For those of you reading LIT-TIL you may have realized that this story maybe a little behind... So Hence this lovely tidbit of a chapter. I hope it's up to standard for you guys, and truth be told I wasn't sure about adding the last scene but oh well it wanted to be written (considering how many times I wrote it in my notes it really kept popping up...)

Disclaimer: I don't own Transformers.

Many tanks to Answethecall and my guest reviewer shadow kat for reviewing!


Chapter 11: The Missing Prank

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"That is so cheating!"

"Nah uh." Dion grinned as his avatar danced on the screen. "It's just grade A button mashing."

"Okay fine but I'm choosing the next arena." Sam said as he pressed the start button and began going through the characters.

Samantha shook her head at her father's and brother's banter over the game, her current reading material, a astronomy book that she had found in the rec room's bookcase lying in her lap.

The kids were spending the day with Sam, who had offered to spend time with them. Even though Nora was originally watching him not so subtly from the corner where she had been stretching before declaring the she was going to go for a jog. That of course had been hours ago, with no sign of her since.

Sam had to admit that he at first had no idea what to do with the kids, At first he spent an hour trying to go through several small stacks of paperwork that apparently need his approval... (Though he was not approving Que's request for uranium, he wasn't that stupid.) The whole time the Twins were fidgeting, Samantha was bored and had tried to read some of the files on his desk, while Dion had begun to drum his fingers on his chair, all while asking round after round of questions.

Sam finally sighed and looked at Dion. "Do you guys like video games?"

And that is what led to the three of them sitting in the rec room with the guys playing video games, and Samantha reading quietly.

Samantha was deeply concentrating on the book in her hands when something cold brushed against her leg. Glancing down the girl's eyes went wide and she let out a shriek. "SNAKE!"

Sam jumped as the girl screamed and leapt onto the couch with them, Glancing down he realized that there were multiple multicolored snakes were slithering over the floor Soon the few soldiers in the room realized this and began yelling. Sam cursed and swept Dion (who of course exclaimed: "Cool!") off of the floor and onto the couch.

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"Don't you dare laugh."

Mikaela's lips twitched. "I'm not." She tried not to snicker at the human chicken formerly known as William Lennox.

"Ratchet, Just tell me you've got a solvent for this crap." Will bristled at the hidden laughter in her voice.

Ratchet sighed as he went over to a cupboard and began siting through it. "I am going to beat those two slaggers upside the helm when I finally see them."

"Oh surely it couldn't be that bad." Mikaela said with a grin.

"You mean besides the exploding oatmeal, and the ipecac that was slipped into my lunch?" Will pointed out with an exasperated sigh. "I hate to see what happens next..."

"Well it seems that they already have, Jazz just commed me, he found Prowl glitched in his office." Ratchet growled. "And there's some sort of disturbance in both the Rec room."

"Lovely." Will groaned. "As if dealing with Mercy and Michael weren't enough for today..."

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"No nononono! Oh come on!" Nora cried as he mp3 batteries finally died on her, leaving her tuneless and stuck forty or so feet off the ground in a net. "Great, just great..."

Sometime earlier that day she had been on a jog when someone let off a loud 'whoop' and she found herself dangling in this stupid fisher's net. She didn't catch sight of who had caught her but she had heard her captors laughing and snickering as they sped out of the hanger.

And of course par Nora's uncannily ill luck it appeared that this was one of the less used hangers, and there had been no one to pass through. She had taken to singing along to her music in hopes the sound would attract anyone...

A soft chuckle broke her misery gripped thoughts.

"HEY! Who's there?" Nora searched the floor below her before her eyes landed on the owner of the laugh. He was standing there his arms crossed as he smirked up at her, his platinum blond head cocked to the side as he examined her through the thin wire framed glasses perched on his nose. He was wearing what appeared to be a uniform of some type, judging from the white shirt and the black slacks that conformed to his toned body.

"I have to admit you have a lovely singing voice." He said as she blinked at him.

"Wait a minute how long have you been sitting there?! No, never mind that you realized that you could have gone for help at any point right? Get me down!"

"And to think that I was enjoying that trilling voice of yours before you started barking." the man grumbled as he examined the net and followed the tether line to it's end. Nora watched him walk out of sight and almost whimpered at the thought of being stuck there till the next person found her when the net plummeted.

Nora shrieked and shut her eyes as the floor rushed up at her. There was a jerk and the net stopped before impacting the ground. Nora glared at the stranger as he chuckled again and she hit the floor. He walked back into sight with a large grin on his face as he caught her glare.

"Jerk." She growled as she stuck her tongue out at him. He chuckled again and helped pull the net off of her.

"Is that really how you treat someone that has helped you?"

Nora narrowed her eyes at him and glared at the name tag pin on his lapel. "I'm sorry Mr. Runner, I seemed to have lost my manners after having the living daylights scared out of me. So forgive me if I'm a little snippy for being grouchy."

He vented a sigh through his nose as he turned his head away. "Yeah whatever."

"Um... I don't suppose you know how to get back to the rec room do you?"

"Sorry femme, but I'm not even supposed to be wandering around here. So I've no clue."

Nora blinked at him again. "Right then... well I guess I'll have to find it myself. Thanks again for getting me down..." She said as she turned and headed through the door she had earlier entered the hanger through.

Barricade watched her leave through the corner of his eye as he glanced down at the pin on his shirt. How did this happen? He frowned at his original designation...

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The Rec room had long since been abandoned by both the soldiers and the mechs. Sunstreaker and Sideswipe having been the last two to make their way out before running off. Sam glared at Sideswipe as he passed positive that this was part of his doing...

"I say that we go in there and shoot the things!"

"Aw hell no. We need a flamethrower or something to torch the suckers."

"First of all guys language I've got little ears here." Sam scowled at the arguing soldiers. "Second there is no way you are using a flame thrower. I will not be the liaison that let you burn the base down. Same goes for going in there guns a blazing. Someone's bound to get shot and I doubt Ratchet would be too pleased with having to pull bullets out of you."

"Hm... Perhaps we could squash them..." Dino pondered.

"You can't kill them!" Dion shouted earning the glances of the men. "They're living creatures too it's not they're fault that they've gotten in here!"

"But it's snakes. Kid you don't play with snakes."

"No you cook them. My mama makes some good rattlesnake stew-"

"Not now Fig!" several of the men shout.

Sam sighed as he face palmed. "God how I wish we could just call pest control..."

"Someone say something about pest control?"

"Nora!" the twins cheered as they ran over to hug the girl. She ruffled their hair as she noted the arguing men. "So did I miss anything?"

"There's snakes in the rec room!" Dion grinned wide.

Nora raised a brow. "Snakes? Really?"

"Yep! One of them touched Sam!" Dion snickered as his sister glared at him. "All of the men started freaking out and now they want to go kill them."

Nora took note of the pleading look in her cousin's eyes before letting out a sigh. "Well I wasn't a park ranger for nothing right? Yo Sam- No sweetie your dad." She said as they both glanced in her direction.

"Please don't tell Mikaela that I had the kids around snakes I'm sure she'd tear me a new one..."

"Actually I was going to ask you if you wanted me to go wrangle up your pest problem?"

Sam just blinked at her.

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"Are you sure about this?"

"Honestly? No, but I've been bitten by too many of the critters not to be that afraid of them. Besides, Dion tell them the four rules."

"Um... They're just as afraid of you as you are of them... So don't show fear because they can smell your phera..."

"Pheromones." Samantha provided the word.

"Two, red on yellow kill a fellow, red on black you're right Jack... Three use something to grab them by the back of their neck keeping them away from you and four..."

"No sudden movements." Nora said as she slowly crawled over the table that they had used to barricade the doorway. She was solely armed with a pillowcase...

"I would point out that you aren't using anything to catch them, so you are breaking your third rule..." Epps stated from his position by the doorway.

"Do you want to take my place?"

"No." the african american shook his head fast enough that she would be surprised if he gave himself whiplash..

"Then shut up!" Nora said as she cautiously made her way to the pool table, giving wide berth to anything that sat on the ground. "I could use help if anyone isn't too chicken to join me." She said loudly as she carefully grabbed a queue stick and slowly headed to her first destination, the sitting areas.

Will, Mikaela, and Ratchet came up behind the group of men and the only lingering mech, Dino.

"Do I want to know what is going on here?" Will asked causing the men to jump and turn to look at their mostly plucked Colonel who was eyeing his men with a WTH look.

"Someone thought it would be funny to release a bunch of snakes into the rec room.

"Wait snakes?! Nora what the hell are you doing?!" Mikaela yelled.

"Mikaela don't come in here." Nora called.

"I'm not but you're going to get yourself hurt!" Mikaela growled. "Get out of there and we'll send Ironhide in there to blast the damned things to kingdom come!"

"I'm not letting you guys kill these poor things, besides only one of them has been of the poisonous variety." Nora commented as she pinned another snake. "They're coral snakes for the most part." She gripped the red, black , and yellow serpent by the back of it's head.

She swiped the stick under the couch once more and met no resistance. "That's all of the ones under here. Anyone know how many more I've got?"

"There is a large mass of them under the bot's sofa." Ratchet grumbled angrily. "It seems to be all that is left in the room."

"Right then... I need another pillow case and or sack and someone to flip that couch." Nora grinned.

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It took another thirty minutes roughly before Nora had the second bag full of the squirming creatures. The soldiers were cheering while Ratchet scolded her about the stupidity of her stunt especially after he scanned her for bites only to discover her somewhat deprived state from being in the net the whole day.

Nora on the other hand was still glancing over the room, not paying attention to the medic. Even after she had handed off the bags to Dino who said her would deposit them out in the desert.

"Nora! Nora that was totally awesome!" Dion cheered as he ran over and glomped her.

"Mhm..." Nora said as she watched Samantha make her way over to the bookcase. A curious sound filled the room...

"SAMANTHA DON'T MOVE!" Nora screamed. The girl froze in her steps at both the tone of Nora's voice and the rattles that filled the air. Where is it? Where is it?

"It's under the fragging bookcase..." Ratchet said after scanning the room again cursing the fact that he had somehow missed it. He went to move forward but Nora shook her head as she spoke clearly. "Any vibration in that direction and it will strike." The teen stared at her cousin.

"Nora..." Mikaela said tightly.

"Sammie listen to me..." Nora said as she slowly walked forward. "On the count of five, I'm going to grab you okay? Whatever you do don't move. Got it memorized?"

"Nora... I know you said not to be scared... but... I am..."

"1..."

"Nora-"

"2..."

"Just stay calm sweetie," Mikaela tried to soothe Samantha

"3..."

Nora was right behind the girl at this point. "4..." she whispered as she wrapped her hands around the girl and quickly spun around and slung the girl as Ratchet shot at the bookcase. Nora hit the ground as the shot went over her head. "..5" Nora coughed as dust, ash, and debris rained down on her. "Thanks Ratchet..."