A Race Through the Night

Prologue

Disclaimer: I don't own Transformers.

Huge thanks to my beta reader and beloved sister enmused!

Okay, so this is my first fic that is totally mine, so tell me what you all think! I've had this plot hound nagging at me since I introduced her very briefly in a few flashbacks in my other story-in-progress Duty and Deceit. Also, Nightracer is not an OC, she's just not focused on in anything major. Check her out on the tfwiki if you like. Enjoy this little teaser, and tell me what you think!

"For Pit's sake, femme, you're just a clone! What do you care about right and wrong or Primus and the Well? Just shoot the rig like the weapon you are!"

She cringed, her frame trembling with fear and anger, her two sniper rifles locked on to the pile of concealed explosives far, far in the valley in front of her. Younglings and sparklings played cheerfully together, their vastly different designs distinguishing between Decepticon and Autobot children, yet they didn't care. They all played like there was no war, no factions, and no hate and prejudice.

Those children were a picture perfect display of the peace Cybertronians were capable of having.

And here she was, standing here atop a mountain, looking down the barrels of two rifles with orders to ignite enough explosives to blow the last of the Youngling Sectors to kingdom come. Yesterday, her world was shattered. Today she had orders to shatter theirs.

But she couldn't do that. They were younglings! They had done nothing to deserve this atrocity, and she refused to have a part in it. Maybe it was true. Maybe she really wasn't supposed to exist. Maybe she really was just a fake, a molded, programmed clone, spawned to be a weapon of destruction for the Decepticon cause.

If that was truly the case, they should have never given her a spark, because right now her spark was telling her that this was wrong.

"Specialist Nightracer! I'm not getting any younger here, fire the shot or get out of my way!"

She turned to glare at Bludgeon, her frame trembling at the prospect of what she was doing and how she would be punished. She would probably end up on the List for this. Though from what she'd heard, she wouldn't live to know if she did or not.

"I-I refuse, sir." She said, her voice small and wavering.

The mech's optics narrowed, his tone dangerous, "What did you say, clone?"

She shuttered her optics for a moment and took a shaky breath, repeating herself a little louder, pointing her guns at the general. "I-I said, I refuse, sir. I may be a fake, a copy, a mistake, but I do know one thing for certain."

"And what would that be?" He sneered at her.

She clenched her jaw, flicking her rifle nervously, "This is wrong. And if I have to kill you to stop this, I- I will."

The green and maroon mech laughed, his disturbingly skeletal face catching the light in a way that made her quake in fear. "Do your worst, sniper, but I don't think you've got the guts to off me up close and personal."

He pulled out his long sword and grinned wickedly at her, beckoning her forward. She muted a whine of her engine. What had she just done? Now she was going to die, and the Youngling Sectors would be destroyed anyway. She cocked her helm to the side, playing up her already very-present fear to seem as though she'd changed her mind.

"I-I'm sorry, General Bludgeon, sir..." She squeaked out, "I-I'll fire the shot right away sir."

"Figured as much. Weak, predictable, and quite convenient." She waited for the mech to relax and straighten, crossing his arms over his chest with a smug smirk as she turned back towards the Youngling Sectors where the children were still playing, completely oblivious to the argument on the mountains. "Well, go on then. Fire."

"Yes sir."

She raised her twin rifles and took aim at what she estimated to be the right height, then whirled around and fired five times in rapid succession, each shot hitting its mark before Bludgeon could even react. The mech's optics were wide and smoking, his mouth hanging agape in shock. The already graying general looked down unseeing at the three smoldering, leaking holes in his spark chamber. Coolant, fluids, and life-En gushed from his optics, mouth, and chest.

The femme stood there, frozen for a moment as she watched the mech gurgle and writhe before at last going still and gray in a growing pool of his own life fluids. Her twin rifles still smoked from firing the blasts.

And then she ran like the Pits had broken open.