The first thing she felt was the dull ache penetrating her entire body, followed by a strange, liquid tingle coarsing through her.
"Hey, Dudes she's coming around!" Miko recognized the voice as Henry Masterson, Unit:E's resident tech geek and annoyance. She heard foot falls as others rushed toward her, and a familiar voice holding them back.
"Ep ep ep!" Ratchet scolded, making Miko smile inside as her eyes fluttered open. "Give her some room! Thats it," He said softly as Miko saw a light move across her slowly clearing vision. "That's it Miko. Good, good."
"Uuuuugghhh, Ratchet?," She groaned, looking up at the autobot medic, trying to push herself up and out from under the thin hospital sheet, only for Ratchet to tenderly push her back down. She tried to resist, but her limbs felt like lead logs.
"Easy," He said, "you burned through a lot of energon, and your systems need time to reboot."
"Reboot?" She wondered, before looking down at her arms. Both had IV's inserted into them just below the elbow, but one was dripping a clear liquid into her blood stream, while the other was glowing blue and connected to her still transformed right arm. 'Energon,' she realized, slowly raising and turning the appendage over, the barely glowing pink circuits crisscrossing the dark purple metal. This did not go unnoticed by Ratchet.
"I've already begun a level one diagnostic. Hopefully it will reveal the extent of your, 'condition.'" The japanese teen sighed and slumped back in her bed, just as Rafael approached with the less familiar Henry right behind him.
"Hey guys," She smiled weakly, turning her head to look at them as the younger teen genius smiled back.
"How are you feeling?"
"Like Slag," She answered bluntly and honestly, noticing someone was missing. "Where's Jack?"
"Still in debrief with Fowler and the Regents," Henry said not taking his eyes off her cybertronian arm. Raf elbowed the inventor in the side, shooting him a glare only for the taller tech genius to glare back. "What? I'm just trying to figure out whats what." But this only earned him a certain medics ire.
"Well you can do it somewhere else," He spat dryly, glaring back at the inventor. "Take a scan and examine it in your lab if you must." Henry held the medic's optics only a moment before he turned and walked away, causing Raf to shoot his own glare at Ratchet.
"Hey, what gives?"
"I'm simply attempting to preserve patient doctor confidentiality." Raf only scoffed at that.
"Thats a load of scrap. Come on Ratch, why don't you trust Henry? I know he's not the nicest guy sometimes but come on."
"Trusting that insect," The medic said wryly, "Would be like trust a scraplet not to eat metal." The mention of the tiny cyber-pests brought a name back to Miko's mind.
"Bulkhead!" he yelled, sitting up so fast her head began to spin.
"Miko!" Ratchet scolded gently pushing the girl back down, "I already told you; rest. Let the energon do its work."
"But, where's Bulkhead?" Ratchet's only response was to take a step back, allowing Miko to see the much larger berth next to hers. Only now did she realize her bed was on the catwalk overlooking the rest of the hangar, and consequently, the autobot recuperating nearby. She smiled when she saw Bulkhead lying, unconscious but very much alive judging by the rumbling snores coming from his vents.
"He suffered extensive damage to his vehicular mode," Ratchet admitted, gesturing to the wreckers dented plating and still shattered glass. "And while he very nearly exhausted himself into stasis lock, there is very little permanent damage. Nothing a few solar cycles rest won't fix." His faceplates turned grim as he turned back to Miko. "You however," he said leaning over her and examining her transformed arm. "You have once again left me baffled."
"That makes two of us." Miko turned her head, and saw her best friend walking up the catwalk stairs.
"Hey Jack-rabbit," She smiled, trying to sound better than she actually felt. But the young agent knew her too well for the deception to work.
"Still under the weather I'm guessing."
"Yeah," she sighed sinking a little further into the beds thin cushions. She looked past Jack and the sight of sunlight streaming in from the partially open hangar doors brought a new question to mind. "How long was I out anyway?" She asked expecting a number of days.
"Not long actually," Jack shrugged folding his arms, "Three, four hours tops." The only one not surprised by this seemed to be Ratchet.
"Stasis lock from energon deprivation rarely lasts for prolonged periods," he said matter of factly. "Provided you can administer a fresh infusion quickly." Miko let the medics words soak in for a moment, one that allowed an awkward silence to form between her and Jack, who couldn't help but stare at her metallic limb.
"So um," The young agent started rubbing the back of his neck, "I'm guessing you didn't."
"No," Miko said flatly, voice devoid of the energy and spirit Jack had come to know her by.
"Can't imagine what this must be like for you," He said, hoping to get Miko to open up and voice whatever she was feeling inside, but the girl just remained silent. It was starting to scare him, and he had a feeling it was only going to get worse.
"By the All Spark," Ratchet suddenly gasped, staring at the cybertronian sized monitor before him. "Thats, thats not possible."
"Ratchet?" Jack asked nervously, not entirely sure he wanted to know what had shocked the medic.
"The diagnostic I ran on Miko is complete," he said breathlessly as Miko began to push herself upright. "I was expecting surgical grafts but this is."
"This is what Ratchet?" Miko asked anxiously. Jack looked back at his best friend, and for maybe the fourth time since he'd met her Miko looked scared out of er mind. Ratchet must have seen it too, as he hesitated before delivering the news.
"According to the diagnostic scans, the cybernetics now visible on your arm extend throughout your entire body, and the components and alloys are undoubtedly cybertronian." Jack watched Miko, but the japanese teen said nothing. "If I had to theorize, It would seem that your cybertronian frame is encased within some kind of, techno-organic exo-skeleton. Miko," he said turning to her. "Were you involved in any significant trauma as a child? An accident of some sort?" Miko thought for a moment, she'd fallen from a tree and broken her right arm when she was eight, and there was that time when she'd cracked a rib racing her friends bike but those hardly seemed like significant trauma. She shook her head no.
"Hmph, well that rules out a self-reformatting."
"Self what?" Jack asked.
"Self reformatting," Ratchet explained, "Its a self preservation function initiated by the T-cog, and only happens when a cybertronian has been so heavily damaged that not even stasis lock can preserve our spark. During the later days of the war, both sides sent reconnaissance units to star systems neighboring Cybertron in hopes of finding alternative energy sources to supplant dwindling energon supplies. Cut off from immediate aid and reinforcement, these units were often forced to heal themselves by reformatting their bodies, which meant scanning whatever form was available to them. So it is not unheard of for a cybertronian to adopt an organic alt-mode."
"But," Jack said remembering the medics earlier words, "I'm guessing thats not the case." Ratchet looked at Miko, still not believing the young girl had remained silent all this time. It wasn't right seeing her this shaken or quiet.
"No," he said directing his attention to Miko. "Miko, I understand how confusing this must be for you and you would like nothing more than answers at this time. But without more detailed scans I'm afraid I'm only speculating. Is there anyone you know, a family member, who might be able to tell us more?" Miko thought for a moment, but when she spoke her voice was laced with anger.
"...My Dad," She spat quietly, "He and my Uncle know something."
"Do you mean the other human that was with you on the freeway?" She nodded yes, causing Ratchets faceplates to twist into guarded contemplation.
"Hmm."
"What is it?" Jack asked, not liking the medics sudden mood one bit.
"If I recall, he and Wheeljack left for japan through the ground-bridge approximately half an hour ago."
"Hold on a sec, why would someone who just learned about cybertronians be ground-bridging halfway across the world with one?"
"He didn't say," Ratchet admitted darkly, "Only that he was under orders, from the Regents."
"No, absolutely not! Out of the question!" Fowler liked to think of himself as a reasonable man , but maintaining that title was proving difficult. Especially against obstacles such as those facing him now.
"Director, please understand," The Regent's lead speaker, a sharply dressed gentleman of middle years that went by the name of Rook at the moment. "We have every intention of dealing with this threat."
"By sending our only defense halfway across the universe?" Fowler said as calmly as he could, wishing his superiors had not dismissed Jack so soon.
"We are aware of the situation," another regent said dismissively, her older face partially obscured behind a set to black bangs that did nothing to hide her contempt for the man before her. "Despite your neglect to inform us."
"It wasn't my intention to keep you in the dark," Fowler said attempting to placate the men and woman before him. "I wanted to make sure our communications were secure against Soundwave. By the time we had done that the situation had escalated."
"An escalation your deliberation allowed to happen Director." Rook said, deathly calm and not hearing any of Fowler's defense. "We know all about your communication with your friends on Cybertron, a message sent before the incident in Japan."
"Your job Director," The third, quieter regent said leaning forward and folding his hands together, "Is to oversee the monitoring and surveillance of all extraterrestrial threats to the people of earth and to appraise us of these threats so we may determine how best to deal with them." It was times like this that made Fowler miss his army days.
"With all due respect Sir," Fowler said biting his tongue, "This isn't just any threat we're dealing with here. The Decepticons have centuries more experience than us, in warfare and subversion tactics. Our only chance to repel this threat is with the Autobots."
"There is no need to involve Cybertron is this matter," The female regent said briskly, leaving Fowler speechless but only for a moment. "We have already made arrangements for you to be granted access to all of the most advanced weaponry available." Before he'd been impatient, now the regents were getting on his last nerve.
"I'm sorry Ma'am," Her said, deathly calm, "but whatever you think you know about the Decepticons. Is. Wrong." The woman sat a little straighter, but the condescending just continued.
"The Decepticons," Rook said deliberately, "Were disbanded by their former commander on Cybertron."
"Where Soundwave was not present," Fowler reminded them. "And I'll bet you all thirteen stripes that he's not about to give up the fight." The Director knew first hand how a soldiers loyalty could turn to deadly fanaticism, and Soundwave was as loyal as they came.
"You believe then," The third regent said, having remained silent for most of the briefing, "That this communications officer, this Soundwave, may try to rebuild the Decepticon forces here on earth?" Fowler's answer was curt and clear.
"If he hasn't started already." The regents fell silent, looking between themselves before speaking again, Rook taking the lead as usual.
"All right Director, you can keep your Autobots. But they are to remain covert at all times. And as for this Predacon." Fowler kept his cringe to himself. Vanishing cars, trucks, and bikes he could handle. A giant red white and blue metal dragon however. But what he heard from the regents next was ... unexpected.
"We think it would be to everyone's benefit if it was kept under close supervision. By someone with extensive knowledge of both human customs and disguising cybertronian nature." Fowler felt his heart sink and then bounce right back up to smack his tongue. It didn't take a genius to figure out who they were talking about, just an obscene amount of clearance.
"I'll be sure to tell Rodney that."
"There is no need Director," the female regent said curtly, "Agent McNeil has been updated and is already en route."
Wheeljack was only half paying attention to the road, letting his temporary charge guide his vehicular form while he took in the scenery. Out of all the countries he visited while exploring earth, Japan had latched itself into a special part of his spark. He told himself it was the peace and quiet and the mountains, both of them big fat lies. It was the buildings really: The sweeping roofs and gentle curves took his processor back to a time before the war, back when he'd just been another student training to be a warrior in the Elite Guard. But more than the war, that was before he lost his family, before He had turned his back on them and everything their Sensei had ever!
He cycled a sigh and cleared his processor. Going over his list of skeletons was the last thing he needed to be doing right now. Instead he focused on his "driver" examining the small man, but mostly trying to read him under that mask he called a face. Neither of them said a word until finally, Wheeljack couldn't take it anymore.
"So," He started, trying to break the ice, "You're Miko's Uncle." His passenger sighed, leaning back slightly.
"Well, no," Rodney attempted to clarify, "I mean its, uuuggh its complicated."
"Most families are," Wheeljack said, earning a groan from Rodney.
"Tell me a bout it. Sometimes it, I just, buuuuhhh." He slumped forward onto the wheel and Wheeljack let him rest his eyes. "I need a vacation. A loooooong vacation."
"I hear that," Wheeljack said, already sensing a fellow drifter in the human. "You know, there's an earth like planet just a galaxy over."
"No-ho-thanks wheels," He laughed lounging back, "I think I'll keep my feet on the ground fer now. But thanks for the offer. Turn left here."
"Gotcha," Wheeljack said, turning off the main road and down a narrow driveway that seemed to vanish somewhere in the tree's ahead. The branches brushed against his frame, and Whelljack casually thought how prissy Knockout would get if he had to drive through terrain like this. The ex-Decepticon medic was still more than pathetic in the wreckers opinion, but his sparring sessions with Smokescreen and Bumblebee were slowly training him out of it.
"Here we are," Rodney said as Wheeljack found himself driving up to a very old but well kept house. The building looked to be two stories tall with white walls set in dark wood frames under a sweeping roof of dark gray tiles. Wheeljack realized from the dated architecture coupled with the extensive gardens laid out in front of and likely behind the building he was likely looking at Miko's ancestral home. His musing though did not mean he didn't notice the old woman staring at them from the gardens. He shut off his engine.
"Wait here," Rodney said quietly, stepping out and standing beside Wheeljacks vehicle form. "They've been through a lot in de past few days and well..." Wheeljack said nothing, just locked his doors and put it in park. Rodney sighed and let his carefully created mask of clam fall. He walked toward the house's front door, pausing to bow to the woman standing on the covered porch. Naoko Nakadi returned the bow, not slowed or impeded by her old age.
"McNeil-san," She said, her normally calming song like voice hollow and weary.
"Mrs. Nakadi," he returned, tears beginning to well in his eyes as his throat started to choke. "I, I'm so sorry for your loss." The older woman closed her eyes and bowed her head, her own tears slipping from her amber eyes, a trait shared by all Nakadi women.
"She is with her father now," She said, searching for a silver lining, even if it meant reminding herself of her husbands death nine years ago. He could see the lines where tears had stained her wrinkled cheeks, and he knew it was unlikely she had slept last night.
"If, you don't mind me ask'n," he began, but the Nakadi matriarch cut him off.
"They're in the washitsu." The man only had to think a moment before he caught her meaning. They bowed to each other, then Rodney entered the house, slipping off his shoes before going to confront his friend. He had visited the ancient Nakadi home many times before, so it was not long at all before he found the correct room. He slid back the paper and bamboo doors, taking in the smooth mat covered floor, the shelves and cupboards he knew to contain jars of special herbs grown in the gardens outside. His gaze lingered only for a second on the sword hanging from the wall over a painting of its previous owner, Miko's grandfather, Hiro Nakadi. He looked away and across the room, only for his heart to break.
He was sitting halfway between the door and the middle of the room, legs crossed and folded. He looked like a statue wearing his most casual of clothes, a bare brown shirt and khaki pants, not even seeming to breath as Rodney stepped inside the room. He followed his gaze, up to the small only slightly raised bed lying the the center of the room.
The first thing Rodney noticed about her was the absence of her contagious smile, that goofball toothy grin that could infect anyone with a good mood, even her dour husband. But instead her pale lips were straight, and her eyes were closed. She appeared to be sleeping, lying there in that snow white kimono with her hands folded over her stomach, her long hair carefully combed to a shine he knew would soon fade. Just as she had.
Rodney looked away from Mika's body, not daring to hold it in his eyes another moment, or he knew he wouldn't be able to pull himself back together. He turned to his friend.
"Dynomo?" He called softly, and waited for a response.
"..." The darker man remained silent, leaving Rodney asking himself is the man had even heard him.
"Dynomo?"
"...I did this." Rodney said nothing, letting his grief stricken friend give his pain voice. "Its my fault she died this way, and not from time." Rodney was one of the few people the Nakadi couple had told the truth when Mikahura was diagnosed with ovarian cancer five years ago. He remembered how fragile Mika had looked when she recounted how the doctors had explained the disease to them, one the doctors were not equipped to combat. But Mikahura had been calm. No despair. No fear. She had expected this, for the same reason Miko was an only child.
Try as they might, Dynomo and Mikahura had never been able to have a second child, and two years after Miko was born an examination confirmed Mika was sterile. And Rodney knew Dynomo held himself fully responsible for all of it.
"You can't blame yourself," Rodney said, hoping against hope his words wouldn't fall on deaf ears. "No one knew what was gonna happen."
"Why are you here?" He asked in a tone that carried another meaning. 'Why can I not be alone with my grief?'
"I, Its about Miko," He said timidly. "She, she saw me on the phone last night and, well." He stopped before his stuttering could cripple his voice, took a breath and calmed his shaky voice as best he could. "I had to tell her. I know you wanted to be the one that broke it too her but."
"It's for the best," He said solemnly, his throaty voice hauntingly smooth and fluid. His gaze shifted downward, toward the floor in front of him. "At the end, We are all but echoes of our dreams. A resonance of what could have been, had the fates not decreed it so." He paused, a single tear slipping from his green eyes as he looked back to his wife. "But in the end, like the sun destined to set as the moon is to fade, we are all dying."
Rodney stepped forward, just enough to see over his friends shoulders, and to see the small tanto sword lying unsheathed before him. He swallowed hard, knowing well that the sword was the traditional weapon used in seppuku, a ritual suicide.
"What about Miko?" Rodney asked looking at Dynomo, his tone slowly edging away from nervous and toward contempt, though the mans gaze never left his wife's body. "How do you think she'll react when she looses not one, but both parents inside of a week?"
"The time for me to guard my Daughter is over," he said, steadfastly. "Too long have I tried to shield her from the world." He looked down at the blade before him. "Now she must go forth, and do what I cannot. Live, where I no longer wish too." He closed his eyes as a ghost of a smile fluttered over his face, only to vanish like a spectre in the fog.
"Its for the best," he echoed, reaching down and picking up the blade. "For now the child may finally go forth into the day, and face the night unburdened by the sins of the father." He began to unsheathed the sword, and Rodney knew he'd waited long enough.
"She knows Dynamo." He froze, becoming a statue in the blink of an eye. "She knows there's more to what she is than meets the eye, and that you've been keeping secrets from her. And," he added, his voice taking on a dark tone, "They know too." Dynomo turned to face his friend, green amber flecked eyes piercing Rodney's very soul, searching for any hint of deception of exaggeration. For a three second eternity neither of them spoke, until Dynomo uttered a single word.
"When?"
"I don't know," Rodney admitted, "judging by the way she snapped she could have known for months, weeks, maybe years. Fer all I know she found out that night but ... After I found her, He found us. I don't know how he came back or when, but I do know he wasn't alone ... And it wasn't one of his old goons either."
"Describe him." But Rodney had something better than a description.
"Miko called him Soundwave." Dynomo remained rigid, but Rodney knew when the gears were turning in the man's head.
"She knew his designation," he said in a flat tone, one that asked how.
"Yeah, looks like Streak's been keeping secrets of her own." 'And I wonder where she gets it from?' he asked silently to himself. The room fell back into silence, as the dark skinned man's mind worked this new development over and over.
He'd spent his whole life trying to make up for the mistakes of his old one, and more than all his other efforts these past 18 years had allowed him to finally forget his past and move on. Instead of wandering aimlessly he had helped raise a family. Instead of lamenting over his failures, he had laughed with his wife and child.
"She needs to know the truth. But more importantly, She needs you."
Now it was all coming back, bearing down on him like a tsunami, inescapable and total in its destruction of all he had come to know. His whole world. 18 years spent building a new life, he knew were about to be dashed like a fishing boat on the rocks.
There was a soft clink of metal as the tanto's sheath recovered the blade, followed by a deep exhale from the man holding it. Dynomo stood, eyes still locked on the peaceful body before him. He bowed, his head coming within inches of his knees. He stood again and turned away, and Rodney saw his posture change the moment he did so. His shoulders locked, his back went straight, and the air about him changed from a man resigned to his fate to something that was strong because it was needed to be. He walked toward the sliding doors, but stopped, looking at the painting and sword hanging from the wall at his right.
"Take it," The voice of the elder Nakadi said from the door, making Rodney realize he had never closed it. Dynomo looked at his mother in law, then back at the blade resting in its display frame. "Hiro loved you like a son," Naoko said wistfully, eyes full of remembering, "he would have wanted you to have it." Dynomo approached the sword, and with the reverence of one taking up a cherished legacy, removed the sword from its stand.
"Thank you," he said, reaching down and retrieving the worn leather strap that accompanied the blade.
"Take care of my granddaughter," Naoko said as her eyes teared. "Please don't let her." The elder woman finally broke down crying, and was soon embraced by her son in law. "Please," She sniffled, "I can't loose any more of you."
"You will not,' Dynomo said firmly, "I promise you, with all that I am."
"Thank you," She said breaking the hug, but not bothering to wipe her tears. "Now, if you could let me be ... alone with my daughter." Dynomo nodded and walked out of the room, followed by Rodney after a quick deep bow to the grieving mother.
Wheeljack was just about to become bored out of his processor when he saw Rodney exit the house with a very grim looking friend in tow. It took the wrecker a moment to realize who he was looking at, and even when he did he could still barely believe it. For starters Miko had almost none of her fathers features. His skin was darker and his short black hair had the slightest tinge of brown to it. There seemed to be some similarity in the nose but it there was it was very slight. What really caught Wheeljack's optics however, was the eerily familiar shade of green making up the man's eyes.
He unlocked his doors just as the two approached, Dynomo seeming hesitant to enter. It was not lost on Wheeljack the way the man was staring at him, like he was trying to take him apart and decide if he was real or not. He finally slid into Wheeljack's passenger seat, not even glancing at Rodney beside him. The smaller man sighed, then adjusted his seat; the signal for Wheeljack to send Ratchet their coordinates for a ground-bridge. A few seconds later the swirling blue green vortex opened behind them, and as Wheeljack turned to enter it he heard Rodney mutter a grim comment.
"Welp, Here we go again."