Hey guys! Thank you for the great reviews! As always, I hope that this next installment is to your liking! Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I don't own Transformers. I DO own Project Seven (Cat) and Project Five (Project Five)
P.S. By the way, Instead of using Italics and going through having to replace half of my story after saving a document, I'm using " -" to show thoughts. Just thought I'd let you guys know since I've changed things up a bit.
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"Okay guys, so you understand what to do?" Cat asked.
Sam helped Mikaela out of the back and replied, "Yeah, I think we've got it. Wait here for you guys and listen to the radio for any emergency transmissions."
"Right. Whatever happens, don't come into the building. You don't know what you're up against, and we probably won't know in time if you get captured. But if you think there's a possibility of you being found out, press this little button rapidly. It'll send us a sort of morose code and we'll take care of things from there... Hopefully..." Cat explained.
"Yeah, yeah. We got it! Just hurry up, already!" Mikaela rolled her eyes.
"Sorry... Just making sure," Cat smiled.
"Come on! Let's go already!" Five had already broken in the back door without sounding the alarms, and was tapping her foot in waiting.
Cat and Lillian looked back to Five, Lillian going towards the door, Cat turning back towards the teens.
"Be careful guys..." Cat said seriously as she ran to Five and Lillian, joining them.
"...Yeah... You too," Sam said quietly, him and Mikaela watching as the three disappeared behind the thick, metal door as it slammed behind them.
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"All right, Lil. You think you can get to the security room by yourself?" Cat asked.
"It shouldn't be too much of a problem. As long as I don't pass anyone that recognizes me behind these sunglasses, I should make it on my own fine," Lillian assured with a nod.
"Good. Five, you and I should start heading for the Allspark," Cat and Five separated from Lillian and began to walk a different direction as Cat brought up a hand radio.
"You guys find the hanger?" she asked quietly.
With the aid of the Autobots, Cat managed to tune the radios into no other frequency but the ones that they use for intercom use. That way the radios couldn't be listened in on if any of the agents or guards were flipping through the channels.
"Not yet. We're almost there. Bumblebee and Ratchet have stayed where they can observe the children safely, and we've decided that it would probably be best if Ironhide went in," Optimus replied, him and the other two driving towards the coordinates that Five had given them for the hanger.
"That's fine, we're nowhere near the Allspark yet, so you've got some time. I'll check back in a few minutes," Cat turned the radio back into her pocket.
While walking with Five down the corridors, each of them at a heightened sense because of their surroundings. This was, in fact, the place that they had escaped from not more than a few days ago.
Five growled, "I don't like this Seven..."
"Neither do I... I was hoping to avoid this place at all costs... But we don't have a choice. This is for bursting the doors wide open for the public to understand what this government has been doing all of these years. Not only that, but it'll feel pretty good to take something right out from under the nose of these guys," Cat smirked.
Five looked over to her look-a-like with a newly formed smile, "I didn't think of it that way... Let's go for it!"
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Lillian walked down every corridor quietly, as if she were one of the regular agents who would normally be patrolling the area. She was getting very close to the security command center, which she would have to think of a good reason to kick the guard out of his station in order to take the spot needed to break the security locks on the doors in order for Cat and Five to get to the Allspark.
-I'll think of that when it comes down to it- Lillian thought to herself as she neared an elevator.
-Almost there!- she almost couldn't hold in her excitement about taking advantage of the people who were running this whole scheme.
"Lil?" A voice broke the woman's thoughts and she froze into place, hoping that if she didn't answer the person asking would leave.
"Lil is that you?" a man walked down the hallway towards the woman.
Lillian looked up to see that the elevator was still a few floors away and only slowly making progress towards her. After which she finally gave a look over to see who it was that was talking to her.
"Uh... Hey... Brad..." she didn't know what to do. On the one hand she was supposed to be missing, on the other hand, this acquaintance of hers didn't need to know exactly what stipulations came with her being "missing".
"Hey, I thought I heard that you had gone missing?" he asked in an unsure tone as the taller, skinny man wearing a blue and white polo button-down shirt and black dress pants approached.
Lillian came up with a last-second plan and gave a fake, hardy laugh.
"That was days ago... I was brought back and questioned and here I am now," she looked up to see that the elevator was still just a couple of floors away.
"So they kept you here after that too, huh?" Brad asked with a smile.
"Of course they did... You didn't expect that they'd just let me go did you? That would be too nice and easy for them. No, I'm afraid I've been stuck here like the rest of them..." She joked as the tone for the elevator's arrival jingled, the doors opening.
"Ah, here we are. Sorry, I've got places to go, people to see," Lillian rushed onto the mechanism and turned around to press a button for the ninth floor.
"It's good to see you, Lil," Brad's smile wavered a little as he stared into her eyes.
"Y-Yeah... Good to see you too..." she lied as the doors closed.
Lillian sighed a sigh of relief and leaned her back against the side of the elevator. She could almost feel her knees about to buckle under the stress of the fear that she was feeling. Her heart beat against the inside of her chest as if it were demanding to be let free. She could feel her blood rushing through her body.
-I haven't felt this scared since before I was an Army recruit...- Lillian thought darkly as she jingle of the elevator sounded, letting her know that she had reached her designated floor.
Stepping slowly off of the elevator, Lillian had wondered if everyone could possibly believe her lie. That there were probably several agents of higher standing who, if recognized her, would surely know the truth. She put those thoughts at the back of her mind for the moment, though.
-I promised Seven that I would do this for her, and I can't let fear get in my way now...- she thought as she headed towards the command facility.
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"Do you think a lot of people will recognize us?" Cat asked.
Five looked around the corridors then replied, "Doubtful. As long as we keep our cover as agents, and no one sees my eyes, we should be fine. Just don't talk to anyone unless absolutely needed."
Cat nodded slightly at her older counter-part, "Right..."
As they silently strolled down the hallways, Cat could hear two separate parties talking into their makeshift walkie-talkies that she had managed to put together. The voices sounded like a back-and-forth between Ratchet, Optimus, and Sam. She reached into her pocket and turned the volume down so that even she could barely hear what they were talking about.
"Hello?" a voice from down the hall suddenly asked. Five and Cat came to a halt and turned down the middle of the hallway.
"Are you two lost?" two agents walked towards them from the other end of the hall.
Five and Cat looked to each other, using their inner communications to transmit their thoughts.
-What now?- Five asked.
-Just stay calm... We might be able to talk our way out of this...- Cat replied, putting a smile on her face, Five doing the same.
"Lost? Not at all. Why do you ask?" Cat asked.
The two agents approached at last, stopping within just a couple of feet from Five and Cat.
"No one's allowed on this floor or the two above us..." the other agent replied.
"We were given special orders, which enables us access to these floors," Cat replied.
One of the agents reached a hand out, Cat could sense Five tensing up.
"Let's see the orders then. We were never informed of there being special access rights given to anyone..." he ordered.
"My good fellow, we have just arrived from last night's attack in Arizona. Our badges have been stolen, and we were given direct orders from someone above your pitiful standing, to do something beyond your capabilities. Now quit bothering us and let us do our jobs!" Cat ordered. Five was almost speechless she was so impressed with Cat's quick thinking.
The two guards narrowed their eyes at the women in front of them, and for a moment there was a brief silence, both parties going over different scenarios in their minds of what to do next.
Finally one of the guards said, "You know what? Just let them go... If they were involved in last night's fiasco then they're probably not yet aware of the ban on these floors..."
The other turned in shock and said, "Our orders are clear!"
"You heard him! We've got things to do, and we can't be held up by low-life's like you!" Five began to get angry, they didn't have time for this!
The other guard scoffed and crossed his arms, "Fine... Go on ahead then. It's not like we're going to find what the higher-ups are looking for anyway."
Five and Cat looked to each other then back to the other two.
"Find what, exactly?" Cat asked, curious.
"For some odd reason, they think that Projects Five and Seven are going to try and break in here... But there's no reason for them to want to come back here... So they're banning too many people from coming through these hallways, expecting those fools to just come walking in here," he explained in a sarcastic tone.
Five snickered and said, "Like they'd be dumb enough to do that."
Cat stifled a laugh, and the two guards actually did give a loud chuckle.
"It would be okay, though. We'd be sure to take them out as soon as they got here," one guard boasted.
Five and Cat went from a light mood to an "oh really?" facial expression.
"And... how would you be able to do that?" Five asked, crossing her arms.
"We're specially trained! We've got the needed skills to take those two down!" They began to walk away laughing.
"Oh you do, do you?" Five was about to follow in suit and go after the two guards but Cat was struggling to hold her back.
"Besides, those little girls are just too noticeable. I hear some of the experiments they did to them stunted their growth," they cackled with laughter again.
This time Five was holding Cat back, "Little?!"
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Meanwhile.
Sam and Mikaela had driven the SUV around a little checking the area out, and then parked back to where they had dropped the other three off.
"You okay, Sam?" Mikaela asked, noticing his silent moans while leaning on the steering wheel.
"I've got a killer headache..." he replied.
Mikaela couldn't help but feel a bit responsible, thinking that if it wasn't for the fact that he tried to protect her the day before, he wouldn't have come to harm.
"That was something we should have asked Cat about," Mikaela replied leaning closer to him to make sure he was all right.
Sam turned his head towards the girl, "How would Cat have been able to help?"
"She wouldn't. But we could have asked her if she could possibly have encouraged Five to do something. She can heal flesh can't she? Maybe Cat can't, but Five certainly seemed to be able to..." she got a thought, "Wait... if Five can heal flesh, why can't Cat? She can do Alchemy too, can't she?"
Sam raised an eyebrow and looked to Mikaela. She was right. Cat made it pretty clear to them when she first met the group that of all things, she couldn't conjure up food out of nowhere, and she couldn't heal human flesh. But Five seemed to be able to do the opposite.
"Good question... Maybe the guys would know about that," Sam picked up the makeshift radio that Cat had given him and began talking into it.
"You guys there?" he asked, not sure who was connected to the radio.
"What's wrong, Sam?" Ratchet was the first to come through.
"Hey, you guys wouldn't be able to scrounge any information on Alchemy from the interne- world wide web, would you?" Sam asked.
There was a brief silence, Sam thinking that perhaps the radio had lost connection and was about to give it a quick hit when Ratchet came back through, "Very little information, but there is actually some out there. What did you need to know?"
"We thought that maybe there'd be an answer as to why Cat and Five have different abilities," Sam replied.
"Yes, we've wondered that ourselves. Did you find anything that might explain this Ratchet?" Optimus radioed in, joining the conversation.
Another moment of silence.
"Nothing too descriptive as to their specific abilities. But I did manage to find information about different Alchemists, and their different abilities. Apparently, every Alchemist will have the same ability in basic Alchemy, but some of them carry different capabilities in their advanced training. Some having abilities in the mechanical senses, and others having abilities in the medical field," Ratchet explained.
"Well we know that Five healed Catherine, so she must have the medical advances. And we know that Catherine can make structures and weapons, so she must have the mechanical advances," Optimus pondered aloud.
"Alchemy seems to be quite an ability among Humans. If we could adapt those abilities, we would be victorious in battle!" Ironhide spoke up.
"Wait a minute Sam," Mikaela spoke, "If Cat has the mechanical advances, then why did she just use her Alchemy to take that tracking system apart off of the truck, and then put all of this together? Didn't she do all of this by hand?"
Sam's eyes widened, "Yeah, she did... Hey guys, "he spoke back into the radio, "Cat didn't use her mechanical skills to put this stuff together, why do you think that is?"
There was a silence over the radio, but then the radio in the SUV turned on and Optimus's voice came through, "That is one of the things that we asked her while on the way here."
"Whoa, what's the deal?" Sam asked.
"If we're going to speak about Catherine, I'd rather speak through here so that she's not distracted," Optimus replied.
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Chapter Teaser!
"So it must be true then. You are aware of your own fate?" Ratchet asked.
Cat looked in front of them to see that the SUV carrying the other Humans was far off ahead of them.
"Well I don't know if this is my last day, but I'm pretty sure it's getting close anyway. Yes, I'm very much so aware of my illness and what it could possibly do to me. I'm actually surprised that you haven't bothered me about it until now," Cat smiled a little.
"We were unaware until yesterday, when Lillian had first let us in on the whole thing," Optimus replied.
"I see. Well, it's not like anything can be done right now. If you want us to help you get your Allspark, then it would be better to do it now, when we have the government's attention all over the place. That way they don't know when or where we'll come out of hiding," Cat explained firmly as she continued her work.