A New Dawn - Transformers Prime (4)

Chapter Five

   "Interesting," Ratchet said, breaking the hour long silence he'd been upholding since Finn, Miko, Jack, Raf and I had returned to the base with the body of a human looking Cybertronian.

   "Really?" Miko said, sarcasm heavy in her voice. "I knew it was cool, but interesting? Wow, we really have a lot on our hands."

   I elbowed her, and turned to the medic. "What have you found?"

   "This is a Cybertronian," he confirmed, not looking up from his magnifying lens that was held above the metal body. "But their body has been manipulated drastically to be compacted into this form."

   "So somehow this Cybertronian was shrunk," Raf piped up.

   Ratchet nodded distractedly. "Yes, though by what means, I am not entirely sure yet."

   "What about that gold dust?" I asked. "The one in the body's energon."

   "It is abnormal," he agreed. "Though its source is unknown to me at the moment as well. You said it reacted with your own silver dust, Amanda?"

   "Yeah. It fizzed and almost smoked, like they were fighting each other."

   He frowned, peering closer at the body. "Then I have a suspicion, but not enough evidence to support it. Give me more time and I'll-"

   A loud tri-tone beep interrupted him, making us all turn to the large computers on the base wall, where a message in a white box surrounded by red outlines appeared.

   C: ALERT – SUSPICIOUS ACTIVITY DETECTED. LOCATION – TEXAS, USA. TIME – 15:30. SUGGESTED COURSE OF ACTION – DEPLOY INVESTIGATION UNIT(S) IMMEDIATELY.

   "What's that from?" Jack asked.

   I frowned, furrowing my brow. "Cam. I installed her into the base's systems so that she could monitor things for us, remember?"

   "So what's this?"

   Instead of answering, I turned back to Ratchet. "Didn't you say there was a problem in Texas a couple days ago? In the desert?"

   The medic looked up finally, and nodded. "There was, but my scans turned up nothing."

   "Well obviously there was something," Miko scoffed.

   "Raf, standby Ratchet if he needs any help with that body," I said, my tone serious. "Jack, your on ground bridge duty. Finn, monitor the comms. Miko, you're with me. We're going to see what really did happen in Texas."

   They each hurried off to do as I said, but I caught Finn's hand before he could follow, causing him to give me a questioning look.

   "I need you to be ready to go at a moment's notice," I told him, lowering my voice so that only he'd hear me. "I don't know what Miko and I are walking into, and if there's trouble, I might be able to hold them off for so long."

   He nodded, a reassuring look on his face. "I'll be there. Promise."

   That lifted a weight off my shoulders, and I smiled as he leaned forward to press a quick kiss to my forehead before giving me an encouraging look. With that, I walked away from him and down the steps of the platform towards the ground bridge, which opened as I approached. I shot a look to Miko, who grinned, and then stepped through.

~~~

   We emerged from the ground bridge into an open stretch of nothing but sand.

   "Wow," Miko said, putting her hands on her hips. "It looks like those movies, where you have this one road, a bunch of desert, and tumbleweeds. Where's the cow skull at, that's the only thing we're missing."

   I smirked. "I mean, you're not wrong. It is kinda weird."

   "I'm always right," She smiled, then looked around again. "So why we here? There's nothing around."

   "Well, there was an explosion that Ratchet was investigating a couple days ago, but now it set something off in my satellite, which was why Cam sent that alert," I explained, scanning the area. "But Jack and Finn didn't want to ground bridge us to the exact coordinates to make themselves feel better about sending us in."

   "Please," she scoffed. "You have totally taken out Cons before, and I'm a perfect distraction. We can hold our own."

   "Try telling that to a couple protective boyfriends," I laughed. "Come on, the site is that way."

  We began down the broken pavement, both of us searching for whatever could have caused the trouble, when my phone rang.

   "Hey, Finn," I answered, putting it on speaker and tucking it into my pocket. "Are we on track?"

   "Yeah," Finn said. "Keep heading south. Judging by the map, you shouldn't be able to miss the site."

   "Really?" Miko made a face. "Because all I see it sand and-" she shuddered. "I think that was a lizard."

  My eyes widened. "Don't tell me you're afraid of lizards too."

  "100% sister. One of my few weaknesses."

   "So if we get attacked by a lizard, we're screwed."

   She thought for a moment, then nodded. "Yup!"

   "Nice," I sighed. "Let's just fill our pockets with rocks to throw."

   Miko let out a laugh at that, and we continued walking. I shed my plaid shirt and tied it around my waist, opting for just my tee as the heat began to hit me.

   I paused, wrinkling my nose as a slight burning smell filled the air. "Do you smell that?"

   Miko frowned, took a deep breath, then coughed. "Ew, what crashed and burned?"

   "Let's find out," I spun my wrist, summoning my powers and spreading them lightly across the sand to scan the area. There was a slight tug to the south-west, and I pointed in that direction.

   "That way," I said, walking to where I felt the tug. Only minutes later, Miko gasped next to me.

   "Whoa..." She gawked.

   "You can say that again," I muttered.

   "What?" Finn said impatiently, making us both jump. We had forgotten that he was still on the phone with us. "What is it?"

   "It's a ship," I said, my voice slightly astounded. "A Cybertronian one."