Chapter Four
It's hard to imagine that she can safely shake hands, Dart mumbled as the elevator doors closed behind Solarflare. There was a pattern of five small divots in the rounded edge of her shoulder plate, barely noticeable except to the discerning optic – and Dart had a pair of the best ones around. There were other seams and such divots patterning her metallic body, some more visible than others – the product of shoddy repair jobs.
She forgot the quartermaster's level and had to consult the chart plastered on the back wall of the elevator. Hitting the button for the ground floor, Dart swayed slightly as the lift lurched and began to descend. She pondered Solarflare's words, recalled the strained timbre of the other femme's vocalizer as she spoke of shooting her if necessary. "Don't give me a reason to," she said. She's so strange, I don't know if I could even begin to tell what would set her off … but she seems so … nice. Any further rumination was cut off as the elevator chimed her floor and the doors drew back into their recesses. Dart found herself on the rec room level and blinked in confusion. She didn't dare ask one of the milling Autobots, a few of whom paused in their meanderings to stare at her.
"Excuse me."
The tall, dark-haired woman wearing the work uniform of the kitchen staff paused mid-step and looked up at the lanky femme. Dart continued, "Could you direct me to the quartermaster?"
The woman's eyes flickered briefly, and then she nodded. "Head on through there," she said, pointing to the hall beyond the rec room. "You'll need a card to get in, though."
"Thank you," Dart replied, patting her hip carrier. She and the woman parted ways and Dart walked up to the barred doorway. There was a keypad and slot for what Dart supposed was her plascard. She pulled the key out and swiped it, rocking back on her heels and waiting for a blaring alarm. The keypad blinked green and three locks tumbled within the door's structure. Dart waited a beat, and when the door didn't swing of its own accord, grabbed the handle and quickly pulled downwards. It swung open easily enough and she slipped through, tucking the plascard back into her carrier for safekeeping.
A short hall gave way to the massive storage room that housed all human and Cybertronian food/fuel supplies as well as other miscellaneous necessities. Dart stepped up to the wide white railing that bordered the warehouse and looked down. Autobots and humans milled around below, some driving forklifts – others were the forklifts.
"State your business, soldier," a gruff mech vocalizer ordered. Dart whirled, legs splayed out in a reactive stance. The bulky green and grey mech whom she faced took an involuntary step backwards, but quickly recovered. "Business," he repeated, folding his arms and tucking a clipboard between them.
"Dart, here to pick up supplies for … Flamestrike," she stumbled.
The mech vented air and looked at his databoard. "I have no orders for the infiltrationist."
"Uhm," Dart fumbled, scrabbling around in her carrier for the plascard. "Here." She thrust it out at him, right under his olfactory sensor.
The mech whom she took to be the quartermaster grabbed the card and fed it into a slot in his board. Dart hung back, optics flickering. "Well," the mech grunted. "It's one of Subcommander Prowl's passes all right. Okay, soldier, what does Infiltrationist Flamestrike need?" He handed the plascard back to her, large blue optics calculating; Dart nodded, trying to remember the list.
"Uhm, flasks of Energon, some high grade and Energon … chips?"
A light blinked on the wall next to the green and grey mech. "Quartermaster here."
"Quartermaster Highrise, this is Infiltration Specialist Flamestrike," the familiar vocalizer drifted from the comm unit; "I was just checking to see if my courier, Dart, arrived."
"Right here, ma'am. I'll set her up with all that you need."
"Good; thank you."
Highrise tucked his clipboard into subspace and hooked a finger in Dart's direction. "All right, Courier. Let's get your things. This way; step lively and watch out for the lifts. We've got a few new humans on training duty and one of them's not too keen on brakes yet. I had to scrap two drones this afternoon and I'm not about to send anyone to Med Bay."
oOoOoOoOo
Early-morning traffic flowed like gentle birds into the City. Dart stood on the top of the stairs, overlooking the woods that housed the training grounds; the box of supplies lay at her feet. Dawn was rosy, not quite deep pink, but threaded with hints of purple and night blue. Midsummer scents filled the air, wafting towards the City and swirling around it, caught up in the spray of the generators. Dart inhaled, drawing every nuance of scent into her olfactory system. The power of nature recharged her in a way that no berth or power cord ever could. It brought a spark to her optics, a lift to her Energon pump and vigor to her laser core.
Sensitive audio receptors caught the footfalls of two mechanical beings behind her. Dart turned and saw Solarflare and Flamestrike walking side-by-side across the flat, open ground between turrets. Each femme had a distinct walk: Flamestrike strolled with an upright carriage, her tail held with rigid precision behind her and wings folded neatly at her spine; Solarflare walked at a slight forward angle, light on her feet despite their size, the pinions of her wings fanned and extended. There was confidence in every line of their bodies, a difference Dart could feel in her synthetic veins. At once, she felt awkward and gawky, reliving those high school years all over again. The "in-crowd" was approaching and she was the outsider. Worse, she was a defector – akin to a nerd asking to join the jocks' table at lunch.
Dart watched them and saw that both femmes were carrying several items looped around their bodies. Solarflare had a belt strapped around her waist with a conventional human leather holster; five pockets dangling from the belt were threatening to burst. Her gryphonic counterpart had something large and round poking out over the top of her flame-colored head; a complex loop of rope was bundled and attached to her hip. The courier's optics flicked to the box of supplies she'd placed on the floor beside her; she bent and picked up the blue-steel package, holding it close to her chestplate.
The femmes were all smiles, that a slightly cheery "good morning" inadvertently slipped from her lip components. Shock made a quick appearance on Solarflare's face, then slipped quickly into pleasantness.
"Good morning to you, too, Dart. Ready to go?"
"I suppose so," she admitted.
Flamestrike nodded and pulled two thin disks out of a slot in her right forearm. "Ladies, these are our coordinates. I've estimated our travel time at an hour and ten minutes, with good headwind."
Headwind? "You mean … flying?" Dart interrupted over Solarflare's query of location. "Flying?"
The brown and flame-colored gryphonic femme tilted her head, tail swinging in an idle arc. "Well, yes. It's the quickest way of travel, since all three of us are flight-capable." Dart took a half-step back as Flamestrike's optical sensors tightened. "Are you implying that you can't fly? What little I know of your schematics indicates you can."
Think quickly, Dart, the courier told herself. "I, uh … they were damaged when I came in and I never got around to getting them repaired."
Something in Flamestrike's gaze told Dart that the infiltration specialist wasn't fooled. "Well, that puts a small kink in my plans. Tell me you can properly transform."
Mutely, Dart nodded. Flamestrike crossed her arms over her gryphon-head chestplate and looked at Solarflare. The grey avian femme shook her head and shrugged. "We'll leave by the bridge, then," Flamestrike said. "Head on down and we'll meet you there."
Somewhat relieved, Dart nodded and began to walk towards the opposite end of the City. Flamestrike's voice called her back around. "Don't forget to insert the coordinates into your system," the gryphonic femme instructed.
"All right!" Dart called back. She returned to walking and held up the thin disc, juggling her cargo with the other arm. Now, only if I knew where she wanted me to put it …
--
Flamestrike was irritated; while her facial planes remained rather smooth, the brown and flame-colored femme couldn't hold her tail. The silver appendage with its tri-bladed, fiery tip jerked spasmodically, lashing her calves and ankle joints. "What's that human saying about assuming things?"
Flare paused in fixing the belt around her waist. "Assuming? Oh, making an ass out of you and me."
"Right. I should've known better, Flare. How could she have survived in the Decepticon ranks so long with programming like that? Not repairing her boosters my boron compressor."
"Maybe we can find out," Flare replied, reaching out with a black steel pinion and nudging her wingmate. "That was why you wanted her along in the first place."
Flamestrike nodded, tight-lipped. "Best get on with it. The wind's picking up."
Privately, Flare was relieved to be on the road and in the air. She finished her adjustments and, satisfied that they wouldn't tangle in the complex parts that would make up her avian altmode, threw out her wings, feeling the wind play against the sensitive neuros embedded into the tips. She half-crouched, beating the large pinions and stretching servos that hadn't seen use in a few weeks' time. Electric thrill shot through her system, heading straight through to her cortex, lighting up every pleasure sensor she possessed. Flying was the greatest high in her mechanical life – even interfacing (Sorry, Raj, she apologized.) came second. Here, in the wind, she was free from everything: duty and rational thought.
With one more good, hard beat, Flare threw up her arms and transformed. Her lower torso spun and shrank, protective grey plating easing out of small compartments in her back to cover those sensitive areas. At the same time, her arms retracted into her chest, shoulder struts snapping down and forward. At last, her head sank into the cavity, nestled next to her Energon pump and spark chamber, to be replaced by the black-beaked avian head.
The eagle that was Solarflare shook out her tail feathers and beat her wings once more. To her right, Flamestrike was finishing her own transformation: a brown-armored amalgam of feline and avian parts. Bright green optics winked out of the avian face at the eagle. "Ready?"
"Always," Solarflare called back. With an ungainly hop-skip that was inherent in land-bound – and mechanical – birds of prey, Flare ran off of the nearest edge of the City, throwing herself into the void. Her anti-grav boosters kicked in at the moment her pinions were thrown open and they propelled the grey eagle skyward in a joyful, looping spiral. A keen golden optic noted Flamestrike doing the same thing, though her leap was more of grace than gangly, with her four legs to Solarflare's two.
Sweet, warm wind blew against Flare's metallic nares, sweeping through her system, cooling her hard-working servos and invigorating her spark at the same time. She climbed higher, circling the comm tower where she spent most of her online hours plugged into that Primus-forsaken unit.
"This way, wingsis." The voice crackled out of her internal comm system and sounded politely amused.
Eh? Oh. Flare gave herself a rough, internal shake and spun on her inner pinion towards the spot where Flamestrike was hovering. Her friend's large beak was pulled into a smile as she approached. With a flick of a pinion and a turn of her talons, Flamestrike flew onwards. Flare allowed herself a private, rueful grin and followed, flying directly across from her friend, so that their wingtips were no more than twenty feet apart.
The air grew warmer as the hour progressed, the rising sun cresting the horizon at last, spilling clear golden light across the valley. Rays beat down over Flare's grey metal back, infusing her system. She kept an optic on the road below and finally spotted an inconspicuous late-model black Pontiac TransAm; the only way she knew that car to be Dart was by the white lightning bolt splayed across the hood. Well, she has anonymity going for her, if nothing else, Flare mused. That relative invisibility stretched to include no faction symbol, though anyone paying close attention would be able to tell that no one was actually driving the Pontiac. Still, Flare had to hand it to Dart for choosing such a relevant altmode.
The unlikely trio passed out of City limits and hit the open Tennessee highway, the avians at the front, the Pontiac at the back, moving along like a reversed arrowhead. While she trusted Flamestrike to lead the way, Flare nonetheless kept tabs on the slim disc the other femme had given her.
"Running well, Dart?" she called down.
After a moment's hesitation, there was the femme's reply: "You bet."
Hmm. Maybe Dart was like Solarflare, finding freedom and joy in the openness of the world. Perhaps they'd been doing her a disservice in keeping her City-bound. Small wonder she was nervous, edgy and shy! Flare concluded. Well, this certainly turned things around.
Th-thump! Th-thu-mp!
Musical vibrations echoed in Flare's inner audio receptors. Confused, the avian femme glanced around her and down, looking for the source of interference. There was nothing save for the open grey highway, Flamestrike to her right and Dart trailing obediently behind them.
Th-ump! Ba-dumth!
Of course! Flare smiled and tuned her newly-installed dials; lyrics began to pound in her cortex along with the musical strain. Dart was playing her radio! And it was good, too. She glanced to her left, but Flamestrike was frequency-deaf and unresponsive to what was going on in Flare's cortex. At least something good has come out of this, Flare chuckled. Travel music. I wonder if I can hack into Sirius? Suddenly, a hour or two of pure, textbook flight was looking up.