of the trust we share." Came his baritone voice, that to me seemed to sound defeated or wary of what had happened.

"This isn't my war." He said as he looked at Prime with what I could describe as remorse for doing this.

"Not yet, but I fear it soon will be. Your world must not share the same fate as Cybertron. Whole generations lost." Came Prime's response and this time I could have sworn that Prime was trying to withhold tears at the information he had just let Sam know of.

"I know, and I want to help you, I do, but I am not some alien ambassador, you know? I'm a normal kid with normal problems. I am where I'm supposed to be. Why not Caliene here? I'm sure she could do the job better than me, I mean she's Military, and I'm just a kid trying to get through his first Semester of University. I'm sorry. I... I really am." Sam replied as he turned to look from Prime to me and then to face Bumblebee and Jazz's Alternate Modes.

"Sam, fate rarely calls upon us at a moment of our choosing." Came Prime's voice as I watched Sam start to walk towards Bumblebee who had his passenger door open.

"You're Optimus Prime. You have Caliene, Lennox and everyone at N.E.S.T. You don't need me." He said as he walked over and climbed in to Bumblebee's Alternate Mode and the young Autobot drove his charge back to University for his morning lessons.

"We do, more than you know." Came Prime's defeated voice as he watched them leave. Walking up to Prime I patted his pede and when he looked down I smiled back at him.

"Dun worry Prime, he'll come around soon enough and I guess ah could try and make the Government idiots listen ta reason, although ah'm kinda tempted ta take ol' 'Hide wit' meh as back-up, dey might just listen den." I said before walking towards Jazz and Anubis – the latter who was peeking out of Jazz's Passenger door window.

"Let's just head back ta Base fer a few hours of recharge, alright Prime, ah know ya need some and ah do too." I added with a stretch and a yawn that was wide enough to make my jaw crack. I smirked when I saw Jazz's mode twitch at the noise.

A.N.: Well this chapter was 6 pages long in but it seems shorter here. Anyway please leave a review if ya want, and thanks to all of you who favorite/follow this story it really means a lot to meh.

I will hopefully have more time to write the next chapters now that  the Youngling's go back to School. To all those going back to School/University/College - Good Luck.

For everyone else, hope you have had a great Summer Vacation! *runs to go jump in lake to swim*

See ya's soon.

Chapter Text

Disclaimer:

I Caliene_Sunstar do hereby state that I in no way own Transformers, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. They are owned by Hasbro/Takara and Michael Bay Films. The only Characters I own are Caliene Meredith, Anubis the Cellphone-bot and any other OC's that may show up in this story. I do this for myself and others to read whilst making no Monetary Funds from this.

So Legal can go swing over the Grand Canyon.

Key

/"speech"\ = Radio Chatter

Previously in Chapter 18:

"Let's just head back ta Base fer a few hours of recharge, alright Prime, ah know ya need some and ah do too." I added with a stretch and a yawn that was wide enough to make my jaw crack. I smirked when I saw Jazz's mode twitch at the noise.

And now onto Chapter 19

Meanwhile whilst Cali was heading back to her Base in New Jersey, Anubis was keeping track of everything that was going on over the radio frequencies used by the Military.

/"Conn, Sonar. Gained new contact, bearing 214, and possible hostile, confirmed for Project Deep Six Drop Point."\ Conn Operator.

/"What do you got?"\ Executive Officer (SiC)

/"SU pulled five contacts at 5,000 feet, diving fast. Never seen anything dive that deep that fast."\ Conn Opperator

/"Man battle stations. Chief of the watch, man battle stations! Helm, left full rudder, all ahead two-thirds."\ Executive Officer (SiC)

/"Left full rudder, two-thirds."\ Helm Operator

/"Dive, go deep."\ Executive Officer (SiC)

/"The nets protecting NBE One are screaming, sir."\ Conn Operator

/"That is 9,300 fathoms down. And no confirmed DSRVs on site?"\ Executive Officer (SiC)

/"None, sir."\ Conn Operator

/"Then, people, we've got a problem!"\ Executive Officer (SiC)

/"Conn, Sonar. Now hold six contacts, and they're coming up fast!"\ Conn Operator

/"Sound collision alarm. Left hard rudder. Five hundred feet. Angel Six, we got six hostiles coming up."\ Executive Officer (SiC)

/"Collision imminent port side."\ Conn Operator

/"One hundred feet."\ Helm Operator

Anubis kept a record of the conversation that had just happened and waited until Cali was awake before giving her the news he knew she didn't want to hear, the Mech known as 'Megatron' was back and after those who had destroyed him before in the Battle of Mission City.

Cali POV:

After arriving back at my Base, I looked to see that Anubis had gone into a recharge – poor bot was probably exhausted from all the work he has been doing for myself, such as keeping a link open to our Guardian Jazz so that he knows where we're at etc.

Once I walked into the hanger, I was shocked to see so many soldiers hustling around trying to find answers to the following information:

"Major, incoming SOS from Autobots!" came the voice of one of the Techies – Jacobs I think it was. "Multiple Decepticon contacts in motion. Vicinity, eastern United States, sir!"

"As in how many?" came Lennox's response as he walked over to check the screen and I followed close behind him also wondering what was going on.

"Unclear, sir." Came Jacobs' response with a slight cringe that he knew that was not what any of the higher-ups wanted to hear.

"Well, get clear." Came the sharp response from Lennox. I myself was wondering why I couldn't make out any of the other 'bots on Base except Jazz and Anubis. One thing that the Cube had done to me and I hoped that the Autobots never figured it out was that I could sense their Energy Signals if they were within 10 miles of me. I just hoped that it hadn't done anything else to me, or I would have a hard time keeping my job if any of the Government Stooges found out about it. I really had no interest in becoming a 'Lab Rat' of any kind, Ratchet not withstanding.

"The Autobots are on the move, splitting into two teams, sir. They're not answering our calls and they're heading to New York and Philadelphia." Came Jacobs' voice as he watched the group split in to their respective teams, and as I watched I just knew that those who were currently hauling Aft to Philadelphia were heading to get to Sam, which meant that Prime was there in the lead and that something bad was happening to Sam.

"All right, full weapons deployment. Wheels up in 20 minutes! Move it! Let's go!" came Lennox's voice loud and clear as he turned and headed towards the door of the Hanger and towards his room to grab his gear.

Running to catch up with him, I grabbed his arm and stopped him before stating, "I'm goin' wit' Jazz and Anubis ta see if we can catch up ta Prime and his group befer somethin' goes FUBAR. We can get there quicker den you guys – Jazz is da fastest thing here right now and time is most definitely of the essence. Ah'll see ya's all soon though. Stay safe!"

With a nod of his head in understanding Lennox clapped me on the shoulder and headed back in his original direction to his rooms whilst I ran to get in Jazz's Alternate Mode and haul aft ta catch up to a stubborn Prime and his group. I just hoped we would make it in time.

Chapter Text

Disclaimer:

I Caliene_Sunstar do hereby state that I in no way own Transformers, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. They are owned by Hasbro/Takara and Michael Bay Films. The only Characters I own are Caliene Meredith, Anubis the Cellphone-bot and any other OC's that may show up in this story. I do this for myself and others to read whilst making no Monetary Funds from this.

So Legal can go swing over the Grand Canyon.

Chapter 20

A.N.: 

+"Dialogue text"+ for dialogue using "radio montage" (which is what Bumblebee uses to communicate)

Cali’s POV

By the time we caught up to Optimus and Sam, it was see something that I never in my entire life thought I would see, something that would change the playing field of this Intergalactic War we were helping to fight.

“You're so weak!” came the roar of Megatron as he stepped up behind the Prime who from what Jazz and I could see was looking for Sam. It was at this point that I swear everything slowed down to about half speed as we watched helpless to intervene (Jazz still had ‘Nightmares’ about how he almost off-lined) as Megatron shoved his canon through Primes chest and blasted his Spark back to the Well of Sparks.

“The last Prime is dead!” Cheered Megatron, which caused me to shudder uncontrollably (probably due to my feeling his Spark Energy go out) as I pondered what was going to happen now if the Leader of the Autobots and a great friend was truly gone.

I was jolted from my shock when I heard the sirens of Ratchet’s Alternate Mode and then his booming command, “Autobots, attack!” before facing Jazz and Bumblebee, the latter who had skidded to a halt right next to Jazz’s form and I could make out the forms of Mikaela and some other boy inside.

“Bumblebee, get them out of here! Jazz go with him!” came the shouted orders from Ratchet as he continued to fire on what Decepticons were left in the area. I grabbed the now running Sam and all but threw him into Bee’s interior stating, “We’ll be right behind you, Bee try and find somewhere where we can hole up and figure this situation out, I have a feeling that the slag is about to hit the fan.”

After making sure that they all understood, I jumped in through Jazz’s open Drivers door and we peeled out after Bee and his passengers with the two annoying twins of Mudflap and Skids following us, I guess they were told to stick with Bee who was one of the few who could actually control them somewhat.

As we drove away from the battle behind us I looked at the steering wheel and then climbed over the center console letting Jazz activate his Holoform and take over the impression that there was at least someone driving.

Letting out a shuddering breath, I looked at Jazz’s Holoform and announced, “I better contact Lennox and let him know what happened here Jazz. He has the right to know as Acting Commander of the NEST Forces.”

Jazz nodded before saying that it was probably a good idea to use Anubis to contact Lennox since he was technically a Secure Line and could get reception anywhere. So gently asking Anubis to patch me through to Major Lennox I waited until they connected me through on their end.

We were still enroute to meet up with Cali and Prime to save Sam from what we suspected to be Decepticons going after him for vengeance for him killing Megatron in Mission City. What I wasn’t expecting was one of the flight crew coming back and handing me a headset stating that I had an incoming call. 

“This is Lennox.” I answered and as soon as I heard Cali’s voice on the other end explaining what had happened, my whole world just stopped, I couldn’t believe what she had just told me – The Big Guy, Optimus Prime was dead, killed by Megatron as he tried to protect Sam. She also stated that she and Jazz were going to be sticking with Sam and Bumblebee as protection and to not let Galloway know this incase he tried to mess things up even more than he had already.

We had travelled for hours when finally Bumblebee had found an old disused Jail from sometime in the 40’s from my best guess at seeing the state it was in. We decided that this was as good a place as any to hide out and lay low for a while so that we could gather our bearings back and figure out where to go and what to do from here on out.

It was only 35 minutes into us being here that the other boy – who Mikaela said was named Leo – came running out of one of the buildings towards Sam waving his Cellphone around saying that both him and Sam were wanted by the FBI, CIA, Interpol and other International Police Agencies. Luckily his phone had recorded the report on the news and we played it back before Sam did something crazy.

“Citizens of the human hive, your leaders have withheld the truth. You are not alone in this universe. We have lived among you, hidden, but no more. As you've seen, we can destroy your cities at will, unless you turn over this boy.” We watched as many pictures of Sam ranging from his Student ID card to his Driver’s License and Social Security Card Number were displayed. “If you resist us, we will destroy the world as you know it.”

News Report on CNN:

“What we're hearing from the German government is that the world broadcast was a satellite hacking. The military has just told us they have assumed Condition Delta, which is the highest level

we have been at since 9/11. President Obama is being flown to a bunker somewhere in the middle of the United States in the face of the worst simultaneous attacks ever around the globe.

The aircraft carrier USS Roosevelt goes down off the East Coast, all hands lost. Worldwide casualties are in the neighborhood of 7,000, but that number could climb. It's still too early to tell.

What we need to ask now is, "Who and why?"

The FBI is still trying to locate the boy, Sam Witwicky. We believe they have information about the attacks.

The FBI, CIA and Interpol are all seeking the cooperation

of worldwide law enforcement.”

As soon as it was over, Leo started spazing out again, “You need to listen to this, man. You gotta check this out. They have a traffic-camera spotting... They have a picture of me, man. We're dead, bro. FBI, CIA, we are wanted fugitives now!”

  “I just need you to focus for one minute, man. Just stop. This thing has blown up to a whole other level, all right?” Sam said hoping that this would calm him down, but it seemed a futile attempt, so he did what I was about to do.

“You know what? Give me this thing.” He took the phone from Leo. “They can track us. Do you see this?” Sam waved the phone around trying to get his attention which he finally did.

“What?” came Leo’s shrill response as he watched Sam literally place his phone on the ground and smash it with his foot before walking off towards where the rest of us were sat.

  “They can track us? Like, satellite track us? Okay, I'm not even with you guys! Technically, I'm like a hostage. This is kidnapping...  Enough is...” he was cut off when Mudflap and Skids stood behind him and called out, “Yo, Leo!”

  “This thing's gonna give me a heart attack, I swear.” He uttered and I smirked stating, “Well now ya know how ah feel, Kid, and ah work wit’ ‘em.”

 “That's 'cause you is a wuss.” Came the response from Mudflap who then fist bumped his twin whilst Jazz just sat there and shook his head as if exasperated with the pair of younger bots.

“You guys forced me into that car, right?” came Leo’s response as he seemed to be on the edge of freaking out again.

 “I think he's scared.” Said Mudflap looking down at Leo before looking back at his twin who then uttered, “Hey, Mudflap, what are we gonna do with this shrimp taco?”

 I tried so hard to not laugh at what was said next by Mudflap as it was almost like something that Ironhide would have said or even Jazz if he was in the right mood.

“Let's pop a cap in his ass, throw him in the trunk and then nobody gonna know nothing, know what I mean?”

“Not in my trunk.” Came Skid’s response as if the very thought of having a human in there was disgusting to them.

“Yo, bumper cars? I'm hearing you. Okay? I'm right here and I can hear you! No one's popping any caps in any asses, okay? I've had a hell of a day!” yelled Leo as he turned and stormed off someplace to hopefully calm down before I gaged him just on principal.

“Why don't you get a haircut with your bitch ass?” came the retort from Skids and his twin wasn’t that far behind either when he said, “Go whine to your boyfriend!”

  “Listen, Sam, I know what I'm gonna do, man. Look, I'm just going to go to the authorities and tell them the truth. Like, I had nothing to do with this. So, I'm not an accomplice.” Said Leo as he walked over to Sam, all I could do was shake my head, this kid really didn’t understand that he wasn’t ever going to have a normal life after this.

“Hey, you wanted this, right? You wanted the real deal? Well, that's what this is. Wake up! You're in the middle of it! You want to run? Go ahead! No one's stopping you. Stop complaining.” Said Sam as he tried to retain a sense of calm around him, which from what I could see, probably wouldn’t hold up too much longer. So intervening I walked on over and told them all to rest up for a while whilst I went to a nearby store and grabbed some food for us.

Walking back to Jazz I grabbed my ‘to go’ bag and found a spot to change out of my BDU’s and into a pair of khaki green cargo pants, AMMO T-Shirt, gray hoodie and then placed my work boots back on, before placing my bag back into Jazz’s trunk and grabbing my wallet from the passenger seat.

Explaining to Jazz that I was going to get some food and liquids for me and the kids, he nodded and asked if he should come with me. I told him to stick close to Bee and the kids, that way I would feel better about their safety and that I was going to be taking Anubis with me just in case. Nodding that he understood, I walked out of the abandoned Jail ruins and headed towards the stores a few blocks over.

It would take me until dusk to get back with all that I had grabbed at the local Dollar Store – backpacks, food: such as Snacks, Water, and Raman Noodles and Jerky, then a few other items such as soap, wash cloths and mini pocket tissues. Yes I wanted to be prepared if we ever were stuck like this for a while.

I had my Leatherman pocket knife and my two military knives that I always carried on me – one in my boots and the other on my belt under my jacket – since you never knew when you were going to need them, safety first in the world as it was now.

Roughly 3 Hours after Dusk:

“There's nothing that you could have done. You did the right thing by hiding the way you did Sam, even though Prime died, he died saving you from a much worse fate. Don’t let his memory be tarnished by the fact that you are now feeling guilty, he wouldn’t want that.” I said as I finished up my snack and threw the debris into the oil drum we were using as a fire pit. “Ah’ll be over with Jazz if ya need meh, ah need ta spend some time wit’ mah Guardian and Anubis, which ah haven’t had time to do recently.” I said as I continued past Mikaela and Sam to slip inside Jazz’s Alternate Mode and cuddle with Anubis who had decided to transform into his bot mode.

“You okay?” came Jazz’s voice from the radio, and when I didn’t answer he activated his Holoform and leaned over to give me a reassuring hug. It was at this point that I broke down and sobbed hard. It was hard to loose someone who you respected and worked with, and Optimus Prime was no different, to me he was the epitome of what bravery and good leadership was, and now he was gone.

“Yeah. Thanks Jazz.” I said as I hugged him back. Sitting up right I leaned into my pack on the floor and grabbed a couple of the tissues in there and blew my nose and wiped my eyes, it really wouldn’t do for the kids to see me loose my composure like this when they needed a strong figure to watch out for them.

  Climbing back out of Jazz to breath some fresh air, I heard Sam talking to Bee and listened in, it sounded as if Sam was feeling guilty about everything that had happened, even though I told him not to be.

“Bee, if you hate me, I understand. I messed up. I'm sorry.” He said as he looked at Bee who was sat down in robot mode watching his charges.

+“Young fella, you are the person I care about most in my life. If there's anything you need, I won't be far away.”+ came the radio from Bee trying to reassure Sam and unfortunately failing.

  “He's dead because of me. He came here to protect me and he's dead.” Said Sam sounding close to tears but not letting any fall.

  +“There's some things you just can't change. So, his sacrifice for us would not have been in vain. Hallelujah!”+ came Bee’s response as he transformed down into his Alternate Mode.

“I'm gonna make it right. I'm going to turn myself in.” replied Sam as he faced away from Bee to face Mikaela and the twins.

  +“We... We've got to stick together.”+ came the last snippet from Bee as he revved his engine and nudged the back of Sam’s legs with his front bumper and hood. I fully agreed with the yellow and black scout and made Sam jump a foot or two in the air when I spoke up.

“He’s right ya know, we gotta stick together or we will all fall apart and ya not gonna turn yaself in, I won’t let ya and ah’m sure dat Mik here as well as yer Guardian won’t let ya either.” I said as I walked closer to them with Anubis who was watching with rapt attention.

  “Yes, I am. I am going to turn myself in.” said Sam as he watched everyone around him from Bee’s bumper.

  +“Everything we worked for will be wiped out in one day!”+ came the radio from Bee’s Alternate Mode as he once again nudged Sam’s legs with his bumper to get his point across, and it seemed to work since Sam pulled up his sleeves and showed some inked marks on the inside of his forearm, with a determined look on his face.

 “You two...” he called out to Mudflap and Skids, why he asked them I’ll never know, maybe it was because Jazz was snoozing right now and Bee couldn’t exactly talk back properly yet – which I needed to try and work on when we had some time to do so.

 “Huh?” came their response and I just shook my head ass I muttered “Yeah real articulate guys!” earning a smirk from Mikaela and a chuckle from Bee as he revved his engine slightly.

  “Hey, you know the glyphs? These? The symbols that have been rattling around in my head?” asked Sam as he proceeded to show them the marking on his arm.

  “That's old school, yo. That's, like... That's Cybertronian.” Came Skids’ reply and then his twin butted in with, “That's some serious stuff, right there.”

“They gotta mean something, like a message or like a map. Like a map to an Energon source! Can you read this?” Sam asked as he kept looking at the twins.

“Read? No. We don't really do much reading. Not so much.” Said Mudflap as he scratched the back of his helm in embarrassment, I just stood there and shook my head, “Idiots!” I muttered.  

  “If you can't read it, we gotta find somebody who can.” Said Sam in exasperation as he sat back down near Mikaela and she hugged him.

  I was now standing by the fire barrel keeping warm, since there was a slight chill in the air and singing slightly to Anubis to keep him calm since he was now picking up on the tension that the group was telegraphing.

He was just staring to calm down somewhat when he jumped at the sound of Mudflap and Skids talking out loud for the rest of us to hear.

“Look who came sashaying back! Hair growing like a Chia Pet.

Look at him.” Said the twins and caused the rest of us to face the direction of the recently hidden Leo Spitz.

  “I had a bit of a mild panic attack earlier, right?” he said as he came closer and tried his hardest to walk around the twins at a distance.

  “That's 'cause you're a pussy.” Came Mudflap’s voice as he walked past them giving them the evil eye.

“I think I'm allowed that, considering what I've been through. I heard you have a problem. I think I know someone who can help.” Leo said as he got closer to the rest of us.

“Who?” asked Sam, his eyes brightening up slightly.

“Robo-Warrior.” Came the short reply from Leo. This got everyone moving and I moved Anubis with me over to Jazz and gently poked his driver’s door, when this didn’t get a response from him, I started to stroke the hood of his Alternate Mode and that got me a response, one that made the twins and Bee chuckle. Jazz was purring!!

Then came the moaning, he was moaning enough that I was blushing by now and that was what finally got Bee laughing through his radio loud enough to wake Jazz up the rest of the way.

I hope to have the next chapter up soon – Halloween at the latest, and since it is a Sabbat for me (I’m Pagan!), plus my Youngling’s will want to go Trick-or-Treating too, I will try to get it done and posted by then.

‘Til All Are One!

Chapter Text

Chapter 21

We were in our respective rides listening to Leo going on and on about his website and the mysterious guy we were now heading to meet that could possibly help us.

“This guy, Robo-Warrior, everything about anything alien, he's supposed to know. One time we revenge-hacked his site and maybe I saw some of your alien drawings or whatever.” He said as I gently stroked a now dozing Anubis, who had woken up a short while ago in a panic – for a reason none of us could figure out.

After 4 hours of driving we finally arrived at our intended – at least by Leo’s standards – destination, definitely not some place I would expect an Alien Know-it-all to reside at.

“This is it. Yep.” Came Leo’s voice over the radio in Jazz’s Alternate Mode and smiled as we parked in a line along the sidewalk outside of the building. I watched as the three teens – Leo, Sam (wearing a baseball cap) and Mikaela - climbed out of Bee’s Alternate Mode and started talking. At this point I rolled down the window and listened in.

“Deli. Good front!” came Sam’s voice as he looked around trying to spot anything out of the ordinary, specifically Cops.

“All right, wait here. I'll give you the go/no go. All right?” was Leo’s response as he turned to head on in. Deciding that I should go and wait with Sam and Mikaela, I climbed out of Jazz and after closing the door I started walking towards Bee’s Alternate Mode, but not before I ran a hand down the hood of Jazz’s Alternate Mode, at which I smirked when he jerked back slightly with a ‘barp’ from his horn. I can be a sneaky bitch when I want to be and vice versa with my Guardian, he can be a rather sneaky Mech at times – comes with his job being Spec-Op’s.

After getting a snigger out of Mikaela and Sam and a sound clip out of Bee, Sam started walking towards the front door of the Deli. Deciding to ere on the side of caution Mikaela and I walked after him – sometimes he could be such an idiot.

As we walked through the door we were assaulted by the noise of a busy shop. “Number 42, we got your kishka, knish, kasha-varnishka and kreplach combo right here. Cash only. Who's next?”

I stopped short when I heard that voice, one that I hadn’t heard in two years, a voice that made me want to shoot the idiot just for what he did back then, when he tried to offline Anubis and tortured Bee. Just as I was about to walk up and slap him to see if he remembered me at all I heard a female voice yell at him.

“I told you to cure the lox in the brine and then smoke it.” I sniggered and tried to cover it up when I caught Mikaela looking my way with a raised eyebrow. Shaking my head at her with a smile she caught the message… don’t worry about it.

“Ma, you want me to cut my hand off, or what?” came the irate yelling response from the idiot, and if what the female voice yelled next, he truly was one.

“You... You ruined a beautiful piece of fish, you retard!”

The idiot’s response to that made me smirk wider and walk over to the counter, pretending that I was perusing the wares behind the glass. “I'm like a ninja with a blade. It's an art form.”

He finished serving the customer in front of him and then rather rudely said to the customer, “Give me your money. Get out of here!”

Shaking my head at the language usage – in a busy store no less – I started towards the idiot and stood behind Leo. Luckily I had had my hair cut since the last time I had met this man and the clothing was different, including the jacket so he shouldn’t recognize me too quickly. He was currently yelling at another of the employees as we waited for him to acknowledge that we were waiting to be served like any of his other customers. “Hey, Sal! Watch your reach, huh?”

It was rather quickly after he said that that he noticed how close Leo was to the counter and staring at him. “Take a number, young man.” He said as he noticed that Leo didn’t have a numbered ticket in either of his hands.

“Robo-Warrior. Know him?” asked Leo with a glint in his eyes that said that this was our guy. I groaned when he responded. “I never heard of him.”

“You never heard of TheRealEffingDeal. com?” came the irate squeak from Leo’s mouth as he tried to get the guy into a rant.

“You must be talking about that amateur-hour blog operation with Game Boy-level security.” Said our now very valid yet annoying link to figuring out what in the name of all Gods and Goddesses was going on with Sam.

“Robo-Warrior. It's him! It's him! That's the guy right there! That's him!” came Leo’s excited voice as he spun around to tell Sam and Mikaela, and all but bashed his nose into my chest with how fast he spun around. Reaching out and grabbing Leo to steady him, I gave him a quick look and then looked towards the man we were here to see.

“No.” came the man’s response as Sam removed his hat. And apparently Sam wasn’t much better when he realized who we were to talk to. “You got to be kidding me.”

“All right, meat store's closed! Everybody out! Out, right now!” yelled our contact as he started to slam stuff down on the counter and hurry folk out of the store.

“Wait a minute. You know this guy?” came Leo’s shocked voice from behind me as I had moved in front of him incase our contact got rough, but I nodded my head that we did know this idiot and not by our own choosing. “We're old friends. Isn’t that right Seymour?” I said, which caused Leo to gasp in shock.

“Old friends? You're the case that shut down Sector Seven, got the kibosh, disbanded. No more security clearance, no retirement, no nothing.” He yelled before turning and rounding on Sam and Mikaela and adding, “All 'cause of you and your little criminal girlfriend. Look at her now, so mature.”

At this point I shuddered, he really needed help if he was saying that out loud and to a trio of teenagers who were half or a third his age. Really creepy!

All our thoughts were stopped when an argument started up between two of the other workers in the store.

“Moron! Where's the whitefish?” came the voice of the woman from earlier and turning around I saw one guy hit the other in the arm before the other retaliated with a hard shove and yelling, “Hey! Don't touch me with the pig.”

“Yakov!” Simmons yelled trying to get his attention, it seemed to work as the conversation continued. “What?”

“You don't get Christmas bonuses standing around! You want those new teeth
you saw on SkyMall?” he said raising an eyebrow and waited for his workers reply. “It's my dream.” “Then help her out.” Came Simmons’
reply.

“You live with your mama?” came the combined voices of disbelief of myself and Mikaela, I mean really, someone Simmons’ age really shouldn’t be living at home with his momma. I internally laughed when he responded with, “No, my mama lives with me. It's a big difference.”

What didn’t make me laugh however, was what he said next and I scowled at him warning him to not cross the invisible line that we had here. At the moment it wouldn’t take much for me to just shoot him on principle, but since we needed this idiot to decipher the glyphs Sam was seeing and writing I was going to wait and see what he would do.

“They got your face all over the news, alien boy.” Simmons said as he walked out from behind the counter and started to pace the main floor of the store as if trying to figure out why we were here talking to him when all any of us wanted to do was be no-where near him.

“Yeah, I know.” Came Sam’s defeated voice, as if he knew where this was going.

“And NBE One's still kicking, huh? How did that happen? Don't answer. I don't know what you're hiding, but I don't want anything to do with it. So, good-bye. You never saw me. I got bagels to schmear. Vanish.” Said Simmons as he finished his pacing, turned and headed back behind the counter.

“SIMMONS!!” I yelled and was surprised when he turned and looked at me with a brow raised in silent question. Responding to it I went on with, “Can you give us five seconds? Look, hold on, we really need your help.”

“Really? You need my help?” came his surprised reply looking towards me but I pointed him towards Sam and shrugged as if to say ‘He’s the one ya need ta talk to not meh!’

“I need... Look, I am slowly losing my mind. Okay, I had a little crab-bot, plunge a device deep into the soft tissues of my brain and started projecting little alien symbols like a freaking home movie! And on top of that, I'm a wanted fugitive. So, you think you got it rough?” Sam was all but hyperventilating by the time he was done with what I was starting to call his mini-rant. But apparently Simmons had had his attention piqued.

“You said it projected images off your brain?” he asked as if he knew something we didn’t, and if we were honest with ourselves he probably did know more than us.

“Right. Meat locker, now!” he said as he locked up the front door to the store and then led us to the Meat Locker in the rear of the store.

“Dead pigs.” Came Leo’s voice as we entered the cold air of the Locker, I was suddenly grateful for my jacket.

“What you're about to see is top secret. Do not tell my mother.” Said Simmons as he moved a few boxes of meat and then moved to open a hidden hatch in the floor. By now I was once again ready to smack Leo as he was muttering on and on about conspiracies and such, then he muttered out loud, “Swine flu. Not good.” As he skirted around a hanging carcass, as if just touching the dead meat would contaminate him.

“Now you know. Next time you eat a goat or a pig, there's a story behind it. Sad little story.” Said Simmons, as we followed him down into the secure room.

“An entire city flat. How do you explain that?” asked Leo as he looked at Simmons who was looking and climbing over boxes of files and other stuff I don’t think I could name even if I tried. It was then that Leo then asked Simmons, “Are you saying you believe in aliens now?”

It was this last bit that had me laughing loud and hard, surprising Leo and the others, once I had regained my composure – though not by much mind you – I turned and faced Leo stating, “Dude, this guy was working on one of the meanest Decepticons to ever exist up until two years ago when we killed him in Mission City. You met him the other day, the one who had Sam pinned on the concrete slab, according to what Bee told me about your little trip. That was Megatron, the Mech that killed Optimus Prime!”

Luckily for me Simmons was busy muttering to himself aloud as he searched for whatever he was looking for. “Okay, files, files. We're talking about symbols.”

Leo looked shocked at what I had said to him and wondered away from me to look around the room that I would probably think would be in his dreams for months after this. All this information on Alien Existence was enough to give the guy wet-dreams for the rest of his life. “Hey, still radioactive. Hands off.” Came Simmons’ voice as he watched Leo try and touch something in a bell jar container. Looking closer as he moved away I noticed that it was Frenzy’s head – Simmons really was a sick man if he was keeping that little spaz’s head in a sealed container like some sort of a trophy.

Shaking my head I turned around and faced Simmons and the kids again, by now Simmons had found what he was after and set it all down on his desk in the middle of the room.

“Okay, Cube-brain. Any of these look like the symbols you saw?” he asked as he opened up a folder and started laying out pictures, grainy black and white photos and a few in color. Just looking at the clothing the people in the photos wore told me that these were taken back in the 20’s and 30’s.

“Where'd you get these?” I asked as I watched Sam, Leo and Mikaela stare at them, before I turned my attention back to Simmons as he set up an old style movie projector and screen.

“Before I got fired, I poached S-7's crown jewel, over 75 years of alien research, which points to one inescapable fact. The Transformers, they've been here a long, long time. How do I know? Archeologists found these unexplained markings in ancient ruins all over the world.” He stated as he placed more photo’s on the table. “China. Egypt. Greece.”

He then dimmed the lights and played the film reel for us. “Shot in 1932. These the symbols you're seeing in your head?” he asked as the scene’s changed and different angles were shown as well as different monuments around the world.

“Yeah.” Came Sam’s voice, although he sounded like he was both shocked and awed that this had been found and recorded at the turn of the twentieth century.

“Same ones over here, right? So, tell me, how did they end up all drawing the same things? Aliens. And I think some of them stayed.” He said as he grabbed another file and tapped it on the table.

“Check this out. Project Black Knife. Robots in disguise, hiding here all along. We detected radioactive signatures all across the country. I pleaded on my knees with S-7 to investigate it, but they said the readings were infinitesimal, that I was obsessed. Me. Can you imagine that?” he looked around at all of us and I just couldn’t help myself when I uttered, “You obsessed? Never! A little eccentric, but never obsessive!” I snorted at the end when he gave me a look that said he didn’t believe me. Huh guess the guy does understand sarcasm, who knew?

“Yeah. Megatron said that there was another Energon source here.” Added Sam as he looked up from the pictures and right at Simmons, who had moved his attention back to Sam and the pictures.

“On Earth. Another source?” he asked Sam as if he was trying to process what he had just been told. “On Earth.” Replied Sam before continuing on with what he had to explain. “Okay? And that these symbols, maps in my head, would lead him there.”

“You talk to your Autobot friends about this?” Simmons asked as he looked around at us. I decided to help Sam out here and retell them what Jazz had told me on the drive over whilst we waited for Leo to tell us the directions to this Deli.

“No, no, no, the source is before them. Whatever the Energon source is, it predates them. It's before them.” I explained, hoping that Simmons understood why we were here now and talking to him.

“So, it comes before them.” He stated and I nodded my head, “Correct. That is why were here with you now, well thanks to Leo any ways.” At this Leo smiled at me, and nodded his thanks at being recognized for his contribution to our hunt.

“Well, then we're porked, unless we can talk to a Decepticon. I mean, I'm not on speaking terms with them.” came Simmons reply. He looked towards me and Sam as if we had anything else to add and I shook my head before adding, “The only talking to the Decepticon’s I have are the cusses I throw at them in battle Simmons, sorry.”

“Actually, I am.” Came Mikaela’s voice. Now that surprised me quite a bit that did, and I asked her where this ‘con was. She explained that it was currently in a sealed tool case in Bee’s trunk. Nodding in acceptance of this information both Mikaela and myself said we would go back up to Bee and get the case.

After making our way back downstairs with the case, we sat it on the table in front of everyone, including the Holoforms of Jazz, Bee and the two idiot twins. I tapped the side of the case and smirked when I heard a muffled, “Let me out!”

Looking towards Mikaela, I nodded and she grabbed the padlock holding the top closed and unlocked it as she said, “This is going to be a little bit sad.”

Watching the others nod in understanding, Simmons got insistent, “Open it.”

After opening the lid she grabbed the chain that she had hanging out the one side of the case and held it tight. What came out of the case shocked almost everyone of us. It was a small mech, and looking at him hard you could just make out his Alternate Mode – that of a RC Truck.

He would have been cute if it wasn’t for what came out of his vocal processor the moment he spotted all of us. “I will have so many Decepticons on your butt!”

I glared slightly and reached out to the little Mech to tap him on the arm and jerked when a small jolt of energy slipped from my fingertips to his arm, causing him to stare at me in surprise. “Hey, behave!” I said as Jazz stared at what had just happened. ‘Yeah,’ I thought to myself, ‘he’s gonna be talkin’ ta meh later abou’ dat, just how do ah explain it ta him?’

I was brought out of my mental chatter to the sound of Simmons asking Mikaela, “What is it, a Decepticon?” he asked in shock and awe before shaking his head.

“Yeah.” Came the response and the conversation continued around me as the little Mech was still staring at me, but he was trying to chew his way through the chain around his neck. “And you're training him?” continued Simmons with Mikaela responding with a meek, “I'm trying to.”

“I spent my whole adult life combing the planet for aliens, and you're carrying around one in your purse like a little Chihuahua.” Said Simmons as he stared in disbelief at the small ’con.

“Do you want a throw-down, you pubic 'fro-head?” came the voice of the small ‘con, who apparently needed some teaching in manners.

“I'm sorry. I'm so sorry about your eye, you know, but, if you're a good boy,
then I'm not gonna torch your other eye. Okay? I'm not gonna torch it. Just tell me what these symbols are, please.” Came Mikaela’s voice as she squatted down in front of the small ‘con, and looking closer at him I could see that one of his optics was burnt out and dangling every time he looked down, causing him to place it back into the right fixture. I really hoped that she hadn’t tortured the mini-con too much before placing him into the tool case.

“All right. I know that. That's the language of the Primes. I don't read it, but these guys...” the small mini-con looked rather surprised to see such old pictures of much older vehicles, some dating back to the 1910’s.

“Where the frick did you find photos of these guys?” he continued as he lifted each picture and skating around on his little rear tires trying to get a good look at each one.

“Is this they?” asked Simmons as he looked on in awe at the mini-con. “Yeah. Seekers, pal. Oldest of the old. They've been here thousands of years, looking for something. I don't know what. Nobody tells me nothing, but they'll translate those symbols for you.” Said the mini-con, as he wheeled around to face a map of the US on the wall of Simmons’ room and activated what I would deem was a laser-pointer set-up but much more advanced.

“And I know where to find them.” He finally added as we all looked on and I was shocked at how many of these ‘Seekers’ were in the US alone, most of them in either private collections or museums.

“The closest one's in Washington.” Said Simmons, as we all figured out the best on to go to, and shuddered when I realized that there was one close to where my family lived, probably at the old Base there as a display piece.

Shaking my head and getting myself together again we packed up all we needed and got back topside to Jazz and ‘Bees Alternate Modes and heading off to our closest destination on the edge of Washington DC – The Smithsonian Air and Space Museum.

Chapter Text

Inside the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum

I paid for Jazz, myself, Mikaela and Sam to get into the Museum, and explaining to the guy at the counter that I was trying to get the pair to join the Military by giving them a recruitment spiel. In addition, what better way to do so, than at one of the most interesting Museums for Aeronautical and Space Paraphernalia in existence?

I had decided to grab my note book/sketch pad and made my way further inside the Museum… having a Military ID can be a blessing at times and in this situation I explained to the guards there that I was hoping to sketch some of the older fighter planes they had here for the guys who couldn’t make it.

Heck add in the watery eyes routine and I was golden, nothing guys hate worse than a crying female, let me tell you, especially since it worked on my brothers and Uncles, never my Dad though – think he was immune to it.

I walked back around to stand by Mikaela and Sam, the latter of whom had a very active Anubis sitting on his shoulder and chirruping at anyone who would listen. Then it hit me, how in the name of Primus did the little guy get to Sam so fast and without me noticing? He was supposed to be in Jazz’s Alternate Mode! Then I slapped myself hard enough to make Mikaela look at me in surprise, to which I mouthed, ‘Anubis is on Sam’s shoulder, he should have been in Jazz’s Alternate Mode, but he escaped!’

Nodding at me she looked at Sam and laughed, before heading on over and telling him to hide, he really was cute to watch but we were on a time limit here and Simmons was giving the rest of us the stink eye for the hold-up.

But, back to the Mission in progress, I was half way down the main hall looking at the Mannequins they had dressed up in flight gear and other such things I could clearly hear the conversation between Leo and one of the Guards.

“Yo, baba! Bad news, bro! Ran out of toilet paper! You got any out here? Please tell me you do.” – Leo.

“Sir! I suggest you get in there. The museum is closed!” – Security Guard #1.

“Listen, man, I understand that, but as you can see, this is important. All right? Thumper dumper. I got to go. All right.” – Leo acting slightly panicked by now.

“Sir, you are a grown, naked man around children. Pull your pants up and exit the building.” – Security Guard #1 again.

“I'm not going anywhere.” – Leo as he waddles back into the Men’s bathrooms in the Museum.

It was a short time later that we had tasered the Security Personnel in the building and I was passing back by the bathrooms when I caught up with Simmons.

“What is going on in here?” I called from around the corner, not wanting to see something that could further scar me or Anubis for that matter. What came next from Leo’s mouth was anything but reassuring.

“How many times can you get tased in the nuts before you can't have kids?”

By this point I was mentally face-palming since I really didn’t want to smack my face any redder than it was, my poor blood-pressure!

“You are an amateur, man, a rank amateur. We just downed five guards. Five guards. Get your stuff and get out of here.” Said Simmons as he hauled Leo across the floor by his arms since Leo was still not recovered from the amount of electrical current that had gone through his lower body.

“I got to get the tracker, all right.” Said Simmons, as he dropped Leo roughly onto the ground and opened up a case he had set down. Next to him Mikaela was opening up the tool box she had grabbed from Bee’s form - with me explaining that it contained my paints and such for my sketches, the guards had no problems with her bringing it in, they probably thought she was helping me out.

“Be good.” Came Mikaela’s voice, before a really, annoying tone of, “I'm claustrophobic.” Came from the mini-con monster truck, before he transformed down to his alt. form and drove around the displays, looking for the right one.

“Look, look. Follow him. Follow him. He knows where he's going.” Came Sam’s voice as we tried to keep up. “He knows something.” He added as we continued jogging around the displays, and trying to not hit anything.

“What?” came Mikaela’s surprised voice from behind me since I was jogging in front of them and using my senses that I still hadn’t told Jazz about – the one about sensing their presence – I skidded to a halt in front of one of the oldest yet best Bombers of the late 20th Century.

“You got what I got?” asked Simmons to Sam and the rest of the group. “Yeah. A beaut of a Bomber, the SR-71 Blackbird.” I said in reverence. This was an old Bomber, but they were used for a long time and able to carry quite a bit for quite a long distance.

“There he is. This guy's a legend, like the Chairman of the Board! Yo, freshman, point the shard and watch the magic happen.” Came the mini-con’s voice after he had transformed back to his wheeled pede form and was skating around the feet of us and the roped off area around the plane.

After watching Sam lift the remaining shard out of a metal film canister with a pair of tweezers so as to not touch it – which made me wonder about something that seemed off about Sam.

He was radiating the same aura as the shard, which I knew was slightly different from my own aura that the main Cube had bestowed upon me at the Battle of Mission City, just over 2 years ago.

I was brought out of my thoughts by Mikaela yelling, “Shit. It's a Decepticon!”

“Decepticon?” came the voices of Simmons and Leo as they watched between the Plane and Sam, with Mikaela in tow running full tilt at them. “Behind the MiG now!” came Simmons’ response to the sounds coming from behind me.

I turned to look behind me and stood stock still in awe as the SR-71 Blackbird that I knew to be a sleeping Cybertronian, transformed rather awkwardly, almost as if he was having trouble moving parts to where they were supposed to be – kinda like an old man with Arthritis who requires a cane to walk right.

“What sort of hideous mausoleum is this?” came his booming voice, as he looked around confused. He must have gone into stasis out in the open and then the Military had retired his Alt. Mode and sent it to the Museum to be placed on display. I think I would be quite peeved too about that.

“Answer me, pawns and knaves! Show yourselves or suffer my infinite wrath!” I tried hard, really I did to not laugh at that, he was starting to sound like my Grandpa when he was telling us about some story or another – he really used to get into what he was saying.

“You little spinal-cord-based organisms!” he said when he looked down and around and spotting at least me, looking back up at him. I knew I was going to have a crink in my neck if I had to look up at another tall Mech like this.

“Bugger it!” came the expletive as he knocked down a piece of a space probe/Mars Rover Lander. “Behold the eternal glory of Jetfire! Prepare for remote systems override!” he yelled as he waved his walking cane at the main hanger doors to this section of the Museum.

“I tell you, this guy did not age well.” Came the Mini-Con’s voice from behind me as I continued to watch the Elderly Cybertronian try to figure out why the doors weren’t opening for him.

“I don't think he's gonna hurt us.” I said as Sam nodded in agreement, even I knew that if he had been going to hurt us, he would have done as soon as he was transformed.

By now, I was getting weird looks from almost everyone except Sam and Jazz’s Holoform, the latter of whom seemed to have a rather thoughtful look on his face. Maybe he was thinking the same as me, who knew what my goofy Guardian was thinking half the time.

“I command these doors to open. Fire! I said, fire!” came the rather irate and loud voice of Jetfire as he pointed towards the hanger doors where they brought all the larger exhibits in through. I instinctively ducked when I heard a ‘whoosh’ sound of a rocket/missile being launched. What Jetfire said next made me snort to hold in a laugh.

“Bollocks!”

It was shortly after he said that word that he bashed his cane into the door and denting it enough to pries it open and started to walk away from the building. The whole time he’s doing this he’s grumbling and moving in rather funny ways. “Damn these worthless parts. ltchy, wretched rust in my arse!” He said as he reached back and looked to be pulling at a rather uncomfortable – at least to him – plate of armor that caused some rust particles to rain down as he walked. Guess the Elderly Mech could do with seeing Ratchet for a major work over and rust removal.

“The museum is going to be very angry. Very angry. We gotta catch that plane.” Came the voice of Simmons from behind me as he looked at what had once been the Hanger Doors to the Museum. Nodding my head in agreement and thinking better of what I was about to do – considering it was crazy to even think about chasing after a ‘Con bigger than me by something like 50 times – I ran after Jetfire, calling for him to stop and wait for us, that we could help him. At the speed he was walking at – which wasn’t very fast mind you, he had a walking cane! – you’d think catching up with him would be easy… WRONG!

It was rather difficult – his steps were slow yes but he had extremely long legs. I was suddenly very grateful to my Military training that I wasn’t out of breath chasing him. It didn’t take me long to notice that the rest of the group had caught up with me and that I could hear the engines of Jazz, ‘Bee and the minor twins coming up behind us, even though Jazz still had his Holoform next to me. I could tell that the conversation with Jetfire once everyone was standing still was going to be very interesting.

Chapter Text

Previously in Chapter 22:

“The museum is going to be very angry. Very angry. We gotta catch that plane.” Came the voice of Simmons from behind me as he looked at what had once been the Hanger Doors to the Museum. Nodding my head in agreement and thinking better of what I was about to do – considering it was crazy to even think about chasing after a ‘Con bigger than me by something like 50 times – I ran after Jetfire, calling for him to stop and wait for us, that we could help him. At the speed he was walking at – which wasn’t very fast mind you, he had a walking cane! – you’d think catching up with him would be easy… WRONG!

It was rather difficult – his steps were slow yes but he had extremely long legs. I was suddenly very grateful to my Military training that I wasn’t out of breath chasing him. It didn’t take me long to notice that the rest of the group had caught up with me and that I could hear the engines of Jazz, ‘Bee and the minor twins coming up behind us, even though Jazz still had his Holoform next to me. I could tell that the conversation with Jetfire once everyone was standing still was going to be very interesting.

=======================================================================

Now on to Chapter 23:

"Damn old coot sure can move when he wants to! Hope ah live ta be able ta do the same when ah'm older." I muttered to Jazz who just smirked - almost as if he knew something I didn't.

As soon as the rest of our little group arrived we watched as Jetfire started to rave to himself out loud, and it was safe to say that even I was confused about half the things he was talking about.

"Right. I'm on a mission." he said as he stamped his cane onto the ground and turned to face us
"Wait, wait, wait, wait!" came Sam's voice as he tried to stay out from under Jetfire's Pedes.

"What do you want?" came his cranky response, although to be fair to him if I was his age and had been woken up from 70 odd years of sleep then I too would be cranky. "Look, we just want to talk!" I said as I walked closer to Sam with Jazz a few steps behind me.

"I have no time to talk. I'm on a mission. I'm a mercenary doom-bringer. What planet am I on?" asked the old Seeker as he squinted down at us. "Earth." said Jazz beating everyone to the answer and I gave him a light-hearted slap on his arm in response.

"Earth? Terrible name for a planet. Might as well call it 'Dirt.' Planet 'Dirt.' Tell me, is that robot civil war still going on? Who's winning?" asked Jetfire as he looked around at all of us. This time it was Sam who responded to his question. "The Decepticons."

"Well, I changed sides to the Autobots." said Jetfire with quite a bit of determination in the way he said it. The look on Jazz's face was hilarious - almost as if he was gonna fritz in shock - although ta tell ya the truth... I wasn't far behind him so I asked the question I knew most of us were just dying to ask. "What do you mean, changed sides?"

"It's a choice. It's an intensely personal decision. So much negativity. Who wants to live a life filled with hate?" he replied and before anyone else could ask a question about it, the little Remote Controlled Alt. Mode Truck ‘Con spoke up. “You mean you don't have to work for those miserable, freaking Decepticons?”

“If Decepticons had their way, they'd destroy the whole universe.” replied the Elderly Seeker, who was beginning to act and remind me more and more of my own Grandfather - the type of Grandfather who would sit down with you and tell you stories about how things went when he was younger.

“I'm changing sides. I'm changing sides, too, warrior goddess. Who's your little Autobot?” came the voice of the little ‘Con turned Autobot. I snickered though when Mikaela responded with a “You're cute.” which only seemed to further make me snicker at what the lil’ bot did next. “Name's Wheelie. Yeah. Say my name, say my name.” as he proceeded to hump Mikaela’s leg like a dog.

I decided to ignore the continuing by-play between Sam, Mikaela and Wheelie mainly because it was getting weird even for me and so I went and stood closer to Jazz’s Holoform, who held me close in a secure embrace which made me feel safe and loved - he was grinning like a mad man because of it - even though I was somewhat tired from everything that had happened so far.

“I told you my name was Jetfire, so stop judging me.” This is what shocked me from my thoughts as the old Seeker slammed his walking stick - which had been his front landing gear when he had been the Plane - into the ground as if to make a point about something. I noticed that Sam and the rest had taken a step backwards when he had done that, yet I knew somehow - and I think it had something to do with me being able to sense their Sparks energy - that he wouldn’t intentionally hurt us in anyway.

“I have issues of my own. And it started with my mother! My ancestors have been here for centuries. My father, he was a wheel, the first wheel. Do you know what he transformed into?” By now Jetfire was going into a long-winded rant about his family history and such, but what happened next made me turn and laugh into Jazz’s shoulder so as to muffle the sound. After I had regained control of myself I faced forward again just in time to see what happened next.

“(farts out parachute) Bollocks. My boosters are fried.” said the old Mech as he fell over backwards. We walked closer to the Seeker as he laid on his back a bit trying to regain his equilibrium from falling over backwards, but Jazz and I walked the closest and I stood for a moment next to Jetfire’s helm and I didn’t flinch when the old Mech turned his optics in my direction.

“There is something different about you, Femme.” he said in a quieter voice than before as he starred at me making Jazz growl lowly, “You don’t feel like the other organics that are stood here... Wonder what it is that makes you different?” he murmured the last part as he looked between me and Jazz.

I never got to respond to his question as Sam had come closer, thus cutting off the so far one-sided conversation. “I think we can help each other. You know things I don't know. I know things you don't know, I do.” Sam said to Jetfire before turning to me, “Hey Cali... Can I please borrow one of you blades?”

Quirking a brow at Sam I nodded slowly and handed him my boot knife, his one eye was twitching slightly, almost like a nervous tick, but if he was having the thing that happened - Bee had relayed to Jazz everything that had happened in the dorms after Sam had talked to him on the way away from the Battle in the Forest with Megadork - happening again he needed an outlet and we were surrounded by dirt.

“I could do this all day. It comes in waves, these vivid symbols. They're symbols, but they're in my mind. You see, all this is in my mind and Megatron wants what's in my mind. Him and someone called the Fallen.” said Sam after roughly 10 minutes of carving the dirt with my knife before slamming the blade into the dirt as he finished the last symbol. I growled lowly at him for that and since he was distracted by his conversation with the Mech, I wiggled out of Jazz’s embrace again and walked over a grabbed my knife out of the dirt and wiped it off before placing it back into my boot sheath.

“The Fallen? I know him.” came Jetfire’s response and then continued on his mini-rant, “He left me here to rust. The original Decepticon. He's terrible to work for. It's always apocalypse, chaos, crisis. These transcriptions, they were part of my mission, the Fallen's search. I remember now, for the Dagger's Tip, and the key.”

“Slow down. The Dagger's Tip? The key? What are you talking about?” I asked since this was starting to confuse even me - darn me for zoning out whilst a conversation was going on, and add into the fact that Anubis was starting to stir in my pocket again, poor baby really needed to travel in Jazz’s Alt. Mode more than my pocket.
What we were not expecting was for Jetfire to stand over us like a Vulture over a dead carcass and yell out, “No time to explain. Hold on, everybody! Stay still or you'll die!” Jazz’s Holoform fizzled out at hearing that and transformed into his bipedal form to grab ahold of me before we were surrounded by a flash of intense bright light, and a scared chirp from Anubis as he was shook around in my pocket. All I could do was pray to whatever God or Goddess was listening, that we came out of this alive at the other end.

Chapter Text

Previously in Chapter 23

What we were not expecting was for Jetfire to stand over us like a Vulture over a dead carcass and yell out, “No time to explain. Hold on, everybody! Stay still or you'll die!” Jazz’s Holoform fizzled out at hearing that and transformed into his bipedal form to grab a hold of me before we were surrounded by a flash of intense bright light, and a scared chirp from Anubis as he was shook around in my pocket. All I could do was pray to whatever God or Goddess was listening, that we came out of this alive at the other end.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter 24

I had always wanted to feel like I was flying like a bird, but doing so without wings was a completely different experience, I was holding onto Anubis so tightly that he was screeching in pain to which I relaxed my hold slightly, didn’t want to hurt the poor thing due to my fright.

Falling through the air on the other hand (without a parachute) was not something I ever wanted to do again. As I fell I looked to see where Jazz was, since his Holoform had fizzled out when Jetfire had done what he had. All I can say was that it was an immense amount of energy that drove my senses crazy, and I cried out in shock as I hit something metallic, silver and warm as I landed.

“Primus dat ‘urt!” came a familiar voice from above me. Turning to face the voice slowly since I figured hitting something that hard was going to leave bruising the size of a fist on my back and ribs, I smiled at my Guardian and friend.

“Jazz ya crazy Mech! Ya caught meh! I love ya’s fer it, but mah back sure doesn’t thank ya much, I think ah’m gonna have some rather interesting bruises once we’re done here.” I said as I twisted slightly to see where we at. Seeing that I wanted down, Jazz gently placed me in a sitting position on the warm sand. Reaching out with my senses, I could tell that the Ley Lines here were old, very old, Ancient even and welcoming to someone like me, talking to me and letting me know just where we were - Egypt.

Finally getting up after pulling my senses back in, I stood up and made my way in the direction I could feel Jetfire’s older Spark energy and waving for Jazz to follow me. We reached him before the rest, although I could see Simmons climbing up the other side of the bluff the old Mech was sat upon.

“Well, that wasn't so bad. I just hope we're still on the right planet.” came Jetfire’s voice making me ponder just what he meant, and before I got the chance to ask him, another smaller and angrier voice spoke up. “Hey, that freaking hurt!” Of course Wheelie had to grouch about something happening to him.

“That really, really hurt. You're just lucky that I didn't get hurt! People could have gotten killed, okay? And if I would have gotten hurt, you would have heard...” came the voice of Simmons as he finally climbed up to where we were on top of a mesa. Trust this idiot to make this out to be all about him and not everyone else’s safety.

“Shut up. I told you I was opening a space bridge. It's the fastest way to travel to Egypt.” snapped Jetfire as he glared at Simmons, while I thought back on the tingling sensation that had occurred when he was activating said ‘Space Bridge’. It seemed to explain so much to my senses, yet almost nothing at the same time, which made it even more confusing.
“Why are we in Egypt?” asked Sam, apparently I had missed out on some of the conversation going on around me, and looking towards my Guardian and then down at Anubis I realized that they knew it too, if their smirks were anything to go by - Damn it!

“Don't you get snippy with me, fleshling! You were duly informed!” snipped back Jetfire to Sam - yep I really missed out on the conversation there folks. What I wasn’t ready for was Simmons taking control and calming the strained situation between Sam and the Old Seeker. “Can you just stop for a second? Can you focus? Can you tell us why we're in Egypt so we can all have a little bit of semblance of peace of mind?”

“This planet was visited by our race once before, by our earliest ancestors, millennia ago. They were on an exploratory mission to harvest Energon, the lifeblood of our race.” explained Jetfire as he activated a hologram to illustrate his point about how screwed we were at the moment.

“Without it, we'll all perish, oxidize and rust, like my wretched self! Do you have any idea what it's like to slowly fall apart and die?” he added as he shut off the hologram. Great he is back to being grouchy - kinda like an old person who got disturbed from a peaceful nap or got interrupted whilst telling an exciting story to a bunch of kids.

Yet again Simmons came to the rescue - this is weird enough for me at the moment mainly because this is Simmons we’re talking about! “Let's not get episodic, okay, old-timer? Beginning, middle, end. Facts. Details. Condense. Plot. Tell it.” he said using his hands for emphasis - damn remind me to get him a bottle of the good stuff once back stateside.

“Somewhere buried in this desert, our ancestors built a great machine. It harvests Energon by destroying suns.” said the Old Mech as he looked towards the sun overhead. By this point my mind was probably fried from the heat - a balmy 130 degrees Farenheight in the shade (and since I hadn’t been over here in over a year, aka Qatar 2007 at the SOCCENT Base) I wasn’t used to the heat and therefore grabbed a quick cool drink from my pack and after taking a swig, drizzled some over my head before grabbing a large neckerchief and drenching it with the remaining two-thirds of the bottle before wrapping it around my neck to keep me cool.

“You mean blow them up?” came the voice of Sam, peaking my interest as I finished tying the neckerchief up and placing the bottle back into my pack, which I then handed to Jazz who placed in his Subspace for safe-keeping.

“Yes. You see, in the beginning, there were seven Primes, our original leaders. And they set out into the universe, seeking distant suns to harvest. The Primes set out with one rule, never destroy a planet with life, until one of them tried to defy this rule. And his name forevermore was the Fallen. He despised the human race and he wanted to kill you all by turning on that machine. The only way to activate it is with a legendary key called the Matrix of Leadership.” said Jetfire as he tried to explain why we were there.

“A great battle took place over possession of the Matrix. The Fallen was stronger than his brothers, so they had no choice but to steal and hide it from him. In the ultimate sacrifice, they gave their lives to seal the Matrix away in a tomb made of their very own bodies, a tomb we cannot find. Somewhere, buried in this desert, that deadly machine remains. The Fallen knows where it is and if he finds the tomb of the Primes, your world will be no more.” he finished with a sigh of defeat/remorse as if he knew we were in a whole pile of trouble and yet didn’t know if we could win against this monster.

“Great, everyone get ready for Apocalypse Season - it’s come early this year!” I said with my usual wry sense of humor. “So... what’s next after this.... Zombies??? Little Green Men??? Mutants bent on destroying the Human Race??? Or maybe, just maybe Alien Vampires???” I added whilst looking towards Simmons as if he knew the answer. All I got back from him was a very confused look. Jazz on the other hand had obviously Googled the suggestions and was now snickering like a five year old.

I decided to ask the question that everyone wanted to know, “Okay, so how do we stop him? Stake to the Spark, Decapitation, Chopping of his hands, ya basic slice ‘n’ dice with a scythe, or how about a 2 killaton nuke aimed at him - I don’t recommend the last part though unless we’re on another continent, fallout is a bitch!” I added as everyone looked at me as if I had grown a second head.

Looking around at everyone I just shrugged and asked, “WHAT??? It was just a few suggestions folks, ya know we’re all thinking it!!”

I guess Jetfire thought about it too as he responded with, “Only a Prime can defeat the Fallen.”

“Optimus Prime?” came Sam’s voice as he looked up from where Mikaela was fixing a bandage on his hand from a few scrapes and burns from the ‘Space Bridge’ that Jetfire had done.

“So, you've met a Prime? Why, you must have met a great descendant. Is he alive, here on this planet?” asked the old Seeker asked with quite a bit more energy to him when Sam had mentioned the big guy.

“He sacrificed himself to save me.” said Sam with a huge dose of guilt in his tone as if it was completely and utterly his fault - and yet he hadn’t been the one to pull the trigger, that had been Megatron.

“So, he's dead. Without a Prime, it's impossible. No one else could stop the Fallen.” said Jetfire as he sat down rather heavily - almost as if he had nothing left in him after Sam had said what he did. After the point Jetfire had made about the power that was contained in the Matrix and the Fallen’s battle to get his hands on it gave me an idea.

“So, the same energy that's gonna be used to reactivate the machine, could that energy somehow be used to reactivate Optimus and bring him back to life? Kinda like how the AllSpark worked?” I asked with my mind now working overtime and for some reason, even though my eyes were currently shut with me thinking about this, my new ability - the one that Jazz had no idea about was currently showing me possible equations about energy distribution and such compared to some-bot the size of the Prime.

“It was never designed for that purpose, but it's an energy like no other.” added Jetfire as he looked thoughtful for a few moments as if what I had just said had never been thought of before - maybe it hadn’t but we were currently down one Prime and kinda desperate for any advantage we could get over Megatron and the Fallen.

“So, then how do you get us to the Matrix before the Decepticons get to me?” asked Sam with a slightly panicked expression on his face, but he seemed to have some determination there too as if he thought my suggestion was feasible also.

“Follow your mind, your map, your symbols. What you carved in the sand, it's your clue. ‘When dawn alights the Dagger's Tip, Three Kings will reveal the doorway!’ Find the doorway! Go now! Go! That was my mission. It's your mission now. Go before the Decepticons find me and find you.” said Jetfire as he struggled to stand upright again.

Hanging back as I watched Bumblebee and the twins transform on the sand below the bluff, I nodded to Jazz who quirked an optic ridge at me in silent question before I nodded once and watched as he too headed on down to wait with the others, taking Anubis with him for safe keeping.

Turning back to the Old Seeker, I bowed out of respect and asked him a question that had been bothering me since we had met him, my accent completely gone for once. “You kept looking at me with a thoughtful expression the entire time we were together as a group Jetfire, why was that?”

“It is because my dear Femme, that not only did you have a Sparkling upon your personage, but you were radiating at times a familiar signature - one that just so happened to awaken myself in that hideous mausoleum, it was the signature of the AllSpark. You need to be careful Femme, there are others out there who would use you for the wrong reasons if they knew just what you were capable of.” he responded with.

“I just hope that your silver Mech down there can protect you from those who would wish you harm, you are indeed a rarity, and also you are no longer just a fleshling... You are more like us then you might expect. But you need to go now and find that Matrix before the Fallen does or not even your silver Mech will be able to protect you from him.” he added as he ran a finger down my back in a comforting move - the kind a Grandfather would give a Grandchild to cheer them up or to reassure them that what they were doing was the right thing.

“Okay Grandpa Jetfire, I’ll do my best and make sure that not only do we find this Matrix, but that I am protected from the Fallen as well as Megatron. I guess it’s safe to say that not just Sam has a target on his back now, huh? But Jazz is the best Guardian a girl could ask for. Even if he is a shameless flirt!” I said with a smirk as I walked over and hugged the Old Blackbird’s leg. “Keep ya self safe Grandpa, ya have folks who care about ya, ya know. Just kick some ‘Con Aft if they even try ta tangle wit’ ya, and show them how ya brought the pain when ya were younger!Being Older doesn’t mean ya can’t fight.... It means ya got experience behind ya abilities when ya do fight!” I added as I started to climb down towards where Jazz and the group were waiting for me.

After reaching the base of the bluff, I waved to everyone and we all climbed into our respective rides and headed towards our first destination, where ever it was.
===============================================================================================================

This chapter is 2456 words long without the Authors Note at the End, folks. Not really one of my longest chapters... But it was trying to kick my Aft with how it wanted to flow - also Jetfire let a bit of information slip that wasn’t intended for this chapter... Crazy Ol’ Coot!!

This is also posted on Fanfiction.net for those who wish to view it there.