Chapter 11

I sat silently in my seat, staring out the window. Landscape passed by but I couldn't be bothered to try and figure out where I was. My whole body just felt listless right now.

The fury that had filled me when I saw 'Bee being hurt had fled, the amusement I felt from seeing Sam simply be Sam had left, and the feeling of content—of happiness—I had around Optimus was gone.

I couldn't feel our bond. I knew that it was there: I knew Optimus was on the other side, but I wasn't getting anything from it. It was like a giant echoing canyon now separated OP and I where we used to be shoulder to shoulder. And it hurt as I felt it weaken. The further we drove away from 'Bee and the canal the fainter OP became. We had shared our fear and tension and anger until the last flicker of emotion reached me and he was gone. It made me want to scream and rage that these arrogant feds had no right separating me from my…whatever OP was to me. Friend. Comrade. Ally. But I just couldn't scrounge up the motivation to do anything but sit and wasn't that pathetic?

I snorted softly and it seemed overly loud in the silent car and I didn't look up as the two feds in the front seat glanced back at me. Sam and Mikaela didn't stir. They had dozed off a little ways after we had started driving and both of them had their heads on my shoulders. Mikaela was a silent sleeper with the exception of a few murmured words and twitches and Sam was the same way except with light snorts and snores here and there. Even when I encouraged them to sleep I didn't let myself have that luxury. Someone needed to watch over them and I was the only one present. I didn't trust these feds as far as I could throw OP and I wasn't about to let us be vulnerable.

A sigh escaped me and I rested my head back, blinking at the ceiling. We had been driving for hours if the small digital clock was anything to go by and I know we would be arriving soon.

As if my thoughts had summoned it I saw a barb-wired fence in the distance approaching quickly. I took a deep breath the center myself before leaning my head down and nudging Mikaela's head. Normally I would've shaken her awake, but my hands were still handcuffed behind me and were numb. "Hey," I whispered. "It's time to wake up." I moved my head out of the way when the ebony's head suddenly snapped up and dark eyes blinked for a few seconds, looking around.

"It wasn't a dream," she whispered.

I didn't say anything as I roused a much more reluctant Sam awake. He was just barely blinking bleary eyes when the car passed a security check point in the fence and headed towards a bustling air field filled with jets and helicopters. "Awha?" Sam slurred as he looked around.

"Looks like we're here," I told the teen as the suburban came to a stop and the two feds got out. No time was wasted in hauling us out of the car and towards one of two waiting helicopters. On the way Sam and Mikaela were freed from their cuffs, but I was pointedly left restrained. Sam realized this and was about to turn to snap at one of the feds when I shook my head. He looked at me confused until I pulled my arms out from behind me, holding the loose cuffs with my fingers with a small smile.

"You can pick locks too?" he asked with a raised eyebrow.

I shrugged and threw the cuffs at a stunned fed before following the direction to one of the helicopters as it began to whirl to life. "Something I had to learn while growing up."

"Did you get these growing up, too?" Mikaela asked from the other side of Sam, pointing to my bare arms. Somehow in the fight my jacket had been ripped from me but my backpack had stuck with me, leaving me in a baggy white T-Shirt and oversized cargo pants. The stupid feds kept underestimating me and not checking me for weapons. I had at least a dozen knives in my pockets and my guns and laptop in my backpack.

"Life happens," I murmured in answer to Mikaela as I held my braid against the torrential winds of the helicopter. We scrambled on to the helicopter and soldiers strapped us in and fitted us with bulky headsets. I gripped my harness as we lifted off the ground before turning my attention to the two other occupants in the aircraft. A pretty blond haired woman and a fat black man in nerd glasses. I blinked at the two, studying them before looking out the open door to the quickly passing desert ground.

It was awkwardly silent between the five of us for a good deal of time before the blond woman spoke up with either an English or Australian accent. "So," she began as we looked at her. "What'd they get you for?"

Thank God for Sam's sense of humor. "I bought a car," he said nonchalantly. "Turned out to be an alien robot." He shrugged. "Who knew?"

The black man gaped at Sam and mouthed the word 'Wow'. I snorted quietly. "I knew," I answered quietly.

"Are you some sort of psychic now?" Sam asked with a raised eyebrow.

I raised an eyebrow right back before taking my laptop out of my backpack, which had been resting on my lap. "No. I'm a hacker."

"You're a hacker?" the black man asked, shocked. The woman looked curious.

I nodded. "I hacked into Sector Seven and got some info."

"Sector Seven?" the woman repeated in surprise, glancing at the black man. "We saw that in the signal." When I raised an eyebrow she continued. "Myself and a team were brought into the Pentagon to discover the origin of a code that hacked the government mainframe in less than a minute. Glen and I were taking a look at the signal and saw that there was a message in the signal. Sector Seven was one of them."

I frowned before clicking to my saved data and bringing up the signal I had intercepted a few days ago and swung my laptop around for them to see. "You mean this?" Sam and Mikaela leaned forward and peered at my screen, not quite getting the significance of what they were seeing.

"How'd you get that?" the woman demanded, looking at the signal as the black man scrutinized it.

"Sector Seven isn't the only thing I've hacked in the last few years," I answered cryptically. "And you don't have to worry about finding where it came from anymore. It's Cybertronian in origin. Decepticon to be more specific."

"Cybertronian?" the black man repeated in confusion.

I shook my head and sighed. "I have a feeling you'll figure out the meaning of that word soon enough. Until then… What the hell?" I scowled as my screen shut down and I lost my wireless signal. "Who the fuck hacked me?" I hissed and brought up my security window only to sigh and close my laptop.

"What's wrong?" the black man asked.

"The virus activated," I answered simply. "It wasn't just a message in the signal. There was a virus waiting to infect everything. Right now all satellites are down."

"Then…then how is everyone supposed to communicate?" Mikaela asked in confusion, looking between us. "Don't we need the satellites to talk to each other?"

The black man nodded. "Yeah. And apparently we aren't supposed to talk to each other."
"We're flying in the dark," the woman murmured.

A glance out the window caught my attention. "No," I corrected. "Apparently we're flying to Hoover Dam." Everyone peered out the window and saw the architectural marvel.

"What are we doing here?" Sam asked. No one could answer him.

"My name's Maggie, by the way," the woman suddenly said.

"And I'm Glen," the black man added.

We introduced ourselves in the same manner, but my hackles rose when Glen looked at me in suspicion. "What?" I demanded shortly a minute later, glaring at the nerd.

"Are you the Star?" he asked. "The infamous hacker that no one can get in contact with and revenge hacks with a vengeance? The one with the username of four stars?"

I blinked before going carefully neutral. "Yes," I answered and the man's face lit up.

"Oh my God it really is you!" he exclaimed and I winced as the volume crackled over my headset. "You have no idea how cool this is! You were my inspiration to begin hacking. Is it true that you really hacked into the government mainframe? Well, you must have if you just said you hacked Sector Seven since they're a government group. But that doesn't mean you really hacked the government. I mean, I didn't expect for you to be so young. What are you? 16? 17?"

"Glen!" Maggie interrupted, glaring at her friend. "You're embarrassing yourself."

"Oh," Glen muttered, looking between his feet and me, blushing. Sam nudged me and I gave him a dry look. He just grinned and Mikaela had a coughing fit.

As we landed I couldn't help but stop and breath. There was something here. In the dam. I could almost feel the fact vibrate through me. Something big and something powerful was down below our feet. Waiting.

My moment of serenity and awe was ruined as I was jerked back roughly. I spun with a snarl, but reigned myself in as the feds slapped cuffs on my again, this time in front. They were learning. Sam and Mikaela turned from where they were peering over the edge of the dam and their faces immediately darkened as they landed on me. Just before Mikaela pulled her purse with her I thought I saw something shiny move over the edge before it disappeared. I felt a brief worry, but it disappeared when I was roughly shoved to get walking.

There was a little bridge we were lead to that lead to a vertical cement tower that went way far down. On the right side of the walkway stood a dozen men in full army uniform at ready along with a few feds and an old man in a suit. The old man was talking to one of the army men with brown hair and I was just catching the words of intel from the army men and ships being fitted my Sabot rounds when I was shoved again and I stumbled as I tripped over a crack.

"Hey! What do you think you're doing?" a voice demanded and I looked up to see the old man stalking over towards us. I blinked when I realized that this was John Keller, the Secretary of Defense of the United States. And he was mad if his glare towards the feds behind us were anything to go by. "This is a child. What are you doing putting her in handcuffs?"

"Sir," a horribly familiar voice called. I glared at Simons as he came up behind the Sec Def with a condescending small smile on is rat face. "This girl is a criminal—"

"And we have several trained army soldiers along with God-knows-how-many federal agents around here," Mr. Keller interrupted sharply. "I think we can release this young lady. And I doubt she is a criminal, Mr. Simons."

Simons looked like he swallowed something disgusting and I wisely kept quiet as Simons motioned for his men to uncuff me. "Thank you," I told the Secretary of Defense.

"It's no problem. Do you mind telling me why you were cuffed?" the old man asked and I chuckled lightly.

"I may have made them mad when I didn't want to come in."

"Don't you understand that this is a national emergency?" he asked incredulously and I knew he was one second from judging me.

"I know, sir. I knew before even you, no offence. And I was working to put a stop to it when I was waylaid by these jokers." I looked up through my eyelashes at the older man and saw him looking me over critically before seeing Simons and a random balding guy talking to Sam and Mikaela out of the corner of my eye. I scowled before I saw Sam walk past Simons, looking smug and Mikaela looking pleased and starry eyed. Well, it looked like I wasn't needed. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Secretary," I said, finally being polite and getting to the basics. "I've been following the motion you've been trying to pass and I wish you the best of luck on that."

"Thank you," he replied back, holding out a hand. "And you are?"

I shook his hand after a brief hesitation. "I'm Star. Just an average citizen keeping tabs on her government."

The shrewd suspicion in his eyes melted somewhat into amusement as we began to walk. "You aren't average if you're here," he shot back and I smiled a little, keeping an eye on Sam and Mikaela as they waited for me by the metal doors in the cement tower.

"Isn't that the truth," I muttered before looking at the soldiers still waiting to follow us through the door. I blinked as I recognized the man Mr. Keller had been talking to earlier. "Aren't you William Lennox?"

The man blinked and frowned a little at me. "Do I know you?"

I shook my head after a pause. "No. I just know you and your team's reputation."

There was general shifting down the line of soldiers and even a snort or two. Whispered Spanish reached my ears. "Wonder if we'll get fan girls now."

I leaned back and looked at the Hispanic man who had obviously spoken and replied in the same language. "Not if you keep talking to yourself you won't."

I immediately got shocked looks and I held back a smirk. A black man standing next to Mr. Lennox, Robert Epps if I remembered correctly, openly gaped at me. "You understand that idiot?"

I shrugged and kept in Spanish. "No more than I understand you."

The Hispanic man immediately cracked up and tried to smother his laughs. While I walked away I heard his friends try and get what was funny out of him as I went to meet Sam and Mikaela by the door. On my way I saw that I would pass Simons as he glared at me.

I couldn't pass this up.

I subtly palmed one of my knives and 'tripped' on a crack while passing Simons, landing on my hands and knees right next to him. As expected the asshole just stood there and did nothing to help me other than sneer at me. "Clumsy little girl, aren't you?" he mocked.

My left hand with the knife had landed right behind his right leg and as I stood I drug my knife up the back of his pant leg to the middle of his butt cheek, revealing his boxers underneath. Thankfully my razor sharp knife made the ripping absolutely silent and I seamlessly pocketed the knife again before I stood fully upright again. I threw a small smile at the rat man. "A little breezy, isn't it?" I asked cryptically before continuing on. Sam and Mikaela were snickering quietly while the Sec Def raised an eyebrow at me. "I told you I made them mad," I reminded gently as we went through the doors and got in the elevator inside, riding it down.

It was only at the bottom of the elevator and at the base of the dam that Simons cursed and glared at me. I kept a straight face. We began to walk across the bottom of the dam, heading towards an opening a little ways in front of us and Simons seemed to slip into his element as he led the group, underwear be damned, and began to debrief us.

"Alright. Here's the situation. You've all had direct contact with the NBEs," he began.

"NBE?" Epps called as we all sped walked after him.

Again. I couldn't resist. "Non-biological extraterrestrial," I called loudly for him to hear, forcing away my quiet nature to get back at Simons. Said man glared at me over his shoulder, but I continued. "They're the robots you've all seen. Simons and Sector Seven have been looking for them for years while trying to stay unnoticeable."

"And you would know all about them, wouldn't you, alien girl?" Simons snarled as he stopped and spun to get in my face.

I didn't flinch and only smiled. "I wouldn't. But I could if you left me the hell alone. Now, Mr. Tour Guide, where to next?"

Simons growled lightly before turning and continuing. "What you're about to see is classified," he called as we went through the door.

I instantly wished for my jacket as a wave of cold hit me. Though I forgot about the cold as I saw what was in front of me.

Megatron.

There was no one else it could be. He stood there, stiff, with a permanent snarl on his face, covered in blue ice and scaffolding surrounded him. Scientists in bio-suits scaled the scaffolding and did various things as we entered. The balding guy I had seen earlier talking to Sam Mikaela joined Simons.

"Dear God," Mr. Keller breathed. "What is this?"

Before I could answer him, slow as I was still stuck in my own fear and trepidation, the balding man spoke. "We think when he made his approach over the North Pole our magnetic field screwed up his telemetry. He crashed in the ice probably a few thousand years ago. We shipped him here to this facility in 1934. We call him NBE1."

Sam crossed his arms and put a finger to his lips in thought as he peered up at Megatron, obviously not feeling the same I was. "Well, sir, I don't mean to correct you on everything you know," he began. Translation: Hell yes he meant to ruin their perfect little world. "But, I mean, that's Megatron." He looked at Mikaela and I and we nodded in agreement. There was no doubt. "He's the leader of the Decepticons."

"He's been in cryostasis since 1935." The balding man looked Sam up and down before stepping forward and putting a hand on the teenager's shoulder. "Your great-great grandfather made one of the biggest discoveries in the history of mankind."

Simons stepped forward and smiled up at the frozen Megatron. That made me really uneasy. Not because Simons was getting cocky, but because I didn't want to think of what Megatron would do if he was up and moving. Even frozen he had this air of…destruction. Insanity. Cruelty. Evil. It sent chills down my spine and I almost wanted to pull back my newly named arch nemesis as I looked up at Megatron's dark optics.

I was shaken out of my thoughts as Simons started talking. "Fact is, you're looking at the source of the modern age. The microchip, lasers, spaceflight, cars. All reverse-engineered by studying him." He strolled past Sam and got in his face. "NBE1. That's what we call him." Prick.

Sam only raised an eyebrow, but I did see his hands curl into fists.

"And you didn't think that the United States military might need to know that you're keeping a hostile alien robot frozen in the basement?" Mr. Keller demanded, directing accusing eyes at the balding man.

The balding man kept his cool and only spread his hands innocently. Innocent my ass. "Until these events, we had no credible threats to national security."

"Well, you got one now," Keller growled.

"So, why Earth?" I turned to see that it was Lennox who had asked the question.

Sam and I shared a look before he waved subtly waved a hand at me. Looks like it was my turn. "It was—is—the Allspark," I replied slowly.

"Allspark? What's that?" Epps questioned.

I shifted my weight uneasily and edited some information so these blood-sucking feds didn't get any ideas. "It's a cube. Filled with energy that allegedly created the first Cybertronians." I pointed at Megatron to emphasize the word's definition. "The giant robots. Anyway, Megatron—"

"That's what they call them," Sam told Simons pointedly, interrupting me briefly.

"Is the leader of the Decepticons. They're the bad guys if you wanna keep it simple. Megatron wants the cube to transform all of Earth's technology and use it to take over the universe and then some. That's they're plan," I explained.

"You're sure about that?" Mr. Bald asked.

I gave the man a dry look. "I couldn't have gotten that info from a better source." Then I caught the shared look between the balding man and Simons and blinked at them. "And you know where the Allspark is."

The balding man hesitated before turning. "Follow me," he ordered, heading for a simple wooden door. "You're about to see our crown jewel."

That feeling was back. The feeling that something was here and waiting. Something big. And as the wooden door opened and I stepped through I knew what it was. The Allspark.

It sat there in a cavernous room, tilted and surrounded by scaffolding, taller than even two—maybe three—Optimuses and covered in Cyber writing. I shivered as I felt something pass through me and approached the window that looked out over the cube. This was it. The very life of Cybertronians and in the hands of human beings. I ignored Mr. Bald talking in the back as I stared at the metal cube. The symbols on it seemed to shiver right in front of my eyes even though I was a good distance from it. For a brief second my chest flared up in pain again and I rubbed it absently, watching as a light lit up in the corner of the cube nearest to the floor. Then it occurred to me.

"You're keeping the cube not a hundred meters from Megatron?" I asked slowly, quietly, interrupting Mr. Bald's speech. I didn't take my eyes off the All Spark. "The very object that he and his mechs are looking for is sitting just on the other side of a wall and you think this is smart how?"

"Until now we only thought it a piece of space junk," Mr. Bald reasoned and I turned my head to look at him.

"Don't gimme that. You may not have known what it truly was, but you knew it was important otherwise you wouldn't have moved it here next to your reverse-engineering project."

There was an awkward silence in the room until Maggie spoke up. "You said the dam hides the cube's energy. What kind exactly?"

"Good question," Simons remarked before turning and leaving the room, expecting us to follow. It was with difficulty and Sam's nudging that I left with the group.

The next room we entered looked like a vault from the outside. It didn't help that when we all stepped in that we were locked inside. Mr. Epps and Glen gaped at the claw marks on the wall while I stared at the box in the middle of the room, trying to understand why I wanted to curl up and cry. I just felt waves of fear and sadness and terror coming from that box and couldn't understand why. It was just a box. Why would I be afraid of it?

"Anyone have any mechanical devices?" Simons asked. "Blackberry? Key alarm? Cell phone? Laptop?" I bared my teeth at the man for that last comment and clutched my backpack closer. People began digging through pockets until Glen pulled out his phone and threw it at the man. Simons grinned mischievously and opened the small door on the box while we put on black goggles. "Nokia's are real nasty," he remarked. "You've got to respect the Japanese. They know the way of the samurai." He slammed the small door shut and went with Mr. Bald to a panel on the wall.

I frowned, knowing Nokias weren't from Japan, but not sure where as I stood by Mikaela. "We're able to take the cube's radiation," Mr. Bald explained. "And funnel it into that box."

Then there was a bright flash of light and I blinked to clear the spots from my eyes, watching the Nokia in the box, dreading what would happen next.

It started to vibrate in place and a weird shifting sound reached my ears when suddenly I was washed with fear and panic and the phone transformed.

A small little being stood in its place. It seemed to stand on its two arms and was mainly made up of is chest, which had a small blue light shining through its armor. Its spark. Absolutely tiny red optics stared up at us from its head and had a little tiny ponytail thing.

"Who are you beings?" it demanded in swift Cyber, looking around and spinning. "Where am I? Answer me!" When it didn't get any answer, only gasps and shouts of surprise the little guns that had been resting by its sides swung up on to his shoulders and began firing a little machine gun at the glass. Chills swept through me at the little Cybertronian's next words. "Where's my Carrier? I want my Carrier! Carrier! Carrier!"

Shouts of surprise and demands echoed in my ears before I saw Simons circling the box with a predatory grin, talking. Then the small switch in his hand. I just knew what it was going to do. And I had to take away Simons' reason to kill the little Cybertronian. I whirred that sound Optimus told me was reassuring. Quietly to keep the others from hearing. The reaction was almost instantaneous. The little Cybertronian stopped firing and swung towards me, staring with big optics. "Calm, little one. Calm. No harm. No danger," I told it in slow Cyber that I tried to make as understandable as possible.

He came closer to the glass and pressed against it, keening loudly and scratching at the glass with one arm, trying to get to me. "Carrier! Help me! Please!" he cried and it felt like a knife through my heart. Then it steeled as I saw Simons' finger moving towards the switch.

I spun and kicked out, knocking the switch from his hand and catching it in the air and punching Simons in the chin. "Don't you dare!" I snarled at the shocked man before crushing the switch and tearing off my goggles.

"What are you doing?"

"Stop!"

I ignored the shouts of protest and opened the small door. I ignored the weapons that were pulled and pointed at me and just focused on the tiny little being in the box. The baby. "Here, little one. Safe. Promise." The little being crawled onto my hand and I immediately cradled him to my chest, stroking his back. "You were going to kill a baby," I whispered in the otherwise silent room. I turned my eyes to a now standing Simons. "This is nothing but a child—a baby—and you were going to kill it?" I got no answer but incredulous stares. "How many times have you done this?" No answer again and I felt dread and anger build up in me. "How many babies have you murdered?" I hissed.

"That's no baby—" Simons began.

"Look at him!" I shouted, holding the Cybertronian baby closer so he knew I wasn't angry at him. "You've seen what they grow into and you don't think this a baby? He could be killed by simply dropping him; he's that fragile. So I'll ask again. How many have you murdered?"

Silence again until Sam hesitantly stepped forward, eyes glancing between me and the Cybertronian in my hands. "Can I…" he trailed off.

I looked down at the little being in my hands and how he was pressed firmly to my chest. As if sensing my gaze he tilted his head up and met my eyes. "Yes, Carrier?" he asked, sounding a bit like a questioning whistle to untrained ears.

I tried scrounging my very limited vocabulary to say that someone wanted to meet him and found I knew no way to word the sentence, so I just motioned to Sam with my eyes and the little Cybertronian cringed at the sight of him, pressing harder into me. I shook my head and stroked his back, whirring quietly and covering a cough at my abused throat. "No. Safe. Promise. Ally. Safe," I assured him. The little Cybertronian glanced at me questioningly and said a word in Cyber I was unfamiliar with, so I just nodded in agreement. He then didn't protest as I passed him to Sam, though he was incredibly tense and stiff on his two arm-leg appendages.

"He's so light," Sam murmured as Mikaela came up next to him. I glanced around the room to see that every single set of eyes was fixed on the little bot and weapons were almost forgotten as they were aimed towards the floor instead of at me or him this time.

"Look," Mikaela gasped, gently rubbing over the bot's chest. I nodded when the little one glanced at me again, assuring him Mikaela was alright. "He's so tiny compared to 'Bee." Sam nodded. They both grinned when the bot began to purr at the petting.

Then the room shook and there was a distant rumble. The little bot stiffened again and looked around wildly, saying something in rapid Cyber before turning and jumping for me. I caught him midair and held him close, trying to stop my racing heart at the thought of the little one hitting the floor.

Mr. Bald braced himself against the wall as we all looked at the ceiling uneasily. "Gentlemen, they know the cube is here," he announced and I barely resisted the urge to roll my eyes. Dramatic much? Then the phone rang and Mr. Bald picked it up. "Banachek," he said, identifying himself. So that was his name. "What's going on?" I couldn't hear what was being said but I saw Banachek pale dangerously. "What?" he demanded.

Lennox moved through the crowded room and grabbed Banachek's arm. "Do you have an arms room?" he demanded and Banachek nodded numbly as he hung up before steeling himself again.

"Simons will take you there, but I have to go do damage control in the NBE1," Banachek told us as he exited the newly opened room. I cradled the little bot close and shielded him from view as Banachek went one way and Simons began leading us another, running down the hall and yelling at us to hurry up.

I'll tell you guys this and probably spoil everything from now on. I hate deaths. I love writing fix-its. And I thought it would be fun to throw a sparkling into this whole mess, make this whole over-worked idea a little bit more original. Meet Nokia-bot, he'll be named in the next chapter I think. I can't remember…