Transformers: The Cross

Chapter 7 - The Reunion

     Instead of shaking my hand, Rafael just stared at the marks on my arm. Inquisitiveness consumed his gaze, his entire focus absorbed into the symbols.

     "Whoa," he whispered. "How in the world did you get Cybertronian glyphs all over your arms?"

     I shrugged. The boy became engrossed again, not really seeming interested in my answer, and I thought it was a little creepy that he wasn't blinking. I watched him warily, discreetly trying to draw my arm back to my side.

     "Dude," Miko called. "You're freaking her out with your nerd stare."

     It took a second before Rafael snapped out of it and laughed awkwardly. "Sorry. It's just that I've never seen this kind of thing before. Scraplets? Data Cylinders? Sure. A bunch of Cyberglyphs all over human skin? Never."

     "You don't know the half of it," Sam commented on the side, giving me a knowing look.

     Question burned in Jack, Miko, and Rafael's eyes, but Sam didn't bother to answer, and neither did I.

     To tell the absolute truth, I didn't think either of us really knew how to explain in simple terms what was going on, and I really wasn't comfortable discussing myself with strangers. We hardly knew each other, and I already felt like a specimen on a petri dish.
 
     "Hold on, I'm sorry. Wait a minute." Sam had that critical twinkle back in his eye, and I felt an accusation coming on. "So you don't already know who the three of these kids are?"

     I shook my head.

     "What?" Jack faltered a bit with a nervous chuckle. "Sam that's impossible, how could she? We literally just met her." 

     The spazzy brown-haired boy remained intently focused on me, as if my face were some sort of crossword puzzle with no clues provided. "Well, Jack, you remember the first rule about Robot Fight Club, right?"

     "Yeah," he and Miko said simultaneously.

     "And you know how there's that one exception to every rule?"

     "Wait, stop. Stop right there," Jack commanded, chopping a hand in the center of our tense circle that had formed. He looked Sam in the eye."You're not serious. She knows? About everything?"

     "Uh-huh," Sam replied.

     "You told her everything?"

     "No, what the fu-" He caught himself for Rafael's sake. "You and Ironhide, I swear to god. I didn't tell her squat. She told me everything."

     Miko squealed and hopped around excitedly. "Oh, my gosh are you a spy?! That is so cool!"

     "No, no, no. That is not cool, not cool at all," Sam blathered at her.

     "I bet she's a double agent!"

     "Miko," Jack chastised. "This is not the time!"

     As they fought amongst themselves trying to sway Miko's perception of 'cool' in the right direction, I pressed a palm to my forehead and dragged it down my face, then walked a little ways away. 

     Looking back at the bickering crew, I noticed that everyone was the same height; Rafael had made himself scarce.

     I spotted him miles away from the group, hooked to a computer screen on a far off wall. Attached to a cord in a random outlet, was what seemed like a personal laptop.

     Rafael had it set on his lap and sat on the floor, his back against the wall, like he'd been there the whole time and hadn't moved at all. It was crazy how much he looked like the adults, a fixed zombie-like stare at the monitor accompanied by a small frown. Briefly, I wondered what was so important that he had slipped away so quickly for.