Chapter 8 - Present
"All right, here's the situation." said the man that had been arguing with the teenage boy. Anna just knew that she was going to get really annoyed with him real quick. She was actually glad that something like this was going on because it kept her mind off of Tony and what could possibly be happening to him. "You've all had direct contact with the NBEs."
"NBEs?" Epps asked as they walked.
"Non-Biological Extraterrestrials. Try and keep up with the acronyms." the man said. "What you're about to see is totally classified."
They walked into a large room and Anna gasped, reaching out to grab a hold of Epps's arm as they saw a large robot, larger than the one that they had fought in Qatar. She had fallen back to walk in between Epps and Lennox when they had entered the large room. Epps just looked down at her and let her continue holding his arm as he was scared too.
"Dear God. What is this?" Keller asked, finally finding the ability to speak.
"We think when he made his approach over the north pole, our gravitational 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." Tom Banachek, the only S-7 agent whom had introduced himself, said.
Then the annoying one spoke again. "We call him NBE One."
The teenage boy spoke. "Well, sir, I don't mean to correct you everything you think you know, but, I mean, that's Megatron. He's the leader of the Decepticons."
"He's been in cryostasis since 1935. Your great-great-grandfather made one of the greatest discoveries in the history of mankind." Banachek said.
"Fact is, you're looking at the source of the modern age, the microchip, lasers, spaceflight, cars, all reverse-engineered by studying him. NBE One. That's what we call it." he snapped, geting in the boy's face. Anna rolled her eyes at the man. She was seriously considering just punching the man in his face to get him to shut up.
Keller glared at the agents. "And you didn't think the United States millitary might need to know that you're keeping a hostile alien robot frozen in the basement?"
Banachek at least had the decency to look chastised but the other agent with them just stood there, defiant. "Until these events, we had no credible threat to national security."
"Well you got one now."
Anna looked up at Megatron curiously, recognizing that the one that had attacked the Qatar base was similiar to this one with their spikey appearance, and the menacing feel that she could feel radiating from him. "So why Earth?"
"It's the Allspark." the boy said. It seemed this boy had more information than they had thought.
"Allspark? What is that?" asked Keller.
"Well, yeah, they came here looking for some sort of cube-looking thing. Anyway, Mister NBE-One here, a.k.a. Megatron, that's what they call him, who's pretty much the harbinger of death, wants to use the Cube to transform human technology to take over the universe. That's their plan."
The agent that hasn't been introduced yet looked a bit nervous. "And you're sure about that?"
"Yeah." the teenager said. Anna caught on first.
"You guys know where it is, don't you?" Anna asked, causing everyone to glance at her before their eyes returned to the two agents who had exchanged looks.
"Follow me." Banachek said, jerking his head.
They all followed the two agents down a side tunnel. Anna sped up to introduce herself to the teenager.
"Hi, I'm Anna."
They shook hands. "Name's Sam, nice to meet you."
"So what'd they get you for? Other than your connection to your great-great-grandfather, I mean."
"Well, I bought a car, turned out to be an alien robot… Who knew?" He said, sighing. Anna grinned at him.
"Actually that sounds kind of awesome… And the way that you just said that indicates that your car-turned-alien-robot is a good sort. Am I right?"
Sam nodded. "Yeah, he is part of a different faction of Cybertronians - the Autobots. The Autobots want to preserve and protect all innocent life… And thanks to these a-holes, Bumblebee is being experimented on right now, most likely."
"I promise you, Sam, I will do everything that I can to get Bumblebee out of here, alright?" Sam smiled at her in gratitude.
"Thank you, Anna." Anna nodded and fell back to relay the information that Sam had told her to Epps and Lennox.
"So we have an evil alien robot, this Allspark thing that both the Decepticons and Autobots want, and a good robot, all with in a good distance from each other? Is that what you're telling me?" Lennox asked.
"Yep." Anna said. Lennox sighed.
"Are all of these men idiots or what?" Epps grumbled. Anna laughed quietly.
"I'm sorry I didn't tell you guys about my real name." Anna whispered. Lennox and Epps exchanged glances over their surrogate sister's head. Then Epps wrapped an arm around her shoulders and pulled her into a side hug as they were still walking towards this Allspark.
"Don't you worry, girlie. We aren't mad, we're more hurt than anything." Epps said.
"And besides, if the stories that we've heard about Stark is true, then we can't blame you for wanting to runaway and change your name and then not mention it… And we're not going to pester you, Anna, okay? Because even though you hid your real name and most of your past from us, you are still the Anna Jackson, know-it-all that we love… okay?" Lennox said, hugging her as well when Epps let her go.
Their moment was broken when the agent spoke. "You're about to see our crown jewel." They had entered a little observation room.
"Whoa," whispered Sam gazing at the gigantic cube that took up most of the room below them.
"Carbon dating puts the Cube here around ten thousand BC. The first Seven didn't find it until 1913. They knew it was alien because of the matching hieroglyphics on the Cube as well as NBE-One." He seemed very proud of what little they did know. "President Hoover had the dam built around it. Four football fields thick of concrete. A perfect way to hide its energy from being detected by anyone or any alien species on the outside."
The blonde haired woman started slightly. "Wait. You-you said the dam hides the Cube's energy. What kind exactly?"
Anna was getting a really bad feeling now… the same kind that she had gotten before the Qatar base attack.
Banachek led them to another room. "Good question. Please step inside. They have to lock us in," he explained as they all entered the small room.
The other male civilian spoke for the first time as he examined the torn up walls. "Oh, wow."
The annoying agent spoke. "Anybody have any mechanical devices? Blackberry? Key alarm? Cell phone?"
"I got a phone," said the male civilian throwing his phone over to the agent. Anna had a feeling that he wouldn't be getting that back anytime soon.
The agent flipped it open smiling. "Ooh. Nokias are real nasty. You've got to respect the Japanese," he said opening the glass box in the middle of the room and putting the phone inside. "They know the way of the samurai." He snapped the box shut.
"Nokia's from Finland, idiot." Anna said, not able to keep her mouth shut any longer. Keller looked at her from beside her.
"Yes, but he's, you know… a little strange. He's a little strange." he whispered. Anna smiled.
The agent flipped some switches. "We're able to take the Cube radiation… and funnel it into that box."
Everyone, except for Anna, let out startled yelps as the Nokia shuddered and abruptly transformed into a tiny Cybertronian and abruptly began chattering and running around the box.
The agent grinned, pleased with their responses. "Mean little sucker, huh?"
Anna frowned, not liking how the agent talked about the little robot. It might be the inner scientist slash inventor in her, but she thought that the little robot was cute and was scared. And another thing, its eyes were blue, not red like the robots that had attacked her and her team. As the robot began to shoot at the box, she heard the agent mutter to Banachek, "Oh… He's breaking the box."
Anna pulled out her gun and aimed it at the agent, not noticing that when she spoke that the little robot had frozen and was staring at her.
"Don't even think about it." Anna spoke in a deadly voice. The agent froze and stared at her, in fact everyone was frozen as well as they watched the two of them. "You are going to drop the switch and you are going to step away from it. I can't believe that you were about to kill a little baby robot for just being scared."
"Baby?" Banachek asked. Anna switched her glare onto him.
"Yes, baby. Do you not see the size difference between Megatron and this little guy?" Anna turned her attention to the little robot whose blue electric eyes were locked onto her. "Hey there, little one. It's okay, I'm not gonna hurt you." She crooned, opening the box and cautiously sticking her hand in. The little robot met her eyes and knew that Anna meant no harm to him and would protect him.
He made a little chirping noise as if asking a question before he came to some kind of decision and squeaked happily, skittering onto her hand and clinging onto her as she drew him out of the box to cradle him against her chest.
Any protests or comments that would have been said were interrupted when the lights flickered and a distant boom was heard and the walls shook slightly.
Keller glanced up looking deadly serious. "Gentlemen, they know the Cube is here."
Lennox spoke up. "Do you have an arms room?"
Next thing they knew everyone was running out of the room and towards the arms room in a hurry, they really didn't want to be unarmed when Megatron unfroze.
Anna had convinced the little robot to transform back into a phone and she slipped him into a deep pocket to keep him safe as they ran.
"Move it! Move it! Let's go!" Lennox shouted as the lights began to flicker a bit.
The agent that was still with them began to bark orders to his agents. "Forty millimeter sabot rounds on that table!"
Lennox was busy commanding his team. "That's good. Get all the ammo you got. Everything you can carry. Bring it."
Sam walked up to the agent. "You got to take me to my car. You have to take me to my car. He's gonna know what to do with the Cube."
The agent looked incredulous. "Your car? It's confiscated."
Sam glared at him. Then unconfiscate it."
"We do not know what will happen if we let it near this thing!"
"You don't know-"
"Maybe you know, but I don't know."
Sam gritted his teeth. "You just wanna sit here and wait and see what happens?"
"I have people's lives at stake here, young man," he shouted getting in Sam's face.
Anna spun around and grabbed the agent, pinning him against the car behind him. "Take Sam to his car!"
"Wha-" cried the agent.
Then came a cowboy stand off with S-7 agents pointing guns at the soldiers and the soldiers pointing their guns at the agents.
Anna knew that Lennox had her back so she didn't even move her attention off of the agent that she had pinned to the car.
"Drop it." she heard Lennox say.
"Drop your weapon, soldier. There's an alien war going on and you're gonna shoot me?" the agent said, trying to get the situation under control, even as Anna pointed her glock into his chest.
Anna glared at him. "You know, we didn't ask to be here."
The agent tried to look stern. "I'm ordering you under S7 executive jurisdiction."
Epps snorted, "S7 don't exist."
Anna nodded. "Right. And we don't take orders from people that don't exist."
"I'm gonna count to five."
Anna cocked her gun. "Well, I'm gonna count to three." she threatened, her face and tone compeltely serious.
There was a few seconds of silence as it registered in everyone's mind that Anna was being completely serious and that Lennox wasn't calling her off so that showed that he wasn't backing his Lieutenant one hundred percent.
John spoke up, "Simmons?" Now she had a name for the idiot agent.
Simmons looked over. "Yes, sir?"
John smiled grimly at him. "I'd do what she says. Losing's really not an option for these guys… And Anna is incredibly stubborn."
Simmons looked back at Anna as she sent a smirk towards the Secretary of Defense who despite breathing hard was still pressing the barrel of her gun into Simmons's chest firmly and swallowed nervously. "Alright. Okay. Hey, you want to lay the fate of the world on kid's Camaro? That's cool."
Anna eased up on the agent and then they were off. To release Bumblebee from whatever these people were doing to him.
