Chapter 2: The Meetings
As they entered the conference room, Ironhide could tell the mood was sour and that Bumblebee had already filled the rest in on the situation. "I'm sure Bumblebee has already told you of our new intel, as you all know Mirage infiltrated the cons base and was able to discover that they are indeed planning a strike. Without Mirage here to report his findings in detail I'm afraid that we can only speculate as to what they may have in store".
"Sir, did Mirage give an idea as to where they are going to strike?" asked Ratchet.
"No, his message only said that Starscream and Soundwave are planning a strike and that he will have the details once he returns," stated Bumblebee.
"Optimus, I have a suggestion; Wheellack has been working on a device for some time now. He says it's a device capable of creating temporal displacements allowing us to see the Decepticons movement before it happens. This could come in handy against the cons; Ratchet you know more about this than I do," stated Prowl.
Sighing, Ratchet filled everyone in, "Yes Jack was working on a device that he hopes can manipulate the space time continuum by allowing us to see a Decepticons next move and counter it. But this is all theoretical, he's been working on this for thousands of vorns now, it was a project he started with Perceptor. I started helping him where I could after the Battle for the All Spark but I don't know the progress of the device since we got separated. In fact I wasn't aware that he had it on base with him, I haven't really gotten a chance to speak to him about it since he rejoined us".
"Prowl could you ask Wheeljack to join us for this meeting, please," asked Prime.
"He's already on his way here," was Prowl's prompt reply. He always made it a point to be one step ahead of everyone so it didn't come as a surprise to anyone that he had comm'd Wheeljack before being asked. It only took a few kliks for the Engineer to arrive, "Wheeljack, thank you for joining us, Prowl and Ratchet were just telling us about the project you have been working on for a while, and we would like to know more about it".
"Sure Prime, it's a sort of 'time machine' I guess you could call it except it's not designed to send someone forward or back in time, rather just to see the immediate future. Temporal science is very unpredictable which is why it's taken me forever on this project".
"How is it supposed to work?" inquired Bumblebee, "Well Bee, it creates a field around the device and anyone within this field is able to see what can happen in the immediate future. It can be 5 seconds into the future or 5 minutes, all depends on the settings. I guess you can say that it's like having precognition as the humans call it. Time inside the field is basically sped up, so only the people within the field are affected and will see what's going to happen".
"Is it dangerous?" asked Ironhide skeptically knowing the engineer's track record for having inventions blow up in his faceplates. "It won't blow up I assure you, unless its damaged of course," with a pause he turned to his leader, "May I ask why the sudden interest in my invention?"
"We have a situation, the cons are planning something and we do not know what as yet. Right now we are waiting for Mirage to return so we can get a more detailed report on the con activity," explained Optimus.
"The best course of action would be to hit them in space, which will minimize damage to this planet and will allow us to battle more freely without having to worry about harming the humans".
"That would help a lot of our battle strategies Prowl", replied Ironhide.
"You know that most bots are not designed for a space battle," retorted Ratchet.
"Yes we are aware that we are at a disadvantage, Prowl what do we know about the Decepticon forces?" queried Prime.
"We have been systematically destroying all the Decepticons on Earth but we do not have a count of how many there are in space or on board the Nemesis. Mirage will be able to give us a count of the cons on the Nemesis but that is all we know. And we still have not found Barricade, he's hidden somewhere on Earth and probably will use this as an opportunity to strike us".
"You are thinking of using my device to even the odds of this battle," Wheeljack stated. "I wish to keep it as a backup in case we are overwhelmed and the odds are against us," replied Optimus.
"My battle computer has given me the plausible scenarios, the only one with an 86% chance of success is if we lure the Decepticons to the moon and fight them there, which should eliminate any space battles. If we use Wheeljack's device, that chance increases to 90%."
"Now that we are all aware of the current threat, let's await Mirage's return and see what detailed intel he can give us. In the meantime, I will inform the Secretary of Defense of our probable plan. Let's make the necessary preparations, you are dismissed," concluded Optimus Prime.
Everyone filed out in their own groups towards their tasks, Ratchet and Wheeljack left together to finish work on his device and make it ready for battle, while Ironhide and Bumblebee went down to commons in order to appraise their human and autobot friends of the battle to come, leaving Prowl to retreat to his office in order to strategize their up-coming battle.
Aboard the Nemesis
"This should do well for now Soundwave; I think we should have more of a chance of winning with this plan than we ever will with any of Megatron's".
Soundwave could only nod, taking in the plan they had set forward. They were evenly matched with the Autobots even though they suffered a lot in their last skirmish but both were confident they could match the bots with the help of Barricade. Having come out of hiding, Barricade was their only spy on Earth and it would stay that way as long as they needed him. With the latest intel from him, they were able to devise a formidable plan and Starscream did not want to waste any more time, he wanted things to be set in motion.
This found Barricade on the move for his part of the plan while Starscream and Soundwave rounded up the Decepticons on board the Nemesis. Sending a data burst of their plans via the Decepticon frequency, Starscream set off to inform Megatron in detail as to their course of action, I'm going to enjoy throwing this victory in his faceplates, thought Starscream.
Within the shadows of the hallway, Mirage heard everything said between Soundwave and Starscream. Deciding that he had overstayed his welcome, he began to make his way towards the nearest hatch in order to report back to Autobot HQ. What he was not aware of was that Soundwave had detected his presence in that moment and sent a coded message to Starscream. As Mirage made his way out of the Nemesis, he was met with two Decepticons patrolling the hallways. That was when he knew his cover was blown, and so hasten his retreat before he was discovered for good. He decided to take the exit furthest away from the bridge, knowing the one he was headed for would have guards by now. With any luck, those exits would be left relatively unguarded; and he was right as he approached his destination. There was only one guard at this exit who he was able to incapacitate fairly easily. Once outside, he quickly made his retreat towards Earth.
On the bridge
Soundwave saw the blip on the radar speeding away from the Nemesis and knew this would not bode well for them. "The Autobot has escaped and is making his way to Earth," stated Soundwave as Starscream entered the bridge area.
"What is the point of having minions if I have to do everything myself!" growled Starscream. "Soundwave prepare to depart in a cycle, we will have to speed things up and strike before the Autobots can gather".
"Acknowledged," and with that, left the bridge. Now alone, Starscream knew that any information the Autobot took back to their base would be detrimental to the plan he had. The only option was to execute their plans ahead of schedule and hope the entire thing does not blow up in their faceplates. Going over to the comm station, he sent a coded message to Barricade information him of the change in timing. Receiving an affirmative from him, Starscream left the bridge to finish his preparations.
Later next evening…
Mirage's entry into Earth's atmosphere was too hasty and he ended up much farther from base than he anticipated. Without an alt-mode with flight capabilities, he contacted the NEST base in order to request a pick-up. Once appraised of his situation, Optimus sent out Skyfire to retrieve him and that's where he found himself a joor later.
"So what's the cons planning this time Mirage", asked Skyfire casually. "It seems they have planned a two front attack on us; I must say that I did not know Starscream could plan anything. I only heard parts of their conversation and the parts I heard does not bode well for us".
"Optimus is not going to like this one bit," Skyfire said sourly, "No one knows that Starscream is actually a brilliant strategist and with his scientific background, he can be a
formidable enemy if it wasn't for his cowardice".
"Well good thing for us that he values his own spark over everything else, otherwise we would have been scrapped a long time ago".
They lapsed into a comfortable silence, both deep in thought about the upcoming confrontation. It wasn't much later that Skyfire announced their arrival at HQ. Receiving a comm from Optimus to meet him in the conference room, Mirage mentally prepared the report he was going to give Optimus. As he reached the room, he was surprised to see all of the officers. What was more surprising was the fact that Wheeljack was present and he didn't know why the Engineer would be called to an officers meeting. Giving a nod of acknowledgement to his peers, Mirage sent his report to the mechs present via data burst and faced his leader, "Sir, it seems Megatron has given Starscream and Soundwave the task of planning an attack on us. And from what I have been able to gather, they have a pretty solid plan. They plan to use Barricade as a distraction in order to execute their main objection which is to strike HQ; I was unable to determine where Barricade is located as Starscream made it a point never to mention his location."
"That's just great, how are we supposed to prepare any sort of defense if we don't know what they have in store? We can have a defense here but we will not be able to defend against whatever Barricade is up to until it's too late."
"There are only so many things they can do Ironhide, we will just have to be on high alert since we do not know the full extent of their plans," Optimus said.
"There is one more thing that I found out; I believe there are some second thoughts amongst some of the Decepticons. I think their loyalty towards Megatron and the cause may be wavering; some think that Megatron has finally lost it with their newest assignment."
Ratchet snorted, "They are only now realizing that Megatron is insane; they really are a few bolts short".
"What's their mech count Mirage?"
"There aren't many cons on the Nemesis Ironhide; about 17 including Megatron but out of that only 9 are battle ready as the rest are damaged."
At that moment, the battle warning went off throughout the base. "Tactical; Report," ordered Prowl almost immediately, "Sir, one of our operatives in Washington just sighted Barricade, we suspect he is heading for the White House."
A look of dread descended on each Autobot present, they knew that if any harm came to the President of the United States then the Americans would deem it an act of terrorism and retaliate against whoever they felt is a threat as a very small portion of their military was aware of the Cybertronians on their planet. This would lead Earth into a World War and they could not allow that to happen, they had to stop Barricade.
"Prowl, I want you and a group of Autobots to head towards the Nemesis and make sure the cons from space cannot attack us here. Bumblebee, get a team together; we will go after Barricade and we'll take Skyfire with us as backup."
Prowl ran the variables through his battle computer and came up with the perfect line up of mechs to take, "Prowl to Sideswipe, Windcharger, Blaster, and Silverbolt, report to the hanger immediately. Silverbolt, bring the other Arielbots with you." Receiving acknowledgements from each, he turned towards the other officers, "Ratchet, Wheeljack and Ironhide, I'm going to need you three to come with me. Bumblebee if I could borrow Mirage that would be very beneficial."
Bumblebee only nodded before the group raced towards the Hanger to intercept the cons. He too left with Prime, comm'ing Jolt and the twins in the process to meet up with Skyfire and them. Even as he made his way to the Hanger, Bumblebee had a foreboding feeling that things were going to go horribly wrong for them.