Already feeling absolutely exhausted, Bill now couldn't help but wish she'd just stayed at home and tucked herself into bed rather than trail after Alex.

The eleven hour drive through the middle of nowhere had worn her down considerably, since she'd constantly had to be on her guard to make sure that whoever was with Alex wouldn't notice her following them, since she and they appeared to be the only cars in the vicinity. However, one minute she'd been following the Ram and Mustang, then the next thing she knew, they'd disappeared completely, having been swallowed up in the vast desert expanse. Frustrated and tired she'd just pulled over on the side of the road, and had grabbed her phone to try to get into contact with Alex, however every time she dialled his number, she just got an automated voice telling her he was unavailable.

Unsure where Alex had gone, if she'd lost him, or the cars had just vanished, Bill decided that she'd try to get at least a little rest, even if it meant doing so on the side of the road. She was hardly in the right frame of mind to drive eight hours back to Amarillo. It would be a little rich had she previously yelled at Alex for drunk driving if she came off the road having fallen asleep at the wheel.

However, she'd just been about to rest her forehead on the steering wheel when she noticed something in the distance to her right. At first she thought it was a dust devil, dust swirling around, but she soon realised it was a helicopter, slowly rising into the sky. She watched it closely, squinting slightly as she took in it. She wasn't knowledgeable in the field of armed warfare, but it seemed to her that the chopper was loaded with charged rounds. If it was taking off from a nearby air force base, it must be going somewhere with intent of causing some destruction.

Again, Bill was about to dismiss it and shut her eyes, but this time she noticed another dust cloud, this time getting closer to her rather than going upwards. She pushed a few stray strands of hair from her face and rubbed her eyes, both due to fatigue and disbelief, as she watched a fire truck off all things, ploughing through the desert. Then out of the dust as she watched other vehicles emerge behind it; an ambulance, the Ram and Mustang from earlier, and was that an Aston Martin too? If Alex was still in the Mustang, there was no doubt he'd probably be having something close to a heart attack having been in contact with not only his brother's DBS but this one too.

She watched in increasing confusion and awe as the chopper moved over them, adopting a speed that kept it exactly above them while the vehicles below it moved with a precision on the road that Bill knew most drivers didn't have.

Was Alex still with them? She continued to squint and strain her eyes, but she couldn't make anything out, no matter how hard she tried. She'd just have follow them again.

Alex had better be grateful she was stalking him like this.

With a loud sigh Bill started the engine up again, running a hand over her face as she did so, telling herself to wake up and that they'd hopefully come to a stop soon enough. If they didn't, Bill didn't honestly think she could drive for much longer, and she knew she'd have to give up and concede defeat, having to resort back to just hoping Alex would be ok.

She was sure he was old enough by now to look after himself, but she had a little niggling feeling at the back of her mind, telling her that something wasn't quite right. Maybe it was the armed helicopter flying above the Mustang Alex had previously been in, or maybe it was something else. She couldn't quite be sure. But all the same, she carefully pulled back onto the road, settling herself into driving, her eyes focused on the disappearing vehicles in the distance, the sun glinting off the backside of the Aston Martin like a beacon, of help or warning, she wouldn't know until she caught up with them.

Half an hour into flying, Alex was already contemplating selling his soul for a stomach of iron that wouldn't roll around quite as much as his current one was. Or at least a sick bag.

Reaper's idea of fun was Alex's idea of hell.

He didn't even know helicopters could do half the things Reaper insisted on doing, let alone how they didn't plummet out of the sky each time he executed some ridiculous move. In a way, Reaper was just like an airborne, silent Jak, but at least Jak couldn't do a barrel roll, making it look like Alex was suspended above deadly rotating blades of death.

Alex couldn't even just concentrate on anything else, since every time he tried to look in a various direction, Reaper would lurch this way and that to unnerve him. Even asking him to stop didn't have much of an effect. All the Autobot replied with was something pertaining to it doing him some good to toughen up. But seriously, why did Alex need to be thrown all over the sky in order to 'toughen up'? He was going to see if Crossfire would have a word with Reaper about dangerous flying, and here he was, thinking these guys were nice to humans.

Five minutes had passed since the last time Reaper had done something insanely stupid, so Alex allowed himself to relax a little and focus on the sprawling desert town appearing on the horizon. He could make out a large area covered with houses and various other commercial buildings, and as they edged closer, the distinctive profile of the world famous Strip began to take shape. He could see the needle like Stratosphere at one end, and the Luxor pyramid at the other, as they approached at a slightly eastern angle, the road stretching south to north. He spotted a few helicopters hovering over the city, as well as planes taking off and waiting to land at McCarran airport, and he wondered how Reaper was able to get into this airspace without any trouble. From what he'd seen, this chopper was fully armed and loaded.

Alex supposed NEST may have made a few arrangements with, well, everywhere. He was just about to let his gaze wander with a passing chopper when a small beep drew his attention to Reaper's screen.

'Can you see where the protoform fell?'

"What am I looking for exactly?" Alex frowned.

'A giant plume of smoke. It's not hard to miss.'

"Well I hardly know, do I?" Alex grumbled, beginning to scan the horizon, looking this way and that. After a little while, he shook his head, "Can't see it."

There was a little pause before Reaper responded, 'Centre of Las Vegas Boulevard.'

"The Strip?" Alex leant forward in his seat, shielding his eyes slightly as he ran his eyes slowly down the Strip, "You mean… You mean that cloud of smoke isn't just some fancy Las Vegas stunt? One of you has just crashed landed in the middle of the Strip?"

'Apparently so.'

"You guys are messy. What happened to being undercover and subtle?" Alex ran a hand over his face.

'Things happen.'

"Like Paris?"

'Like that. I'm going to land at the airport. Traction will pick you up from the side of the road below the Mandalay Bay hotel. You will join him and the others while I keep watch. Don't leave their sight.'

Alex had to read rapidly as the words flashed across the screen, almost too fast for him to follow, "This is not going to work. There's going to be a random naked robot there right, he doesn't have a vehicle form? How will you talk to it and convince it to come away with you in public?"

'If the protoform has any sense it will have adopted its vehicle form as soon as it could have. Hopefully it's just waiting. It may be shaken. We'll recognise it easily, and it us, so it'll follow. As for the destruction, Crossfire and Pulse have found that their vehicles come in helpful for such occasions.'

"Slow down with the writing," Alex grunted, "But yeah, I sort of see your point."

'We're going down now, so hold on. Once we land, get out and get to Traction, he'll be visible.'

"Do you have physic links or something?" Alex frowned.

'Technology. Internal communication devices.'

Alex shrugged, "Fair enough. Stupid human, remember?"

Reaper's response was the suddenly feeling of falling and Alex looked away from the screen just in time to watch them begin to plummet back down to earth. Maybe plummet wasn't the word, since it was a controlled decent, but to Alex, the ground looked like it was rushing up to meet him too quickly for his liking. He just closed his eyes tightly and tensed his stomach, praying that he'd be ok.

Eventually he felt the landing skids come in contact with the ground, causing Reaper to rock slightly and Alex to whimper, but once they'd come to a definite stop, he cracked his eyes open, catching sight of the screen which now only had the word 'Go,' on it.

Alex hesitated slightly but quickly unbuckled his harness, letting Reaper open the door for him as he did so. He then jumped out of the door, feeling the heat hit him in the face, just as if he'd opened an oven door, and he looked around quickly, ignoring the roaring of planes and other helicopters all around him.

He soon spotted Traction, as Reaper had said, waiting by the fence over to one side, which was part of Las Vegas Boulevard, yet was devoid of hotels for the moment. He quickly began to hurry in that direction, trying not to look like he was running in case people thought he was a little odd, or may have something to do with the explosion just down Strip.

Alex hurried through a gap in the fence, unsure if it was an exit or just a torn part of it, but either way, he did his best to look as casual as possible as he squeezed through, before darting over to the Ram. He yanked open the driver's door and jumped in, barely having enough time to pull his seatbelt on before Traction was off, slipping in with the traffic which was extremely dense, obviously due to the incident on the Strip. Alex looked around them, unable to see Jak or any of the others, so he supposed they'd just gone up ahead without Traction.

"Are you ok?" Traction asked eventually, his voice sounding like it was coming out of the speakers around Alex.

"Uh, yeah, sort of," Alex shrugged, "Don't like flying."

"Good," Traction responded briefly, obviously concentrating on the task at hand.

Alex fell silent, looking out the window with a sigh. Normally he'd be bouncing all over the place if a Vegas trip had come up, however the place looked like it was spiralling into chaos. People running around, yelling, people taking pictures. Many people were trying to turn their cars around wherever possible to get off the Strip, causing nose-to-tail and nose-to-nose traffic that was inching along slowly. The smoke from the crashed protoform looked more devastating on the ground, and as they slowly crept along the Strip, closer to police barricades, Alex could see the full extent of the damage.

The protoform appeared to have come from the southeast, and had managed to gouge a hole in the top of the Planet Hollywood. That hadn't caused too much damage, however it had then travelled onwards, straight into Las Vegas' Eiffel Tower replica. Apparently these alien robots liked destroying Paris. The top of the Tower had come crashing down across the Strip on top of a fair number of cars, its tip coming to rest between the Monte Carlo and the Bellagio. Thrown off a little by the impacts, the protoform had apparently then crashed finally into the lake in front of the Bellagio, once home to the dancing fountains, now home to a large amount of rumble and leaking water mains. Scorch marks and chunks of asphalt showed how close it had come to ploughing into the lobby of the Bellagio, which would have undoubtedly killed a large number of gamblers and holidaymakers. As it was, Alex supposed a good number of people would have been injured by falling debris; others trapped or crushed in cars, or caught up in crumbling buildings.

For aliens that said they protected humans, the damage this one had succeeded in causing, coupled with the incident in France, suggested that while their hearts, or whatever they had in its place, were in it, they just didn't seem to be good at it.

Eventually Traction pulled up beside a few police vehicles, allowing Alex to get a better look at the scene. He supposed Crossfire and Pulse were there somewhere, but he admitted that he couldn't distinguish between them and the other various fire trucks and ambulances darting between smouldering cars.

"Where are they?" Alex muttered to Traction, "I can't see them at all. What about -?"

Someone rapping on the window cut him off, causing him to jump in shock. He scrambled around for the switch to lower the window, though had to rely on Traction doing it for him eventually, and found himself face to face with a rather irritated looking cop.

"Yes?" Alex put on his best innocent expression, looking confused, yet shocked at the same time.

"Sir, you have stopped your car in the most awkward of places. If you hadn't noticed, half of Las Vegas is currently falling apart due to a stray meteor. So if you could please turn around and move on, it would be much appreciated," the man folded his arms.

"I… Uh. I…" Alex faltered when suddenly the Ram made a loud spluttering noise, the engine beginning to whine loudly, "My… My engine's gone. Sorry. I might be out of gas, at least I hope it's that."

"Sir, this is not helpful," the cop looked less than pleased.

"I can hardly help it, officer," Alex gave a little shrug, "If you're willing to move my vehicle or maybe take a look under the hood, go ahead. But as of now it's not going anywhere. It might be fine in a minute, I don't know. So for now I'm staying in the safety of my car."

The policeman surveyed him with a look of disgust, allowing Alex to casually turn his attention to the scene behind him, where the police and firemen were running around wildly to cut people from their cars. He was just about to look back to the man staring at him when he suddenly caught sight of movement behind one of the teetering legs of the Eiffel Tower, just to the right of him. He blinked a few times then shook his head, unable to believe that he could just about make out Drag and another taller Autobot that he didn't recognise, both in their natural states, casually slipping away from the carnage.

"Why are you shaking your head like that, sir? Did I say something you didn't like? The prospect of jail time maybe?" the cop leant into his field of vision, blocking out the two robots.

"Uh, what?" Alex snapped out of his daze and focused on the cop again, "Jail time? What no! I was just thinking about something, don't worry about -," he was cut off by Traction's engine roaring loudly, quickly easing back into the normal loud hum. Alex guessed he'd seen Drag and the other one too, or been told to move, "Oh, would you look at that, my truck's just fine!" with that, Alex casually hit a random switch on the dash, making it look like he'd just activated the window as it slid back up, blocking out the police officer.

"I advise you get out of here quick, Tract," Alex muttered as he watched the man's face stiffen as Alex disappeared behind the tinted window.

"On it," Traction responded, backing up slightly before doing such a tight turn that Alex swore a normal Ram would never be able to do it, "Drag's with the protoform, Jak's making his way to meet them right now, Crossfire and Pulse are a little caught up right now. We're to get the protoform out of town a little way, just out of the havoc and main eye, and wait. Reaper is keeping an eye out for Spectre in the sky, as well as any other Decepticons on the ground when he can," he gave a quick overview.

"Little too easy maybe?" Alex dared muttered.

"Hmm," Traction murmured in response, obviously agreeing with him, "Just hope nothing goes wrong while Crossfire and Pulse are caught up."

"I'm hoping alright," Alex nodded and glanced over his shoulder as Traction managed to slip into a stream of traffic heading back away from the destruction, back the way they'd come, "Though it's so obvious that something bad is going to happen now. I read books and watch films where people talk like this and then, kapow, everyone's dead. That's the end of that."

"Thank you for that Alex," Traction muttered as he manoeuvred his way through the traffic, horns blaring all about them, people yelling abuse and screaming too.

Alex just shrugged and sat back in his seat, falling silent as he looked around them; glad Traction was the one struggling through the mayhem and madness, not him. He kept looking around for the others, but in all the time they were stuck in traffic, he didn't catch even the smallest glimpse of them. He saw a few Mustangs that were similar to Jak, but none of them had the unique black racing stripes that he wore. He couldn't even see Reaper in the sky, but he supposed that he had to keep going round in circles to keep an eye on them all.

Eventually they managed to pull free of the majority of the traffic, speeding up a little as Traction began to weave his way though the traffic, slowly leaving Strip behind them as they carried on south down Las Vegas Boulevard, passing the airport and following shopping centres.

Alex kept his eyes peeled for any of the Autobots, but he still couldn't see them, and though he hated to admit it, he was getting a little worried. It wasn't that he didn't like being left with Traction; it was just that he was concerned if they ran into trouble what might happen to them without one of their team, since he was busy ferrying a human around.

He was just about to mention something to Traction when he heard a high pitch whine of a sports car engine coming from in front of them, and Alex glimpsed an orange Lamborghini Gallardo speeding towards them. Fastest car in the world, if Alex remembered correctly. Attractive low-rider too, even though impractical. It also looked like it was breaking the speed limit something stupid. As Alex was slowly processing this useless information, it had also swerved across onto the wrong side of the road, now heading straight for them.

There was a moments pause before Traction flung on his breaks, swinging open his driver's door, "Get out now Alex!" he yelled, not even waiting for Alex to try before flinging him out onto the road, seatbelt snapping.

Alex hit the ground hard and grunted loudly in pain, rolling part the way across the three-lane highway, only just being narrowly missed by a passing car. As he rolled, he was just about able to make out Traction and the Lamborghini suddenly both rapidly unfold, far faster than he'd seen any of the Autobots do, before they crashed violently into each other, blurring into a mass of screeching metal.

Alex yelled something intelligible as he came to a halt, clothes a little torn, grazes and scratches littering his arms, and looked up to find the robots engaging in a violent fistfight above him. He just knew something bad would happen!

Traction was far larger than the other, smaller Lamborghini, and was grabbing various parts of it, pulling on them violently, "Decepticon scum," he snarled, sounding far more vicious than Alex would have thought the laidback Autobot could ever be. The opposing Decepticon just growled back loudly, attempting to grab Traction around the throat, however was too late as Traction flung him to the ground and stamped on his chest. It tried to get up, small gun like contraptions replacing both hands, and it didn't wasting any time in firing them at the Autobot, bullets ricocheting off metal all over the place.

Alex cried out again as gunfire sounded all around him and he tried to crawl away from, doing his best to avoid the Lamborghini's flailing limbs and flying shrapnel.

He couldn't believe this was happening, right here, just outside of the Strip on a main highway. Subtlety? What freaking subtlety? These aliens seriously needed their dictionaries updated. They were having a damn bitch fest, right above his head. Alex could almost imagine the sounds of metal hitting metal as the two giant robots slapping each other. He half wished that he could just yell at them to cut it out, but he'd most likely just be trampled into the ground, and it was probably he best keep out of the way in case the Decepticon saw him.

He peered around a car he'd found to use as shelter, watching as Traction continued to pummel the surprisingly tough little robot while spitting vile abuse at him, ignoring the other's screeching.

Alex told himself that it was better the Decepticon died than got to him and got him killed instead.