And a Star to Steer her by

Chapter 1

Author's note: I have to apologize for taking so long with this. My life completely fell apart over the past year or so and I'm now living in a homeless shelter, so I've had a lot of other stuff I've needed to focus on. I've finally managed to focus enough to start working on the story despite the constant loud, distracting noises in the shelter. Apologies in advance in case I take a while to post new chapters. Life is likely to be disrupted even more before things settle down ...

*****

"Wow. Get a load of that." General Sanchez stood in front of the huge monitor and pointed at the image of Terwilliger jogging toward a car. Terwilliger had added short pink fur to his armor and big bunny ears to his helmet. Then he noticed the gamer tag hovering above Terwilliger's avatar and snickered: Boris Jackov.

In the corner of Sanchez's eye, several of the people seated at control panels around the observation room glanced at the screen and did a double-take. The human-size Pretender bodies piloted by Optimus, Elia-1, and Strika stood beside Sanchez and watched without reacting to the bizarre sight. Optimus and Strika were too stoic to comment on it and Elita probably just hadn't been on Earth long enough to notice anything unusual.

"Terwilliger seems to have taken a level in goofiness," one of the men behind Sanchez muttered. "Dunno if I could take him seriously on the battlefield."

"Yeah, I suppose." Sanchez shrugged. "On the other hand, if I saw that coming over a hill and pointing an assault rifle at me, I think I'd shit my goddamn pants."

Laughter rippled around the room and Sanchez turned to Strika.

"Commendable job on the simulation, by the way. Interesting that you chose to base it on GTA Online, though."

"The combat simulation I saw Mr. Darby and the others participating in two months ago gave me a few ideas. I acquired a copy of the simulation, examined its code, and developed a fully-immersive virtual-reality version. Mr. Terwilliger and a few others requested some additional features, such as the option to more extensively customize their avatars, and I saw no reason not to grant their requests."

Sanchez grinned. "It's not a combat simulation, it's a video game. But this is a worthwhile experiment. We could use it as a springboard for developing an original training simulation without using someone else's intellectual property." He glanced at Strika again. "What's the mission objective?"

"This one is simple: Steal two of the 'Lazer' jet fighters from Fort Zancudo. I wanted to see how the team functions together, mainly. When I was in battle with them, I was able to see only part of the overall picture. This will give me a chance to observe them from a broader perspective before they go on leave."

"Makes sense. It'll give you a better look at their dynamics and how they improvise to deal with unexpected changes." Assuming they take it seriously. Sanchez glanced at Terwilliger's pink-bunny armor and held in another laugh. "One thing I learned while playing GTA with my granddaughter is that unexpected changes happen all the time, especially in a public session with a bunch of 'tryhards' harassing other players."

On the screen, the team lined up near their vehicles. Jack and Arcee got into his Coil Brawler, which had to be weird for Arcee because her alternate mode in real life was a vehicle.

Sierra climbed onto her Mark I Oppressor, a motorcycle with a small rocket thruster built into it, while Smokescreen cocked his head at a very 1980s-looking car.

"Not bringing your X80 on this?"

"The X80 is still my favorite car in the game, but I thought the Stromberg might be more useful for this. It's armored and can take five or six direct rocket hits before it explodes. I figured you could drive that while I take the flying bike."