A bolt of lightning hit the ground near the power station. It was clear that this would happen multiple times in the very near future. The bolts were not from the ominous storm clouds in the distance above the nearby village.
Kris Karmichael prayed none of the discharges hit his brand new 2015 Dodge Charger. He really did not want to explain to his higher ups why a squad car had fried circuit boards, again. Kris had already come up with a plausible cover story to explain this freak show.
Another bolt came his way landed two yards to his right. The charger would not offer an ounce of protection if he did not do something soon. The monstrous giant robots would see to that, all three of them.
The tallest menacing robot was clearly the leader. Never once did it do any dangerous work of sabotaging the substation. The one actually doing the dangerous job was overworked and under kept. This second one did not appear to want to be there; if the large rips in its outer metal plating were anything to go by. The third one's purpose seemed only to make iridescent clear glass like cubes out of its chest plate and provide communication interference.
The interference was not needed, as the whole county was prone to rolling communication dead zones on an hourly basis. Pigeons were the only system of communication not affected by the rolling blackouts. These messenger and homing pigeons only worked if Kris wanted backup to arrive from the local secret military base. Kris only used this method for the potentially world-ending events the world population was not ready to know are a possibility yet.
Kris did not put much thought into the thought of the fact that the three monsters let him approach the fence. He did get his adrenaline rush of the evening when the leader told him to watch how superior the robotic nightmares were to the inferior hairless apes of this backwater planet. The leader then barked out some orders in its native tongue sounding more like electronic pops and clicks to the enslaved drone.
The main electric amplifier of the substation started to arc. As the third tried to connect his glass cubes to these electrical arcs, the amplifier blew causing the robot to monetarily loosen control of communications. This was just enough time for the police officer to inform the HQ of the situation at hand and not to permit the local power company to send out their idiots out just yet. The third robot recovered. Sensing the communiqué in progress, it shot a warning blast at the car more so than at the human.
A flash from a set of headlights alerted the officer that the local conspiracy theorists were here. Great, just what he needed, the local gossip machine was to go a twitter about aliens again. If he hazarded a guess, the trio of humans would be the town's notorious troublesome twins and the resident medic from Hell. Those three never left each other's side, except for the necessary and obvious exclusions.
The human trio one by one turned off their headlights and coasted to a stop 100 meters from chaos. The communications robot saw this and notified its evil leader. The leader emitted some sort of scanner-based plane of laser beams, rotating 360° around itself. It then barked an order in its strange robotic lingo back at the communications expert. Kris could only guess the command had to do with the four cassettes extruded out of the third robot. Each cassette made a nail-on-chalkboard sound was they shook and contorted into mini – human sized – versions of their host. The minis marched in step toward the parked cars, halting five meters away, daring the humans to try something. Things were getting weird.
Kris's squad car made an odd sound as if its engine turned over too quickly. It too began to shake and contort into a robot. His Charger – now robot – was the only one with wing like protrusions coming out at 45° perpendicular to it shoulders. It had the aura of Prince Charming and that of the Creature of the Black Lagoon. In his shock, Kris failed to hear neither the similar sounds coming from the other cars nor the telltale sound of laser fire as he lost coherent thought and consciousness, falling into a dreamless sleep.
§
Kris awoke as if he were coming out of a medically induced coma. The sky was starless. He did not think it was supposed to be 100% overcast nor was there to be a lunar eclipse that night, but complete darkness was still possible. He brought his hands up to his face to wipe the sleep from his eyes. There was a small resistance from the IV in his arm connected at the underside of his wrist. There was also resistance from the monitor cables on his left. Perfect, he was in the wrench thrower's domain. What happened? How did he get there? He groaned as he realized his predicament. He knew better than to move.
There was a hiss of pneumatic actuators and moving joints somewhere to his left. A flash of electric blue light and a panic of the robots' language accompanied the hiss.
Upon hearing the din, every wretched light in the room turned on with maximum luminosity blinding the occupants two. Just as the human's eyes adjusted to the new surroundings, a blur of angelic gold followed by one of demonic red came to the side of their bedridden brother. Two sets of perfect metal arms restrained and comforted the one in panic mode.
An aura of impending doom descended upon the entire medical ward once the pandemonium was pacified. The medical chief advanced towards the immobilized automaton. The twin demons knew to back away when the dragon wanted its proverbial prey. The dragon of a machine only came up to the strong shoulders of the identical perfect beings. What it lacked in size was made up in its aura of commanding control. Kris idly wondered what would happen if his favorite healer were to meet up with his robotic counterpart.
There was the usual banter in between a robot and his medical provider. At least that is what it looked like. This continued until the golden demigod with its keen attention to detail quietly notified his superior of the state of the human's consciousness. The MC must not have liked this development as it gave out a muttered shriek sounding much like a famous human explicative.
The red hellion tried and failed to hide a muffled laugh. The boomerang of a wrench came out of nowhere smacking the trickster upside its head, leaving a dent showing the MC's physical prowess. Kris could not help it; he smiled at the entire scene.
The medic touched a spot on its neck where a human male would have an Adam's apple. It actually began to speak in a language pleasing to the human ear, "Kris Karmichael, do not panic, but I need to know what you remember about what happened before you blacked out."
The human from his position on the med berth let fall a calculated gaze on that of the mechanical's. He thought the medic was eerily familiar, even more so than before with the human sounding voice. Testing he replied, "I was investigating a blown transformer when my squad car was struck by an arc of electricity."
"Is that what you are going to submit to your superiors? Or are you testing to see if I am evil robot like those from earlier this night?" The medics patience was starting to thin.
Kris released a breath of air, "Well since you brought it up, are you?"
It was clear the medic wanted to brandish its wrench at the human. "No mechanical being in this room –" an electronic snippet from the red twin earned him another wrench to the helm. – "it's not a torture chamber to those who actually follow the rules." The power in the room turned its attention back on the officer, "As I was saying, no being in this room is partnered with the evil ones from before.
Meanwhile, while the conversation was going, the golden twin kept the bedridden robot distracted by running extension cord-like feelers across the monochrome mech's torso. It appeared that the downed mech had been shot there with an incendiary round of some sort.
The officer sat up, resting both of his fists on the bed by his pelvis bone. He ducked his head to gather his thoughts. Then he looked into the medic's optics. "The answer to your question is yes. That is what I'm going to tell the higher ups. Before you ask, the people of this town know something is going on, but they don't want any details unless it directly affects them."
The medic promptly pulled out the IV and cables. "You will find your clothes at the end of this room in the changing room. I will want the gown back."
Kris got off the bed and started for his uniform. He stopped mid-way and turned back. "What do I call you? I have a feeling the evil ones will be back once they are done licking their wounds."
"He's too smart for his own good." The demigod seemed to smirk. He was sitting down now, squeezing the bedridden mech's servo. When did he start doing that? "Maybe we should keep him as a pet…" Part of Kris's mind wanted to be that. That was an odd thought.
Red butted in." You and your pets. Last time you got a pet, it ate half of the medical supplies. Moreover, the time before that you had a cyber-wolf. A fragging cyber wolf. Not only did it leak lubricates that would eat through cybertronian metals, it also had a knack of making bots horny –"
"Why do you think I always took him into battle against –"
The medic forcefully merged the helms of the twins together with a sickening crunch. "Go get dressed and take one of the vehicles in the parking lot. I'll take care of the paperwork."
§
The parking lot was full of cars of every make and model from the 1980's. Karmichael walked in three rows in and spotted twin Lambos. Someone clearly did not like his Italian sports cars. These cars had jet packs. The odd thing was these were the only street legal cars there, even with all the dents and scratches. Kris idly wondered again about the connection of the twins and these two sports cars as he climbed into the driver side door of the golden one. Then he remembered he needed keys. He reached for the glove box when he noticed the strange markings on the dash. He ran his fingers over them as if to commit them to memory. "I feel as if I should be able to read this."
The Lambo stirred to life. The symbols started to glow then disappeared. From the speakers came a voice with power to arouse anyone. "I figured you would select this one. Prowl wouldn't see the irony of in the choice though."
Startled, Kris made a failed attempt to crawl out of the living metal.
"Where are you going, officer? The party is just getting started." The voice continued.
"To Hell! My medic was right. I'm going insane! The job is getting to me. Cars are talking to me!"
Cables similar to the golden twin's quickly and methodically bound the organic male. "Calm down. The town needs you to keep yourself together, right?"
The logic of the situation was failing him again.
§
Ratchet never truly understood the connection the twins had. Many years ago, they had let him become their close friend. The war was worse then. He quite often would forget to recharge and fuel up. It was forgivable in the given circumstances. The twins formed their friendship to avoid being sent to a labor camp for prisoners as punishment for their uncontrollable behavioral patterns. They seemed to have broken their friendship in order serve better on the frontlines. It was healthier for the twins, but Ratchet never could forgive them.
Now that their small ragtime group of Autobots was stranded on this organic world, the duo kept trying to make amends. Ratchet knew better. They were driven by their programming to do so. Even more so since Prowl took a direct hit to the torso from Megatron's fusion cannon. The poor bot would never online, not without proper tools only found on Cybertron. He had no way of knowing what damage occurred to the processor when the power surge hit Prowl's battle computer.
The worst-case scenario was that Prowl was in a vegetative state and life support only was keeping the battle computer from going bad. He kept running weird simulations to keep that part of the tactician's processor alive. He had about another hour before he needed to start the next simulation.
There was a hiss of pneumatic actuators and moving joints somewhere to his left. A flash of electric blue light and a panic chirp of electronica accompanied the hiss. Before Ratchet could stop them, the terror-some twins rushed into the medbay. Both were trying to comfort the processor dead mech.
Ratchet sauntered into his domain. Pushing the two demigods out of the way, the Medical Officer began mumbling explicatives about bots not leaving much alone. Ratchet carefully took readings as to what caused a dead mech to react as if it had a nightmare. This continued until the golden demigod with its keen attention to detail quietly notified his superior of the blinking red light next to the spark monitor indicating a simulation had ended. The MC did not like this development. He gave out a muttered shriek sounding much like a famous human explicative that rhymed with fire truck.
The red hellion tried and failed to hide a muffled laugh. The boomerang of a wrench came out of nowhere smacking the trickster upside its head, leaving a dent showing the MC's physical prowess.
The twins were still hoping that their favorite prank target would pull through. They stupidly believed Prowl's body shut down into this state to buy him time for medics to save him. How foolish of a thought, but they were not trained in proper medical care. Ratchet had to do something drastic soon. The safest course of action was to transplant the battle computer into a new host. Much to his misery, Sideswipe was the only one currently capable of supporting such hardware.
A quick look at the results of the simulation told the healer bot his time window for action was narrowing every passing hour. If only he knew Prowl's state of mind. This new simulation should test if the piece of battletech could pull some basic memories from deep storage in the processor.
Sunstreaker against his superior's knowledge had modified the new line of code, not in any way that would alter the results, but would send a message to Prowl's sub consciousness thoughts. This was merely a line of glyphs that would appear on anything that belonged to Prowl, or in his opinion, what Prowl was allowed to have intimate access to, mainly he and his goofball brother.
§
Dawn was breaking into the alabaster room with verdigris highlights. There was a flashing indicator on his phone. On further inspection, it was a conformation .txt file from Chief Rais about early last night. He also had another message from the military base a few miles away. Reading the message was difficult with his pounding headache. He reached over for his miracle in a bottle, taking a dose and a half. He got a whiff of his natural perfume. When was the last time he showered? Looking at the clock told him it was not an option. He was to meet a member from the base at one of the strange crime scenes for the base.
Grabbing a bottle of a shower in a can, he quickly squirted himself as he remembered what he read about those particular military personal officers. Apparently, a chemical plant ruptured four chemical vats on Friends and Family Day. The ensuing smoke released copious amounts of thick black smog into the air. Within minutes, everyone on the base was covered in the toxins. The common reaction was the green skin varying from emerald to dark green. Luckily, only one person died and the death was ruled as a stress induced heart attack caused by the day's excitement. The EPA has yet to remove the quarantine for the affected people. The Smaragdines as they are now known by are one of the best-kept secret in the government. Kris only knew about them as he regularly dealt with the extended families of the affected.
§
There was color everywhere. It even still lingered in the air. It looked as if a glitter bomb had gone off, one with talcum powder to aid with dispersion. An odd shape caught his eye. It looked not dissimilar to an electric key board from a high-end piano company. Odd. Was it there as a perpetrator's signature, or was it a symbol for the intended victim?
"Don't move. Put your hands on your head where I can see them." Someone with a strong feminine voice commanded behind him.
"How am I to put my hands on my head, if you told me not to move?" Kris did not bother to follow her second command. How did he not hear her approach? He glanced out of the corner of his eye to where he parked the Lambo. It was instead his charger in near mint condition. Really odd.
"A smartass I see." She cursed softly as she searched her person for something, most likely her comm. device. A soft click of activation told Kris she had found it. "Chief Rais, this is Rueda L Erthes of Area 51. Where is that backup YOU PROMISED?"
This was going to be fun. As soon as Rueda closed her comm., his started ringing. Rueda was not going to take any chances. "FACE me. Slowly, reach into your pocket and grab your phone." It was not her day it seemed.
He did so, knowing he was going to have her in his proverbial servo soon. Servo? Never mind. His thoughts were getting off track.
"Who is calling you?"
Without looking, he replied "Most likely my boss." Let her figure it out.
"And who is your boss?"
"I will let you answer to find out." He tossed the phone gently over into her servo. Shouldn't it be 'hand'? From the look on her face as she heard the voice of the person she had just cursed out on her own phone was priceless.
She quickly ended the call. Looking at the Lambo, then back at Officer Karmichael, she gave him a quizzical look. "Since when do county sheriffs get to drive expensive sports vehicles?"
"Ever since I impounded it from the local drug cartel." Why did he see it as his charger before? "Now, is this mess behind me the reason you called for me, or shall I be attending to other pressing issues in the town?" Like where is her car?
"Hop into your swindled vehicle and follow me onto the military base." She was seated in her Jeepster. When did she get into that? Oh yeah, She did when I was talking. Today seems to have a lot of dream logic in it. A glyph similar to the ones inside the Lambo appeared on her license plate. Then it changed into the phrase: CopsSon.
§
Susstreaker on lined suddenly. His recharge cycle was plagued with how he failed to save Prowl. Starscream decided to prove once and for all that he, the Decepticon air commander and SiC, should lead the Decepticons. His target was a nuclear bomb testing facility. Luckily, there were no such weapons present. Megatron and his TiC Soundwave – truly, the only loyal mech the leader had – interrupted the ensuing battle, thus usurping the seeker's schemes, again.
This sudden out-flanking maneuver caught the Autobots unaware, leaving Prowl venerably exposed. Sunny, while in the mist of performing Jet Judo on the evil aerialist, struck his landing to in order to force Starscream to careen into the 'Chaos Bearer'. It was too little, too late as Megatron fired his fusion cannon at Prowl just before getting a face full of pissed off seeker.
Time seemed to stop as Prowl took the hit. He fell in such a way that it seemed unrealistic. When the tactician was fully on the ground did time resume for the golden frontliner. He let loose his fury in berserker rage upon his enemy combatants. He vaguely remembered his twin feeding off his rage as Sideswipe joined the fray. Ratchet could not have saved Prowl if it were not for the twins actions buying him time to get to the downed mech.
A black servo touched his right shoulder pulling him out of his musings. "It's not your fault." The owner of said servo stated sleepily. "Your brooding is bleeding through your side of the bond again."
Rolling over to look at his brother in dismay, "I could have saved him, Sides. If I was just a bit quicker, he would be okay."
"You don't know that. Prowl, more than anybot else, knew the risks of going into battle." Sideswipe, now fully awake, pulled his other half into a hug.
Sunsteaker tried to shrug out of the physical contact, but he put forth no effort in his actions. He let his doppelganger rest his helm on the shoulder where his hand was previously.
Sideswipe whispered lovingly into the nearest audio receptor "If you are just lay here and continue to brood, go guard the object causing your afflictions. This way I don't have to hear your annoying systems as well as feel your feelings about the matter in my inner being. I have patrol at first shift you know."
Without another word, Sunstreaker rolled over on top if his berth partner pushing him into their shared berth before getting up and heading for the Hatchet's lair of doom.
Yelling just loud enough for artistic twin to hear him "I love you too Brother!" Sideswipe promptly went back into recharge mode.
§
The military base had seen better days. Kris sensed an impending cloud of equal portions of calamity and doom drenching the place with daily showers of sadness. Today was no different. The gate guardsman was normally a very happy person, but the depressing atmosphere was also affecting him. The county was starting to feel it as well. "What happened?"
"The crime scene is in the FTK lab." Okay, not exactly what he asked about, but Rueda might not have all the details yet either.
The FTK lab was located in what would appear to be an old maintenance shed. The shed appeared to be perfectly functional, right down to the car lift for oil changes. Ruada walked pasted a rusted metal rod used as mounting spot for a large set of handy-hands. The oversized lug nut on top of it started to glow, emitting a room scanner. It liked whatever it read on its sensors, causing a trapdoor first to appear and then to open. This new walkway was part of one of the numerous tunnel systems used by the base.
A utilitarian tunnel with many junctions led forth to the lab. It felt odd that they mostly went through the middle passageways when they came to a junction. The entire walk was uneventful as if it was part of a lost memory.
A simple card swipe let the duo into the lab. It was a typical inorganic lab. It just happened to be frequently visited by a mister Adam Savage. In other words, ordered chaos. There was no other sign of trouble other than the small broken vials of liquid near the sink.
The lab had two islands in the center of the room each fitted with a fume hood containing three spigots for gas, distilled water, and air. These fixed table areas were untouched by the force of chaotic energy ruling the lab. In the corner nearest the door they came through, was a set of cabinets storing the various volatile compounds according to the classification of each volatile within. Each other corner had air canisters, or the wall mounts to secure them. Continuing around the room in a counterclockwise matter each wall had countertops in an increasing state of disarray. Some of the wall space above these counters was devoted to more storage of who knows what. On the cleanest counter were two of what Kris's favorite mad scientist referred as Zetasizers and centrifuges. Cattycorner to the entrance was a glass door.
Officer KarMichael turned to his impromptu partner, "What crime happened here? Improper housekeeping?"
Cadet Erthes looked back at the other," The officer told a joke. The world must be ending. Primus kill me now." She then started to turn the room over looking for something small.
Desiring not to poke the proverbial bear, he followed her lead. After a few minutes, he broke the silence "What exactly are we looking for?"
"Something out of place, you'll know when you see it…" was the curt reply as the military personal continued her movements in an autopilot fashion. The cadet pointed without looking up, to the adjoining office. "There is the victim's personal study."
The office was the opposite of the lab. There was not even an empty energon cube in the trashcan. Energon? That is not even a word, right? The ornate desk took up most of the space, being centered and facing the both the door to the lab and the one to the hallway. On the wall opposite the hallway, there was an immense black and white picture of some microscopic polymer, if its nameplate was to be trusted. Still behind the desk, but on the adjoining wall, was a calendar of 'Cybertron's most wanted: swimsuit edition' – sold only through charity fundraisers. In the corner furthest from him was a cabinet hidden only when the solid steel door was open. It was odd, but it was not out of place like some of the leaves on the potted plant next to it.
The plant was unmistakably an artificial one. One branch looked like someone pulled it out, flipped it upside down, and reattached it. The officer automatically started to correct the branch's position. With it still in his hand, a trapdoor appeared for the second time that day.
Rueda peered around through the doorway, "What in the Pit did you just do?"
[green book has rest of scene]
§
The results were disconcerting. The medic stared at the file names pulled from Prowl's simulation. He had designed the script to pull the most important memories of the tactician. Each corrupted file focused on a different Autobot. There was no surprise there. No, the concerning part of each file showed Prowl at one of his weakest aspects of his life. The first was how he found Red Alert defending Bluestreak during the raid that killed the city of Praxis. His coding had gone haywire as he claimed them as his progeny. The next two were mainly about the prank wars frontliners used to ease the boredom between the fighting. It wasn't until he was recruited that Jazz saw the manipulations of the SiC. He was single-handedly turning the tide of the war to protect his fmily. Everyone was glad to be on his team.
The final memory file was of one that Ratchet remembered the day going differently. It was one of the few rare times that a Decepticon captured an Autobot. It just had to be Prowl. The only good for Prowl that came out of the event was the fragging tactical processor causing the MC his current problems. The Dinobots never respected Prowl like the way they did Optimus Prime. Shockwave attempted to create a trine bond between his prisoners. It only tied the Dinos closer together. The twins were there of course, they were sent in to kill the Frankenstein-like creations before onlining. It was later reported that the Twins were late due to what is known as general Terror Twin shenanigans.
Prowl almost bonded with bots that hated him. Sunstreaker, the master of subtlety, barged in unknowingly breaking a feedback loop preventing the trine from forming. Sometimes Ratchet wondered if he and Sidswipe could bond with another. As the formost expert on Cybertronian twins, Ratchet knew very little about them. The only thing certain for the Twins, was that they protected only each other. If one protected somebot else it was because that bot served as a way to further protect the other twin from harm. In his case, the Twins protected him because he rebuilt them too many times to count. What a life insurance policy.
Whatever coding the Twins did, seemed to help. Prowl wasn't as processor dead as they thought. Slag. Curse his medical ethics.