Chapter 1: Shattering the Glass
Green fire swirls in the ground bridge vortex. The countless shades of green leap and twist into a tube-shape, rolling and occasionally flashing red. These flashes appear more and more often until they almost completely engulf the teen-age boy with his blue motorcycle riding through the tunnel of flames. He seems worried, either about the state of the clearly unstable ground bridge or what is happening on both ends.
"Arcee…" he murmurs, uncomfortable with the way the bridge is acting.
"I know, I see it too," his motorcycle answers, worry clearly in her voice as well. Finally, the bridge decides that enough is enough and collapses in on itself behind them, sending a wall of red and green flames swirling and roaring towards them. The flames engulf the duo and spit them out the other side onto the top of a shady hill. To stick the landing though, the motorcycle is forced to transform into a tall Cybertronian warrior femme, making sure not to land on her charge. Doing so however, requires her to land Spiderman-style over him, legs and arms splayed.
"You okay?" she asks, worry in her voice.
Jack nods. "Where are we?" he asks with confusion.
They have landed on the side of a rocky hill overlooking a tree-covered plain. A gentle breeze floats over them as birds sing and leaves rustle in the breeze. It seems peaceful to the boy and femme until the sound of an explosion rocks the blissful silence.
"What was that?" Jack asks his partner.
"No idea, but we'd better be careful. Stay close." Arcee creeps down the hill, Jack hot on her heels. She hides behind rocks and trees, blasters activated. Several more explosions follow as well as the clash of metal against metal. Eventually, they come to within a few feet of the spot where the noise is emanating from. They hide behind a rock and peek around.
To their utmost surprise, a black and red mech with blood red optics is dueling a white Seeker, blue optics showing his slight panic.
"Cliffjumper?" Arcee wonders. It appears that she is correct. The black and red bot looks like an almost identical copy of Cliffjumper, except for the colors.
"Starscream," Jack mutters. The Seeker is white with red and blue accents and looks surprisingly like Starscream, except for his brilliant blue optics. It appears that he is losing this battle with the unknown mech now with only his claws as weapons. Suddenly, the red and black bot sees his chance and dodges under the jet's guard to slam into him. Both hit a nearby rock, hard, the Seeker's wings bending in a painful manner making him shriek in pain. The jet tries to clamber to his feet, but the fact that the other bot has him trapped stops him.
"This is for RC!" the black and red robot hisses, his voice full of malice, scarlet optics flashing in uncontrolled anger. He aims his blaster at the jet's head, ready to blow it off at any second.
"Cliffjumper, I did not mean to kill your partner. I was only acting in self defense."
Cliffjumper laughs coldly, "really Starscream, really? Keep telling yourself that and you might believe it."
Suddenly, a large Cybertronian jet transforms behind the two mechs. Unsheathing his sword, he attempts to run the red and black bot through but Cliffjumper manages to dodge out of the way. He turns to take on his attacker, sending off several rounds into the silver titan. The silver mech sheathes his sword in preference of his fusion cannon and fires at Cliffjumper, successfully driving him away from the downed and barely conscious Seeker. The black muscle car squeezes off a few more shots before transforming and leaving the clearing. Starscream whimpers, drawing the silver mech's attention to the Decepticon SIC.
"Are you alright old friend?" he asks the jet, worry in his voice.
"Yes Megaton, I believe so," is all he manages to reply, although he is clearly lying. A large wound on his right side leaks energon freely, as well as his crumpled wings, already surrounding him in a puddle.
"Let's get you back to the ship, shall we?" Megatron then speaks into his comm. unit. "Soundwave, I need a bridge. Tell Knock Out to ready his med bay, Starscream's badly hurt." He gently helps his second-in-command to his feet, and supports the limping bot to a swirling ground bridge portal that has just popped up.
Jack and Arcee watch the exchange between Starscream and Megatron with amazement.
"Did he just call Starscream what I thought he did?" queries Jack. He looks up at his friend and notices the look on her face. "Arcee, are you alright? What's wrong?"
"Cliffjumper's alive." She whispers in shock. As soon as the ground bridge portal closes, they creep from their hiding place.
"Why did Cliffjumper he have red optics? And why do Starscream and Megatron have blue optics?" he asks his friend. Arcee merely shrugs. Jack continues, "The colors are different too. This is so weird!"
Right behind them, another ground bridge opens and out steps Bumblebee, but with reversed colors, and an acid green Bulkhead. Following them are several of what look like Vehicons, bar the fact that they now have Autobot symbols instead of Decepticon symbols. They all have red optics, just like Cliffjumper. Immediately Bumblebee, Bulkhead, and the Vehicons pull out their weapons, ready to fire on Arcee and Jack. "Who are you? Where is Cliffjumper?" asks Bumblebee without any beeps or whirs. He notices Arcee's Autobot symbol and approaches cautiously. The Vehicons spread out into a circle surrounding Arcee and Jack with Bulkhead and Bumblebee facing the duo. Arcee does not like having enemies at her back and crouches protectively over Jack. Bumblebee watches her with some surprise. Female Cybertronians have almost disappeared from the universe. Airachnid was the only living one he knew; Starscream had recently killed the only femme on the Autobot side.
Bumblebee watches Arcee as she prepares for attack and realizes that this unknown Autobot is protecting a human of all things. A look of disgust somehow crosses his face as he speaks to Arcee. "A fleshling? Why are you with one of those things? Are you an Autobot or not?" He takes a threatening step forward, but Arcee's blasters whirr in readiness to fire.
"Uh, maybe we should take her to Optimus. I'm sure that he would know what to do," Bulkhead states. Bumblebee just glares at him.
"Not yet, you simpleton," he hisses spitefully at his partner. "We will take her to Optimus after I have had my fun with her. Until then, she is going nowhere." Bulkhead seems pleased and leers at the blue femme while Bee turns back to the circled duo. "Now answer me, who are you?"
Suddenly, a low thrum fills the air. Bumblebee's optics widen with fear. "It's Hardshell! Take your positions and prepare for attack!" he shouts, completely forgetting about Arcee and Jack in his panic. The Vehicons quickly turn and prepare for battle, blasters aimed at the trees surrounding the clearing. Arcee sees her chance, grabbing Jack before transforming and darting away. Unfortunately, Bulkhead notices them and fires on the motorcycle, just managing to graze her, but causing enough damage that she flips out of vehicle mode and hides Jack behind a rock. Running from behind the rock, she is attacked by Bumblebee. Darting left and right, she dodges Bee's blasts and tries to jump over him. To her amazement, he grabs her out of the air as she goes over his head. He holds her by one arm and blasts her several times in the chest before throwing her away. She lands hard and desperately tries to rise, but the scout pounces and prepares for the final deathblow.
The thrumming grows louder, and a huge, blue, Insecticon slams into Bumblebee, knocking him aside. The Insecticon transforms, using his body as a living shield over the unconscious Arcee. A Hummer crashes into the clearing and transforms into a bulky red and orange bot with one eye. "Breakdown!" Bulkhead yells. The two titans charge and clash with a grind of metal. The Insecticon is easily dealing with both the Vehicons and Bumblebee, already killing all but one of them. Finally, the last one is destroyed leaving only Bee to weather the brunt of Hardshell's furry. Bulkhead is currently fighting Breakdown while back-to-back with Bumblebee when the massive Insecticon sees his chance. Swiping a huge clawed servo, he smashes it into Bee, and sends him crashing into the rock Jack is still hiding behind. Bee climbs unsteadily to his feet and speaks into his comm. unit, "Send a ground bridge. We'll be with you shortly." He turns to Bulkhead who is fighting both 'Cons at the same time. "Bulkhead! Let's get out of here!" he calls out. Transforming, he speeds to the swirling vortex of a ground bridge. Bulkhead follows suit, grabbing Cliffjumper's corpse as he goes.
Breakdown moves to follow them, but Hardshell stops him. "Let them go. We need to get this bot to Knock Out. She's already lost a lot of energon." Breakdown nods. Hardshell looks around him as if he is trying to find something. He lumbers over to the rock that currently hides Jack, making as much noise as possible. When he reaches it, he quietly sneaks around and gently scoops the human up in his servos. "I found the human that was with her. He seems okay, but I don't know enough about his kind to be certain." Breakdown nods distractedly as he examines Arcee. She has a major chest wound from where Bumblebee's blasters have hit her. Breakdown speaks into his comm. unit, "Soundwave, I need a bridge. Let Knock Out know that we're bringing in a critically wounded bot." he gently lifts her and walks through the ground bridge portal. Hardshell follows, gently cupping Jack in his servos as he follows.
On board the Nemesis, the Decepticon star cruiser, Knock Out the medic busily works on Starscream's wounds. The sky-blue and white bot finishes his work and begins to replace his medical equipment when a voice crackles over the med bay comm. system. Breakdown's voice fills the room. He is halfway through his sentence; Soundwave patched him in through his comm. center. "-Out know that we're bringing in a critically wounded bot." The cyan medic sighs and pulls out the equipment he had put away moments before.
Soon the door to the med bay opens and Breakdown enters carrying a wounded femme-bot. Immediately Knock Out is all business. "Set her here," he states, pointing to the berth opposite Starscream. His friend gently sets her down and Knock Out begins. He keeps up a running commentary as he works, explaining his actions to Breakdown and Hardshell as he works. "Looks like most of the damage is to her chest and spark chamber, but her legs look a little singed as well. I can stop the energon loss and check her spark for injury, but I'm mostly worried about internal damage. Breakdown, will you please set up an energon drip for me? She's very low and needs to be replenished." The big mech nods then quickly hooks up an energon cube to a drip and inserts it into her arm. "Will she live?" asks Hardshell. "Yes. Fortunately, her injury is not as bad as it first looked even though she has light armor. She was lucky that only Bumblebee attacked her." A few seconds later, the 'Con medic asks, "What happened?" Breakdown explains their side of the story.
Breakdown and Hardshell had been searching for energon deposits when they picked up a warped Autobot ground bridge signal. They stopped when Megatron and Starscream bridged back to the Nemesis. About to continue on their mission, they saw a female Autobot and human emerge from behind a rock. Surprised, they decided to watch and wait to see what happened. They heard the entire conversation between the two and were about to break cover to confront them when Bumblebee, Bulkhead, and their entourage enter via ground bridge. Again, they decided to watch and wait. However, when Bumblebee began to get violent, they wanted to help the two newcomers out.
When Breakdown gets to the part when Hardshell finds Jack, Knock Out glances up from repairing Arcee. "A human? But what is a human doing with an Autobot? And where is it?" he asks, looking around suspiciously.
Hardshell chuckles, "right here in my servos. I thought that he would try to escape, but he never did. Never freaked out either." He holds out his cupped servos to Knock Out, who looks at their contents with curiosity.
Jack has not been having a good day. He had been kidnapped by Decepticons, held for ransom, and now he as no idea where he is, again captured by Decepticons. Definitely not a good day in anyone's book. Now he finally gets a clear view of Knock Out and is surprised to see that the normally red, vain medic is now blue, but his finish is as spotless as ever. His blue optics are filled with compassion and curiosity, not hate, as he peeks into the Insecticon's servos.
Across the room, Starscream finally wakes up with a groan, stiff and still in a little pain. Knock Out barely spares him a glance before returning to work on his other patient. Starscream merely lies on the table, content to listen to Knock Out's commentary and wondering groggily who the medic is working on. He hears Breakdown, no surprise there, and Hardshell, but he is still half-conscious, so he does not make much of it. Knock Out sighs as he steps away from the other table, "okay, that's the best I can do. Her spark was not damaged, thank Primus, but most of her chest armor was eaten away by the blasts. I'm surprised that her arm has not fallen off; there wasn't much holding it on." Now Starscream opens his optics to look at the other bots' topic of conversation. To his great surprise, a blue and pink femme-bot that he has never seen occupies the medic's other table. He has her hooked up to several machines that are monitoring her life signals. She looks so familiar, but the jet is positive that he has never seen her in his life.
Knock Out leans over Hardshell's servos and appears to be speaking into them. "So human, what are your names and how did you manage to befriend an Autobot?"
A deep voice comes from behind them, causing them all to jump. "Yes, I would like to know that as well."