Transformers: Vapour Trails
Author's Note: First, I'd like to appologize to my readers, assuming I still have any. I'm in my third year of university, majoring in English. This means I have TONS of essays to write, books to read for school, and very little time to work on my own stuff. Sometimes, I literally can only write a sentence a week. Thanks for your understanding.
Also, for the first time in my life, I have made a school sports team! I'm on the Brock University Fencing Team, in Women's Epee, which has really, really helped with this chapter, and with my action scenes in general. In thanks, this chapter is dedicated to my teammates on the fencing team. Brock Badgers rock!
Special thanks also to Lady Tecuma, Litahatchee, and Hearts of Eternity for your patience, encouragement, and editing help. In fact, I'm visiting Tecuma and Lita in Florida right now! (Yay to shorts in February!) You're the best!
The background song for this chapter is "Bodies" (aka "Let the Bodies Hit the Floor") by Drowning Pool. If you want to add a little music, start the song at the start of the last scene.
Also, if you happen to spot any area in this or previous chapters where I have missed changing Nightbird's name in my editing, please let me know in a PM, not in your review, and say exactly where you spotted the inconsistancy. (i.e. chapter 3, scene 2). I've been trying my best to catch every instance, but unlike my protagonists, I'm only human. Cut me some slack! :P
I hope everyone enjoys this chapter, and thanks again for reading!
Chapter 4b: Let the Bodies Hit the Floor!
"Ohshit." The synonym for human exhaust had quickly become one of Frenzy's favourite Earth curses, and it seemed especially appropriate for any situation involving Ironhide. "Gotta workfast!"
Several other choice words, from Cybertronian, English, and the myriad of languages Frenzy had learned since he had first come online, entered and left his processors in rapid succession as the frustration he felt towards the computer in front of him grew exponentially. "Slaggin'pieceofJunkionscrap!" It had been sparklings' play to hack into the base's network, much simpler than even the relatively easy task of hacking Air Force One, but no matter what he tried, the same annoying message kept presenting itself: "File Not Found".
"Fuck!" Another favoured word – especially well-liked for its versatility. "Fuckfuckityfuckfuckfuck! 'FileNot Found' myaft!"
For a creature Created and trained to hack ever-improving Autobot computer systems, the sheer simplicity of these human computers, barely above the cave wall scratching they had made around the same time Megatron had crashed into this Primus-forsaken rock, made them all the more annoying. Momentarily forgetting that this was supposed to be a stealth mission, Frenzy's foot claws started to prick tiny holes in the hardwood floor of the base commander's office as he typed faster than the human eye could follow, lines of ones and zeroes flashing by on the monitor equally quick. Stupid humans. In real computing, things were much more complicated than just on or off, yes or no, right or wrong…
However, yes or no was precisely what he was looking for, with "no" being by far the most prominent answer. Suddenly, the typing, scanning and the inevitable chattering to himself Frenzy always did while hacking, stopped, as one tiny line of coding caught his attention. All eight of Frenzy's icy-blue optical lenses expanded. This particular line of ones and zeroes told him that a large amount of data had recently been wiped from the military network. Not moved or locked away, but completely erased. Only this obscure line of code remained to indicate that anything had ever been there at all.
"Whatwhatwhat fuckery is this?" Screeching a string of Cybertronian curses that would make a Combaticon rust, Frenzy scanned the entire system in one massive fury, wires sparking, random letters popping off the keyboard as Frenzy pushed the archaic machine to its physical limits. "Finally!" One tiny, forgotten fragment of a text file presented itself:
"For more info, seeseesee analog … what'sthat?" Here was a word Frenzy was unfamiliar with. Using his newly self-upgraded, Barricade-blocking-proof internal routers, he looked up the definition on that ever-so-useful human Internet. " valuealongacontinuousscale … the slag? Physical representatatation ofdata? Physicphysicphysical? How the slag doyoudothat?"
Utterly confused, Frenzy did the only thing he could think of: typed "analog" into the base's positioning system. After nearly half a breem, a ridiculously long time to wait for data, even with the computer barely holding together, an answer appeared on the now cracked and smoking screen. A section of the map's graphics lit up.
"'File Room' thatthatthat's just down the hall!" Leaving behind the now-derelict Dell, Frenzy scurried out of the base commander's office, and down a side hallway. He easily hacked the electronic lock for the door to the mysterious file room, and scurried inside excitedly. What surely Cybertronian-inspired technological toy would be just waiting for him to sink his little claws into?
Frenzy's antennae drooped. There was no computer here, no laptop, not even an electrical outlet. The only things drawing power in the room, besides himself, were the faintly flickering florescent light panels in the ceiling, even then only barely, with two thirds of the cylindrical bulbs burnt out. Covered in a layer of fine, gray dust, were rows and rows of plain, black-painted, aluminum monoliths. Curious, Frenzy reached out for what appeared to be a handle of some kind sticking out from the nearest one.
He jumped back, startled, as the drawer slid out. What he found inside was definitely no supercomputer. Instead, there were layers of some soft, flimsy material which stuck on his claws, ripping, when he tried to pick it up. Frenzy remembered seeing something like this before; one of the fleshlings on their pitiful leader's aircraft had been reading a document made out of the same kind of material, only flimsier. What was it called again? "Papppper? Yeah! That's ititit!" On the "paper", markings matching the same peculiar symbols the fleshlings used in their text files were written. He read it aloud. "Invoice: 100 000 gal. XA-574 engine coolant forforfor f-series jets…isthisthis analog?"
Frenzy could not believe it. This was how the squishies hoped to hide their data from hackers – by storing it in this inefficient, time and space-consuming, easily destroyed, antique excuse for a medium? Well, it would not keep this hacker out! "Anaanaanalog!" Snarling what he now considered to be the worst expletive the English language had to offer, Frenzy dove faceplate first into the nearest file cabinet's drawer …
"Is something wrong with your plane, Carol? I thought I heard the engine sputter for a second there."
"You know these old birds, Will."
"Actually, being a groundpounder and all, I don't."
"Well, they've got their kinks."
"I'm sure …" Hide growled. The old soldier had not stopped staring at Carol, grimacing was more like it. As rude as he was acting, at least Ironhide was putting a little more effort into the "disguise" aspect of being a Robot in Disguise, as he had remembered to open his door before letting his holoform exit the truck this time. Will grimaced himself, remembering how long the shouting match between Rob Epps and Ironhide had lasted after that little mishap – Epps yelling for being "freaked the fucked out", Ironhide in turn yelling something at the tech sergeant in his own, electronic-sounding language that Will would rather not know the translation to.
Will's train of thought was broken, as a pair of ground techs brushed past him, luckily to the opposite side of him than Ironhide's holoavatar, to roll up the dismounting ladder to the side of Carol's plane. Carol briefly nodded at the techs, but made no move to leave her cockpit. Instead, she was giving Hide a matching unfriendly look to the one he was giving her. "That's not exactly a regulation vehicle, Sergeant," she said.
"It serves my purposes quite well." Hide grumbled, then reluctantly added "ma'am" when Will kicked the one of the truck's tires.
"Where do you pick these guys up, Will?" Carol asked, obviously not impressed with Hide's lack of military manners.
"Like I said, he's Special Ops. You know what those guys are like." Will tried to explain. "One sec, I think I left my PDA in the truck." Allowing Carol to begin her post-flight checklist, Will headed back towards the Topkick, and jerked his head at Hide for him to "follow". "What's the matter with you?" he hissed as he opened the truck's door to pretend look for his non-existent handheld.
"You know, I could have just left my holoavatar over there." Ironhide argued, his robotic voice coming from the truck radio's speaker's rather than from the simulated soldier, which was still staring at Carol intently.
"Why? So you keep staring at her like a cat watching a mouse? I said you could trust her, already! Cut the anti-social!"
"I don't recall being 'social' as being part of our arrangement here."
"You're the one who wanted to be the Autobot military liaison."
"Only because Prime's too busy making sure your idiotic government actually does disband Sector Seven, Bumblebee's spark-sitting the younglings, and Ratchet's …"
"…Still trying to piece Jazz back together?" Will asked quietly.
"Slagger doesn't know when to give up." Ironhide grumbled. "The last thing we need right now is another human - "
"Getting in your way?"
Ironhide's holoavatar glared at him. "Stop finishing my sentences. Look, just get this friend of yours out of her plane and back to base, so one, we can recruit her, and two, we can stop this stupid game. Being a truck is one thing, pretending to be a human is fraggin' degrading!"
"You know, I was kind of hoping my species would maybe meet 'beloved pet' status with you guys." Will started. "I could be like a German Shepard or something."
Ironhide – both the truck and his holoavatar – made a sound suspiciously like a snort. "Right now, you barely make 'hamster'."
"Hamster? Come on! At least give me something with some bite to it."
"Mute it, or you'll be downgraded to 'goldfish'." Ironhide said. "And another thing: Carol's body temperature is two point oh-four percent higher than normal for human females."
"…so?"
"It's suspicious."
"For Christ's sake, Hide! Now you're just nitpicking!" Will groaned.
"I am not. If you want someone to pick parasites off your skin, ask Epps. I hear it's a bonding ritual for your not-so-distant biological relatives."
"That's not …" Will began, then shook his head. "Forget it. Look, she's probably just excited from flying. Pilots get that way; it's some sort of thrill for them to be in the air, from what Carol's always told me."
"Sounds like a slaggin' Seeker."
"A what?"
"A particularly annoying kind of Decepticon." Ironhide pointedly ignored Will's subsequent glare. "Just be careful." With no further comment, his holoavatar started to walk back towards Carol's plane.
Will closed – or rather slammed – the door to the truck, and followed. "I'm telling you, there's nothing to worry about."
Scorponok poked his head out of the sand below one of the jeeps parked just off the air base's tarmac, and watched the screen from Frenzy's entry window blow back and forth in the desert wind, hanging by one hinge. Frenzy had been in the base for nearly three breems now - ten earth "minutes", from his vague understanding of such things. Either way, it was much longer than it would usually take the little silver mech to hack even a sophisticated Autobot computer system, never mind the squishies' toys. He chirped in frustration, missing Blackout's more direct way of getting information.
A loud crash shook the arachnoid back to attention as the screen finally gave way to gravity. Startled, he hid behind one of the jeep's tires, barely daring to peek out in the direction of his Mistress, and the Autobot and his fleshling pet that she was trying to distract. The human turned his head briefly towards the noise …
And a flash of recognition burned through Scorponok's memory banks.
Kill them.
The order had been simple, but efficient, like all of Blackout's orders. Kill the humans fleeing the base, every last one of them …
Scorponok lying beneath the sand; the pain of his physical wounds were nothing next to the shame he felt for failing Blackout …
Blackout scooping him up in his massive arms, chirping to him quietly, soothing him, promising to tear apart all of the fleshling fraggers who had dared to hurt him…
Stay here Scorponok. I'll be back soon …
Blackout had not come back. He would never come back. And somehow, Scorponok knew it was this human's fault!
For an astrosecond, conflict racked Scorponok's simple processor. Nightbird had said to stay here, to wait for Frenzy.
Although Nightbird was kind and caring, although she had saved Scorponok's life, she had only been his partner for about an orn. How could that compare to the mech who had brought him online, who had cared for him and protected him for so many vorns, who was a part of Scorponok's very spark?
Kill them. Kill them all.
His optics shining with a murderous red glint, he sunk back under the sand.
Scorponok always obeyed.
Nightbird's holoavatar met her opponent's irritating scrutiny with an annoyed stare of her own. "Found your PDA?" She asked the human, her avatar's holographic eyes not leaving Ironhide's fittingly decrepit avatar's for an astrosecond, although her own sensors were firmly locked on the Topkick himself.
"Um, no. I must have left it back home or something," Will replied lamely. From what Nightbird understood about human facial expressions, he looked like he did not even believe his own words himself … like he was ashamed to be lying to his "friend". If Nightbird could have used her faceplates in this configuration, she would have smirked. Primitive social conventions could be so useful.
Forcing her holoavatar to turn its head towards Will, in a gesture that apparently reassured humans that speakers were indeed paying attention to them, Nightbird casually asked, "so what gives? Your friend's acting like he's never seen a Stealth before. That's surprising for 'Special Ops'."
"You're acting like I should be impressed." The "sergeant" countered.
Nightbird carefully adjusted her tone. "You should be. Only the best pilots can keep these beauties in the air, right Will?"
Will took a step back and held up one hand. "Groundpounder, remember? I'll take your word for it."
"Anyway," Hide interrupted. "We need to talk to you about … an unusual mission. Come with us." The avatar walked back to "his" truck, the door swinging open slightly before the avatar's hand had touched the handle, something a human would not have noticed. To Nightbird's trained sensors, however, Ironhide might as well have painted his faction symbol on the top of his hood.
Slag! Her holoavatar could only move a few mechanometers away from her frame, plus it had to stay within the line of sight of her projector. Not to mention that even a comparatively dense, trigger-happy Autobot like Ironhide, infamous for solving problems with his cannons as opposed to his processor, could tell the difference between a human and a weightless hologram. As she tried to fight the sense of panic threatening to overwhelm her systems, Nightbird crossed her holoavatar's arms. She had to make her excuse look believable from the human's perspective, while distracting both him and Ironhide from her real motives. An idea came to mind, something that almost always worked with her own faction. "No offence, Will, but your friend here has no idea how to ask a lady out. If you and Sarah want to set me up that badly, you can do better than him."
"I've had better than you." Ironhide retorted. He made no effort to hide the disgust in his tone.
Not that Nightbird found the idea any less disgusting. However, if one thing could muddle the thinking of males of all species, it was the suggestion of sex. "I seriously doubt it."
"I don't." Ironhide was proving to be a frustrating exception the rule. .
"You guys, stop." Will interrupted. "Seriously, we've got to talk to you; it won't take long."
"Why can't you tell me here?"
"It's confidential." Ironhide said gruffly before Will could respond.
Nightbird spread her holoavatar's arms wide, indicating the empty hanger. The last of the dayshift's F-15s had left on patrol and the other stealth pilots were long finished their post-flight checks. "What, do you think the planes are going to gossip? Whatever you have to say, you can say it here."
Hide snorted. "Let's just say I'm not taking any chances with these relics."
"Relics! This coming from a guy driving a rustbucket GMC, of all things. Don't you know what that stands for?"
"'Glorious motorized classic'." Hide said smugly.
"How about 'got mechanic coming?'"
"Carol, cut it out. This isn't like you." Will interrupted. "Hide, cool it! Carol really likes her Stealths …" Will tried to explain.
"I don't care what she –" Hide started. Then, his avatar's eyes narrowed as a small, malevolent grin formed on its face. "Just why can't you leave that ugly flying geometry experiment for an astrosec?" he asked "Carol" pointedly.
"Hide!" Will yelled.
"I don't know, why don't drive something besides that busted up old gas-guzzling monster?" Nightbird yelled, before she could stop herself. "Astrosec" … oh shit … wait, that doesn't necessarily mean anything. Nightbird forced herself to calm down; she had to gain back the human's sympathy. "I'm sorry Will," she began, the words sounding more alien to her than anything else she had said. "I've been under a lot of stress, with the brass scrapping the Stealth program, the jackass I have to work under next …"
The human offered her a small smile. "Yeah, Lieutenant Colonel Latta, I've heard horror stories about him, even among us groundpounders. Reminds me of back in boot camp; remember that one drill sergeant we had?"
"Yeah, was he ever a jerk, making us do a hundred pushups for every little thing." Nightbird laughed nostalgically. Carol's memory files were proving their usefulness.
"What was his name again?"
"Drill Sergeant Townsend." Nightbird answered automatically.
"It's amazing that you can remember something from so many cycles ago." Ironhide remarked icily.
You're going to have to do better than that. Nightbird thought. "Will you stop with the weird words already? 'Astrosec'? 'Cycles'? What are you, some kind of NASA washout?" These amateur traps were really starting to irritate her.
"It is kind of weird that you'd remember stuff like that. I'd totally forgotten the Sarge's name." Will remarked, though he did not sound suspicious.
"It's weird the things you remember." Nightbird answered. She was certain the look of annoyance on Ironhide's avatar's face reflected the actual Autobot's growing impatience. Good. "So Will," she began, continuing to distract the human. "How are things with you and Sarah anyway? She must be happy to have you home," she said, placing a knowing look on her avatar's face. Her research indicated that humans could talk about their family units for excessively long periods of time, if they were encouraged to do so. Hopefully, such a discussion would bore Ironhide enough that he would leave.
Will's face lit up at the mention of his mate. Good, her research seemed to be accurate. "She's really happy, and she's not the only one. You really should come over and see Annabelle sometime."
"Annabelle?"
"Didn't I tell you? Well, you've been overseas, so maybe not. Sarah and I have a new baby girl! Here, I've got pictures in my wallet." As Will fumbled around in his pockets, Nightbird looked up the vaguely familiar term in the research archives of her memory banks, not daring to access the humans' internet with Ironhide so close. Girl … a young female human. Baby …
A baby was a newly Created human, a small, helpless, squirming little thing, with no preprogramming whatsoever, unable to walk, to talk, to even feed itself, communicating through cries and other unintelligent noises, completely dependent upon its parents.
A new life. A tiny little beacon of potential, of hope.
Something that her own kind, with the destruction of the Allspark, would never experience again.
Unless…
"A … baby?" Nightbird stuttered. Instinctively, automatically, she sucked air into her intakes, a Cybertronian equivalent of a gasp.
In less than an astrosecond, she realized what she had done.
Ironhide's avatar smiled a predatory grin. "Will, get away from the plane." He ordered, as the Topkick started to Transform, an all-too familiar sound filling the air.
"Hello? Anybody in there?" The young private turned the doorknob to the filing room carefully, surprised to find it unlocked. "If y'all are, get the door, will ya?" He pushed the door open with his knee, as a stack of the Base Commander's files filled one of his arms, and he held a half-empty coffee pot with his other hand, trying to reach for the room's light switch while avoiding spilling the now-lukewarm liquid. He had probably just forgotten to lock the door after fetching the last batch of files, and cursed under his breath. Good thing Colonel Stark was home sick today, otherwise he'd get an earful for that.
Finally switching on the main room lights, he dragged his feet over to the nearest cabinet to throw his stack on the top, nearly slipping on a bunch of papers scattered across the floor in front of it. "Damnit!" Shoving his stack on top of the cabinet, he kneeled down, put the coffee pot down beside him and picked up a handful of papers. A few more choice words escaped under his breath as he examined the mess; he knew full well who would have to clean it up.
"Son of a bit …" he stopped in mid-swear, as he noticed that the next cabinet over also had a pile of papers scattered in front of it, as did the next one, and the next. It looked like the entire contents of the filing room had been pulled out and blown around the room like autumn leaves from a Land of Accounting. He froze, and a scratching sound caught his ear from the back of the room.
Drawing his pistol, the young private quietly made his way towards the sound. He crouched behind a cabinet, using it for cover, and peered around the corner.
The sound was coming from inside the third-last cabinet in the room, the scratching noises accompanied by muffled, almost electronic-sounding muttering as papers were tossed out of the cabinet by whatever was inside. The private's eyebrows raised in confusion as he distinctly heard several word that would be more at home in the barracks than in a file room, along with "analog", for some reason. A flash of something silvery and metallic caught the private's eye; some sort of robot? He shook his head, thinking he had spent far too many nights watching old science fiction movies.
"Al…alright, come on out of there with your hands up, ya hear? Now!" The private tried his best to sound commanding. He pointed his gun at the cabinet, trying desperately to stop the shaking of his hands.
He almost lost his grip - on his gun and on his bladder - as four clawed, metal arms suddenly sliced their way out from the cabinet, and maniacal, chattering laughter answered him from inside. "Stupidstupidstupid squishy! Youdienow! Heeheeheeheeheeheehee!"
Forgetting his training in one surreal moment, the private dropped his gun and ran for his life.
With the sound of gunfire bouncing off the cabinets behind him, his feet slipping on the scattered papers, he finally saw the thick, lockable, bulletproof door in sight. Just a few more steps … and then there was a sharp, piercing pain at the back of his head, a sickening, hot wetness.
His vision going red, the private managed to reach out towards the fire alarm next to the light switches. The last sound he heard was the base-wide alarm going off, a comforting welcome to oblivion.
"'Ironhide, what the hell!" Will yelled as the Topkick Transformed. No point of continuing this ruse now. He turned to see Carol frozen in her cockpit, a look of horror plastered on her face … Jesus! She wasn't even breathing!
"Carol!" He ran up the dismounting ladder. "Carol, it's okay! I know it doesn't look like it, but Ironhide's a friend, really." No reaction. "Carol?" Will reached out to put a hand on his friend's shoulder …
Only to have it pass right through her.
"Will! Get away from there now! That's not your friend!" Ironhide boomed. His transformation sequence complete, the giant mech stood in front of the plane, the tips of his cannons glowing bright blue with plasma energy just waiting to erupt, into … into…
It couldn't be possible. Not Carol, not his old boot camp friend, Sarah's high school classmate, their Maid of Honour at their wedding, Annabelle's middle namesake …
"Captain Lennox." Ironhide's voice was now a low, dangerous growl. "Move, now."
"I … Ironhide …" His head turned towards the giant mech, only to see a the concrete beneath him collapse suddenly, then explode outwards just as Ironhide stumbled backwards, explode in a horrifyingly-familiar way …
"Ah shit, no! 'Hide!" Will yelled as the scorpion-shaped horror he had thought they had finished off in Qatar burst out from under Ironhide in a very unwanted instance of deja-vù. Will leaped off the ladder, barely missing the laser fired from the scorpion's tail, directly at his head.
He landed flat on his back on the hanger floor, just as the Carol's plane made an increasingly familiar noise.
Another man would have stood, transfixed, and probably would have got himself killed, as the Stealth reformed itself. Angular panels became armour, long, humanoid legs emerged, appearing to "wear" practical, military-like boots, unlike the bird-like legs of that other jetformer, wings folded and jutted out from shoulders, decorative, yet shield-like and functional, the cockpit slid against the back of the head momentarily, before sliding forward, covering the visored, robotic face like ... a ninja? No, more like a fencer's mask, an eerie, faceless look. The fencer motif was complete with the extension of a long, thin, rapier-like sword appearing in one clawed hand, a shorter, bladed pistol-like weapon in the other.
Will Lennox, however, was no ordinary man. He was a US Army Ranger, with probably more combat experience with Decepticons than any other human on Earth. As such, he spared the robot that used to be his friend's plane just a passing glance, trusting Ironhide to take care of it, as he fired his pistol at the scorpion-bot, while getting up and running towards the main base's armoury. He kept professional, focused on his goal, even with the boom of Ironhide's massive cannons going off behind him, the clang of Fencer's sword against the Autobot's armour, and the occasional techno-peppering sound of laser fire from his pistol-blade when his sword evidently was not enough.
Joining the chorus was the base's fire alarm, and a squad of heavily-armed soldiers ran out of the main building, pursuing another blast from the past – the same little silver gremlin that had attacked them at Hoover Dam. The small robot was carrying a pile of papers in its arms, dropping them occasionally and running back to grab them while trying to avoid gunfire from the soldiers. Remarkably, he managed to avoid every bullet, as the hyper little spaz seemed to be moving even faster than it did at Hoover Dam.
Will did not have time to shout a warning to the soldiers before the Scorpion mowed down its ally's pursuers in a barrage of alien machine gun fire.
"Heeheeheeheehee! Get'em, Scorponok! Squishiesgosquish!" He heard the Gremlin cheer.
Will grabbed one of the dead soldier's M-16s, dove behind a jeep for cover, and fired at the little monster. He smirked; the base's soldiers had at least been smart enough to equip their guns with sabot rounds, as one burned through the Gremlin's light leg armour, leaving a satisfying little hole. He knew that would not work for long – already the Scorpion was skittering murderously across the tarmac towards him – but he had to do something to hurt the bastards before he was killed.
Before the Scorpion could reach him, Ironhide dodged away from his struggle against the rapier-wielding Decepticon, and punted the Scorpion across the base like a football. Will's eardrums almost burst from the screech of fury that caused the Fencer to emit.
Ironhide used the distraction to stomp in front of Will. "Ready?" He growled. Unlike the almost-maternal concern the Fencer seemed to show for the Gremlin, trying to keep himself – herself? - between Ironhide and it, Ironhide was not trying to protect Will, at least, not any more than brothers-in-arms normally did. Will appreciated his respect.
"Ready." He answered.
The Fencer did something strange then. She lifted her sword up in front of her faceless mask and down again quickly, a salute to her opponent, before taking an offensive stance. Ironhide reciprocated with a curt nod, before firing his cannon again. As before - judging from the lack of singe marks on the Fencer's armour – she dodged the plasma shot in a fluid, graceful, cat-like motion, fast for a robot with a 60-foot fighter jet as an alt mode, and stabbed at Ironhide's armour, apparently looking for weak spots. However, Ironhide was named as such for a reason. The rapier's tip, even with all the pressure of its master's thrust behind it, just could not penetrate Ironhide's thick, iron hide. The two Cybertronians' fight was a stalemate – the Fencer could not do any real damage to her armoured opponent, and Ironhide was just too slow for his cannon shots to hit the Decepticon. Not that the 'Con would have stood much of a chance if Ironhide did manage to hit her, as one cannon-shot went astray and hit one of the Stealths inside the hanger, which violently exploded.
The explosion of her "fellow" Stealth seemed to distract the Fencer for a second, and Will took his chance, jumping out from behind Ironhide and firing sabot rounds into the Fencer's legs. The alien shrieked harshly, but before she fell over, she fired the jet engines on her back, propelling the Decepticon forward in a flying fleché against Ironhide, her rapier stabbing right through one of Ironhide's cannons as she flew past, slashing at Ironhide's head with her pistol-blade as she went. Ironhide roared at the loss of one of his cannons, and fired off the other as the Decepticon half-Transformed in mid-air. He missed again, but singed the Fencer's wingtip as she fully Transformed and the Gremlin scurried up her trailing landing gear.
"Get back here slagger, and fight like an Autobot!" Ironhide roared. His remaining cannon needed a second to warm back up – why he had two of them – and by the time he fired off another shot, the Stealth was no longer in the place he had fired at. It dodged and turned in the air like a giant black crow, even with her landing gear still deployed and in an aerodynamically-difficult shape like that of an F-117's. Will saw her dive down almost to the ground, something, probably the Scorpion, scurry up her landing gear, and once her gear retracted, heard the sonic boom of her accelerating to mach speeds – something a Stealth also should not be able to do.
"Damn it!" He swore himself. "Ironhide, did you contact Optimus?"
"As soon as I suspected that plane was a 'Con." 'Hide growled as they both watched the small black triangle of the Stealth fade into the distance. "He and Ratchet are on their way, for all the good it will do."
Will shared in his friend's frustration, but at least Ironhide had had the courtesy – intentionally or not – to say "that plane" and not "that woman". "And Carol?" He already knew the answer, but he had to ask.
Ironhide still growled, but more softly than before. "I'm sorry, Will. Your friend is dead."
"Yeah," Will sighed, and leaned against Ironhide's leg. "I know … but so is that 'Con."
Ironhide's faceplates broke into a small, gruff smile. "That's my human."
"Oh, shut up, you walking tin can." Will half-heartedly joked, as a familiar flame-decoed Peterbilt and yellow emergency Hummer drove into the base and immediately Transformed.
"Ungrateful hairless ape." Ironhide growled back.
As Ironhide stomped over to his comrades and yelled something at Ratchet in Cybertronian - probably about fixing his precious cannon, knowing 'Hide – Will continued to stare out at the desert horizon for one last second. Just what was that strange, Decepticon Fencer doing here anyway? Why did she – he, it, whatever – kill Carol? He shook his head, and started to walk back to base. He had a feeling that he would have his questions answered soon enough.