Sorry for the long wait everyone! I started this chapter, but didn't like the way it was going, so I deleted it and had it halfway done before I went on vacation, so I didn't have much time to write. Then when I got back, I got sick. Literally the day after. I feel fine now, but it delayed all of my stories. So, here's chapter 4

As usual: I don't own Transformers or Before he Cheats by Carrie Underwood.

Chapter 4: A Small Problem

In Toxin's base, Akar practically screamed at his men.

"We failed to capture an autobot. Does anyone want to tell me why we failed?"

"Sir," One of them spoke up. "It was because we didn't take the shot that we had immediately."

"That would be true." Akar said. He folded his hands behind his back. "I think we just made Fireteam Phoenix mad, and I'm sure we'll get a rematch soon."

He chuckled evilly. "Very, very soon."

"Sir?" Another one asked.

"Ready our assets." He orders. "We're going to be ready for them."

At Diego Garcia, all six members of Fireteam Phoenix were in a long meeting with Morshower, Optimus, Will, Galloway, and Sam. Arcee had come out of stasis earlier that morning. Autumn really wanted to take a bold move against Toxin. Majority of the committee was not in favor.

"I have reason to believe that Toxin is not an immediate danger." Morshower stated when Autumn tried to plead her case.

"Morshower, sir," Autumn started. "Clearly you don't understand the threat Toxin is posing to NEST."

"Their intentions are not clear enough to plan a course of action," Galloway stated.

"They have made their intentions perfectly clear." Arcee said.

"Akar obviously wants to become NEST's latest headache." Autumn snarked. "And I'm inclined to say he's succeeding."

Galloway started blabbing. Hunter leaned in and whispered.

"He's a jack-wagon."

"There's a reason he's single in his fifties and has no friends." Autumn responded.

"Ooh, burn."

"Are the two of you ruffians going to have a conversation that we all have to stop for?" Galloway asked.

"Did you ever consider being a middle school teacher, sir?" Autumn grinned.

"No, why?" He responded, deadpan and clearly not understanding that it was meant to be insulting. Sam and Will laughed. Ironhide chortled, before Chromia, smirking, elbowed him in the side, obviously trying to tell him 'Don't encourage her'. Arcee just smiled and shook her head. Ratchet was laughing and failing to hide it miserably. Optimus was trying to suppress a smile.

"You sound just like one."

Galloway looked deeply offended.

"You walked right into that one, Galloway." Morshower shook his head, then turned his attention to the still grinning lieutenant. "Lieutenant Autumn Copperhead."

Getting addressed as your rank, first and last name was akin to getting your First, middle and last name from a parent.

"Yes, sir?"

"This is not a joke, nor is it comedy hour. I would appreciate it if you treated it as such."

"Yes, sir." She still had that awful grin.

"Moving on," Morshower continued. "What kind of attack are you thinking?"

"One that's quick and straight to the point."

"Are you sure this is going to work?" Galloway asked.

"If you don't mess it up." Autumn narrowed her gaze coolly. Galloway grimaced and leaned back.

"Request granted." Morshower said.

"Thank you, sir." Autumn dipped her head respectfully.

"Good. Prepare your plans, then run it by me and Sam."

"Alright."

So, after looking at it a hundred different ways, Autumn had her plan. Instead of intercepting Toxin, Fireteam Phoenix was going to bring the slimeballs to them. Sam looked at the plan which it had taken Autumn and Ratchet several hours to come up with.

"Are you sure this'll work?" He asked, flicking his gaze from Autumn to Ratchet.

"Nope." Autumn smirked.

"You guys are unbelievable!" Sam shook his head.

"Says the one who killed Megatron all by himself." Autumn narrowed her gaze.

"heh." Sam snorted. "Guess so."

Autumn picked up the paper, and meandered to Morshower's office with Ratchet.

"You know, it's funny," Autumn smiled. "I swore I'd go into some sort of engineering field, but here I am."

"Everything happens for a reason." Ratchet concurred.

Autumn could hear the conversation Galloway was having with Morshower.

"…Fireteam Phoenix is going nowhere, they're out there, especially Autumn. She's the craziest we've had yet."

Autumn swung the door open. "So, I guess we'll just have to be the underdogs, like always."

Of course, she was no stranger to catching curveballs. Galloway looked… well… like he'd knew he screwed up.

"The plan you asked for?" Autumn offered Morshower the paper. He read it for a moment, before looking up at the soldier and the autobot.

"You ready to mobilize?"

"As soon as we can."

Later, Fireteam Phoenix, Sam and Galloway were in a C-17. Galloway was by the cockpit with earbuds in and blocking out the world, while Fireteam Phoenix and Sam were closer to the exit, left to their own devices.

"So, why does Galloway want me to come?" He asked.

"At this point, who knows? The guy's a nutjob." Autumn played with her helmet absentmindedly.

"It's one of the seven wonders of the world we were able to convince him to give us more adequate quarters than just an open space in the middle of a hangar." Arcee responded.

"I still think it would've been funny to force him to live like that and see how he likes it." Autumn snarked. It was well known that Autumn liked her space and time to herself, neither of which that the NEST base offered all of the time.

"Now that's just uncool." Sam shook his head.

"So was recharging in the middle of a hangar." Ratchet responded.

"It's not like you would ever get time alone in there," Autumn pointed out.

"That was the point." Galloway remarked, turning off his phone.

Ratchet exchanged an uneasy glance with Autumn. He wondered who much the man heard.

"When will we be stateside again?" Autumn's question took Ratchet by surprise. She had confided with him that she wanted to be home again, after being on Diego Garcia for 8 ½ months and feeling like she'd been rat-raced around every other day. He wanted to, as well. As much as he could try to fight it, the small cottage on acres of land that Autumn owned was home to him as well, where he, Arcee and Autumn often stayed up and watched meteor showers. The Witwickys, Lennoxes and Copperheads all relocated to Tennessee, within miles of both each other and the nearest Military base that Morshower requested.

"When things calm down." He said in a steely voice. The young lieutenant glanced at her feet. Galloway got in her ear. "Don't try to be the hero, Lieutenant Copperhead, It's not in your blood."

He turned away, giving her a side-eye. Autumn shifted her feet and glared after Galloway before the C-17 landed roughly onto the tarmac. Ratchet wondered what he meant by not being a hero.

"A warning would have been nice." She said sourly.

"Well," Hunter stood up. "Are we gonna get going?"

"Yeah, no point in sitting around." Autumn shrugged. The autobots got out, while the two siblings stood near a crate, debating something about it. Ratchet turned his gaze around the airport. MIA was the airport code. He chuckled as Autumn oversaw Hunter hauling the crate full of decoys to bait Toxin to come to them rather bossily. She turned her gaze around the airport with disgust. Sam watched her with amusement.

"What, you don't like the Miami airport?"

"No, I don't, it's the worst airport, I hate flying into it. It's dirty inside, and the people who work it are rude."

"Tell me how you really feel." Sam grinned.

"I just did."

A clatter cut off anything more anyone could have said. The crate which Hunter was carrying's contents spilled out on the ground.

"Oops." Hunter said sheepishly when Autumn gave him a glare.

"Don't break those, Hunt."

"Sorry."

Travelling to the place to bait Toxin, Fireteam Phoenix set up the decoys, and then waited. And waited. For hours. Ironhide complained. Hunter fell asleep. Chromia started doing donuts in her motorcycle mode. Ratchet shifted his position of sitting every 2 minutes. Autumn was on the verge of losing her patience. Arcee just teased Ratchet, who didn't fight his sparkmate.

"I've got them on the radar." Ratchet announced. Autumn gave Hunter the thumbs up. He called Sam and told him to bring in the cops so they could arrest Toxin's leader and his henchmen. Fireteam Phoenix hid behind massive shipping containers as Toxin pulled up.

"Where are they?" a voice snarled. Autumn glanced around the corner as Ironhide readied his cannons. He met her gaze and she gave him a decisive nod.

Ironhide let out a roar and spun around, pinning Akar to the ground as several cops pulled up, not a moment too soon. Toxin found themselves at the barrels of several guns of varying sizes.

"It appears I've underestimated you again." Akar hissed, trying to get out from under the massive hand.

Optimus and Bumblebee pulled up and one of the police cars transformed to reveal itself as Prowl. Sam got out of Bumblebee's driver side door and stood beside Autumn and Hunter. He looked wide-eyed at the scene in front of them. The police officers began to cuff Akar and his henchman. The young lieutenant glanced over her shoulder as she heard a helicopter. A strange looking gun was mounted to it. A flash followed and then the sound of it firing. Everyone was blinded for a moment. Autumn's vision returned first. At the sight in front of her, her hands slacked around her weapon and it clattered to the floor as her jaw dropped. She removed her helmet and blinked dumbly.

The autobots were the size of toddlers, hardly more than 2 feet tall, built like toddlers too with stubby limbs and large head compared to their bodies.

Hunter hid behind Autumn, before peeking over her shoulder. "What…?"

Sam looked over at the two siblings with a look that said 'Is this real?'. The autobots looked equally flabbergasted. Optimus glanced at his servos, and then around him. Ironhide glared up at the sky (A lot of help that did). Ratchet simply met Autumn's gaze who simply just rapidly shook her head and rubbed her face.

"So, uh," Sam started to say. "Ya think Wheeljack'll know how to fix this."

"He better," Ironhide muttered darkly.

Autumn glanced over her shoulder at the cops getting all of the Toxin members in cop cruisers. Where do you start with a problem like this? She asked herself. All of her training from NEST could not had possibly prepared her to deal with a situation like this. Neither could her tenacious resolve: You could hold her down, but pity to the unfortunate soul who made that mistake when she retaliated with twice as much force. Granted, ever since she was a teen growing up around the autobots sometimes she wished they were smaller, but now she wanted to take back every time she had.

"There's no way this is gonna end well." Autumn said under her breath.

"Be more positive, Autumn." Sam smirked.

"Fine!" She, absolutely teeming with unbridled aggravation, spat. "I'm positive this won't end well."

The completely furious lieutenant stomped off to one of the cops and barked an order at him.

"Oof." Hunter winced at one of her English and properly ticked off curses. "Whatever guy puts a ring on her better know what he's in for."

"Hunt," Autumn turned, using his nickname and put her hands on her hips. "My romantic life clearly is not the most pressing concern at the moment."

And then Hunter keeled over laughing. "How'm I supposed to take anything seriously' right now?"

Autumn slapped the side of his face hard, which just made him laugh more. "Get yourself together."

Once he finally stopped, he glimpsed at his sister.

"Sooo, how do we tell Galloway?"

Autumn glanced at him dumbly. "I didn't think that far yet."

"You might want to," Ratchet commented. Autumn spun around to come face-to-face with the aft himself.

"Good afternoon, sir." Autumn dipped her head slightly.

"Hello, Lieutenant. Would you mind giving me a report?"

"No, Sir, not at all. We successfully stopped Toxin, mostly, but we ran into a small problem."

"And what would that be?"

Autumn glanced down at Ratchet when he stood beside her. It was weird to look down at him.

"Oh."

So, the flight back to base was very interesting- to say the least. It consisted mostly Sam and Hunter singing an earsplitting duet of If I had a Million Dollars by the Barenaked Ladies. For the record, that was one of Autumn's favorite songs. Ironhide questioned if either of the boys were drunk. It grew so concerning that Ratchet even ran a medical scan on both of them to make sure they weren't.

Wheeljack's initial reaction the Fireteam Phoenix's arrival was hilarious. He hid because he thought it was a prank from the terror twins.

"Are you sure it's ok to come out?" Wheeljack whined from behind the door, which Autumn stood in front of.

"I promise you, Wheeljack, this isn't a prank. In fact, the twins are going to be very upset that they didn't come up with this first." Autumn knocked on the door. When Wheeljack let out a pitiful whine, the young lieutenant knocked harder on the door. "Don't make me pick the lock, Wheeljack." Her tone was full of warning.

Wheeljack opened the door and popped just his head out. Autumn was starting to get tired of the theatrics. "I hope you realize how ridiculous you're acting."

Wheeljack nodded and crawled out from behind the door. Autumn breathed an Our Father, asking God for patience. After, she simply scowled at the overgrown sparkling scooped up a very grumpy Ratchet.

"How did this even happen?" Wheeljack asked the mech in his palm, who only intensified his glare.

By a stroke of very bad luck, both sets of twins spun around the corner. Sunstreaker, lost in his mirth, leaned against Sideswipe who was also laughing as Skids and Mudflaps unwisely approached the scene in front of them.

"How does somethin' like dis happen?" Skids asked.

"Yah, like how?" Mudflap asked.

"I wish we thought of something like this first." Sideswipe grinned.

"If the two of you ever pull a stunt like this," Autumn called the twins attention. "I will personally make sure you're in the brig so long that everyone forgets you're even in there."

"But what if you get married by then? We want to go to the wedding!" Sunstreaker chirped.

"This is the second time I've been reminded about my love life." Autumn snarked.

"But why wasn't the last guy any good?"

"I'm not at liberty to answer any questions about by personal life, let alone my romantic life." She said flatly.

"Autumn caught him kissing her best friend," Hunter chirped. "so then she Carrie Underwood-ed his truck."

"Carrie Underwood-ed?" Sideswipe asked.

"Google Before he Cheats." Autumn responded.

Sunstreaker's optics widened when he got the google results and took a tiny step back, clearly scared for his paint job. Sideswipe laughed.

"You did that?"

"If you slash 4 tires then insurance with cover it. But if you only slash 3 the cheater has to pay for a new set of tires. And you never leave your name at a crime scene" Autumn's eyes had an almost scary sparkle to them. "So, technically I didn't do it the same way the song did it."

"But why?" Sideswipe asked.

"That's none of your business." Autumn shook her head.

"You should at least look for a guy." Hunter smirked. "There's plenty of guys who'd love a girl like you."

"I'm not sure if I should feel complimented or pissed." Autumn put on her best RBF. "Moving on…"

"But I love annoying you with your nonexistent love-life." Hunter sulked.

"You're the worst." Autumn glared at him.

"I know!" He smiled his biggest. "It's fun!"

"I can see that you're having fun."

Sam glanced at his phone. "Morshower wants to talk to us."

"Again?" Ironhide grumbled.

"Did you really think that we'd do all that and get away with not having some form of meeting?"

Turns out, the meeting was just Morshower telling Fireteam Phoenix and Sam that they can go stateside for a while until they figure out what happened to the miniaturized autobots. Wheeljack said it was going to take at least a couple of months, but probably more. Optimus stayed on Diego Garcia so Wheeljack could have someone to look at to reverse the effects of the blast.

While she was waiting to leave, Autumn got a snack and a drink from the commissary. She was texting her mom and her sister to tell them that they'd be home for a bit. She smiled wistfully thinking about how her nieces, nephew and younger sister must've grown.

Brendon, a young fighter pilot grabbed some food on a tray and scanned the tables, walking through the mostly empty room. That was when he saw her. His jaw fell to floor and it took him a moment to realize that the girl he'd laid eyes on was Autumn. She'd gone to the middle school as him; she was cute then, more so in personality than looks, and he could admit to having a small crush on her. But now… now she was beautiful. Her long brown hair framed her finely featured face.

"Is anyone sitting here?" he asked her. Autumn glanced up to met the blue eyes of a soldier close to her own age. He gave her a small smile.

"No," She shook her head. He sat down beside her.

"You're Lieutenant Copperhead, aren't you?"

"Please, just call me Autumn." She shook her head. "You would be…?" She prompted.

"F-18 pilot Ensign Brendon." He grinned widely and proudly. "I was air support for your mission in Colorado."

"Did you go to Top Gun?"

"Yes." He nodded. "Graduated top of my class."

"Careful," Autumn smirked. "You might want to manage expectations."

He laughed. "I'm sure you would know how to do that; you've proved that before."

"In combat?"

"Naw," He grinned. "In middle school when you punched the bully."

Autumn went red in the face. "You're Brendon Kismet, aren't you?"

He nodded, while also thinking how he was going to get her number.

"Yeah, we kissed on the playground, and you promised you wouldn't tell." Brendon grinned.

"You didn't change at all." She smirked, shaking her head.

"I could say the same for you."

"I'm curious, how'd you end up as air support for NEST." She asked abruptly.

"They needed someone with the right skills for the type of mission that NEST has. I guess I fit the criteria. You?"

"I grew up around the autobots. I guess you could say I felt like I owed them something for every time one of them saved my skin." She laughed. Then she rolled her eyes. "I hate the way my laugh sounds."

And here Brendon thought it was sweet. "I think it's beautiful, a lot like you." He took her hands in his. She almost looked like she was about to cringe.

"Well, we'll see about that." She got closer to him, smiling. "Brendon, you are one smooth operator. No wonder I let you kiss me on the playground in 6th grade."

"Autumn!" A voice that could only belong to her brother called. He walked in carrying… a tiny Ratchet. Ironhide trailed behind. Autumn pushed Brendon away.

"uh-" She stuttered. "What, Hunter?"

"Here." He plunked a very shocked looking Ratchet on the table. "This is yours."

"Well, this is awkward." Autumn cringed.

"I concur." Ratchet raised an optic ridge.

Autumn gave Hunter an annoyed face, and he sprinted from the room, Ironhide ran after him.

"I… gotta go." Autumn met Brendon's gaze.

"Yeah, I probably do too."

"Uh- here." She scribbled something on a piece of paper and shoved it in his hands. She then picked up her phone and stuck it in her pocket. Ratchet jumped off the desk. "Talk to you later!" She called.

"Yeah, see you around." He glanced at the piece of scratch paper. A phone number: 865-746-2384. It didn't take a genius to figure out who's it was or why Autumn had written it. Brendon smiled to himself. Now he just had to keep the girl around. He realized she was the type of girl he was looking for to put a knee on the ground with a ring for. In that moment, he promised he'd marry her.

So, how's that for some action? Also, the phone number is made up. The area code is Knoxville, but please don't call it. Its not real.

And yes, I do tease-ship Autumn and Brendon rather badly.

Can you tell I'm a Carrie Underwood fan? Her music is amazing. I love her songs, and Jesus Take the Wheel gives me chills every time I hear it!