Maelstrom Chapter 33
Conversations in the Kitchen: Chapter 4 "Hoping you Like Me Too"
Part B
Author's note: This story is part of a LONG series called Maelstrom. It is strictly Gen. 1 - sorry, but that was all that was out when I started writing back in the late 1980's. It began as a fan-publication so the first chapters are in the form of a comic book! If you have not read the nine original Maelstrom Comics and the preceding text stories, I strongly suggest you do. This is a complex universe. They can be found at http// illmatar. deviantart. com (I have put double spaces between the URL here or FF . Net eats the link.) The comics and art which accompanies this series are there...and believe me I am a better artist than writer.
Most chapters of this series contain strong language and violence. Rated M for adult themes! Really! Transformers characters belong to Hasbro. Critiques adored! This scene contains strong language, violence, and sex. Rated M for adult themes! This chapter has something for everyone. It has violence, sex, humor. It has Matrix issues, Jabez issues, and Decepticons. It has cannon-twisting history, ass kicking, and angst...duh.
Transformers characters belong to Hasbro. Story and OC characters are mine. Critiques adored!
Conversations in the Kitchen
Chapter 4
Part B
Continued from Part A
Rodimus steered them away from most of the side labs, although they could see the faint stirrings in the dust which indicated Lancer's passing.
"Why don't we go in there?" Springer asked him at one point. They were ignoring a large, important looking room.
"Because what's in there will only make you angry," Rodimus said. "It's a lab, but the work tables all have restraints on them." His voice was even colder than the air around them.
Springer took a page from Kup's book and cursed the Quints quietly under his breath for about five minutes straight. Every word made a visible puff of fog from his mouth.
They came upon more bodies and one of them brought Magnus up short.
"It can't be! Marissa! I KNOW that Quint! Look! The one with the missing face! He was one of my worst tormentors. It's...so hard to put this in words. I had...no words when I knew him. I remember him... doing... things to me...to some of the others. They would argue with each other. Most of the subjects died from what he did to them. It was like he was trying to blend them...with other things. Organic things. I... remember one time... he kept pointing at me...but the Quint in charge of the gladiators wouldn't let him have me. It was the one time I was glad to see that bastard who kept making me fight. I don't know what happened to this one's face. He was gone for a while and then he showed up wearing this mask. I can't say I was sorry he was maimed. Only that whatever did it didn't finish the job."
Magnus looked long and hard at the corpse on the floor. He kicked it. "I'm glad you're dead you twisted piece of slag! I wish it had been me! There'd be smaller pieces of you I promise!" Then he turned to Marissa and hugged her, sobbing quietly.
Hot Rod whirled on his twin but found Rodimus shaking his head and smiling sadly.
"Peace, Little Brother," Rodimus said, holding his hands up as if in surrender. "I'm not sending him back for this. This is healthy. He's not endangering anyone or himself. You think I don't know the difference?"
"Just checking," Hot Rod muttered.
Lancer interrupted them by coming up out of the depths and de-cloaking. "Something is draining the energy down here. I can feel it. The very molecules are slowing down and that's why it's so cold! It was starting to drain the power out of my suit, but I got it to stop. Love, how's your energon level?"
"It's fine...normal consumption for what we've done so far," Rodimus said.
"Are you sure?" Lancer pressed.
"Yeah, but I'll keep an eye on it," Rodimus assured her. She looked at him askance. "Promise!" he swore.
"OK...but whatever it is we're getting close," she warned.
X
X
X
They trailed ever deeper, past more grim labs and rooms obviously meant as holding pens. There were bits of robotic limbs attached to decomposed organic remains and skeletons. There were rooms that seemed to be part obstacle course, part torture chamber, and with each passing step Magnus became more certain this place was where he spent his childhood. Certainly, he hoped that two such hell-holes didn't exist. Marissa's tight grip on his hand kept him in the present. He was amazed that he didn't flash, although the memories flooded him one after another.
The number of corpses suddenly thinned out, which only strengthened Magnus' certainty.
"Kup told me that once they breached the lowest levels, the Quints called a retreat. They sabotaged my restraints so that they'd fail after the Quints escaped. I guess they were hoping I do some damage for them... and I did too. Luckily...I didn't kill anyone." Marissa squeezed and shook his hand.
"I think you're right Magnus," Rodimus said. "Lancer just found stone holding cells down a few floors and to the left. We've almost hit the bottom guys. She also says she's scanned another hidden door off to the right down a side passage. That's where the energy drain is going. Maybe you weren't the only nasty surprise the Quints left behind."
"That's not a comforting thought, Mr. Prime Sir," Springer said. "You aren't much for troop morale are you?"
"Nope," Rodimus said. "Fuck em! That's what I say."
The group laughed. Hot Rod looked at his twin and they grinned stupidly at each other.
Lancer rejoined them a few minutes later and led them to the hidden door she had found. No one suggested going left at the intersection. Behind the hidden door was a short hallway and another door. This door had major security measures all over it. Rodimus skillfully bypassed these by hacking it...with his sword. Two firm diagonal slashes and one full-bodied side kick and the door saw fit to let them pass. On the other side, a massive hallway with more doors running the length of the far side...and one very massive door on the end.
"Let me guess," Springer said. "The power drain is behind that thing."
"You are an exceptionally good guesser," Lancer told him.
"Lucky me," Springer groaned.
"Should have worn a parka!" Marissa complained.
"I hate the Quints," Foul Play said with a sigh as she wrapped her arms around herself and shivered hard enough to chatter her teeth. "I also hate these damned uncontrollable human reactions to every damned thing."
"Maybe we should just leave it closed," Hot Rod suggested hopefully.
"What? Learning to be cautious already?" Rodimus smirked. "How positively old fogeyish of you."
"Look who's talking old! I am merely wondering if we even need to see what's in there. We're looking for a crystal, not trouble! If it's got Lancer worried then it's more than I want to take on while I'm a squishy."
"I probably should be picking on the kid about this," Springer said, "except that I completely agree with him!"
"Thanks...I think," Hot Rod said.
"Well, for the record, I would agree as well, except that whatever is draining this place may eventually spread to the rest of the planet and I am just not the sort to let Quint handiwork wreck a world," Rodi said gravely.
"See how he talks? That 'Prime' extension automatically makes you talk that way," Springer said.
"Hot Rod?" Rodi asked.
"Yeah?"
"Hit him for me will you?"
"Sure!" Hot Rod answered....and he did, even though Springer tried to dodge.
"Thanks," Rodimus said, moving up to inspect the door beside his mate. She was already standing in front of it, her tail flipping erratically on the ground.
"This door's unlocked," Rodimus said after a moment's inspection.
"That doesn't improve my view of it," Magnus growled. He kept thinking of how the Quints' final move with him was to turn him loose on his saviors. "What could have survived down here all this time?"
"We're about to find out," Rodimus said.
He pushed.
X
X
X
Within the chamber there was nothing to see at first. Air even colder than what they were feeling blasted out at them. Lancer growled though... she could see it...a huge coil about twice Rodi's size laying in the center of the room with rivulets of power flowing along the ground to it like tiny streams. She crouched into a defensive pose and hissed as it suddenly reared up and turned to face her.
"Primus!" Hot Rod exclaimed. "It's a giant hot dog with tentacles!" He was right. The creature did look like a large, reddish hot dog with two spindly, wiggly tentacle "arms" and a grasping circle of teeth arranged like flower petals.
"No it isn't! It's an energy leech! Do not let that thing touch you! It will make you a leech too!" Rodimus cried.
"You've fought this thing before?!" Magnus cried. "How'd you kill it?"
"I didn't! I blasted it into space!" Rodimus groaned. Such an adroit solution was not presenting itself at the moment.
Anything else he might have said was forestalled by the beast's first assault...right towards Rodi's mate. Huge, cumbersome, and bloated the leech should have moved sluggishly, but it didn't. It lashed out towards Lancer like a striking cobra and she leapt straight up to avoid its attack. Somersaulting mid-air over its back, she landed on the far side of it, but it tracked her and attacked again almost the instant she touched down. The thing pulled at her energy through the floor and though she resisted, the group actually saw some of her energy arc into the ground and over to the creature.
Rodimus cursed unconsciously in every language he knew and shot at his mate with his blaster. Magnus and the others felt brief shock but then realized she was simply absorbing the bolts. Leaping up almost exactly as Lancer had, Rodimus slashed at the back of the leech's neck with his sword.
The results were not what he was hoping for. The blade did cut...but only slightly. His sword would slice through yards of hardened steel like air, but the leech's rubbery flesh cushioned most of the impact and the wound was only a few inches deep. Lancer was scanning the thing for weak spots and coming up with nearly nothing. It had no internal organs to speak of. Apparently it had no need to circulate or digest. There was something like a brain about where Rodi had cut, but it was deep in. Leaping back over the thing, he cut at the same spot again, going only a little deeper.
Apparently the leech did have some kind of nerves because this time it roared and turned on Rodi for a minute. It struck at him and he needed all of his assassin's training to dodge the repetitive blows. Ducking under its "chin" he came up around the back of it and cut at it again. Lancer tried to follow suit, but as she sailed over it more of her energy flowed out into the thing.
Lancer! Just keep away from it! Rodi sent.
I can't stop it! It just PULLS and the power goes right to it! she sent back.
I know. Lead it away from the others so we can fight without crushing them! Rodi sent back.
Lancer ran towards the far end of the chamber, evading strike after strike as it followed her instinctively. It continued to focus on her even though Rodimus harried it with his sword as they went, cutting deeper each time he hit his mark. He nailed a good blow (which he was now measuring in inches) but the thing rolled in pain in the same direction he was going. He landed ON it as it thrashed against the stone wall. The wall cracked under impact after impact as the creature contorted in pain.
Rodimus might have celebrated except that the instant his feet touched the surface of the leech's skin he felt his life-force being sucked out of him. He felt a strange hunger starting to rise and wondered if he was being converted into another leech like his friends had been so long ago on Cybertron.
With the last of his will he forced himself to fall away from the thing and as he did he felt a surge of power coming to him from his mate. The hunger subsided, but he knew it cost her a lot of her own energy to restore him. He shot at her again with his blaster and saw answering shots coming to her from their friends as well. Magnus had the gang barricaded behind some rubble and they all had their side arms trained on Lancer.
Rodimus wondered vaguely how many other males could say they were grateful when people tried to shoot their mates.
The wall crumbled outward. This room had never been designed to hold this creature - it looked more like a warehouse than the holding pens and cells they had seen. The Quints had moved the leech there, hoping the Autobots would release it on themselves. Instead the Bots had found Magnus first and fled, leaving the Quints afraid to reclaim the base and cursing their maimed, four-faced member for ever creating the creature.
Hot, muggy air from the jungle outside streamed into the icy chamber causing fog to diffuse the sunlight which streamed in. Magnus and company were glad of the light. They hadn't been able to see much of the battle and didn't want to get stepped on getting closer.
Rodi and Lancer had obviously moved the beast as far from their friends as they could, but the room wasn't large enough to get them completely out of danger. As the walls shuddered under the leech's flailing, bits of rock and ceiling fell. Arcee got a minor crack on the head, and Hot Rod barely dodged a major piece that might have crushed him, but simply grazed his face and left a long shallow cut down one cheek. Blood dripped down his chin like red tears.
Perhaps it was the blood which called them. Perhaps they would have come anyway, but only moments after the leech broke a hole to the outside, the faint light coming in was suddenly blotted out. Magnus stared at the movement as a misshapen black cloud streamed through the small breech and spread out into the room. It moved erratically through the air towards them.
"What is that?!" Marissa cried. "It moves like a flock of starlings!"
"Somehow I doubt our luck is gonna let it be starlings Marissa!" Springer noted. As the swarm closed in they heard the loud buzzing of thousands of wings.
Magnus shot at Lancer again, noting as he did that she was slowing down. He was debating emptying his side arm into her when Hot Rod yelped in pain and disgust. One of the encroaching cloud had broken ahead of the others and hit him in the arm where blood from his chin was staining his shirt. It looked like a small, fuzzy, brown blob had attached to his arm, but as he pulled at it they saw that the two inch critter had a proboscis almost as long as its body. The needle thin nose had plunged into his flesh and was stained red. Hot Rod looked at it, a bit nauseated, as a thin tongue darted out of the tube shaped mouth to lick his blood off its face and then out towards him. Apparently, it was still hungry.
Hot Rod found that the usual protectiveness he felt towards little furry animals didn't seem to apply to something that so clearly found him tasty. He squeezed. It died easily.
The buzzing got louder and they all looked at each other. Suddenly, shooting at Lancer became less of a priority, although they all tried at first to split their attention. In only a few seconds however, Rodimus and Lancer were completely forgotten. Magnus and his companions were surrounded in a hot fog of flying bodies...they couldn't even SEE the fight with the leech, let alone participate.
Magnus desperately bellowed an order to set their blasters on wide beam. They all got hit multiple times will they fiddled with the controls, but each blast cut a wide path of clear air through the swarm. Unfortunately, such fissures closed almost at once. Trying to protect themselves and each other, they went back to back and shot through the swarm in turns, moving towards the wall to give themselves a protected side. One person went on the offensive while the other tried to remove clinging parasites. Each time they removed a wriggling body they killed it, but it left a small wound which bleed freely, and attracted many more.
Rodimus, in robot form, wasn't a target for the blood-hunters, and was completely unaware of his friends' plight. He was at the center of an invisible tug-of-war between the leech and his mate...and she was losing. Neither was really coherent enough to notice when the supporting bolts from Magnus' crew stopped, but Rodimus knew this fight was coming down to who could hold out the longest. He had made some progress cutting in towards the brain, but every time he got close, the leech drained him. Lancer no longer had enough energy to completely distract the leech from her mate, which only sped up their deterioration. The leech would drain Rodimus, Lancer would restore him, the leech would drain what she put back...and once in a while it would go after her directly.
Rodimus made a cut, but partially missed his target because he was having a hard time moving fast enough.
The beast thrashed, and the tail end hit Arcee. They had been forced away from the wall by more falling debris, and while they tried to head straight back she was too far out. Struggling to remove about a dozen blood-suckers from Springer and herself, Arcee forgot to watch for the leech and the swinging tail hit her with a glancing blow. It was still enough to drain her and send her flying. Springer cried out and raced towards her, taking numerous hits on his back and legs as he neglected to defend himself. He took even more when he bent over to pick his mate up and carry her back to the rough circle the others were making. Marissa left Magnus undefended a few moments to help Springer remove the crowded bodies from his back and shoulders...and from Arcee who lay on the ground under their feet.
An impending disaster saved them.
Lancer debated desperately. The suit cost her very little in energy generally, but today it seemed a huge expense. She decided the defense it provided her from the beast's physical mass was no longer worth the cost in power. Exhausted, she deactivated it...and immediately took numerous hits from the flying swarm. For the first time she was aware of the desperate fight her friends were in...and a possible source of energy for herself. The leech seemed unaware of the swarm - it seemed to need direct contact or contact with the ground to pull energy, but she saw the thousands of bodies as a huge source of power.
Usually drawing energy from a living body sickened her, but seeing as how they were drawing her very blood out of her body, she found she didn't care too much.
She simply pulled and almost instantaneously the swarm fell dead.
Magnus and crew looked around in confusion, then relief, and finally disgust as they were suddenly rained upon by tiny dead bodies. The disgust came mostly from the little twitching corpses they had to pull from their own flesh. Magnus quickly took stock. They were all blood soaked and riddled with holes, but Arcee was the only one who seemed badly injured. Checking back on the leech battle, Magnus saw that at some point, Rodi had cut the things "arms" off, but Magnus thought he could see them growing back in. With shock, Magnus realized that while Rodimus had cut nearly half way through the leech's neck, it hadn't slowed down much.
The same could not be said for Rodimus. He was still leaping and dodging in that infuriating, agile way of his, but the leaps were shorter, the dodges cutting much closer. He made to cut the beast, scored, but got caught by the resulting thrashing. As he landed on the far side of the worm-shaped body, he paused instead of moving immediately. The tail slammed into his right side and crushed him into the wall. The left side of his body compressed inward, denting the arm, his chest, and crushing the spoiler like tin foil. On the right side, he came away with a concave dent from the tail which ran from his mid-chest to his hip.
And of course the leech drained his life nearly dry.
Lancer, glowing from her blood-swarm recharge, stretched her hand out towards her mate and poured energy at him. The leech whirled on her again as the brightest source of power in the room. Rodimus fell to his knees as it pulled away from him - his colors were dull and greyish. They brightened as Lancer flooded him with power and his head snapped up.
He knew, without even sending to his mate, that this was it. It was all she had and she was giving it to him. She wasn't even moving as the leech advanced on her. He let rage take over his common sense, and as the leech moved slowly towards Lancer, Rodimus retracted his right hand and pulled out a spinning saw blade.
He leapt onto the thing's back and felt the immediate power drain. Lancer continued to pour energy into him and he plunged his right arm into the wound he had made. The saw blade slowed, straining against the thing's rubbery flesh, but it cut in. It slowed more as his energy faltered. Lancer's energy torrent became a trickle and she fell to her knees in front of the leech.
Magnus and company drained the last remaining dregs from their blasters into her...she sent that last little gift on to her mate. Rodimus screamed silently, chunks of leech flesh splattered up out of the wound and coated his chest. Lancer collapsed completely to the floor , but as she did Rodimus felt a wet and sickening "pop" under the saw blade. The consistency suddenly went from tough rubber to pudding under his arm and he fell forward into the wound with the sudden lack of resistance.
The trashing worm underneath him abruptly became still.
Exhausted, crushed, and grey again from life-drain, Rodimus just slid off the leech's back to the floor. He sat there, covered with gore, hands on his knees. The Prime in him forced him to look up, to evaluate his people. He saw Magnus and company staring back at him, covered with blood as though they had been pelted by darts from head to toe. Rodimus wasn't clear on how they got that way and he worried vaguely that Arcee was stretched out on the ground...as was Lancer, but he knew his mate lived.
"Arcee?" he asked. It was all he could summon the strength to say. Marissa and Springer were with her.
"She's coming around," Marissa told him.
Rodimus nodded, and tried to stand. His legs were shaking, but he managed on the second try. He was mentally calling for his mate even before he reached her side, and felt her respond. She wasn't really unconscious, just completely exhausted.
Lancer lay on the floor on her stomach, eyes closed because she couldn't find the energy to open them. She reached out, hoping to find something, anything, to give her mate the recharge he needed once again. She found it, and panicked. The warning she threw into Rodimus' mind came almost too late.
Rodimus, for all the trouble he had getting himself to stand, suddenly found himself motivated to run.
"GET DOWN! GET DOWN!" he roared, running at Magnus and the others. Magnus responded to the order instinctively, hearing life or death in Rodimus' command. The whole team threw themselves down and away. Springer covered Arcee with his body.
Rodimus threw his body down and side-ways from a full tilt run. He didn't expect much protection for himself, but maybe he could make his body into a sort of break-wall for the others. His momentum kept him moving and he threw his hands out in front of him to catch the wall and keep his mass from crushing his friends.
Behind him the world went white.
All the others saw was Rodimus suddenly running and screaming at them to get down. They didn't know what the problem was but the urgency, the terror, in his voice moved their limbs for them. They saw him fling his battered body sideways to the floor and were suddenly aware that there were thousands of pounds of skidding metal scraping towards them. His flame-wrapped chest suddenly looked more like an encroaching wall than part of a person...an object to be feared and avoided. Then they were ducking Rodimus' enormous limbs as he slid towards them at high speed. Sparks rained down upon them, adding small burns to their wounds.
Watching an Autobot barreling at him out of control, Magnus had flash-backs of getting run over by a different Prime. His thought, inappropriate as it seemed was "Oh no. Not again."
Then the light flared up behind Rodi's back and it became clear that this dangerous stunt was Rodi's only means of saving them. His outstretched arms went rigid and electrical surges caused his body to spasm. Magnus saw Rodi's eyes widen and his mouth contort with agony. At that moment, he realized how horrible it was that Rodimus couldn't scream as every circuit inflamed with overload. Blue-white electrical arcs dove in and out of his body like breeching dolphins. Mercifully for all of them, the anguish only lasted a second as the room and Rodi's optics went dark, leaving them with an unconscious body sparking its way across the floor towards them rather than a flashing being flailing in agony.
Sometimes you had to look on the bright side.
Rodi's arms reached the wall. They buckled under the slowing force of his skid, but they were enough resistance to stop his body from crushing his friends against the wall. Barely.
They were all contorted into odd positions in their attempt to find room between his chest, the wall, and his tangled limbs.
For a long moment, no one moved or spoke. There was the sound of sparks, of dripping water, of wildlife outside, and their own ragged breathing.
"Hot Rod?" Springer gasped. The triple changer was crouched under Rodimus' inert fingers, having ducked there at the last minute.
"Huh?" Hot Rod answered. He was flattened against the wall, arm in front of Foul Play who was ashen and wide-eyed. They were mere millimeters from Rodi's face. Hot Rod's chest brushed Rodi's nose when he inhaled too deeply.
"I'm never calling any version of you 'little' again," Springer vowed.
"If you think I won't remember that because I'm freaked and everything you're wrong," Hot Rod vowed. His voice had a hysterical edge to it.
"Quit it you two! Is anyone seriously hurt now besides Arcee? Is Rodimus functioning at all?" Magnus snapped. Everyone, even Arcee, responded that they were OK, although the fem-bot's voice was weak and unconvincing.
Foul Play was even with Rodi's optics. "I don't think he's on-line. His optics are dark...Ultra Magnus...his color is bad...he may be," Foul Play gulped and threw a glance at Hot Rod, "he may be gone Sir."
"We have to get out from behind him! Can any of you move?" Magnus asked. "Marissa and I are pinned!"
Hot Rod looked at the still face in front of him and wondered why he wasn't more disturbed. The vague thought that he would look that way when he died surfaced and was pushed down at once. "I can Sir. Give me and Foul Play a minute and we'll come for you."
He gave Foul Play a push to get her moving. She was staring at Rodi's face as if mesmerized. They came out around the top of Rodi's head and helped Springer and a dizzy Arcee climb up over Rodi's crumpled chest and down his back on the other side. They moved fast - the metal on his back was heated from the blast.
Using the crushed spoiler for hand-holds to get down was a necessary evil. Rodimus' entire back was covered with slimy, steaming chunks of leech. They weren't really sure what had happened to the monster. Rodi's last cut had nearly severed it, but now it was splattered all over the chamber as though someone had fed it a bomb. The pieces smoked and sizzled like meat from Carly's barbeque.
"I'm never eating hot dogs again," Hot Rod vowed as he helped Arcee find a marginally clean piece of debris to sit on. Joking helped him somehow. Springer sat down next to his mate shakily. His skin was pale and yellowish, making his blond hair blend in to the rest of his face. Arcee leaned on him and he put a supportive arm around her gingerly.
The area smelled like burning tar and they all coughed frequently.
It was a bit more work to get Magnus and Marissa free because they were pinned between Rodi's knees and some sizable chunks of rubble. Hot Rod managed to slip back into the space around Rodi's mid-section and he pulled while Magnus pushed at the boulder blocking them. It only took a moment for them to make a space big enough for Marissa and Magnus to squeeze through, and they were even able to use the rock as a stepping stone to get out from behind Rodi's still bulk. Magnus was glad they were able to get out quickly. He was worried Rodimus might never reactivate, but he also felt deep concern that if Rodimus did come back online while they were close, it would be in the middle of a full-force flashback. Magnus understood that Rodi's Autobot form was less sensitive than his human body, but an overload was undoubtedly one of the most painful things a Transformer could experience.
Magnus kept this worry to himself.
He jumped down and tried not to think that he was climbing over a corpse. Rodi's vibrant reds, rusts, and golds had dimmed to near blacks and greys...and Magnus had a sudden eerie insight into why his own matte paint job frightened so many people. In addition to the earlier crushing blows he had taken, Rodi's entire back was charred from shielding them from that mysterious blast. The damage was extreme. Whatever had happened, Rodimus had undoubtedly saved their lives at that moment.
The City Commander refused to allow himself to start grieving. Rodimus might just be knocked out, although his dull color was a very bad sign, but Magnus knew whatever the case, he couldn't help the Autobot right now. Rodi's circuits would reset themselves or they wouldn't.
He tried to focus on those he could help, knowing Rodimus wouldn't thank him for neglecting any of them.
"Where's Lancer?" Magnus asked.
"Over here," Foul Play said. Something in her voice made Magnus fear the worst.
The Ex-Decepticon stood about ten feet from Lancer, and Magnus was about to ask why she didn't go closer when his eyes gave him the answer.
Miniature lighting bolts still surged in and out of Lancer's body. There was a circle of heated rock around her that glowed an angry red. It was split and fissured in a spider-web pattern as though hit with a powerful blow and was the only area around not covered with splattered leech. Her hair, never un-braided in their experience, was spread out under her like a golden curtain. She was entirely nude. Magnus heard the others gasp as they came up behind him. He wondered vaguely if it was the glowing rock, the arcs of errant power, or the vast array of scars that trailed along Lancer's entire body.
Marissa had a stupid, inappropriate thought that now she understood why Lancer always wore full-length pants and long sleeves, even in the Florida heat.
"Is she alive?" Magnus asked.
"She breathing," Foul Play said, "but only once in a while."
"We need to get to her! What happened to her?" Hot Rod exclaimed. He reached his hand over the fading hot spot and immediately got shocked.
"Ouch!" he exclaimed.
Lancer twitched.
"Is she waking up? What are all those marks? What could have made all of those?" Foul Play asked.
"Foul Play," Marissa answered her, "Those aren't from today. Those are old scars. I don't see any fresh wounds, but those twitches are not good. She's not waking up, she's having small seizures."
There was an ear-splitting, screeching, grinding noise behind them. Metal on metal scraping and setting their teeth on edge. They all turned and saw with immense relief that Rodimus was moving. Magnus held them back from rushing to Rodi's side as the Autobot painfully turned over onto his stomach. He rolled over and put his hands to the floor and tried to push himself up on quaking arms. As he did, he morphed, and his face contorted into another silent scream. He hung his head down between his arms and shuddered.
Continued in Part C