"Captain Lennox, your wife is online."
One simple little web chat in Qatar, so many years ago. Five minutes of bliss, a loving wife and a beautiful baby daughter.
One soldier's life spared.
He went over there to protect them from the world, to keep them safe. They are his driving fire and his every breath; they are why he lives. And they ended up saving him, without even realizing it.
To think that all of this started with one simple, glitching webcam…sometimes it blows him away. And to think that he'd be involved in this…Guys like him were in movies about small-town stories centering on the "golden boy", or maybe Army thrillers about a man finding his way in the world. Anywhere he went, it was Action/Adventure all the way, but to think he'd be involved with aliens and secrecy, and throw a bit of Sci-fi in the mix…
He guesses he was never meant to be the Army movie guy after all. He was the small dose of real-and-physical in the Sci-fi movie. And frankly, that's where he belongs.
He thinks back on it, all those years ago. The heat of the desert that burned even out of the sun, and at the time he had been…well, pissed that he had to cut things so short. He had never imagined what those few little frames of static would mean for him. What it would mean for the world.
And now here he is, in the middle of hell, for the third time, and they're all he can think about as he rushes through the ruin that was once Chicago, trying desperately to find Epps and Sam and their little renegade team.
He wants to do nothing more than just zone out and think of Sarah and her fair hair and angel's face and her arms around him, and Annabelle's huge, bright eyes and soft smile and loving, meaningless words while this place goes to the Pit. But he has to keep his mind clear; he has to focus if he wants to get out of this alive, and see them safe again.
Qatar was bad; his guys were on the line, but at least the danger was far from home. And Giza…damn, Giza was a day straight out of hell, but it was far from home. But this, here…this was Chicago.
Freaking Chicago!
The Decepticons had crossed a line. They were on his turf now, and the Autobots'. They had threatened his family and blown his friends out of the sky.
To say he was pissed off and itching to blow them all to hell would be an understatement.
"Sir!" One of them calls back over his shoulder.
Will, hearing alien shrieks he knows don't belong to his bots, rounds the corner.
"Mark it!" he orders, cocking his machine gun viciously. "Decepticon!"
There's the sound of something very bad, and very, very big smashing into everything through the close rubble; finally, the team manages to make it through the dense pile and to the small intersection, where chaos is unfolding like crazy.
There's a massive Decepticon he realizes is Starscream, and that's bad news, and worse, he's thrashing around like a fish on a deck, slamming his head into buildings and clawing stone and brick off into the streets below like he's on fire.
And then he hears the screaming.
There's a girl dressed in gleaming white against all the grey, cowering behind a smashed telephone booth, shouting a name that makes his blood chill.
"Sam!" she screams, as he charges through the chaos to slam down against the wall beside her.
Carly.
He turns around, and realizes with a sickening feeling that there is a long cable attached to Starscream's head- the reason he's flailing around, there's only one optic glowing- and Sam is hanging on the other end like a puppet, being thrown in all directions and coming dangerously close to being smashed up against the walls and the Decepticon himself.
"What the hell is he doing?" Will yells, immediately trying to formulate a plan. But God so help him, he can't think of one thing to do.
Then suddenly Starscream jerks his head, slamming up against a crumbling office building, and Sam disappears through the shattered window.
"Now!" Will roars.
His guys do the best they can, firing at all vulnerable shots, but Starscream is letting his gun rip blindly now, tearing everything apart. They duck down, they hide, and just as Will throws a glance over his shoulder again to watch the robot, he sees Sam leap out of the window, land on Screamer's head, and stab him right in the other eye with something long and pointy.
Okay, the kid has lost it.
He jumps down, much to Will's relief, slinging like crazy on the line, and making a beeline straight for him.
"Sam!" yells Will, grabbing the boy as he catapults down to keep him from zipping over the side of the building again. But there's something wrong, the cable is still attached, linking Sam's arm to the Decepticon's head…
Sam is yelling, he is yelling, stretching up to try and slice through the cable with his knife, but Starscream, blind with pain, falls to all fours and begins crawling out of the giant alley, towards the main roads, dragging the boy and the soldier along with him. The asphalt scraps Will's long black suit and the cable is harder to reach than ever, and he and Sam are still yelling at each other, but he doesn't let go.
Then finally, something the kid says sticks. "We have to get out- the bomb!" the boy shouts.
"WHAT BOMB?"
"THAT BOMB!" he jerks his tangled hand at Screamer's head.
This can not be happening.
And then they're moving again, being dragged against the ground, and Will's stomach leaves him in a lurch and Starscream decides at that moment to stand up, pulling them both with him. And still Will hangs on, struggling desperately to hack at the cable, but it's all he can do to keep from falling to the ground thirty feet below as he and Sam sway like branches caught in the breeze of a hurricane.
"I got it!" he shouts, finally grabbing a firm hold on the cable above them. "How long do we have?"
Sam doesn't grace him with an answer. Starscream's jets roar to life, and the panicked Decepticon tries to flee, jetting up sixty feet into the air. Sam and Will scream with everything that's left in their lungs. It's like a rollercoaster, only a million times worse, and everything is hanging on by Sam's hand and Will is holding on so hard that he can't feel his fingers anymore, with his palm clamping painfully over the cable. His biggest thoughts and greatest fears are rolled into one; he is focusing everything on not letting go, and everything on trying to cut them loose.
Starscream begins to fall, his jets spluttering out as he bumps into a skyscraper, and lands on top of a parking garage, jostling them, and with one last ounce of strength, Will reaches up and slices through the cable with his knife.
They fall, and they fall, and they fall, as Starscream's head explodes and red fire and blue sparks shower down around them, and right as Will is sure they're screwed and he'll never get to say goodbye to Sarah again, massive, warm hands are around his body, bringing him down to earth even faster, but he's not afraid; he knows these hands…
The world blurs into one long shape as they summersault, and he and Sam land heavily on Bumblebee's hood as the Camaro backs up hurriedly, trying to avoid Starscream's falling carcass.
They lay there for a minute after it's over, and to Will, everything seems twice as brilliant and crystal clear, his mind is so in shock he can't think, and every muscle in his body is turned to rubber.
Finally, the boy breaks the stunned pause.
"…Well, he's dead." is Sam's brilliant line.
Will looks at him and stares. Just stares.
And then he remembers how he reacted the first time he killed a Decepticon, jumping up and down like a little girl, and decides not to judge too harshly.
This boy is as much his own as Epps or any NEST soldiers or any Autobot. And now that he's not immediately in the claws of death, momma-bear-Lennox mode is tuned down a tad, and he can breathe again.
If they think it's bad when he does it, they should see Sarah…
He won't pretend like he didn't feel like he'd won every lottery in the world when Optimus finally spoke.
"We will never leave your planet alone."
He looked down at the ground, and shamelessly, a tear slipped down his face.
He's been in NEST for about six years now. He's been a soldier for even longer. The last time he almost cried was the first time he held his daughter, and Ironhide was there to see it in a stunned silence.
And here, now…
He's going to see Sarah and Annabelle again. He won't have to go to the Witwicky's house…er, R.V, and explain why Sam won't be coming back. He won't have to close the NBE-sized hangar in Diego Garcia.
They've won.
Part of him can't believe it, but they've done it. They've done it. He takes a deep, trembling breath, sniffs, and looks up, blue eyes reflecting the dim sky, one hand on his hip supporting his gun, as he looks at the creatures that brought his world tidings of hell, and then delivered them from it with pure sacrifice. He sees the ruins of Chicago. He ignores it for now. Instead he looks at Carly and Sam, so young and so determinedly in love, and knows there's hope for the future.
A/N; to all those who have been saying i missed something in the action or messed up the facts, here's my note; Thanks, but i cant get EVERY little detail, like Starscream kicking someone and missing, becasue the point of veiw I'm using requires a little less detail and a little more panic, since Will isn't looking down at what Screamer's doing and more looking up and trying to get the hell off that cable. If you think I missed something CRUICIAL though, then please, tell me so i don't spend months looking like an ignorant idiot. Thanks to all who have reviewed this fic!