Family Affair

Chapter 3

It had taken A LOT of convincing before the army had allowed Blackout to work for them. He had to go to them personally because going through the Registry had failed. They little insects had gotten smarter about their personnel information so when that backfired he had no choice but to deal with this task face to face. It had taken ALL of the Pavlow's will power to keep from simply blowing up the fleshlings along with the rest of the base. For a starting job, he had to help with the pyrotechnics of the public air show that would be displayed at the human's base of operations. The army base and the air base were located at the edge of the other's perimeter; the only thing separating the two were the tall chain link fences armed with barbed wire on the top. Fortunately, the people he now worked for didn't seem to find it necessary to report his presence to the Autobots. Meaning he would be able to work in peace without having guns pointed at his head.

So far the humans had actually taken to some of the ideas he had given them and were now setting up the display for the air show. Meanwhile, Blackout watched the fleshlings making sure they did everything correctly and occasionally giving them instructions when they were needed. Sometimes he would step in and rearrange some of the wires but other than that the humans were actually doing pretty well on their own.

To his dismay, however, an Autobot did show up and of all the ones it could have been it had to be Ironhide. Along with the Weapon's Specialist was of course Commander Lennox. Blackout shrugged and went back to overseeing that fireworks display but was quickly pulled away by Ironhide as he demanded, "What in the Pit do you think you are doing?"

"My job," Blackout answered simply not really wanting to deal with the crabby Autobot.

Ironhide gave the Decepticon a blank stare and echoed, "You're job... HAH! Do you really expect me to believe that the humans just GAVE you a job?"

"Do you really think I give a fuck what you believe?" Blackout asked flatly.

The Autobot blinked his optics several times, "Did I just hear a Decepticon using a fleshling swear word? I believe I did."

The Pavlow sighed heavily, "You know for someone who is a lot older than I you still have a lot of growing to do." The chopper heard a snort down by his right foot and looked to see Commander Lennox trying not to laugh, "I see someone else around here might have the same view point from time to time."

After a few minutes, Blackout turned back to his worked and was surprised that he was actually able to work in silence. Unfortunately, Ironhide wasn't the type to remain quiet for very long and the fact that he was bored out of his metal skull didn't help at all. "So… Why are you Decepticreeps affiliating yourselves with the humans? I thought you guys hate them," Ironhide tilting his head slightly in curiosity.

The Pavlow snorted, "You're right, Autobot. I detest them; I find them rather disgusting but they aren't the Decepticons' main concern. The fact that I am working for them is between me and the humans I am working for. To get a job you must be a citizen, correct?" The last question was directed to the human because he knew that the Weapons' Specialist wouldn't know the answer.

The commander seemed to notice this and replied, "Yeah, that's right. So, wait. You took the citizenship test?"

The smoke black chopper nodded, "It was required so of course I took it and passed remarkably I might add."

"Have all of you guys gotten jobs? Or is it only you so far," Lennox asked looking slightly confused.

But instead of an answer, Blackout returned to the task at hand because it needed to be finished. Just as the commander was about to ask again the whine of jet engines as three colorful F-22s shot by. The one in the lead had a white base color, crimson red trim along the front edges of its wings and its underbelly and cobalt blue on its nosecone as well as on the tail fins. The one on the left wing has a cobalt blue body, black trim and a crimson red nosecone along with matching tail fins. Finally, the one on the right wing was pure black except for the blue-violet trim along the front edges of the wings, on the nosecone and the tailfins.

The lead Raptor's cockpit opened just as the pilot inside jumped out into the air. It suddenly did a flip in midair and the body began to unfold as Starscream transformed before making his landing. The pilot landed gracefully in his outstretched palm. Skywarp and Thundercracker followed suit and skidded to a halt next to their leader, catching their pilots in the same motion. It was irritating Ironhide that there were so many Decepticons and he couldn't shoot a single one of them because they were under sanctuary. He growled in annoyance as the Seekers sneered at him while they set their pilots on the ground before walking up to the Pavlow, "Are the fireworks ready, yet?" Starscream inquired, ignoring the Autobot glaring daggers at him.

The chopper turned to face him, "They shall be soon enough. I've added some of my own personal touches-." He was interrupted by his COM link as it suddenly sprang to life, "…the frag?"

"What is it?" Skywarp asked.

Blackout replied incredulously, "I'm being hailed… Right now I'm scanning the frequency to see who it's coming from…" the chopper trailed of suddenly before letting out what sounded like a slight gasp.

"Who is it?" Starscream demanded as he tapped his talons against his arm impatiently.

At first he was silent, then for the first time in the longest time he grinned widely as he said, "Scorponok is still alive." Then he opened the link and in Cybertronian he spoke, "This is Designation Blackout, identify."

"This is Designation Scorponok," the scorpion responded," Blackout I request retrieval from the continent known as Africa. I also have cargo with me."

"Cargo?" the Pavlow echoed with a raised optical ridge, "What kind of cargo?"

"Well, um… I'm sort of in debt. You know how hard it is to repair myself with my bulky claws so I happened upon this stranded female and she was able to repair my COM link. She had just gotten my scanners up and according to my readout she did a rather remarkable job," he explained to his master.

Blackout blinked his optical shutters a couple times, "WHAT?!" he shouted aloud.

"Ya know, this may sound like a stupid question but… Who the fuck is Scorponok?" Will asked while scratching the back of his neck.

Thundercracker peered down at the human and answered him flatly, "He is Blackout's drone. He is a Cybertronian scorpion."

Lennox' eyes grew as wide as saucer plates when he realized who that was, "You mean that thing that tried to stab me back in Qatar?!"

"Yeah, that was him," Starscream confirmed with a bored look on his face.

Meanwhile, "How the Pit are you in debt to a human?!" Blackout demanded.

Scorponok sighed heavily, "The only way I could get her to cooperate was to offer compensation and the only thing I could offer her was a ride back home."

The chopper groaned in annoyance, "Fine," with that Blackout closed the link and rubbed the bridge of his smell receptor, "I don't believe this."

"What did he want?" Skywarp prodded verbally.

"He's stranded in Africa and he wants me to retrieve him. He said he had found a fleshling, a female by the sound of it, who could repair the comm. unit but apparently she would only do it if he offered payment of some sort. So I now have to bring her back, too," growled Blackout.

Ironhide had been standing there listening the entire time and had to roll his eyes, "Yay… More 'Cons I can't shoot."

The Topkick's comment caused the commander to face palm and look up at him, "Hey, 'Hide? Why don't you go help Sarah with Annabelle? You wouldn't be stuck here getting irritated and the rest of us can work in relative peace."

The truck balked at the Captain, "But, I was ordered to help you keep an eye on them!"

"Dude! I am a grown man! An adult. Like another adult, I am fully capable of doing my job, by myself. Got it! Look you gotta understand, I'm one of those folks who finds it frustrating when people don't think I can watch my own ass," Lennox stared at him in the optics with narrowed eyes, "Now, can I ask you to do this one thing for me? I have to help with this and you can help me by making sure that my wife and daughter have a way here tonight. 'Kay?"

"Fine," his shoulders slumped in defeat before he transformed and sped off.

"Now," the commander turned back around to find the others staring down at him odd expressions, "What?"

At first no one spoke but then Skywarp started with a big grin, "And craaack goes the whip."

"Well, if you treat me like a kid you better expect it to be thrown back in your face ten fold because I don't put up with that shit," the commander shrugged before going on, "Now as I was about to say… Blackout, I believe the explosives are almost done here so I don't see anything wrong with going and getting… Scorponok? Also, you said he had a human female with him. Did he mention whether she was military in appearance or civilian?"

"He did not specify the identity of the human but I suppose I could heed her request since she did repair Scorponok's comm.

***

"What did he say?" AK asked the scorpion. She had just repaired his damned comm. link when he had radioed for his master, whom he called Blackout.

The metal arachnid clicked his claws together thoughtfully before answering, "He will be here. Do you have any wire caps in your bag?"

"I think so. Lemme look," Anakia pulled loose the drawstrings on her backpack. She had long since gotten past the whole giant scorpion thing and was actually of another sentient being quite comforting. AK's pack was huge so she had to do some serious digging but her efforts were rewarded as she plucked from the very bottom of the bag ten wire caps, "Too bad the outpost was totaled. I'll bet there were plenty more but it's probably all buried in sand now."

The scorpion seemed to make a strange clicking sound and tilted his head at her but didn't ask. "Those will do for now," he nodded, his injured tail swished back and forth. Anakia went to work scrapping off burnt casing and wiring that were showing through open bullet wounds in his metal hide.

"It looks like you took a pretty bad whoopin'. Judging by the melted edges around the holes, I'd say they were magnesium rounds," AK commented as she earned the equivalent of a hiss as she plucked a spent bullet from one of the wound openings, "So... I hate to pry but now I'm curious. What did you do to make someone wanna take you out with mag rounds?"

Scorponok hesitated at her question. He could remember like it was yesterday. Blackout had leveled a human military base and had sent him after the fleshbags that were trying to get away. He had finally cornered them when suddenly there was this explosion of white hot pain against his hull. It became so unbearable that he retreated by burrowing back into the ground. In the heat of his escape the spike that used to be at the end of his tail had been blown off.

The drone was trying to think of a good way to explain this when there was a ping on his radar. "He is waiting for us outside," he said suddenly and charged out of the cavern.

Anakia grabbed her stuff before running after him back out into the hot sun to see the large form of a Pavlow chopper landing on the sandy ground. Scorponok squealed happily as he barreled out to greet his master. However, Anakia was having a different reaction.

He heard a gasp from somewhere behind him and skidded to a halt to look up as the woman's eyes widened in reserved, not really fear, more like wariness. She was still moving towards them but at little slower pace.

***

Blackout was coming up on the savannah; he remembered it from when he had to search out the old human military base that he had the pleasure of blowing sky high. He scanned the terrain and immediately received several blips on his radar. The Pavlow scanned each one individually looking for his drone's distinct energy signal which wasn't too hard since the other blips were only organic life forms. Peelings off in the direction the signal was coming from; he couldn't help but notice one of the organic blips was almost on top of Scorponok's blip. 'Must be the human,' Blackout concluded.

He watched as the two of them came bounding out of a small patch of thick underbrush near a medium sized mound of raise earth. The Pavlow scanned Scorponok as he set down on the dusty ground. He was covered in holes and part of his tail was missing, from his scans he could tell that he was also in dire need of energon. That's when he heard the female gasp. He gave the fleshling a once over, taking in her appearance. The garments she wore, although darker in color, were the same as those of the U.S. Army. Her hair was black, very black and very long; it was to the point where she had to actually tie it back to keep it from dragging along the ground and collecting dirt. Not that it mattered, because she was covered from head to foot in filth. He noticed that her skin was really flush and judging by the radiation coming off of the reddened areas they had been over exposed to the sun.

But what got him was her reaction. He could see that she was afraid but it wasn't an unbridled fear but a fear of something one would recognize from a nightmare of the past. Blackout scanned her and his ponderings were confirmed by her spiked heart rate and increasing respiration. He watched as she sighed and hiked up her pack to keep it from falling off of her shoulder. She followed after Scorponok to where he had landed; her eyes were cast downwards onto the dirt beneath her feet.

Meanwhile, Blackout spoke to Scorponok through their internal link, "She's a survivor ain't she?"

"It appears that way. I can't believe we overlooked this one. Thank Primus, too. I probably wouldn't have been able to comm. you if she hadn't tripped over me," the scorpion answered with a mixed expression.

"Waitta minute. She found you by tripping over you? How'd she manage that?" the helicopter inquired.

"It's a long story. I will tell you all about it when we get back."

Blackout seemed to be convinced and slid open the side panel to the cargo hold so the both of them could climb in. Scorponok leapt in first and then the woman tossed in her stuff before hoisting herself up into the hold. She reluctantly slid her belongings next to one of the passenger benches and flopped into the seat. As soon as she sat down the sunburn began to take its toll on her energy levels; she yawned widely not even bothering to stifle it.

The Pavlow cringed inwardly as her body odor hit his smell receptors. He couldn't hold back his question, "What the frag have you been rolling in, human?"

"Sorry, I ran out of soap," she rolled her eyes in annoyance. "I guess my abilities of foresight are a little weak," her voice dripped with sarcasm that would have made even Starscream proud, "I wasn't able to predict that I would need EIGHT YEARS worth of soap. I'll be sure to introduce you to the Fabreze when we get back to base."

"Fabreze?' Blackout echoed in slight confusion.

Anakia explained with a sigh, "It's an odor eating compound. They have one for fabric, upholstery, and air freshening." AK didn't mind talking to the Pavlow; it actually was helping her to ease her nerves.

All she got for a response was an 'oh' and the cargo hold fell silent. The woman yawned again but this time gave into to her body's need for rest by flopping over onto her right side taking up the rest of the space on the bench. She was just about to close her eyes and pass out when there was a clicking noise really close to her ear. Anakia opened her eyes to see what it was but it was only Scorponok tapping his claws together. She returned her head to the resting position and started to slip into unconsciousness when Blackout's voice pulled her away, "I am assuming that you have a designation."

The soldier groaned in protest at not being able to sleep, "Name's Anakia Kora. AK for short, although most of my comrades back in my last company called me AK-47. I entered the military when I was eighteen and became a repair, maintenance worker. I was assigned to the Airland base out near Tranquility in the state of California and before I got stranded they had a surplus of mechanics on the army's half so I would often find myself helping with repairs over on the airbase side." Anakia figured if she gave him the usual details that people wanted to know ahead of time that he wouldn't ask anymore questions. Boy was she wrong.

"So, wait... What all have you repaired since you've been in the army?" the chopper was now fully intrigued. This human could be of some use to the Decepticons since they didn't really have an actual medic on their side.

With a frustrated sigh the woman rose to her feet and began pacing the length of the cargo hold, "Let's see... I've repaired three or four different kinds of military choppers, about ten or so gunner jeeps, seven convoy trucks with and without the canvas tops... um... Countless weapons; sniper rifles, hand guns, shot guns, rocket launchers, automatics, though me favorite one was a beat up old Magnum .44. The barrel was bent all to hell and the bullet holder was no longer attached to the gun. That's just on the army's side of the base. For the air force, I've replaced burnt out and or broken runway lights, repaired the communication's consul at least four times. I've also gotten to do repairs on three Soaring Eagles, two Strike Eagles, one Fighting Falcon, three Hornets, two Super Hornets, and seven Raptors. That's all I can list off the top of my head."

Anakia noticed that the chopper had grown eerily silent and she stopped pacing to await his next response. Meanwhile, she could see out the corner of her eye that the metal arachnid was staring at her, his curiosity had obviously been peaked as his head was slightly tilted to the side.

Blackout was one of those mechs that was really hard to impress but he did a quick search for her profile in the military archives and found that she was indeed telling the truth. "Most impressive... For a human," he finally grumbled out. He made quick bank to the right as they made their approach on the base. The chopper hailed the human military base and was granted permission to land.

Commander Lennox was waiting for him to land along with a couple of others, Sergeant Jerome Fredrickson who was a thickly built dark skinned man that Blackout recognized from Qatar as the one he nearly stepped on. The other one was Sergeant Carlos Juagro; he had dark tanned skin and was also really well built but less bulky with a heavy Latino accent. When Blackout touched down he flung the cargo door open. Without any hesitation, Anakia jumped down to the solid cement of the base and the first thing she said was, "Oh my god! It's cement!" She jumped up and down a few times to confirm her declaration before carrying on again, "Thank God for concrete!" Then she looked up at the three soldiers staring at her in awe, "I'd get down on my knees and kiss the ground but that would be overkill."

Jerome was the first to come around, "AK!!!" He almost bowled her over as he tackled her in crushing bear hug. The other two whooped along with him before Jerome set her back on the ground, "Woo! Girl you reek but damnit it's good to have you back!"

"That's right bitches. I wasn't dead just on a much extended leave which involved me bustin' my phone when I lost connection and running out of soap. Hell, if I had known I'd out there that long I'd have brought bigger pack," Anakia scratched the back of her head, "I hate to cut this short but I need a shower and then I need to find a bottle of Fabreze."

"...the fuck do you need Fabreze for?" Carlos cut in but then remembered who brought her back, "Oh."

Through all of the excitement no one noticed the large metallic pincer reach up to tug at the edge of Anakia's shirt until she turned around to see who it was. The three men jumped back a couple feet but the woman remained calm as she looked down at him, "S'up?"

Instead of saying anything, the scorpion waved his injured tail in front of her face until she realized that something was dangling from it. "Oh! My stuff. Heh! Thanks, dude," She patted him on the head before heading off towards the main building. The other three soldiers could only stare at her back in amazement as she walked away.

---

I think some of the names for the other two soldiers were a bit off. I couldn't think of them and I didn't have access to the Internet when I wrote this chapter so bear with me. I hope you guys like it. Sorry for the wait but life has kind of been kicking my a** as of late so that's why I haven't been posting.