And so there it was.
The strange little homestead of Sandra-Gould and Sofia-Gould.
Humans who had managed to do what many had considered impossible for any organic to achieve: To gain the privilege of an audience with Decepticons.
Time to go meet them.
"Remember, I give the signal you fire immediately. I want the house gone in moments." The Pretender spoke as they exited IO-10's cockpit, him closing his door behind them.
Because while they were all here to make an alliance, they had to prepare for every possible scenario. Which was why they had two highly advanced warning systems parked outside on look out.
Should the humans make the very critical error of betraying them, they would be ready.
And so, with that resolution, they made their way towards the house with a strange structure until they reached that strange door made out of...well, they couldn't identify the exact material. It wasn't anything like what they'd had at home and it looked...odd? They think it might have been made out of that...tall plant matter they'd also seen about, the ones that looked like organic spires with little offshoots.
Whatever it was, it looked awful. They almost hesitated in touching it, but they would have to be doing stuff like this a lot now if they were to be stationed here. Best get used to it now before it became a problem...
...But they never got the chance to, because something from above caught their optic.
Someone was watching them.
They looked up above just in time to see a flash of something red duck away out of sight.
And then the door flung open.
"Sorry, but if you're here to see Sierra, you'll have to come back another time. She's sick today and we can't risk bringing in any guests." Two humans were standing at the entrance, with tense expressions clearly indicating they wanted their apparent guest gone as soon as possible.
"To the contrary. Sandra-Gould, Sofia-Gould, I'm not here to see your daughter. I believe instead that we have some business to discuss." The Pretender smoothly spoke, taking in the sight of the humans before them. The first they'd ever actually met, and as the images online suggested about humans, both did indeed look very different.
A trait about them that was intriguing, both contrasting the cybertronian potential for uniformity, as well as reminding the pretender of the variation that at the same time cybertronians possessed...Either way, it still remained ultimately inconvenient for a spy looking to pass themselves off as one. That didn't change, intriguing or not.
As for these particular humans, they seemed to finally notice the purple cars parked close by.
"Oh...so you're the..." One of the two made a sound, before looking imploringly to the other half of the couple for support.
"Forgive the offence but you are not exactly what we were expecting." Was provided after a brief moment of hesitation. "And, if you are who you say you are, we would like a bit more evidence before we are to discuss business."
An understandable request, and one they complied with: allowing their lenses to flick up, revealing the circuitry of the optics underneath.
The reactions were immediate.
Sierra watched from her window as what seemed to be a yellow haired girl headed inside with her parents.
Was that the alien?
Okay, umm, well...did not look how she expected. She had to admit, she was kinda semi a bit disappointed over here, but still, Sierra very quickly conceded she should really not be judging a robot alien refugee for not looking sufficiently like a robot alien refugee. She knew looks could be deceiving and you can't exactly help your own appearance...mostly. There was always make-up and pretty clothes and...
...Okay. Way off track there, woah. She'd already been down this rabbit hole that lead to nothing but contemplating alien clothing culture already today and she'd promised herself to try exercise some restraint on that for a while. It was wrong and it was inconsiderate considering the situation. Time to push that from her mind again.
So, anways she wouldn't judge but it was still a bit...confusing she supposed that of all things this being from a different planet looked exactly like a human...unless, that is, she was looking at a hologram?! Or they were some sort of robot shapeshifter terminator style?! Ooh! Or a life-model decoy sent to interact with humans without raising alarm that would be caused by their true appearance?! Yes! Those could make a lot more sense!
Ideally Sierra would like to be able to actually go up and ask them to solve the mystery once and for all, confident that question should be culturally okay to ask them at least, but...there was one problem which made doing that much more difficult: her moms locking her in her room.
This was completely unfair!
She probably should have kept her mouth shut about insisting on meeting them, that was a lesson learned, but she didn't even think she was asking much! Just to meet the alien so she could help them!
"Sorry Berry but you have to stay in your room today." They said.
"You're not old enough to help mija." They said.
How was thirteen not old enough to help?!
Well, she wasn't going to let this stop her!
She might not be able to get in the meeting, or even through the door, but the alien would be leaving the house eventually. And when they did, there was always the window! She'd seen this done in movies before, she could totally do it. She had sheets! This was a great plan.
And so she got to work stripping them, flinging stripped pillows and comforter alike across the room as she did. She suspected she had hours to do this, but she did not want to risk missing this chance!
...Except she quickly realised that she had no idea how to properly do those super strong knots that wouldn't immediately come undone and cause her to just fall out her window.
Falling out the window, was not a super good first impression.
Sierra decidedly let off a groan with this realisation, before heading off to her computer, determined to not be thwarted at literal step one.
Time to Google and hope that the art of skilfully tying sheets together did not take too long too master.
"Are we at an agreement then?" The pretender spoke, surveying the two organics in front of them, the discussion finally seeming to be nearing it's end.
"I would say that we are."
All in all, the arrangement had gone down...almost exactly as planned.
Sofia-Gould would be managing the business side and buy up the land which the vehicons were to mine on. Claim it as that of the Gould Mining Corporation, which according to human law would make the land their private property and trespassing past it's borders illegal. Keep the gaze of organics far, far off the sites. Any more troublesome figures who objected to this would be bribed.
Which was convenient. Because while lone humans wondering in could easily be dealt with, were too many to go missing in the same areas that could attract some undesired attention. From human government and Autobot alike.
As for Sandra-Gould, she would continue doing the same thing that the family were before they even knew exactly what it was. Scouting for and digging up energon along with fellow humans deemed sufficiently loyal. Particularly around areas far too close to human settlements to have any vehicon go near.
With most humans the pretender would be concerned with allowing them to seek, let alone excavate energon. Even they, an actual cybertronian, were admittedly not at all skilled or even knowledgeable in those areas...but the demonstrated ability of the Gould family to do both was what had caught their optic to them in the very first place.
However, even with all that had been entrusted upon them and said...skilled and useful humans the Goulds may be but they were still humans. And only a fool would trust the organics completely. Blindly. No matter what was said in this room.
Especially as there were still some important matters that required immediate clarification.
"Then the deal is set. But there are still some other matters that need to be discussed."
"Oh?" The humans exchanged glances with each other. "Is there an issue?"
"The answer to that question depends entirely on your own responses to mine." The pretender narrowed their optics ever so slightly even as their tone remained neutral. "Why?"
"Why are we helping?"
"That is the question. Where I come from, nobody in the higher castes would ever help anyone but themselves if there wasn't something in it for them. So, what do you see as in this for you? " A pause as the question was allowed to sink in. "It's certainly not profit. At least...not from helping us." This time, within that mostly measured and neutral tone, there was a slight but undeniable bite to it that broke through.
"If you're concerned about us selling you out, I can assure you that will not happen. Profit is not an issue-"
"Indeed? Records exist that seem to suggest otherwise-"
"This is about Sumdac, no?" This time it was the pretender who was sharply interrupted by Sofia-Gould.
Not a word was said by the pretender and their expression remained unreadable, but that in itself seemed to be enough of an answer for the human who quickly continued on.
"When we first discovered this energon, we did not even know what it was truly called, nevermind it's level of importance to any aliens. All we did know was how as geologists with the resources to do so, it was our duty to study this mineral and try find use for it. So when another scientist showed interest and started requesting to purchase samples, of course we accepted! As would have any respectable figure in our field." She assured.
"If that's true, then how come you did not mention this earlier?" The pretender queried.
Their failure to do so is why this meeting had only gone almost exactlyto plan before.
"Because it didn't seem important." Sandra-Gould interjected next, a mild look of exhasperation on her face as she did that did not escape the questioner's notice. "It was no secret."
Several kliks of a terse silence passed by, everyone in the room doing nothing but watching each other and thinking.
"Next time leave it to me to decide whether a matter holds importance or not. For now you are to stop selling to this roboticist unless I directly say otherwise after investigating the matter further. Understood?" The warning carried in those words was very clear in the decepticon's tone.
"Completely."
"It had better be, if this alliance is to last. Which brings us back to my original question: why do you, higher caste humans, want to help us?"
The moment Sierra saw the alien leaving, the meeting with her parents apparently having finally finished, she put the next phase of her plan into action and went right out her window, makeshift rope in hand.
And in the very next moment after she let out a wheeze and a groan, as she tried to focus past the fuzziness in her vision that the resulting fall had brought on.
Everything seemed to have been going great! No- it was going great! She'd got all the sheets tied and that had held! Like she knew they would!
But it was the table they were tied too which had betrayed her, unable to support her weight.
And in just one moment she'd went from climbing to being on the ground.
A fact that was humiliating!
This was humiliating! Humiliating! How could this happen to her?! Falling out of a window was not a good first impression! She needed to get up now. She had to try salvage this immediately!
It was just a little teeny tiny mini fall from window to ground anyway. Shouldn't be that hard, she wasn't...that hurt.
Think of it like a cheerleading routine, mid-competition and everyone watching you, got to do this perfectly and in one go, she told herself. If it took any more tries than that it would make this situation even worse!
So here it went! Left leg tuck in, right leg tuck in, lean forwards and then...bounce up.
Now actually on her feet once more, she turned to try spot where the alien was, crossed between a mix of hoping that they hadn't seen this failure of a display and also hoping that they hadn't left yet. If everything were to be perfect, they would still be here but, uh, well, facing the opposite direction.
Luckily, vision now cleared enough to see all this again too, Sierra found that at least the alien was still here. But it wasn't facing the opposite direction.
They were staring right at her.
"Hi!" Sierra called, cheeks burning as she both realised that this was in fact her first impression and absolutely did not stumble towards them.
"You're alive." They responded.
Pfft. "Of course! That little fall?" Sierra let out what she hoped sounded like a smooth laugh as she gestured to herself. "Would take much more than that to get me!"
No response to that, the alien simply kept silently watching her.
"The name's Sierra! Sierra Gould!" She reached out for a handshake.
"I'd surmised that." The alien simply said, all the while not making any movement or indication that they'd seen the hand. Just…staring her dead on…
…
…The silence lengthened, as did the level of discomfort that Sierra was feeling about how this was going.
She wondered and hoped that this was not visible on her face.
"I'm sorry." The alien finally spoke up, demeanour immediately shifting to being much friendlier. "I'm being rude." They reached out their own hand and shook Sierra's, proving that they were in fact tangible. "You were saying?"
A sigh of relief as the tension lifted.
"So, I take it you're the…decepticon?" Sierra started up again, remembering the name she'd heard for the species.
A mildly amused look. "A decepticon."
Were anyone in school to dare try being that pedantic like with her, she would have had something big to say about that and do about their reputation, but as it she was a bit distracted by how here came her chance to solve a mystery at last in as polite and indirect way as she thought was possible!
She was quite proud of herself for being able to grab it in such a way.
"And are they all like you? All-" A general gesture at the blonde in front of her " -human looking."
Disney human looking even. In Sierra's opinion the alien was dressed very…Disney like. A cultural thing?
"I'm not human looking. This is just as much my alt-mode as a car is theirs." The alien did not even turn to look at them as they said that, instead choosing to keep facing her, but it was clear exactly which ones they were talking about.
Sierra had obviously seen them earlier and obviously noticed that they had a nice aesthetic to them, good choice of model and colour- Some sort of custom Cadillac Ciels maybe?- but…
"Them?!" She hadn't thought that they might be alien robots in disguise! Oh, this was so cool! She was getting to meet three aliens today! Three!
"H!" She waved over.
A greeting that was followed by one of the cars flashing its headlights at her, side mirrors moving up and down.
A response which caused Sierra to clasp her hands in delight.
"That'll be IO-10 saying hello." The human-alt-mode-alien translated.
"Hi IO-10!" Strange name, the actual human thought.
IIII OOOOOO Tennnnn.
More like a impersonal code or some sort of a registration than a real name…well weird to call someone…. she ought to ask about that some point and...wait…
"Wait." She realised, harkening back to a revelation she'd unwittingly breezed past earlier. "If these are your alternative-modes and not your usual ones, that means you must be shapeshifters." Sierra started, gaze flicking between the car-alt-mode-aliens and the human-alt-mode alien, as she put together the pieces about which of her original theories might have actually been right.
"To an extent."
"An extent?"
"As much as someone with two fixed modes could be called a shapeshifter."
"You guys can only be two things?"
"Mostly."
"Mostly?"
"There are rare exceptions. We're not one of them."
Sierra took barely a moment to let that sink in and imaging all the possibilities of just what those exceptions might be like, before shifting onto her more immediate next question of whether or not she could meet the other two up any closer, gesturing generally at them both.
This time the alien did turn towards the cars, folding arms and head tilting as they did so, as if surveying over some potentially unstable quarry.
"Not both." Came the conclusion. "If you want to meet one of the twins, you meet IO-10 only. Stay clear of IO-09. IO-10's the one on the-"
"I know him! He's the one that flashed." She waved again at him and he flashed again at her.
"-Alright then." This time the alien caught that part of the exchange, an eyebrow raising at it. "No toughing though."
The thirteen-year-old meanwhile rushed over, making the journey in only several very bouncy skip-like strides, beaming.
"You're so cool!" She clasped her hands together, giggling. "I like your alt! Muscle cars are nice. Fast-ish but you don't have to worry about a breeze denting it. I'm not sure if I want one yet or a sports car when I'm older. Do you race?"
Side mirrors moved up and down.
"Nope? Is that a nope? You should! I've seen it, it's awesome! And you're already a car so it's like-"
"Are you done?" The other suddenly snapped, startling the red-headed girl. "We didn't come here to be harassed by organic sparklings."
"Excuse you!" This time, Sierra snapped back automatically.
"Nine, do try refrain from being rude to the natives. We are co-operating here with the Goulds." And the demeanour of the human looking alien shifted once more at that, to something that was much more aggressive.
"Can it Pretender! We didn't agree to let them get their greasy paws on us!"
"I didn't touch! And I'm not greasy, I showered this morning!" Sierra objected.
The pretender didn't berate IO-09 again this time.
Instead, once again their mannerisms once again abruptly flipped.
"I must apologise. Being here and not home…it isn't easy. Not all of us are handling it so well." They said sadly to Sierra.
Who then in turn rubbed her hands together awkwardly, head down.
"Right. No, yeah I get that." She mumbled, before looking back up again.
"It must suck. Earth isn't that great or anything and…" She'd love to get off it some day. See what sort of things space had to offer. Even just one other planet.
But this wasn't the time to be saying something like that, she supposed.
"I hope you come to like it here. Just ask and I'll help how I can, and I can help a lot!" She pressed a hand to her chest for emphasis.
"Getting you, all used to this rock, or more blue rocks." The rocks did seem to mostly be what they were after.
Highly toxic, beautifully glow-y ones.
"Much obliged. However, I'd like to ask a question about that?"
"Sure!"
"Why?"
"…Why sure?"
"No." Was corrected. "Why do you want to help?"
"Because it's the right thing to do!" Came an honest answer without a moment's hesitation.
Sure, getting to meet aliens was a bonus, a big bonus.
But like, the Goulds were hardly using the rocks so if they could help a whole bunch of people by giving them to them instead…well, why wouldn't they? As her parents had said, these were refugees here and they certainly had the resources to help.
Couldn't exactly say no.
Queen Bee of the school Sierra was hardly the pinnacle of morality even just in Jasper, it was no secret she was often a bully. Had to be to be to keep her reputation up. But she wasn't that bad.
Not by a long way.
"Well then, that trait. must run in the family." The response seemed to have pleased them. "Your parents said the same thing."
Their gaze went back to turning towards the car guys then, before speaking up once more.
"We should be going."
"Okaaaayyy…. well it was nice meeting you guys!" She almost added in an except you to the rude IO-09 but thought against it at the last moment.
He was new to the planet. It couldn't be easy.
Just like you don't pick on the new kid in school. You give them a grace period before you see whether or not they're fair game.
"We'll be back. Our business here isn't done and we'd like to keep an eye on things. I'm sure you understand."
Sierra agreed that she totally did.
A nod and then they began to head off, the door of IO-10 opening to allow- their name! What was their-
"Name!" She called out, in disbelief that such a such a simple thing had never been asked. "I never got your name. That's IO-10" - a hand was gestured at 10- "and that's IO-09" -the hand moved to gesture at him- "And you're IO…?"
"Call me Alice." And like that the name was finally given.
But…
"Alice?"
Kind of more human than expected. Even if they did look like…
Oh. Oh, she saw what had been done here with Disney human looking alien.
"Wonderland Alice?" Not subtle now at all now that she thought about it.
"Is it obvious?"
"Not a bad name. My parents named me after the Sierra Bermeja back home, because it's every girl's dream to be named after a mountain."
Even if that mountain had also turned out to be the first ever site in which a human would discover energon. The Goulds having less named their daughter as a tribute to the site itself than as a tribute to what they'd found buried in it.
"But-" Sierra then stifled a giggle with her hand. It wasn't mean-spirited- what sort of friends didn't criticise each other's outfits after all? Had to make sure they all maintained a standard! - it's just the sheer absurdity in this case to her of how she'd never thought she'd see an alien…what was it called...? Cosplay?
Some geeks at school had talked about it.
"-you might want to change the get-up. Wear something that's in. Like me!"
"Including the paint?" Alice queried, apparently genuinely interested in hearing this feedback.
"The what?" That didn't change the confusion about what they'd said though.
"Is that not what this is called?" Alice gestured at their own face.
"No, it's called a good use of the blood of my enemies." Sierra said sarcastically, getting now what was the topic. Make-up.
What she was not expecting however, was for Alice to appear to take that sarcasm as…well, not sarcasm! They instead nodded along without seeming the least bit of perturbed.
"I would have thought you were young for something like that. Do you have many enemies that I might need to be aware about?"
"What?! What- no! No, it was a joke! I was joking! This isn't people!" Her tone hiked.
It hiked even higher when she realised just why Alice might have been so willing to accept
"Do your people do that?!"
Attempts not to judge the extra-terrestrials had by now gone just as much of the window as she had to even meet them.
"I was only trying to be polite in asking about yours." Alice got in and sat down on one of IO-10s seats then, although they kept an arm on the door, presumably to indicate to Ten not to close it.
"But we all still have to leave, so I don't have time to answer any more questions for now. Perhaps later."
"Later!" No perhaps about it.
She wasn't being cut out of helping these guys and she wasn't being cut out of finding out the truth behind their stance on the use of the blood of their enemies either.
Nobody cut her out of anything!
"Goodbye, Sierra-Gould."
Although perhaps…perhaps if she'd been a bit older, a bit wiser and a bit more aware of the fact that she'd just gotten herself involved in not only treason with this alliance, but also an intergalactic war, that wouldn't have been her top concern as she waved goodbye to the departing Decepticons.
But she would learn all that eventually.
Just not today.
Today, this thirteen-year-old would just have to puzzle out the few things she did know and plan what sort of questions she wanted to try asking next…along with also try to find a way to sneak back in her room, before her moms saw that she'd left it.
Those would be her concerns for this day.
The rest would have to come on another.