The end of an era 2
Disclaimer: I do not own Transformers and all I get out of this is good mood.
His sensory readings parted like water, leaving empty space, beautiful nothingness, and his secondary sensors kicked in. Sringer felt the All Spark get closer and he cursed in his mind. Primus help them, he hoped Megatron was too busy with Optimus Prime to pay attention. There was a slight anomaly in the readings and an automatic sub-routine of his checked it out. He had no interest now. Then the results came up and he did a double-take, stumbled out of the fight, probably unbalancing Optimus, but unable to help. The white space, according to its dimensions, should have two centers. Near each other, near enough to collide, but it wasn't happening.
What slag in Primus' name? It did not compute.
There was a reason he was equipped with scientific equipment, but he had only kept the sensory software. He didn't even like to remember his one-time creator. Hundreds of vorns ago, Flame had been a member of the Iacon Academy of Science and Technology on Cybertron. He had proposed adapting Megatron's plan, turning Cybertron into a mobile war world, so that it would instead become a mobile spaceship, but Optimus Prime had spoken out against the plan, as the ethics of the plan were questionable to say the least and the fusion reactor required would be too dangerous. Flame had been denied funds to continue his research. He hadn't given up. He had embezzled money from the academy and continued his research in an old lab in the city of Kalis with the experimental engines that Starscream had built for Megatron.
It was before the war, when things still made sense. But the double reading would made sense in no context. There was only one The All Spark. The one and only. His sensors had to be glitching.
They hadn't glitched since the day the mech that had built them had tweaked them purposefully, to draw him near.
Flame had spent vorns attempting to repair the engines ready for firing and solve the energy problem, to prove that he was right all along. He had disappeared and left Springer hurt and rejected. Then the war begun and vorns later yet a massive explosion devastated the city of Kalis and the Autobot headquarters that had been built there. Soon, the base was attacked by reanimated shells of the victims, mere drones now. Wanting an audience to see him proved right, Flame had kidnapped all of the surviving Autobots he could get his hands on, including Optimus Prime and the Wreckers. He had fought for his leader like a mech reprogrammed until he had caught a glimpse of his creator. A half-cocked attempt to save Flame had left him knocked out.
Flame planned to fire the fusion engines and set Cybertron on course through the cosmos, much to everybody's dismay. Before the war it had been unethical and whimsical, now during the energy crisis it was fragging madness. Flame and Optimus, the only one out of the holding cell, began to fight, but Flame proved too strong to beat quickly. The fusion engines became dangerously unstable and were moments from going to critical meltdown, but Flame would still not listen to reason.
At the last minute the Wrecker leader, Impactor, arrived and killed Flame. He then sacrificed himself again, being destroyed by radiation as he shut down the reactor. Springer dealt with it. Not happily, but they had been estranged for many vorns and he dealt like everyone else. No one still lived and was without their scars. War gave everyone tragic past.
Still, those custom research and analysis sensors were malfunctioning again and he had a bad feeling about it. Even if he had just been hit that hard.
Optimus Prime was assessing the situation. Devastator was an immensely powerful warrior, prone to raging bouts of destructive fury. However, because his left leg, Mixmaster, was so badly injured his sheer destructiveness was limited and because primitive psyche is limited to only the thoughts and actions on which all his components can agree Roadbuster easily dominated the fight, with assistance from Jazz. Topspin and Broadside were currently out of fight and Ratchet was seeing to them, cursing them right through the stratosphere. That left Barricade for Twin Twist and Bumblebee, Starscream for Whirl and Ironhide, Hailstorm for Taser, Blackout for Scoop and Sandstorm and Frenzy harassing the wounded.
Optimus Prime and Springer fought Megatron together.
Springer was retreating from the fight, probably badly damaged since before Optimus had arrived, but Optimus had fought his counterpart for a very long time. He knew he would escape mostly unscathed yet again; with him, Megatron wasn't even truly trying. That made what he was going to do all the more painful, but he wouldn't stand aside and watch his soldiers get slaughtered in his stead anymore.
"Devastator, separate! You are less useful than numbers now!" Megatron bellowed and with this change there would be eleven fighting one-on one. It was bad for his smaller bots, Jazz and Bumblebee, especially bad for Ratchet whose attention was on his patients. Megatron fired his fusion cannon to force Springer aside.
"Don't you think that was a bit of overkill?" Optimus asked, twisting his body to protect his retreating comrade.
"In a war there is no overkill, brother mine. There is only "open fire" and "I need to reload"," Megatron declared. This is what happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object, he thought. You truly are incorruptible aren't you? He knew they would dance like this forever and it didn't sound like a bad eternity to him. Not anymore, this deadly grace of theirs.
Springer run towards the strange readings with great leaps that made the ground vibrate. There hiding under a bush, completely inefficiently, were three humans and Ronald was holding the All Spark tightly against his chest. The second centre was located somewhere inside Judy.
"What you think you are doing, bringing the All Spark this close to the battle?" he demanded harshly. The younglings were no soldiers, but anyone should have at least that much common sense, especially if they were small enough to get stepped on.
"Optimus Prime needs it for the plan," Ron whispered. He held the All Spark protectively and seemed almost to be in tears. He was breathing his mouth open.
He was almost in tears. It had dawned to Ron somewhere on their way from his hiding place to the battlefield that the plan succeeding would mean All Spark's death. Not the All Spark anymore, just All Spark, the second one already in Judy's belly and how had she taken it so peacefully anyway? He had a feeling that All Spark had had a hand in that and there would be a hell to pay, for him. But she had just done what she had to. Like she had done when she had first gotten him mixed into the mess, and it hadn't really been her fault. Archibald Witwicky had gone to the Arctic Expedition of his own free will and Megatron had marked the glasses. Megatron was cosmic levels of bastard because he wanted to be. She hadn't really betrayed him and so he had to fight tears.
She wasn't crying. It was her plan, originally, and she was going to be the one to pay. He had to be as strong as she was.
"What you think you are doing, bringing the All Spark this close to the battle?" Springer demanded harshly. He hoped he didn't have to help her do it. Maybe he didn't?
If Megatron wins this battle he will destroy this world, out of spite. You can't risk that happening.
And God forgive him, he couldn't. The thought was too big to contemplate and he found himself numbly answering to Springer.
What plan the human was talking about? There was no way he could have come in contact with Optimus Prime at any point of the battle and the Autobot leader hadn't told him of any plan.
"There is no plan," he answered, realizing only then how bad that sounded.
"Just ask Optimus Prime," Ronald quietly told him, holding the All Spark even tighter. His hands were shaking. Springer was suspicious, but it couldn't hurt, could it? He picked a secured channel.
Prime, Ronald Witwicky has the All Spark here, he sent. The response was immediate.
Bring it here, Optimus Prime told him. Now Springer really not-liked the situation, abhorred it dreams and weird sensor readings included, but he knew better than arguing in the middle of the battle so he snatched the All Spark from the boy, praying his leader knew what he was doing and why.
The second centre wasn't moving. White space was twisting like hot, sluggish metal.
When Taser had killed Endgame it had been out of sheer rage held in a tight grip, but had she had the presence of mind to think about it she would have known it was revenge too. It was different now than the crystal clear compulsion that warped his mind, but he had a feeling he was killing his past now. If he only managed to kill Hailstorm he would never again have to deny himself energon until his fuel tanks were empty and pure and it wasn't like he liked hurting himself.
If he had been Ironhide, built for forceful law-enforcing and heavily modified after joining the army, and even more for the war, Hailstorm would have ended up very dead. As it was, he had probably been a courier before joining the Decepticons (why had he done something so utterly idiotic?) and Hailstorm was much bigger than him. His main weapons were riffles and his tasers and the electric arc that cut the air was beautifully destructive, but not enough. Hailstorm seemed more irritated than hurt and that angered him.
"Why don't you just die? After all the crazy scrap you have done!" He wasn't being fair and after so long it was wonderful.
"Taser," Hailstorm recognized him. No more, but he had always been this blank. Hailstorm was his mortal rival now when the real culprit was gone, but he probably barely made the breem's rival to the other.
He only heard the loud crackling as a bolt of red light shot from the icy infiltrator's weapon. He could hear and sense the pressure of something exploding beyond his range of vision, could feel the heat and the bits and pieces of stone raining down on him. They twisted and threw themselves against each other again, her electric discharge weapon crackling.
"Look what you named me after!" he screamed. Hailstorm withstood the second discharge with little more difficulty than the first.
"You are still crazy," he stated like a fact, "but that's not surprising, is it?"
They fought, blast after blast, strike after strike, exchanged and drew back. The battle was twirling like dance as they dodged random fire that escaped from the other fighters and Taser prayed to All Spark that neither he nor anyone he liked, except Optimus Prime who seemingly had no self-preservation protocols and was bound to do so, ended up against Megatron alone, just like always. In the end, it wasn't a dirty trick or any special technique. Hailstorm just was that much better or luckier, he shot Taser's left leg and he fell down. He was done, but he wasn't done as he looked into the small crack in the other's hip plates. He could see the protometal through it, one of the few places the other had it and it was good luck at last. Because shock there would hurt like smelting pit. Hailstorm seemed to have no last quip, no compulsion to gloat, as he aimed and every sensor in Taser's leg protested as he rolled out of the way the best he could and sent a lightning without raising his hand.
Pain like something he hadn't experienced in hundred vorns shot through Hailstorm and while he shot reflexively he knew it hit only ground. His vision was cycling through its settings: infra red, ultra violet, night vision, x-ray vision and cosmic rays. He barely felt when Taser pressed his riffle against his chest plates. The other one had no intention to gloat, either. He shot three times and the last shot pierced Hailstorm's spark chamber.
His processor rebooted and he had to bring his optics online manually. It was all he had time to do before every sensor in his body started to scream in pain. For few astroseconds that moved sluggishly in pain he had no recollection of who he was. And then he was Gadget, disoriented, damaged and more than little scared. He had gone to report in to his new Commanding Officer and now he was in the middle of a fight, on a planetside. He was lying on his back, staring the sky. It was blue there, but it didn't say much. He reached for his first-aid mini drone, but he didn't have it on him. What had happened to him and why couldn't he remember? He was Autobot Gadget. The inventor of creative ways to make things go boom, the daredevil, junior engineer under the command of Magenta, he was… He was Hailstorm and he understood what was happening to him. He really hadn't expected it to end like this. Pity.
Then the world reasserted itself in a ruthless fashion and a harsh shriek broke through his vocalizer. He was Shimmer, wasn't he? Why was he in pain? Frag all this existential crap, Shimmer thought viciously. He glared at the sky above him which explained where he was, but not how he had gotten down there. And he was Hailstorm again and he remembered. Not very much anymore, but he viewed what he could.
Hailstorm had infiltrated the neutral mining settlement, his first mission. From his vantage point on top of an old observatory tower he could see the entire layout of the place. It had been a tiny place, similar to a any other settlement Hailstorm had seen on Cybertron. He had lived in one, few stellar cycles ago. It was small, with perhaps sixty inhabitants at the most and no professional soldiers. It was a hard life, as he knew well. He had lived the life until the Decepticons had intercepted Minor Beta Hex, sparing only the flight-capable mechs. He had wanted to live, so he did. Minesweeper had been an instructor with the Decepticon Empire for nearly its whole existence. He'd had a hand in training nearly every spy in the Decepticon army.
White Noise.
That settlement had been supposed to be the site of a secret Autobot boot camp, full of sympathizers planning on smuggling supplies to Autobot resistance cells in Kaon. The idea had been completely absurd. The Decepticon Empire wanted the neutrals destroyed and their territory taken, so that they would do. Getting results led advancement in ranks and the chance to go up against more challenging opponents.
Torch.
It hadn't mattered to Hailstorm that the rumour wasn't true. He had been giving as good as he had gotten. Decepticon High Command wanted the Acid Wastes settlements pacified and the rumours of Autobot spaceports and boot camps were as good justifications for what had to be done as any. He lived, he just wasn't quite sure why. At least he didn't regret, that was what he had been afraid at first.
Several of his sub-systems had shut down. His repair systems attempted to repair his cracked spark chamber at twenty-two percent functionality, to no avail. Right arm non-functional. Polarity. He was junior field medic first class Polarity. Senior medic Ratchet had left to join Prowl and a few other Autobots from his unit on a mission on the second asteroid belt, leaving Smokescreen in charge of the base and those who remained. So from that moment on till Ratchet returned Polarity was on his own, whether he wanted or not. Primus, what was he doing, lying there injured? He had to help the others, he was the only one that could! He tried to sit, but failed. Wheeljack should be there too, but the engineer could only step in to help in the case of a dire emergency. Then again, that definitely was one. The fight was still going on. His consciousness was slipping; he couldn't even manually override the stasis lock. He didn't want to die.
Hailstorm had been deadly injured in the Battle of Hoover Dam, but Polarity was the one to die.
Growling, Ratchet grabbed Frenzy's shoulder. The little one had almost slit his main fuel line with one his shurikens.
"Hold still, you midget-sized knife factory!" he bellowed to the slippery hacker. Frenzy separated into two parts to escape his circular saw that whirred close to his midsection.
"Accursed pint-con!" Frenzy was trying his damnest to kill the wounded and while his shurikens would have been no threat to the Wreckers had they been well, they weren't. Broadside was the one worst off, a direct hit from Megatron's cannon wasn't an energon walk even for someone as big as he. Topspin had less immediately life threatening damage, but the damage done to his fuel processing unit would be a glitch to fix later. And you didn't want to process and then eject fuel from system to system. That hurt like little else. He would need a circulatory mock-up.
Frenzy slit a coolant line in Ratchet's right elbow joint. That hurt too.
Crackling of an energy weapon, beautifully destructive claws, Megatron charged at Optimus Prime like great, fluid tidal wave. Optimus dodged, blocked and struck back, certain that he could bear this one last time without crumbling.
Prime, Ronald Witwicky has the All Spark here, Springer sent to Optimus Prime. He was going to do the unthinkable, what could he say to his soldier?
Bring it here, he ordered, steeling himself. All it took was one moment of courage and then it would be over.
Optimus struck Megatron and dodged far out of reach towards Springer and his trusted Wrecker came through for him despite the unanswered questions lingering between then, charged in and his han touched Optimus' briefly. Then Springer was gone again, per Optimus's stern order, and despite the circumstances the look on Megatron's face was truly amusing, even hilarious. The prize was now in Optimus's left hand, smaller than it used to be, but just as true.
Grief still lingered in Optimus' spark, but now another emotion was flowing steady through his spark too and it was core-deep frustration and anger, unexpected in its strength. His brother had shredded and thrown away everything that used to be beautiful and full of life in favor of mindless destruction, all he had once sworn to protect with his life. So many of theirs had fallen since and now he found himself staring at his brother like he would a gamma-ray storm, ruthless havoc. Now there was another planet, another species in harm's way. More death for his brother to devour.
"One shall stand, one shall fall." He said the words solemnly and Megatron didn't come close to understanding how serious he was this time. He charged for Optimus once more. Optimus accepted the whirling rush of violence and madness calmly, determination beyond questions. Cybertron would stay lifeless husk, but its true hope had been given up a long time ago. Earth would live on.
Once they had fought only to hone each other into perfection, to protect each other. Once there had been the sound of Optimus' back crashing loudly into the wall in the training platform as Megatron had stepped in close, frustrated and worried as he reprimanded:
"Pay more attention to your opponent's legs, or one cycle that move might be the death of you." It had been a genuine, innocent comment in those golden, innocent cycles, made in earnest. Now there was sound of Lord High Protector Megatron's shoulder scraping against the mountain face. The Decepticon leader almost, but not quite, fell down into the canyon and water below them. Optimus stepped closer. His sensors could pick up the scent of death and energon and hot metal, it clung to them like another shell.
"Pay attention, Megatron, that move was nearly the death of you this cycle around," said in earnest anger, bitter and mocking, the rumble of Prime's voice harsher than he had meant and he mourned what could never be again.
In the light that was spreading into the newly lit lights like hope from the broken doors of the ruined secret base, Optimus Prime reflected sharp and golden like the reflection of Primus in his creative glory, the All Spark divine in his hands, and for the briefest of moments Megatron hesitated, suddenly unnerved. But he shrugged the sense of foreboding off, he hadn't come this far, to the verge of proving his infuriating brother that he was right, to back off because of irrational emotion. Even better eternity could be his now, one where he was right and Optimus Prime knew it also. What was a vision of light to him? Light was dead, the entropy had won, he had won.
His energon intake hitching, Optimus grinded his gears and lifted the All Spark towards the intimidating creature looming over him. Energy crackled along his hands and it burned like acid, making him wince. Still he held on, shoving it toward the glowing cavity he knew was within Megatron's chest. He had seen the other's spark once before, when he had still been called Orion Pax. They had been young and curious and very trusting. Determined blue optics focused hard on the one specific point he had to hit to penetrate the chest plates and get to the spark. He knew he only had one try. It wasn't enough, his own spark screamed out in desperation as the first try only cracked those vital, enforced plates, but Megatron stumbled all the same, reaching for Optimus to keep his balance.
He had decided, he had all the reasons in the universe. It burned all the same.
"What are you doing, Orion?" Megatron asked and while Optimus knew it was a deliberate attempt of manipulation, not even the first time Megatron had used the tactics, he hesitated. And he hit one more time as he must. The bare spark was no more brilliant than the next, but no less vibrant either. As the doomed spark burned the All Spark, licking between his fingers, its very pulse matching the pulse of his own, he was faintly aware of long, sharp claws reaching towards him. It was in vain now and he knew that Megatron knew it too. As the weapon digits buried into his shoulder they eclipsed all light of the dying Lord High Protector who had chosen to not protect, but destroy. In those precious astroseconds he didn't even have a chance to call Megatron's name.
He didn't want to die, but he wasn't really afraid either. He just couldn't understand. There was only pain and disbelief. Optimus Prime was shattered in his processor as his optics shattered and he burned. I fought till you became numb, was his last, kind of vicious thought. Then there was only feeling, love and hate, desperation and need, and then no more.
Megatron fell down. Echoes died down with a loud crash. Silence was absolute and motionless.
Twin Twist used the pause to reload with an ominous click and then the whole pit was freed once more, but this time the Decepticons were scattering, scared and shocked and lost like they had never been before. Megatron had been their god of war, living god, how could he be dead? Starscream was the first to leave; no reason to risk his life for nothing, and how could the Prime be so stupid? The All Spark was no more! It didn't compute, no way could he be that desperate, with his all-precious morals. But he was just that desperate and he, Starscream, the prince of Vos, had to flee with his hands empty.
Twin Twist took little damage from Bonecrusher's blades and then they collided again with fire and clash, but even the mindlessly savage gestalt con didn't have his spark in it anymore. And once you lost the will to fight death was only a matter of time.
Bonecrusher, retreat! It was Scrapper, he was shocked enough to use an open channel.
Hailstorm! Answer us! But there was no answer and they had to flee. And that was when Ratchet got Frenzy in his hands just so and his shot sent the cassette flying. He turned back to his patients with busy tools. Rest of the fight was of no interest to him now, but he couldn't help but ache for Optimus Prime.
"Time to wreck and rule! Let's send these Decepti-cans back in sparebags!" Sandstorm shouted with a shrill voice. The Wreckers fell on them and the Decepticons fled, scattered, retreated, leaving only Optimus' bots and the wounded to occupy the battlefield. Taser slowly limped to Ratchet, adding himself to the patients. He seemed dazed, like he didn't quite know where he was or doing what. Ratchet knew how that felt.
"At least we all still live," he said. No one had really expected that mercy. And the Slagmaker was, thank Primus, finally dead. He gave Optimus a meaningful look.
"You left me no choice, brother," Optimus said solemnly. Settled deep in Megatron's protometal was a bit of the All Spark, all that was left from the very concentrated explosion. Optimus picked it up and for few precious astroseconds there was a whisper of life, but then it was gone. Optimus clutched piece of the All Spark close to his own shell.
"What now?" Taser asked with a small voice.
He felt empty, like his central processor had been entirely wiped leaving him blank. He had known what he was doing, it hadn't been an idle decision, a whim, but no determination in the universe could prepare for what he had done. Destroyed the All Spark, wiped out the future of his race and the reason of his own existence with one single push. Logically thinking they had been doomed ages ago, but hope was the last to die. Primus, let me be wrong in this pain, he thought, shuddering when he thought how their deity would see him now.
"I am pregnant!" a human screamed.
He turned around, everyone turned around to look at the young human female, standing little apart from the gathered Autobots. He consulted the Teletraan 1 database and when that didn't yield an answer the fledgling information web of humans. Pregnancy, the carrying of one or more offspring, known as a fetus or embryo, inside the uterus of a female human. How he envied her species for being capable of creating their offspring with their own bodies. But the way she had screamed was a mystery to him. Optimus wasn't familiar with human nonverbal communication either, but he imagined the way his mouth was open, the hair ridges above her eyes and the stiffness of her body spoke of a shock. The creation of a new life was a joyful thing, wasn't it? One of the young males laid his hand on her shoulder, looking hesitant.
"Maybe it's not so bad. I mean, it's not your fault." He winced when he said that. The female, a girl, turned to face him and swatted his hand off.
"What you mean, not so bad? This is a catastrophe of epic proportions! What do you think I am going to tell my mom and dad, that mystic alien artefact decided it was a good idea to get me pregnant! And just how am I going to give birth to a cubicle object? What about the x-ray scans? Does it have an umbilical cord and if it does just how much sustenance is it going to need? Am I even going to survive this? And what am I supposed to tell my parents?"
Mystic alien artefact? Give birth to a cubicle object? Hope truly was the last to die, because almost painfully Optimus Prime hoped.
There were more humans, drawing near now when the battle was over. Many of their soldiers had probably died and he owed an apology for not keeping the situation better under control, but he had to get his answers first.
Judy was shocked. She was betrayed and violated, she was pregnant at the age of sixteen. The blasted cube had manipulated her, made her obediently run circles like clockwork mouse and it had decided it was a good idea to get her pregnant! With The Wizard of Oz theme music! Follow the yellow brick road her ass! Her life was over because her father was so going to kill her and hide the body.
Judy didn't like admitting it, but she was a closet romantic. When rarely she had thought about it her sense of hopeless romanticism had taken over and she had imagined marrying the boy she had been best friends with as a child at the age of twenty-something. She had imagined taking long walks with her future husband, Ron, their child in the stroller, their child lying in a cute bed next to their parents' in pink baby clothes, the proud mom and dad sitting side by side as their child grew up in utter cookie-induced bliss. When VCR died and went to the cats' heaven they would buy some small, cute dog. Of course she knew that fairy tales only existed in those beautifully drawn books in the libraries, but this was too much. She hadn't even gotten the fun part and now she was expecting some kind of baby space monster! Her heart had dropped into a deep, dark place she'd had no idea existed in her body and she knew it wasn't coming up again until she got herself out of this mess.
A big Autobot was kneeling in front of her, not as big as Broadside, but too freaking huge anyway, and somehow the face with no mouth and no real, expressive eyes still managed to convey tentative hope. Ron took her hand and squeezed it tight. It was good he appeared to want to stand by her. It's not like he didn't have anything to do with it. Maybe she could blame him. Maybe the Autobot would be kind enough to step on her and end her misery.
"I am sorry to distress you," an oddly kind and warm voice boomed, "but I must ask. What exactly do you mean by talking about the All Spark and pregnancy?"
It was wholly inappropriate moment to feel sympathetic, but she remembered what Ron had told to her when she asked why he was ready to help them, the Wreckers.
"I mean, it's pretty ridiculous to be worried of them, I know," he had said, "but they could be considered as members of endangered species. They are pretty darn dangerous pandas, or maybe more like crocodiles. Are crocodiles an endangered species?" She wasn't so sure herself, but she thought that maybe they had it even worse than her. Imagine that. And then she realized something other, something huge and happy for a change.
They must want the baby space monster cube, just like they had wanted the bigger one! And just what kind of super intelligent aliens couldn't perform a cesare section? They were supposed to do medical experiments as well as crop circles. Her parents didn't have to ever find out!
"I mean that the cube thingy decided to procreate before dying and I'm the poor single mother now," she said. Those optics brightened from blue to nearly white and yes, they wanted the cube baby. She was still mad at Ron, but her life was saved at least.
Caroline Witwicky was pacing in her living room. The night's sleep had been restless and now she had woken up, unable to go back to sleep. She hadn't wanted to wake her husband; the poor dear was worrying himself sick for their son. So was she, but she was also angry at him, for Ron wasn't the only one missing. Judy had gone missing the very same day and Caroline was half convinced that they had just taken away together, with little care for their worrying families. Even then, another part was nagging at her for being a bad, untrusting mother; that wasn't like Ron and Judy. They didn't smoke, sneak money from their parents' pockets, drink or do any of the horrible things teenagers this age seemed so prone to. They were good children. But where were they? Why couldn't they be contacted?
They most likely had their mobile phones with them, or at least the phones weren't home, but it was like the damn contraptions had just dropped out of existence. The signal couldn't even be found, or something. She had never really trusted this new-fanged technology anyway, just as bad as the nuclear power. Emilia Garland had always claimed that it all originated from aliens, but that was Emilia for you.
What if they had been kidnapped? Would she ever get her son back alive, ever hold him in her arms again?
Sleep deprivation wouldn't help Ron any. Sighing and kicking the door when she opened it, Caroline went to the kitchen to make some hot chocolate for herself. Maybe it would help her sleep. The radio was sitting on her kitchen table and she switched it on, wishing for some soothing music. The lovely chords filled the kitchen, she recognized Die Geschöpfe des Prometheus by Beethoven. She had just enough time to heat the milk before the music was interrupted by news. Bad news, but of course.
"The police say they are investigating the incident in an area where the USA military are known to operate." They talked about shots and fighting, about the battle of Hoover Dam and the communists. And suddenly, Caroline Witwicky, half sick of hearing how everything would surely be all right and tired like she couldn't remember even having been before, had a sickening feeling in her gut.
She left the radio and the kitchen table, she made three paces through the room to the hall and straight out of the house. The cool, damp night air hit her against the face and she stopped, realizing she only had a bathrobe and pink flurry slippers on. She watched the lilies, in full bloom, but hidden into the buddies for the night. Rationality reasserted itself; what would his boy be doing in Hoover Dam? How would he have gotten there in the first place? She turned to go back inside, beaten and tired, and she saw that the small glass window on the door had been cracked a little by her hard push.
"Oh, I really must be cursed," she mumbled as she stumbled back into the bedroom, hoping that tomorrow would bring better news. For few, desperate seconds she had been positive that the Hoover Dam fight had something to do with her Ron.
Hell hath no fury like one thwarted Walter Simmons. He had tried to contact the army, but had been tld, that secret Government agency or no, they would have to wait for the get-go from the said Govermnt, which would be long time coming if he knew the cowards without vision any. he remembered being told those had his son and for the sake of the said son he wished it wasn't true. He had been denied weapons, allt that was left were words and nice aliens existed only in space fantasies for adults. In real life no one came to tell the meaning of the life and how killing was wrong; in real life the aliens were soulless war machines and if he was going to die tonight he was going to give them a reason to do so. He had strapped explosives around his waist and chest and he begun walking, two of his men, though Clairmont was actually a woman. They were trying to stop him.
He wasn't about to let them. They had strapped themselves as well.
Optimus Prime, their leader. He was big and wonderfull and sad. Reg couldn't understand why he would be sad now. Doctor-bot Ratchet, he was scary, and Ironhide who had threatened him with his cannons. Reg hated the way his knees had gone soft like jelly. Jazz whose attitude didn't jazz, but rocked, mute Bumblebee and spiky Taser who was wounded pretty badly if he understood anything about how the Autobots were supposed to look like. The introductions had been hasty and odd, and Reg had only paid minimal attention to them. He was alive! They had won! Joy was bubbling inside him.
Macy could love Thomas Rye all she wanted. There had been an orange sports car and he had stepped into it. All right, been carried into it unconscious, but that as irrelevant. This was life! They had won and they all lived! He laughed for no other reason than happiness. Then he saw a jeep advancing and part of the joy was replaced by anxiousness. That had to be his father. No way would his father let someone else be the first contact, whatever way the contact was made.
Optimus Prime was anxious as the human vehicle drove towards them. The report he had gotten from Springer spoke its harsh language of carnage, fleeting, fragile human lives lost, never to be regained. These humans awaked protective instincts in him, played all the creative strings of his spark, he didn't want to see any of them in pain. He owed them an apology. He owed them more, but even the All Spark couldn't return organic sparks to life, like Nova Prime had found out in his time.
"Is he morally, ethically, spiritually, physically, positively, absolutely, undeniably and reliably dead?" Judy sing-songed with small voice, keeping brave face the best she could. She pointed towards Megatron. Optimus Prime was silent, trying to decipher the odd question, but Topspin had already had time to get used to at least the way humans' speech rarely made sense.
"Ethically, spiritually, physically, positively, absolutely, undeniably and reliably dead. Spark dead. Frostbitten dead, even," he confirmed.
"Frostbitten dead?" asked Ratchet curiously from overhead, having stopped cussing Topspin's utter and complete lack of common sense. He wasn't common with human biology yet and frostbite was an alien concept to him, as were all the other, curious ways of dying only organics could manage. The car stopped and three figured stepped out of it. Optimus prime took one, big step to greet them. Reg's heart rate skyrocketed.
"When organic tissue freezes solid, the water within that inflates the cells when it freezes, and the ice crystals puncture many important parts. Which is basically what the ice must have done to Megatron. I think that was the reason he let you just push the All Spark into him just like that, Prime. It wasn't too bad when he was immobile, but when he began to move the strain to his damaged systems began to show," he explained. Whatever Optimus Prime was going to say to the newcomers was interrupted by a shrill voice.
"And what business did you have kidnapping my son?" Walter Simmons bellowed.
It was like Reg had hoped. No Mega-man, Megatron, no Cube, All Spark, and Sector Seven wouldn't get its hands into the new one Judy was going to give birth to, out of all freaky and bizarre possibilities. He couldn't be blamed. He was the victim. All right, his father would probably blame him some anyway, but not too much. And now he found something within himself that wasn't satisfied with it. He had been right and he had risked his life. He had some self respect.
"They did nab me, true, but I wasn't exactly screaming and kicking all the way here. Actually, I thought it was theirs, and I wanted to become an engineer from begin with." He listened to himself with a detached kind of horror, wondering why he was begging for trouble like that. He was so going to get hurt for that. But he was right, he knew it and his father could beat him, but he couldn't make him think otherwise. He had won, as Walter Simmons counted victory, and Reg loved it.
And, as formidable a man as Walter Simmons was, he didn't held a candle to the Decepticons.
"Please, sir, the Sector Seven Operations Directives are there to protect us. They are not a set of vindictive pronouncements directed against making progress," the woman said, trying to drag his father away from them. She had a very short hair and the flat chest of an athlete. Reg got a feeling that she knew his father pretty well.
"Has anyone ever seen this famous and infamous Sector Seven Operations Directive Manual?" the man asked, standing one step behind her. He was rather big and sturdy, Reg had a feeling that the captain of his school's football team would look like that if he ever enlisted.
"Well, no," the woman admitted like she wasn't entirely sure it was the right answer.
"They are making it up, aren't they? The bloody book doesn't exist!" the man exclaimed with something like good humour. Reg had to respect his nerves.
"Clairmont, Vaughn, I assure you that it does exist," Walter Simmons sneered. He was beyond pissed off, obviously, to not see such obvious manipulation in advance. Reg winced inwardly. Ron took his hand and then Judy took the other.
"We will talk," Optimus Prime said and Reg couldn't even imagine saying no to that voice.
"I love us," he whispered. The air was smelling like hot metal and ozone, but also like water. I was going to rain again.
Time measurements. Some of them vary in different continuities. I took Wreckers from IDW and I decided to be consistent with my continuities.
astrosecond 0.498 seconds
breem8.3 minutes
cycle (IDW continuity) 1 hour 15 minutes (1.25 hours)
mega-cycle (IDW) 93 hours
deca-cycle (IDW) about 3 weeks
stellar cycle (IDW)7.5 months
vorn 83 years
AN: Protometal is the liquid-like protoform metal all Cybetronians are made of and it isn't usually all used to make altform-fitting solid bodies. In protoforms protometal isn't vulnerable because it can accommodate pressure to avoid damage and there are no specialized sensors programmed to register damage as sensation that may be painful, but in a closed space with pain sensors attached it can be truly the weak spot.
Caroline's intuition was nothing supernatural. She had experienced a terrible blow, she heard from the radio about another terrible thing and her mind made an association between those two things. She was correct, but that was just a coincidence.
The Clairmont here s a descendant of Wallace Wilson Clairmont, one of the First Seven. Judy was singing Ding Dong! The Witch Is Dead from The Wizard of The Oz. I don't own it.