AN: Wow, I'm so sorry I took so long. I seriously thought I'd have this up a week ago! *shamefaced* I hope this chapter is worth the wait. The Mysterious Decepticon reveals himself, and Elita get's to strut her stuff!
Disclaimer: I don't own Transformers, and I don't own "Good Morning Beautiful" by Steve Holy (thank goodness).
Ch. 6 – Confrontation
"Good morning beautiful, how was your night? Mine was wonderful, with you by my side…"
Sam cracked one eye open, but shut it quickly to block out the harsh sunlight. He groaned and tried to roll over as best as the passenger seat would allow. "No it's not," he mumbled. "I'm still sleeping, go away."
Mikaela was still unconscious in the backseat, on leg on the floor and the over wedged against the window as she had tried to fit her tall frame in the limited space. She seemed comfortable enough despite the awkward position though, since Bumblebee hadn't been able to rouse her via country music yet.
"And when I open my eyes, and see your sweet face, it's a 'Good morning beautiful' day."
Sam groaned again, still stubbornly refusing to open his eyes. "It's too early for this."
"Actually it's nearly nine," Bumblebee corrected. "And according to human studies, young humans need to begin the day with a good meal so that they'll have energy for the day and develop properly into adulthood."
Sam cracked his eye open again, and for the first time realized that they weren't on the highway anymore. From his slouched, lowered position he could make out the underside of buildings and streetlamps they passed.
"Lemme guess: another drive-through?"
"I'm sorry Sam, but we don't have time for anything else. And you DO need you're nourishment."
"Uh, not to sound like a total ungrateful jerk or whatever, but aren't we on a time crunch here? Where ARE we now, anyway?"
"We passed into Nebraska about two hours ago, and at this point, ten minutes either way isn't going to make much of a difference."
Sam straightened in his seat, raising the back of the chair to its upright position as Bumblebee, with Jazz hanging back, pulled through the Burger King drive through.
Sam almost pointed out that eating the fast-food joint breakfast menu completely negated the whole 'proper meal and nourishment for the young humans' plan, but caught his tongue.
He liked Burger King anyway.
Meanwhile, several hundred miles away in Ohio, in the bathrooms of a roadside Wendy's, another pair of teenagers were getting ready for the morning.
With a final spit Aine rinsed off her toothbrush, before cupping the water in the hand to sip and rinse out her mouth with. Mournfully she thought about hot showers with shampoo and a breakfast of eggs and toast, but she (and Nolan) had to make do with only a face wash and a change of clothes for hygiene and a couple of granola bars with water for breakfast.
Aine had suggested getting a hot meal, since they were here anyway, but Nolan shot that down quick.
"Fast food is like alcohol," he had reasoned. "You're better off avoiding both, but at the very least you shouldn't have either before noon."
Of course, then they had to explain to the Femme Commander what alcohol was and what made certain foods faster than others, why both were bad, and why people consumed them anyway.
Femme Commander…
Aine frowned in thought as she ran her brush through her hair. Femme…that was the Cybertronian equivalent of 'female,' right? So if there was a Femme Division, then that meant that was where all the femmes were assigned to. Did this mean that the Autobot army deliberately separated its troops between the femmes and their equivalent of males? Were the females not allowed to fight alongside the males?
Aine wasn't a feminist, but she COULD still be offended by blatant sexism on the part of a foreign government.
"That's completely unfair!" Aine exclaimed to the mirror. "That's…that's complete sexism! I thought they were supposed to be an advanced species! That's, like, a paradox or something! And Optimus is supposed to be the leader of all the Autobots, right? Why would he let that happen?"
Her opinion of the Prime taking a sudden nose dive, Aine forcefully shoved her toiletries back into her bag, and stomped out of the bathroom scowling. Poor Nolan, who had been waiting for her, was completely bewildered.
"Uh, Aine?" He asked tentatively, "Are you alright?"
"I'm peachy!" she answered shortly, "but the Prime is a total jerk!"
Aine stomped outside to the waiting Maybach with the bemused and slightly apprehensive Nolan trailing after her. As soon as they were within the privacy of Elita's cabin, Aine gave voice to her most recent frustration.
"Why aren't women on your planet allowed to fight with the men?"
"Excuse me?"
He circled around the town, bypassing it completely to get to the other side. Elita was IN there, he was certain of it. He had picked up her radiation trail just a few hours ago, and it lead right here but hadn't exited yet. Up until now she had been favoring a straight forward path, so while there were several exits OUT of the town, he was almost positive which one she would take.
With that knowledge, he rushed ahead to lie in wait. A less disciplined Decepticon would have been quivering with excitement and anticipation, or would have rushed in to attack her now, but he was better than that, smarter than that. He didn't care about the possibility of humans lives lost in the crossfire, but if he challenged Elita One in a populated area, the humans would call in their peace keeping and military forces to stop them. Their weapons may have been primitive compared to his own, but they had the advantage of numbers. He might be able to kill a hundred, but they would overwhelm him eventually, and his ability to move discreetly would be compromised until he scanned a new vehicle.
Granted, the one he had NOW wasn't terribly discreet, but at least no one thought it was alien in origin and were quick to give way to him. Besides, in spite of the primitive design, he rather liked it. It suited him.
He didn't know how long he had until his quarry emerged. He needed to prepare while he still had time.
"The femmes are not separated from the mechs due to law or tradition," Elita was explaining as she drove through the town streets, "but merely through circumstance. It need not remain that way, but by the time the war was fully under way it became most strategically viable for the Femme Division to remain mostly separate, and under my command."
"How'd that happen?" Aine asked, still annoyed but calming down (to Nolan's relief – an annoyed Aine was, like, against the laws of nature or something!).
"Understand first that, in spite of the wars incredible longevity, it began swiftly and quietly," Elita started. "Megatron was quick to recruit as many able bodied soldiers as he could, securing the brightest minds he could find, and destroying the ones who would not side with him. When the war finally broke out in the open, it was swift and brutal in Megatron's favor. The femmes and younglings, lacking the heavier armor and weaponry of the mechs, were particularly vulnerable."
"Like the tsunami," Nolan muttered in realization.
"The tsunami?" Elita queried.
"A few years ago, there was this huge earthquake in the Indian ocean," Aine explained. "It created a huge tsunami that killed about two hundred thousand people, I think, and left at least a million homeless. Women and children were most vulnerable because they weren't as strong and were more easily swept away by the waters."
"An apt comparison then, in terms of swiftness and sheer destruction," Elita concurred, with a hint of sadness. "In any case, while Megatron's attack had caught nearly everyone by surprise, it had not gone completely undetected, or unanticipated. A few were able to discern the coming storm, and moved either to try and stop it, or prepare for when it finally broke."
"Lemme guess: you were one of them?" Nolan ventured.
"I did not see the danger in time to stop it," Elita admitted, a tinge of regret in her voice, "but when the war broke out I did what I could to protect as many lives as possible. As I said, femmes were among the most vulnerable, so I focused my attention on them. I gathered as many as I could, all that I could find, in hopes that our numbers would provide greater protection, since we could not afford to idly wait for assistance and protection. When it became clear that Megatron was prepared for a long war, I shuttled the ones who did not wish to fight to neutral cities. Those who wished to stay and fight, I helped them learn to fight and utilize their own strengths, and together we developed our own way of fighting, our own tactics that utilized our own skills to the highest benefit. We did not have the heavy weaponry for a frontal assault, so while Optimus lead his armies in the open battlefield, my Division would strike from the shadow's, cripple the Decepticon forces with surgical strikes and covert operations. We became experts at guerilla warfare."
Aine was staring at the dashboard with a mix of disbelief, uneasiness, and awe. Nolan looked thoughtful.
"So backing up for a minute," Nolan said as they left the city limits, "the Femme Division was never officially a part of the actual Autobot army, since it was something you created yourself?"
"In the beginning, yes, that was the case. Eventually, Optimus approached me about making my division a formal part of the army. Because it would facilitate communications and coordination, I agreed. However, my division remained largely unchanged, and remained under my command. All that really changed was that I formally became a Commander, with only the Prime as my direct superior."
"Hold on, I thought you said the Femme Division was still separate from the army." Aine said.
"It is, in that I am the only officer who can command them. They answer to Prime only if I am not there, or his orders do not conflict with mine. Officially, he is my superior, but my Division sees that as mostly a formality. He has his soldiers, I have mine, and it just so happens that I have all the femmes"
"So then Optimus is like the general and you're a colonel?" Aine asked. She didn't know how the military hierarchy worked, but Elita got the gist of the real question.
"To use your own government as an example, it would be more fitting to say the Prime is the Commander in Chief, and I am one of his generals."
Oh wow.
Aine and Nolan exchanged a look. Not only where they friends with a giant alien robot soldier, but she was a giant alien robot general. How cool was that?
"Does this mean you could command the entire Autobot army?" Nolan asked in awe.
"Not under normal circumstances," Elita corrected. "Because of my unique position, I am not actually in the chain of command. Should something happened to Optimus (Primus forbid), command would go to his 2IC and lead tactician, Prowl. After him is Jazz, the head of Special Operations. But I am an officer, so I have been in positions where I have had to take command of a unit not my own."
Aine settled back in her seat, her fledging feminist fury having been abated, and as she turned this new knowledge of her friend in her mind, she watched the scenery go by. They weren't on the highway now, but rather were taking a more scenic route (at least compared to what they had before). From her side, Aine could see the trees a hundred yards away or so, tall pines densely packed together, with a long stretch of grass between the trees and the road. Perhaps not the most stimulating of views, but it was better than what Nolan had, which was the slope of the steep hill the road was hugging.
Fortunately, Nolan wasn't interested in his lack of a scenic view.
"So wait, you said the war ended up covering the entire planet, right? What happened to the neutral cities and the femmes that didn't want to fight?" he asked.
Elita hesitated a second before she answered, "The neutral cities only offered safety for a short while, before Megatron turned his attention to them. He saw them as his chance to fill his ranks and add to his resources. Any neutral that didn't become a Decepticon was destroyed so that they would not become an Autobot. Sometimes there would be survivors, and a few of the femmes I had sent there would later join my Division. Most, however, I never saw again, and can only assume they have all perished."
The teens sucked in their collective breath. Elita had tried to save so many lives, and they all still...
"But, but you still managed to save a lot of lives!" Aine said. "If it hadn't been for you, I bet all the femmes in your Division would've died by now!"
"The numbers I was able to save do not compare to the ones I could not," Elita said quietly. "I cannot forget them, but I have come to terms with the fact that I cannot change history, only protect the lives I still have."
Aine sunk a little into her seat. "Well…even if you only saved one out of a hundred, I bet that one is still really happy to be alive."
Elita said nothing.
Because the hill was so steep, and the road hugged it so closely, and because Elita's scanners were too damaged to detect the danger soon enough, no one saw the threat hiding a hundred feet up the slope, obscured by the pine trees. Not until Elita turned the corner did it burst forth and come barreling down the slope, using gravity and its impressive size to add to its ramming speed.
Aine never saw it coming.
Nolan only noticed something big, green, and metallic out of the corner of his eye before it slammed into them.
Eltia had been the first to see the danger, and even then she was nearly too late. But it was enough for her to put on a quick, intense burst of speed so that the attacker would hit her back end instead, and not the front where the children were.
Aine screamed as the car spun wilding a full 360 from the force of impact as the rear windows cracked and burst, the rear door badly dented in.
Elita rocked on her wheels as the spin concluded, then revved up her engine as she darted out of the way of another ram, driving off the road and onto the grassy empty field so fast she left skid marks.
Their attacker, a huge green behemoth with six wheels and a gun turret on the roof, followed them, engine growling like an angry beast.
Nolan twisted around in his seat to get another look at the metallic beast, to confirm his suspicions of what, exactly, was doing its level best to crush them. When he saw it, he still almost couldn't believe he was really seeing it.
In his multitude of jobs, it was inevitable he would have a multitude of coworkers, some being more colorful than others. One in particular had been a high school sophomore with an obsession for anything related to the military, in particular guns, weapons, and vehicles. So enthused he was, he would often share his considerable knowledge with anyone who had the dubious luck of being stuck with him when business was slow, going so far as to show pictures on his phone and sharing scores of technical data of what made it so awesome and dangerous.
This was how Nolan was able to recognize their current attacker.
"That's a GILA!" he exclaimed in shock, disbelief, and dread.
"A what?" Aine asked/shrieked as Elita spun the car around with a squeal to face the monster.
Any further explanation Nolan might have been able to conjure up was cut off as their seatbelts snapped off and he and Aine found themselves being literally thrown from their seats with a violent jerk, their bags in the truck quick to follow. Nolan had barely finished bouncing before Elita was transforming, firing bullets of energy or plasma or whatever the HELL soldiers on her planet used for ammo at the enormous GILA with a wrist mounted gun Nolan never even realized she HAD. He wanted to yell something at her, about how she was exposing herself to the driver, they had to get out, and she was going to get humans killed if she fought back, and just why was the US army trying to kill them anyway?, but Elita beat him to the punch.
"Get back to the road, go up the hill, and hide until I come for you," Elita ordered, firing at the GILA's tires.
As Nolan was learning, Elita was one of those people who, when she gave an order, no matter what the situation, you followed, period.
Nolan scrambled to his feet, grabbed his sister by the hand, and pulled/dragged her toward the road and the hill that grew on the other side of it, to reach high ground and (hopefully) relative safety.
The GILA had other ideas, however.
Nolan and Aine skidded to a halt and actually fell back on their rumps as the military vehicle (which really had no right being this deep in the US at all), stopped in front of them, forcing Elita to cease fire lest she risk harming the children.
For a heart-stopping moment, nothing happened. That moment was enough for Nolan to finally realize an important fact:
The GILA had no driver.
Then the GILA exploded, just like Elita had when he had met her for the first time.
Transfixed, the pair watched them complicated process of splitting and shifting of part that was both familiar and alien, as the monster truck stood on two legs, towering over them and blocking the sun with his (for if nothing else, they could tell this one was NOT a femme) bulk.
Nolan stared up at the robotic visage, wide-eyed and too shock and scared to run, his brain too overwhelmed by this new development to order his body to move. The robot looked down at him, and unlike Eltia's expressive, even attractive, face, his was covered with a red visor and mask, completely hiding his expressions and making him impossible to read.
Aine glanced back over her shoulder at Elita, silently praying that she shoot the robot, grab them, protect them, do SOMETHING already! Because she looked back, she could see Elita's reaction to the newcomer: her gun was slightly lowered, and she was gazing at the robot with shock and…recognition?
"My oh my, two little squishies far away from home," the visored mech cooed. While his face might have been impossible to read, the gleeful malice in his voice was unmistakable. "Don't you know it's dangerous to wander so far from home?"
He raised a rifle that was bigger than Nolan himself, more like a cannon really, and aimed it at the children. Nolan could see straight down the barrel, and the glow that was growing it its depths.
Light at the end of the tunnel, Nolan thought inanely.
"Bye bye squishies."
Before the mech could fire and reduce the humans to wayward atoms, a blast to the shoulder rocked him back, forcing his shot to go wild.
With an explosion (this time a literal one) of deafening sound and light, a block of trees was reduced to chard stumps and earth, the tremors of the force being felt even by Nolan and Aine where they still sat.
The Decepticon (for what else could he have been?) glared hatefully at Elita.
"Your fight is with me, Onslaught," she intoned, her voice icy and powerful like an arctic wind.
"So good you remember me Elita," the Decepticon – Onslaught – purred. "Surprised to see me? You DID leave me for dead on that asteroid along with the rest of my gestalt. Didn't think you'd see me again, did you?" He swung his rifle/cannon around to bear. "I came a long way to find you, Elita. Now be a good femme, and die."
Onslaught blasted away, but Nolan knew he couldn't afford to stick around and see what happened next. He and Aine had to get OUT of the line of fire before they were killed by a stray shot or misstep. Reaffirming his grip on his sisters smaller hand, he pulled her up with him and they ran for their lives across the grass and across the road, scrambling up the steep hill slope as fast as they could, resorting to clambering on all fours at points when a foot slip on the loose dirt and slippery grass.
Amazing how fast the human can move when fueled by adrenaline and terror.
They didn't stop until they were halfway up the hill, where the trees grew and the slope leveled off some. Only then did they look back at the battle of the metal titans, heaving in air, their lungs greedy for oxygen, their legs trembling and aching from the strain of trying to run straight up.
Onslaught was taller, broader, had heavier armor and, between the huge rifle and the missile launcher on his shoulder, most certainly had the edge in pure firepower. He was favoring holding his ground and firing his rifle at the elusive femme, who kept moving and dancing around him, neatly avoiding each shot and coming in a little closer as she circled him. Which, Nolan realized as he kept watching, wasn't that hard.
He had compared Onslaughts weapon to a rifle, but it was more like a shotgun: it had a powerful projection that made its hits devastating when it hit home, and created a rain of dangerous shrapnel even when it didn't, but it couldn't be fired rapidly enough and needed a second or two between each shot to reload (or whatever). It probably had one hell of a kickback too, what with all that power in each shot, and while Onslaughts bulk would help a lot in keeping the barrel steady, it would still have an effect on the overall accuracy of the weapon. So long as Elita timed it right, she could easily avoid the full blast, though she wasn't always fortunate enough or quick enough to miss the shrapnel entirely. She was already showing the damage in nicks and scratches.
On the other hand, Elita, with her lighter armor and weapon, was free to move with speed and agility that Onslaught simply couldn't hope to match. Even though she was moving more than Onslaught was, she wasn't wasting any energy either, moving in quick bursts and not wasting a single motion, a single bit of energy, using her energy as efficiently as possible. Her wrist mounted blaster was like a pistol: not as powerful, but it could fire fast and often, and she was peppering Onslaught every chance she got. His heavy armor protected him well, but the extra weight meant he didn't have a hope of avoiding her shots the way she avoided his. He could take more, but he ended up receiving more than she did, and the damage was showing on him as well.
Right now they were at a stalemate, but by its very nature it could not last for much longer. Elita would either miss a step and Onslaught would blow her away, or she'd get in close enough to force Onslaught to abandon the gun and…well, Nolan didn't know what Elita was planning once she got that close, but if she had a plan then it couldn't end well for the Decepticon.
"Nolan, what are we going to DO?" Aine asked, her voice trembling and still breathless from the run as the ground shook again.
Nolan, for once, had no answer for her. He only tugged at her hand to pull her away. They needed to put as much distance between themselves and the fight before a stray shot killed them both.
"Omigod, this is so AWSOME! Are they making a movie?"
What the hell??
Nolan and Aine peered down the hill in sheer disbelief. They had thought that a giant robo-death match was incredible? It didn't hold a candle to what they were looking at now.
A blue car was sitting there on the road, parked to the side with the top down, revealing the five occupants, three guys and two girls, about collage age if Nolan had to guess.
Another of Onslaughts shots missed it's intended, dancing target, and boomed into the field behind her, sending another tremor through the earth that even the younger teens could feel from up the hill. The new guys shrieked and laughed about how 'wicked cool' that was, and 'so totally realistic!'
"You have GOT to be kidding me," Nolan muttered, still not quite believing his eyes. "Do they have a death wish?? And when did they get here, anyway?"
"I don't think they believe it's really real," Aine said, fear and worry for their friend put on the back burner for the moment in favor of bewilderment as the situation took a sudden turn for the surreal. "They must have showed up when we were coming up the hill, that's why we didn't notice them before."
Nolan's own bewilderment was shoved away when he realized that one of the guys, the one in the front passenger seat to be exact (wow, the third guy in the back between the girls must had won the coin toss), was holding a camcorder and was recording the fight, providing commentary about how they stumbled upon a secret filming session for an as-of-yet unannounced movie that they HAD to go see when it came out now.
"Oh SHIT!!" he exclaimed. "Aine, stay here. I have to get that camera!"
"What? No Nolan, come back!"
Aine's pleas were ignored as Nolan hurried down the hill again, nearly falling twice and rolling down the rest of the way in his haste.
If these dorks wanted to risk their lives for a good show, Nolan really didn't give a damn. But if that footage found its way into the wrong hands, or hell, ended up on the evening news, then they were completely screwed. Elita might have some super-advanced card up her sleeve to avoid the government and media hounds if they got wind of this, but Nolan wasn't willing to take that chance.
"What's the matter, little Autobot?" Onslaught mocked, apparently not yet aware he was on Candid Camera. "Not so tough when you have nowhere to hide, aren't you? I always knew you were a coward, that's why you never faced any of us in a real battle: you knew you never had a chance against any of us in a fair fight."
With that, Onslaught fired off his missile launcher.
Elita did something then so incredible, Nolan was forced to stop at the bottom of the hill and just gape.
Rather that leaping or stepping out of the way as she had been doing before, Elita held her round and merely twisted her upper body to avoid the missile. Demonstrating a combination of reflexes, speed, and quick thinking that no human could hope to match, especially under such stressful circumstances, Elita grabbed the missile as it flew past, spun it around, and used its own thrust to launch it right back at Onslaught.
The missile hit him dead center of his chest, toppling him backwards with enough force that his feet actually left the ground for a second, and he hit the ground with a mighty crash.
Elita cocked up her wrist pistol near her face, her expression serious and hard, almost as if she was posing for an army poster (and looking fantastically scary at it). At that moment, she was the very image of deadly grace and fatal beauty.
"I can always deal with Decepticons," she said, her voice as soft and powerful as the ocean tide. "Elita One knows no fear."
At that moment, Nolan had a full appreciation as for WHY Elita was one of the highest ranking officers in the Autobot army.
Incredibly, even though he now sported a charred, sparking hole in this chest, Onslaught still wasn't down for the count (what did it take to KILL this guy??). He struggled to a sitting position as Elita approached, and fired off his shotgun again, which Elita was forced to leap back and to the side to avoid.
"Primus slaggit, why won't you die already?!" He roared, his former good humor (such as it was) having evaporated.
"You go girl! Shoot him dead! Show him what you're made of!" A high pitched voice cut through Nolan's head, and with a start he remembered what he was doing down here in the first place.
Camera Guy was still happily recording the fight, now joined by one of the girls and the backseat guy with their video phones. "Dude, this is gonna be gold on YouTube," he cheered. "Any one seen the camera crew yet? I wanna get them in the shot if I can."
Instead of an answer, Camera Guy found his beloved camcorder being forcefully wretched from his grasp, nearly taking his hand with it as the strap slid forcefully off the appendage.
"HEY! What the hell man??"
Camera Guy spotted some teenager running a little way down the road with his camera and a couple of cell phones his friends has been using to take pictures (said friends were currently vocalizing their displeasure at the robbery).
"Hey! Give that back!" Camera Guy yelled, hopping over the closed car door and giving chase. He didn't have to go far, because the younger teenager (to his shock and horror) now threw the Camcorder and phones to the asphalt with all the force he could muster and proceeded to stomp on them with all his weight to destroy all video evidence as quickly and utterly as physically possible.
"Hey hey HEY!" Camera Guy yelled, pulling the boy off the electronics with a hard pull on his shirt neck. "What the HELL are you doing? That was my camera!"
"What the hell are YOU doing?" The kid shot back. "Are you blind or just stupid? You've all got to get out of here before you're all KILLED!"
Camera Guy blinked, and actually chuckled. "What? My god, you don't think this is all real, do you? It's gotta be a movie or something, something super secret…and I had it on FILM you jerk!"
Camera Guy started pulling/dragging the kid back to the car, using his weight advantage to leverage him along as he tried to resist. "You are totally paying for it. AND for my friend's cell phones too!"
"Forget the freaking camera you idiot! You have to get OUT of here before-"
One shot went wide and blasted a crater in the hillside, raining dirt and debris on their heads.
The teen and the twenty-something both hit the ground, covering their heads with their hands as the debris hit their backs, the shocked and scared screams of the people still in the car filling the background once the noise of the explosion died away. Nolan could feel his ears still ringing from the blast.
Still up on the hill, Aine had slid to the ground, knocked down by the blast, her breathing increasingly short and erratic as the tell-tale trembles and shakes overtook her body and nausea began to rise up.
No, no, not again, not again, it's too soon, I can't have another one now…
As the dust cleared, Aine could see the road and the people again.
Her heart stopped.
Nolan and the Camera Guy were both face down on the ground, not moving.
"Oh no…" she whispered. "No, no, no no no…NOLAN!"
She pushed off and nearly slid down the hill slope, heedless of the danger or the other humans. All she saw was her brother, her most precious person, on the ground, silent and still.
"Nolan! Nolan! Nolan!" She cried as she ran to his side. As she came close to him, Nolan finally stirred and pushed himself up.
"Aine? What…I told you to stay on the hill!"
Aine went weak with relief as she dropped next to her brother's side, too happy to care about the pain to her knees.
"Nolan, thank god you're ok. Are you hurt? How's your head? How many fingers am I holding up?"
"I'm fine, I didn't hit my head, and two fingers and a thumb." Nolan coughed (stupid dust). He looked over at the fight, and his gaze happened across their bags, forgotten and still sitting in the grass off to the side where they had fallen, as yet unharmed.
But for how long before the fight shifted their way?
Nolan focused on his backpack, and felt his chest freeze up.
Mom…I have to get Mom!
"Aine, stay here!" he ordered, before clambering to his feet and, in a fit of seemingly suicidal single-mindedness, rushed for the bags, heedless of Aine's attempts to stop him.
Aine watched him go in disbelief. He was risking his life for their luggage? Where his priorities really THAT screwed up?
Aine felt strong hands on her shoulder, pulling her to her feet and dragging her backwards.
"C'mon, we've gotta get outta here!" Camera Guy shouted, having finally decided he had had enough.
Aine struggled against the grip, but he must have played varsity football or something, because his grip, while not painful, was like iron. "No! No! I'm not leaving my brother!"
Camera Guy couldn't pretend he had the faintest idea of how this girl and her brother got there, or what was going on, but his conscience wasn't going to let him leave this girl behind when the safety of the area was suddenly dubious at best.
But it didn't mean he had to be nice about it.
"We'll get your brother later, just get in the DAMN CAR ALREADY?!"
With that, he swung an arm under her legs and practically dumped her into his friend's laps in the back seat. The other College Kids tried to hold her offer empty comfort that it'll be alright, but she wasn't having any of it.
"No! No! Let me go! I can't leave I can't leave!" she screeched, wriggling and twisting, trying to escape her saviors and captors, adrenaline shooting through her body as the shakes over took her body. Before she knew it, she was screaming.
"Ahhh, ahhh, AHHHHH! AHHHH!"
"Sweetie, calm down," one of the girls said gently, trying to keep calm in spite of her own growing fear and uncertainty for the younger girl's sake. "It's going to be okay, we're gonna get out here and call somebody, get you back home and get this straightened out, 'cause no way is all this legal-"
"No no NO! Nolan, NOLAN! HELP ME! AAAHHHHHHH!"
"She's freaking out! I can't hold her!" The lone backseat guy yelled his arms around Aine's small shoulder. The girls joined him in restraining Aine before she could hurt herself or anyone else, one girl holding her legs, the other her head, brushing her hair in a soothing gesture. "Shh, shh, please, calm down, we're not going to hurt you, we're trying to help you, and you're brother too."
"Mike, what are you doing??" The driver called out to Camera Guy. Rather than having gotten back in the car, Camera guy – Mike – was dashing toward the crushed electronics.
"Just a sec! I need my camera!"
Mike sprinted back down the road while his friends yelled just how stupid he was being, his prize broken but still in one piece.
Suddenly Aine's petrified screams were replaced by gasping and wheezing, like her diaphragm had suddenly stopped working right, her eyes staring straight up, unseeing and wide with fright, her hands clutching and scratching at her chest over her heart.
"Oh my god, I think we need to get her to a hospital!" the girl brushing her hair exclaimed in a panic.
Nolan, not realizing the predicament his sister was in, closed in on the first backpack, which happened to belong to Aine. He swooped down and grabbed it with one hand, swinging it onto his shoulder without breaking his stride, still sprinting for his own backpack and the real prize, until a metal leg staggered backwards into his path.
This time, rather than freezing, Nolan let out a startled yelp before darting around the metal pillars that were Onslaughts legs, still hell-bent on his retrieval mission.
Onslaught whirled his head around at the human he had nearly stepped on, one of the creatures Elita had brought with her.
In sheer pettiness, Onslaught took a second to swing his gun around and shoot the human at point blank range. But a shot to his gun hand stopped him, and the rifle was blown out of his hand completely.
"You keep forgetting who your true threat is," Elita chided. "It is no wonder how I was able to bring down your entire gestalt, if this is how sloppy their leader is."
Onslaught saw red, forgot about the human entirely, and he charged at Elita with an angry roar, just like she wanted.
This fight had to end NOW, before the humans were hurt or more could arrive. If one of them had had the presence of mind to call for help, then their time was almost up.
Elita smacked her thigh, which opened up a small compartment that spat out a small brown cube with several blinking lights and a few switches on one side. In a single, fluid motion, Elita caught the cube and slammed it into the ground in front of her, and Onslaught, recognizing the device, stopped in his tracks.
"This S-class EMP grenade has a radius of five miles and will detonate exactly three minutes after I remove my hand," Elita said, still crouched down, her voice as calm and cool as ice. "In my alt mode, I will only need one, perhaps one and a half to get out of the danger zone. If you do not leave now, you will not be so fortunate.
Elita lifted her hand, and a red light on the cubes top surface began to blink and beep ominously.
For a moment, Onslaught held his ground, and he and Elita were in a standoff.
He had two options: try and kill Elita here and drive five miles away in less than three minutes while he was injured, or retreat now and finish this later.
As much as he wanted his revenge, he wasn't stupid enough to overestimate his abilities, or at the point of being suicidal about victory.
Onslaught wanted to slam a fist into the ground in frustration and anger, but he didn't have the time.
"Next time you won't be so lucky," he growled. Onslaught transformed, and booked it out of there, down the road and back in the direction Elita had come from.
Elita dashed over to Nolan, and as the boy grabbed his own backpack, the femme scooped him up.
"Hey!" Nolan exclaimed, more in surprise than annoyance, as Elita practically flew to the road with the human cradled to her chassis (to Nolan's embarrassment, despite the fact that femme and human female anatomy weren't THAT similar).
Nolan could see the car of collage kids still in the road, the Camera Guy just getting into the driver's seat. And in the back seat…
"Elita!" he yelled. "They've got Aine!"
'They' could hear the sound of something big and heavy coming their way and as one they looked up to see one of the giant robots heading their way.
'Panic' could not describe their mind sets.
"Go go go go!" Mike screeched, snapping his seatbelt. The driver complied, slamming the accelerator to the floor and tearing out of there with a screech of burning rubber.
"No! No! Don't let them get away!" Nolan yelled as the blue car pulled away. Gently dropping Nolan to the ground, Elita transformed and popped a door open for Nolan, who literally dove in. Elita didn't even wait for him to properly sit before she hit the accelerator and hit her top speed (which is a good deal faster than a human built Maybach 57S should be capable of) in less than three seconds, chasing after the blue car that had taken her girl.
And so the three vehicles, one real and two fake, tore off in two different directions along the same lonely little road as fast as they could.
The field was quiet again, though it would show the scars of the quick but violent and intense battle for some time yet. For a minute or two, all was silent and still, with the exception of a beeping brown cube the size of a small chest.
The beeping increased in frequency for a few seconds, until it suddenly stopped and the red light switched to green.
The cube exploded into a thousand pieces and scorched the grass and earth, leaving a few small fires that would die out quickly in the moist air. But the real danger, the EMP blast, would go unnoticed by all but the most sensitive of the organic creatures.
That is not to say it would go completely undetected.
Already dozens of satellites were picking up on the blast and sending the information back down to earth for the military, the government, and the meteorologist's benefits.
Of course, Telatraan-2, while lacking a satellite of its own, made up for it by picking up transmissions made by the hundreds of satellites conveniently already in orbit. So the Autobots already knew what happened before Keller even relayed it to them.
That didn't mean they had a better idea of what it actually meant.
"What the frag was THAT?" Ironhide exclaimed, more in frustration than in actual query.
"From the intensity and the radius of the EMP blast, I would say it came from a high-grade grenade that special ops teams favor," Ratchet answered anyway. "Though for the love of Primus, I can't imagine why anyone would want to detonate one in the middle of nowhere. EMP grenades are about knocking out electrical equipment; they're completely useless in a natural setting. Waste of a grenade. Not unless…" Ratchets eyes brightened in realization, "it was a fight between the two Cybertronians. We already know one in a Decepticon. If they fought, then the other MUST be an Autobot!"
"Or the Decepticons are in-fighting again," Ironhide countered. "At least we know they're not in cahoots with each other. But if they have EMP grenades, who knows what else they have." Ironhide raised a fist to slam into the wall, remembered where he was, and slammed his fist into his other hand instead. It was less visually effective, true, but better than bringing the human-built and not-yet-completely-Autobot-reinforced walls and structure down. "Slaggit Prime, you should have let me go instead of Bumblebee!"
"The mission objective hasn't changed," Optimus said, ever calm and patient in the face of Ironhides rising ire. "The Decepticons haven't done anything yet that threatens human's lives or exposure. At least we know we will not have to face a united attack in the near future or a repeat of Mission City, but we still need to wait for Jazz and Bumblebee to complete their mission."
"So we're just going to wait for the Decepticons to make the first move?" Ironhide asked.
"In truth, I don't like this either," Ratchet agreed, folding his arms. "Sam and Mikaela are in greater danger now."
"We already know there was risk before we sent them," Optimus pointed out. "I trust Bumblebee and Jazz to keep the children out of the real danger, but they are still needed for this mission. I will inform them of this new development, so they will be prepared."
"Optimus, at this rate they're going to need more firepower," Ironhide persisted. "I have the most, so I should-"
"It is too late for that now. They can't afford to wait for you to catch up. If the other IS an Autobot, then Jazz and Bumblebee need to find him as soon as possible. We have already made our choices, Ironhide, now we must live with the consequences."
Ironhide grumbled to himself, as he always did when he knew he had lost an argument, but raised no more objections.
He understood the situation, but Primus slaggit he didn't have to be happy about it.
Onslaught slammed a fist into the ground, creating a small crater and sending the birds flying in panic. The Decepticon took no note of them.
He almost had her, he could have had her! He had superior armor and weapons, he could have worn her down, he could have destroyed her! But she had to pull that fragging kamikaze move and force his retreat. Now she knew he was here and after her. He won't be able to surprise her again, now that she knew to be on alert for him.
Onslaught slammed his fist into the ground again for good measure, then straightened and moved to cross his arms, only to wince as he was reminded of the hole in his chest. Right, he'd better take care of that.
Pulling out his feild kit, Onslaught made himself comfortable and started to repair what damage he'd could. He'd have to scavange for parts later, and he was no medic, but a good patch job would do for the moment. Besides, he was built for the battlefield, and had been given heavy armor and several redundant parts in case of heavy damage. The blast to his chest only looked bad from the outside, but it wasn't nearly as crippling or painful as it looked. He'd be back to optimum power within a day. While he worked, he considered his situation.
He was going to need a radically new strategy because, as much as he hated to admit it, outside of a one-on-one fight Elita had the advantage here. This world was alien to them both, but she was trained and experienced in adapting and using whatever the area had to offer to her fullest advantage, while he was a straight up soldier who, while the leader of his gestalt, ultimately took orders from higher officers. The open battlefield was still his best bet, so long as he could prevent the Commander from pulling another trick like that.
What he needed, Onslaught mused, was a way to get Elita exactly where he wanted her: alone, out in the open, with nowhere to hide or run to, and no more tricks up her sleeves.
The former gestalt leader recalled the two human's Elita had been carrying with her. Why exactly she stooped so low to allow the filthy creatures inside of her, Onslaught couldn't hope to fathom. But she had protected them, twice now, and the Autobots, even the less scrupulous ones, were notoriously soft-hearted…
Behind his face mask, Onslaught grinned as his plan began to fall into place.
Brute force was very nice to have on your side sometimes, but as he was remembering, the mind was a far more potent weapon.
AN: Fess up, how many of you thought the mask-and-visor mech was Soundwave? Raise your hand and send a comment! ;)
Funny story regarding the Antagonist: for the longest time, I was planning to just use and OC. I needed an antagonist that had a vendetta against Elita, and in G1 the closest character to fit that was Shockwave. But when I thought about it, it just wasn't in his personality to seek personal revenge. Same with Soundwave. They're both very logical, and while I'm sure with the right motivation they'd become quite vengeful, I just couldn't make it work. Hence the OC.
But after I posted the 4th chapter, I was sitting in class trying to come up with a name for my OC and was going through the Decepticon names in my head for inspiration. I thought of Devastator, which lead me to the Stunticons, and suddenly I had a eureka moment: 'Motormaster!'
Then Onslaught elbowed his way in and insisted he'd be a better villain, since he was smarter and one of the Combaticons had already been killed in the movie (Brawl/Devastator). BTW, I don't remember who exactly it was that pointed that out to me, but I think it was Slink T. Ferret. So everyone thank him, because he's (maybe) the reason why Onslaught is here!
If you want to see a pic of Onslaughts alt. mode click /ybi/1/24/56/shinecommerce/folder/294/img_294_12791_5?.com
Any and all reviews will be loved and cherished, even if it's just to say 'good story', 'you suck!', or 'grapes are sexy.' Though personally, I'd prefer the first one.