Newer World Order

Chapter 10: Diving Deeper

"Hey, Colonel." Jack smiled as Ashanti sat at the adjacent table, and Arcee waved and put her arm back around his shoulders. "Any news on Sokolov?"

"Not yet. Your mom's doing a hell of a job shaking Silas up, though. He's been a hard nut to crack, but the things she's been doing are so fucked-up that he's starting to unravel already. Shouldn't be much longer before he either caves in or gets agitated enough to let something slip."

"Glad to hear it," Arcee said. "We still need to deal with Megatron and possibly the DJD before we head off to find Unicron. There's enough on our plate without MECH and their 'newer world order' bullshit."

"My thoughts exactly. In the meantime, we're still searching for Sokolov and staking out all of his known contacts. If we don't get a breakthrough with Silas, sooner or later Sokolov will turn up anyway. I'm just hoping Silas breaks first, because the sooner the better, right?"

Everyone nodded. Ashanti glanced around at the others and picked up one of her chili-and-cheese fries. As usual, several of Jack's friends and their new Cybertronian allies had gathered for lunch. Ashanti was surprised to find Optimus's and Elita's Pretender bodies among them, seated at the far end of Jack's table, talking quietly while sampling a variety of foods and drinks, now that they had bodies capable of ingesting. Raf and Tomoko's brand new human-size doppelganger sat between them and the others, grinning and holding hands as they talked.

He's growing up fast. Ashanti smiled. It's kinda sweet, though.

"So," she said after letting another moment pass, "how're things with all of you?"

"Well, Sierra just brightened my day," Jack said with a huge grin. "Go on, tell her what you just told us."

Sierra laughed and turned to face Ashanti. "I heard about this from a friend who works at the new casino in Jasper. Vince's parents made him get a job over the summer, and he ended up working as a valet."

"Oh, Jack's favorite school bully." Ashanti arched an eyebrow. "So how did that brighten your day? Did he get fired or something?"

"Yeah, but there's more to it." Sierra giggled. "He lasted two days before he had to deal with a rude customer. I mean, a really rude one. Total asshole."

"Even worse than Vince?"

"From what Sierra told us," Jack said, "this guy is probably what Vince will be when he's in his forties. Like, Vince cranked up to eleven."

Sierra nodded. "Just verbally walked all over him. Snapped at him, hurled insults, acted like his shit doesn't stink just because he has a lot of money. Vince can dish it out, but he can't take it. The guy threw his keys at him and walked on into the casino, so Vince parked the car and then ... got a rather interesting kind of revenge."

Jack burst out laughing. "I never thought I'd say this, but I kinda have a grudging respect for Vince now."

"Why? What did he do?"

"He jerked off in the guy's car!" Sierra screamed with laughter and slumped over the table until she caught her breath.

"Seriously?" Ashanti's jaw dropped.

"Yep!" Sierra took a few more breaths. "Jizzed all over the steering wheel and the dashboard. Guess he thought the guy wouldn't figure out who did it. Whatever he was thinking --"

"Sounds like he wasn't thinking. The very first suspect would be the valet he pissed off."

"Yeah. I'd never try anything like that." Jack shook his head slowly. "I've done some stupid things, but even if it crossed my mind, my first thought would be that someone will find out what I just did."