Yeah...considering how long all of you have had to wait for this, it should be a novella. Instead, its a fairly short paragraph. I struggled and fought with this for months, before deciding just to cut out the flotsam that was holding me back. Hope it was worth the wait though.
Chapter 11 - Mayday
The jets were designed for maximum agility and intimidation, unlike anything this tiny planet underneath had ever seen. Their wings gleamed with the heat from entering the atmosphere, nothing more than a prickle on their sensors and adjusted their course to follow the beacon that had been calling them for so many months.
After far too many cycles waiting around, they were not waiting another second. But, as they honed in on the signal, one paused ever so slightly, and jerked as a small object burst from within, breaking apart but heading in a very distinct direction.
'Rumble!' shrieked the jet. 'What do you think you're doing.'
The asteroid didn't reply, fleeing out of sight. The seeker growled and transformed, closely followed by his partner.
"Slagging thing all but begs for a ride and then dumps us the second we make planetfall?"
Skywarp snapped. "I just do not get Soundwave's midgets."
"Does anyone?" Thundercracker replied. "Wanna go grab him?"
"...Nah. He's small fry. Have to face Starscream eventually, and I'm bored."
"Yeah...Starscream better have a plan."
"It's Starscream, he always has a plan."
"...Let me rephrase. Starscream better have a good plan."
"Ohhh..."
Thundercracker sighed and transformed back into a jet, continuing his descent, closely followed by his trine mate.
Lower and lower they flew, until the buildings beneath them became clear. The temptation to fire prickled through their sparks, but they ignored it, heading for the desert further along. Their trine leader was apparently going for subtlety for once and keeping them out of sight. The signal grew stronger, and two frames came into view, driving across the desert and stopping at the coordinates. Neither of which had wings.
Their confusion grew as they transformed and landed, studying the two machines who also transformed to greet them. There was Hook, and next to him was...no...
Thundercracker considered himself an excellent soldier. He carried out his orders without complaint, he gave his opinion when asked and stayed mute when not, and never treated his superiors with anything but the respect they required.
Skywarp had no such morals, and collapsed to the ground in laughter as he recognised the silver car accompanying the Constructicon. Seconds later, Thundercracker broke, and joined him. Starscream growled in annoyance, but that only seemed to spur the two on.
And now Hook was snickering. Again. Wonderful.
"Will the two of you just shut up!"
Skywarp choked back his giggles to get back to his feet, and smirked.
"Whatever you say, Wheelie."
The Jet was fast enough to dodge the first blast, not so much on the second. He yelped and crashed to the ground, while Thundercracker quickly stepped out of Starscream's line of sight. The seeker looked tempted to fire again, but retracted his weapon instead.
"If you're quite done, we'll have company in a matter of nanoclicks. So get in the air and start doing your job."
Skywarp brightened, and jumped up. "Autobots? Finally! It's been forever since I got to pound on them."
He jerked back when Starscream glared at him once more.
"Do NOT go overboard. I am not wearing this ridiculous get up for fun. We won't be at full strength until we retrieve my wings, and Optimus and his followers are not to be taken lightly. So unless you plan on joining me on the ground, retreat is the final objective. Understood?"
The seekers nodded, and jumped into the air.
Deuce tapped the stylus against the paper as he tried to figure out where he'd gone wrong. He was trying to recreate the blueprints of the base to see if there was anywhere he'd been forgetting about hiding. Ratchet and Bumblebee were getting close to finding his place in the rafters – they'd seen him head for his 'tunnel' one too many times, and he might need an alternative. However, without Hax goading him on, it was too hard to concentrate.
He gave a sidelong glance to the chamber where his other half's spark resided. It was still fluctuating, spread out far too widely and flashing fast enough to give human seizures. He sighed and turned away. This was depressing.
"You should have gotten better by now," he muttered.
"He still has time youngling."
Deuce looked in Ratchet's direction. The medic was looking at him fondly. "This has never been done before. The fact that he's still here is a testament to him. Don't give up."
Deuce smiled. "Wasn't gonna."
Ratchet smiled back, then flinched as a report from the security sensors pricked his own. It was picking up energon levels from just outside. But not particularly strong ones...
"Ratchet?"
The youngling had picked up on his tenseness, and was watching him carefully.
"Stay here, Deuce, I'll be right back."
He walked out the door, heading for the entrance with purpose.
"I swear, if Jazz has been experimenting with drones without informing me again..." he growled, but activating his gun just in case.
Perhaps he should have been more cautious, something he kicked himself for again and again after the fact, but he was used to ignoring such small signals.
When something growled and landed on his neck joints, sending his systems into a crashing spiral of pain, the medic swore he never would again.
Ratchet jerked his head, hands flying, and he caught sight a shockingly familiar mech.
'Frenzy?'
No...Rumble...
Oh Primus no...
"Ratchet!"
Both heads jerked up at the shriek, and one pair of optics widened in horror, another in satisfaction.
Deuce was standing in the doorway, frozen.
Rumble jumped, aiming for the youngling, but Ratchet could see it coming, yanking the mech back and trying to crush him in his hands.
"Deuce!" Ratchet roared. "Get to the medbay and activate the security protocols. Do NOT leave!"
The youngling didn't move, and Rumble slipped out, scurrying up Ratchets limb.
"Now, Deuce!"
The youngling fled, and Ratchet swung an arm – too late. Rumble was already at his neck. Thin and frail, vicious hands slipped into the cracks of Ratchet's armour, and he felt his systems go numb.
He made another lunge, desperate to grab the small mech, but Rumble was already gone, and Ratchet had just enough time to register the strike before crashing to the ground, awake but frozen in his shell.
Satisfied that his only threat was immobile, Rumble jumped from the body and smirked, kicking dust at the head before slowly heading in the direction Deuce had run.
"Rumble!" Ratchet gasped. "He's just a youngling, leave him be!"
The small mech paused, and cocked his head.
"No. He's more than that. So much more."
And with that bounded off deep into the base.
"Rumble! Rumble!"
It was no use. Ratchet cursed, and activated his emergency subroutines in an attempt to get back up on his feet, then activated his comm, thankfully still functioning.
"Prime! We have a major problem!"
"It's the Seekers!"
The convoy immediately swerved, narrowly missing the first barrage of blasts fired their way.
"Autobots, scatter!" Optimus ordered, transforming and equipping his sword. Skywarp had already turned and was heading for his next strike.
Such was the Prime's concentration that when his comm blipped, he brushed it aside with another thought, and leapt into the fray.
With the road clear, and the Autobots eyes on the sky, the reventon and bulldozer sped past, completely ignored.
Deuce slammed the door of the medbay shut, hastily pounding the buttons to lock it down. He backed up, and bolted over to Hax's spark.
"Hax," he whispered. "Help me – I don't know what to do now."
The door buckled, and the youngling flinched at the high pitched growls that followed.
...But froze at the skittering footsteps of someone climbing upwards. There were maintenance shafts above the medbay, barely large enough for a human to climb in. They had no access to the medbay, but the walls were thinner...
Almost subconsciously, Deuce crawled around the chamber, crouched and hidden by the metal panelling but kept his eyes on the maintenance panels above. He smothered a shriek as high above, a shot blasted straight into the room, and looked up to see the red optics of a far too smug Decepticon.
The small silver frame jumped to the floor, landing with a heavy thud. As red optics scanned the room, Deuce tensed.
"Come out, come out, little spark..."
Behind the chamber, Deuce stayed frozen as the cassette tiptoed closer. He knew he'd have the size advantage, but he'd heard enough stories from Jazz and Bee to know smaller mechs could take out behemoths with ease once they had the experience. And he had no weapons...
The youngling slowly crept around, trying to follow the route Rumble was taking, when the footsteps stopped. He froze, trying to figure out where his foe had gone, before the sound of digits on glass drew his attention upwards.
Rumble was perched on the top of Hax's chamber, and was grinning.
"Found you."
Deuce shrieked and bolted, just narrowly missing the sharp projectiles thrown his way. Rumble jumped down and followed at a relaxed pace. Deuce had fled to Ratchet's larger medical berth, hiding behind one of the legs. He froze as Rumble paused, and turned to look back at the spark floundering in the chamber behind him.
"What's this?"
He crept forward.
"This one feels like you too...that's impossible."
A sharp claw scratched along the glass, and the spark went crazy, flying and dispersing in its cage.
"Stop that!" Deuce screamed, jumping from his hiding place and running towards the Deception. Rumble swung round, firing another shuriken. This one hit Deuce square in the shoulder, and the youngling crashed to the ground, groaning in pain.
"Don't..." he moaned. "Don't hurt Hax."
The cassette was walking towards him. "Hax? He feels like you. Is he special? Is he your brother perhaps?"
Brother?
Deuce rolled over, trying to pull himself up, and nodded. Brother. It was as close a word in English to what Hax was. His admittance made Rumble chuckle, and he plucked one of the projectiles that had missed from the floor, fingering it with frightening focus.
"Perhaps I'll just shatter that case. Let you watch him die."
Deuce jerked to his feet. "No."
Something stabbed his servos, and he crashed down again.
"Why shouldn't I?" Rumble hissed.
Deuce froze at his next words.
"My brother died for you."
Skywarp cackled as his shots forced the Autobot leader off the road and into his true form. Oh how he'd missed actually having something interesting to shoot.
'Skywarp!' Starscream hissed on his comm. 'Stop playing around and retreat!'
'What!' Skywarp whined. 'We've got em pinned!'
'Do not question me, Skywarp!' Starscream hissed. 'Move out, or you'll be the one trying out the wheeled mode next.'
The seeker growled, and fired one last barrage before shooting up into the sky, too far for the Autobots to follow, before spinning and arcing over, coming in to glide over the speeding vehicles. Moments later, Thundercracker was by his side, flanking their small convoy.
"Why, Screamer?" the Seeker whined. "We had them!"
"And in five minutes they will have the human army here ready to take us out," Starscream snapped back. "The fleshlings may be small but they were cannibalising parts from Megatron for vorns. And they're surprisingly hard to target lock. I am not risking anything until we have a full trine in the air."
"And then?" Thundercracker asked.
"And then I have one little piece of a puzzle to collect, and then you can have all the fun your sparks desire."
"...Promise?"
"On my spark."
"...fine."
"You can't imagine what it felt like" Rumble hissed, still stroking the glass. "To have a connection so strong even the universe couldn't weaken it, only to feel it rip apart in the blink of an eye. To feel every iota of isolation, and yet still be expected to carry on.
And to make it worse...I could still feel him. Faintly, weakly, but he was still there. Soundwave couldn't explain it, so I decided to hunt it down myself. I grovelled at the feet of those stupid seekers for the chance; I thought maybe my brother had survived.
That Frenzy was waiting for me."
He glared at Deuce in contempt. "And instead I find you. A pathetic little Autobot youngling scavenged from the dead. You don't deserve his parts."
Deuce took a step forward, holding his arm against his chest. "He...he killed hundreds. You can't blame someone for doing the same to him."
"We are at war," Rumble hissed. "How is killing one to give life to another justified by Autobot standards?"
Deuced faltered. He wasn't sure how to answer that.
"They didn't need him. I can almost feel Barricade rolling through your armour. He was more than enough. Did they think a cassette wouldn't matter?"
The Youngling shook his head. "You don't know anything! That wasn't-"
"We are tools!" Rumble shrieked. "Not even soldiers, just minions of one. Frenzy was the one thing I could count on, and they took him from me. So I'll take yours in payment!"
"NO!"
Rumble turned to stare at Hax's spark. "Take some comfort in this Sparkling. An eye for an eye. And a brother for a brother."
He made to shoot one final shuriken into the glass, when he heard a shriek, and footsteps running towards him. The cassette turned just in time to fire at Deuce, who stumbled, but didn't stop, and grabbed the smaller mech roughly, throwing them both into a roll, tossing them off the table. They hit the ground with a clang, and Rumble immediately jerked back, while Deuce moaned on the ground, his chest armour shattered by the almost point blank shot. Rumble took several steps back; fingering the torn energon lines the larger mech had somehow managed to latch onto and chuckled.
"So...you will protect that spark as well as yourself?"
Deuce was still writhing on the floor, but jerked his head up to growl. Rumble cocked his head at the malice on the young face, and began what could almost be called a smile.
"Hmph. Good."
The two jerked as the sound of footsteps in the corridor thundered towards them as a frightening pace.
"Looks like the medic finally reactivated himself," Rumble muttered, and leaped up the wall back to his makeshift entrance.
"This isn't over, Youngling. We will meet again, and one of us will get what we want."
With that, the cassette fled, and the doors to the medbay burst open.
"Deuce!"
The Youngling gave a weak wave.
"What took you so long?"
Ratchet thundered towards him, his growl drowned out only by the roar of his engine. At first Deuce flinched, until he realised sluggishly, that he wasn't the cause of the medic's anger. Strong arms carefully cradled him up, holding him close.
"You did very well. How do you feel?"
Deuce smiled. "Hurt."
Ratchet sighed as he ran a scan, while Deuce turned away, looking at Hax's chamber.
"He was going to kill Hax. I didn't want him to, but I couldn't stop him."
Fingers ran over the small helm. "Ah, little spark, you're young. Too young for this war I think. But both of you are still here, safe for now. You did the best you could."
But Deuce didn't seem to be listening. Instead he was silent, eyes focused on the table.
"Deuce?"
"Ratchet...look."
The medic followed the younglings gaze, and froze.
There, safe inside its containment field, a solid and stable spark shone.
To be continued...