...
The Crew
...
Jack blinked as he stepped out of the vortex. For just one fleeting second, he had half-expected to see the familiar main bay of Autobot Outpost Omega One. Instead, what greeted him at the other end of the portal was something else entirely.
It immediately reminded Jack of some sort of aircraft hangar; the first thing his feet touched was a short metal runway that ran the entire length of the chamber, feeding directly into the Ground Bridge, and it was just wide enough for five cybertronians to comfortably stand side by side.
Located on either side of this runway were what looked like four heavy, industrial elevators, two on each side. They were large, increbidly so, and their purpose was made clear when Boris maneuvered her MODE right into one, its footsteps shaking the ground. Jack stopped in his tracks and gazed in amazement as the docking clamps secured the mecha and a gantry slid into place.
"What are you waiting for, civilian?" grunted Boris' voice, "You going to move, or do I have to give you a warning shot?" Jack swallowed, and took a step back; he had only known the girl for a few minutes and he already had the feeling that she might make good on her promise. An electric buzzer sounded, followed by a hydraulic hiss and a rumble, as the elevator, MODE and all, was slowly lifted up through an opening in the ceiling, obviously to another floor entirely.
"Give her time," muttered Throwback, as he ushered Jack towards the exit, "She'll simmer down after a while, give or take a few hours."
"In the meantime," chirped Throttle, "Let's get you over to sick bay; Flatline will want to take a look at you."
Another buzzer sounded, and the large heavily reinforced double doors situated at the far end of the bay rumbled open. Beyond, was a large flourescent lit hallway that stretched before them, with several other corridors branching left and right.
"Are we underground?" Jack asked, as they walked down the hallway, his head craning upwards towards the ceiling.
Throwback coughed. "Sorry, Jack, that's kinda classified..."
Jack looked at him strangely, but then Throttle answered. "It's standard procedure," she explained, "We still don't know whether you pose a threat or not, so we can't tell you anything just yet."
Jack eyes widened just a fraction. "And...And if I am a threat?"
"Well," Throttle said, "Security protocols state that we will have to surgically remove your eyeballs and scrub your corneas-"
"W-WHAT?!" Jack screamed.
Throwback quickly laid a servo on Jack's back reassuringly. "Throttle, you're scaring him!" he snapped, "Jack, don't worry; nobody's removing anybody's eyes..."
Throttle, on the other hand, simply looked mildly bewildered. "What? What did I say?"
Eventually, Jack was led down to the sick bay; a large set of metal double doors, painted red with the universal medical symbol plastered across it in white. A small screen inset into the door itself stated that the doctor was 'IN'.
"So...," Jack said, uncertainly,"Flatline...what's he like?"
Throttle bent down towards him. "Word of advice: try not to make eye contact and do exactly as he says...You'll know what I mean," she added, seeing Jack's baffled expression.
"She's got a point there," said Throwback with a theatrical shudder, as he faced the door. And then he did the strangest thing; he tapped a servo lightly against the doorframe and drew a digit across his chest plates in a complicated gesture, as he muttered something inaudible to himself.
Immediately Zed's words came to Jack's mind: "Oh, you're gonna love him, man; he's friendly, likes to play cards, loves music...Bit superstitious, though..."
Superstitious...Was this what Zed had been talking about?
Throwback flipped a switch on a wall mounted device, and spoke into the speaker. "Flatline? It's me. We've got the package and he's waiting for a medical assist."
A green light flashed on the door panel and the doors slid open with a hydraulic hiss. As they peeled apart, a jet of cold air hit Jack with all the force of a popped champagne cork, followed by a cloud of cold vapour. It was like opening a giant freezer.
The vapour cleared away, and there, standing stock still, arms at his side and stiff as a board, was a mech. He was remarkably tall, a four wheeler, judging by the wheels that sprouted from his shoulders and ankles, had incredibly thin and gangly arms and legs, and was painted entirely in a grey-ish off-white color, with a muted, mustard yellow in places.
But the most unsettling part of him was his face.
When Jack had studied the Second World War in history class, he had become privy to the fact that Nazi scientists often performed grotesque experiments on concentration camp inmates. He'd also seen a picture of one such scientist, and now that he looked up at the mech before him, Jack couldn't help but notice the frightening resemblance.
The scalp of his helm resembled the wierd cap that surgeons wore to keep their hair in check, his faceplate, covering his mouth and entire lower face, could easily be a surgical mask, and his optics...The optics were nothing more than two circular lenses, glowing a bright cyan with no discernible pupils, and to Jack, they were goggles. The boy couldn't help it; he felt his skin crawl.
Flatline looked down at Jack, the rest of his body perfectly still, as if frozen. "Is this the package?" he asked. His voice was quiet, almost a mumble, and he spoke in a detached monotone.
"That's him," said Throwback, who had gone noticeably stiff.
"That's the package," said Throttle, her voice suddenly less airy than before. "He'll need some cleaning, and maybe a quick check up..."
Jack couldn't help but squirm a little as Flatline appraised him dispassionately with his blank goggles, his servo twiddling a tiny dial on the rim of his optics with digits that looked far too thin and skeletal for Jack's liking. Then the mech bent down and plucked Jack from the ground like a toy, the boy screaming as his stomach flipped from the sudden change in height.
Throwback reacted. "Flatline, wait-"
But anything Throwback had to say was cut off when Flatline padded the door closed right in the scout's face. Flatline and Jack were left alone in silence, the boy squirming against the surprisingly strong pencil-thin digits. The mech ignored Jack as he walked a short distance to another set of doors, padding these open and revealing sick bay.
It was much larger and much more clinical than Ratchet's med bay, all gleaming metal walls and polished surfaces. A row of berths ran along one side. Various consoles and holo-screens adorned the other, interspersed with rows of storage units and carts that held various tools and supplies. As if to solidify its position as a medical facility, the familiar antiseptic odour that Jack had come to associate with any hospital or clinic permeated throughout sick bay.
That, and it was cold. Not cold enough to be freezing, but just enough to make Jack shiver slightly and to cause his breath to condense.
Flatline approached a berth and gently lowered his servo. Feeling the spidery digits loosening, Jack squirmed out of the mech's servo and hopped down onto the padded surface. Flatline then turned to a holo and began typing.
Jack fidgeted. Something about the way the screen's glow played across Flatline's face was unsettling. "So...what're we gonna start with?" asked Jack. "Is this like a regular check up, or-"
Flatline stopped typing and walked over to one of the storage cabinets, without a sign that he had heard Jack at all. He padded one open and began rifling around inside. Having found what he was looking for, he returned to Jack's berth with a clear container filled with a luminous blue substance. The mech set this down on the berth and went back to the cabinets, leaving Jack alone.
Jack frowned, and cautiously approached the container. It was large, cylindrical, about as wide as a bath tub and as tall as two average adult humans stacked one on top of another. The luminous substance within glowed with a soft light, and this piqued Jack's curiosity enough to look for a label. A quick jog around the container revealed a label that identified the substance as 'Sanitation Gel'.
"Huh...," Jack took a step back and his eyes looked up at the open top of the container. If it was sanitary, it was safe right? Maybe he could hop up and see just what this gel-
Flatline returned, his sudden appearance startling the boy; somehow, he seemed to move without making a sound. "Stay still," he monotoned, as he activated a small device he held in his servo. A flickering beam emanated from the device and ran over Jack up and down, from head to toe. Two seconds later, the beam winked out, followed by a beep as a small holo screen was projected from the device. The cybertronian text was incomprehensible to Jack (from his angle, it was all written backwards anyway), but he could see images of his innards and skeletal structure, which slightly unnerved the boy.
Flatline quietly surveyed this data for half a minute, and then shut off the device, setting it aside. "So...," Jack asked, nervously, "Clean bill of health? Or something?"
Flatline didn't reply. In fact, Jack didn't even need a reply, because when the mech turned back to Jack, he held what looked like the largest pair of tweezers Jack had ever seen.
"Wait...What-"
The tweezer suddenly snapped down on the back of Jack's shirt, and the boy was suddenly lifted up. Jack yelped, as his feet left the ground. "Hey, wait! What are you-". Flatline's servo reached for the gel that he had set aside previously, and positioned it beneath Jack.
Realization hit Jack, and he only had a split second to draw in a lungful of air, before Flatline dunked him in the gel, tweezers and all.
Sanitation gel didn't feel so bad; it was somewhere between fluid and jelly, with the texture of something like silly putty. Unfortunately, it was also bone-freezingly cold, and the way it slipped and squished over his body and into his clothing made him want to squirm violently.
Flatline stirred Jack around the gel for approximately ten seconds, and then lifted the boy out of the gel with a wet 'schlluuuuurrrp'. Jack gasped heavily, as his lungs finally tasted air, and he almost collapsed as he was set back down to the berth. He was literally dripping in luminescent blue gel, huge wads of the substance sliding down his front and splattering to the berth. The temperature of the substance, as well as the cold of the sick bay made Jack shiver as goosebumps appeared on his skin.
"Wha-What was that for?!" squawked Jack, in between gulps of air.
Flatline, once again, ignored him as he plucked Jack off the berth and deposited him on the floor of the sick bay. "Through that door is a bathroom," said the mech, as he calmly pointed to a metal door beside a large console. "You may bathe yourself there."
"Wha-"
"Zed will have fresh clothing brought to you." And then he turned back to the holo and resumed typing, leaving Jack alone. The boy stared after Flatline for a second, before closing his mouth and sliding the door open.
After his unceremonius encounter with the gel, the shower had been most welcome. The bathroom wasn't that bad either, and Jack had only been too happy to dump his gel encrusted clothes into a waiting basket and proceed to scrub every last blob of the substance from his skin.
The warm shower also gave him time to think. So the team, so far, comprised of a somewhat superstitious scout class mech, an airy helicopter sniper femme, a highly aggressive mecha-piloting young girl of dubious nationality, an eccentric Operator with a flair for profanity, and a creepy-as-hell medic who looked a little too suspect for Jack's taste.
Yep, he was having a hell of a time here.
Jack shut off the shower and dried himself off. Slipping a towel around his waist, he drew aside the shower curtain and heard a sharp knock at the door. "Yo, Jack!" said a familiar voice from the other end, ""Yo, Jacky-boy! You in there?"
Jack quickly hopped out of the shower stall. "...Zed?" Without pause, Jack slid open the door and came face to face with the mysterious Operator himself.
His first impression was that of a very, very tall imp, about the same height as Jack, and almost as thin. His cheeks and pointed nose were peppered with freckles that bordered his bright green eyes, and the ear splitting grin he wore was missing a tooth. The most alarming part about him, however, was his hair. It was a flaming red and despite being cut short, it stuck out in every direction, like a spastic hedgehog.
Zed's grin grew a few inches. "Heh...You're skinnier than I thought you'd be..." He stuck out his hand. "You know me already, man, but still, lemme introduce myself; name's Zed, Operator. Good to see you in the flesh, man."
Jack took his hand. "Jackson Darby," he said, awkwardly, as he looked at Zed up and down. The Operator wore a utilitarian greyish blue trouser and military jacket setup, with a simple white shirt. The Autobot logo was printed on his shoulders in red, and a pair of bright orange headphones sat around his neck.
"Hey, man, I'm glad you made it out in one piece!" chirped Zed, "Survivin' in a Dead Zone and bugs? Yer awesome, man, yer awesome..."
"Uhh... Thanks?"
"Oh, yeah! I almost forgot; here's yer clothes! Just got 'em straight out o' the laundry."
"Oh, right," mumbled Jack as Zed handed him what looked like a black plastic baggie. Jack frowned as he stared at the thing; the baggie was like the sort used to store food, except greatly oversized.
Zed had probably seen Jack's expression. "It's easy man, just pull the tab an' open up the bag. Yer clothes'll be in there, I promise."
"Err, right...just give me a minute to get dressed..."
"Hey, take your time, man, take your time..."
Jack slid the door closed and frowned, as he turned the baggie over to see the words 'Autobot Unit Standard Issue: DO NOT TAMPER' printed in white, as well as a series of barcodes and strings of numbers. Grasping the bag tightly, he carefully pulled the tab and the baggie popped open.
Apparently Zed's clothing was a uniform of some sort; the outfit was identical to Zed's, down to the last detail, even the red Autobot logo on the left shoulder. The logo was what made Jack pause. Now that he had a closer look, he could see that it had been modified extensively. The eyes had become slanted in an intimidating death glare, and the lower half of the logo had been fashioned to resemble the jaws and teeth of a human skull. The words 'Rogues Gallery' were emblazoned below in red.
As the logo leered up at him, Jack wondered, for the umpteenth time that day, just what had he gotten himself involved in.
On the other hand, the clothes were nice and comfy, and Jack gladly slipped them on.
"Lookin' good," Zed said, as Jack stepped out of the bathroom, "Hell, you spend a few days here, and you just might fit in..."
"Yeah, maybe...Listen, I never thanked you for getting me out of that tight spot..."
"Hey, any time, Jacky-boy! 'Sides, it's not like I-"
"Ouch! Dammit!"
There was a commotion as the doors to sick bay suddenly slid open, and Throwback walked in hurriedly, his arm supporting another mech, with Flatline leading the duo. "Put him over there," the doctor said, with no sense of urgency at all, as he walked over to a cabinet.
"I said watch it!"
"You know, Dozer" said Throwback calmly, as he helped the newcomer sit on the berth, "This would be a whole lot easier if you didn't yell so much."
"It'll be a whole lot easier if you just shove that remark up your ass," growled the new mech as he settled down, the strangely modified Autobot logo on his shoulder catching the light. He was taller than Throwback, a little slimmer as well, with long legs. He was painted entirely in an olive green military camo, with sections of silvery chrome on his chest, thighs, arms and helm. His grey faceplate was chiseled, with small nicks and scratches, and three blade like fins, sticking vertically upwards, ran from the back of his helm to the forehead. His optics, surprisingly, shone a bright red.
"Dammit, I let my friggin' guard down!" swore Dozer, "If I hadn't, then that stupid 'Secticon wouldn't have fragged my goddamn leg! Fuckin' A!"
Said leg did, indeed, look bad. A large gash ran from the ankle joint to the kneecap, exposing the delicate components and inner framework within. Luminescent energon and ambulatory lubricant gushed out in thin rivulets and dripped to the floor.
Throwback whistled. "That does look bad," he said, sympathetically, "Let me guess...Scarab?"
"Mantis."
"Ouch."
"Yeah..."
"Wow...Somebody got ambushed," piped Zed.
Dozer looked up, and his gaze fell on Jack. He gulped, as the mech's ruby optics narrowed. "Hey, Zed...Is this the guy you were talking about?"
"Yep," grinned Zed, "That's Jacky-boy, right there!"
Dozer hefted his injured leg and gestured to the wound. "Take a gander, Jacky-boy. This is all on you."
Jack took a step back. "Uh...?"
"Don't play dumb," Dozer growled, "If it weren't for you, we wouldn't be risking our limbs in a Dead Zone. I mean, come on, even a school kid knows Dead Zones are Insecticon territory."
Jack gulped. "Uh...well, I'm sorry-"
Dozer snorted. "'Sorry' he says...Yeah right..."
"Aww, give Jack a break, Dozer," said Throwback, "He needed our help anyway, and besides, he doesn't seem so bad."
"Yeah, tell that to the fucking Mantis," grumbled Dozer, as he lay back on the berth.
Zed threw an arm on Jack's shoulder and steered him away from Dozer. "Aww, let 'im be, Jack, he'll come to his senses..."
"I don't think so," muttered Throwback, as he walked alongside the boys, "I mean, you can never really be so sure with Dozer, what with that temper of his..."
Jack swallowed; he really wasn't very popular at the moment. Deciding to change the subject, he looked around the sick bay, until something curious caught his eye; a transparent cylindrical vat placed on a low shelf, with numerous pumps and hoses snaking in and out of the assembly. Floating inside the vat, inside a pale transparent liquid were...
Jack craned his neck, squinting, and then sucked in a breath in shock. "There...There are arms inside that thing!" he exclaimed, "Those are severed arms!"
Throwback and Zed stopped in their tracks, and looked up. "Oh, those," said Throwback, "Nah, don't worry, Jack; those aren't severed arms."
Jack swallowed and looked again. Indeed, now that he was having a better look, he realized that they were not disembodied arms at all. In fact, they looked more like artificial limbs of some sort. "What are they, then?" he asked, shakily.
"Synthetic vat-grown muscle fibers and artificial nerves," deadpanned Flatline, as he passed by. "They are the Commander's personal supply. Please do not touch."
"The Commander lost th' right arm in a brawl," explained Zed, "They replaced it with a prosthetic, but it needs a supply o' muscle fibers. Y'know, fer repairs an' shit."
Jack frowned. Interesting...So this 'Commander' was a human, judging by the size of those arms...Strange; he'd always assumed this mysterious leader was a cybertronian...
"Is this the boy?"
The three of them turned in unison as yet another mech limped into Sick Bay, this time supported by a MODE.
The MODE caught Jack's attention first; he'd thought it was Boris again, but then he noticed that this MODE was a different model. It was much less bulkier and more aerodynamic, and it was painted in a light aircraft grey color with dabs of white in several places. The head was different as well; while the head on Boris' model was reminiscent of a helmeted soldier, this was more angular and smooth, with the modified Autobot logo printed on the front in white, and a green visor. Sticking up from the mecha's head was a long antenna whose function Jack could not discern.
"Throwback, I won't ask again," the mech said, blue optics narrowing, "Is this the boy?"
"That's him, Storm," said Throwback, warily.
And he had good reason to be wary; the injured mech the MODE gingerly supported didn't look very pleased. In fact, he looked majorly ticked off. He was a seeker; tall, slim, large wings flaring out from his shoulders, and he was painted mostly dark blue and white with bright daubs of orange in places. "Jack, I presume," said the seeker, as the MODE helped him onto the nearest berth. Like Throttle, he had an English accent, his voice clipped and curt. His silver faceplate was narrow, with a slightly protruding chin.
"Jackson Darby, actually," replied Jack. "But...you can still call me Jack."
"I am Stormfront, Second in Command of this unit. You are to remain in Sick Bay until my say-so."
Jack blinked. "Wha-?"
"I have just gotten off communications with my commanding officer," Stormfront carried on, as if he hadn't heard Jack at all; he seemed more concerned with the sizable wound in his side. "Once my wounds have been tended to, and I have been given clearance, I will escort you to the Commander personally."
Jack was about to protest, but then Flatline turned up to tend to Stormfront's wounds, diverting the seeker's attention. "He's...not very pleased with me...is he?" mumbled Jack.
The MODE turned its head to Jack. "Well, you did force him to fly into enemy territory," said the mecha's pilot, voice crackling through external speakers. "So yes, he is quite upset." The MODE's cockpit suddenly opened with a loud clunk, revealing the pilot.
He was another boy, looking to be the same age as Zed, with dark skin and a neatly combed mop of black hair. His face was long and thin, and a pair of glasses were perched on his nose.
Zed smiled. "Jacky-boy, meet Mordor."
Jack's brow crinkled. "Mordor-?"
"It's not Mordor," sighed the MODE's pilot; apparently this happened a lot. "Jack, ignore him. My name is Mordecai."
"Uh...Hello," greeted Jack, as he awkwardly waved. "Look, I'm really sorry for-"
Mordecai waved his hand, the MODE following suit thanks to the controls. "No need to apologize, I completely understand," he said, "If I were you, I'd probably do the same."
Jack felt a twinge of relief. At least there were a select few here who weren't upset because of him.
A heavy footstep startled him; it wasn't a violent one per se, but it was powerful enough to make him think of Bulkhead or Optimus' heavy treads. Warily, he looked to the doorway. The doors hissed open, allowing Throttle entrance. She was carrying a small crate under her arm, and she was in conversation with another person, her helm turned back and upwards so she could properly look at-
Jack's eyes went wide in shock. Closely following Throttle through the doorway, her pedes making the very ground shake with her every step, was the largest femme Jack had ever laid eyes on...
No, 'large' was an understatement. She was enormous; she looked big enough to pick up Arcee and comfortably seat her on her shoulders. The twin cannon barrels that protruded from her back barely touched the top of the doorframe, and she held a pair of huge crates under both her thick arms; Throttle's own small pallet looked laughable compared to the immense load the ginormous femme was carrying.
"But sis, I could have helped!" said the femme. Surprisingly, she sounded very young, a trait that belied her immense size.
"That's true," said Throttle, evenly, "But you know what Stormfront and the Commander said. You're still inexperienced for this sort of thing...Hello, boys!"
"Are those the meds Flatline's been looking for?" asked Mordecai, "Better get them to him; Dozer's looking bad."
"Will do!" chirped Throttle, "Oh, and by the way, Jack, I'd like you to meet my little sister..." She gestured up to the massive femme, making Jack's jaw drop.
"Little sister?" he asked in a weak voice; he was still trying to wrap his head around the notion of an Optimus-sized femme.
"Jack, meet Payload," said Throwback, "Payload, meet Jack."
Jack took an involuntary step back, as the femme's optics focused on him. She set the two crates down to the floor with heavy thuds and knelt down for a closer look.
Payload's vehicle mode was obvious. The caterpillar treads on her shins and shoulders, the enormous cannon barrels, weathered desert camo paintjob; she transformed into a tank, and a very heavy one at that. That, and she was surprisingly good looking for a massive femme; she was bulky, but the armor didn't compromise the natural curvature of her frame all that much. Like her sister, her optics were a brilliant green.
"So is this the guy?" she asked, tiliting her head to one side. "Looks like a toothpick to me..."
"You say that to everyone," mumbled Mordecai. "I'm going to go dock my MODE, I'll be right back." And with a twist of the controls, he was off.
Payload shrugged. "Whatever...Way I see it, Jack could get torn to pieces...I just hope the Commander's merciful; looked real mad when I passed by..."
"Wait," said Throwback, "Are you saying the Commander's back in base? Back in base and pissed?!"
"Yep. Just docked the Krieger at the MODE station and headed straight for the Command Center."
"Oh, boy," groaned Zed, his chirpy attitude gone in an instant.
Jack swallowed. "So the Commander's angry..," he said, "And this is obviously a bad thing, because...?"
"You don't want to face the full force of the Commander's wrath head-on," said Throwback, ruefully. "A lot of Decepticons have been on the receiving end of it, and...well, they never really survived long enough to tell anyone..."
A shadow fell over Jack. Startled, he looked up to see Stormfront standing over him. The Seeker's optics were still narrowed as he spoke, "My repairs are done...If there are no other complications, then we shall meet the Commander personally."
Jack swallowed. "No...none at all..."
"Good," said the second in command. He knelt down, his wings hitching upwards, and he proffered his palm.
Jack quickly hopped onto it without hesitation, and the Seeker slowly stood up. With not so much as a glance towards the others, he strode out of sick bay, the doors sliding shut behind them both.
Jack tried not to feel to uncomfortable, as Stormfront carried the boy down a series of corridors. So far, they had not exchanged a single word between them; Stormfront looked a little too moody and didn't seem like he was interested in much conversation anyway.
Twice, Jack had tried to initiate a dialogue, only to change his mind at the last minute; when a mech like Stormfront looked straight ahead with such an expression of moderate irritation, you tended to forgo any sort of conversation.
In any case, the point was moot; Stormfront had already reached a set of large double doors marked 'Command Center'. Without hesitation, he quickly keyed in an override. The door pad flashed green and the doors swished open smoothly to reveal the room's contents.
The room was large and circular, with walls reinforced by steel-gray industrial plating, and the lighting was provided by the soft glow of fluorescent tubes inset into the domed ceiling at regular intervals. Other than that, it all felt like a rehash of Omega One's interior; gangways, catwalks and platforms filled with consoles and screens wrapped the walls, obviously for human use. Some of these platforms were even suspended high above Stormfront's helm, though what they held, Jack could not say.
Dominating a huge arc of the room was the largest vidscreen Jack had ever seen. It stretched wide, hugging the curve of the command center, and looked to be as big as a cinema screen, if not bigger, easily dwarfing the smaller screens that dotted the chamber. It glowed a bright blue, easily illuminating the chamber better than the flourescents above, and it displayed various windows filled with charts and readings.
Stretching right across the room, a few meters away and directly in front of this monstrous screen, was a narrow rectangular platform on which an array of smaller consoles and desktop monitors were stationed.
Their combined glow, coupled with the massive main screen, framed a lone figure standing directly in the center of the platform. Whatever features Jack could make out of the person were obscured by the glare of the screens. That, and they were facing the massive screen, their back to Jack, thus rendering it impossible to make out anything else...
Stormfront halted. "Commander."
"Stormfront..."
The voice was feminine; surprising, because Jack certainly hadn't been expecting the Commander to be a woman. But her voice was rough, almost like she was growling, and there was a deep tone to it. She gestured to a space with a flick of her hand, not bothering to face them. "You have him, don't you? Put him over here..."
Stormfront obliged. His palm lowered to the platform, and Jack tentatively stepped down, his shoes meeting the metal floor.
"Were you injured, Stormfront?" asked the Commander.
"Yes," said the Seeker, "But Flatline gave me adequate treatment; I'll manage."
The Commander simply nodded. Now that Jack was directly behind her, he could make out an unmistakeable smoky scent; the smell of cigarettes. She wore an old-fashioned greatcoat, the sort you'd expect to see officers wearing at around World War Two or something, and her hair was tied back in a loose tail. Judging by the way the coat hung off her body the way it did, he deduced that she was quite thin, albiet somewhat athletic.
There was a slight rustle as the Commander raised a metal flask, the scent of alcohol catching Jack's nose just before she took a long hard swig. As she did so, Jack got a view of her arm, and he felt his stomach turn slightly.
Yes, he knew the Commander had a prosthetic; he just hadn't realized how unnerving it would be. It was somewhat thin, the fingers almost like those of a skeleton, and the whole thing looked like it was made of a hybrid of rubber and grey-ish silver; almost like some horrible travesty of metal and living tissue. It looked so...so antiseptic, unfeeling and clinical, that Jack couldn't help but feel a little put off.
The Commander pulled the flask away, capping it with a single motion. "Now," she said, "As I'm sure you're aware, I'm not very happy right now. In fact, I'm pissed, but I'll try to control myself. The reason? Well, let's see. You contact my recruits, completely by chance, and request for help."
Jack opened his mouth to speak, but the Commander raised her prosthetic arm, silencing him. "Now don't get me wrong. Anyone would ask for help in your situation. The only problem is that you made the call deep in enemy territory, meaning that the signal could have been traced and that our location would have been compromised. That, and you put my soldiers in grave danger, especially both of my best MODE pilots. In addition, two of my men were injured, and had they spent a second longer in the Dead Zone, they would have been fatally wounded.
"Bottom line is, you've gotten two of my soldiers hurt and put two MODE pilots in danger when they should have been in battle practice. I'm not going to blame you for all that. They will. What I am going of blame you for, however, is for being a complete waste of time and resources. In other words, our rescuing you better be worth all the goddamn trouble."
Jack swallowed. The Commander must have sensed his anxiety, because she carried on speaking. "Are we understood? Good. Now, let's start with you. What's your name?"
Jack took a deep breath. "My name's Darby...Jackson Darby...But my friends call me Jack..."
The flask hit the floor with a sharp clang that echoed throughout the Command Center. Even Stormfront was startled; the Seeker drew back sharply, wings twitching, optics wide."Commander?!" he asked, concern evident in his voice, "Are you alright?!"
But the Commander was too preoccupied to listen to him. She stared at Jack, with such a look of incredulity, it was almost frightening. "Is...is that...Is it really...?," she rasped, voice hoarse, "You...You haven't even...What?"
Even Jack was flabbergasted. He stared right back at the Commander with a look of slack-jawed incomprehension. The eyes arrested him first. The left was a familiar light brown eye, almost the color of champagne or honey. But the right was a different story. It was identical to the other, right down to the color but it was lifeless, with a metallic or plastic sheen to it; obviously another prosthetic. The face was still familiar, with the same unmistakeable skin tone, but it was now narrower, the chin much more pointed. The most drastic difference was the hair; it was a solid sheet of black.
"Dear God...," whispered Jack, eyes wide in abject shock, "No, this...My God...Miko...Is it really you?..."