thanks for the review, guest SunnySides! Look! Over 1000 words!
I shrieked as my world was suddenly glaringly bright. After sneezing a couple of times, I opened my eyes. I had no idea where we were.
"Luke? Kain? Michael?" I asked, looking around me. I found them on the ground a couple of meters away from me.
"Everyone okay?" Luke asked, getting to his feet.
"Yeah, I'm okay, but, uh, where the hell are we?" Kain asked.
"Dude! What the hell was that thing?" Michael asked.
"Are we dead?" I asked, really not sure.
Luke put two fingers to his neck and shook his head. "Not unless you have a heartbeat after you're dead."
I checked myself. Yup, there was a slightly elevated heartbeat. "Okay… now onto what that was…. well, we don't know what it was…. but whoever left it out is a genius, because if we're not dead, and we aren't at the school, then we were… I don't know, teleported, I guess? Teleported to where ever we are…"
"Jeez, Caity, that is so helpful!" Luke said rather unhelpfully.
"Let's start walking!" Michael said cheerfully. I tug at my hoodie, uncomfortable with the heat. It had to be at least eighty degrees right now.
I carefully pulled it off, tying it around my waist and letting my arms have some relief from the heat. My tanktop bunched up a little, but it wasn't enough for me to pull it back down.
We walked for hours, me occasionally complaining with a smile, and some easy banter going between us. Some uneasy banter was brought up as well, but that was as to what we were going to do if we didn't find out where we were.
"It's getting dark," I commented, looking at sky with worry.
"And there is a road sign," Luke said.
"Tranquility, Nevada, four miles," Kain read.
Me, being who I am, shook my head. "No. Nonononono! We did not go into the movie. That stupid thing did not put us in the movie!" I say.
"What are you talking about?" Michael laughed, though it was uneasy.
"Transformers. Tranquility, Nevada is where it starts, it's where Sam lives," I say, annoyance in my tone.
Their faces of disbelief were enough to tell me that they got what I was getting at. "Well, shit," Luke said.
Yup. That about summed up the situation.
"So… how are we going to get out of here? We don't even know when we are! Because, I am pretty damn sure that it's not our time," I say, scuffing the dirt with my shoe and walking in the direction of Tranquility.
"When was the first movie made?" Kain asked.
"2007," I reply. I was….. eight at the time. Great. If we even existed in this place I was an eight year old.
"You know how weird it would be if we met the younger us-es?" Michael said.
"About as weird as us meeting older us-es from a different universe," I replied dryly.
We walked a bit longer, finally seeing the edge of the town. "Now all we have to do is find Sam's house," I say.
"Wait, you're telling me that you, who seems to know everything about Transformers-" Kain began.
"Just the movies," I interrupt.
"You didn't let me finish, Transformers Movies, and you don't know where Sam's house is?"
"Nope," I say, grinning sheepishly.
"HEY! Are you kids okay?" a voice asked beside us on the road. I turn and look, seeing the generic police officer cruising next to us. My blood went cold, but Michael didn't get the danger.
"Uh, no, we're actually a bit-" he began before I punched him on the arm, glaring at him warningly, thinking of the words I had just read off the side of the car.
"To punish and enslave" it read.
"We're fine, sir. Just out for a walk," I say instead.
The officer looked at us suspiciously before nodding and driving off. Michael turned on me, rubbing his thin arm.
I glare up at him, because, seriously, he's like six and a half feet tall. I bend down to tie my shoe, being paranoid, and scratched three words into the dirt.
That was Barricade
Comprehension dawned on their faces as I straightened, scuffing out the words with my foot.
"You didn't have to punch me!" he still protested.
"You didn't have to be born, and yet here you are," I snap.
"What's that? I can't understand stupid," he retorted.
"Really? Then how can you understand yourself?" I asked innocently. Luke and Kain laughed, informing Michael just how badly he had been burned, and by a girl, no less.
"Why am I friends with you guys, again?" I asked in amusement.
"Because you love us," Luke said, poking me in the side. "Admit it!" he ordered, poking me again as I laughed and attempted to dodge.
"Alright, alright! I love you all like I love my brothers! Except, you know, you're all older than me, not younger," I say, jumping out of reach of them.
"Caity-cat!" Kain said, tickling the back of my neck, which made me duck and purposely scratch his arms. "Ahh! Don't hurt me, I'm sorry!" he screamed when I easily twisted his arm behind his back.
"Caity, be nice," Luke said while he laughed. Michael wisely was staying out of it. I release Kain after another second, grinning and shaking my head, my mood lifted once more.
"Ground rule number one, don't get killed. Rule number two, don't get separated. Rule three, Luke is boss," Luke said.
"Why do you get to be boss?" Kain complained.
"Because I'm badass and you just got your ass handed to you by a girl, hey, hey, no, Caity, no!" Luke said, catching my arms and easily holding them still when I went to poke him in the side. "What I mean is that you're two are too scared of Caity for her to listen to you, and I'm older than all of you," Luke continued.
"By a month and a day," I grumble, warningly jerking my knee up, not actually hitting him, but getting him to leap away in fear.
"No. That's not even funny. Do you know how much that hurts?" he snapped, still holding my arms and poking me in the side.
"Sorry, sorry!" I squeal, finally getting away from him.
"Man, when I get back, I am going to sleep, and never getting up again," Michael complained.
"If we get back," Kain said.
"Hey, I'm the pessimist, not you," I say.
"No, I'm the pessimist, you're the realist. I don't know what the hell you two are," Luke said.
We faded into silence, walking into the town, spotting Barricade a couple more times, but he didn't bother us, so maybe he hadn't actually spotted us.
We somehow got lost again, well, not really somehow, I mean, none of us had ever been there before, but still. We turned up in some downtrodden part of the town, the sense of danger enough to get us to stick together.
Yes, it could be sexist of them, but they insisted that I stay in between them all, and yes, I willingly agreed to do so, because despite not being in bad shape at all, actually, I'm in pretty good shape if I do say so myself, I don't like actually harming people, and I probably would never be able to hold my own on my own, while my friends could all say that they could take on anyone if they worked together.
It was then, in that bad part of town, that police lights flashed, and a siren whooped, informing us that we had caught the wrong kind of attention of a cop.
"You four still out on your walk?" he asked skeptically.
I jumped, turning. My friends did as well, apprehension on all of our faces. "Yeah. It's a great day for a walk, isn't it, sir?" I ask.
"It's getting pretty late. Why don't you get along home?" he asked, but it sounded more like an order.
"Are you going to make us?" Luke challenged. I blinked at him, thinking he had gone insane. "Rule three," he reminded me quietly.
Right. Luke was boss. Whether I liked it or not, I wasn't going to be stubborn for once.
"I will," Barricade growled. Luke looked at him unimpressed and I crossed my arms nervously.
"How do you plan on doing that? You don't know where we live, and you don't know our parent's numbers, so you can't call them, I mean, really, you can't do anything," Kain said, stepping up to stand beside Luke.
"Yeah, and we're not scared of you," Michael said. I face-palmed, wishing that my friends weren't such idiots.
"Knock it off, stop pissing off the cop," I order. "Sorry, sir, we just want to walk a little bit longer, then we'll turn it," I say. "We're having some…. family troubles and needed to get away from that for a bit," I say.
Barricade looked at me, his expression telling me he didn't believe my story for a second. "All of you? You don't appear to be related?"
"We're adopted," Luke said, catching onto my idea. "My brothers and my sister and I are adopted," Luke said.
Barricade looked like he had grudging respect for us sticking to our story. He glared at us for another moment before driving slowly away.
When we saw him turn, four blocks away, we deemed it safe to talk again.
"Adopted?" I hiss.
"What, YOU are," Luke defended. "I had to think fast, alright?"
"We are never going to pull off being siblings," I say. "We're too different," I say.
"Well, just act normal. I mean, we kind of act like siblings…." Luke said, trying desperately to not be pessimistic.
I roll my eyes. "SURE we do," I say. "Well, the cop car looks to be perfectly fine, and a little bored, if he's pulling over kids, so I'm betting we're before the movie starts. Let's find Tranquility High. Maybe we can keep watch until it all passes, then ask the Autobots for help?" I say. Who am I kidding. Sam probably wouldn't take us seriously.
"Yeah… but, in the mean time, where are we going to sleep?" Kain asked.
Now that he mentioned it, I was exhausted. "I don't think it'll be a good idea to sleep, not with… that cop lurking around," I caution.
"I wish we were back home, then we could all just go home and we could meet up tomorrow," Kain said with a sigh.
"I couldn't," I say softly, thinking about how bad things had been at home when I was eight, my sister would have been nearing her first birthday.
The group was quiet for a moment, and Kain looked like he wanted to kick himself. "It doesn't matter, anyways, what would you say when they opened the door? Oh, hi, I'm your kid, but from a different universe and seven years in the future. Can I spend the night here?" I scoff.
"Oh… right," Kain said. I felt guilty for snapping at him, and I softened up a bit.
"Hey, it's not exactly easy to remember, is it? I mean, this stuff doesn't happen, except for in books," I say. Kain nods.
"And movies," he adds.
"Well, what about food?" Michael asks. I look at him.
"Did you bring any cash? I only have fifty on me right now," I say. I only had that because I had been planning on ordering a yearbook, forgetting until we were already driving that I had already ordered it.
"I have a hundred…" Michael said, checking his wallet. "Oh, an a free coupon for a soda at GetandGo."
"I have all my money with, I just cashed my paycheck," Luke said. "Plus the stuff I already had, I've got about two hundred and twenty five."
"I brought twenty five," Kain said.
"That's four hundred between all of us," I say.
"Good job, you can do math!" Kain said mockingly. I grab for him, but he dodges.
"Man, I don't want to spend all my money," Michael complained.
"I don't want to be stuck in this universe. Looks like we both might be out of luck," I hiss back at him.
"Hey, hey, hey, no need to get pissy, kitty-cat! Jeez," Michael said. I would have tackled him right there, but Luke held me back. I glared at Michael, who backed away in slight fear.
"Be nice, BOTH of you," Luke ordered. He left go of me, glaring at me warningly. I back away, raising my hands in surrender.
"So… shall we go get some pizza and hang out at a park until morning?" Kain asked.
"I'm going to lose the little sanity I have left," I mutter under my breath as I follow them.
We got our pizza, carrying the greasy circle in a box to a nearby park. One that I actually recognized.
"Hey, this is the lake that Sam goes to in the movie, the one where he sucks at pick-up lines," I whisper to them.
"Cool. So… maybe this won't turn out to be a total fluke," Kain said.
I bit into the pizza, wishing I had a little ranch to go with it, but too tired and hungry to care.
The guys talked as I slowly drifted off, one hand supporting my head, and the other curled up by my chest.