Static

Chapter Nine

Evil glee flared to life across Megatron's face and optics. He grinned and raised his arm again, to fire on the dumbfounded armies. Pink-purple fire flew across the room and caught a few Autobots and Decepticons in the chassis, knocking them down but not out.

"Autobots! Decepticons! Retreat and scatter!" yelled Ironhide as he and Motormaster stooped to pick up the stasis-locked CMO. The Cybertronians didn't need telling twice. They scattered and ran for their lives. Mirage managed to run forward and scoop up Optimus before Megatron hit him with is cannon.

"'Bee! Take Optimus!" yelled Mirage as he went down. Bumblebee ran forward to his fellow Special Ops member and grabbed Optimus, who was still crying, and ran for the door. He looked back at his comrade but one look from Mirage told him that he needed to get Optimus to safety and not worry about him. And with that, Bumblebee ran.

The partially wounded ran towards the Medbay to wait for the others. Energon flowed steadily from some and they tried desperately to stem the bleeding. Others were clutching their shoulders or chests or whatever may be injured as they waited for help to arrive. Hound and Mirage were among the wounded and were about to start makeshift repairs when Hound realised something.

"Hey, guys?" the others just groaned in response. "Didn't Megatron and Optimus first come here?"

Another groan.

"And you're point is, Autobot?" snarled Hook as he tried to mend Scrapper whom was fast falling into stasis lock.

"Well, shouldn't we get out of here? Megatron obviously remembers how to fire his cannon so what if he remembers where the Medbay is?" Hound's voice increased in volume and was tainted with worry and fear. Everyone else exchanged looks of realisation. Suddenly, the door opened and everyone jumped, one bot screamed, thinking it was Megatron. It was Jazz.

"Y'all best get yer afts to Prowl's quarters now if y'all wanna live! Megatron's on his way here now!" Jazz said, he too looked frightened. Again, they didn't need telling twice. "Follow me!" and they all legged it down the corridors to the tactician's quarters, adrenalin pumping through their circuits.

"Who'd have thought we'd still be running from Megatron, even as a Sparkling?

"Where are they? Jazz should be here with them by now!" Prowl said as he paced the room. Both armies were hiding out in a secret room that lead off from Prowl's main quarters.

Knock, knock, knock

"What was that?" Bumblebee whimpered, he was worried for Static; the two bots had become very close friends and Bumblebee always feared for his friends.

"I'm no expert but I don't think Megatron would knock." Said Bluestreak in an all-too-calm voice.

"Hey! Are ya gonna let us in or not?" it was Jazz's muffled voice. Prowl hoisted himself up to the door and gently opened it.

"Mind the step, Jazz did you get the injured?" said Prowl

"Yeah but Scrapper is nearly out of energy according to Hook, we gotta get 'em in fast and patch 'em up quickly!" replied Jazz as he lowered himself into the secret room. He and Ironhide helped the injured mechs down and laid them next to Ratchet's "sleeping" chassis. Jazz then ducked back out and fetched a few of Ratchet's tools and a rationed supply of Energon cubes.

"Alright, great work Jazz" praised the Praxian tactician, "ok, listen up! We've only got a limited supply of these and they're gonna have to be rationed off! Those whose energy levels are critically low raise your hand" twelve hands went up. "Good, Jazz, Ironhide could please hand out one cube per bot for those who need it? Keep your hands up!" Prowl then turned to Wheeljack who was tinkering with an old communications system that hadn't been used since the wars. "Wheeljack, how are you doing? Any luck?"

The engineer shook his head. "Not much so far Prowl, I've been trying to link up with Teletraan One but to no avail. I can't even pinpoint Megatron's position!" Wheeljack hung his head in shame and defeat. Prowl patted him on the arm gently.

"I know you can do this Wheeljack but it doesn't matter if you can't ok? Bumblebee, Perceptor, how's Optimus doing?"

"He's doing fine Prowl but his Energon flow to his antennae cannot stabilise nor function properly without an automatic jumpstart motorisation device that was left in Ratchet's Medbay." Said Perceptor

"Say what?" Prowl didn't do too well when Perceptor went all "scientific" on him

"The antennae cannot be functioning properly without a jumpstart to stop him bleeding. The thing we need is in Ratchet's Medbay." Bumblebee simply explained. He cast a worried look at Optimus who was gazing up at him with azure blue optics.

'He's just too innocent.' Thought Bumblebee, ' he doesn't deserve this either. It's not fair and I'll bet he doesn't even understand what's going on.' All of a sudden, an audio-splitting bang erupted from outside the room and the door that had concealed the Cybertronians for so long was blown clean off its hinges. Several Autobots were killed somehow in the blast and were left buried under a load of rubble. Megatron soon came into view and started towards Optimus, gun poised to kill him. It was just like it was before.

====== Optimus' POV ======

"Megatron! No STOP! I screamed at him. I was so terrified. I didn't understand what was going on. Most of my friends were dead and I was next! Megatron hovered above me and I could see his cannon warming up to fire; to destroy me. I could see no way of getting out of the situation and my shoulders slumped in defeat. This was the end, I had had no company with me as I died and now Static would grow up without a family. If Megatron kept her alive he would probably raise her as a Decepticon. I couldn't allow that but I couldn't get out of my current situation. I felt so guilty with myself; if I had allowed Megatron to come and play with Static and I, then maybe none of this would have happened. Perhaps if I hadn't gone and fought with Megatron the first day we met Static. Or if only I had thought more about what Megatron wanted instead of what Static and I wanted then maybe, just maybe, we'd be ok and I wouldn't be about to die fight now.

"And now, you die, Optimus Prime!" Said Megatron, his voice so venomous that I couldn't help but wince at the tone of it.

He fired and everything went white.