every mech or femme speaking in bold is speaking through the comlinks
Ashley woke up the following morning the same way she had been waking up since she met the autobots: invasive poking of metallic fingers the size of her entire torso or more and the obnoxious whines and callings from the red mech known as sideswipe.
Moving her head ever so slightly, she opened the available eye to glare at the said robot who cheered up visibly once he saw her react.
"You're awake!" he chirped.
"Sideswipe why can't you let me sleep?" she growled sinking her face back into the pillow. Again the poking began.
"Because, Prime wants you ready for the government guy and we're in charge of you, so our task is to make sure your ready" Swatting away his hand (not too roughly for she learned that hurt quite a bit) she slowly sat up and stretched popping a few bones and making the robots present wince. She noted that Ironhide and Ratchet were at a table far away talking in lower tones and in their language, they probably didn't want to wake her up like sideswipe had just done, Sunstreaker was behind his brother looking at the said bots with suspicion for some reason.
"Fine, fine… I'm up…man you can be annoying…" Sunny snorted at that.
"Try being bonded to him, its much worse." She gave him a curious glance before getting to her feet and wondering where the hell could she get a mirror to see how bad her hair was, she then remembered she was in the presence of car transforming into robots beings and motioned for sideswipe to get closer, as he did so she grabbed a metallic part of his body turning it her way.
"Hey!"
"Shut it, you wake me up, then you be my morning mirror "she said turning the car door's mirror to see herself, it wasn't too bad…but she was definitely in grave need of a shower and new clothes. "Well that's pretty…"
"What is?" the Yellow Lamborghini asked suddenly paying attention to the two.
"I certainly can't meet a government official looking like this… I mean man…I look almost like a cavewoman…I need a bath and new clothes…" she rubbed her face in an attempt to relieve the stress building up.
"You can't be in the ones you have at the moment?"
"Ew no! Sideswipe I've been wearing these for two days! I stink, literally, my hair is all tangled and messy and I need to brush my teeth…seriously not washing your teeth for four days is just plain out gross, I think I can still taste every food I ate in that time…"
He listened curiously as the human kept describing how much work she needed in her appearance and quickly deduced this was going to take long, and that he had no idea how to help her.
"Should we call for help?" He asked his brother through the com. Link so the human didn't hear them.
"Slag yeah, I have no idea what she's even talking about…what on cybertron is toothpaste? Do they make it from their teeth?" His brother replied also glancing at the human curiously.
"I'll call bumblebee then…"The red lambo said changing the link connection. "Bee? You online?" There was a bit of static but after a minute the familiar sound of the connection came as did a drowsy voice from the usually cheerful 'bot.
"Bumblebee here…what is it Sideswipe?"
"Ashley is spouting some kind of nonsense about not looking decent for the government official and wants to get some things…I have no idea what half of the stuff is."
"Oh… I suppose she's right…I'll be there in a breem, Bumblebee out."
He turned to stare back at the small human to notice she had stopped talking and was glaring at him.
"Were you even listening?" she asked in a low tone.
"Halfway through yes" he said truthfully, really it didn't matter if he did hear everthing, he didn't get it anyway.
"Good, then take me to a local store, I really need to finish this as soon as possible, when's the suit coming?"
"Suit?"
"The government dude, you know? Suit? Guy wears a suit all the time?" seeing his perplexed expression she sighed and waved a hand as if saying she gave up explaining. "Can we just go? Please?"
"We're waiting for Bumblebee, he knows the area, plus he'll probably know where you need to go more than we do…"
"Oh right…you guys just landed."she said in an apologetic tone.
While they waited she had the decency to remember to fold back her sleeping bag and left it over the mattress, by the time she actually managed to do so the small yellow mech had arrived and was looking quite tired while the twins just broadly grinned at him oblivious to his foul mood for waking up so early in the morning.
"So…this is a ball…" Sunstreaker said not sure what to make of the white plain building with bold electric lights in the shape of human letters.
"Mall sunny, mall, and yes, this is where we humans get most of the items we need.
"Why do you need so much?"
"Well it varies, but I guess you have a point, we do want too much and most of the time we don't need it. There's loads of petitions to stop this but we live in a consumerist world these days…so it doesn't work very well."
"Sounds logic" he snorted in a sarcastic tone.
"I'll only be a few minutes ok?" She said hurrying to leave.
"Oh no, your not going alone" a human voice said behind her, making her jump nearly three feet in the air and backaway with a speed they weren't expecting, thus slamming backwards onto Bumblebee's door, she calmed down once she recognized the red head who smiled sheepishly rubbing the back of his head in a apologetic manner. "Sorry about that…"
"DON'T DO THAT!"she nearly shrieked trying to calm down her accelerated heart, over the last few days Sideswipe had the tendency to turn on his hologram whenever he pleased scaring the wits out of her everything.
"Side's we talked about this…" Bumblebee said in an already defeated tone, making her wonder if he was paying attention to what he was saying or had recorded it somewhere in his database. "Though Sideswipe has a point Ashley, we need to accompany you inside, you can't go by yourself."
"Why the hell not? Its just a bloody mall, nothing happens at the mall other than the typical sale's mosh." She asked looking down at the car not caring if anyone was watching.
"Sale's Mosh?" the twins asked with bewildered faces.
"An aggressive activity human females get into at these places when the item's prices descend." Bumblebee cleared them, to which Ashley just patted his mirror.
"Exactly. And I don't plan on getting anywhere near those…nothing worse than a raging woman after toilet paper on sale." She grinned seeing their confused looks, it was rather enjoyable to do that. "So back to the subject, other than that nothing really ever happens in there, so you guys can relax a bit, enjoy the sunshine and…er… I don't know catch up on whatever subject you couldn't speak while I was around" she turned to leave not looking back at them this time.
"Come back in half an hour!" Bee warned before she was too far away, Sideswipe's Hologram still followed her with his gaze; his brother undoubtfuly was doing the same in his car mode.
"Are you sure about this? Last time-"
"Last time was in a different place, Ashley does have a point, she doesn't need us for everything, besides, I've done this dozens of times with Sam and Mikeala, trust me you don't want to spend your time in there." Without waiting for the twins to argue back he set his wheels in a bit of a more comfortable position and prepared for a nice stasis nap, women tended to take long in shopping even if you gave them a time limit. "Wake me when she comes back".
"All right…lets see…" One of the things Ashley actually hated was in fact to shop, but this was a dire necessity, and she could at least get some time to think for herself, she usually couldn't do that when she was alone but to do it when in the company of giant robots from outer space? Nope…impossible to think. "Where the hell is that shampoo brand…oh what was the name of it?" she mentally fought to remember the brand of the shampoo she usually used, all she knew was that the bottle was orange, she had absolutely no memory to the type of cleaning and beauty tool's brands she used. "I'll just pick a different one for a change…wonder if the autobots have a bathroom with a shower there?" she had been to the base's human bathroom before, but she hadn't seen a shower there. She pondered for a while a frown on her face. "I'll just buy a swimsuit and a hose…" she said picking a particular shampoo that had the nice scent of cherry blossoms.
After a total of twenty minutes she was done with shopping and nearly in her turn to pay at the cash register, that was when she noticed a police officer at the entrance of the mall, he wore the usual attire but the little medal that identified the police seemed a bit different, though she couldn't be sure, she was still a bit far away, for a split second they exchanged gazes, a smirk appeared on his lips making her turn away and shiver, something about that just crept her out, she knew that feeling, she knew that smirk, and it was never good news. She paid for her stuff and quickly headed for the door avoiding to trade a glance with the police man, only to have her path blocked by his hand.
"Miss, I'm afraid I need to see your identification, we're looking for someone that mildly looks like yourself."
"Er…sure… can we just step outside though? This place is a little too hot for me, I need fresh air" she said paling a bit, either this was plain bad, or really really bad, she couldn't see his eyes behind the sun glasses, damn policemen and their intimidating accessories. He nodded grabbing her arm to make sure she wouldn't run away and they stepped outside, she put her bags down against a wall and pretended to search for her ID, inside she was praying the guys were watching.
"Hey Sunny?"
"What now?" the yellow Lamborghini asked in a foul mood, he was trying not to think about the sun shedding his paint.
"Ashley just came out of that place with another human" his brother said in both a curious and anxious tone. Sunny turned on his alt form's sensors to look at the said girl.
"Isn't that one of their authorities?"
"Think she was caught doing something she shouldn't?"
"I don't think she's the type to attract trouble like you sides…"
Sideswipe nudged the yellow camaro lightly to wake him up.
"Bee." No response "BEE!" the horn suddenly blasted as if the yellow car had been startled from his nap.
"What?"
"We got trouble."
"Please tell me it's not a car jacker…"
"A what?"
"Never mind, what's the problem?"
"Check the entrance."
Ashley's heart almost swam in delight as she heard Bumblebee's horn, that had to mean they saw her, now for the tricky part.
"I'm sorry, I must have left it in the car…I'll go get it in a second, here I'll leave my things with you to guarantee I come back okay?" The cop just gave her that smirk again and nodded, she quickly proceeded to jog in the car's direction, though just as she was about to cross the street she heard a siren, and turning her head so quick it her neck nearly snapped, she saw a police cruiser heading her way at a surprising speed.
"ASHLEY LOOK OUT!" she heard three engine's starting but knew they wouldn't get there in time, without thinking she simply jumped into the air rolling and crashing against the black hood.
Surprisingly she didn't feel the front mirror even crack as she hit it and rolled over the top falling off the car on the back and onto the sweet pavement, the police cruiser stopped a few feet on her side, for a split second she thought the man was coming out to check if he had killed her by accident, but no such thing happened, she turned to look at the car with a pained look, her whole body was aching now and she got some mild cuts in the process.
To her utter horror the tires spun backwards as the car headed back for her in reverse, this time she was sure she couldn't jump over it. This time however the yellow form of a Camaro appeared out of who knows where and slammed the police cruiser sideways directing its course just far enough to miss her head by inches.
With an effort she was already trying to get before the car had even reversed she got to her feet shaky and wobbly, her head felt a little dizzy but her instincts were telling her what she needed to know, she had to get away, and fast.
Before she took more than three steps however the sound of shifting gears and whirring warned her of what was about to happen, looking back she saw the police cruiser change its shape, closely followed by the young scout who quickly attempted to stop him from charging again, he was holding him back, Bumblebee might have lacked in size like the others but he certainly compensated it by his wits and strength, not to mention agile feet, he knew exactly where to place them in order to stop the larger decepticon.
This was however when chaos reigned, people had started coming out of the mall and upon seeing the two gigantic metallic figures attempted to either run to their cars, down the street or back into the building, successfully making a disorientated ant colony getting in the way of larger creatures that didn't want to step on them, well at least Bumblebee didn't…Barricade was having no caution at all with that.
"Ashley!" she heard the car approaching before she even heard his voice, Sunstreaker had somehow managed to get in between the humans still in his alt mode and next to her. "Get in, we need to get you to safety!"
"But what about-"
"He can handle it, side's is here for back up if he needs it, now hurry!" upon saying this she saw his twin coming at high speeds towards the two transformers, the people had mostly cleared the road in fear of being run over so he had free path and slammed right into Barricade's legs. Ashley quickly got into Sunstreaker as she saw the gravel break with the decepticon's falling impact, this was far too dangerous. The seatbelt quickly tightened her to her seat as the yellow Lamborghini stepped on it. This seemed to get the black and white's attention though as he activated his primary weapon, his blade like hands started extending and spinning madly, making both Bumblebee and Sideswipe back away, she gulped.
"Now I know why you call him Barricade…" she said in a shaky voice looking out his rear view mirror.
Sunstreaker said nothing, he had four things to pay attention to: his brother's bond link, scanning the girl to see if she was in any way overly injured, contacting the remaining autobots and getting the hell out of there so the human could be safe.
Primus did he hate leaving his brother behind, usually Bumblebee was the one to do this mission, but he had been the fastest to get to barricade so he was now tangled with the decepticon, besides they had a score to settle, Sideswipe would be there as backup but mostly to make sure the humans wouldn't get too involved.
"Sunstreaker to Optimus Prime. Optimus Prime please come in" Ashley turned her head to his radio listening in to his communicator, after a few seconds a popping sound of static alerted them the connection had been made.
"Optimus Prime here, what is the problem Sunstreaker?" By the sound of calmness in his voice he had probably been resting.
"We're under attack! I don't know how the pit Barricade got here so fast after our fight a few days ago but he's here! Bumblebee and Side's are holding him off, I have Ashley with me, she has some bruises but nothing too serious." He sounded agitated, she could guess he was worried for the others, not that she blamed him, she was too. Just then another connection was made to their com links,
"FRAG IT TO THE PIT SUNSTREAKER GET BACK HERE!BEE'S DOWN!" Sideswipe's voice came out as if he was right in the middle of a fight, you could hear metal clashing viciously against each other. Her heart could have been stabbed and it still wouldn't hurt as much, bee was down? This was her fault! He had gotten into a fight to save her and …wait what exactly did these beings meant by "down?" was it for them someway to say dead? Could they even die? Fear started to take over her, she felt like crying but still didn't, worse of all Sideswipe had called his brother by his full name, meaning it was dead serious.
"Hold on Side's! I'm coming!"His brother said almost sounding desperate; she knew he was divided between protecting her and going back to his brother.
"Sunstreaker, we're on our way, keep Barricade busy." Optimus's voice said now a bit more alert.
"Sunny!" she called getting his attention, she knew this by the way his stirring wheel turned sideways. "Go help them, I'll wait out here, as long as you guys can keep him away from this location I'll be fine, I can handle it. They need you right now." She waited for his answer, he was probably in a deep thought, finally his door opened and he loosened the seatbelt that had been a bit too tight.
"stay here" he said firmly as she stepped out and he closed the door, zooming out back to the others.
She stared at his leave unsure of what else to do but stay put, really what could she do against a giant metallic form?
She sat down at the edge of the street walk waiting; this was somewhat familiar with their first night, without the exception that she was killing her brain thinking Bumblebee was probably dead. She could hear the crashing and smashing coming from the battle, but couldn't see anything because of the bloody mall standing in the way.
How the hell had this all started again? Oh yeah, police officer asked for her identification saying he was looking for someone… then the car came over and…she had just realised the cop had probably been a hologram.
"Damn it…" It had been her fault her friends were getting hurt, and she never let anyone get hurt because of herself, but it really was a completely unrealistic fight to go against the police cruiser.
"What am I thinking?! Since when have I been such a coward!?" she berated herself getting to her feet, she couldn't just stay there and wait, she had to at least be able to help the injured, that was the least she could do! She quickly made her way back running down the street wincing as her muscles were still protesting from the heavy treatment, she tore down the exit of the parking lot, having come from the other entrance this one was probably less risky. What she saw made her heart falter, cars crashed everywhere, holes and burned pavement spread around, the two Lamborghini's were fighting against the decepticon in close combat, which didn't look very wise considering the spinning blades as his hands kept throwing them back with incredible strength, if it were here she'd be mashed potato by now.
"Oh come on…don't get yourself chickened now!" she searched for the yellow camaro and thankfully found him a few feet away from the fight, enough to go by unnoticed.
She passed by a turned over truck whose cargo had been spread out and by some other cars until she reached the yellow form, he was still in Bi-pedal mode, but his arm had been completely torn off, she could see it too far away for her to drag it back, if she even could, he was leaking some sort of vibrant blue liquid from what could pass by as injuries and had numerous dents and scratches in his body parts, mainly his chest, it barely even had paint left there.
"Bee?!" she asked cautiously approaching the mech, not wanting to get an automatic defence reaction from him.
The mech initially had the said reaction, nearly jumping from his spot ready to strike whoever came near, but since he didn't see any towering form over him he probably realised it was a human, habbit was a good thing for once and his optics quickly settled on her form, she approached him a bit more hurriedly now.
"Oh my god! What happened to you?! Wait don't answer that…I don't think I want to know." She went for his arm at first but he quickly put his still remaining arm in the way. " Don't worry, I'm not going to hurt you."
"Don't touch the energon" he said in a strained voice, his capacitator was at it again, he had probably screamed when he was hit.
"The liquid you mean? Okay, but let me at least have a look at that wound, I can't let you bleed to death" She had been told about energon during her question game with sideswipe, but hadn't actually seen it.
He reluctantly set his arm aside and his back fell completely flat against the ground so that he was facing the sky, that's when she noticed more energon was coming from under him, and that he could in fact lie down like that.
"Christ! Your wings are missing!" she said approaching to make sure, there was the gap of the said wings where all the energon was coming from, she didn't dare approach too much, the smell was too strong.
"They should be around here somewhere…" his voice was fading.
"Hey! Hey! Don't you dare turn off! Stay with me here, I'm going to see if I can find some tools from the delivery truck over there, keep yourself awake or I swear to whichever deity you believe in that I'll make you throw toast out of your butt!" she headed off without waiting for his bewildered answer and started rummaging around the boxes, keeping an eye open on the twin's battle, it wasn't looking so good, she had a feeling they'd resort to shooting soon." C'mon…there's gotta be something here I can use…just have to look well enough-aha!" she said triumphantly pulling out what she was looking for, it wasn't exactly the same as working tools from a garage but they'd have to do, grabbing an empty box and filling it with all of her needed items.
Making sure the path was clear, since the said shooting had indeed begun, she made her way back to the now wheezing camaro, his optic covers were shut but from the faint light coming from under them she could tell he was awake, that and he moved to look at her when he heard her dragging the box.
"I don't know that much about mechanics nor medicine but from what I can see you need those tubes to shut to keep that liquid in right?" a slight nod was her answer. " Well I don't know if this is gonna hurt or not but its my best shot…" She took out a spatula, it was a cooking one but it would have to do, she couldn't touch the leaky cables for fear of the liquid, and she wasn't sure if rubber gloves were going to do the trick, then she brought out a hair Iron.
"What in primus is that?" Bumblebee asked looking a bit fearfull.
"We use it to dry our hair, it should heat the rubber enough to close the tubes, but it won't be enough to make the er…energon burn." He shuddered. " Sorry it's the best I could find…Ratchet will have to fix you better when they get here."
"You managed to contact them?"
"Sunny did when he left to drop me…" she deliberately let out that she was going against orders. "By the way…thank you…for saving my life." She said while starting to close one of the tubes. He looked away trying not to think of the pain he was in.
"No need to thank me, it was my duty."
"No it wasn't…you weren't on a mission, and don't you dare say it is your duty to save every freaking human because that is just bullshit" he was a bit surprised by her language, since she usually wasn't this aggressive with it, but managed to smile in the end, he enjoyed this human just as much as Sam, they were curious creatures and always entertaining, plus they had straight out weird morals and sayings.
She closed a third tube making him wince, she glanced upwards to his face to make out if she made any mistake but once he relaxed she had the confirmation she could go on.
"I closed the three larger tubes, that should hold this side for a while, I need you to try and roll over so I can fix your back, think you can manage?" with a weak nod he did as told and she was facing the camaro's bleeding sore back, if it were human it probably would look like a whip had been trying to make its way into his flesh. She shivered at the thought and approached with a bit more care this time, there were a lot more leaks here and they were between tight spaces in his armour so it was hard to fix.
She was halfway done with the first wing's cavity when she heard an alarming sound, first it was an explosion, then a figure of red black and white flying past them and crashing at the end of the park, then Sunstreaker's desperate yell for his brother.
"SIDES!YOU FRAGGER I'LL SLAGGING KILL YOU!" the yellow Lambo had literally lost his mind, he shot, hit, heck he did everything he could to reach the suddenly stunned decepticon.
Sunstreaker no longer minded the scratches in his paintjob, he didn't mind the dents, his optics were flaring a dangerous blue, almost turning white as he hammered down on barricade, yet he left too many openings.
"Shit he's gonna get hammered if he doesn't finish this soon!" she tried to look at sideswipe but he was too far away. She quickly went back to fixing Bumblebee's back, she needed this done, and pronto, where the hell was that back up?!
"Ashhhh" bee's voice came in a hiss, she ignored him " Ashhlleyyy"
"I'm here, I'm here, just hang in there."
"Y-you neeed to r-r-runnn" his voice was failing.
"Not without you guys, and don't argue with me on that!" she finally finished one of the wing cavities and turned to the other.
Suddenly the expected sound came, Sunny's body went flying, how the heck did that bot even do that?! Both Lambo's were taller and probably stronger than him, how could he beat three autobots when he was just one?!
The decepticon smirked seeing his third foe now done, he had numerous injuries but he could deal with those, he turned his scanners on and found what he was looking for.
Optics glared at human eyes, and human eyes glared at red optics, he started to make his way over, she didn't move form her spot next to Bumblebee he was trying to at get up, he had gathered enough energon when she closed his main lines, but he had absolutely no chance in this state.
"Hand over the human, scrapheap." His grave voice said. She was surprised he actually used English, but had the distinct impression he only used it to scare her, well that wasn't going to work. Before she could say anything however Bumblebee's leg came in between them as he took a shaky defensive stance.
"Ashley get out of hereee" he said motioning in a shoo motion with his hand, she glared at it.
"No way! Why the hell do you want me anyway you rusted old toaster! I have done nothing to you!" Bumblebee got nervous, not only was she not running, she was disobeying, and insulting one of his nemesis, this was going to hurt…
"Like you wouldn't know fleshbag" his hands spun in a threatening motion. She glared back at him not having the slightest idea what he was talking about.
"Ashley go! Now! That's an order!" Bumblebee said in an agitated voice as Barricade smirked, this wasn't good.
"You heard him fleshie, run while you can, within a while I'll catch up with and we can have some fun together." He let a low chuckle of amusement. At that time Bumblebee lunged at him, throwing him to the ground, the two rolled viciously, but without one of his arms Bumblebee couldn't get fight back with one side and Barricade used this to his advantage, successfully pinning the yellow bot down and rolling his hand ready to dismantle his face slowly.
Ashley didn't even need to think. She grabbed a clothe from the box she brought, she had intended to use it to clean the fluids once she was done, and then grabbed a piece of broken gravel from the ground, putting it inside and spinning the cloth above her head she called.
"Hey! Goliath!" the decepticon stupidly looked up at the human only to be hit in an optic by the gravel she let out of the clothing. " That's to show I CAN fight a stupid beast like you!"
Optic shattered, Barricade sat back and loud an ear piercing mechanical howl of pain, upon his glare setting back on her she knew what to do.
"Ohhhh shit…" she ran, closely followed by thundering steps, she faintly hear Bee shouting something but didn't even want to make out what it had been, she weaved her way between larger cars, effectively slowing him down. A shot however hit the path in front of her stopping her on her tracks, she had no time, clawed fingers closed over her with such for she felt the ground break and hit her with dust.
"Now I have you…" sneered the deep sadistic voice.
Cliffy :D must have been my biggest chappie, hope you like it