Chapter IV
. . .
In every life we have some trouble. But when you worry, you make it double. Don't worry.
- Bobby McFerrin "Don't Worry be Happy"
. . .
"Long story short, I wasn't able to make it out before my jury trial. I ended up going. The scientist testified against me...as me. It was weird. My parents testified against me. Several of my classmates confirmed my identity as the one little innocent Moonlight went home with."
Moonlight could feel his mind starting to unravel. The amount of emotional turmoil his spark could take was being overloaded.
The scientist's presence sat like a stone in Moonlights processor but strangely quieter than usual, almost silent. He had a suspicion that he wanted to force Moonlight to focus entirely on the trial.
A spark attack would have been Primus showing Moonlight mercy.
He could use even the smallest bit of mercy right now.
"The jury would like to call Stormdrain to the witness stand."
Frag.
. . .
"Even Stormdrain testified against me."
. . .
"Is the mech that caused the death of Vincentus in this room?"
Stormdrain leaned into the microphone. "Yes."
"Can you point him out to us?"
Her shaking hand raised until Moonlight was on the other end.
"Thank you, Stormdrain. That's all we need for sentencing, Alpha Council."
. . .
"Y'see, unlike humans, the sentenced get no last meal. It was seen as a waste to feed any bot on death row. What they get instead is a last ride. It's kinda sucky. All it is is a ride from the courtroom to the recycling plant after sentencing. I think humans would call it a 'crematorium'? Organ donation center maybe? Except my remains would be melted into scrap to be used for construction because, as a convicted felon, I gave up my rights to have my remains passed on to another potential Cybertronian. The old regime was literally built of the remains of criminals, which is ironic considering the corruption of the party in power.
"Anyway my ride was quiet. Things were going quite well according to my plan. I was cuffed, of course, and the one newbie called Ironhide was more bothered about my fate than I was. He'd glance at me every so often, wouldn't meet my optics, looked at the prison truck walls.
"We never arrived."
. . .
Crankshaft, obviously the veteran of the group of the prison guards with his resigned demeanor, world-weary posture and battle scars, was the first to pick up on the almost silent high pitched static noise coming through the truck walls. He went rigid, optics unfocused, as he tried to pinpoint the origin of the sound. Moonlight noticed the change in the all four guards' posture; they were all on high alert. This was not good. This was not part of the plan. As if to make things worse, Moonlight's tanks ached with emptiness. It had been days since he'd had anything to consume. (The hospital had known he'd get the termination penalty. His rations had been cut off since the trial began.)
The back door opened and the voice of the truck droned from above, "Now arriving at Lexicon Recycling Plant."
No. No that's too soon, we should be going to Iacon. Iacon, you blast ended idiot rustbrained-
This was all wrong. This wasn't a recycling plant, Lexicon or Iacon. It was a junkyard.
Moonlight's cooling intake hitched. He felt a cold prickle starting to creep up the back of his neck. The sense that someone like him, a criminal, a conniver, immediately put him on edge.
The back door of the transport truck opened with a slow pneumatic hiss. The force field keeping his cuffs against the wall shut off with an unexpected jolt of electricity. Moonlight's sense of balance and view tilted and he stumbled away from the wall, barely catching himself before he fell to his knees.
. . .
"Someone who shall remain nameless for now had hacked the truck drone. Crankshaft had realized this by now. The other guards had realized this. Unlike my captors, I knew not only what was happening but who it could be. The scientist. He was the only one with access to my mind. He was the only one I knew of on Cybertron that was able to get inside a bot's mind. He was the only one that came to my mind. He was also the one that had just testified at my trial. His smug little aft kissing face and my parents, my poor creators. They had to watch their son give a testimonial lie and looked at me like I was the scum of the cosmos.
"I died on the inside. Primus hated me and my attempted journey to prove my innocence was falling apart by the second."
. . .
A noise high and shrill and indescribably intense enough to bring an audio receptor to the point of overload filled the back of the truck. The drone shut off- the lights flickered and died, the voice faded away after attempting to inform the guards of a possible infiltration, the electric locks on Moonlight's hands released with a click. One guard, the newbie, was quickest to his pedes, intent on seeing if the mech behind this malfunction blocked the door.
There was no mech. There was a speaker, the obvious source of the (now growing in intensity and pitch) noise. A message Moonlights comm. system, which had been disabled by the caretakers in the hospital.
The notification almost startled him. It had been ages since anyone had wanted to talk to him let alone been able to. The comm system was set to open only to one of the hospital employees. It had been impossible for even Moonlight to get it to work again. But there it was in his line of sight- a communication from an unknown source. There was only one possible mech that knew how to hack into his processor and try to communicate with him.
:Get out.:
The scientist. Notwithstanding who it came from, Moonlight needed no more encouragement to dart out from under the hands of Crankshaft, which had been coming for him while all of this happened instantaneously.
He ducked two more pairs of hands and, seeing the opportunity, nicked a stun gun from the subspace of the newbie, jabbing it into his lower abdomen and sprinting away just as fast as he cybertronianly could. Even from the increasing distance between him and the speaker, he could hear the noise getting louder. He heard the guards start to scream and fall. He kept running.
:Turn left.:
Moonlight didn't dare listen to the mech that had hacked his brain. This had happened before. Someone had been inside his mind before. This was not okay. By Primus, he wouldn't let it happen again. He kept running straight, eventually scanning a random alt mode from amidst the rusting junk and speeding toward the outermost edges of the city.
Even as he drove away, his vision filled with notifications of stop, I demand you stop now, turn around, he didn't stop. His processor was spinning with images of the scientist on the other end, waiting to do more experiments, waiting to cause more spark attacks, wanting him to switch back so he could further mar his self worth and identity and make everything infinitely worse.
No. Moonlight couldn't do that. There was literally no way he could let that happen again. For better or for worse he could not afford to be captured by that son of a glitch when he was in such a weak condition. He needed to heal, rest, get his bearings, formulate a new plan. Primus, he needed something to eat.
He couldn't do any of this while literally running from the law.
He needed a place to rest.
