Chapter 5
"Well?" Mirage queried.
Chip delicately adjusted a knob made for much bigger hands. "Just about got it." He grunted. "A little more and…there." He slumped back in his wheelchair. "Okay, that should do it. I've filtered out the worst of the static and cleaned it up as best as I could."
"Good." Mirage replied. He reached out and hit the 'play' button.
A deep, gravelly male voice thrummed from the speakers, laced with static. Mirage frowned as he listened. "What's he saying?" Chip asked. "I don't recognise the dialect."
The spy's frown deepened, a terrible suspicion growing within his spark as several things fell into place. "This investigation just made a U-turn." He got up to leave.
"What do you mean?" Chip asked. "Mirage? Mirage!" But the spy was already gone.
The human stared at the doorway for a moment, then quickly activated the intercom.
0o0o0
Ironhide listened carefully as Chip relayed what Mirage had said. "Raight, thank you Chip. Ah'll tell 'im." He closed the comm. link and turned to Prime. "That was Chip. He says him an' Mirage uncovered some audio file, then Mirage just got up an' left. Chip reckons he's gone t' track down th' shooter on his own."
"Uplink to Teletran and find Mirage's transponder." Prime ordered. "I will not have Autobots going off on their own on this."
"Will do Prahme."
0o0o0
Mirage waited in a shadowy side corridor, his back pressed to the wall and a silenced laser pistol in hand. He would be here soon enough, Mirage thought grimly, fingering the trigger of his gun. Then, there would be revenge. One did not betray one's teammates without consequences, and Mirage would make sure that there would be suitable consequence for this crime, unlike the soft-sparked 'justice' that would be meted out from the commanders if the culprit were brought to them.
His fine-tuned audio sensors picked out the sound of approaching footsteps. The first were slow and measured, seconded by a quick patter of smaller feet. Mirage shrank back into the darkness as Trailbreaker and Bumblebee passed his hiding spot. An unusually heavy footfall confused him for a moment, until he realised that it was the twins, walking slower than usual but still in perfect sync with each other. Finally, he heard the sound he had been waiting for- a light tread with fairly long strides and a click from an ankle joint that still hadn't come quite right.
The blue and white tensed as the unseen mech approached, then as he came level with the corridor, lashed out with a left hook that left his target staggering, before dragging him into the darkness and pinning him to the wall; his left arm pressed against the culprit's throat and the muzzle of the gun forced into the seam under his chest. "Tell me," Mirage growled, "Why shouldn't I kill you right now?"
"Because Ididn't have a choice." The captive mech replied quietly.