Arc 1: In the Shadows

Chapter Nine

Shot Down/Kindred Souls

An explosion shook the air, causing Riku to snap his eyes open, head jerking up to see the ship the large robots had been on, fall into the water in flaming pieces.

Distantly, Riku heard a teenager scream in denial and felt his heart break even more.

Of course the Robots would have friends with humans, they had to have.

It wouldn't make sense otherwise…

Riku shakily stood up, hand reaching to touch the tucked away Sunaena that was ice cold against his bare skin, feeling the cold seeping through his shirt.

He shivered, an overwhelming sense of Doom coming upon him.

Riku turned and screamed at the red eyes glinting from the shadows.

Something struck his neck and he fell.

Why me? Riku thought vaguely in despair, why me?

Harry Potter froze in his tracks as he heard a familiar voice whisper in his mind, faintly.

Why… me? It came scrambled and Harry felt an ache in his heart for a strange reason as an image – of the fallen angel (because who ever heard of an angel with black wings if they weren't fallen anyways?) with silver hair, falling to the ground surrounded by deadly shadows, new scars visible even in the fading light – came to his mind's eye.

"Harry?"

The messy black haired teen looked up to see his godfather leaning against the wall, a concerned look on his gaunt face.

Harry shifted slightly, realizing where his feet had taken him:

The room where the Black family tree hung.

"Yeah?" he asked quietly.

"Is there something wrong?"

Harry looked down, trying to figure out how he felt. He just felt... drained. Tired. Yeah, that's how he felt. He felt tired. Exhausted actually. The trial had taken more out of him then he had realized.

He looked up and found that Sirius looked as exhausted as Harry himself felt.

"Sirius… could we… go somewhere? Just the two of us?" Harry asked, a mischeivious glint filling his eyes that hadn't been present for a while. "We could dye our hair – the muggle way and no one would know if we went somewhere remote… like the woods – we could go camping! I've never gone camping before!"

Sirius' face filled up with a cheer that had been absent for a long, long time. "Pup, I like the way you think. I have just the place…" the man grinned roguishly. He put a hand on his godson's shoulder. "Just leave it all to me, pup!"

And Harry gave a true smile, one that hadn't been present on his face since Cedric Digory had died.

Sirius smiled weakly back, mind racing to figure out how the two of them would do this, because he would do this dang it! Just so he could get his best friend's son to smile like that again, let him be the kid that the Durselys had never allowed him to be.

Because just that Petunia had had a change of heart, didn't mean that he could fully forgive her, not when his godson was still scared from her scathing words. When Harry could be the teenager that he should be, then maybe would Sirius think of forgiving her.

He came out of his thoughts and ruffled Harry's already messy hair. "C'mon Pup, lets go get some of those sandwiches that Molly made for lunch, I'm sure she wouldn't mind if we snitched some early, yeah?"

Harry snorted at that and let his godfather drag him into the kitchen.

The battle raged, and through it all, an animalistic Decepticon prowled, chattering to itself as it waited for the blasted shield to be gone so it could claim his fleshy prize.

But despite all the firepower that the small-ish bot (he was still about a head taller than a fully grown human despite being on all fours) had, the bolts of plasma could not penetrate the invisible barrier.

The bot sat back with a pout, air huffing out of his air vents in the human equivalent of a sigh.

This fleshy was different. There were these strange appendages that grew of fleshy feathery – things – on its back.

Was it a never before seen fleshy? If so, the bot was sure he'd get a reward of some sort.

The metallic wings and tail twitched, as his prey stirred. The bot crouched, talons unsheathed.

As the fleshy sat up, the bot launched himself at the helpless target.

Scene break

Riku sat up, rubbing his head before realizing that his place of unconsciousness had not changed.

But this thought as barely registered before a shadow went overhead and Rik fell over with a yelp before staring incredulously from his back as the attacking bot slammed into a glittering Dark Shield that had somehow formed while he was unconscious.

Riku gave a laugh as he sat back up, rubbing at his shoulder blade; ruefully he supposed that his innate Moon Magic might have had a hand in his protection against the red eyed bot.

Riku's eyes widened. The thing looked like a small (relatively speaking of course) metallic baby dragon!

"Just what are you?" Riku whispered in awe as the dragonoid robot prowled at the edge of the domed translucent shield, long reptilian tail twitching in the air, swooshing side to side, restless.

Riku sat there, silver haired head moving with the direction the dragonoid robot stalked, eyes trained on the lithe alien beast.

An occasional swipe of metal claws against magic shield before more pacing.

And then, with a low growl, the beast sat down on its haunches and just stared, unmoving.

Riku stared back, daring not to blink lest the moment be lost.

…staaaaare…

The whole world disappeared as the two of them locked gazes, their surroundings meaningless as both sentient beings tried to figure the other out.

This fleshy as weird. The bot had decided, ten minutes into the stare down.

It hadn't gone off screaming (well, it had screamed but it hadn't run off at least) when the fleshy had seen him.

So the fleshy was either stupid or increadibly brave and stubborn.

Maybe all three.

Meh.

Blink fleshy blink for Primus' sake!

staaaaare

…this could take a while…

Despite the battle, the staring contest went on, both too stubborn to give up and look away.

Night fell and still explosions and screams went on.

Riku sighed and looked at the Dragonoid robot wryly. "Your kind, I suspect?"

The other had the grace to look sheepish, silver wings flattening against the ground and tail lumped delicately.

Riku huffed out a quiet laugh, full of the wry sarcastic humor that many knew his by before his face softened.

"You don't want this do you?" Riku asked quietly, and if possible the bot looked even more dejected, letting out a long mournful keen.

Riku suspected that the robot was young and opportunistic, who had not considered the rashness of his decisions when he had made them.

Just like he had when he had opened the door to his world's heart and let the Darkness take his world and rip it apart.

He knew. And he understood. This robot had been just like him, arrogant, prideful and insanely curious. Too curious.

Without either of them noticing, Riku's trust and sympathy for the bot caused the Dark Shield to flicker and fade away as the Sunaena melted from the ice cold it had been against his skin to a pleasant warmth.

It was morning and both boy and machine were surprised to find that they had fallen asleep, trusting eachother to not kill the other.

"So…" Riku leaned against the alley wall that was miraculously still standing. "got a name that you'd be able to tell me?"

There was silence as the robot thought this over and then static filled the air. Des…designa…nation sta…tus… unkno…wn…. Que…ry….fail…ed. q…ue…ry: sta…tus? Na…me…? Q…uer…y? …Qu…ery?! ….Query!? Stat-t-t-tu….s…. failed! Status: Unknown.

The robot shook its head.

Riku leaned back, looking thoughtful with his arms crossed against his chest. "Well then, how about I name you… Draco?" a shake of the adressed's head. Riku considered. "Draconem?" another shake of the head. "Ginryō?"

The dragoniod dragon nodded it's head in agreement and then turned around suddenly, rigged.

"Ginryō?" Riku asked, approaching the dragon robot. Ginryō turned his metallic serpentine head and gestured at Riku then Ginryō's back. "…You want me to get on?" Riku asked with disbelief. Ginryō rolled his red optics and nodded.

Such a slow fleshy I have befriended….

Riku hesitated then shrugged to himself before getting a running head start and hopping on to his new friend's back.

You ready, fleshy?

Riku pumped up his fist in the air, totally aware about how Sora-like he was acting but he didn't care. He was about to ride into battle with an ex-enemy robot and did he care? Not one bit. Well… kind of. But right then and there? He was acting on his heart, he could have regrets later!

"Let's go, Ginryō!" he yelled and Ginryō leapt into action, dashing out of the alley way and dodging bullets as he went, Riku cheering before a well placed jerk from Ginryō reminded him that he shouldn't be bringing any more attention towards themselves if they could manage it as they were in a battle zone and screaming on the top of his lungs would certainly not help.

Ginryō rolled his red optics but continued running, they had to get to the tower before this strange fleshy's world was pulverized and used as slave labor.

While the two had slept, Ginryō had had a change of heart.

Or maybe his change of heart had happened a long time ago, it didn't matter. What mattered was that this hunk of earth that was the third away from the star called Sol was about to be destroyed as Ginryō's home world was summoned through the giant Space Bridge and the strange fleshy had grown on him despite being so… different.

But different was good, Ginryō supposed. It wasn't a bad thing, and there was something about the fleshy that just drew him closer.

Any thoughts of a reward for the strange fleshy were thrown out the window by the time he had woken up. He was going to make things right. Marginally.

He'd try at least. He needed to atone for his mistakes. The mistakes that had gotten so many of the strange fleshy's kin (were there any like this fleshy? Ginryō didn't know) killed. He had to pay his friend back. With his life if Primus so willed it.

He was going to make things right, by Primus he swore he would!

AN:

Yeah Riku gets an awesome dragonoid transformer guardian. Did I meantion that Ginryō looks like a DRAGON? Yeah, Riku is cool like that.

*cough* anyways. Yeah, was watching DotM again, realized that there is NO FRIGGIN WAY that the city of Chicago can be on the other side of the bay where the Autobots launched, but… eh, suspension of disbelief, please work with me on this. So, how do you guys like Ginryō? Is he authentic enough you think?