Duty and Deceit
Chapter 13
Infestation
Quick note. If you haven't read my one shot "Ages Come and Ages Go" I would highly recommend that you do so. Things will make much more sense with a stronger idea of Terabyte's past.
The spy glanced around the corner into Kaon's med-bay, quickly darting behind the wall; pressing her dorsal plates to the cold iron, she peeked again. Knockout was standing off to the side, busily buffing his polish. Vain fool.
Taking advantage of the medic's lack of attention to anything further than his own chassis, the dark colored and slightly dented and scuffed femme snuck into the med-bay tossing a glance over her shoulder as she went. This was embarrassing... But she really didn't want to deal with the arrogant, egotistic mech.
The red medic tilted his helm towards her and she dived quickly behind a berth, sincerely hoping he hadn't seen her. After waiting a few astroseconds, the spy dared to make her move. She had located the magnetic stylus... on the table directly behind the medic. Just her luck.
She stood up quietly and darted from her cover to the next berth up, bringing her a few more meters closer to her objective. Once she got the stylus, she would have to find and obtain the armor paints; she'd run out of her personal supply. Those would be even trickier; the paints were stored in the subspace cabinet that Knockout was standing in front of.
The femme pulled in a deep vent of air, cooling her systems and gathering her courage. There was a certain thrill to this, entering enemy territory, stealing an object of value from right under his nose…
Black feet tip-toed silently across the medical bay as the spy approached the counter where Knockout was still studiously buffing himself. She grinned at the absurd, tuneless humming coming from the medic. He had a hideous singing voice.
Now that she was close enough to reach, the Prussian blue and black femme slowly stretched her silver hand towards the magnetic stylus, stilling her vents. The medic stepped sideways towards her and she instantly went stiff, hand still outstretched. Knockout was now directly between the stylus and herself, warily she tilted her helm up to see if she'd been discovered.
The arrogant red mech looked down at her and blinked. "What. Are you doing?" He asked slowly.
Frame overheating both from having stilled her vents for too long and from embarrassment at her predicament, the two-wheeler snatched her hand away from where it had been only inches from touching the mech's elbow. She stood up straighter, facing the medic.
"I- I needed the… uh… magnetic stylus…" She spluttered very professionally, realizing just how deep of trouble she had just got herself into.
He laughed, putting the buffer down and taking a step towards her, to which she responded by taking two backwards. "Well, Terabyte, if you wanted to see me, you need only have asked; I do try to make myself available."
The small, scuffed femme spluttered for a few more nanoseconds before regaining her composure and pulling up her 'commander' voice. "Medic, all I want, is the stylus and a paint kit. If you could be so kind as to give them to me?"
Knockout grinned at her and winked one dark red optic. "Yes, of course. How silly of me." He drawled.
She raised one cold, silver hand to press between her optics with a repressed groan after he turned to the cabinet. The cool servos felt good against her overheated faceplates. "Just get the supplies."
After a few clicks of digging around for the correct shades of gray, blue, and black, the medic turned around to her and handed the paint kit and a stylus to her. Knockout lifted her free hand in his own – her cannon arm, not the wisest of decisions – and spoke. "The requested items, I believe? Beautiful colors, should get you back to your usual state of beauty, dear Terabyte."
As he raised her hand to his lip plates, it took all of the spy's will power not to purge in his face. Instead, lowering her mini-cannon to its lowest frequency – enough to cause significant cosmetic damage, but not so much that she could get in trouble for it – grinning savagely, she fired directly into his face. "Thank you for the supplies doctor… By the way, you might want to look in the mirror sometime, you look terrible."
Knockout , oh so gracefully, fell backwards on his aft; a look of total shock and horror twisting his face-plates – now with peeling paint and a thick layer of black char – most comically. It really did look hideous…
She walked away as if nothing happened before stopping at the door to look back at the stunned mech, who was now running one hand over his face, inspecting the damage with growing dread as he was no doubt imagining how it looked. "Do have a good cycle, Medic. Although I must say, I hope I won't be seeing you… Hurts the optics."
Luckily for her, Shadowlight did all of her repairs, otherwise the medic would have been certain to take vengeance for his spoiled finish.
Terabyte smiled at the memory; never again did Knockout approach her for anything other than business, and even then not without keeping a very close optic on where her cannon was pointing. She never did like the Decepticon medic, far too full of himself.
The spy glanced down at Raf and the little creature and smiled sadly as she was once again reminded of her little brother. She had promised him, when they were separated that terrible day, that she would find him. Now, more than a decavorn later, she still hadn't been able to find the white and gray mechling. She sincerely hoped he was alive… there were nearly 500 known survivors of Protihex; perhaps he was among them.
Meanwhile her thoughts were interrupted as they entered the main chamber.
"Hey guys! Look what Terabyte and I found." Raf said, raising the recharging creature slightly, careful not to disturb it. The other humans got up and came towards them, whereas Ratchet simply called out exasperatedly.
"We're busy!" As he spoke, the Autobot medic glanced over at Raf.
Terabyte's helm shot up from where she was bent on one knee next to Raf, one hand resting gently on the child's back and shoulders. In spite of the drastic size difference, she had forgotten, just for a nanosecond, that he wasn't… Ratchet jumped up with a squeal, dropping the damaged pipe in his hands. Bumblebee, Bulkhead and Cliffjumper all looked up to see what had startled the medic, before duplicating Ratchet's response almost exactly and transforming their hands into blasters.
Instinctively, Terabyte leaped in front of the three human younglings, placing her own frame in the Autobots' line of fire. "What in the world is your problem?! Pointing weapons at younglings? Human younglings no less?!"
Simultaneously Miko stepped up and shouted, "Hey, hey! What's with you guys?"
All three Autobots looked at the mini-bot incredulously. "Scraplet!"
"You don't know what a Scraplet is?" Bumblebee asked, twitching his blaster at the creature recharging behind her.
"What's a Scraplet?" Raf asked slowly, shooting a wary glance at the metal creature in his arms as if second guessing the wisdom of holding it.
"Only one of the deadliest vermin to walk the face of Cybertron." Ratchet answered gravely.
'I thought that was the Autobots.' She thought bitterly. Terabyte swapped to English, hoping she wouldn't get reamed or punished – she still wasn't convinced that the Autobots would continue to be as lenient as they had been, she could very well get beaten for disobedience – for dropping into Cybertronian. "Thats a Scraplet? I've read about Scraplets but… Why hasn't it attacked yet?"
Jack raised one eyebrow at the medic disbelievingly, "This little thing?"
"But you're giant robots!" Miko exclaimed in amazement as she gestured to the slowly waking creature, "Scrappy here is, well, teeny."
"You have no idea of the damage that 'teeny' thing can do!" Cliffjumper retorted, looking a bit too trigger happy for Terabyte's comfort. She didn't move from her protective stance in front of Raf.
"Aww, this little guy wouldn't hurt anything!" Raf said, smiling at the creature as it raised its giant helm and looked around, optics brightening as it zeroed in on the large group of Autobots in front of them.
"I'm not so sure Raf… if its processors were scrambled when it hit its helm, then it would only have appeared harmless until a light defrag- Bumblebee watch-!" Terabyte yelled as the Scraplet shot across the room in a bee-line for the yellow scout.
He let out a prolonged, high-pitch beep before crashing backwards to the ground as he tried to escape the Scraplet's many razor like denta. It ran up and down the mech's yellow leg rapidly, leaving a trailing hollow where armor had been.
With a fierce yell, Raf came out from behind her wielding a large crowbar, running straight to where Bumblebee had managed to kick the Scraplet to the floor. Terabyte gaped at the little fleshy as he raised the crowbar and hit the Scraplet with it again and again… and again. When the creature was little more than a small pile of scrap and sparking wires, Jack put a restraining hand on the little boy's shoulder.
"Easy there, killer." The older human said with a bemused smile.
"I'm pretty sure it's dead now, Raf." Terabyte added quietly.
As Raf ran over to where Ratchet was assessing his guardian's damage, the femme heard Miko tell Jack, the human girl's tone indicating that she was quite impressed.
"Whoa. I did not see that one coming!"
Terabyte let out a draft of hot air. At least she wasn't the only one. She never would have expected such violence from Raf. Others maybe, but Raf?
"- esh-wound. He'll live." Ratchet assured Raf.
"Now do you believe me?" Cliffjumper said his tone plainly screaming 'Told you so!', "All Scraplets do is dismantle machinery and eat anything metal. Especially living metal!"
"Well, bug squashed. Game over, right?" Jack asked.
"If only it were that simple, kid." Terabyte answered softly.
"No. When it comes to Scraplets, there is never just one. And I fear I know how they got in here…" Ratchet muttered.
"The pod." Terabyte and the others all finished.
At the pod.
The Decepticon femme glared at the thawed pod as if by force of will she could close the gaping hole in its front.
"It's a trap. A Scraplet trap." Ratchet said, dramatically pointing out the obvious.
Bulkhead stuck his helm into the gap and groaned. "An empty Scraplet trap."
"It was probably ejected into space eons ago."
"Only when it landed in the Arctic, the temperature kept them in stasis." She spoke her thoughts aloud as she calculated all the possible outcomes of an infestation.
Jack stepped around a puddle of cold water and spoke up, "Until we got it thawed."
"And now they're ready for 'Autobot brunch'." Miko finished. Terabyte had to take a minute to access the internet and look up 'brunch'. English was so strange, in spite of its simplicity.
"So… How many are we talking about?" Raf asked nervously.
"Thousands." Ratchet replied. "Power malfunctions, groundbridge malfunctions… Sure signs that their infestation is well under way."
With that dire statement, the group returned to the main room.
"Ratchet to Optimus. We have a situation…" There was no response on the line other than a low buzz of static. "Optimus, come in!" The medic growled and slammed his fist on the terminal. "Scraplets have gotten to the comm. link systems. If we don't eradicate this infestation, they will reduce this whole base to a scrapheap."
"Well I say we bug outta here and let 'em keep it!" Bulkhead said emphatically. Bumblebee and Cliffjumper both nodded their agreement as the humans ran up to the rail so they could communicate better. Terabyte stood off to the side a bit, where she could still take part in the discussion without being intrusive.
"We can't leave, Skyquake isn't well enough to be moved. Even if he were, I'm pretty sure none of us can carry him." Terabyte protested with a worried glance at the Autobots. She wouldn't put it past them to just leave Skyquake to the Scraplets.
"Evacuation is not an option." Ratchet agreed with her. The spy let out a vent of relief. "If we don't get the ground bridge back online stat, Optimus and Arcee will perish."
Jack took a step forward with a confused expression distorting his fleshy face. "They… will?"
Before anyone could answer, Miko ran up to her large green guardian with her hands on her hips. "Bulkhead! You never run!"
"Miko, you haven't seen a swarm of these things devour a bot. I have. They pick you apart from the inside out, going for the small, juicy bits first—fuse by fuse, circuit by circuit, 'til there's nothing left, and I mean nothing... not even your optics." Bulkhead replied.
"Wow… That's… a little gruesome for younglings, don't you think?" Terabyte muttered under her breath. Whatever happened to common sense?
Jack scowled a little bit before stepping up. "You have to let us help."
"We're not made of metal!" Raf exclaimed as the wisdom of Jack's words hit him.
The spy smirked. 'I like you kid, but it took you that long to work that out?'
"Yeah! Scraplets can't hurt us." The pink haired girl agreed.
Ratchet raised one hand to his chin thoughtfully. "Typically, I find your… fleshiness to be your least engaging quality… But it would appear to provide an advantage under these extremes."
'And the humans complained that I was insulting.' She thought drily.
"Good. So we pair off. One 'bot one human." Jack decided firmly. Turning to Ratchet, "I'll watch your back while you repair the groundbridge."
"And we go bug hunting." Miko said excitedly. Everyone in the room looked over at Bulkhead and Bumblebee's scared moans.
It was soon agreed that Miko would go with Bulkhead, and Raf with Bumblebee. Cliffjumper suggested that he go with Terabyte to check the third portion of the base.
"And who will be your protection?" Ratchet rolled his optics as he spoke, plainly showing what he thought of that idea.
Terabyte huffed and crossed her arms over her chassis, comforted by the weight of her cannon; Cliffjumper had convinced the other Autobots that they needed all the firepower they could get. "I don't need protecting. If you trusted me, I'd go alone."
At the same time, Cliffjumper leaned his weight back and grinned at the medic. "'Preciate your concern for my well-being, Doc, but do I ever need backup?"
"Huh. As if I care if you idiots want to get yourselves eaten alive. My only concern is how Arcee would react if I let you get killed." The medic shuffled around in the ground bridge wiring.
Terabyte couldn't help but notice the underlying fondness in Ratchet's gruff tone. She had, for a short time, felt his mind in hers and she knew that he didn't like expressing himself. So he acted grouchy and tried to pretend he didn't have friends that he cared about. Then if they died, it would be easier to pretend it didn't hurt.
But all sides in a war have minorities. And the good Autobots were most certainly a minority...from her experience, they were about as easy to find as - to use a human term - finding a needle in a haystack
"I'd watch your back if I were you, Cliff'." Bulkhead warned as he and Miko headed down one of the three other two teams quickly followed suit.
Cliffjumper looked back at her and winked. "Nah, that's what I brought you for, right?"
She nodded. This mech tossed his trust around like an oily rag. The femme wondered just how he still could after so many vorns of war. Even on the right side of the war, betrayal was inevitable... she'd learned that the hard way.
At the sound of metal clinking above them, Terabyte jumped around with her cannon charged and ready; her right hand holding her cannon-arm steady. Crouching down into battle stance, the spy scanned the area carefully, the golden glow of her weapon adding extra light.
Nothing. She stood up with a shake of her helm and followed as the red mech continued on cautiously.
"Getting jumpy?" He teased. Her only response was a low growl.
Not long after, a huge crash followed by a loud shout and blaster fire rang through the base, making the walls vibrate. Terabyte stared at the smoking hole in the roof, one optic ridge cocked. A thoroughly roasted organic creature fell from the opening, landing with a light thump by the femme's foot.
Another shriek split the air as blasters were fired at the carcass. Terabyte leapt away from the pile of dust that once was alive, her foot stinging from her proximity to the blast.
"Die, Scraplet! Di-Oh... That wasn't a Scraplet was it?"
She looked at the mech in front of her, trying hard not to laugh. She wasn't particularly successful. "Getting jumpy?" She asked with a wry grin. "I believe that that was a 'rat'. Although it's rather hard to tell from what's left of it."
After that, the search had been relatively uneventful up until the last room. Mech and femme slowly entered the cargo bay, weapons ready.
The lights were off, completely eaten through by the Scraplets. Cautiously, Terabyte crouched down and, steadying her mini-cannon, activated her alt-mode's headlights, which were positioned in a vertical row between her chest plates. The light shone in the dark cargo bay, bouncing off of the gleaming armor of Scraplets.
There were hundreds of the creatures all over the walls, roof, and floor, busily chomping away at the metal surfaces. At that moment, every single purple pair of optics in the room turned to the two Cybertronians.
"Ohh mech… We are so dead." Cliffjumper muttered as the creatures opened their mouths, revealing millions of sharp teeth.
"We aren't dead yet, run!" Terabyte shouted as she started blasting the Scraplets, now flying at them almost too fast to track, mouths opening and closing rapidly. They were so close together that each blast took out several at a time, but there were far too many to fight.
Giving up on weapons, both transformed and sped down the halls as fast as their wheels could take them. The Decepticon femme winced as thousands of tiny teeth clamped down on her armor, shredding through it instantly wherever they landed. With a glance at Cliffjumper, she saw that he was also covered with the Scraplets. Blue life-En flowed from their wounds as they sped away from the mech-eating swarm.
They burst into the ground bridge chamber and transformed, slamming the metal doors behind them. Bulkhead and Miko both came in at the same time, and Bumblebee and Raf were already there. Cliffjumper and Terabyte were in the worst shape of the three teams.
"-re leaking Energon like-" Bulkhead was saying as he walked in.
But the Scraplets were already in the chamber. They swarmed the air, Ratchet, Jack, and the others all attacking furiously. In spite of the large number of inert Scraplets on the floor, there seemed like an endless number of them.
Quickly enough, Cliffjumper, Terabyte, Bulkhead, and Miko had all joined the fray, taking out as many of the creatures as they could. Girly screams could be heard coming from Bulkhead, along with the grunts and moans of everyone else as they acquired more wounds. So far, damage was still relatively minimal, just shallow scrapes.
Just when she was wondering if they would ever stop coming, the room went mercifully quiet, the floor littered with offlined Scraplets.
"We get 'em all?" Jack asked, panting slightly.
Terabyte looked over at the others, all sitting up against the wall, examining their damage. She slid herself down into a corner a little ways away and pulled out her med-kit, repairing what she could. She had been doing all of her own repairs for so long, ever since Darksh-
But she couldn't think about that now. If she ever stopped to think, Terabyte wasn't sure if she'd be able to go on. She'd seen so much loss in her relatively short vorns…
Hearing a loud groan from Bumblebee, she looked over just in time to see the yellow scout bash his helm against the box he was laying on. The crash echoed slightly.
"So the rest of them know we're in here?" Bulkhead asked, dismayed.
Ratchet spoke sternly from where he was helping fix Cliffjumper's shoulder. It was leaking life-En from a punctured fuel line. "We will not allow ourselves to become their next meal. If we do, Optimus and Arcee will never make it out of the Arctic. We must get the ground bridge operational."
Terabyte shot a worried glance at the door she and Cliffjumper had shut. It was creaking loudly as the Scraplets worked to chew through the heavy duty, multi-layer door.
"Then we can send them anywhere on Earth!" Raf exclaimed.
"Not just anywhere, we can't endanger the innocents on this planet." Terabyte pointed out. She forced herself not to cast a warning glare in the Autobots' direction. They wouldn't care about the innocent, but from what she could tell from her short time with them, they would heed her suggestion to maintain their false reputation.
Jack tilted his head for a moment then spoke. "Why not back to the Arctic? We already know they don't do cold."
Miko grinned and pumped her fist in the air. "Sweet! One stop shopping!"
"Given the body mass of the Scraplet…" Ratchet mumbled thoughtfully, "Subzero temperatures should freeze them on contact… Think, Ratchet think! If the ground bridge is still down,"
Terabyte and the medic concluded simultaneously, both shooting the other a dark look as they did so, "There must be a breach in the Energon fuel line!"
"That's two levels down!" Bumblebee whined as he banged his helm on the box again with a discouraged whirr.
"Would you quit do-" Terabyte cut herself off abruptly and started over with stiffly respectful English. "Apologies sir. I am simply concerned for your neural circuitry, as you seem intent on reducing your processors to scrap."
Raf tried and failed to stifle a giggle. "She does have a point, 'Bee."
"Uh, if we weren't breaching, we could down and fix it." Bulkhead gestured to the life-En running down his leg.
Jack hefted his fire extinguisher to his shoulder. "How do we find it?"
"And how do we fix it?" Raf finished.
Terabyte admired the humans' courage. When she was a youngling, she didn't have half that much bravery. Until Protihex. But she wasn't really a youngling after that. Who could be?
Not knowing the base perfectly yet, she remained silent, waiting for one of the Autobots to answer. In the end it was Ratchet who replied.
"Miko, you know where Bulkhead's quarters are, correct?" The girl nodded. "Take the first left after that and go to the end of the corridor, and turn right. The fuel lines run along the wall. Got it?"
They all nodded and Ratchet continued. "Take a repair kit with you and find the breach. All you should need to do is weld an appropriately sized patch over the leak."
The medic handed them a tool kit and a few sheets of light weight patch metal. It would be temporary, but it would work.
"Got it." Jack confirmed. "Go to Bulkhead's quarters, take a left, a right, find the hole, weld it shut. C'mon guys. We can do this."
If anyone noticed the waver his voice, they didn't mention it.
Nearly a breem had passed and the fleshies still hadn't returned. Ratchet and Terabyte wearily continued repairs while the rest of them lay against the wall in silence.
Finally the large, olive green Wrecker broke the eerie quiet, which until then had been pierced only by the ominously creaking doors and the ever-increasing sound of metal teeth chomping away.
"So if we get-" Bulkhead cut himself off. "When we get the ground bridge working, we send the creepy crawlies out?" He cycled a deep vent, with a wince. "Bring our 'Bots in."
" We can't bring the Prime and the second in command in first. If we do, the Scraplets will have no reason to leave." Terabyte sighed, now - at Ratchet's request - trying to stem the flow of life-En from Bumblebee's leg. Suffering from Energon loss herself, the femme hadn't had the energy to bother resisting. "We'll need bait."
"Where are we gonna get bait?" Bulkhead shouted angrily. "Scraplets already helped themselves to everything we've got!" He waved one arm at the partially eaten base and the nearly chewed through door that was the only thing between them and the Scraplets.
"You volunteering, Decepticon?" Ratchet snarled. "Because there is no way I'm ordering anyone to do that."
'Except me, of course. It's fine if the ' Con does it." She thought sourly. "Yes. I realize that. But we still need bait. I was not suggesting you do it. We need bait; I'm a prisoner. I'm disposable." The spy said quietly, inserting resignation to her tone. If she was going to be forced to risk her aft for Autobots then they had better believe she did so out of the kindness of her noble, repentant spark.
"Terabyte, you don't have to do this." Cliffjumper whispered. The red mech was badly damaged.
"Oh really." She gave him a flat look. "Can you honestly tell me I have a choice? I'm not trustworthy enough for you and I'm more disposable than your own mechs. No. I do have to do this; there's no one else who will."
The Autobots fell silent. Just then the kids ran in, Jack leading.
"Ratchet!" He shouted, "All systems go!"
At the same moment the door disintegrated, and the swarms of Scraplets flew in, mouths open wide.
"Fire it up!" Miko yelled.
Ratchet stood up, stumbled over to the ground bridge controls as Scraplets attacked him again. Reaching the switch, the medic slammed his hand into it, falling with the lever and landing on his face plates with a crash.
"Ground bridge... Activating."
The Prussian blue two-wheeler wobbled to her pedes and boosted her temperatures as much as she safely could. Her plan worked and the Scraplets, who saw in infrared, left the Autobots and targeted her.
"Come and get me, you little scrap-heads!" She shouted as she ran into the portal to the freezing Antarctic.
Optimus and Arcee were stumbling towards the ground bridge portal, looking almost frozen solid. Terabyte stumbled as the frigid air came into contact with her purposefully overheated frame with a hiss of steam.
"Get down! Now!" She yelled as the Scraplets came pouring through the portal behind her. The femme wondered how badly she would be punished for daring to give the Prime and his second orders. A sound beating for sure.
The Scraplets froze solid and knocked her to the snow on impact. The two Autobots braced themselves for whatever they were expectin only to be lightly pounded with a barrage of offlined Scraplets.
Once they were back at base and Ratchet was repairing the two commanders, the spy bowed in front of the Prime, with her helm brushing the dusty floor. The Autobots and humans all stared at her in shock, though the terrified femme didn't see their expressions. If she had presumed to give Megatron an order like that, even to save his life, her punishment would be severe. She could only imagine how much worse it would be with the Autobots, destroyers of cities.
"My apologies, Lord Prime." Terabyte whispered, her helm still resting on the ground. Her frame gave a convulsive shiver, though not from the recent cold, and she rushed to continue. "Mighty Leader, I offer my humblest apologies. It was not my place to give orders and I have exceeded my rank as prisoner of war in doing so."
Shaking, the small femme unclasped her cannon and deactivated her Energon dagger, pointedly shifting it so that she couldn't extend it without damaging the vital fuel line in her arm. Ultimate submission. With the Decepticons, such open submission often made punishment less severe, as she could offer no resistance. Holding her cannon up to the Prime, Terabyte waited patiently for the inevitable pain, her armor clamped almost painfully tight to her protoform.
She heard the huge mech stand up and step towards her, each pede-fall announcing his approach with a fearsome bang. She had never been strictly punished before; she was good at her job and followed orders. The femme was terrified of the Autobot leader. Skyquake had taught her to be able to fight mechs nearly twice her size, but there was no way to train for sitting at the mercy of the mech who could go hand to hand with Megatron.
She shuddered again, an involuntary whimper coming from her engine as she realized what she'd just done. The Prime was going to beat her to scrap, and she had just given away her only chance of living through it.