"I really wish you had consulted with us before you laid out the welcome mat." Keller eyed the immense face that filled the screen before him. On the nineteen-inch laptop screen, Optimus Prime looked positively cramped, even though in reality he had plenty of room in the Air Force hangar being used as a temporary contact point.

"I apologize if I have created any undue trouble for you, Defense Secretary Keller," the massive mechanoid said, "but I will do whatever is in my power to save what is left of my people. The more of us that are in one place, the better our chances to defend against another Decepticon incursion, should one occur."

"Speaking of which--" as if the nation's immigration problems weren't complicated enough-- "We discovered this video taken in Kansas earlier today. Do you recognize either of these individuals?"

The plate-sized blue lenses irised narrow and flicked to one side as a window popped up on both ends of the teleconference. Optimus Prime seemed to almost scowl as the twenty-second fight played out.

"They have taken local camouflage. Without direct communication or a close-range scan, I can't say for certain who they are. We already knew of one Autobot newcomer," Prime said. "I have sent our scout ahead to that very location, but this news changes the situation."

"How so?"

"The newcomer hasn't responded to any of our attempts at contact. This skirmish you uncovered only worries me more. I am going to mobilize all Autobots." A pause. "Ironhide reports that Captain Lennox wishes to accompany him, if you are amenable."

"I prefer it, actually," Keller replied. Having a human representative present to act in the government's interest went a long way to making him feel better about this particular mess. Not that he would sleep any easier tonight at any rate. At least he could trust Lennox to give him a full and concise report, rather than whatever the Autobot leader decided was worth telling.

"Rest assured, Defense Secretary Keller, that if this is an offensive by Decepticon agents, we will send them back with-- what's the phrase? --with their tails between their legs." Optimus Prime's tone was all business. "If they are not too damaged to run."

Whiplash turned, taking the brunt of Rumble's barrage across the wheels mounted on his back. Pain lanced through his circuits as one of the tires blew. Repair systems automatically kicked in, and he blocked neural feedback from the damaged area.

"Holy shit," Nic, cradled in his arms and clinging to his chest armor, coughed when Rumble stopped.

Consecrated excrement? Whiplash filed the interjection away as another possible misfire of his corrupt language data and set Nic down. "Stay behind me," he told her, turning to face Rumble.

"You know, shortstack," the Decepticon said in an almost conversational tone, cannon twirling idly, "This just ain't fun any more. Downright boring, you are. Used to be we'd have your lot backed into some little asteroid or moon, and we'd have us a real party before you'd cut and run. Give us a nice chase, we'd catch up, and--"

"Do you never grow weary of the sound of your own vocal processes?" Whiplash wasn't about to let Rumble work up to the really nasty stuff. Not in front of Nic. "Truly pitiable when Bluestreak calls you a prattler."

Rumble took a threatening step towards them. If Whiplash could get him away from the opening, Nic could make her escape, and soon after Whiplash would make his. It was a dance that was getting very old; he had to grudgingly agree.

"You're slipping, Autobot. Not so brave without all your buddies around you. And hey, Bluestreak got what was coming to him." Rumble brought up to bear one of the circular plates that had been set in his wheels, and drew the spinning mechanism down his chestplate, right down the middle. "The boss split him open real nice. You remember that, don't you?"

So much for keeping away from the nastiness. Whiplash's blades extended of their own accord, his internal pump pressure rising. This wasn't going to work, the two of them trading unpleasantries. It used to be such a sound tactic-- annoy the enemy into doing something stupid, lead them into ambush or let them make some colossal mistake that the rest of his unit could then exploit-- but again, Rumble was right. The rest of his unit wasn't here. Whiplash simply was not designed for sustained, direct heavy combat alone.

The thought hadn't crossed his processor to bemoan this fact until now.

"I thought he said he was bored," Nic piped up, standing beside him with arms crossed. "So is he going to start something or stand there and reminisce? Because now I'm starting to get bored."

Both mechanoids turned incredulous optics on her again, Rumble more in exasperation in counterpoint to Whiplash's horror.

Nic continued blithely, speaking to Whiplash as if the Decepticon weren't even there. "Personally, I don't think he can take you, not really. Guys like him talk big, but, well... that piston-thing in his arm? Definitely compensating for a shortcoming or two."

Whiplash, blades snapping back in, only just managed to grab her and leap clear before Rumble's shot hit. He spun about and deposited Nic behind a stack of blocks, some sort of stone aggregate material. "Have you suffered total cognitive function failure?" he demanded.

"It got him away from the hole," she pointed out, standing on tiptoe to look over the blocks.

Sure enough, Rumble was stomping through the settling dust cloud, cannon powering up for another shot. "I dunno how you can stand to be around that thing," the purple Decepticon growled. "What possible use could it be to you? Can't be the scintillatin' conversation." He fired.

Whiplash sidestepped behind the blocks and crouched as low as he could over Nic. The stack of blocks blew halfway out, spraying them with dust and gravel. Before he could tell her to run for the opening, she darted out under the cover of the dust cloud and was quickly out of his sensor range. He stood, priming the cannon in his right arm and extending blades from his left.

The glow of Rumble's optics gave him his target. The Autobot surged forward, letting a shot fly. Rumble ducked, but it had the intended effect. Now Nic could escape.

Pay attention to me, Decepticon. I'm not throwing rocks.

Blades swinging, Whiplash leaped. With a satisfying shrrrrnnch! his blades bit deep into Rumble's shoulder underneath an armor panel, puncturing cables and knocking cogs out of alignment. A painful, but not debilitating strike. Rumble howled with fury, scrabbling as Whiplash used his face as a handhold and climbed atop him.

"Slagging little glitch! Get off me!"

"Ask politely," Whiplash replied, and slipped another blade out, thrusting straight down behind Rumble's chestplate. More cables nicked. A lubricant line sliced down part of its length and spurted. Nowhere near Rumble's spark, of course. Whiplash never had that sort of luck.

"GRAAAAH!" Whiplash didn't have enough time to pull out before Rumble reached up, grabbed Whiplash by a leg and slung him violently away. The blade, still wedged down in Rumble's chest, snapped off.

Whiplash slammed into a wall and dropped to the floor. Picking himself up, he looked at the quarter-length broken blade in disgust and retracted it. That would never repair on its own. He looked up as his opponent plodded over to him. Rumble picked delicately at the broken length of metal until it came free, dripping with lubricant.

"Them's the breaks." Rumble made a show of examining the blade, held pinched in two fingers as if it were something especially foul. Then he chuckled and hefted the blade in a firmer grip. "Now it's time to break you."

He swatted aside Whiplash's three remaining blades as the Autobot attempted to attack. Rumble came in fast, seizing the much smaller Whiplash by the abdomen and slamming him back against the wall. With another nasty laugh, Rumble jammed the blade through the mechanism of Whiplash's shoulder, somehow missing all the important parts but pinning him neatly to the wall.

"You're all alone," Rumble cackled. "See you in the Pit, Autobot."

Whiplash kicked, glancing a blow off Rumble's arm. "You fir-aaaaaiiigh!"

Rumble used both hands to pry apart the panels of Whiplash's chestplate. Internal alarms screamed. Pain that couldn't be overridden lanced white-hot through his circuits. His spark chamber clenched and flared, exposed.

That was when a chunk of debris came sailing in through the dusty air to peg Rumble square in the back of the head.

"He's not alone!"

Rumble turned, letting go of Whiplash. "Oh, come on--"

And there was Nic, wielding a long, narrow metal pole, which she thrust spear-like directly into one of Rumble's red optics.

With a shriek of rage and pain, Rumble reeled away, wrenching the pole out of his shattered and utterly ruined lens. Fixing the remaining one on the little human, the Decepticon pulled back an arm. Nic started backing away. One of the circular wheel-guards popped up, and he snapped it down at her, sending it spinning right for her head. At the last possible nanosecond she stumbled, fell, twisting wildly aside, and the razor-edged wheel embedded in the floor beside her ear, the only casualty being a section of the long, reddish fibrous strands growing from her head.

Whiplash pushed himself off the impaling blade and dropped to the ground as Nic rolled away, clutching at the strands and staring at the wheel-guard.

"Okay," he heard her mutter. "The spinners aren't funny anymore."

Wasting no more words, Whiplash brought both cannons online and began firing at the still-disoriented Rumble. Optic injuries were particularly painful, and, like a forcible assault on one's spark chamber, the pain could not be immediately overridden. Whiplash used this to his full advantage, continuously firing, driving Rumble back, easily dodging the wide shots he could manage to return.

Nic was behind him. "That way! Push him back over there!"

With a brief glance to see what direction she was indicating, Whiplash divined her plan and gleefully changed his angle of attack, pouring more power into his blasts to herd and pound Rumble back step by step. The last step took him over the edge through an opening in a column, into a shaft. The battered Decepticon fell. Whiplash didn't bother to listen for an impact, but kept firing into the shaft's walls, knocking chunks of rock, metal and other material loose to rain down the shaft after Rumble. For good measure he brought down part of the ceiling, completely burying the shaft's opening.

At last Whiplash stopped, his cannons hot from the barrage. Dust slowly cleared, revealing only a pile of rubble. Neither Autobot nor human moved or spoke for several anxious minutes, watching the rubble carefully for any sign of movement.

Nothing.

Whiplash retracted his cannons as Nic leaned against his leg, expelling a gust of air.

"I am beginning to reevaluate your rock-throwing strategy," he said, "since twice now you have turned a battle in my favor."

"Hey, this is my planet," she replied, sinking shakily to the floor. "You don't just come to somebody's planet and go stomping all over their friends. It's rude." The amazing little human let out a high, slightly hysterical laugh and slumped over his foot. "Ho-o-o-oly freaking cow. Please tell me that's it, Whip-- he's gone, right?"

Whiplash made a stab at scanning the rubble. Rumble, it seemed, had fallen beyond his reach to see. He tried to push his damaged scanners but the attempt sent a dull, unpleasant twinge through his systems. "As far as I can discern."

"Good." She picked herself up, shaking off dust. "Are you all right?"

"My repair systems are already at work. Nothing serious, thank the Matrix." Whiplash retrieved his broken blade from the wall and scraped the dregs of lubricant off before sliding it back into its slot and locking the now-useless weapon in place. "And you? Are you damaged? Your... fibrous head-covering..."

Nic's hand came up and grabbed at the shortened strands. "It's just hair. I'll live. Bleh. I need a shower." Hands went to hips and she looked up at him. "I'll also need to dig out my helmet if I'm going to be riding around on you."

Hardly believing his good fortune, Whiplash knelt. "So you agree to help me?"

"In for a penny, in for a pound, I figure," she replied bafflingly, "and you're going to need a decent rock-thrower, don't you think?"

Chuckling, he transformed and tested his newly-repaired tire, finding it reinflated and whole, though it would still be another few hours before he dared put any sort of speed on it. "Come. Lead me to your hesitance--"

"Um... residence?"

Primus, I give up. "You can gather what supplies you need. We should begin as soon as possible."

"Right." He felt her climb into the seat, so tiny, so frail and light. "Whiplash, the Decepticons... are they all like him?"

"No," he told her, starting his engine.

She leaned in, grabbing the handlebars. "Okay. Good."

"Most of them are bigger."

"So what'd you tell your mom?"

Mikaela glanced over at Sam just as Bumblebee turned down the radio to background-noise levels. "About what?"

"This trip." Sam shrugged. "Surely she wouldn't have let you come if she thought you'd be all alone with a boy."

She returned the shrug, sweeping her hair behind her ear in what she hoped didn't look like an uncomfortable fidget. "I just told her I was going out for a couple days. She's used to me just traipsing off anyway, and she's been in a mood lately."

"Bad mood?"

"My dad's parole hearing is next month," she said, leaning her head against the window.

Sam favored her with a curious look. "I thought you were looking forward to seeing him again."

"I am," Mikaela replied, "Mom isn't."

"Oh." Funny how he could pack about seven shades of meaning into one awkward syllable.

"And last night she said the d-word. Divorce." She let out a humorless laugh. "So when Bee told me about this, I just went for it. I really need the distraction, you know?"

"Does your dad know?"

"I don't think so. The last time she went for a visit was six months ago, that I know of. And when I went last week he was all upbeat about coming home, so probably not."

"Ouch."

"Hell of a welcome-home, right?" Mikaela stretched as much as she could in the car seat, and felt the seat inch back slightly to give her more legroom. She grinned and patted the arm rest in silent thanks. Oh, what am I getting pissy about? she thought suddenly. Here I've got not one but two guys who like me for who I am, my dad is getting out soon and I'll still have all this whether or not there's a divorce. "You know, I think he'd like you a lot."

Before she'd met Sam, she'd never known it was possible for someone to trip while sitting down. "Uh? Your-your dad?"

She couldn't help it. He was so easy to fluster, and so damned cute at it. "Yeah. Maybe you and him could have a lunch with me sometime."

"You want me to meet your dad?" Sam's hands floated off the steering wheel and he wasn't even pretending to watch the road anymore. "He's not one of those dads who likes to, I dunno, talk about his gun collection that may or may not exist, right before I take you out?"

Mikaela smirked at him. "I don't know. He hasn't had a chance to bully my suitors, so, maybe. Be fun to find out."

"Fun, she says. Hey, Bee, you'll protect me if Mikaela's dad tries to pinch my head off, won't you?"

A burst from the radio answered him. "So you better run and hide-- (frzt) You're in trouble now-- (szxt) --a dead man walking, a dead man walking--"

"Oh, fine, I see how it is!" Sam poked at the dashboard as Mikaela dissolved into laughter. "I help save the world and this is the thanks I get."

"You're going to milk that for the rest of your life, aren't you?" Mikaela giggled.

"Damn skippy." Sam thrust his chin defiantly out, the very caricature of martyred and put-upon. He couldn't hold it for long, though, and grinned at her, one of his open, honest grins. "Besides, I think Bee'll have his hands full protecting me from my own parents when we get back."

"What? Why?" And from Bumblebee, a questioning blip of radio static.

"Well, they made me promise to do two things after the road trip. One, I'd have to get a job for the rest of the summer--"

"That's not so bad."

"And two, I explain exactly how the hell I got my hands on a 2009 Camaro."

"...oh."

"Yeah, so I'm wracking my brain here. They know I don't have this kind of cash, and I haven't been selling my organs on the black market, either. I thought about saying it was Pimp My Ride or Overhaulin' or something, but then Dad would want to see the show."

"You could say the government gave it to you to replace the, uh, older model."

"My mother'd be all over Simmons about her roses if that were the case. Already considered that." Sam leaned back in the driver's seat, arms folded as he frowned at some distant point beyond the hood of the self-driving car. "I'm only so good at bullshitting, and they're not stupid... figured I'd have something worked out by the time we found the new guy and got back home."

"Speaking of which..." Bumblebee's voice filled the car's interior, startling Mikaela. Before she could admonish him-- Ratchet had told him to give it a rest-- the steering wheel flipped down, and the instrument panel folded in on itself to reveal another panel of utterly alien (literally) design. A thin beam of light sprang up from some mechanism within.

"Oh, I've seen this," Sam said excitedly, like a kid with a new video game to show off, "he can even get Cinemax on this thing--"

Mikaela raised a brow.

"--but you know, we totally watched Lifetime instead, of course."

"Uh huh." The beam of light had coalesced into a roughly rectangular plane hovering above the converted panel, glowing faintly blue as shapes flickered into being in the 'screen.'

"Optimus just sent me this," Bumblebee said, and switched to a swell of country music: "Well, Ah smell T-R-O-U-B-L-E!"

It was a pixelly, shaky video of two robots tussling in a cloud of wind-blown dust. Sam leaned forward, nose-to-hologram, squinting as if he could clear the picture that way. "Trouble? I take it you mean this isn't a couple of Autobots having a minor difference of opinion."

"Which one's which?" Mikaela asked, latching onto Sam's shoulder as she craned to see. Bumblebee had frozen the video on what was probably the clearest frame. "I hope little blue guy's not the Autobot. He's getting his ass kicked."

"No way to tell from this," Bumblebee replied, his buzzing mechanical voice cracking.

Mikaela gave the dashboard a flick. "Hey, don't make me tell Ratchet on you."

"All we hear is radio ga-ga," Queen blasted contritely from the speakers even as she felt the car accelerate down the interstate. The holographic screen flickered and switched to a news broadcast.

"--struction site in east Topeka where a series of explosions have rocked the area, seeming to originate in the building itself, which locals have dubbed 'The Eyesore.' Police and bomb squads are already on the scene but as of yet there seem to be no injuries or fatalities, but also no leads or indications whether this is a terrorist attack or just an accident. Please stay tuned to KSNT for further updates on this--"

"Oh geez." Sam's voice was flat with understatement. "And you still can't contact new guy?"

"--Noise, but I can't hear anything--" the radio responded.

"Better floor it, Bee," Mikaela said, unnecessarily because the Camaro was already speeding up even more. The steering wheel reappeared and Sam resumed pretending to drive.

After a moment, Mikaela favored her boyfriend with a sidelong look. "Lifetime, huh?"

"A movie about a little deaf orphan boy and a puppy. I cried like a baby."

"Uh huh."

The side door swung open as the sound of Whiplash's engine reverberated off the brick-and-stucco of the Darlings' house. Nic saw Uncle Terry's jaw drop as she sailed past, down the driveway on a shining blue Tomahawk. She wondered what he'd explode about first: her unexplained car accident, the fact that she was riding a motorcycle without a helmet, the fact that she was riding a motorcycle that wasn't supposed to exist, or that she was riding a motorcycle at all.

"Nicole Breanna Darling!" He followed as she parked Whiplash on the concrete patio in back and got off. He had to shout to be heard over the throaty roar of the engine. "What is this?! Your car-- I just got a call from Karl Wilkins that-- Nic, can you turn that thing off?"

"Whip, cut the engine," she said, and turned to her uncle as Whiplash solicitously shut his engine down. "Sorry, this has been a really crazy day."

"How about we start with this business with your car, and... how did you do that? What is this thing?"

Nic sat down on a plastic patio chair and looked around the back yard, thankful for the tall privacy fence. "Aunt Marie and the boys here?"

"No, they're at the shop, and don't change the subject-- Karl calls me saying he saw Eugene's little girl tooling around town on some monster bike without a helmet, and I tell him no, he's got to be seeing some other insane redhead, because my brother taught you better than that." Terry waved an arm at the 'monster bike' and Nic flinched, hoping Whiplash wouldn't take offense. "So am I crazy, or is this thing a Tomahawk? Where did you get it? And I thought you swore off bikes, never mind that it's not even close to street legal."

How can I change the subject when you won't pick one? "Uncle Terry, just-- give me a second, something huge is going on and I'm trying to think how to tell you."

Terry drew in a long breath, and, with a sidelong look at the motorcycle, took a seat in the other patio chair. "Did you steal it?"

"What? Uncle Ter-- no!" Nic burst into laughter, smacking her hands over her face. "Steal it! Ohmygod."

"Well, honey, look at it." Terry grinned, releasing the tension with a little chuckle. "Explain me this, pumpkin."

"I..." Nic pulled her hands down her face. "I've got a friend who needs my help. I've got to go away for awhile. Hey-- let me finish, no, it's not drugs and I didn't kill anybody."

Terry shrugged innocently, as if he hadn't been about to suggest those very things. Nic knew her uncle only too well.

"He's lost and I can help him find his friends. I don't know how long it'll take."

"That's real charitable of you, but can we skip to the part about this... this?" Again he indicated the bike. "And... what happened to your hair?"

Nic stood up and regarded Whiplash, who sat quiescent where he had been parked. "Uncle Terry, can you keep this to yourself?" She half-turned and pinned him with a look. "I'm serious."

He leaned forward, clearly concerned, and nodded.

"I want you to meet him. So you know why I have to do this." She hoped her disguised robot friend would cooperate; the last thing she needed would be for him to sit quietly on his wheels and make her uncle think she was in need of heavy medication. "It's okay," she said, addressing the bike directly. "You can trust him."

For a moment, the robot did just sit there. Then the blue and turquoise fairing split apart and shifted. Nic reluctantly turned away from the sight to gauge her uncle's reaction, which was a little more spectacular than she'd hoped for. As Whiplash stood up behind her, Terry let out a garbled cry, scrambled, and managed to flip his chair backwards.

"Uncle Terry!" She rushed over to him, just as he leapt to his feet with surprising spryness for a man his age, grabbing the chair and holding it out in front of him as a shield.

"Jeeziss!" Terry bit off the oath in startled falsetto.

"Uncle-- it's okay, he's friendly!" Nic inwardly rolled her eyes at her own words; as if Whiplash were some oversized stray dog that had followed her home. "This is Whiplash."

"Whiplash...?" Terry repeated, still pointing the chair legs up at the robot, who for his part, merely tilted his head, blue lenses blinking.

"Yes. My friend. The one I'm helping."

"It is an honor to meet you, Commander Uncle." Whiplash made a sort of quarter-bow, inclining his head and shoulders briefly.

"He's just my uncle," Nic said, and wondered if the alien robot even had a concept of the term-- if alien robots had familial relationships at all.

"Nicole--!" Terry's voice was still perched in the rafters, as it were, and Nic tried to pull the chair out of his white-knuckled hands.

"Put it down, Uncle Terry, he's not going to hurt you. He's... an alien. He's just a little lost, is all."

Terry's mouth came open and closed with no sound as he stared the robot up and down several times. Whiplash politely endured the gaping, slowly taking a few steps back and lowering himself to a kneeling position on the corner of the patio, perhaps realizing that his towering height was part of the problem.

"Nic speaks the truth," he said. "I would never harm a human."

"Never harm a..." Terry seemed to shake himself out of some of his shock. "Just what do you want with my niece?"

"I told you," Nic put in. "I'm going to help him find his friends. Some of his kind's already here somewhere, he just can't find them."

Another few moments of imitating a goldfish, and Terry lowered the chair, running a hand down his beard. "...well, I, for one, welcome our new robot overlords."

Nic gave her uncle a sharp smack on the arm. "Oh, now you get cute."

"I am not here to conquer." Whiplash sounded positively aggrieved at the very suggestion.

"He's joking. He's being a wiseass." Hell of a time for the patented Darling coping mechanism to kick in, she thought. Falling back to smartassery was more than a tradition in her family; it was practically a genetic trait.

"Is-- where did-- how did this happen?" Terry sputtered.

"Last night, when I was filing," Nic replied. Only last night? It seemed like weeks ago. "He crashed in the field out back. When I went out there to see what it was, he popped out of the crater and scared the bejeezus out of me. I slipped and knocked my head on that old footbridge and fell in the creek, and next thing I know, I'm on the shop floor." She grabbed her uncle's arm for emphasis. "He saved me."

"Last night?" Terry threw Whiplash a sharp look. "The shop computer. You did that, didn't you?"

"It was the only method I could find to obtain the data I sought," Whiplash said, "It was not my intention to cause an inconvenience."

"Data? What data?"

"Language-- how to communicate with Nic."

"He downloaded English over dial-up," Nic clarified.

Terry shook his head. "I'm still taking it out of your paycheck."

Nic threw up her hands. "Whatever-- Look, I've got to get ready. I'm going to get my stuff together, Whiplash, just wait here."

"Please hurry," the mechanoid replied, and folded neatly up into the Tomahawk shape.

Terry gawped anew, daring to approach the bike and poke cautiously at the closest handlebar. "How-- Nicole?"

Already through the patio door, Nic half-turned and shrugged. "Yeah, he does that."

"He does that," Terry repeated flatly, and followed her inside. "Hold up. Wait a second, Nic, can you start over? Alien... bike... thing, and you still haven't explained your car, what happened to your hair--"

"Answer to both those questions is the same thing," Nic said through a heavy sigh. "Rumble."

"Anytime you want to start making sense, it'd be great."

"Rumble. Bad robot alien who followed Whiplash down here. He's the one who trashed my car." Nic opened the coat closet and dug around behind a vacuum cleaner. "Where's my old backpack?"

"Bad robot alien. And this... Whiplash character is a good robot alien, I suppose."

"Ye-e-es," she drawled, standing on tiptoe to look on a high shelf. "He pulled me out of the creek, remember?"

"Where is bad robot alien now, and dare I ask again what this has to do with your hair?"

"Rumble--" and here she couldn't help but feel a rush of mixed terror and exhilaration at the memory-- "is gone. We buried him."

"We?"

"Whiplash and me." Nic found the backpack-- a basic black nylon and canvas affair that would be easy enough to wear for extended periods. She brushed off a few dust bunnies and checked the interior; it hadn't seen action since the last day of high school over three years ago. Her luggage acquired, she ducked into the kitchen for a pair of scissors and headed for the bathroom.

"Nicole. I want you to start at the beginning. Please." Terry stood in the doorway of the bathroom, arms folded, eyes fixed on his niece.

Nic took in her reflection in the sink mirror. She was dusty and scuffed, and the section of shortened hair made her aware just how close she'd come to being beheaded. This was no game. She had stepped into the middle of a battlefield that spanned galaxies, and she had never felt so small.

But at the same time, the young woman staring back at her was someone she hadn't seen in two years.

So as she took the scissors to the rest of her hair, she told her uncle everything. She tried to play down just how much actual danger she had been in, but she had the feeling he guessed it anyway.

By the time she'd finished the tale, a pile of copper-red hair was nested in the sink. Terry was regarding her with an uncharacteristically inscrutable expression. Nic frowned thoughtfully at her reflection. The self-administered haircut wasn't exactly to her liking, but it was better than going around with only the left half of her head of waist-length hair. She'd managed to get it more or less a uniform length all over, about ten inches, but its thick waviness was making it wild and flyaway; a sort of Irish-flavored 'fro.

"So you're going to ride off on-- and I can't believe I'm saying this-- an alien robot to find more alien robots, and the only leads you have are Nevada and California," Terry said. "With yet more alien robots hell-bent on blowing your alien robot up."

Nic dumped her shed tresses in the trash can. "That's about the size of it."

"If I hadn't just talked to your not-a-bike out there this would be the point where I ask what the hell you've been cutting your crack with."

"You're a very funny man, Terrence Darling." Nic used a washcloth to take off the worst of the dust on her face and arms and squeezed past her uncle. "Whiplash needs a guide."

"You've never been out of Kansas."

Nic went into her room and tossed the backpack on her bed. "That's not true. I went camping in Nebraska that one summer."

"You're dodging the issue," said Terry. "This is dangerous. You've already been attacked. Twice! Twice in one day!"

"I know. I was there." She turned to face him and planted her hands on her hips. "And you know what? We won. I could have run away both times but I couldn't just let-- Rumble would have killed Whiplash, and then he'd come after me just for the hell of it. If I hadn't stayed to help, we'd both be dead. Whiplash and me, we make a damn good team."

She whirled and yanked open her closet door, diving into the clutter collected at the bottom. "Whiplash needs my help. He can't exactly go cross-country as a riderless bike and stop at a gas station to ask for directions, and by the way, has anyone seen any other giant robots 'round these parts?" Her hands came upon a smooth, round object and she unearthed a motorcycle helmet. "And we can look out for each other."

Terry, leaning against the doorjamb, drew in a long breath and shook his head. "Figures it would take something falling out of the sky to get you back on a bike."

Nic, depositing the helmet beside her backpack, paused and took a breath, steeling herself against the flood of tears she'd been holding back since she'd made the decision to go with Whiplash.

Two years minus a day since she'd been on a motorcycle. Two years minus a day since her and her father's shared birthday, and two years minus a day since that father-daughter ride down the flat, straight Kansas roads when her father's bike had seized and flipped, killing him almost instantly.

Two years minus a day since Nic had pushed her own motorcycle into a ditch, swearing she'd never touch another.

"Daddy would want me to go."

Terry let out a soft chuckle. "Hell, he'd probably be fighting you for Whiplash's seat."

The dam burst, a massive release of tension and pent-up grief. Nic pawed the streaming tears off her cheeks and laughed. "This is huge, Uncle Terry. So much bigger than me. If I don't see this through, I'll regret it for the rest of my life, and Daddy would never forgive me."

Terry came into the bedroom, enfolding his niece in a tight hug. "Wish I could just tell you no, but you're a grown woman. Just... be careful. And I expect regular updates."

Nic returned the hug fiercely, grinning into her uncle's big chest. "What're you going to tell Aunt Marie?"

"The truth. That you're taking a friend for a ride home." He disengaged and glanced at the empty backpack on the bed. "You'd better get your stuff together."

Nic snatched up a scarf-- blue, though not a match for Whiplash's color-- and rolled it up into a band to hold her hair back from her face and keep it manageable under a helmet. "I'll grab something to eat on the road and call you when I find a motel." She bundled up a few t-shirts and a pair of jeans, cramming them into the backpack. Toothbrush and the bare basic toiletries were next. She was about to zip it closed when she remembered something else from two years minus a day ago.

The last birthday present her father had given her.

Again she dove into her closet, pulling out a box. Inside, butter-smooth leather was creased slightly from the long storage but still supple and new, having never been worn. A full set of high-quality and very expensive motorcycle leathers, all in matte black save for the right shoulder and sleeve of the jacket, which was white. Simple styling, no outlandish chains or extraneous zippers, exactly to her taste.

Nic grinned at her uncle. "Out and shut the door. I've got to change."

Whiplash shifted anxiously on his wheels.

Perhaps this Commander Just-Uncle Terry human would forbid Nic to accompany him. The larger human had seemed visibly more distressed by Whiplash's appearance than Nic had been. The Autobot wished his sensors could stretch just a little further so he could hear what the humans were saying.

If Nic were ordered not to go, what then? Could he establish another such rapport with some other human? Not likely. Or make his way on his own?

Whiplash had had more than enough of being alone. Nic simply had to--

"You ready, Whip?"

No longer clad in the flimsy woven-fiber armor, Nic stood at his side wrapped neck-down in some form of organic grained material, much more durable-looking. Under one arm she held a sturdy helmet, and strapped to her back was a netted sack packed with her supplies.

"Yes, Nic," he replied, immensely impressed. He wondered what her function in human society was-- if she wasn't a soldier of some kind, he would be very surprised indeed.

The Uncle human appeared in the portal of the construct and came to Nic's side. She leaned into the larger human, wrapping her free arm around his torso. His response was to wrap both his arms around her, and briefly touch his mouthparts to her forehead. Whiplash observed the exchange with great interest. Though the gestures were foreign to him, he realized this was no commander-subordinate relationship. This was... familial.

"I love you, Uncle."

"I love you too. Be safe." The Uncle human jabbed a finger at Whiplash as Nic mounted. "Take care of her, Mr. Whiplash."

"I owe her my life," Whiplash replied. "I can do no less."

And he fired up his engine, his spark buoyed. The road to Optimus Prime and the haven of this new homeworld was finally stretched before him.

Rumble's down, but is he out? And even if he is, that road's not going to be as straight as Whip thinks it is, nooooo.

Once again, thanks so much for all the awesome reviews! I continue to be amazed at how great this fandom is.