Entering a new reality is always an odd feeling. The displacement as the world around you shifts. I couldn't open my eyes, but I was laying on the ground. My wings twitched, feeling the air shift. Interesting.
I could hear voices speaking around me. But I couldn't make out what they were saying. It was like everything was underwater. I felt someone shaking my shoulder. It felt like ages before my eyes finally opened.
I was in a cell of some kind. I looked at the hand on my shoulder. Following the arm attached to it I came face to face with my cell mate.
Deep blue eyes set in a gruff face. He was big and intimidating. Arms like canons and muscles for days. Or at least I think they were muscles, it was hard to tell underneath all that armor. The lighting in the room wasn't that great either.
"You alrigh' kid?" His voice was gruff, but quiet. I couldn't see any ill intent from his face, only concern. Shaking my head in order to clear my thoughts I looked back at the man.
"I'm alright, my heads just a little foggy." I struggled to my feet, my limbs didn't seem to want to listen to what I wanted them to do. Wings flaring to try and catch my balance, that was going to take some getting used to. The man hovered next to me, offering a hand in case I needed it.
"You've got quite the dent in that helm of yur's kid, I'm not surprised yur processors slow to start up." Raising a hand to my 'helm' I felt around for the offending dent that supposedly was the cause for my disoriented state.
Sure enough, there was a dent. Decently sized from what I could tell. Letting my hand fall I looked back towards the giant man. "Where the hell are we anyway?"
"We're in a Decepticon base kid, not the best place for somebot as young as you are." He looked me over, as if sizing me up. "What's your designation anyway?"
"..Prowl, you?"
"Ironhide" He grunted. He took a cursory look around our cell. "We need to find a way outta here befo' the guards come back."
"What do you have in mind?" I look towards the opening of out cell. What appeared to be a wall of red light separating us from the hallway.
Odd, those lights have to be what's keeping us in here if Ironhide hasn't walked out on his own already. Lasers maybe? Only thing I can think of that would be able to do that. Must need a power source of some kind to...
"You OK kid?" Jumping I turned to see Ironhide peering down at my face.
"Sorry, just getting lost in thought trying to figure out how to get past the door."
"That's getting lost in thought? It looked like you were trying to turn it off through sheer force of will or somethin'." Sadly my friend, a Jedi I am not.
Turning back to the wall I tried to collect my thoughts once more. That door needed to be able to pull power to operate itself. But does each door run off of the same generator or an individual one?
"Hey Ironhide? Do these doors share the same power source or do they have their own?"
"If it were two or three cells, I would have said a single generator..but this place is massive. So I would assume they would have dozens. So...individual I'd suspect."
"And the wiring? How do they connect to each power source?" He frowned at that.
"The connectors would have to be pretty close to the cells considering how many are packed down here. What exactly are you tryin' to get at kid?"
"The wiring Ironhide! That's how we'll get out. We cut the power source and we turn off the lasers." Realization finally seemed to dawn on his face. "If each power source is as close together as you say they are, then ours has to be somewhere in this very cell. We just have to look for the wires."
We started turning this way and that, searching. I looked along each wall, the floor, nothing! Wait a second... looking up at the ceiling I found what we were looking for. It was small enough to go unnoticed, only noticeable to those who knew what to look for to if it needed repairs. Bingo.
"Hey Ironhide, I think I found it. Can you give me a lift? I'm too short to reach it on my own." He grunted, while gently grabbing onto my waist as he proceeded to lift me up onto his shoulder. Good thing my claws are so sharp, otherwise we'd be screwed.
Swiftly cutting the wire, the door to our cell was deactivated. As Ironhide realized me from his hold he peaked out into the hallway. Looking back at me he nodded, the coast was clear.
It was slow going, making our way through a maze of twists and turns as we navigated through each hall. Every so often Ironhide had me use my door wings to search for nearby Decepticon patrols. Which was really cool by the way, not only could I sense Ironhide's spark, but that of the Decepticons that were patrolling the very halls we were currently in.
We were able to find the room that housed all of Ironhide's confiscated weaponry. How this guy was able to carry so many guns at one time was beyond me. He even offered to give me one of his combat knives. "Jus' in case we run into trouble." He had said.
"Better to be safe than sorry I guess." He laughed at me for this.
We were almost home free when our luck finally ran out. Two guards stood by the main door. I looked towards Ironhide, Now what do we do?
I glanced down at the dagger in my hand, then back at Ironhide. He nodded, motioning that I would take down guard while he got the other.
I had plenty of experience using knives from the other VRs I had played. Memory muscle was an amazing thing. Memory muscle and muscle memory were pretty much the same thing. Only difference was that memory muscle takes place when your brain is the one acting on instinct, not your physical body.
My gaze hardened, knife ready in one hand before I took off. I kept low to the ground, my steps silent and quick. The guard was dead before he even knew what was happening.
I jumped onto his back using my momentum to help slam the knife into his head. After he fell to the ground with a THUMP, I turned to see Ironhide had just finished off the other guard.
Removing my knife from the guard, we made our way out of the building. It wasn't until the base was far off into the distance when Ironhide stopped to look at me.
"Hey kid, you know how to use your T-Cog right?" I tilted me head to the side.
"T what now?" He sighed hard.
"Your T-Cog, your alt mode? Can you use it?" I continued to stare at him, my confusion starting to show on my face. Realization formed on his face. "You've never used your T-Cog before have you?" Shaking my head, he started to pace. Silently cursing as he did so.
I took a moment to actually study Ironhide's character. For a NPC he seemed to have a lot of character to him. More so than any of the others I've met in precious games. Maybe the creators are testing out a new VI? Now that I thought about it, Cybertron's tutorial hasn't been very informative when it comes to explaining the dynamics of the game. I've had to figure everything out on my own so far.
Ironhide came to a stop a few feet before me. He seemed to be deep in thought. He looked out into the distance, towards the direction we had originally been running in before he looked back at me.
"We have too far to travel by foot. I hope you're a fast learner kid cause we need to get moving again. Fast." Squaring my shoulders, I gave a firm nod. The sooner we got out of here, the better.
The process of actually learning how to use a T-Cog wasn't as complicated as I had originally expected it to be. The weird part though? I transformed in a vehicle. A motorcycle to be exact. Or at least Cybertron's version of a motorcycle. The sensation was an odd one. My body shifting to become something else entirely.
But I drove a motorcycle every day. Learning how to drive myself, as the bike, shouldn't prove to be too difficult. I was a little shaky at first but I got the hang of it fast enough. I could keep my balance without falling over at least.
When Ironhide transformed, it was into a something that seemed to resemble a truck. He took the lead, me following close behind. It was strange, feeling the hard ground beneath my tires as we drove. Ironhide said that if we kept up a decent pace, we would reach one of his factions base soon. They called themselves Autobots.
As the Decepticon base grew smaller and smaller behind us, I could only hope that things would start to look up for us soon.
Hope you guys enjoyed reading this chapter as much as I did writing it. I had fun thinking of how my Prowl would break down a situation to find a solution.
On another note, updates might not be as frequent as I would like due to having a full time job and going to school, but I will aim for posting 1 chapter every other week if possible. Maybe sooner depending on how nice the plot bunnies are.
