War, as seen through the eyes of history, is the most powerful agent of change, greater at toppling nations and sparking revolutions than any natural disaster or slow economic decline. After only a few short years in Vietnam, the American populice did an abrupt 180 in their views of life in general and war in particular, warping from a nation rallying behind its troops in a way reminiscent of WWII to condemning soldiers as baby killers and throwing flowers at politicians.
But the natives of Cybertron had not been fighting for only seven, or fifty, or one hundred years. Ever since the Great Betrayal over four million years earlier, a slim margin of the population labeling themselves 'Autobots' had fought against the tyranny of the warrior caste who had abused their power to assume absolute control, the Decepticons. For four million years, an entire species had been at war-- the equivalent of 571,428 consecutive Vietnam wars. Needless to say, more than the structure of nations had changed as a result. The Cybertronians themselves, in a desperate bid to survive, changed their very bodies as well, altering themselves until they could blend seamlessly with their environment and thus raise their chances of living for another thousand years or so.
This adaptability, however, was not limited to the physical form. With every new lifeform they encountered, the Cybertronians set out immediately to not only find suitable disguises, but also to download and assimilate as much of the native culture as possible. Arriving on earth, most of the Autobots (and a handful of the Decepticons) had skillfully sorted through the multitudes of different cultures, dialects, and customs to find those most likely to give them an advantage when dealing with humans. And so all learned to speak english, almost all (except for Arcee) adopted male personas, and most acted in a similiar manner to a well-balanced, middle-class white American. Most, that is, except for three quirky outliers-- Jazz, Mudflap and Skids.
Darting secretively down the hallways, cell phone pressed tightly to his ear, Sam knew-- intellectually-- that the twins were merely engaging in a carefully planned act. Yet no matter how hard he tried, he could not imagine either one saying 'indubitably' with a straight face. If it was an act, it was certainly one they enjoyed.
"Yo! Get yo butt in gear, man! Frozen dog shit could move faster than that!"
"Gonna have ta have to bust youse down to double-owe-negative-one if you don't make like a faucet and run!"
"I'm going as fast as I can!" Sam skidded around the next corner, plowing through the red fire door he had been instructed to find without slowing down. "Couldn't you have picked some place closer?!"
"Could've hacked our legs off too, but then ya wouldn't get to play secret agent with the twins!"
Emerging onto the narrow landing of a stairwell, Sam was forced to skid to a stop and grab onto the railing at the shock of hearing Mudflap's voice both over the phone and echoing from the metal walls. Lowering the phone to his shoulder, he leaned his upper body over the rail and looked up at the endless stairs leading to the floors above.
"Psst! Double-owe-zero! Down here."
Following Mudflap's broad urban accent, Sam found the Autobots twins one floor beneath him. The sight of them crammed into the narrow space, stuck almost on top of one another-- bumping the walls and themselves with a jumble of elbows, knees, hands and feet-- made him sputter, inexplicably amused. He was still freaked, wigged out, losing it, but now he was freaked, wigged out, losing it AND entertained.
"Thanks for the support," Skids, partially smushed beneath Mudflap, sulked at his snicker.
Sam flipped the phone shut with his chin and started down the stairs, taking two or three steps at a time. "I aim to please," he panted.
Stopping just short of the tangled mass of robotic limbs, he bent over and planted his hands on his knees, huffing from the strenuous sprint he had undertaken from the lounge to the back stairwell that seemed (to Sam) a mile away from anything at all. During the last two minutes of his run he had not encountered a single person, and even the walls themselves seemed to breathe a neglected air. Though he could have taken a few breaks, or even contained himself to a jog, he had chosen instead to bolt down the hallways for all he was worth, slowing only long enough to be sure he wasn't about to bowl someone over. Any spare second of unoccupied time, even if it was a second spent pausing for breath, was a second in which his mind started to gibber with stark terror and crushing despair (not coming back not coming back, Bee help me!).
"How did you guys manage to fit in here anyway?" he asked between breaths. He didn't really care about the answer, not exactly, but it was something to focus his mind on.
"Ain't you figured it out yet? We got talent fallin off us like spare parts!" Mudflap struggled forward, trying to disentangle himself from his brother. He ended up kicking Skids in the face in the process.
"Yow! Watch it, ya stumble-footed after-burner!"
A green fist lashed out and caught Mudflap in the side, doing no real damage but connecting with a resounding CLANG that rattled Sam's teeth.
"Youse the one blockin up the whole place with yo aft, slagger! That thing bigger than Screamer's ego!" Mudflap retaliated, twisting his brother's arm behind his back and getting him in a head lock. Even more entangled that before, the noisily stuggling pair stumbled into a wall, causing the whole stairwell to rumble.
If they had been human (or if he had been Bumblebee) he would have rushed into the fight, prized them apart, and knocked their heads together. But ten feet shorter and several tons lighter than the yellow scout, Sam settled for pin wheeling his arms and shouted, "Will you two knock it off?! You're making a racket! Everyone's going to know we're here!"
Still crushed in a head lock, Skids piped up, "Secret agent man got a point."
Mudflap smacked the back of his head but grudging released the entraped arm from his grip. "Suck up."
"Bitch."
"Toad face."
"Aft-kisser."
Only space-faring alien robots, Sam reflected with something like awe, could make an exchange of insults sound like terms of endearment. Restored to the spirit of the misson, the Las Vegas Christmas-colored robots moved with relative swiftness and grace to extricate their respective body parts with a minimum of noise. Their hunched frames still filled the corridor, giving it the feeling of being no more than a rat's hole, but no longer did they appear to be contestants in a Twister tournament.
"Alright. Well, I'm here, obviously," he spread his arms to emphasize the fact, "So what's this 'surprise' you guys were talking about? What's going on with Optimus and Thatcher?" His lips quirked, though this time there was no humor in the expression, "Are they dating, or something? Please tell me they're not dating."
"Eeew..." They shuddered in unison. "Ya fried my processer, man!" Skids lamented at the same time that Mudkip muttered, "Did NOT want that image in mah head."
"So then why did you have me rush down here? And if you say 'Sike', I'm going to sic Bumblebee on you," He paused, "No, scratch that. I'll sic Mikaela on you."
"Micky," Mudflap scoffed, "What's the hotty think she gonna do? She don't stand a chance against da mastas!"
The twin robots cackled and bumped their fists together.
Sam let an eery, flat smile spread across his face. "Let's just say she can be very creative with a welding torch."
They froze, then started verbally backpedaling. "Naw, naw! This ain't no joke!" "Serious business here, double-owe-zero."
"And that's another thing-- why did you nick-name me after James Bond?"
Mudflap leaned towards him conspiritally, bringing his wide head so close to Sam's that he could track the minute whirling of the lens-like rings that made up his optics.
"You, me, an him? We got some spyin to do," he said lowly.
Sam's heart started to knock loudly against his ribs, his throat drying to a desert-like consistency.
"You mean that meeting they're having now, right? You want us to eavesdrop on a Optimus and Thatcher while they're talking to Lennox's team?"
"Them?" Skids snorted, "Who'd want to spy on those dried up sticks? Nah, we got somethin much jucier to show you, somethin no one's supposed to know about, 'cept we caught 'em arguing 'bout it."
Mudflap pulled back, straightening up as much as was possible in the confined space.
"See, right 'bout now that meetin should be lettin out-- that's the end of the legit part of all this mess. The stuff some o dem gonna talk 'bout all secret-like after? Not so much."
Sam looked between them dubiously. "And you're going to help me spy on your leader."
"No duh. For offin Megatron, you really ain't too bright."
Mentally shaking himself like a dog shedding water, he ignored the insult and replied, "Cool. Awesome. Nifty. Let's do it."
It was nothing if not fascinating watching the twins attempting to pose as tour guides. Their size limited them to a very circuitous route through the ship, most of the time traveling through stairwells and corridors where the space between the walls was greater to allow the passage of large equipment. Adopting the graceful, fluid stride common to the alien visitors, Mudflap and Skids were able to lope along too fast for Sam to keep up. At such times-- and when they lithely dropped down between floors without bothering to use the stairs-- one of the other of the pair would snatch him up and carry him along. The gentleness of their hands set a strange counterpoint to the brusqueness of their manner; he never felt even the faintest bite of pain.
The observation of their careful handling lead to another, more unnerving observation-- both Mudflap and Skids were strangely possesive. Not in the way that Bumblebee was possesive-- Bumblebee, who had a habit of appointing himself not only Sam's guardian but his potential-friend screener as well, acted possesive the way a...well, the way a lonely alien would snatch up his friend and hiss at anyone else who tried to come near (my friend, my ally, my-- my--). The twins, on the other hand, regarded him as a cross between co-conspirator, amusing thing, and pet.
When at last Mudflap, who had assumed the position of unofficial leader, brought them to a halt in the middle of a corridor facing nothing but a blank wall, Sam was thoroughly sick of being passed around. Smoothing his transformer-wrinkled shirt, he threw a glance around them and said, "Now what?"
"Watch and learn, Padawan!" Skids reached up and touched a boring stretch of metal ceiling, moving his fingers as though tracing an invisible pattern. Just about to suggest that maybe he had a few loose screws rattling around in his head somewhere, Sam gaped as the tips of his fingers transformed into flat-edged tools resembling spackle knives-- which he then effortlessly inserted around the edges of a nearly invisible metal panel. Jiggling the revealed plating loose from its moorings, he pushed it up into the crawl space above and slid it aside.
"All right! Now we're gettin somewhere!" Mudflap enthused, using his brother as a strangely shaped ladder to vault into the enormous duct.
"Pit-spawned slagger! Watch where yo puttin yo feet!"
As the inevitable hand came toward him, Sam submitted docilely to being set into the crook of Skids' arm like an life-sized doll. Tucking the human down against his armor, the neon green transformer leapt after his brother. One inside the shaft, he nudged the panel back into place with his foot. Utter blackness, like the dark of night inside a cave, descended with moth wings over Sam's eyes, and a rush of gratefulness that he had been picked up flooded him. He would never have been able to follow them unaided in the pitch black.
From somewhere to their left Mudflap hissed, "Come on, rust bucket! We ain't go no more time to fool around!"
And Skids started forward into the darkness. For a moment Sam was gripped with panic, heart leaping into his throat at the thought that the robot carrying him-- the several ton robot carrying him-- was wandering around blind and might, at any moment, fall through the ceiling beneath them (ceiling below, floor above, everything is upsidedown/downsideup).
"If you can't see where you're going, I don't want to know," he whispered to his handler. Out of nowhere, something that felt suspiciously like an enormous finger poked him in the back of the head.
"Say, 'infrared scanning' with me, home boy."
"Oh. Okay, now I feel stupid."
Poke, harder this time. "You IS stupid if you can't do somethin this simple. Say 'infrared scanning'!"
Folding his arms over his chest and scowling crossly into the dark, he repeated, "Infrared scanning," and felt like a trained parrot. Ugh.
To his astonishment and humiliation, Skids actually giggled. "Ooo, Freaky. Say it again."
Instead, Sam made a rude gesture in the dark, knowing that the robot could see it with his 'infrared scanning'.
"Now that is just plain mean."
"Shut up!" Mudflap whispered furiously. Sam jumped-- the other robot could not have been more than five feet away. "Youse both idiots! Gabberin like a bunch of femmes-- we gotta be slick o Prime'll drop-kick both our afts an nail 'em to the wall!"
At this point the vent must have constricted-- Sam felt Skids hunch over him as he ducked to squeeze himself through. They continued that way, shuffling awkwardly forward in silence, until Sam glimpsed a spot of not-darkness up ahead.
Something made a clicking noise in the dark, then whirled and whined like a dog whistle ascending in ptich-- and suddenly a faint blue light illuminated Mudflap's silhouette. Since the robot's back was toward Sam, he could not see what sort of device he held that gave off the light. The redish robot signaled with a waved hand to his Sam's lumpy transportation, and Skids scuttled forward, stopping short of the spot of not-darkness. Closer now, Sam recognized it as a slotted grate similar to the kind found at base-board level in homes, though this one was the size of a sewer grate.
Silently, moving with more care than seemed possible for a creature of such size, Mudflap set down the device in his arms beside the grate. To Sam's punch-drunk mind, it somewhat resembled those tapering wooden towers given to babies and used to hold stacks of rings of various sizes and colors. He tapped the device, gave it a sharp twist, and the blue light flared momentarily before settling back into a steady glow.
"Alright, you can unstick yo lips now, Skids."
But it was Sam, struggling slightly to be let down, who spoke first.
"What is that thing?"
"Dis baby here? Only da best sensor nullifier dis side of da Milky Way."
Skids set him on his feet, and Sam cautiously approached the large grate and the device sitting quietly beside it, vaguely fearful that it would suddenly go Ka-BOOM.
When no more information seemed forthcoming, he prompted, "And a sensor nullifier would be....?"
"Means no bot will be able to pick us up on his scanners. 'Less a course he know's we're here and he comes looking for us, in which case we're screwed," Skids answered, crouching down beside him. The three formed a loose semi-circle around the grate. Opening his mouth to ask what they needed a sensor nullifier for, Sam looked down through the grating and answered his own question. Somehow, they had ended up in a vent overlooking a hidden corner of the cargo bay. Fifty feet beneath them sat Optimus in truck mode, neither moving nor speaking nor doing anything mildly note-worthy.
Somehow he knew, without being told, that they were waiting for someone else to arrive.
"And you're sure he doesn't know we're here? He's not like, you know, snickering at us and waiting until our backs are turned to jump up and cut the floor out from under us with that glowing sword of his?"
Skids waved him off. "Not a chance, double-oh-zero. We's slick as black ice-- ain't no one knows where we at."
"I hope you're right," Sam muttered to himself under his breath.
"Oo! Dis side give ya the best shot of the action-- get over here!" Interjected Mudflap excitedly.
The red robot reached for him. Sam could not help the animal reflex that screamed Dark! and Wantstoeatme! that caused him to flinch away slightly. But before the orangy-red appendage could pick him up, two hands closed around his rib cage from behind and lifted him up and away. Skid held him at arms length away from Mudflap, using a foot to the face to hold the other Autobot at bay as he attempted to lunge across the grating.
"My human! Go find ya own!" And skids made a noise very similiar to a defiant raspberrry.
Torn between fuming in outrage and slapping a hand over his face in exasperation, Sam glanced back down through the grating to check on Optimus (just in case)-- and saw Thatcher rapidly approaching the disguised alien leader.
"Enough!" He snapped, pointing down at the scene far below when both twins looked at him in confusion. Abadoning their fight as though it had never taken place, Skids and Mudflap straightened up and leapt lithely back to their places, Skids taking the time to set Sam back beside the grate from where he had snatched him.
Holding his breath, Sam leaned forward to peer through the slatted bars, feeling the two aliens do the same on either side of him.
Looking as stiffly enraged as a man can look when viewed from above, Thatcher stalked towards the parked Peterbilt. His polished shoes tapped out a staccato rythm on the metal planking. Surprisingly enough, he came sans briefcase or clipboard (or a helper bearing the two items), carrying with him only an air of crackling frustration tinted with a kind of helpless resignation. It was like watching a kid jump into a boxing ring with the heavy weight camp-- the kid knew he was going to lose, and that fact frustrated him all the more, fueling his defiance. The feeling was a familiar one to Sam. (No where to run, no where to hide, a metal demon stalking towards him-- give me the cube, boy!)
"You are the most stubborn jackass I have ever met," Thatcher stated with authority to the silent truck.
Sam choked on air; Skids pounded him on the back.
In any other scenario, telling a driver-less truck that it was a jackass would be ample reason to stick the name-caller in the looney bin on suspicion of drunkeness. But the incident unfolding in the cargo bay was not any other scenario-- the truck, despite appearences, was not inanimate, and Thatcher was as stone cold sober as a priest on Sunday.
The highly decorated General stopped ten feet from Optimus' front bumper, clasping his hands behind his back. As serene as ever, Optimus did not rise to the taunt.
"Some would consider that a compliment, General."
"But you know damn well it isn't, so I say again: You are one stubborn SOB," He grunted, "I'll have you know you've gotten Washington stirred up like a nest of angry hornets over this. I had to turn off my phone so I wouldn't have to hear a million repetitions of the same old questions."
To Sam's surprise, Optimus rumbled in a way that could have been a laugh.
"I have full confidence in your ability to handle it."
"Yeah, well I don't," Thatcher refuted. He ran a hand through his hair, just as if he were a little bit nervous, "I don't have the authority to do what you're asking-- Hell, I don't have the political pull to even get one foot in the door with this!"
"But it must be done, General," Optimus' voice, though soft, held a steely note of resolution. Determination. Like granite. "And it must be done soon, before we dock in India. I have no desire to cause an international incident by being charged with kidnapping."
Sam's heart missed a beat, stuttered, and picked up in double time, thudding so quickly that it hurt. He leaned down until his forehead rested on the grating, hooking his fingers around the slats. (Breathe, remember to breathe)
"Which is why I had to ask the slimey bastard for his help, as much as I might wish to throw him over the side. He has the connections and the know-how you need if you're so damned determined to do this thing.
"I am," Optimus affirmed, then hesitated. "Although the fact that he has demonstrated considerable animostiy towards us in the past seems to indicate that he would be unwilling to help us now."
"Us? What 'us'? This is your problem, Prime-- your quest, your shitstorm."
There was a long pause, then; "You are not as hard-hearted as you would like me to believe."
Thatcher swore vehemently, using vocabulary so colorful that he must have been a sailor earlier in life.
"Look, I'm not saying I agree with you or what you're doing....but in the interests of diplomacy, I know a few marines that are good at keeping their mouths shut if I need to dangle him over the side as presuasion."
"I thank you," Optimus answered the unspoken affirmation of support.
"What on God's green earth are you up to now, Prime?" An angry voice called from somewhere out of sight, swiftly growing in volume to accompany the approaching rat-a-tat of another pair of shoes. Sam recognized the second man by his voice long before he strutted into view-- Galloway. Unlike Thatcher, Galloway carried a bulging briefcase in one hand and a wad of files in the other, files which he was currently involved in waving angrily through the air. "General Thatcher, I insist that this- this parody of a joke be terminated immediately!"
Posture radiating a distinct coldness, Thatcher turned from Optimus to observe the advancing Galloway, nonplused by his theatrical gesturing.
"I assure you, sir, that this is not a joke."
Sam blinked at the use of the respectful term, then remembered from sophmore politics class that all army hierarchy was technically subservient to the civilian government. Thatcher wasn't brown-nosing-- he was showing the minimum respect required.
Galloway motioned violently towards Optimus, not even having the decency to face him-- as if he were not there, or as if he were unworthy of being faced.
"Really? Then how about a psychotic delusion? He just came back from the dead-- how do we know he didn't lose a few circuits in the process?"
For an instant, Sam wished more than anything else that Jetfire was there to teleport him to the floor of the cargo bay so that he could beat the bastard senseless.
"If you wish," Optimus interrupted, "My medic can provide you with a detailed report on my physical and mental state-- though I am sure you would find that the only thing I am lacking is time to rest."
"One robot insisting that another robot isn't crazy," Galloway mocked in an airy tone, throwing up his hands, "Because of course that is an objective way of proving relative sanity."
Thatcher, hands still clenched tightly behind his back, stepped up into Galloway's personal space and glared down at the smaller man.
"How about," he copied the other man's mocking lilt, "You do the right thing for once in your miserable life and either help us or resign so that someone else can?"
"You cannot force me to resign," Galloway responded stiffly. Thatcher gaced him with a distinctly predatory smile.
"Of course not. You'll simply be fired when it comes to light that you cannot act without extreme bias towards the very people we are trying so very hard not to piss off."
Galloway stiffened. "The President--"
"The President may just get down on his knees and lick Prime's feet in gratitude. Or hadn't you heard that it's no longer fashionable to try to undermine human-Autobot relations?"
Galloway glanced from Thatcher to Optimus and back again, face more pallid than alabaster.
"Very well," he finally said. Stiff. Faint. "I'll make a few calls. See what I can do."
He jumped when Optimus spoke; "Whatever needs to be done must be done by tomorrow night. I cannot delay telling him any longer."
As though struck by a bolt of lightning, Sam jerked backwards from the grate, scrambling away from the sight of Optimus, Thatcher and Galloway fighting over something about him. Logic whispered that Optimus did not seem to be plotting to harm him, yet instinctual fear washed over him in wave after wave of terror that they were planning on turning him in, arresting him like some wanted criminal ('--still hunting for the illusive Samuel James Witwicky--') and turning him over to the mercy of the masses-- or the mercy of the Decepticons (--Megatron, starcream-- slashing claws, fangs snapping together near his cheek-- 'I'll let you be my pet'--).
Sinking through water, sinking through air (can't breathe), he flailed away on his hands and knees-- an accidently kicked over the sensor nullifier. The machine whirled, clicked, and the blue light went out. Their web of protection vanished. Almost at once, the sound of a lightning fast transformation echoed from below and Optimus cried to the two humans, "Run!"
"Shit! Shit! Shit!" The twins were screaming, scampering away, and Sam was left flailing like a fish. A powerful electric whine of a cannon charging up, and with an almighty shriek of tearing, burning metal a searing bolt of blue energy ripped through the vent beside him, missing incinerating him by scant centimeters. The concussive force of the blast lifted him up and slammed him into the side of the vent-- he cried out as he felt something in his arm give way with a sickening snap. Then he was falling, slipping through the hole in the vent and plummeting towards the concrete floor fifty feet below.
Before he even had time to feel fear of splattering into a pile of human goo, a familiar yellow hand snatched him out of the air-- and slammed him up against a metal crate, fingers curling around him in a cage of claws. Sam stared in horror at the cruel lines of Bumblebee's battle mask, the mask that turned the friendly Bee into the Hornet (my ally, my friend, my--), as his guardian angel in robotic form pulled back his cannon and began to charge it for a second blast.
Terror-- stark, pants-wetting terror-- often comes without a sound, without even a scream. It was all happening so fast, too fast, and he had not yet had time to process what was going on around him. But as he stared down the humming barrel of Bumblebee's ion cannon, terror overcame him, and though he uttered not a sound, on the inside he began to scream (Bee--Bee--Bumblebee, no!!)
The moment stretched and held-- a sliver of time frozen into crystal, trapped in amber. Slowly, so slowly, his identity began to dawn on the yellow robot, and the glow deep in the pit of Bee's cannon faded away. The harsh pressure of Bumblebee's hand around him retreated, becoming a gentle hold rather than a restraining grip.
"...Sam?" The yellow scout whispered, only Bee once more.
"Um..." he shuddered out, "...is this a bad time?"
Before he could blink, the Autobot pulled him into his arms. The motion wasn't a hug, not really. Too many metal lumps and hard angles to make a Bee snuggle-bear. But he found himself craddled by the giant robot, held with infinite gentleness as Bee crouched to the floor and drew him in against him, curling his body around the vulnerable, fragile human as if to make himself a living shield.
"Sam..." Bee murmured again, voice rough, broken, trembling.
"Um, Bee?" He grated, his own voice wavering so hard that he doubted anyone but his robot guardian could understand him. "My arm, I think it's broken--"
In another invisible movement, Bumblebee yanked himself away from his charge-- still holding him, but not longer wrapped fearfully around him.
"Sam, I...."
"My arm," Sam repeated firmly, content to lie there limply for a moment staring at the smoking ruins of the ceiling, even if a metal plate was digging painfully into the back of his head, "Could you scan it, see if it's broken? I might need to go get a cast put on it," The trembling moved from his voice to his whole body; his teeth chattered, his toes twitched and jerked, "N-not that I like casts, they're kinda dorky, but it hurts like hell..."
There was a slight, almost unnoticable pause in the sound of Bee's inner workings, and then he replied, "Yes, your arm is broken. Sam, please--"
"Okay," he cut off the broken plea, "It's okay. I just need....could you let me up, please? I need to have a word with Optimus and then I need to get my arm fixed."
By this time, the other occupants of the room had sufficiently recovered from the shock of seeing Bumblebee's swift and brutal response to flock around the scout and his boy. Rachet and Ironhide must have heard the commotion and come running-- he was vaguely aware of them standing behind Bumblebee, furiously engaged in doing....things. Skids and Mudflap had slunk back in as well, looking as though they expected to be blasted at any moment (though if the angry clip of Rachet's voice was anything to go by, they just might).
Slowly, unwillingly, Bumblebee helped Sam to his feet. He swayed in place for a moment, steadied by a hestitant (trembling?) hand across his shoulders. Then he glanced blearily at Optimus, who was staring at him with open amazement as the wickedly sharp blade extending from his forearm retracted beneath an armor plate.
"...Sam." Probably the most un-intelligent thing he had ever heard come out of the wise robot's vocalizer.
"My arm hurts," he stated without prompting, only remembering after the fact to craddle it to his chest as if it did actually hurt (which it did). "Bee says it's broken. So I'm going to go get that fixed, and then you're going to tell me what Rachet and Thatcher and everyone else has been telling you to tell me."
He blinked again, looking around at all the people staring at him in confoundment, not really seeing any of them save for Bee and Optimus.
"Sam...." Optimus began. Filled to the brim and overflowing, Sam went off on him.
"God damn it, what is it with everyone saying my name and then trailing off!! Oh, poor Sam, let's all get together and throw him a big pity-party while plotting things behind his back!! Things that, I don't know, involve his life!! No-no, can't tell him, he's just a kid, he needs to let those people who know what they're doing handle it!!"
He stopped, breathing in spasmodically, making strange little gasping noises in his throat.
"So I'm going to go get a cast for my arm now. And Optimus?"
The robot went to his knees, giving him his undivided attention.
"When I get back, I hope you trust me enough to tell me what is going on. I saved your life-- the least you could do is inform me of all the ways in which mine is being flushed down the toilet."
Brushing off Rachet's attempts at ministration, he turned and walked away from them, away from Bee, away from Optimus. And kept walking.
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Far above the surface of the earth, above the layers of thunderhead clouds and above the wisps of ice clouds, above all the thinning strata of the atmosphere, a silent monolith hung in orbit around the blue planet.
A satellite, but not. A carbon copy of one made by human hands, every detail precisely replicated except the color. This satellite was black, the color of the empty spaces between the stars.
Alive, and far more intelligent than the fly-brain software running its counterpart, the black satellite silently observed the world beneath it, ever watchful. Trillions of gigabytes of data flowed through it every second-- cell phone calls, e-mails, security cameras; bank records, military records, school records. Searching. Many, many references to a previous target, though no useful information. A cold trail. Still searching-- news broadcasts, radio broadcasts, websites.
--and for approximately 42 seconds, a new glimpse of the previous target, Samuel James Witwicky, appeared in the stream of data. 42 seconds, enough time to scan the video clip 11,234 times with its higher level processors. Analysis of data: 78% complete. Conclusion: Unusable. Location still unknown.
Analysis of data: 94% complete. New conclusion reached: Probable secondary target. Emotional connection to previous primary target. Searching.... location unknown. Conclusion: Unusable.
A burst of new data trickled down one antenna, originating not from the planet it watched but from the newly constructed Decepticon base hidden in Saturn's shadow. ::Work on symbiote, designation: Ravage, 88% complete. Probability of full recovery-- 98%. Addendum: Come on, Soundwave! Don't be such a stiff. Just one little question, that's all. Why did the chicken cross th--::
Communique terminated.
New analysis of data needed. Review tape. Logic processors circling through various plans, options, ideas, weighing the validity of each.
New Conclusion: Data status-- usable.
A channel opened, sent off a brief message to a Decepticon, designation: Starscream, relaying the proposed plan.
Waiting....
Response recieved. ::Excellent work, Soundwave. Continue.::
The drifting satellite remained as silent as ever, but within its wires a new message cycled. A change of status.
Target acquired: Mikaela Banes
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Yay! Confrontation scene coming up next chapter! All will be revealed... *waves hands mysteriously*