Fragments of the Covenant
"If I can be perfectly frank-" Smokescreen began with a groan as he dragged his peds into the dusty old warehouse.
"You can't," Miko interjected brightly as she gave the oil drum a final spin on the chain that suspended it from the ceiling. "We have a strict imperfectly frank policy in this den of geekery."
Smokescreen blinked at her a moment and then threw back his head and laughed full and long. The soundproofing on the walls absorbed both the laughter and the clang as he fell into the beanbag set out for him on the floor. The golden afternoon sun fell in through the window and softened the loud colors of his paintjob.
"Drinks ready," Miko called out cheerfully. "And you better appreciate this. I earned the recipe from Maccadam with my sweat and blood man."
"I would appreciate used barge oil at the moment," Smokescreen said ruefully as he caught the drum she swung in his direction.
He popped the lid off and took a long swig.
"Ah!" he cried out. "That burns!"
"It's supposed to," Miko replied with a smile.
Smokescreen took a more respectful sip and relaxed back into the beanbag with a contented sigh. After a few moments of companionable chatter he glanced over at a man door.
"So what little thing did the Wolfman blow out of proportion to get me out of that pit this time?" He asked.
"Raf says it's serious this time," Miko said from where she sat on his thigh. "And I believe him. He's been ignoring his business. Abuelita is furious at him. Crawling all over Europe in these dusty old monk places. Ignoring his friends."
"I'd be content with the wastebasket of the Hall of Records," Smokscreen went on with an attempt at a roguish grin., trying to lighten the resentment he heard in her voice.
"Well," Raf's voice called out from the door. "What would you think about the Stylus of Alpha Trion?"
Smokescreen glanced up at him sharply. The oil drum gave a squeal of protest as his servos tightened on it.
"Are you serious Raf?" he demanded, his voice harsh with emotion.
Raf smiled grimly at him and adjusted his glasses.
"That- that's," Smokescreen set his drink down and stared into the middle distance. "It wasn't just a stylus," he whispered. "Do you have any idea of what that was capable of?"
"I think I am beginning to," Raf said softly.
"And it's here? On Earth?" Smokescreen demanded.
"Why wasn't it in the Iacon database then?" Miko asked.
"Alpha Trion knew that could be hacked," Smokescreen replied. "He wouldn't have, didn't, make any record of where he hid the stylus or the Covenant fragments."
"If there was no record," Miko suddenly glanced at Raf sharply, "then how did you know where to look?"
"Do you remember why I did that tour of Spain last year?" Raf asked, holding up his arm.
Miko narrowed her eyes at the thick hair on the back of his wrists in irritation.
"Because Abuelita wanted you to do her geological research for her," she answered dutifully. "Wanted to know what saints or whatnot you were related to."
"Just so," he said with a curt, Ratchet like nod, "when I was at the monastery of Samos, one of my great-great aunts was a nun in the ninth century, I found an old letter from her, biological, sister. It led me on an interesting investigation. I found-"
Raf's voice faltered and he shifted his long gangly limbs uneasily.
"What did you find?" Smokescreen demanded, leaning forward eagerly.
Raf held up a file thick with printouts.
"I didn't risk transferring these electronically." He said. "Lucky for us they are all old and not particularly historically relevant by human standards so they were pretty low on the que for digitization."
There was a long moment of silence as Raf hesitated again.
"Well?" Smokescreen demanded. "Are we going on a relic hunt or not?"
Raf smiled ruefully.
"You are," he said. "You and Miko. I have a business to run. But Smokescreen?"
"Yeah?" Smokescreen asked, looking down at his friend intently.
"Do you remember how, when you first arrived, I was the only human who could understand Bee?" Raf asked.
"Yes," Smokescreen said with a bright little laugh, "I think most of Cybertron knows about that by now, given how famous Bee has gotten."
"Well," Raf said softly, pulling out the first document. "It turns out there was a reason I could."
Found in the Archives of the Monastery of Samos
A personal letter to Sister Margret
The Lady Froial to my dearest beloved sister Florintina,
In the year of Our Lord 743,
Yes my dearest one. It is true that The Most High has granted me the great joy of a child, not just any child but a healthy son. He was baptized by the good Bishop Rafa'el after his grandfather. My joy I cannot express to you my dear sister, thou still a blessed virgin. Oh but like that sacred virgin whom we both revere my breast has been pierced with a sword and I am left but to gather it all up in my heart. Oh dearest sister perhaps I sin to speak of this after the Bishop has cautioned me to silences but I cannot bear it alone. My pure and innocent babe, ah but the Bishop assured me it is but a heavenly blessing. That such a pure, blue light is but a sign that his eyes are pointed heavenward. But I must begin at the beginning. The first night I lay with my babe in his crib by my side he woke me with his cry for nourishment. I lifted him up and cried out for his eyes, his pretty blue eyes glowed like the morning sky with a light of their own. I cried out for my husband and he rushed to our side. He considered the thing and said that he had known such a light but once before. It had emitted from the holy and arcane text in our family vaults (you know my dear sister that he is something of a cousin to us so we share much in history). It was soothing to think that this was a holy light but we called the priest. He prayed over the child and the light did not dim. Neither did it dim at the time of his baptism, nor when the elders were called to pray blessings over him. My beloved summoned the nuns who care for the holy documents and they confirmed that this was the same holy light of the arcane text and that of the Staff of St. David the Wanderer, a relic that their sister order tended. However they warned us that the light came and went to times that they did not claim to understand and we should expect the blessing to fade with age. I do not know to be disappointed or relieved my dear sister…
Found in the Vatican Archives
A fragment of a letter from Leo the Geometer to Emperor Theophilus
…the Duc assures me that the documents are true. Copied by the hand of his honorable father. Duc Jorge showed me the holy relic and demonstrated the power his family hold over it so I can verily attest with my own eyes that it behaves as reported. {several illegible sentences} a very clever contraption though I can understand {illegible} legend of giants. The relic itself would appear to be but a common place quill pen from some bird of common grey and blue plumage were it not {illegible} in size. However with the aid of the before described contraption of which I have provided a diagram one man of reasonable strength is able to wield it by placing his {illegible for several paragraphs} continue to glow with a gold light for several hours after the writing is finished. Jorge assures me that the text his father wrote shed this holy light for days afterwards and regrets that the blood of his mother, Godly woman that she was, diluted his ability to write the language though not his ability to read it. The content {illegible} cannot be termed prophecy as it speaks only of the doings of his {illegible} and not at any future time {manuscript ends}
Found in the Monastery of Hosios Loukas
A fragment of Leo the Geometer's personal notes
…can be no doubt that this is the very relic that was touched by, or rather touched Archimedes. Despite its deceptive appearance of animal matter the relic is a thing of levers and gears. No doubt merely seeing the holy interworking of the devices would inspire both great holy awe and mighty feats of reason, however give the manner in which I witnessed Jorge Floria both find and choose his mate and how their blessed child was born I cannot doubt that the relic posses the ability not just to ignite parchments and illuminate metals but to mark the very…
Excerpt of a personal letter of Sir Thomas North, British Royal Museum
Rodger North , 2nd Baron of North
My only regret beloved, is that there is so little time and it takes so very much of it translate but a single document. Can you imagine my tortures when I discovered a tie between the works of both Plutarch and de Guevara? You would do well to ask what ties a man of the first century of our lord in Greece to a man of the sixteenth in Spain. But in a document telling of the history of the woman Pharaoh, who greatness was perhaps only rivaled by our own glorious monarch he speaks of a pagan relic. A mechanical stylus capable of writing letters of glowing fire onto finely beaten gold. This stylus was said to be a gift of Thoth to the Pharaohs and was crafted from the very light of the moon, falling from the night sky. According to the manuscript the mother of this Cleopatra, Cleopatra V, was threatened by her husband while she was yet gravid with her daughter and fled to the temple of Thoth, as he was also a god of protection for women great with child. She hid within the temple for thirteen days, eating nothing and drinking only the water from the holy fountain in which the stylus rested. After that time her husband grew penitent and came to beg her forgiveness. Her daughter was said to be born with eyes of glowing holy fire and a tongue that could speak any language that had been used to pray to Thoth at that temple. Now de Guevara writes of the Spanish Duchy of Floria who kept and tended a relic of great power. A Quill of mechanical metal that granted the gift of languages to a chosen one of each generation. I had a chance to meet one of these chosen ones. A thin and bookish sort by the name of Gonzales who was headed off to the colonies across the Atlantic. He did have a near native grasp of English but I must say I never saw his eyes glow with the supposed holy blue light.
From the archives of the Walter Reed Medical Museum
September 4th 1942
Colonel Raymond,
Of course he bloody well deserves the purple heart! He bloody well deserves a dozen! You know what happened that night! We weren't just caught with our pants down, we were caught stark naked! Except for one ship. The ship Specialist Esquivel was on. That was no coincidence. We were the first ship to sound the warning because Esquivel was at the radar. He was supposed to be off duty but had just pulled a twenty hour shift because he had noted a flaw in our systems. That alone deserves a meritorious duty award. But just as he was about to go to some well earned rest that speaker gave a tiny little squawk and I swear that man's dark Spanish eyes glowed the same green as the display. He jerked the headset off the private on duty and listened himself. No one else hear a thing but he just grimly looked up at me and said.
"They're coming. Warn the fleet."
No I don't know how or why he heard that when the rest of the fleet didn't. Probably because the systems on that ship are his baby and they work better than any ship in the fleet. But by Uncle Sam's Start Spangled Shorts if that man doesn't get his purple heart for the wounds he received in the following battle, you tell General Bryce that I will personally take that shiny [rest of the document redacted]