Chapter 37: "Run boy run"

Sam marched up to the Predacon compound with a smug grin. It had been years since he had battled and he found his energies vibrating with eagerness. He had not even gotten within a foot of the base before the Predacons came rushing out and meeting him halfway. All of them already firing at him. He laughed. They were much like ants to him at the moment. He felt drool pool in the back of his throat. The taste of a Predacon's Spark had chased him through the centuries of a time he had readily snapped them up into his waiting jaws. He had not tasted them in a long, long time and despite the vow he would never do so again, now that the temptation was there: it was very tempting to just reach down and crush them inside his mouth and let their sparks sink inside of him.

He probably should have switched with Gaia...

"Shoot him!" a Predacon (he did not care which) cried and he was fired upon with the full arsenal of their weapons.

Okay... that did sting more than he would have thought.

He threw his head back, threw out a mighty roar and then charged into battle like a hungry demon.

Meanwhile, Gaia shook her head and guided Shadow through the Predacon base. She should have switched places with him, but Sam was not exactly known for being... subtle. It was amusing, considering he had managed to hide away on Earth for a few hundred or so years just watching them. No, it would be better if he vented his frustrations at the Predacons. He would not be suited to sneak around.

"Will he be alright out there?"

"He will be fine. You are Caitlin's child in all but blood. You know her scent, her blood. Hunt it."

Shadow nodded and closed his eyes, allowing Gaia to guide him as he concentrated on his sense of smell... "Urgh that's gross! Don't they clean this place?!" he cried out and shook his head, rubbing at his nose as if it might banish the smell. It did not. It lingered like the stench of a carcass left to rot beneath the sun. Two weeks old. Carrion seemed to like that putrid stuff and some scavengers did not mind it, but Shadow always found himself gagging at the prospect. In fact, now he felt like throwing up... something he really did not want to do.

"Yes, it is quite a smell," Gaia agreed. "I am fortunate to be able to choose if I smell or not."

Shadow shot her glare, but then he sensed something and looked around and found a shadowed corner of the corridor. He hurriedly pushed Gaia toward it and just in time too. A familiar face came into view, a pair of green eyes that seemed to glow in the half-light. Vincent stopped there, an expression on his face that Shadow had never seen before. Then, those eyes snapped on their hiding spot and for a heart stopping moment, they thought they were discovered... but then Vincent was walking away, humming something under his breath... a song Caitlin had once sung:

"Run boy run, this world is not meant for you. Run boy run, they're trying to catch you."

And then Vincent was out of sight leaving shivers down Shadow's spine.

"Come on, Shadow. We must find were Megatron has placed the soul and blood."

Shadow swallowed and shook out his nerves. He concentrated again and sorted through the foul stench to find the familiar warmth of his mother. Past shadows and metal and fire, deeper within the base, he found it right next to something that smelt of death, destruction and evil. It made his teeth shatter, his fur stand on end and his heart quiver in his chest. The fear was all consuming, and he wanted to get out and far, far away from what that thing was. He staggered and fell against Gaia, having lost the ability to stand on his own.

Gaia had shifted forms, human hands touched him and light filled him. There was concern in her face as she patted his face, and he curled around her.

"What did you see?"

He shook his head. "I... It was..." He shook his head again and regained his feet. "It was... Darkness and destruction. Death. Evil. A monster. A nightmare. What will be created if Megatron succeeds in what he is trying to do?" he demanded her and Gaia swallowed at the determined, unflinching look in his eyes. Shadow was not backing down from this. Gaia had not said everything to him and he was quickly realising that he did not like being lied to or manipulated.

Gaia was silent for a moment and that silence was telling.

"Tell me, Gaia!"

"Vincent was given Caitlin's twin sister's soul, but it was corrupted by Kov's meddling. With her blood and what Megatron plans to do next... I... we cannot allow it to happen."

Shadow gnashed his teeth like Dinobot did when he did not like what he was hearing. He growled, baring his teeth and then shot her a look that had Gaia stepping back. After a moment, he shook his head and walked away. Gaia watched him leave, feeling that this feline indeed was more than anyone realised. His intellect was far above what was precedent . What would become of him was unknown. Nothing from what Thor had seen had shown what would happen to him, during the Beast Wars and after. He had been aptly named by Caitlin. He was a shadow.

"You going to stand there like an idiot or are you coming, Gaia?" a hostile snarl slapped her in the face as if he had actually done so. She had deserved it for not telling him about it, but she had not thought he actually could get angry. He was always so happy, so caring of his mother and playful. Being angry and hateful had seemed so alien when one mentioned him.

Even his emotional growth was... amazing.

She rolled her shoulders and followed after him. She had hurt her... grandson and that was something she was going to have to fix. But right now, he was not going to be approachable for her to make amends right now. Caitlin was the same. Emotions were a fickle thing, reacting without logical thought. Shadow was both an intellectual and emotional creature. 'Just like his mother,' she thought with no small amount of pride and remained behind him, keeping her senses on high alert for trouble. While Sam was outside keeping the Predacon's eyes on hi, it did not mean all the Predacons had headed out there.

Focused on his task, Shadow crept into a place that smelt heavily of Megatron and his fur stood on end. The scent of Caitlin's blood and something completely foul was beyond those doors. He was within a few hundred steps to his goal but he found he could not move a muscle. All of his instincts were screaming at him to get out of there and get out fast, but he had a mission he had said he would do. Hesitantly, he crept closer and on high alert, ears peeled for any sound he did not make. Despite his current opinion of disappointment regarding Gaia, she was a constant hum by his side, comfortingly familiar and more welcoming than this place was.

There was a panel on the wall similar to the things he had seen on the Axalon, where the Maximals put up passwords to restrict access their private quarters. For those who valued their privacy, it was rather handy and out of the entire group: Rattrap, Dinobot and Caitlin had the highest security. When they wanted to be left alone and did not have the luxury of leaving the base, they hid in their quarters. Caitlin would often hang in Cheetor's room, finding sleep came easier when beside her 'little brother'... however there was a fact that she was twenty now. There was an obvious age gap, made apparent by just how young Cheetor was. She spent more time in her own room, although she would often sing them to sleep before retiring to her own quarters.

Cheetor and Shadow were helpless against her sweet lullabies...

He found himself humming the tune, and missed when Gaia activated something on his collar. He started and she held up her hands and he almost yelped when he realised he could not see himself.

"Calm down, Shadow. It is to ensure you are not seen. You will have be quiet. The mechanism around your neck removes your from sight, it does not cause silence."

Before he could even think to argue, Gaia had disappeared behind the door as if she had been sucked through it. He was left to stand awkwardly in the hallway, alone with nerves on end for what could have been a few minutes or an hour, before he realised that maybe he should move out of the middle of the hallway. He felt odd not seeing his own limbs, but the alternative to being found by any wandering Predacon made up for his current discomfort.

"Can you hear me, Shadow?" a voice vibrated from his collar, making him cry out – the echo made him wince and he curled up into a tight ball, hoping no one had heard it.

"Y-Yes..."

"Good. No one is in here. There were too many safety measures for us both to enter. I am sorry to leave you in the hallway, but you can tell me if anyone is approaching."

"So, what? I'm a guard dog now?" Shadow growled out.

"You sound so much like your mother," Gaia could not help but chuckle. "I'm afraid that, until you can learn how to use machines, you are better suited to scouting."

Shadow growled. He did not like that. Part of him felt like he should have a sword and some heroic aura as he prowled into battle...

Oh, no, that felt like his father's influence...

'Well, as far as father's go, I think Dinobot is the better role model,' he inwardly mused and then shook his head with a snort.

Well, if guard dog scout he must be, he would become the best there was.

Wolfang was as bored as any Maximal could be and found himself in the odd position of having nothing to do. He had already patrolled that morning, heading alone in the opposite direction of Dinobot and Caitlin. Rattrap had hung around the base to help Rhinox with something. Cheetor had raced off to find Shadow, who had been spending more and time practising his skills as a predator. He had become quite skilled. Five out of ten kills would end up as food and he had only been getting better as time passed. The wolf knew Shadow had learned how to hunt by observing Tigatron, Rattrap and Dinobot. Wolfang could admit the raptor was indeed an excellent hunter. Rattrap was known for being sneaky, and stealth was essential to a predator. Tigatron knew the terrain better than anyone and who better to teach Shadow the art of moving through the wilderness?

It was odd to see the panther, so much bigger than his fellow cats and his face much more expressive. He was capable of intellectual thought and had a wide range of emotions. He was becoming more and more complex as time went on and whatever that meant for his future, Wolfang could only worry. To be the only one of your kind... he could not imagine what that felt like.

Then there was Caitlin... she was the only human here aside from Vincent and he was working with the enemy. At time, she seemed out of sorts and would remove herself from the Axalon, disappearing somewhere not even Rattrap or Dinobot knew. She would return by the day's end, looking a little more relaxed but whatever she did during those moments alone, no one knew. Rattrap betted she was playing with her magic voodoo while Dinobot guessed she had put a picture of Rattrap up on a tree and was throwing the daggers the rat had given to her at it. That, of course, ended up being an argument which had ended with Caitlin throwing an apple at both their heads – loudly remarking the damage a coconut could do, and where she might find one and find the highest point she could find to test the strength of their helms...

Her sadism was matched only by her sarcasm... She looked like a quiet, kind girl until you stepped on the right nerve. Dinobot and Rattrap were quite apt at stepping on all sorts of nerves, but he did not doubt she cared about them. He knew she was afraid of love, perhaps she thought she did not deserve it. He could guess she had bad experiences with it, but to be entirely sure he would have to ask and he would either be given the silent treatment or have his head bitten off. She did indeed possess a sharp, forked and poisonous tongue if she had a mind to use it.

Though, it was never used on Shadow. Cheetor got it a lot more, not that the cat knew when someone was using sarcasm on him. Dinobot and Rattrap were the worst, however. It was one of the very few things the two of them would ever do together without arguing with each other... When they teamed up for good, Wolfang was entirely certain it would mean the end of the Beast Wars, if not the galaxy.

And what was he doing exactly? His mind had wandered and now he really needed to find something to do. Perhaps a trip into Predacon territory would help?

There was nothing quite like something to kill you to clear your mind, after all.

First, however, he would have to inform Optimus. The ape hated when people left without telling him...

Vincent was almost surprised by himself when he had seen Shadow and Gaia trying to stay out of sight. Instead of raising the alarm, he had chosen to walk on by as if he hadn't noticed them. If he were honest, he found no desire to interrupt what could only be their attempt to steal back the soul and the blood. It was going to be tricky. Megatron had kept both relatively close for a time and then under lock and key, beneath a sequence of codes and booby traps even Rattrap would find difficult to crack. Tarantulas had given it a go and left nursing his wounded pride. Vincent had made sure to take footage of his attempt. Blackmail was always useful here, and sticking it to the arachnid had become a hobby of his.

"Hmm... perhaps I shall avoid the base for a while," he mused out loud, having already noted the commotion outside. The spinosaurus outside could only be Sam...

He would have to take the back exit and head for his private quarters. Well, it was more of a cave he had seized that was not part of the ship and not drowned in lava. The entrance was too small for the other Predacons to get in to, though he wouldn't put it past the spider to use his little spider-bots to get access. It was one of the reasons he had set up a barrier to prevent such an occurrence. He had a gathered a rather large collection of the seemingly endless supply of those little gizmos. He had taken them apart to learn how they worked out of sheer boredom. They were curious little things...

It was a fair distance from the base, though he kept in range of communications.

He found he was hungry and mused how the Predacons guarded their own individual food supplies zealously.

Waspinator rarely brought foot back to the base, always taking the time to get out of the base to hunt down his next sugar binge. Tarantulas captured anything – and he meant literally anything – that would stumble upon them. From rats to zebras to even a Maximal cheetah – Tarantulas had proven to be an insatiable glutton. Terrorsaur and Scorponok killed whatever they fancied and ate it right there and were quite aggressive when interrupted. Gartortron kept to himself mostly when he wasn't busy fawning over Blackarachni; gorging on whatever had the unfortunate luck to stumble upon him. Megatron never let anyone see him eat, though Vincent had watched him lose focus for just a moment as an almost animalistic side came out of him. As for Blackarachnia, she was actually rather graceful with whatever she found to eat...

Not that he noticed such things...

Rubbing at his head to try and keep the growing headache down, he almost ran right into the very spider he was thinking about.

"Watch it, human, or I'll rip you to shreds!" came the annoyed snarl and Vincent blinked at the aggression. Hostile tempers went hand in hand with Predacons, but Blackarachnia rarely lost hers. But, then he realised why as Waspinator came flying up behind her and asking her constant questions. Terrorsaur was behind the pair, snickering to himself and that shed some light on the situation.

Terrorsaur and Blackarachnia had never gotten along. Especially since the she-spider was always sucking up to Megatron. She and the 'big boss' were master and pupil, though one could never be too sure if and when she was going to betray him. She had the brains for it, but she did not command the same amount of fear as Megatron did. Pity, really. He wouldn't mind being told what to do but her...

Hmm... What had he been doing again? Ah, yes... Food. He needed food.

He staggered into his makeshift home and found to his disappointment that he only had fruit left. His supply of meat had run out. He shut the 'fridge' and groaned and picked up the apple.

"An apple a day keeps the doctor away," he muttered as he bit into the tender flesh and thought perhaps that was a good thing. Tarantulas was the 'doctor' here and not the kind you went to get treated. He was the kind that put you in the body bag, but instead of burying you: he ate you. It was probably a good thing Vincent could heal faster than normal, then.

The pain in his stomach cleared but the one in his head remained...

He had felt... uncomfortable handing over the soul and the blood. It was one thing to defeat the enemy and another to completely destroy them. He did not hate Caitlin, though by all means: he should. It would make things easier but emotions were strange things. He found he could not hate her. In fact he admired her. She was an interesting person; never acting how you would expect. At first, she seemed the type who would rather stand back and just observe and rarely act. But that was just a mask belying her stubbornness that was matched only by her temper. He had seen firsthand how cruel she could be to those that provoked her wrath – and how protective she was of those she cared about. Even so, there was something so very vulnerable about her. A fragility beneath the strength she carried herself with: and it drew others to her.

Her confidence and the vulnerability beneath it had intrigued him. She looked as if she could break at any moment, but she would never allow herself to do so. She was not his usual type, though she possessed beautiful breasts and a killer smile – it was her eyes that caught most of the attention. They had both been hazel before Tarantulas had taken one: an interesting shade where they were greener around the pupil and went browner on the outside of the iris. On the occasions he had the chance to just look at her, he had noticed the sadness dwelling there.

She was smart, too. Smarter than she probably gave herself credit for – and she was always thinking. Inwardly or outwardly, he would bet his right nut her mind was in a constant state of thinking. When the Predacons had been in possession of the Maximal decoder, he had listened in on a few conversations over the comms. She always expected the worst, but always looked for the silver lining.

He wondered how she did that... and another thought whispered: what would happen to see her sister, corrupted beyond recognition but baring the exact same face she remembered?

He chewed on his lip and sat down. It was out of his hands. He had handed over the soul and the blood. That was all that had been required of him. He had been given no orders to protect them. Part of him hoped that Shadow and Gaia succeeded in reclaiming them, though he knew this would not be possible. Lucariaus would not have given them over, if he had not been certain it would work. Knowing this meant that Megatron would use either the blood or the soul.

What monstrosity would come of it? He could not say. He almost did not want to think about it. So, he burrowed into his nest of furs of creatures he had slain, and endeavoured to sleep it off. There was no room for regrets. He was simply a pawn and so long as he remained a useful one, he would remain alive. He had no wish to die and he would be damned before he dug his own grave.

For better or worse, he would have to help destroy Caitlin.

A small voice whispered in his mind: 'So why is it so hard?'