Wow. 84 chapters and going. Only 16 to go until I get to my long wished goal and I end this story. I'm gonna have a hard time saying goodbye here. (But I'm unsure whether the story will end right on the 100th chapter, but somewhere around there.) But let's leave goodbyes for last. Goodbye is only when the end is definite. And on the 84th chapter, it's not.
So now, let's continue this story like we intended, shall we?
"They're… they're all alive." Nicole gasped, failing to hide her large grin. "Sam's alive!" She hugged me suddenly.
I only smiled. I couldn't grin, for smiling was the most I could do, considering only moments ago I had brought up Ironhide's name… It seemed to pain, haunt and keep me moving forward at the same time.
But I moved that to the back of my mind. What mattered now was that we had contact with Epps, Sam and Carly.
"Alright turn the volume up on that!" Will ordered, pointing to the screen. A soldier at the audio commands obeyed his order immediately.
"Can you rotate? Do something!" Epps yelled as his face was brought up on the screen.
A soldier at the UAV commands moved the joystick around, causing the camera on the screen to move up and down.
"Yes, yes! Okay, okay, okay they can see us!" Epps hurriedly said, moving aside so that Sam could talk. I have never been happier in my life to see Sam at that moment.
"Chicago is ground zero, do you understand? You hear us? Do you understand?"
Mearing gasped from her seat when she heard his voice. "Witwicky…" Neither could she believe he was transmitting information, right here, right now.
"Please listen, Sentinel Prime is here and he has the pillars for his spacebridge. They're on top of the building on Chicago river." Carly stepped in, her golden hair being thrown around her face by the wind.
"Give me their exact position." Will ordered to another soldier. The room was packed with them.
"Now the pillar that controls everything is in the southeast cupola." She finished and moved so that Sam could be in the center of the camera.
"You gotta destroy the pillar. You have to shoot the pillar or they're going to transport Cybertron here, do you understand? Do you understand?"
What? Cybertron… in Earth's atmosphere?
"What? What?" Mearing resounded, utterly confused.
"Where's the GPS on the building and on the drone?" Will yelled, demanding information.
"Screen, sir." The soldier replied as he transmitted a 3D view of Chicago and the exact location of the building where the pillars were being used on. The second screen also had a 3D image of the location of where the drone was.
"Alright." His fist pounded on the desk as he moved away, walking towards me and Nicole. "I want you two to stay here. You're safe here."
"I want to help." Nicole said.
"You're not going anywhere."
"I can help you!" she raised her voice.
"You've done all that you could!" He gave her a sharp look.
She was outraged. "I didn't do anything!"
While my uncle was loading his weapons and taking the bullets from a cabinet, he spoke to her. "So Egypt doesn't count?"
"Of course it counts, but just as I helped you then, I can help you now!"
He finished loading his weapons and with a heavy sigh, he gave her a stern look. "I can't risk your life. Besides, do you want to leave Mel here alone?" he played the card. He wanted to give her a question she couldn't say no to.
"Why are you doing this?" She asked, glaring at him lightly.
"It's my job as a Major to keep you safe. As my job as an uncle, it's my job that when I can't protect Mel, I have to have someone I can trust, be around her. You're the only one here." He said, putting his hands on her shoulders. "It's going to be alright. We'll get Sam back." He said and turned to me. I hugged him. "And you… please be safe and don't go roaming around. Stay here with the soldiers, Simmons and Mearing. Nicole will take care of you." He said, giving me a kiss on the cheek.
"Please… take care and come back." I pleaded. He smiled and gave me another hug.
"I always do." He said as I caught a sad look in his eyes. It vanished as soon as it had appeared, but he had to go. He had to go save Chicago. To save America.
To save the world.
I couldn't face the fact that I could quite possibly lose him, too. The Autobots… Ironhide… Will.
No.
I shook my head, denying my horrible thoughts.
They won't die. I can't let that happen.
I closed my eyes shut, quite tightly, forcing the thoughts out of my head.
"You okay, Mel?" I heard Sarah's voice. I opened my eyes and looked up. She was right in front of me holding Annabelle's hand with her other one. I didn't know she was in here.
Had she seen what had happened with the Autobots?
"Where were you two?" I asked her.
"In the other room, I don't even know what it was for." She shrugged. "Perhaps another weapons room."
At least they were safe in here, with all of us. I sighed and nodded in response.
Dead silence fell after that. Nobody knew what to do or whom to turn to. There was just this fear factor, hanging in the atmosphere, not letting anyone drop their guards. We all could die at any moment.
And there was this constant sadness within me. Sadness followed by emptiness and despair.
The occasional tapping on the keyboard could be heard, but that was it. Everyone went off to the other, unexplored rooms of the base and talked to each other, trying to find a way to save everyone and get rid of the Decepticons.
But there was very little we could do. The Cybertronians were tyrannous beings, Decepticons in general. They would do anything to enslave us all, to make us work for them, in ways we couldn't imagine. They took over our satellites, which I thought was Soundwave's doing. Ironhide told me about him.
And there it is again. Ironhide.
I was jerked from my thoughts as I felt a cold drop of water on my hand. I opened my eyes, only to find them stinging and burning, filled with tears.
I didn't want to be seen like this, but with nowhere else to go, I buried my head in to my hands and tried to stop sobbing. Everything I did reminded me of him.
Why did everything have to be so painful?
And just as I was thinking about how the world was cruel and not worth living on anymore, I remembered Sam. Sam and his girlfriend Carly, along with Epps.
I brought my head up and wiped my eyes. I had to find Nicole. Perhaps she knew where and why were all of them in the middle of a warzone, and not here with us.
She was just on the other side of the room, so I didn't have to look far. I got up and walked towards her. She was sitting with her head in her hands and huffing air out loudly. I didn't know how both of us were still strong, but I think it was more because we had to. For everyone else, if not for ourselves.
"Nicole?" I crouched down to her. She looked at me, putting her hands down. I put my hand on her knee. "Do you know why Sam and Epps aren't here?"
She shook her head. "I… I just…" she tried to say something, but it seemed that the words were out of her reach. "I don't…" she sighed and shook her head. Then she looked at me. Her lips started to tremble as her arms went around me in a hug. "Sorry..." She said, crying on my shoulder.
I nodded and whispered to her promises that I couldn't keep. Promises of the Autobots being in a better place now and that everything was going to be alright. That she shouldn't worry and that we would find everyone safe and alive. But I knew that those were just empty promises.
I hugged her back as we were both sitting on the floor. An occasional soldier would pass by, but we could only hear their footsteps, nothing more.
"They're alive, Nic, they're alive… They'll get out of this safely." I whispered as I held her. "Sam's been in Egypt, if he can survive that, he can survive anything."
She nodded and cried. "But Bee…"
A pang of pain hit my heart, right in the center. I could almost feel my heart cracking and falling apart, slowly, into an abyss of nothingness. Because that day, Nicole and I both lost the ones we cared about most. And it was just so hard to think about them.
"He's in a better place." I sniffed, knowing I would start to cry as well. She and I were just sitting there, hugging and crying together. "We'll get through this." I whispered.
And just as I had said that, the big TV screen was brought to life. How, I didn't know, but as it did, it transmitted some ATM video footage. Another series of screens were turned on, as Nicole and heard footsteps approaching. The other screens were showing footage from the traffic lights. And what they displayed was utter horror to our eyes.
Nicole and I got up slowly, as the brightness of the screen lighted our faces as we watched the footage with our mouths hanging agape. We held onto one another as we stood straight, taking a shaky step forwards.
Chicago was destroyed. It was burning in flames. It was worse than it was mere hours ago. Buildings were torn in half, people were dead on the streets, the buses were smelt on the inside…
Hell had broken loose and it was about to get worse.
Decepticon ships surrounded the buildings and flew across the skies. Whenever there was a person on the street, alive and trying to escape, the ship would fly down to exterminate it, shooting from its cannon and vaporizing the human.
My hand flew to my mouth, my eyes wide the size of saucers. I couldn't believe the tyranny and ruthlessness I was seeing. I knew it was going to happen, but to see it really happening...
And to think Sam was in there. In this mess.
The TV screens sent video footage, transmitted through the UAV drones, and it showed us live footage of many military planes, flying across Chicago. They were trying to get to the other side of Chicago, to save the city.
But as all of us watched the video, Starscream showed up and started to cut the planes in half, punching and kicking them so they could fall to the ground.
He wiped out more than half of the planes and it was clear that his mission was to kill everyone on those planes.
Will was in one of those planes.
I felt instant fear travel through my body, sending unpleasant chills up and down my spine and goosebumps on my arms and legs. It was a horrible feeling. A feeling I once knew and now recognized again.
I didn't know if Will would come back alive.
And just as I saw soldiers jumping out of the planes, trying to save themselves, Starscream sent a rocket towards us, that is, the drone that was transmitting the video, and extinguished it. I didn't get my answer. I didn't know if Will was alright!
Panic took over me as I started to breathe unevenly as I felt all the air from my lungs vanish.
Nicole immediately took me to the other room and placed me to sit on a couch. "Calm down, calm down, it's okay." She soothed, crouching in front of me, holding my hand. "It's alright."
I kept shaking, my vision blurring from the lack of breath. "Will…Will…" I found myself muttering. I couldn't lose Will!
"He's alright, breathe slowly, please…" she said, showing me how to breathe. "He's alright, I saw him escape."
A few minutes later, as my breathing evened out, I looked at her. "Really?"
"Yes." She said, looking at me in the eyes. "I saw him get out safely."
"Did he have a parachute? Did you see a parachute on his back?"
"Yeah." She calmed me, putting her hands on my shoulders. "He's alright."
"But the Decepticons-"
"Don't worry, Will hid behind some buildings when he came to the ground."
"How could you know this?"
"I saw it."
"But the video-!" She couldn't have seen him come down safely, the video was cut off too soon.
"I saw it, Mel, he's alright." She shushed me. "It's alright."
I didn't want to be in this hell anymore. I wanted to get away. I wanted it to stop, so badly. But it didn't and I don't think it ever would.
I buried my head into my hands. If only all of this could stop. It was so much easier to believe, despite my brain's protests, that Will was alive and that he wasn't crushed.
"I don't want this anymore…" I mumbled into my hands, depression taking over. "I don't want to…"
But Nicole was silent. I expected supporting and comforting words of some sort, but no such thing happened. I guess she was at a loss of words as I was unwilling to live anymore. I didn't want to live.
I had nothing to live for anyway.
"You're… sparked?" Sunstreaker's voice echoed in my head. I began to cry at the thought of him gone forever. "No, don't cry. This is a blessing, Melissa."
The words replayed in my mind as the tears dripped through the seams between my fingers, creating puddles on the floor. The words would just replay and I could see all of the Autobots so clearly in my thoughts.
I could see Ironhide. His real form standing behind his holoform, facing me.
My eyes shut themselves from the burning sensation, my heart beating loudly and chest closing in and barely giving me the air I needed to breathe.
My chin trembled without stopping. I didn't want any of this. I didn't want to be a part of this.
I wanted it all to end. I wanted it to end so desperately. Because I knew people would die and I didn't want them to feel the same, horrible feeling of missing someone, but knowing they will never come back.
My hands drifted to my stomach protectively, as my brain drew out a memory of Optimus saying his last words of wisdom to me.
"…keep Ironhide's name and his legacy going… Know this, Melissa, you are never alone. He is always with you…" Optimus's voice resounded in my head, echoing as if he had said it from a very long distance and the sound had yet to come to my ears. But it never did. It was all in my head.
My hands once more drifted to my stomach as I lightly ran circles over it.
Only Will, Sarah, Nicole and Sam knew Ironhide was gone.
But then it hit me like a wrecking ball to a wall, as I raised my head up with my mouth hanging agape, staring into nothingness.
How was I going to tell the others?
Cutting it a bit short here, guys. Inspiration lack is the excuse. :/
So how've you been liking this so far? I know y'all hate me a lot, but it's for a good reason!
Reviews have been cutting down a little. :/ Makes me sad and doesn't inspire me as much to update faster, because through reviews I see who is following and who is eager to read it. Of course, all of you want to read more, but only a select few will ever comment on my work, and I need the feedback to enhance the future chapters. Just sayin'. So I hope you guys put in a little more reviews this time or the next, okay?
Well then, until next time! :)