Nick had driven deep into the desert mountains, away from popular or even remotely publicly accessible places, and set up camp. It was a rather primitive set-up, but it was a necessary one for a while.
They needed to learn what they could and couldn't do. It was trying, it was hard, it was sometimes frustrating and painful, but Karr was learning to handle the bipedal form that had been forced onto him, and Nick was learning to adapt to the shifts he felt through the implant. It was amazing to see his partner this way, to touch a mind that now marveled at the novelty, too.
Hands were new to the AI. As were feet or the fact that he walked and no longer drove. Add to that the increased height and the morphing abilities, and it was a whole lot to master. It helped that Karr had been linked to Nick for the past two decades. Taking his lead from what was instinctive for Nick – walk, run, grasp things – he learned fast. Transformations were smooth and his motor control was increasingly more fluid and fine-tuned, but sometimes there were set-backs, mounting frustration, and even spikes of anger.
But there were also the quiet moments, like this evening, when nothing disturbed what the two had shared for years.
The presence in Nick's mind was the same he had always felt, silently keeping him company. He was grateful for it. He couldn't imagine what it would be like to lose this, to have the intimate connection change, morph into something different. Whatever the Allspark had done to Karr, it had not transformed the neuro implant. They had been too close to losing each other too many times before. Back then, it had never mattered that much; now it was a fear neither wanted to think about too closely.
Nick's thoughts were echoed. He felt a silky, cool touch to his mind, and he smiled. It questioned wordlessly, he answered the same way. Sometimes, there was no need for words, just opening his mind, showing his partner what he couldn't say. This was beautiful, this was perfection. No one could ever feel it like he did, not even Michael Knight. For him, Kitt was his own perfection. They were all different, like fire and water, like black and white, but they shared something so incredible, that they were the same.
Amber eyes glowed softly in the approaching dark. Karr had opted to stay bipedal, sitting with Nick as his driver relaxed in the fading sunlight.
The link couldn't be perfection; never had been intended that way. Despite the beauty is transmitted, it also channeled pain, despair and everything else a human mind was capable of -- into the AI linked to it. Like the pain of a bullet harming the body of the more vulnerable human part. A long time ago, when Nick had been harmed, he hadn't felt his partner react any more than with a brief shifting of his mind. That had gradually changed when Karr had found out that his own prime directive of self-preservation was intimately linked to the preservation of the life of the human he was bonded to. Since then, it had grown from reluctant acceptance to an incredible care.
Almost warmth. Warmth in a way that wasn't radiating an increased temperature, but that was defined by presence. Nick reached for the silky blackness, felt the tangles of his partner's outer tendrils wrap playfully around his hand.
After a while in the desert Karr remarked on picking up signals from something or other, much like the signals from the alien robots that had caused all of this. Nick kept an eye out and discovered a police cruiser in the distance. It simply sat there, without anyone ever getting out or in, and now and then it drove off. Karr tried to scan it, but those scans were blocked, quickly followed by the car disappearing.
"Maybe one of them is watching," Nick murmured.
And waiting. Taunting. Almost wanting them to come closer each time, only to disappear. Nick didn't feel inclined to give in to the chase. If Nick was any judge of symbols, this one was what the Army had registered as a Decepticon, the enemy.
Great. Just great.
They changed locations after that. Frequently. He drove all the way to San Francisco, then back to LA, down to San Diego, and into the Nevada desert once more.
The police cruiser followed.
So Nick made the decision to take this back to where it had started. The Autobots were still here, on Earth, probably not far from their original last stand. Karr was, by and large, one of those Transformers, though he vehemently denied it. If he had to face down a Decepticon, he wanted to do so in the back yard of the Autobots.
Human brains were slow. Inadequate when compared to the mind of a Cybertronian. Even the lower order robots were faster in computing and executing a thought than a highly intelligent human. Barricade, being of a higher order, looked down on humanity with disdain and disgust. So far, for the past months, he had kept a low profile and not attracted undue attention. He was outnumbered and the Autobots were scanning for Decepticon frequencies, looking for survivors. Devastator, Blackout, Frenzy and Megatron had been terminated and sunk in the oceans. Starscream had fled this planet and Scorponok was nowhere to be heard of. Barricade suspected he had buried himself in a safe place, repairing damage received from human weapons, waiting.
Barricade himself couldn't just sit and wait. The distraction of this new, intriguing signal had been a nice change to routine. Without Frenzy, part of his systems felt abandoned and derelict. The little bot had interfaced with him whenever he accessed the world wide web of the humans, had recharged in a special component inside Barricade, and while he had been a pain in the electrodes, he had been company.
Following the signals, following the black car that was surrounded by the electronic signatures of an Allspark creation, Barricade didn't notice the first whispers right away. He was too busy trying to figure out who this car was.
Checking the license plate had left him with no clue. Running visual comparisons with known car models had come equally empty. It had to be a custom made car, with no true basic model, and Barricade's interest grew.
He began to check on the human. What he got after hours of serious hacking – something Frenzy would have been able to find for him in a matter of minutes – had really caught his attention.
DATA RETURN ON SUBJECT:
SUBJECT NAME: UNKNOWN
CURRENT NAME: Nicholas MacKenzie
GOVERNMENT I.D.: UNKNOWN
CURRENT MILITARY: NONE
SOCIAL SECURITY #: NONE
FIRE ARMS REGISTRATION: NONE
I.R.S. CURRENT: NOT AVAILABLE
Barricade watched the words 'unknown', 'none' or 'not available' fill the screen as nothing what he had requested was delivered to him. Still, there was no disappointment or anger. It was another clue.
A few days after meeting up with the strange signal, the Decepticon started to notice the growing whispers in his system. It was like a background murmur, something he couldn't quite pinpoint, nor understand. With Frenzy, there had been chatter when the hacker had been actively linked to his main systems. In recharge mode, there had been a hum of static, interspersed with little buzzing and fizzing noises.
But not like this. This wasn't another Cybertronian trying to get into his systems. This was different, but it originated from the interface area that now lay dormant and abandoned until Barricade might acquire a new partner.
This was a human. The most interesting human Barricade had ever met. And the machine he was driving was a hybrid, for lack of a better word, created by the Allspark, a first generation Earth Transformer.
Barricade was aware that the human and the car had seen him. He had counted on it, taunting them, trying to get a reaction. So far it was a wary distance, a watching and waiting, and he wondered if they would ever make the first step. If not, if they kept their distance, he might just make those steps for them. Before the Autobots got their grubby little do-gooder hands on this intriguing partnership.
He was a Decepticon. Trying to find the best possible option for himself was in
his programming.
It was only too bad that the moment the human attempted this kind of contact
himself, facing him, that the Autobots caught up on his signal and descended on
them like hawks.
tbc...
