His Spark, Her Soul

Chapter 8

"Oh hey, Miko right?" A voice called out and a young girl ran over. Miko turned her head to see who was calling her name. "Who is that?" Bulkhead asked her quietly. "I'm not sure, probably the new student we got. Transferred from somewhere out of the country." Miko replied as the young girl tripped over a crack in the sidewalk and just bit the dirt at full force. "Ooh, gonna feel that tomorrow." He hissed, trying to suppress his laughter. Miko rolled her eyes and jumped down from hopping into Bulkhead's cab and made her way over to the new girl, helping her up. "Hey, are you alright?" Jack asked as he and Rafael quickly joined the two girls. "Oh, yes, I am fine, thank you." The girl replied and smiled warmly before turning back to Miko, "I just wanted to say that I absolutely love your hair!" Miko gave a smile to the girl. She had a feeling that this was going to be a start of some odd friendship. "Well I love yours as well." Miko shifted her backpack on her shoulder. "Oh, you dropped these." Rafael tapped the girl's shoulder and handed her a pair of very rounded glasses. "Oh thanks!" She placed them back on her face, no longer squinting, "Aha! Now I can see! Oh, I'm Victoria by the way, you know the school's new girl? I'm moved here all the way from Russia." "All the way from Russia?" Jack asked as they walked back towards Bulkhead and Victoria nodded, "Yes, this is true, my parents got job offers in America and told me to pack my stuff. Next thing I knew, I was here in America, on a flight to Jasper, Nevada. I'm supposed to be staying with a family known as the..." She paused as she tried to remember the nice woman that her folks had talked to over the phone. "Do you guys know the Darbys by any chance?" Jack turned to her, "You're the girl my mom was talking about?" "You're a Darby?" Victoria asked before smiling "Good thing I caught you! I was afraid I would have to wander around the town in order to find you guys." "Uh? Hey, guys can I speak to you for a moment? In private?" Miko asked before dragging the two boys out of earshot. "Jack, why didn't you tell us you were getting a roommate? What are we supposed to do now? We have secrets to keep and we don't exactly hang around town all day?" Miko began asking a million questions. "I didn't know she was actually coming." Jack defended himself. His mother had forgotten to tell him that she actually agreed to hosting a transfer student. "I'm not sure, I'll take her home and you guys head to the base and warn Optimus of our new situation." He didn't want to call the new girl a problem. That was rude and she's still human. They spilt and Jack led Victoria over to his bike, "Are you okay with riding a motorcycle?" Victoria's eyes lit up, "Are you kidding me! I love bikes!" She hurried closer and gently rubbed the seat, "She is a beaut." "Well then, here." Jack handed her his helmet as he only had one and then sat down, leaving enough room for Victoria behind him. Victoria put the helmet on nice and snug before she hopped onto the bike and held onto Jack's waist as he started up his bike and headed off to his house.
At base, Miko sighed loudly as they made their way up to the platform. "What are we supposed to do now? What if she gets curious about why we drive off into the desert? Like we can't just leave her by herself or at least Jack can't." Once to the top of the platform they collectively explained to the Bots in the base about transfer students and how they now had to worry about a new girl and keeping the secret from her, which was going to be even harder to do. They were a little unsure of how to deal with this new situation.
"What if she finds out anyway?" Rafael asked, "What if she ends up following us here or the Cons attack us while we are in town and she happens to be with us?" He had so many valid points, it made more sense to just bring her in now and explain everything rather than the alternative to be nearly killed by Decepticons. "Why don't we give the young girl a week to settle in and if nothing has been revealed by then. We will have to bring her in and explain." Optimus spoke up after the silence set in. He thought long and hard about all of the options and he felt it was better this way.

Victoria stared out the window of the guest room she had been allowed to use as a bedroom. She had been in Jasper for almost four weeks and it had been very quiet. This town wasn't anything like her noisy neighborhood back home. She felt that she had grown close with Jack and his mother, who was nice enough to refill her prescription without charging her any money. Miko was talking about showing her a big secret and she was very curious about it for a while but it kept being put on the back burner. She understood that Miko and Rafael were probably busy and probably didn't want her in on the secret. She missed her homeland. She missed her friends and family. Victoria wiped her tears away with her sleeve before slipping out of bed, kind of thirsty. Carefully she made her way down the stairs and to the kitchen, grabbing a glass and filling it with water. After taking a sip, she noticed that the light in the garage was on with the sounds of mumbling; like someone was talking. She set down the glass quietly and tiptoed over to the kitchen drawer and grabbed the biggest knife she could. No one was going to break into her host's home and threaten them. She would not allow some stupid thief to hurt the kind people who took her in. As silently as she could she stepped into the garage and slowly made her way forward, jumping out and yelling loudly, knife ready to strike. Jack yelled back and dropped his wrench, "Ah!" "Jack? Oh, it's just you." She relaxed and set the knife down. "Who'd you think I was?" He asked after taking a few calming breathes, eying the knife she had set down. "I heard noises and I thought you were thief breaking into home." Her accent got a bit thicker as she spoke swiftly, "I assumed Mother and you were sleeping upstairs." Jack smiled softly, he appreciated that Victoria was willing to put her life on the line for both him and his mother, but also a little concerned. Did that mean the part of Russia she was from was really rough? "Well it's just me. Mom is at the hospital for her overnight shift." Jack said as he grabbed the wrench he dropped and set it out of the way. "I heard talking, were you talking to your bike?" Victoria asked as she noticed that no one else was in the garage but Jack. "Sometimes I do. When Mom isn't here and I have problems that I'm stressing over, I'll talk to my bike and understand that the problems aren't as big as I think." He answered, putting tools away. "Ah, thinking out loud, good idea." Victoria nodded before stretching, "I guess I should head back to bed then, school in the morning." "I won't be too much longer down here." Jack stood to accompany her to the door. Victoria turned to face Jack after she was halfway through the doorway that split the house and garage, "I want to thank you very much for taking me into your home." "It's no problem at all. I'm sure you'd do the same for me if I ever went to Russia as an exchange student." Jack pulled her into a hug before letting her go back upstairs. He had a feeling that she was starting to feel unwelcome with the way Miko and Rafael haven't really hung out since they met. He closed the door to the garage and turned to see Arcee looking at him. "I think it's time Jack. It's time to tell her what you are a part of." She had been monitoring everything for the past four weeks and she believed it was time to tell her before the Decepticons actually acted and make it much harder to explain. He just nodded in agreement before making his way out of the garage and up to his bedroom. Sleep didn't come easy for Jack as his mind raced about the whole situation. He didn't want to expose Victoria to their crazy, alien life but at the same time she was going to be here until graduation and hiding the secret that long was just going to be impossible.

The next afternoon Jack stood at his bike and rubbed his eyes.
"Jack, there you are!" Victoria hurried over and smiled, showing off her A+ on a report paper, "Look!" He set him helmet down and took the paper, "Wow, that's amazing! Maybe you should tutor Miko sometime." He handed the paper back to her before offering the helmet, "You want to go on a joy ride?" "Absolutely!" She stuffed the paper into her bag and grabbed the helmet, putting it on and sitting behind Jack as he started his bike and they headed off.

"Wow, you have an abandoned base just sitting here in the desert?" Victoria asked as they walked inside the base. Everyone was out of sight as to not frighten her. Miko and Rafael watched from the platform. "Yeah, this is a part of the secret that we've been meaning to tell you about." Jack said as he led her a bit more to the middle of the base. "Part of? What's the rest?" Victoria asked before she heard this strange sound. They both turned around and there stood Arcee in bot form, she bent down to speak to the girl. Victoria's eyes widened and she immediately pushed Jack behind her, "Jack get back!" She pushed him back further, "Hurry, before it attacks!" She dug through her backpack and pulled out some kind of weird looking weapon. "Attack?" Jack stumbled from the shoving, before pushing her arms down that was holding the gun thing at Arcee, "Victoria calm down, she isn't going to hurt you!" "How do you know that?" Victoria asked quickly, putting her arms back up, "These creatures are murderers! You know how many people have died because of them!" Jack looked at Victoria with shock, "You've met them before?" "Not one with so much color, but the are all the same!" Victoria glared at Arcee, "That's why I'm here. I'm here for revenge, these stupid alien creatures destroyed my home town! And what did the government do? Sweep it under the rug like nothing happened! Next thing I know I'm on a plane to America where I'm supposed to meet some agent guy that would explain everything but that doesn't make anything better! That doesn't bring back my friends and family!!" Tears began slipping down her face. "And here you are making friends with them..." "Are you saying that your home town was destroyed by Decepticons? And your government sent you here to speak with Agent Fowler." Jack asked her and she dropped her hands, "You know that name of the agent I was sent to speak to?" Looking at him with confusion. Jack nodded, "I do know him. Arcee works with him. Arcee isn't a bad guy, she works against the ones that destroyed you home town." Victoria looked up at Arcee, "You..." "I won't hurt you Victoria." She sat down and crossed her legs so she didn't look so big and intimidating.
"And we figured it was time to tell you about us." Optimus and the others walked out of the shadows and into view. "But it seems that the Decepticons had already gotten to you."

Many miles away far into the sky sat the Nemesis. Níki shifted uncomfortably in her seat in the medical bay. She had been training for about four human weeks, or at least that's what Knockout says. It was hard to explain but she had this strange feeling since she had awakened. She wanted to understand why it felt like so much was missing. She had no memories except the one that Knockout showed to her from that little chip. She asked him several times about the past but he refused to share it with her, explaining that it wouldn't do her any good to know more memories when she couldn't shared the pass feelings that went with them. She stared at her servos, if she was alive yet not truly alive then where was her soul? Was she a zombie?
All the questions that would never been answered. Maybe Knockout would answer her questions after she killed Optimus, getting the revenge that Knockout wants so badly.
She nodded to herself, that was it. Do the job first and get her answers later. She left to continue training.