Chapter 10
Turn It Off
"The tragedy it seems is unending, I'm watching everyone I looked up to breaking, bending, we're taking shortcuts and false solutions just to come out the hero"
The ride to D.C. was silent, tense. Simmons had opted to ride with the twins following behind them, brave, stupid soul that he was. It seemed that Gabriel and he had some unresolved problems that neither wanted to talk about. Sam barely even noticed, he was so out of it. He couldn't focus at all. He hadn't really hadn't been able to do that in a while, not since Mission City, but now it was just getting worse. He wondered if he could be diagnosed with ADHD after this.
Of course, he knew why this was happening. He anchored himself to the mortal plane, the place for the living. The All Spark, on the other hand, was cutting his ties. It was anchored to the Crossroads, the place where the living go to die where the mind inside the All Spark had ruled. Ally. He would call it Ally for now- if he lived through this- because it needed a name, even if the presence wasn't exactly female. It wasn't male either, not how humans define it. The presence was just there, guide, parent, protector.
And he couldn't focus on that because Simmons didn't know the meaning of shut up.
They pulled up at the Smithsonian near closing time, Simmons finally babbling about something relevant. "Smithsonian Air and Space Museum. Land of dreams in there. All I ever wanted to be was an astronaut," though, oddly enough, he was stripping while he spoke, telling Sam to hold his pants.
Gabriel cocked his head at Simmons's interesting choice of underwear and when he said as much, all he got was a snappish, "What? I wear them when I'm in a funk." He quickly slipped on another pair of pants from his duffle bag and turned to them, digging through his pockets for a bottle of pills. "Okay. Watches synchronized, sharp mind and empty bladder. You get caught, demand an attorney and don't ever say my name. Okay, take one of these pills. Slip it under your tongue. It's the high-concentrate polymer they put in Oreo cookies. Tricks the polygraph every time. Okay. Now, let's get this show on the road."
"You sure you should be tellin' this stuff to delinquents like me and the lovely lady?" Gabe said while slinging an arm around Mikaela, which she promptly elbowed him for.
"My girl, man. Not cool," Sam said.
Leo was steadily panicking, "No, listen, I can't do this. I'm not some alien bounty hunter, guys. I'm not gonna do this. Guards have guns. I don't want to die."
"No shit, Leo. The real deal involves death. The real deal is when people die after they get shot at with the big alien guns that you like to post on your website." Gabriel was getting sick of the other boy and his constant freak outs by now.
Sam grimaced at Gabe. He remembered when he was where Leo was and he'd have loved a little more time to freak out. "Hey man, you don't have to be so hard on him."
Gabe just raised a blond brow and nodded to Simmons shoving Leo into Skids. "It's better than that, ain't it?"
"Kid, kid, kid, you compromise this mission, you are dead to me. Now look me in my eyes and tighten that sphincter."
0o0
"Can't believe we're doing this," Mikaela whispered.
"I think we all done worse," Gabe whispered back. They and Sam were hiding under a plane away from the patrolling guards while Simmons and Leo did their work.
"But I haven't done anything this idiotic in a while," Sam said.
"What about last month when you and Bee-"
"We don't need to talk about that anymore, Mikaela."
"And now I'm curious. What happened last month, Sam?" Gabe turned to Sam and made like he was getting comfortable for the story.
Simmons yelling for them cut off what was sure to be an interesting denial from Sam, judging by the shade of red he turned. They slid out from under the plane and went to digging for the things they would need. Simmons took an old S7 tracker, Sam took the Cube splinter and Mikaela let out Wheelie. Gabe took the duffle and followed the little RC monster truck and Leo went with Simmons.
Wheelie sped up suddenly, driving like he knew where to go and Gabe ran after him, passing Sam and Mikaela. "Guys," he said, "follow him. He knows something!"
He led them to a SR-71 Blackbird near the hanger doors. Simmons ran up with his tracker pointing straight at the stealth jet. "You got what I got? The Blackbird?" Sam nodded and Wheelie directed them all to back up.
"Oh, there he is. This guy is a legend, like-like chairman of the board. Yo freshman, point the shard and watch the magic happen." Sam was reluctant, palms sweaty as he edged towards the jet and held up the tweezers he was using to make sure he didn't touch the Cube again. He nearly screamed when it flew from his grasp, straight to the spark chamber of the sleeping titan. Instead, he just backed up very quickly as it transformed, squeaking out, "Oh shit. Big ass Decpticon."
"Aren't they all?" Simmons asked because he had only ever seen the giants.
"Wheelie isn't," Mikaela said.
"He's a scrap drone!" Sam said as he bumped into them.
"I resent that!" Wheelie said.
The Decepticon Seeker finished transforming, his huge black frame hunched and leaning on a battle-ax for support. He growled at the museum, his low voice and old British accent ringing out, "What sort of hideous mausoleum is this? Answer me and show yourselves or suffer my infinite wrath! You little spinal-cord-based organisms! Behold the eternal glory of Jetfire! Prepare for remote systems override!"
"I tell you, this guy did not age well." They couldn't help but agree with Wheelie.
"I command these doors to open! Fire! I said fire!" he yelled at the apparently stubborn hanger doors before simply slamming the blunt end of his ax into them. The others followed, trying to calm the old mech down but Sam stopped to stare at the All Spark shard on the ground and something told him that not touching it wouldn't work this time. He crouched beside it, not even bothering with the tweezers as he picked it up. All he got from it was calming warmth before Mikaela called to him and he closed his fist around it.
When he uncurled his first minutes later in shock at Jetfire, he didn't notice the lack of shard in them or the new tattoos burning into his hand. "Look, we just want to talk!" he yelled up.
"I've got no time to talk; I'm a mercenary doom bringer!" Jetfire stopped in his rant and looked down at them, squinting slightly before asking, "What planet am I on?"
"Earth. Sol 3," he added, remembering what the bots called their solar system.
"Earth? Terrible name for a planet. Might as well call it dirt. Planet dirt. Tell me, is that robot civil war still going on? Who's winning?"
Robot civil war? But Jetfire shouldn't know about the War, he'd been in stasis for so long and away from Cybertron longer. Actually, none of the math was working for him. The dates on earth and Cybertron just weren't adding up but Sam answered anyway. "The Decepticons."
"Well, I changed sides to the Autobots."
And still hadn't taken their mark, apparently. Sam looked up, shading his eyes as the Seeker sat down and leaned against another plane. "What do you mean, you changed sides?" he said.
"It's a choice. It's an intensely personal decision. So much negativity. Who wants to live a life filled with hate?"
"You mean you don't have to work for those miserable freaking Decepticons?" It was almost comical how Wheelie had to yell to get the lager mech to hear him.
"If the Decepticons had their way, they'd destroy the entire universe," he said with disdain in his voice. He really didn't seem to like his former faction and, if you ignored the fact that the ancient mech shouldn't know about them, he was perfectly correct in his assessment.
The little monster truck immediately grabbed Mikaela's leg saying, "I'm changing sides. I'm changing sides too, warrior goddess. Who's your little Autobot?" And then he proceeded to-
"Aw, you're cute," Mikaela said in the same way you'd talk to a stupid person who just didn't get the picture.
"Name's Wheelie. Yeah. Say my name, say my name."
"What are you allowing to happen to your foot right now?" because Sam was pretty sure the scrap drone was humping her leg. Which was beyond weird. And creepy. Little perverted, too.
"At least he's faithful, Sam," she said and yeah, she's definitely still pissed about yesterday.
"Well, he's faithful and he's nude and he's perverted. Can you just... Can you just stop"" Sam was maybe slightly green watching Wheelie.
Gabe reached down and picked the mech off Mikaela's foot, holding up by the back of his neck. "Now why do that to a lady in public? Especially to a warrior goddess?" Oh, he could already tell that he was gonna have fun with that nickname too.
"It's just something to think about, I'm not... What were you saying?" Sam said in an effort to redirect the conversation somewhere useful. Or at least somewhere that made sense.
"I have issues of my own and it started with my mother! My ancestors have been here for centuries. My father, why, he was the wheel, the first wheel. Do you know what he turned into?"
The humans just stared for a moment before Simmons hazarded a "No."
"Nothing! But he did so with honor! Dignity, dammit!" As he spoke, he stood again and tried to fire up his booster and flight checks. All that happened was a parachute ejecting from his back, dragging him down to the ground. He plopped down heavily, complaining about his fried boosters and rusty parts.
"I think we can help each other," Sam said, not entirely convinced that this rust bucket of a mech was useless.""You know things I don't know. I know things you don't. I do." With that, he backed up to Gabe and grabbed the duffle bag, riffling through it.
"I don't think he knows anything. Honestly, I don't." Leo said and Sam just grinned at his roommate.
When he found nothing sharp and sturdy enough for the job he had in mind, he stood and turned to Bee and the twins, raising an eyebrow at them. When his guardian's blond holo manifested in front of him, he poked it to see if it was solid. "Think you can make a solid dagger for me to use?" he asked. Immediately, it appeared in the other boy's hand and he held it out for Sam, hilt out and the blade against his forearm. Like a well-trained swordsman.
Sam grabbed it and pulled an about face, kneeling in the sand and carving the symbols he had been itching to draw. It was a shorter string this time, a single story instead of a whole history. He carved it out in a large, double lined circle, muttering what he was writing in Cybertronian as he went. This time it was smooth and flowing in that same ringing bells language none of the others understood. Only Bumblebee's holoform remained in the circle with him, a hand on his shoulder, though he disappeared along with the dagger as soon as Sam was done. He looked up at the stunned ancient Seeker saying, "I could do this all day. It comes in waves, these vivid symbols. They're symbols, but they're in my mind. You see, all this is in my mind and Megatron wants what's in my mind. Him and someone called the Fallen."
Jetfire started at the designation, his red optics dulling and then snapping back into focus. "The Fallen?" he asked gruffly. "I know him. He left me here to rust. The original Decepticon. He's terrible to work for. It's always apocalypse, chaos, crisis. These transcriptions, they were part of my mission, the Fallen's search- I remember now, for the Dagger's Tip and- and the key."
"Wait, slow down," this was sounding too familiar for the episodic old timer to just be crazy. He knew he was right about the mech's knowledge then. "The Dagger's Tip? The key? What are you talking about?"
"No time to explain," Jetfire said. Suddenly he looked almost scared and more than a little hurried as he put his servos around them- they had grouped together unconsciously around Sam and his carvings, plus the mech was so huge- and the sound of long unused engines could be heard whining within his chassis. "Hold on everybody! Stay still or you'll die!" And with that lovely exclamation, they were launched into a swirling vortex with only Jetfire to hang onto.
0o0
The sun was bright here and the sand Gabe landed in was burning hot. The air was dry and smelled of old stone, the silence broken by the screams and groans of his fellow beings falling from the sky.
Just a normal Thursday.
Not.
Actually, he wasn't sure it was Thursday here, because he had a feeling that they were far away from home in the US.
"That wasn't so bad. At least we're still on the right planet," from his left and above him. The huge Decepticon turned Autobot Jetfire.
"Oh my god. Where are we?" the same annoying voice he had known since childhood again on his left and slightly below him. Simmons.
"You guys okay?" a shout far off on his right on another dune, most likely. Sam.
"Yeah," her voice was muffled, coming from the dip between the two dunes they seemed to be spread out on. Mikaela.
"Hey, I think we're in Vegas!" that excited voice and dumb idea came from the same place as Mikaela's had. Leo.
When Simmons started ranting at Jetfire like the mech cared, Gabriel opened his eyes and was pleased to see that he was right in his guesses. His father's paranoid training paid off.
"-I told you I was opening a space bridge. It's the fastest way to travel to Egypt."
"When did you... When did you tell us? You didn't tell us anything. You didn't tell us anything. Why are we in Egypt?!" Sam's voice was reaching dangerous pitches and cracking in his frustration.
"Don't you get snippy with me, fleshling! You were duly informed!" The ex-Con snapped back like a father yelling at a petulant child.
Sam took a deep breath, asking his All Spark addled mind for peace again and it slowed to manageable rates, pushing the analysis of the space bridge down for later contemplation. "Can you just stop for a second? Can you focus? Can you tell us why we're in Egypt so we can have a little bit of semblance of peace of mind?"
Jetfire again sat down before speaking, seemingly looking for the right words. "This planet was visited by our race once before, by our earliest ancestors, a millennium ago. They were on an exploratory mission to harvest energon, the lifeblood of our race. Without it, we'll all perish, oxidize and rust, like my wretched self! Do you have any idea what it's like to slowly fall apart and die?"
Simmons made a rude noise and started pacing impatiently. "Let's not get episodic, okay old-timer? Beginning. Middle. End. Facts. Details. Condense. Plot. Tell it."
The mech settled down, hefting his battle axe turned cane into his lap to look it over. He didn't seem to want to speak if this part of his past. "Somewhere buried in this desert, our ancestors built a great machine. It harvests energon... by destroying suns." His voice was quiet at the end, like it was a secret not meant to be told. And maybe it was.
'Destroy suns?" Sam's heart seemed to stop at the thought as the presence in his mind tried to soothe him and the raw knowledge provided him with reasons, documentations, even pictures of it. Still, all Sam could think was, my planet.
"You mean blow them up?" callous moron that Leo seemed to be inclined to be.
"Yes. You see, in the beginning, there were thirteen Primes, our original leaders. And they set out into the universe, seeking distant suns to harvest. The Primes set out with one rule: never destroy a planet with life. Until one of them tried to defy this rule. And his name forevermore was... the Fallen. He despised the human race and he wanted to kill you all by turning on that machine. The only way to activate it is with a legendary key called the Matrix of Leadership. A great battle took place over possession of the Matrix. The Fallen was stronger than his brothers, so they had no choice but to steal and hide it from him. In the ultimate sacrifice, they gave their lives to seal the Matrix away in a tomb made of their very own bodies, a tomb we cannot find. Somewhere, buried in this desert, that deadly machine remains. The Fallen knows where it is and if he finds the tomb of the Primes, your world will be no more."
They were all quiet, trying to absorb all the information from a suddenly serious Jetfire. Mikaela was the first to come up with a valid, coherent question. "Okay, so how do we stop him?"
Jetfire seemed so saddened suddenly. "Only a Prime can defeat the Fallen."
"Optimus Prime?" because Sam had a very bad sinking feeling.
Jetfire leaned downward, shifting onto his knees in the sand, optics bright and excited, "So, you've met a Prime? Why, you must have met a great descendant. Is he alive, here on this planet?"
"He sacrificed himself to save me," it was a quiet, shameful admission. Sam knew that Optimus had died in vain. He knew that he was useless.
Those bright optics dulled again and his massive shoulders slumped. "So, he's dead. Without a Prime, it's impossible. No one else could stop the Fallen."
And his sinking feeling was proved correct. But maybe it wasn't all for nothing, his mind whispered. Maybe you can still save the world and make up for your mistakes. "So," he said, speaking to Jetfire and just thinking aloud, "the same energy that's gonna be used to reactivate the machine... could that energy somehow be used to reactivate Optimus and bring him back to life?"
"It was never designed for that purpose, but it's an energy like no other." The thoughtful look at the suggestion and the awe in his voice as he spoke of the artifact said it all. The Matrix could do it. The question was, would it?
"So then how do you get us to the Matrix before the Decepticons get to me?" The next valid question that needed to be asked.
"Follow your mind, your map, your symbols. What you carved in the sand, it's your clue. When dawn alights the Dagger's Tip, Three Kings will reveal the doorway! Find the doorway! Go now! Go!" Jetfire translated the Old Cybertronian for all of them. He knew the boy Prime wouldn't be able to past his instinctive understanding of it. He also knew that he was far too old to continue his search. And from what the fleshlings had told him, Megatron was on this planet and that meant that Starscream was lurking somewhere nearby. If he could only talk to his old friend-
No, now he had to help the boy Prime that smelled of All Spark. He could not think of old wounds.
Simmons nodded to himself, turning on his heel and heading for the bots, the rest following him. "Okay, we'll all go."
"That was my mission," the Seeker muttered behind them. "It's your mission now. Go before the Decepticons find me and find you."
No one looked up to see the old Blackbird make an almost vertical liftoff as they loaded into the cars.
The humans and Autobots had a mission to complete and a world to save.
Jetfire had a friend and brother to find.
0o0
Mikaela crouched on the stone roof of someone's home, mostly hidden behind the raised stone along the edge. Her blue eyes surveyed the alley they were hiding in and the street beyond, watching for cops. She adjusted the makeshift hijab to wrap more completely around her face. She had been surprised to find that the gauzy black material actually helped cool her in the desert heat when she put it on before entering the village. Women were expected to have their heads covered here and she took advantage of the chance to cover up more from cameras. They were few and far between in a place like this but it never hurt to be cautious.
A few rocks skittered down the edge of the wall behind her. She turned to Bee in time to see him catch hold of the green twin- Skids?- before he fell completely. He gently pushed the smaller mech further back onto the roof so that he wouldn't fall again and Mikaela smiled. Bee would make a great big brother.
Gabriel and Sam sat against the wall directly below her, talking quietly while Gabe set Sam's hand as best he could. Apparently, Sam had sprained his pinkie and broken two more fingers when they fell into the desert and no one noticed until now. The noble bastard refused to tell anyone about it so they didn't know until Mikaela grabbed his hand in the car and realized just how wrong his hand felt. Gabriel had insisted that he set it while Simmons made the call to his contact.
Simmons's voice drew her attention back to the ground where the boys were. "Okay, here's what my CIA contact says. Ancient Sumerians used to call the Gulf of Aqaba the 'Dagger's Tip.'"
"That's the Dagger's Tip," Sam mumbled. The pieces were trying to fit together but there were still too many holes.
"It's part of the Red Sea. Divides Egypt and Jordan like the tip of a blade. 29.5 degrees north, 35 east. Here it is." Simmons fumbled with the map had picked up a while ago, pointing to a bay-like area that did look like a blade.
Sam was still talking to himself, "First thing we've got to do is get Optimus to the Dagger's Tip."
"How are you gonna get him halfway around the world?" and for once Leo was the voice of reason because they all wanted to know Sam's plan for this.
None of them realized just how heavily they were relying on Sam's leadership and the boy himself didn't realize that he was leading his own group of soldiers now. All he thought of was the next step and the answer was easy for him. "I'm gonna make a call."
So they left as discreetly as three brightly colored American sports car can be in search of the next town with a pay phone.
0o0
Gabriel was on the roof this time, sprawled out with a skull cap- the merchant hat called it a taqiyah- pulled low to almost cover his eyes. It looked like he was just sunning himself up there but he had actually taken over watching for cops a while ago. He wasn't sure just how calm Leo could be in a situation like this. "They're gone," he called down as the cop car they had been watching slowly drove past.
He tuned out as Sam made Simmons call and looked up at the other boy's bright yellow guardian. "That can't be very comfortable," he said, looking at the way he was holding onto the wall with one arm and holding onto one of the twins' legs with the other. Bee just shrugged because he didn't really have another way.
Simmons's phone conversation drew his attention back and made him laugh for the first time in a while. "Lennox, I'm with the kid. The kid. You know, the one with the attitude, right? We need the truck. The truck. We got a possible resurrection going on over here. You're not gonna believe where we are. Code Tut, as in King Tutankhamen. Back of a one dollar bill. Coordinates for airdrop, 29.5 north, 34.88 east. Write it down. Write it. Oh my god. I gotta go. Heat comes," and then he hung up the phone, turning towards the man running to them. Gabe had to give Leo props because they didn't even recognize him.
They moved quick when Leo told them that the cops were coming back around, though. They couldn't afford to be caught now. Not this close. With a little bit of luck, they could make it.
Then again, when had any of their luck ever been good?
0o0
Mikaela knew that that check point was a bad idea. Letting Sam drive Bee with no disguise was just plain dumb. But they were all exhausted, slow and stupid at this point. With the day they had- it couldn't have only been a day, Egypt was in a different time zone, it just felt like it- they deserved to be dumb. But they were being followed now by something. Maybe not physically followed, but she felt like they were watched.
She settled back into her (because even though she knew she had to let him go, she wasn't really ready yet) boyfriend's arms and closed her eyes for a moment, soaking up the hot night air.
"Being my girlfriend is hazardous to your health," Sam's voice was quiet and rough from all the screaming of the day and the silence they had been in since they passed the checkpoint.
"Yeah, well, girls like dangerous boys," she honestly missed this banter with him.
"Do they?" he sounded hopeful and it was just adorable that he still doubted her like this.
"Yeah," she said, leaning in to give him a peck on the lips and laughing at the surprise on his face. "You might as well just say it."
Surprise melted into discomfort and he shifted under her. "Ladies first."
"Okay, so tonight you're going to be a gentleman. You're really chivalrous," she huffed.
"Why are you mad at me?"
Mikaela sighed. She didn't want another fight with him. Not now. "You know what? Baby, I'm not- I'm not mad. Do you realize that I just flew three thousand miles to keep you from getting killed?"
"I know."
"Who else could be your girlfriend, Sam? Look at the things I go through with you. And now we're underneath the moon and the stars and the three most beautiful pyramids on the planet and you still can't even tell me that you love me." Okay, so maybe she was a little more frustrated than she thought and maybe she was looking for a fight.
"Mmm... Pyramids," Sam said. His mind was stuck on that one thing, not even absorbing the rest of what Mikaela said. It wasn't the All Spark pushing at his mind, just a memory that wouldn't quite cooperate.
"What? Why do boys always change the subject?" she asked.
Sam gently slid her off his lap and stood up, pacing to the edge of the balcony they were sitting on, unconsciously lifting his hands to frame the stars. "Wait. Pyramids and stars," his hands framing one particular set of stars. He spun and grabbed Mikaela's wrist, dragging her with him, "Come with me really quickly."
He wasn't sure what this building used to be, whether it was ancient ruins or an abandoned house but either way, it was huge and lonely. Sam ran down the stairs with his girl in tow, yelling at the sleeping men downstairs. "Simmons! Leo! Wake up! Gabe! Outside now!"
"Listen, astronomy class, page 47. Remember the class?" he said when everyone crowded around him in front of the window. Leo looked tired and confused while Gabe just looked interested. He hasn't been asleep but he also hasn't been in that class longer than an hour.
Leo was pissed because he had been having a very nice sleep on Simmons's shoulder. Even if he didn't want to admit it. "No. No, I was only in college for two days. Remember that?"
"Here. Get up. Up, up," Sam grabbed them one by one and hauled them onto the half collapsed roof below the window that afforded them a better view of the night sky.
"What are you talking about?"
"Okay, you see those three stars?" Sam launched into his explanation, pointing at a bright line of three stars that touched the horizon. "You see how the last one touches the horizon? That's Orion's belt, but it's also called the Three Kings. And the reason for that is the three Egyptian kings who built the pyramids of Giza built them to mirror those stars, so it's like an arrow staring us straight in the face."
Simmons lifted his arm and followed the line of Orion's belt, trying to figure out where they lead. "They all point due east, towards Jordan. The mountains of Petra."
0o0
The airplane was quiet and darker than normal. Most of the soldiers were getting their first sleep in days and since they were chasing the sun east, the lights had been dimmed to make up for the constant light.
They weren't all asleep, though, Lennox being the case in point. He sat with his head tipped forward, eyes closed and breathing deeply as he listened to the one beside him. She had shown up as they were taking off, sitting beside him and offering to explain the shift in the chain of command.
Lennox remembered when he first found out about the Bots' holoforms, both solid and not. It had been shocking how well they could blend in with humanity, and the woman beside him was the perfect example. He hadn't really met Strikezone yet so it was a shock when she told him that she would explain what had happened at Nellis to appease his obvious curiosity. Her human form and army fatigues were flawless and most of the others, not even Galloway sitting on his other side, realized that she wasn't human.
He fell into an almost meditation as she spoke, weaving the image of the family centered society they lived in and the rules they still lived by. She explained that as Optimus Prime's Promised, fiancé in his terms, she was next in the chain of command, above even the first lieutenant. She didn't explain how she had come by her title or why they weren't together when Prime touched down or why it took so long for her to meet them and Lennox didn't push. He had a feeling that whatever it was had been traumatizing for Strikezone and everyone else involved.
The pilot's voice over the intercom was loud and jarring. Lennox slowly pulled himself from the place her near silent voice had pulled him into. The pilot said the agreed upon words, "We've had an engine malfunction. We're gonna have to divert to SOCCENT. Flight master, let's lighten the load and prepare for bailout," and the Major stood, shouting orders to his suddenly alert men.
"Alright team! Grab your chutes!" Lennox yelled. The femme just stayed seated, watching the soldiers with a muted interest.
"Bailout? Like- like bailout?!" Galloway was panicking, screaming at no one in particular.
"You familiar with the standard MC-4"" Lennox wasn't planning on playing nice with this weasel.
"Of course not! I've never jumped out of a perfectly good airplane before! Wait a minute, is this really happening?" So he did understand the gravity of the situation.
"Yeah. All right, here we go." Galloway didn't know, lazy bureaucrat that he was, and Lennox wasn't planning on helping him out.
A knowing light lit in Galloway's eyes. "Wait a minute. Wait a minute. You're behind this, aren't you?"
"What are you talking about? You heard the pilot." Lennox started fitting the liaison with a parachute, forgoing his own as he spoke. "These guys don't mess around. This is just standard procedure. I'm just following orders to the letter," he cinched the groin strap as tight as he could and took a grim satisfaction at the man's pained shout. "Isn't that what you said?"
"You just signed a death warrant on your career, Major..." Galloway's rant trailed off as the plane suddenly dipped to the side and Lennox suppressed a smirk. "Whoa! What was that? What was that?"
He pretended to look around the plane confusedly. "Oh, that's not good. Come on. Right this way!"
A hand landed on his shoulder as he turned, keeping him from leading the annoying official to the open loading bay. He turned to the face the same femme and she smiled. "I'll take it from here, Major."
He wanted to ask if she was sure but those glowing blue eyes showed mischief and a want for revenge. He couldn't do anything but nod, back away and watch her work.
"Sorry sir. I'll take care of you," she said.
Galloway took in the woman in fatigues that had replaced Lennox and resumed his complaining. "I- I- I can't jump out of an airplane! I have an ulcer! No, no, no-"
Striker pushed him toward him towards the opening in the back and tried not to cringe at touching him. "Come on. It's okay."
"I really can't do this. What are you doing?"
"Come here! Come here," she was getting tired of his stalling.
Galloway realized something and it terrified him. "Why aren't you wearing your chute?"
She smiled and yelled over the wind, "Because I have to secure the VIPs first! Okay, I want you to listen very carefully and memorize everything that I say." She didn't really wait for him to acknowledge her before starting again, "Each chute has a GPS tracker so you can be found by Search and Rescue. Right next to that's a fabric webbing called a bridle, which holds the pin that keeps the main container closed. Okay, are you listening?" It was more than a little fun to rattle off the facts she found on the Internet as fast as she could and it was even more fun to watch the terrified man try to keep up as her words were whipped away on the wind.
"I- I can't hear what..."
Striker slapped him across the face to stop his sniveling. "Stop that!"
Galloway was shocked beyond belief but he did calm down for a moment. "All right. All right."
"All right, when the pilot chute inflates into the air, it pulls the pin and opens the main. Red's your backup, blue's your primary. I want you to pull the blue. I need you to pull it really hard!" She was still yelling and when she mimed pulling on the blue cord he copied her and deployed his parachute. "Not- not now, we're on the plane, you dumbass!"
Galloway's eyes widened behind his crooked little glasses and he screamed when the wind caught him and dragged him out of the plane. Striker stood with her arms crossed and watched him disappear with a cruel smile on her face. She just hoped he had a hard landing.
She turned on her heel and walked back to the watching soldiers. The dark skinned Air Force Tech Sergeant was the first one to break the silence with a grin and a "Did he say goodbye?"
"Nah, he didn't even say goodbye."
He laughed and clapped Lennox on the back saying, "I like her! She's got balls. What's your name soldier?"
Striker gave a human military salute and then the Autobot one, her right fist over her spark before rattling off her designation and rank. "Autobot femme Bladerunner and operational commander. Designation: Strikezone."
"So you're the one that snapped on Galloway earlier? Oh yeah, I really like you." Epps said, just a little surprised by her introduction- he had a feeling that there was more.
"Indeed I am, Sergeant. Now, if you will excuse me, I have to get back to my body. Have to conserve what little energy I have. See you in six hours boys," and with that, she faded out.
Epps turned wide eyes on his friend, "How did she know-"
"Autobots," Lennox said, as if that was the answer to everything.
It kind of was.
0o0
"It's here somewhere, guys." Here was- crap, he didn't even know what it was. All Sam cared about was the fact that it was ancient, the stars pointed here, the Primes were silent for once and he had spent the last three hours in a car with Simmons. It wasn't fun.
Dragging through the burning sand halfway up a mountain wasn't much better, but at least he wasn't in a confined space any longer. There was a doorway up ahead that had been carved into the mountain face and he knew that that was where he was supposed to be going.
The three kings had revealed the doorway.
Leo's pessimistic voice echoed behind him and he climbed up into the huge- room, he guessed, "Yeah, why? 'Cause, uh, we're trusting Grandpa Blackbird who doesn't even know what planet he's on?"
"In his defense," Simmons said, staring at the doorway as he stepped through it, "this is the biggest doorway I've ever seen in my entire life."
"Oh. Okay. Well, that's great. Let me do a quick search, all right? Uh... Nope. Ever cross your mind, guys, that archaeologists have been here before? There's nothing here," Leo was so, so certain that they were done, that this adventure was over because the room was empty. There were no extra rooms, the floor was bare, only one wall painted. The place had this unfinished feel to it like the people who had built it left suddenly.
Simmons rounded on the kid that had been dragged into this. He was fed up with his whining because- "Real life is heartbreak, despair, kid. Sometimes you get to the end of the rainbow and the leprechauns went and booby-trapped it!" It was the story of his life.
"Why am I listening to you? You live with your mother!"
Sam glared at the painted wall, wondering why this was the one and only time that the voices were silent. "It's not over," he mumbled.
Leo turned to Sam and this tone he was tired because his so-called roommate had dragged him across the world for nothing! He didn't even get the alien adventure he had been wishing for. "It is over. It's done."
The twins started fighting then, yelling and throwing punches. It was just too much to ask for them to be serious for just a moment. When Bumblebee grabbed them by their necks and literally threw them out, Sam didn't really notice because something had caught his eye. He had almost forgotten what it felt like to be alone in his head, no All Spark clouding his vision or Primes talking his ears off. It was odd to be working alone again but he thought he understood why when he caught a glimpse of silver in the cracked wall. Sam knelt by the crack the twins had created in their brawl and fingered the armor and symbols he could just reach. "Oh my god. These symbols... Bee, shoot it!"
They backed up, using the edge of the doorway for cover and Bee shot plasma at the wall. Something's wrong, Sam thought as they looked at the hole blown completely through wall of the tomb, it shouldn't have melted like that...
"These are the bodies Jetfire was talking about," Gabriel had awe in his voice and face as he looked around, they all did. Inside was an empty space caged by the massive bodies of ancient Primes.
"The Tomb of the Primes," Simmons said in a hushed voice. He wasn't the only one who felt like they had to respect the shadows of the dead residing there.
"Yo!" Leo yelled, just to hear the echo. He would be the one that didn't feel it.
"Dude, Leo, respect the dead!" Gabe whisper-yelled. Leo had the good sense to look ashamed.
Sam gasped and stumbled forward, kneeling in front of one if the Prime's outstretched hands. "The Matrix!" he murmured in awe. It was beautiful, delicately crafted with Cybertronium and the same trylithium Ironhide's armor was made of- built to last. With shaking hands, he reached out and picked it up, feeling like he was touching something sacred. He was.
But the second he picked it up and the sunlight from the hole hit it, the thing dissolved, turning into nothing more than glittery dust. "No. No... no."
"After thousands of years, it turned to dust," but Simmons just wanted to know the science behind it. He hadn't known the amazing mech that had died to protect this relic and suddenly, Sam hated the ex-agent for it.
Ashes to ashes and dust to dust.
"This isn't how it's supposed to end," he said, his determination flooding back.
He wouldn't let it end.
Simmons perked up at the sound of jet engines and ran out of the tomb with Leo and Gabriel following. Sam didn't notice, too busy pulling off his shoe to get his sock to care. He started pouring the dust- beautiful, glittering, important dust- into his dirty sock. It wouldn't end.
Mikaela's gentle hand landed on his arm, stalling him for a second. "You can't bring him back, Sam. There's nothing left."
How could she say that? There was ash and dust and if he had learned anything in the past two years, it was that the most amazing things could come from ash and dust. "Look! Look around you. We didn't just go through everything we went through for no reason at all, and to just have it end like this. There is a reason that we are here. The voices and the symbols in my head led us here for a purpose. I have a purpose, we all do. I won't let it end." The last slipped out in Cybertronian, automatic words that were more rooted in the All Spark than Sam himself. He switched back to English though as he got to those last few handfuls. "Everyone's after me because of what I know, and what I know is that this is going to work."
"How do you know it's gonna work?" Mikaela asked. Strong, determined Mikaela needed reassurance because her giant, her idol had fallen only a day ago and her world was still unstable. She needed something.
He grabbed the last little bit of dust and put it into the sock, knotting it tightly before looking at her with absolute certainty. "Because I believe it."
She followed him out of the tomb and the ruins willingly after that because she was sure now. She had seen it in those green eyes that it would work. She was also very suddenly sure that he wouldn't just leave her alone once they were over. He loved her too much, just not quite in the same way. So, she would follow him come hell or high water as long as he wanted because she didn't love him like that either but she knew that he needed her too, for the same reasons. To keep his world steady.
"Dropping the big boy. Sam!" Simmons called. He watched the kid turned man walk up to him, determined to do something. "You think you can bring him back to life with that pixie dust?"
"Absolutely. Let's go."
"Clap if you believe," Gabe murmured. They'd need all the magic they could get.