There are two reasons this is getting updated so late. I'm not making any excuses, just explaining. If you think I'm taking too long to update feel free to tell me so. I work surprisingly well under pressure.
The two reasons are as follows: one, I busted my foot up late last week and literally could not walk on it. In fact I couldn't put any weight on it at all. This wasn't a problem- it meant I got to stay home and do nothing for three days. Unfortunately my mother, to ensure I wouldn't turn into a computer-induced zombie, left my laptop upstairs. Sorry, folks, but I don't love y'all enough to crawl up three sets of stairs on my hands and knees. (for those of you concerned, it's almost completely healed now.)
The second reason is entirely my fault: I got writer's block. This chapter has very little action and I apparently went into overdrive trying to make it interesting. I added and took out parts, rewrote whole sections, and spent hours fiddling with individual sentences. I am far from pleased with what you see below, but I decided I needed to post it before I nitpicked it to death.
Also, the world of well-planned time flow takes another hit. Most of this chapter happened before the events of the previous chapter. It simply flowed better this way. What belongs where should be easy enough to figure out.
Disclaimer: I do not own. Sorry.
---
Starscream came out of recharge feeling like he was being smothered.
He started to check his GPS and paused, wondering if Soundwave would recognize his signature. After a moment he decided that the point was moot- the communications officer would know where he was due to the locator chip all Decepticons had. He vaguely remembered Swindle saying something about a jammer, which made visiting the merchant fairly high up on the list of things to do, but until then he might as well not worry about being traced. It wasn't as though Soundwave would be inclined to come get him anyways. Not with his ship blown half to the Pit.
Something was sitting on him.
The seeker came to this conclusion abruptly. He froze, trying to decide if he wanted to know what it was, then ran a scan. A moment later he checked his results against the internet and relaxed. Howler monkeys, he was told; native to the Amazon rain forest. Unfortunately this meant he'd missed his mark by an entire continent. He growled irritably, then shook himself.
"Get off," he ordered. The monkeys- a horde of smelly, filthy animals squatting on his wings and poking curiously at his cockpit- all gave odd screaming noises. None of them moved. Starscream snarled at them and shook harder. He didn't want to risk transforming and accidentally smearing a monkey all across his internals. One animal took a stick and walloped the jet right across the nosecone.
The seeker went still, unable to process the creature's actions. Not only were these little heathens daring to sit on him, they weren't even smart enough to know when to get off. Then one of the animals lifted its tail and started defecating on him.
"Eww! Get off get off get off GET OFF!" He didn't so much shake himself this time as he lunged into the air and rolled, scattering monkeys in every direction. When he was convinced they were all off he settled down, cycling his vents rapidly and scanning himself repeatedly. His auto-repair had fixed the structural damage caused by the crash. Most of it now was all cosmetic, dents and scratches with monkey feces thrown in for good measure.
The animals were sitting in trees around him, making good on their name and producing an unholy racket. Just as Starscream was considering transforming and shooting all of them, one monkey took a fruit and lobbed it at the seeker. It splattered against his left wing and an eerie silence descended immediately. Then, as if by cue, all the monkeys started grabbing anything nearby and hurling it at him. Starscream let out a shriek of fury as he was pelted by overripe fruit, sticks, rocks, and- naturally- more monkey crap. And they'd started howling again, which made it hard for his CPU to string two thoughts together without dear Primus shut them up interrupting.
"All right!" he snapped. "All right, I'm leaving!" He fired up his engines and tried to edge himself out of the grove of trees, but the battering continued. After a moment he tired of this and simply blasted forward, plowing through trees and bushes. He managed to get angled above the canopy and pointed himself to the north.
Howler monkeys, the internet informed him, were direct cousins to the primates from which humans were thought to descend. So essentially Starscream had just been beaten by a gang of unevolved humans armed with fruit and their own excrement.
This did not bode well.
---
Jazz chewed on his lower lip as he watched the TV. He'd volunteered to keep an eye on the freeway bridge story as well as watch for anything new. It would be several hours before the twins got there, though, so he had a feeling it would be a while yet before something interesting happened.
The other two were helping Ratchet try to get something resembling security set up. The medic had plenty to say about his new job, most of which being unsuitable for small children to hear, and was making the humans nervous by constantly yelling "my name is Ratchet, not Red Alert!"
"Sp there are actual security cameras in about fifty places outside," Epps said conversationally. Jazz glanced back and saw him holding a walkie-talkie, which the medic was no doubt tuned in on. Sure enough, the little machine produced a short bark of static, then Ratchet's familiar voice came over the air.
"Fifty?" he echoed.
"It's a big building," Epps shrugged. "Plus they would've been dealing with thieves a lot. You'd be surprised how many warehouses get knocked off."
"Would I, now?" the medic asked blandly. The sergeant checked to make sure he wasn't transmitting before turning to Jazz.
"Who's Red Alert?"
"Autobot security director," the saboteur answered. "Kinda twitchy, but damn good at his job."
"What does 'kinda twitchy' mean?"
Jazz looked up, meeting the human's curious gaze and grinning. "Ravin' paranoid lunatic, if you must know. Most security 'bots are gonna be a little nutty, but Red takes th' whole dessert bar when it comes t' crazy."
"This whole army of yours is full of whack jobs and fruitcakes, isn't it?" Epps asked with a laugh. Jazz snorted and shrugged.
"Us Cybertronians, we got a couple advantages over humans," he explained. "We live a lot longer, for one. But this war… we're fightin' th' same mechs, day in an' out, an' sometimes it feels like we're just runnin' in place an' not gettin' anywhere. Go through that for a couple thousand years an' see how you hold up."
Epps took a minute to process this, then asked softly, "So how long do you guys live anyways?"
"A very long time," Jazz answered morosely. "Sometimes it seems like too long."
There was nothing to say to that, so the sergeant returned to fumbling with the blueprints of the warehouse while the saboteur turned back to the TV.
"What's the count so far?" Epps asked after a moment. Jazz had long since put on mute and was watching the text scroll along the bottom. He'd also filched Sam's iPod and had been listening to whatever music the boy had on it while he watched. As such he barely heard the man behind him, but at the question he hit pause again.
"Twelve now," he said grimly. "Looks like that's it, too. Gotten most of th' rubble cleared away an' all of th' cars are out."
"Damn those Decepticons," the sergeant growled. "Why the hell would they do something like this anyways?"
"My guess is it's got somethin' to do with how Swindle an' Barricade were playin' cops an' robbers earlier," Jazz responded. "Though we'll prob'ly never really know. Th' thing about th' 'cons is, they do a lot of in-fightin', and we don't hear about it unless it gets real messy."
"Seems kinda stupid to me," the human muttered.
"Hey, Jazz?" The saboteur glanced back to see Mikaela leaning against the doorframe. She jabbed a thumb over her shoulder. "Ratchet says he wants to see you."
He glanced at Epps, then followed the girl into the security room. Ratchet was standing next to a long console of monitors. The medic saw Jazz and pointed angrily towards the machines.
"Fix it," he ordered. Jazz wandered over to the console and went around behind it, sliding between the table and the wall to find the main computer controlling the whole system.
"So why didn't you get this up an' runnin' sooner?" he asked mildly. Ratchet didn't answer, which didn't surprise him. Instead the medic merely folded his arms over his chest and scowled down at the saboteur.
"I don't think they were expecting Decepticons so soon," Mikaela offered. Jazz snorted as he reached behind the computer tower.
"Or maybe none of 'em grasped th' concept of th' plug," he drawled, holding the computer's power cord up. Epps started laughing as Jazz turned to show his find to Ratchet. "Gotta plug it in, guys. Don't work otherwise."
"You needed a high-tech saboteur to figure out that?" the sergeant asked.
"You shut up, and you plug it in."
An amused Jazz did as ordered and circled around to the front of the console to watch as the screens flickered to life. There were ten of them, and they began to slowly flit through five different camera views each. Jazz pulled a chair over and sat down.
"I'll see if I can set up th' system so you can hack it an' watch it whenever you- what was that?"
They all peered at the proper screen as Jazz began to type away. A moment later the single images were replaced by dozens as the monitors pulled up all fifty cameras at once. It took him a moment to find the proper one, but soon the saboteur had the image he wanted up. The picture was grainy and black-and-white, but it was clear enough to see a dark shape on the roof.
"Something dark," Mikaela murmured.
"And kinda small," Epps added. After a moment's pause, he explained himself. "Well, compared to the 'bots, I mean."
"Small an' dark," Jazz mused. He shot a meaningful glance towards Ratchet.
"He wouldn't," the medic said in disbelief.
"He would," the saboteur countered.
"Who wouldn't do what?" Epps sounded understandably bewildered. Jazz turned to face the sergeant.
"Ravage," he explained simply. "One of Soundwave's merry band of morons. Supposedly one of the Decepticons' best spies. Got any heavy artillery on you?"
"How heavy you talking?" Epps was scowling at the screen as he mentally ran tally on the weapons available.
"You remember Skorpinok?" Jazz asked mildly.
"Hell yeah."
"Ravage is a lot like him, but faster an' nastier."
"And smarter," Ratchet added.
"Wonderful." The sergeant turned to walk out of the room, pausing for only one more question. "How much smarter?"
The two Autobots exchanged glances as they both tried to evaluate Ravage's intelligence level. The felinoid was wickedly smart, but he had a tenacity that far outstripped anything else. His one-track processor often led him into situations that he would otherwise avoid. Their silence was probably far from comforting, and Epps walked out long before either could think of any easy way to explain. Ratchet glanced once more at the screen, then followed him.
"Why don't we wait for Prowl or someone to get back?" Mikaela asked. "We don't have to go get him ourselves, do we?"
"Yes an' no," Jazz admitted. "I mean, we can wait, but he'll be long gone 'fore anyone gets back. Th' problem is, once he figures out he's been caught, we don't know how he's gonna react. He might take off or he might not. If not, it's gonna get ugly."
"So you're not going to go get him?" she tried carefully. Jazz turned back to the monitors and shrugged.
"Ravage is small but nasty. No reason t' go pickin' fights with him."
"So even though he's a spy, and sitting on our roof, we're not doing anything about it?" Epps was back, hauling a large duffel bag with him.
"What's he gonna hear about up there?" the saboteur asked in amusement. "Th' freeway bridge collapse and Ratchet bellowin' about hatin' his job. Groundbreakin' news, that." He tilted his chair back and propped his feet up on a blank space on the table. "He's prob'ly here t' figure out what th' slaggin' Pit I am."
"Great." The man pulled a strange-looking gadget and placed it carefully on the table. "Just in case, I got these."
Jazz frowned in confusion as he picked up the fist-sized thing. It seemed odd, slightly familiar in design.
"It's a grenade, kind of," the sergeant explained. "It's actually Cybertronian, scaled down to fit human standards. Courtesy of Megatron."
"Ah," Jazz held it up and grinned. "I get it. Interference."
"Well, I don't get it," Mikaela said. Jazz handed her the grenade gently.
"Cut little toy, this thing. This part here latches onto anythin' metal, an' when it goes off, not only does it blow up, but it sends out a high-frequency signal that scrambles a mech's systems for a few minutes." He glanced at Epps. "Got it off Megs?"
"Megs?" the sergeant echoed, sounding utterly dumbfounded. "You call him Megs?!"
"Makes him seem less intimidating. You got it off him?"
"Yeah… I think." Epps eyed the saboteur oddly. "At least, that's what Simmons said."
"You talk to Simmons?" Now it was Mikaela's turn to interrupt. She stared at the sergeant in disgust. The man grunted and shrugged.
"He's not half bad," he admitted grudgingly. "Once you get used to him."
"Kind of like ringworm," the girl said coldly. Jazz smiled at the sergeant's sullenness. He didn't want to admit to liking Simmons, but that the man was providing them with anti-Decepticon weapons had clearly won over the military boys.
"Yeah, I guess. So what were you saying about Megatron, Jazz?" Epps shifted to face the saboteur, obviously trying to change the subject. Jazz humored him and gestured towards the grenade.
"That's Soundwave's thing," he said. "Frequencies, I mean. There's a reason he's called Soundwave, ya know. He uses ultra-harmonized sound waves to do all sorts of nasty stuff."
"Like what?" Argument forgotten- at least for now- the two humans regarded the Autobot warily. Jazz shrugged helplessly.
"Don't know," he responded blandly. "Most of th' mechs he uses those tricks on, don't live to tell th' tale. Those who do, aren't much in th' mood for talkin'."
"I'm gonna assume that that's a nice way of saying 'tortured to insanity'," Epps translated. Jazz nodded once. "That's nice. Why doesn't anyone tell us these things before the freaky scary evil-bots show up?"
"You wanna hear 'bout Shockwave?" Jazz challenged. "Charmin' guy, really, 'cept he's a scientist at spark an' he's got a hard time understandin' th' whole idea of experimentation on livin' subjects bein' a bad thing. Or maybe Blitzwing; now there's someone you definitely do not want to run into, ever. Here's one- Sixshot. Name says it all. Takes a gestalt to bring him down. Th' fact is, there's a lot of scary 'cons out there. You try t' count 'em all, you're gonna be sittin' there a while."
"Wow." Epps considered this for a moment. "So is there any good news in this lecture, or are you trying to tell us that it's basically hopeless?"
"If it were hopeless we wouldn't've lasted as long as we have," Jazz pointed out lightly. "For every 'con who redefines th' word 'evil', there's a 'bot who's basically his opposite. We're not perfectly matched, but we're close enough. No, th' point of that lecture was to tell you that we've been fightin' a long time. Only th' toughest like Soundwave, or th' meanest like Blitzwing, or th' luckiest an' most skilled like Swindle are still around." He leaned back a little farther and dragged a hand through his hair. "Swindle's th' one I'm really worried about."
"Why? Isn't he just some mid-level warrior or something?" Mikaela frowned.
"Sure, an' if that were all he was I'd be cool with it. Problem is, he's not loyal like Soundwave, an' he's smarter an' a lot less predictable than Astrotrain. Who knows what's goin' through his processor right now?"
"Great. So what do we do now?" Epps frowned down at the grenade on the table. Jazz picked it up and turned it over in his hand, thinking about the first time he'd seen Soundwave in action. The 'con had swept through the battlefield like a bad line of code corrupting a program, utterly decimating everything in his path. Back then they hadn't known what he could do, or how to handle him. Now, though…
"We do nothin'," he said simply. "You two wait for Prime t' come back an' I'll see if I can give our little eavesdropper a welcomin' gift."
"Why bother?" Epps muttered, and Jazz smiled darkly.
"Ravage is basically a part of Soundwave walkin' around separate from th' rest. If I can slip him somethin'…"
"… Soundwave will be affected?" Mikaela tried.
"By now Barricade's told him I'm dead. I'm th' only one here who's a decent match for him hacker-wise. I scramble Ravage's circuits with a few lines of code an' Soundwave won't know what hit him."
The two humans considered this. Jazz grinned at them.
"Good thing, folks. Very good thing."
"Great," Epps responded sourly. "So now we wait, huh? This is gonna be boring."
Mikaela paused, then abruptly turned to face the sergeant. "What did you mean, Simmons isn't half bad? Do you know what he did to Bumblebee?"
"Then again, maybe not," the man added. Jazz chuckled, then turned back to the computer screen. He had a few viruses to cook up.
---
"No, Mom, I did not get arrested again."
Sam folded his arms on the table in front of him and dropped his forehead onto them. There was a serious drawback to having a police escort which neither he nor Prowl had though about. After that stunt where Bumblebee had 'stolen' himself, Sam had ended up getting off scot-free with the cops. Unfortunately Judy hadn't forgotten that little incident and when a cop car had pulled into their driveway and unloaded her son, she'd just about hit the roof. Sam was only grateful that she wasn't going after Prowl's holoform, which could only venture a limited distance from the Autobot and lacked a certain solidity.
"Are you sure?" she asked, peering through the curtains. The cruiser was still just sitting there. "If you were, Sam, you could tell me. It's nothing to be ashamed about; everyone has a few scrapes with the police."
"No, Mom," he said loudly. "This has nothing to do with the police. That's not even a real cop car, okay?"
"Not a real- Samuel James Witwicky, did you steal that car?!"
"Mom!" Sam lifted his head and stared at her. "How does 'not a real cop car' sound like 'stolen car'?"
"I don't know, it just… you were gone so long…" She waved her hands through the air and collapsed into a nearby chair. Sam leaned over and peered into the kitchen suspiciously. His mother only acted like this when she'd gotten into the wine.
"Where's Dad?" he tried. Maybe his father would be a little more open to actual conversation.
"He's at the firehouse, doing his Neighborhood Watch thing."
"Right," the boy muttered to himself. He sat up straight and looked at his mother, trying to be firm. After all, he knew what was going on here and what the stakes were. She didn't. "Okay, Mom, I think you should know something. That cop car? It isn't a real car at all. It's actually an alien robot that transforms into a car. And he's not the only one- in fact, there's a whole bunch of them, and they're probably going to start fighting soon."
Judy stared at her son for several long moments. Then she shook her head and sighed. "Oh Sam. This is what you get from working too hard and not getting enough sleep."
"I'm serious, Mom! You know that thing with the freeway bridges in Ohio? One of those guys did that. He shot out the bridge."
"Sam, that is a serious matter. Don't make fun of it."
"I'm not," he ground out, trying to refrain from pulling out handfuls of his hair. "I'm telling the- here. Come out here and talk to him."
"The police officer?" she asked as he herded her out. "Does this have something to do with that Agent Simmons?"
"No, Mom," Sam answered tiredly. Prowl's holoform watched them come down the path towards him.
"Excuse me, sir," Judy began, stepping forward and reaching out before Sam could stop her. "My son has been working on a school project and it seems to have- to have---"
Sam folded his arms across his chest and watched as his mother wave her hand through the hologram, staring at the rippling effect it caused. The holoform disappeared, replaced by sketchy blue lines that looked a lot like the Matrix code, only to reappear after her hand had passed through. Judy lifted her dumbfounded gaze to stare at the police car. The holoform rippled once more, then vanished entirely.
"So… that Simmons bastard was telling the truth?" she asked distractedly. Her son shrugged helplessly.
"Yeah, he was," he admitted. "Or, at least, as much of it as he knew."
"So your car… the new Camaro… it's actually a robot?"
"The old one was too," Sam explained. "The same robot, that is. But Mikaela made fun of him so he changed to something newer."
Prowl, meanwhile, did the best thing he could during this conversation: he sat still and said nothing. He was probably waiting for the proper moment to intervene.
"So this," and Judy didn't quite tap the tactician's hood, "is actually a robot?"
"Yes." Sam nodded, grateful that his mother seemed to be getting it.
"And it's only one of many?"
"He, Mom, not it. And there's about twelve more of them that I know of."
"And they're getting ready to start a war on our planet?"
"Technically they'd be restarting it. But anyways, the evil guys- the Decepticons? I sort of destroyed their leader, so they might be looking for revenge. I was kind of hoping you'd come back to base with us so the Autobots can protect you."
Judy appeared to have not heard her child. She was nodding and mumbling to herself as she turned and sort of half-stumbled a few steps away. Seeing as she was paying no attention to the other two, Prowl felt safe to offer his opinion.
"It might have been wiser to avoid mentioning Megatron and the Decepticons until after we were already at the base," he said softly.
"I thought it would scare her into coming with," the boy admitted.
"I have found that such maneuvers rarely work out as well as planned."
"Oh my god, is it talking?!" Judy stared at the 'bot, backing away rapidly. Sam followed her, holding out his hands as though to catch her if she tried to bolt.
"Yeah, Mom. He talks. But it's okay; he's one of the good guys. Mom!"
But Judy was gone. She darted up the path and ran back into the house, slamming the door shut behind her. Sam shot the tactician an apologetic glance before following her. He found her locked in the bathroom, baseball bat in one hand and a suspiciously empty bottle of wine in the other.
"Taking lessons from Dad now?" he asked.
"Call your father and tell him to get home, now. We're moving!"
After about twenty minutes of trying to coax her out, Sam gave up. He headed back downstairs and out to the driveway.
"It didn't go well, I take it." Prowl stated. The teen groaned as he dropped into the passenger's seat- for some reason it just felt wrong sitting in the driver's seat of a police car, even if he wasn't driving and the police car wasn't a car.
"Might wanna tell Ironhide to get comfortable," he replied, glancing towards the black pickup in question.
"I already did."
"Great. Thanks for the vote of confidence." The teen stared out the window. "Maybe we could wait for my dad. He can talk to her better when she's in one of these moods."
"I'm afraid that is not a viable option. Several minutes ago I received a transmission from Ratchet. It appears we have a spy back at base."
"A spy?" Sam echoed.
"One of Soundwave's symbiotes. Ravage. I would prefer he not remain so close to us, so we are going to return to base. It should scare him off."
"And my parents?"
"Ironhide will keep them safe. Nothing will happen to them, Sam."
Sam nodded and watched his house as they drove away. He trusted Ironhide, sure. But he would still worry, which made it one more concern on top of the seventy-two he already had.
"Why did those 'cons have to show up?" he murmured, not even aware he'd spoken out loud until Prowl responded.
"We are sorry that we have brought our war to this world," he said quietly. "But if it wasn't here, it would be elsewhere. Such is the nature of our race."
He left Sam to chew that over in silence as they drove back to base. Finally the teen decided that this was honestly not too bad. Sure, the 'cons couldn't have picked a worst time to show up, but there were benefits to this madness. For starters, his father would no longer be demanding he take classes in basic car repair.
"I'm a horrible son," he realized abruptly.
"Perhaps," Prowl allowed. "I wouldn't know."
As far as support went, it wasn't much. Sam leaned back in his seat and sighed. They had a war to fight, there was no time for family discussions.
"Sometimes," he said, half to himself, "I miss how simple life used to be."
Prowl cycled his vents, a sound very much like a human sigh.
"So do I."
---
"Have you ever walked into the middle of a conversation and just known you've missed something?"
"Just so you know, you are not funny. Not remotely."
"Because they're all laughing and you're just sitting there?"
"If there's a point to this pitiful analogy, could you kindly get to it? It would be a shame if you had something meaningful to say and I killed you before you could say it."
"This is kind of like that," Dead End finished. He was in one of his rare good moods, which correlated conversely with the dark fury Swindle was experiencing. "Especially since last I talked to you, you were with Barricade and doing nothing, and now you're leaking and alone."
"By the way, I really hate you."
"Do you want my help or not?" The former Stunticon wasn't too concerned by Swindle's snappiness. The merchant was never the most graceful loser.
"Your help, sure. However, standing there and analyzing the situation for five minutes doesn't qualify as help. I would call it 'very slagging annoying'."
"I just find it very interesting that you backed over a mailbox and ripped a hole in your main energon line and the twins noticed it before you."
"Thank you, Captain In-A-Nutshell. I know my life sucks. Either help me or get lost."
Dead End leaned over and tapped one finger on the hood of the Hummer, just between the headlights. Swindle literally growled in response.
"I have only so many energon rations," the darker mech warned.
"I have a very big gun."
"Yes, but your auto-repair should have channeled energy away from your extraneous weapons and into more vital systems. So the very big gun is useless."
"… I liked you better when you were depressed."
"Oh, we still are doomed," Dead End answered calmly. Technically he knew he shouldn't be harassing Swindle in such a manner, but he couldn't help it. The one mech who was always collected and in-control was sitting helpless on a side street, his survival hinged upon the mercy of one of his fellow Decepticons. He'd been there for the better part of three hours, according to him, and he was quite thoroughly unamused by the whole thing. However, Swindle also should have known to not get irritated at the one mech who could help him.
Swindle was quietly muttering unkind things. Dead End stepped back and pulled out one of his emergency rations.
"This is only because you helped restore my force field," he said warningly.
"Duly noted," came the sour reply. Being dependent on someone else obviously didn't sit well. Dead End ignored this display of attitude and carefully siphoned the energon into Swindle's main line. After a moment the Hummer's engine roared to life and Dead End dropped hastily into car form.
"So what happened, exactly?"
"There are a good many answers to that question," Swindle responded blandly. "Suffice to say the twins showed up, which is never a good thing."
"Then…?"
"Then I… slagging Pit, this is complicated. How much of the story do you know?"
"Starscream told me that Megatron is human. Is that what you're talking about?"
"Yes. Anyways, I may have, ahh, misplaced him."
"You misplaced Megatron?" Dead End considered that thoughtfully. "Is that even possible?"
"Clearly it is. I had to transform to handle one of the twins, so I don't know where he went."
Somehow Dead End doubted he was getting the whole story. He also knew nothing he could say or do would pry the truth out of Swindle, so there was no real point in trying.
"And the mailbox?"
"Let's assume you don't need to hear that story and work from there."
In other words, he was embarrassed by the whole thing. Not that Dead End blamed him. When he'd first sensed the Decepticon alarm signal, he'd simply assumed it was Barricade. Swindle had been a total shock.
"So now what?" Dead End asked. "Isn't there some way to track down Megatron?"
"Yes, there is. Tell you what- you find Barricade and Frenzy the Wonder-Spaz and I'll look for Megatron."
"Because you'll conveniently forget what you're supposed to be doing and take off. You've been looking for a way out, and this is a perfect opportunity." Dead End scoffed. Swindle gave a soft hum. Then a cannon cycled out of his left side and pointed straight at the former Stunticon.
"Let me rephrase that. I don't feel like being a team player anymore. If you don't feel like being a crater in the ground I suggest you leave."
"See, when you put it that way…" Dead End hastily backed away, then paused. "Hey, that gun-"
"Look familiar? Your old boss wasn't using it anymore, so I helped myself."
"Right. Well, it was nice talking to you."
"Uh huh."
The two 'cons both paused, then simultaneously pulled away from each other. Dead End saw Swindle tuck the cannon away and turn onto the main road. He waited until he was sure the other mech was long gone before tracing Barricade's signal and starting after him.
This planet did funny things to mechs, he thought wryly. He didn't want to spend too much time here. All the organic matter seemed to corrupt even the healthiest of CPUs. Not that it mattered much, since he'd probably already been here long enough for permanent damage.
Still considering this new way of shut down, he pulled onto the road and turned the opposite way as Swindle did. He had a scout and a warlord-turned-human to find.
---
The world seemed… fuzzy. Yes, fuzzy was a good word for it. Fuzzy was something he had never experienced before now; he'd always been careful to stay in top shape. One little slip and treacherous slaggers like Starscream would be all over him.
Oddly enough, he felt as though he were floating, as though his mind had simply abandoned his stupid organic body and drifted free. At first he didn't like it- he couldn't do anything, couldn't feel anything. Then he'd gotten used to it, and was now almost fond of the sensation. In fact, this whole experience could probably be considered one of the most relaxing times of his life, except some idiot fleshlings kept talking.
"What if they come looking for him?"
"One human in six billion? It'd take decades to find him. We lost all the cars following us. We're fine."
"Maybe he has a tracking device or something."
"Are you volunteering to do a strip search?"
"No, sir! I was just-"
"Then shut up and quit complaining."
Megatron smiled dreamily at the words. There was a way for his Decepticons to find him, and no amount of searching would reveal it to these creatures.
"What are we going to do with him?" a new voice asked.
"Nothing until the drugs wear off."
"Did you have to double-dose him?" Whiny was back again. He reminded Megatron of Starscream. Megatron decided that he didn't like him.
"He almost broke my neck when the first dose wore off too soon," the boss shot back.
The third man, the quiet one, asked one final question. "So when are we going to tell Agent Simmons about this?"
"We're not. Not until we have something real. He's been spending too much time around those Mission City people. He's actually starting to like those machines."
"I'm sure he wouldn't approve of this," Whiny muttered.
"I'm sure he would. Remember the Witwicky boy? Simmons won't care about the means as long as they're justified by the ends."
Megatron tuned the humans back out, trying to keep his mind focused. He remembered, he thought, that Swindle had done something very bad, something to be alarmed about. Exactly what the mech had done kept slipping away. Finally he gave up and returned to enjoying the floating feel. He would have plenty of time to worry after he came down from this.
So Megatron remained, blissfully isolated from the world around him, and unaware that the distance between himself and his only allies was slowly but steadily growing.