If Only

Chapter 18

Today was another work day as usual. I've been coding for the past three hours and making sure nothing is happening that's not supposed to be there in N.E.S.T's computers. A very average day, but those days are good, especially after how rough its been the past few days. My job at N.E.S.T isn't particularly hard, its just tedious and hard to juggle along with fighting. I seem to manage just fine anyways.

Hearing what sounded like lasers shocked me out of my calm state, jumping from my chair I ran out the door. Earning quite a few glares from the rest of the hackers in the room, but those noises were not something you should be hearing on a daily basis.

Stepping out the door, I caught glance of what I first thought to be just Wheelie. Upon further inspection, the small bot' was running around shooting at everything it saw, and it was not Wheelie. It was darker, and a bit smaller. Yet, still had the same shape and same design.

After looking at me, it screamed and aimed its blaster at me. "Aghhh, Human!"

"Ah, Robot!" Ducking, I flipped out my gun and hid behind a wall, looking out as he came closer.

Just as he almost reached my position, Lennox, along with a bunch of other soldiers, came running. One of the soldiers leaped through the air, holding a bowl, and dropped it on top small, enraged bot.

"What..is that thing?!" I stammered, slipping my gun back into my boot and walking out from my hiding place.

"Long story. He escaped." Lennox explains, and I stay confused. He was staying here?

"You mean that Wheelie impersonator has been living here?"

"We captured him after we found him lurking about our grounds, we've been trying to get him to tell us why but he won't speak." Epps adds.

"Have you tried asking nicely?" I snicker, as the bot struggled in the bowl to get free.

He glared at me. Then picked up the bot, careful to not let him loose. "We need to bring him to Optimus. He'll know what to do."

"You haven't asked him yet? Nice going."

Shooting me another glare, Lennox sighs as he leads us all to the Autobot hanger.

We arrived shortly after. Each Autobot was present, and turned to see us as we walked in. "Good afternoon, Major Lennox." Optimus welcomes him in with a warm smile.

"We need your help, Prime." Epps begins, taking the bot and jogging up to the Optimus. "He escaped not to long ago, after we tried getting him to talk again."

"With no luck." Lennox adds.

Frowning, Optimus looked down at the Bot as Epps let it go. He glanced around to everyone in rage, cursing at everything he saw, while pointing his itty bitty laser. The prime did not look so pleased, as he sighed deeply and covered his face with his hand. That's when Wheelie happened to roll up. "What..what is this?!" He sputtered, anger filling his words.

"So there's another drone rolling around in here, huh, Wheelie?" The bot began, seeming amused at the situation.

"Why you..arghh, I'm an Autobot! You piece of scum!"

"Scum? Autobot, filthy piece of tin!" He replied, charging his small blaster.

"That's enough!" Optimus stopped the two, before a fight happened. Although that would be a sight to see, seeing as how small they are.

"Now, Bolts, " The leader began, trying to reverse the conversation. "We need to know what you were doing scanning around N.E.S.T property."

"I'm never telling you a thing." He crossed his arms and lowered through his skull.

"This is never going to work." Lennox argues, shaking his head.

"Why don't you just...hack into his mind and see what his plan was? He is living technology after all."

"You can't hack into a Cybertronians brain. It can't be done." Ratchet altercates, affirming it can't be done. Although I believe otherwise.

"I almost did it back when I found Ravage and Laserbeak's signal, I don't see why not. We could give it a try." I say, glancing up to Optimus who stares down at me curiously.

Once nodding in approval, I jump up the stairs to the computers to log in, and begin my work hacking into the small bots brain.

"Hey! Stay out of my head, human!" The bot shrieks, trying to climb the stairs, but Ironhide stops him by picking him up and holding him by his fingers.

"It says here that his job was to learn of N.E.S.T secrets, and to destroy anyone in their path" I begin, after finishing what I was looking for.

"How..how did you do that? That should be impossible." Ratchet inquires in disbelief.

"Could it be?" Optimus murmurs to himself, shaking his head while walking away. Leaving us all pondering what was going through his head.

***

*Prison outside of N.E.S.T base*

Link Tyson sat on the edge of his prison bed, twidling his thumbs, thinking. Thinking was all he had time to do in jail. That was what Phoneix did as well. It did her well somewhat, but for him, it only did evil.

Link was the hacker that previously hacked into N.E.S.T just a few weeks ago. He wanted to know something, to know a secret no one else to know. To know about the aliens. He is leader of a recluse league known as C.A.G.E, or Conspiracy Agency Guiding Enigmas.

They have been searching for any signs of aliens for 20 years now with no luck. With all the news on giant robots and viral YouTube videos of giant robots, Link and the rest of his team have brought back their interest in searching for life outside of Earth. Cybertronians happened to be their target.

Being trained in hacking was a skill he had used since the age of 21. 32 now, Link could not believe he had been outsmarted. Outwitted somehow, and sent to jail. He was caught as he attempted to plant a virus into N.E.S.T main systems so he could search through them and attain everthing the soldiers knew he didn't.

The constant thing ran through the coders' mind. How could he escape? His fellow comrades met up with him on a daily basis to discuss such buisness. They knew of what had happened, and they planned on getting revenge. Sadly, none of them actually had proper hacking skills like Link did.

But, he was a genius, after all. Just like Phoneix, he could think of some way of escape plan, and it would happen soon. Link, along with his buddies, wanted to know of the one who had beat him. If they could do that as fast as they did, they must've been assuredly clever, and had quite a bit of practice in the field.

C.A.G.E was made up of old members of the military, all trained for battle. They all knew each other from somewhere and could share some kind of story, what really stood out is why they wanted to build the organization in the first place.

Yes, that has been thought of before but with more people and other reasons. These guys didn't particularly want to harm anyone. No, not the aliens anyway. They wanted to take over the Earth, and go do that they wanted to recreate a cybertronian and make an army.

Surely that had to be hard, but, they were set on the idea once seeing the videos of giant robots destroying cities over and over again.

After their last visit to Link, everything was set up. Tomorrow was prepared for. It was ready and he was waiting. Patiently he had waited for so long. It gave him time to ponder all the things he could possibly do for revenge and now, he could play them off. While as today was normal, tomorrow would be the day Link escaped, and reunited with his team.

Tomorrow was the day he began planning out his deed to take Earth, and he wasn't allowing a lone hacker to get in the way of just that.