Fina was right: she could not have moved quickly enough to get inside the Noble once the MECH forces arrived. Bumblebee had been parked next to someone's driveway, behind some bushes where he was unlikely to be noticed, but where Fina could see when the MECH vehicles came rushing past. And come they did. When they finally spotted the Noble parked with engine running beside the road, they accelerated, and Rick barely had time to bounce into the passenger seat. Eddy didn't even give him the opportunity to shut the door before he launched the car, which sent up smoke and then charged down the street with a smooth efficiency that even Bumblebee had to envy.

"This isn't a good idea," Raf said, now in the passenger seat and strapped in.

"It's the only one I've got," Fina replied.

They waited in silence until the MECH vehicles disappeared over the horizon. Then, cautiously in case there was a chase car following, Fina edged Bumblebee out from behind the bushes, rolled onto the driveway and hesitated at the threshold between drive and street. A beat passed, then another, then she finally pulled onto the road, and turned back the way they'd come.

"They're going to notice us," Raf persisted, "We're driving the car they're looking for."

"If they do, then they'll have to chase us again. And we already proven we can outrun them."

Bumblebee might have wondered where she got her confidence, had he not already been driven by her hand. He knew what she could do. But he also knew what she could not do. Fina was a race driver, she was not experienced in the dangerous art of stalking the enemy. Even had she been, there was no place to hide on the road and they were in full view of the MECH operatives as they turned onto the street where she lived.

Bumblebee had not anticipated that they would still be in the driveway, though he almost immediately understood why they were there. They had expected him to turn back, and they had a plan in place. It also became obvious to him how the higher ups in MECH had found out that Larry had him.

There, among the green MECH vehicles, was the black car from the racetrack. Larry and Vera were in the back seat of the modified Viper, and it was evident they assumed that Bumblebee had (or soon would have) reinforcements, because its driver floored it and took off.

The Viper roared like a lion, exhibiting none of the grace but all of the power of the Noble as it took the sharp incline of the driveway like a surfer catching a wave and shot onto the street with a squeal as its tires interacted with the ice on the road and then it sped away.

Bumblebee didn't know what value Larry and Vera might have if not to tell where Bee was. Since he was here, MECH didn't need to ask that. But they might want to know who all knew about Bumblebee's existence, they might use Larry and Vera as hostages, or they might simply kill them just to make sure that what Larry and Vera knew was never made public. And not just about Bumblebee, but about MECH as a whole. There was no telling what information Larry had been privy to up to now. MECH wouldn't want anyone in their employ to fall into enemy hands.

Fina either forgot that she was supposed to be tailing them to see where MECH would take her parents or else she understood that MECH no longer had reason to keep them alive. Either way, she accelerated. Bumblebee hesitated to respond, knowing that he couldn't protect her or Raf, that the only thing keeping them from danger was MECH's assumption that Bee had backup following him, that they had to lose him before his allies caught up with him.

"Please," Fina whispered to him, leaning close to the steering wheel, "I know we haven't done a thing to deserve it, and that you have every reason to hate all of us, and no reason to risk yourself to save them... but please, help me do this. I need your help. Please."

The Fina he had met days ago would never have said such things to him. He knew that something had changed her, had humbled her, and made her realize that she herself was not the only person who mattered. She had come to see what she must always have known. And her request was one he could not deny, even though his reasons for considering it were not what she thought.

Bumblebee's tires caught the pavement and he sped up, extending himself cautiously, all too aware of the treacherous ice over which he was racing. Fina was aware of it as well, and knew as he did that the road ahead was not as straight as it appeared, and was also narrower than it seemed.

There was more ice on the road here than there had been at the race track, and Bumblebee would not normally have exceeded forty miles an hour on such a road, particularly not when he couldn't correct himself if he began to slide. Even Cybertronians were not immune to fishtailing in vehicle mode. They just usually had the option of transforming if necessary, and being able to take the impact if it came to that because they didn't normally have to worry about fragile human passengers.

But Fina's plea rang in his ears, and the black Viper's driver was obviously not going to respect the laws of nature. To keep up, Bumblebee had to exceed any speed which might be considered safe in these road conditions and hope that Fina would be able to maintain control in case he started to slide. Because Bumblebee could partially ignore her directions, she was less at risk of overcompensating than a normal driver would be. Fina seemed to understand this, and trusted Bumblebee, giving him maximum control by asking him to fully accelerate and turning the wheel more than would be wise in an ordinary car when needed so that he could choose how fast to go and how much to turn inasmuch as it was possible under the circumstances. She didn't touch the breaks, knowing Bee could slow himself better than she could, given what they were doing.

A high speed pursuit on winter roads was not what he would have wanted, especially since he was chasing a car that -no matter how modified or souped up- was still just a car with an entirely human driver. And he certainly didn't like that both himself and the other car had innocent passengers. But this had been his blunder, though he didn't have time to sort out which was his first mistake this time, and he didn't want Larry or Vera (or their children!) to suffer for it.

In turning back and revealing himself to MECH, he had changed the nature of this deadly game. He now had no choice but to either concede to failure or play things out as they were now. And the latter meant outrunning that other vehicle; something he had twice been unable to do at the race track.

But there was a big difference between then and now. Then, Fina had been controlling him, making every move as if he had no consciousness or judgment of the situation. Now she was working with him, granting him the freedom to move, and therefore the confidence to accelerate as he had not dared to before for fear of becoming involved in an uncontrolled spin or worse. He had not been willing to reach for his limits because the risk was too great. Now it seemed likely that it was the only thing which could possibly save Larry and Vera, though he wasn't presently sure how that would be accomplished.

The Viper was the faster vehicle design, and now Bumblebee knew that some part of its modifications had probably been done by MECH engineers, who had more than once studied Cybertronian physiology, and that put them light-years ahead of anyone else in designing sturdy, fast cars, meaning that this Earth vehicle might be able to hold its own against Bumblebee even in a fair race. Its disadvantage came only in the form of its driver and the extra weight of three grown people it was carrying versus Bumblebee's much lighter load of only two people, both of which were small.

On the other hand, Bumblebee was not his usual self, in more ways than one. The injury he had sustained in the wreck had begun to heal, but this drive was definitely going to undo that. The difficult turns, and high, sustained speed coupled with the grueling iced road conditions combined to make it a strain on him even had he started off healthy. The black Viper, not being a living thing, could feel no pain, and merely replacing any parts that had been damaged racing ensured a full recovery. The Viper was probably in as good a shape as it had been at the start of the first race, whereas Bumblebee was seriously beginning to show signs of wear.

Though the green MECH vehicles made attempts to slow Bumblebee, they weren't quick enough and were almost immediately left trailing behind. After the first couple of turns on the mercifully deserted roads, the green cars disappeared from his rear view. He was sure they were still back there, but for the moment he had only one vehicle and its driver to worry about.

It was all he could worry about anyway. The vehicle was overall faster, and he found himself struggling against the ice and snow on the roads, fighting just to keep up. He didn't have the time or energy to devote to thinking about what he would do if he ever did manage to catch up or overtake the other vehicle. He knew he'd have to stop it somehow, but he had little means of fighting if it came to that.

The seconds passed like minutes, each one a trial with its own unique challenge. He found himself sliding and fought to right his course with Fina's cooperation. He managed not to spin and regained his equilibrium. In the next second, the Viper started to fishtail and he cut his acceleration to avoid colliding with it while its driver fought to right it. Once it straightened out, he tried to take the opportunity to pass and block it, but the Viper's driver was having none of it and wouldn't let him pass.

Bumblebee was so preoccupied that he didn't even realize Raf was on the phone until the boy began shouting street names. He wasn't sure what Raf was doing or who he was talking to, but he hoped to God that the boy was getting them some kind of help, because he wasn't sure how long he could keep up this increasingly dangerous game of tag. The streets had been deserted so far, but how long could their luck hold out in that department? Inevitably, someone had to be on the road somewhere.

"Yes, Fowler! Agent Fowler!" Raf cried suddenly, pausing as he got a response, "Because it's not Decepticons! It's MECH, humans!... Yes, I know I mentioned a car, but it has a driver... Ratchet... just, just..." he took a breath to calm himself, "Just tell Optimus where we are, let him make the call," Ratchet must have said he was tracking them by the GPS in Raf's phone because the boy stopped shouting street names as they crossed them.

It wasn't for no reason that Raf was shouting. The noise of Bumblebee's engine, coupled with screeching tires on the ground and crunch of snow and ice under his treads made hearing what anyone was saying virtually impossible. The deafening noise was a warning that he was reaching the limits of what he could do. He could feel his tires losing traction and beginning to wobble dangerously, and he was sure Fina could feel it through the steering wheel.

"We have to set him free!" Raf shouted above the racket.

"What?" Fina yelled back, so Raf repeated.

"I know you're doing all you can, Fina," he continued as loudly as he could, "But Bee needs to have full control or this is going to end with all of us being killed!"

{You can do that?} Bumblebee asked, not quite daring to hope, {While I'm moving?}

"Bee, I can't hear you!" Raf shouted, "Just trust me on this."

{Always, Raf,} Bumblebee replied, {Always.}

"If you set him loose, I won't have any control anymore," Fina said, and her voice held fear in it.

Raf had unbuckled and crawled partway under the dash.

"You'll just have to trust him," Raf's voice came muffled as he popped off the cover and looked at the mess of wiring underneath, "Completely."

"I've never trusted anybody that much!" Fina said, but Raf didn't seem to hear her.

Bumblebee felt it as wires came loose, and he also felt the surge of fresh power as he found himself freed from the mechanical equivalent of a bridle at last. The momentary distraction made him skip across the road, and Fina reflexively pulled the wheel, effectively regaining his attention.

Raf pushed himself up into his seat and belted in, then said, "You can still fight him for control. So now it's up to you. You have to let go of the wheel, Fina. You have to let Bumblebee go."