Autobots, Assemble!

Part 2

Chapter 14

Knockout's presence in the hangar, even after the telepath's visit, had all of the Autobots – except the Prime – on edge and cautious. Wasp and Jane were the only humans currently going out of their way to try and befriend the Aston. The only reason the he would occasionally reply back was to contradict a statement or assumption about him that was either totally untrue or grossly exaggerated. But hey, at least he was talking to someone right? A start is a start, no matter how one looked at it.

Knockout amused himself by observing the humans interact with the Autobots without it being obvious he was doing so. No one was doing much aside from chit-chatting with one another like everything was okay. Iron Man was messing around with one of those – oh what were they called again? ID cards? – which had a holographic display up with some sort of crazy equation that he was constantly rearranging. Knockout didn't even know the humans had access to holographic technology. They seemed like such a young race compared to the long-lived Cybertronians. Watching the two teams interact, he could almost forget about the savage civil war still raging after all this time.

Laughter was unheard of among the Decepticon ranks, and yet the youngest humans and the two youngest Autobots were exchanging embarrassing stories with each other, laughing and giggling at the others' expense. He happened to glance in one direction and saw the archer creeping up on the humanoid machine, who was listening to the funny stories with immense interest. The archer had a bucket of wet paint in his hands (where he'd gotten his hands on that paint bucket would probably forever remain a mystery). That could only mean….nuh-uh, he wouldn't do that, would he? The red medic watched as the archer dumped the bucket onto the humanoid machine's head and made a mad dash for the hangar exit. Apparently he would. Knockout corrected himself with a snicker. A few of the Avengers gave startled exclamations and charged after him while the humanoid machine stood stock still trying to figure out what the scrap had just happened to it and why it was now coated in wet green paint.

"Um…is this…normal to you guys?" Knockout asked no one in particular, pointing at the paint-coated Vision. He noticed in surprise that the normally taciturn Ultra Magnus and Prowl were valiantly trying to keep straight faces as they watched a small group of super humans chase down their impish team mate (who still had a firm grip on the empty paint bucket and refused to relinquish it. Knockout could've sworn he heard the archer shout "You'll never take me alive!").

"You always have to expect this kind of craziness when Hawkeye's around, Knockout." Jane said. "Part of being involved with the Autobots, and in turn, the Avengers, is learning how to put up with Clint's stupid antics."

The chase continued on outside the hangar and more of the super humans had joined in. The only one not currently involved in the chase was the android, who was still standing in the same spot with the same baffled expression. The red medic felt a small pang of pity for it – clearly this wasn't the kind of thing it was used to and it had no idea how to respond to the prank. The older Autobots were content to stay put and watch the chase; Smokescreen and Bumblebee finally decided to join in just for kicks, much to Arcee's chagrin.

Knockout then discovered that the hangar the Autobots were using as a base was part of a much larger military compound. New recruits to the human's armed forces watched in disbelief as two giant alien robots and almost a dozen super heroes chased the purple-clad archer over a wide swath of black asphalt and desert.

"Clint, surrender the paint bucket or face the consequences!" Thor shouted.

"Never!" The archer retorted, clinging to the empty bucket like it was some kind of precious gemstone. He took off running again just before Hulk was able to grab him in a death grip.

Back in the hangar, Optimus was desperately trying to hold back fits of laughter as he observed the "chase". Hawkeye was as stubborn as Wheeljack, if not more so, and as playful as Smokescreen and Bumblebee combined. Why the archer had decided to use Vision as his target eluded him. The android was not playful by nature and was rather naïve in terms of understanding human behavior and interaction. Was this Hawkeye's very unorthodox way of teaching him about practical jokes? Seeing the density-shifting android's baffled and yet very intrigued look, he got the feeling that it was. Unorthodox perhaps, but it did seem to be very effective.

Hawkeye was finally cornered and apprehended, dragged back by his feet by Ms. Marvel and made to apologize to Vision. The android's only response to this was a tilted head and one oh-so innocent question:

"Why?"

Knockout kept his snickering as quiet as he could.

Being one of the good guys definitely had its share of perks. Under Megatron's command, everything had been strict and rigid, but under the Prime's command, military structure appeared vastly different. The Autobots and their human allies didn't fight for control of the ranks like the Decepticons did – they shared power equally. From what he could gather on optical evidence alone, the two teams were interwoven and worked as one giant team rather than two separate ones. That's when realization slapped him full force in the face: that's what made the Autobots and the Avengers virtually impossible to defeat – it was their bonds of camaraderie and friendship with one another. They looked out for each other, were there for each other through good and bad, never abandoning anyone if the going got too tough. That was why the Decepticons would never truly win. In their ranks it was every mech for himself, survival of the fittest, and power struggles were commonplace. Megatron didn't understand that an army couldn't depend on sheer size alone; it was a matter of quality over quantity when it came to the Autobots.

And quality almost always won.

OooooooooooooooooooooOooooooooooooo

Hours passed, with nothing occurring to destroy the easy-going air of the hangar. Iron Man, after inquiring over how much the needed materials for the Commander's hand would cost, had returned to Stark Tower to begin the initial base construction with the aid of the Wakandan king, whose knowledge of vibranium would be vital to him. Ratchet had insisted that one of the 'Bots accompany them in case of Decepticon attack only to be reminded that the Tower had automated defense systems and was right in Midtown where all the super heroes were – plus Tony would take his armor with him. He'd given in at that, though an inkling of doubt continued to nag at the back of his mind. Soundwave could easily disable those selfsame defense systems and cut all communications in the building. No Earth computer was safe from the faceless and silent Decepticon Communications Chief. The only person who'd managed to at least bother him had been Rafael, when the Decepticons had been trying to use the Giant Size Array, a massive array of radio telescopes in Texas, to pinpoint Cybertron and bring through an army of undead warriors. Rafael had eventually failed when Soundwave had cut the hard lines, but the tween had managed to buy the Autobots some time by constantly undoing Soundwave's hacking and had managed to swipe the schematics for the Decepticon Spacebridge. If he hadn't gotten those blueprints, the entire planet would've been overrun by, as Miko called them, "Zombie-Cons."

It was a little quieter now that the inventor was no longer present. Ratchet and Jarvis were still searching for enemy activity and Raf was still scouring the internet for possible Predacon remains. Vision had offered his aid to the tween who had happily accepted. His advanced programing would help Raf get past any firewalls that were too hard for him to get past. The one thing to the two were forbidden to do was hack into S.H.I.E.L.D's network. The last thing they needed was an angry Director Fury trying to arrest them for sneaking into their servers without authorization.

The hours ticked by. Knockout was still not allowed outside the hangar, much to his obvious annoyance, but the red medic really couldn't blame the Autobots for being overly cautious about him. It wasn't every day that a Decepticon switched sides on a spur of the moment. The one thing he enjoyed doing when he had down time – street racing – was a big no-no for Autobots. In some ways they were even more restrictive than the Decepticons.

OoooooooooooooooooOooooooooooooooooo

Construction of the hand base was going smoothly back at Stark Tower. The engineers in his employment, the ones he trusted fully anyway, were sympathetic to the last degree when they'd been told who the giant metal hand was for and why they were building it. T'Challa had ordered the needed amount of vibranium metal flown in by jet and was patiently awaiting their arrival while he helped build the main support struts. Adamantium was far stronger than the metal the Cybertronians were built from. Even if the outer layers of the hand were pulverized again, the adamantium skeleton would prevent the hand from being destroyed fully. If the entire hand was reinforced with the metal, it would be nearly impossible to crush, but adamantium was expensive.

So the team of engineers worked away on the giant hand with the two Avengers, eager to see the finished product. The construction of the skeleton went faster than anticipated and left them with time to kill while they awaited the delivery of vibranium. The team of engineers wanted to know a little bit more about the recipient of the hand – personality, likes and dislike, pet peeves (did Magnus even have any pet peeves?). Tony kept the answers as vague as he could. The Autobots were supposed to be a highly classified government secret after all. He might trust his employees, but he'd learned thanks to the Skrull invasion that an ally could be a phony. The entire planet had learned that the hard way.

It was right when the expected shipment of vibranium arrived that the power failed. Not even the backup generators were working. It was like the entire building had been hit with an electro-magnetic pulse. The last time something like this had happened was when A.I.M had unleashed Technovore on the Tower and had nearly ended up killing Iron Man. They'd ordered the rogue AI to target the Arc Reactor in his chest. Technovore had eventually been gotten rid of by tossing the thing into the giant Reactor that powered the entire building – the AI had literally been blown to bits after it tried to absorb the energy.

Iron Man hissed at the engineers to find some place to hide. They didn't argue and ran out of the double doors to find a hiding spot elsewhere in the Tower. The two Avengers scanned the building to see where the power failure had originated. From all indications it had come from the outside, not inside the building. Their first thought was that A.I.M was back for round two until the scream of half a dozen jet engines met their ears. That could only mean one thing.

Decepticons.

The building shook as it was pummeled by high powered energy shots. A red missile roared through the thick glass and flung sharp shards in all directions. The shrapnel harmlessly bounced off Tony's armor. Panther wasn't as lucky. A few of the glass shards ripped through his suit and left ugly cuts that began oozing blood. The Wakandan ignored them as best he could but Tony could tell he was really hurt. Tony grabbed Panther and shielded him as another missile roared in through the breach the first one had caused, impacting the far wall with a loud bang and leaving a smoking hole. A grey jet with blood red highlights hovered in front of the broken glass windows surrounded by alien looking grey and red jets.

"Starscream." Panther hissed, holding his hand over one of the cuts on his arm.

"Hello again, King T'Challa." The grey and red Seeker purred. "And you, Stark. Quite the set-up you have here. That replacement hand wouldn't happen to be for Commander Magnus, would it?"

"What's it to you?" Tony shot back it. He liked to think of himself as an even-tempered man but when one brought Starscream into the picture, he lost all sense of control. The Seeker just rubbed anyone, even him, up the wrong way with his high and mighty attitude. If ever someone had an ego to rival Megatron's, Starscream did.

"Why are you here, Screamy?" He continued. "Are you after the vibranium, is that it?"

The grey and red jet seemed confused. "Vibranium?" Starscream repeated. That was all the answer Tony needed. The Seeker wasn't here for the vibranium. He was here for something else. It didn't seem likely the 'Con was here for the Tower's Arc Reactor – they already had a giant warship that was powered by an engine far more advanced than the Reactor itself.

Before he could finish his train of thought the jet armed itself with some sort of electric gun – a stun gun. He was here for them. The Seeker fired off a round at him and the Iron Man armor effectively shut down, leaving both him and T'Challa open and vulnerable. Easy pickings for the Seeker Captain and his buddies. The only upside to this horrible situation was that the 'Cons were unable to fit through the windows, in vehicle or robot mode. They were just too big. But Starscream was nothing if not resourceful. He'd wormed his way out of situations far worse.

The air shimmered at the edge of the broken windows and a lanky human in a grey army uniform solidified. He was joined by a dozen others in dark purple versions of Hydra uniforms. Tony dimly remembered Ratchet mentioning something like this once before – holoforms, hard light holograms that the Cybertronians employed in densely populated areas. The Autobots normally employed them in order to better blend in but they were capable of being made into mobile weapons units that could reach targets their users weren't able to.

Each holoform raised a hand held energy pistol and aimed them right at the two helpless Avengers. Then they fired, and the world went dark.

"Quickly." Starscream hissed. "The stun guns' effect will only last so long. I would've killed them without hesitation but Lord Megatron wants these two alive."

The two unconscious humans were bound at the wrists and tossed into the cockpits of two Armada drones.

OooooooooooooooooOoooooooooooooooooooo

The Wakandan awoke to the sensation having been in a cramped space for quite some time. His eyes opened slowly, painfully, and the first thing he noticed was the bars. He was in some kind of cage. He still had his suit and he quickly tried to analyze the metal. No Earth metal matched but Cybertronian metal did. The Wakandan put two and two together. He was on the Nemesis and was being held as a prisoner. And this day had started out so well, too…..

"Pst. Kitty cat!" Tony's voice whispered loudly from somewhere to his left. He'd been captured as well. Panther turned to see what the inventor wanted. "Good, you're up. I've already tried to contact the 'Bots but all our comms. are being jammed. Calling for help is out of the picture, T'Challa. We're completely on our own."

Tony snapped his mouth shut when movement was audible near them. Megatron walked in with a cruel, smug smirk. The warlord shoved a smaller mech to the front whose wrists were bound in stasis cuffs.

"I believe you three know each other?" Megatron hissed.

The cuffed mech was Ratchet.