Ep 1.5 - The Unwelcome Party (Smokescreen, MECH, now open!)

[Deleted]

(Week 2, day 1 ep 1.5)

An alert tone brought him back to consciousness. For a klik, he'd struggled to fight down panic as the sound sent him back to the moment he'd first awoken on the Avengeance, a Decepticon prison ship. He was enclosed, yes. Encased. But-

He was in an escape pod. Not a containment pod. He wasn't imprisoned anymore. He was free.

The alert was to let him know the pod was approaching its pre-programmed destination and not the result of an few asteroids bouncing of the Avengeance. Smokescreen called up the holographic control interface and it soon displayed the planet where the new frontline supposedly had been drawn.

It was...blue. Smokescreen peered at it critically. Blue...? He hadn't had a formal education back on Cybertron -how could he?- so his knowledge of exoplanets was lacking. Thankfully, the pod's sensors had picked up landmasses that would be suitable for landing. Smokescreen couldn't tell whether there was something more important than the other, so he tapped a random location and hoped it wouldn't be putting him down in enemy territory. The pod's boosters started to adjust its course and prepared for the descent.

With that sorted, he settled back, retrieving an energon cube from subspace. Unlike the containment pod, he actually had enough space to fuel himself. Smokescreen grimaced as he pulled out the cube-

Don't think about where it came from or what you did to get it. It's just energon now. You need it and you didn't have a choice. Heroes can't do anyone any good if they offline from energon starvation.

-but he was going into an completely unknown situation, potentially hostile, with no prior intel. He needed to be at his best. Megatron and the Decepticons were down there. Optimus Prime himself was down on that planet.

He was going to see the Prime himself. His idol. The very mech Smokescreen wanted to be. He couldn't come so far, only to fail now.

I'm not going to let you down.

As the pod got closer, Smokescreen was startled to suddenly feel the press of digital signals. An info-net? He'd heard of them but Cybertron's had shut down long before Smokescreen had come online. Whatever it was, the programming language was alien and unrecognizable, nothing Cybertronian about it. How odd. Was there another species on the planet? He'd only scant information about his destination.

It didn't matter though, Smokescreen supposed. He'd be finding out soon enough.

The pod hit the atmosphere and shuddered hard. The heat of re-entry caused the ablative heat shields to glow red-white and even with all the protective plating, some of the heat was still able to reach Smokescreen tucked away inside it. He kept still as the pod was pitched this way and that, buffeted hard as the forces of physics all battled to take control of the descent or rip the little pod to pieces.

Then-

It plunged down, terrifyingly fast. Thrusters engaged to slow the pod down as it fell and to change the angle. All too quickly though, the pod slammed into hard earth, skidding hundreds of meters and ploughing a large trench of dirt behind it.

It took a few kliks for the pod's on-board computer to check whether everything was in order. Then clicks could be heard as its internal machinery began to open up. Light -real light, Smokescreen hadn't seen anything like it in vorns- filtered in, blinding his vision as he adjusted the parameters his optics were used to operating in. Smokescreen hauled himself forward, staggering out as his pedes touched solid ground. There was hissing steam and heat as the pod's metallic surface began to cool.

Smokescreen's balance wavered and he fell onto all fours. The Autobot stared down and marvelled at the new planet underneath his pedes. He'd spent his whole life on Cybertron, up until the point he'd been captured, then he'd spent vorns aboard the Avengeance. All this, so much of this was- new! So unfamiliar!So fragging weird!

Smokescreen lifted his head, optics off as he basked in the sunlight and laughed.

I made it! I can't believe it but I fragging made it!

His optics powered up and his joy evaporated almost as quickly as it came as he realised he had no slagging idea where he was or how he was going to find the Autobots.

Scrap.

[Deleted]

When: 1330
Where: Unknown, Spyglass camp


The call, when it came, was one they had been dreading.

"Damn it," said the radio operator.

The soldier standing guard at the entrance looked over at him quizzically. Rain thundered into the roof of the communications tent, which lay huddled against the treeline of a coniferous thicket; camouflage netting draped over it to hid it from detection. Wires climbed a nearby tree, leading to antennas concealed among the branches. The heavy drizzle beat against the mesh and canvas and dripped into silvery puddles outside.

Inside the forest lay a scattering of khaki tents. Several military transport trucks sat among them, draped in more netting. The camp was still and quiet. Like the other MECH camps that had been established across the western states in the wake of the evacuation, it had been ordered to maintain a code of silence while their pursuers searched for them.

Eleven minutes ago, that silence had been broken.

"What is it?" said the soldier.

The radio operator tore off his headset and turned away from his radio stack. The rough field equipment was covered in a sheet of plastic to ward off the worst of the moisture. Cherry lights glowed on it.

"We've got a problem," he said grimly. "You'd better get the commander."

----

It took less than two minutes for the commander to appear.

His dark body armour was wet with rain, his boots and black cargo fatigues spattered in mud. He arched a brow as he ducked into the tent.

"It's the Lightning Rod base, sir," said the operator. "We just got their call."

He passed the commander a slightly crumpled piece of paper, upon which the transcript of the formatted message had been hastily written in pencil. For security purposes the call had been relayed through two other communication systems to disguise its origin.

It was a short transcript, terse and to the point. The commander read it, frowning.

"Lightning Rod first became aware of the object's atmospheric entry through the satellite uplink, sir," said the operator. "Then the object descended into the range of their primary surveillance radar. They watched it on radar all the way to the moment of impact."

"Which means it landed somewhere close to them," said the commander.

"Yes sir, much too close for comfort - less than twenty miles from their location."

"And they're certain it's alien in origin?"

"Yes sir, quite certain."

"Lightning Rod has eight Kiowas online, doesn't it?"

"Yessir, and two gunships plus the OH-6."

"And the transports?"

"Yes sir."

The commander thought it over. He rubbed his chin.

"Good," he finally said. "Give them the order to scramble one of the gunships and two Kiowas, and to put the transports on standby. Then get me a line to their R&D unit. We might as well use this unexpected opportunity to bring the Anvil project online and gather some data."

The radio operator stared up at him. "Sir?

Silas folded the piece of paper and tucked it into a cargo pocket.

"This is a temporary problem," he said. He smiled coldly. "Let's turn it into a solution."

----

Wisps of smoke drifted up and out of Little Cottonwood Canyon.

They rose from the ship lying at the bottom of a deep valley. Mounds of earth had sheeted over the nose of the craft, burying it nearly from sight. Though the deacceleration thrusters had done a good job in controlling its decent it had still landed hard, its armoured hull carving a deep path through the silt.

The walls of the mountain slopes rose high around Smokescreen, dark and furrowed with snow at their highest peaks. Tall pine forests carpeted the hills, broken here and there by patches of rock and warm dirt. The sun shone brightly through the fluffy clouds overhead, brilliant against the blue sky. It was an idyllic scene.

Something thundered in the distance.

The sound was soft at first. It vibrated off the valley slopes. Disturbed birds rose fluttering into the air as it grew louder, more recogniseable.

Helicopters. Moving in fast.

[Deleted]

The landscape was completely unfamiliar to him. Smokescreen's optics roamed wide over pine trees, shrubbery and snow capped mountain tops all without actually comprehending what he was seeing. All his life he'd lived in the metallic confines of Cybertronian society. But as interesting as the environment was, no matter how alien-

If you're in unfamiliar territory, the first thing to do is scout out the area and find a safe point, the voice of Smokescreen's instructor growled. You need a base of operations first, some place to fall back to when everything turns to slag. Then you can start to advance forward and explore the rest of your environment.

Smokescreen set off immediately. The escape pod didn't have anything to offer him other than a smoking beacon to his location. He decided to head for higher ground so that he'd be able to survey the area and get a better idea on his position. Smokescreen set off at a brisk but leisurely pace, treading up the rocky ground. There was no need to expend more energy than required, he might be needing those reserves later on-

The Autobot's audials pricked. The distant thrum of airborne vehicles reached him. That he recognised, even on this alien world. Fliers. Or something similar. Decepticons or Autobots? He couldn't tell. Smokescreen's lip-plates pulled together as he frowned thoughtfully. It would be better to err on the side of caution until he could get a handle on what he was dealing with. Continue on his upwards path? The cover provided by those strange green structures thinned the further up the mountain he climbed. And if those approaching forces were hostile and in sufficient numbers he didn't want to get trapped up there.

Down then. There would be more space to run and more cover. Possibly even use his alt-mode. Smokescreen altered his course, ensuring that he was not looping back to the crash site, rather taking an arching path away from it. He was cutting horizontally across the hillside, not heading precisely down into the valley but along it. He adjusted his pace, speeding it up into a brisk run. He needed to move quickly but carefully, not exactly trusting the strange organic earth beneath his pedes. It crumbled so easily...

Maybe he could try pinging his Autobot comm lines. They were wildly out of date though, dating back to the fall of Iacon. The Cons had probably decoded the encryptions by now. It'd be a huge risk, especially if they weren't friendly.

Comm channel's a last resort. Get outta sight, find some place to hide, figure out what I'm dealing with. Sounds like a plan.

Seemed simple enough.

[Deleted]

Before long, the first helicopter appeared in the sky behind him.

It was a small single-engine aircraft with a bubble canopy and skids. Its paint was a dark matte grey; no registration marks could be seen anywhere on its tail or fuselage. It came to a halt directly over the landing site and hovered there, turning slowly around the pillar of smoke that gently rose from the downed ship. Its side door was open, revealing a glimpse of the pilot and passenger inside.

Both wore dark fatigues. The passenger leaned far out of the door and focused a pair of binoculars on the ship. He slapped the pilot's shoulder and pointed down at it, then to something leading away into the forest.

It was Smokescreen's trail, the path of disturbed brush and trampled earth that he had left behind him as he ran along the valley.

The little helicopter banked sharply. Its motor whined as it peeled out over the forest, heading in Smokescreen's direction. With a roar of wind and a waft of Jet A fumes it roared over him, its downwash beating at the tops of the pine trees and making them thrash. Then it was gone, hunting over another patch of hills.

Lucky. Perhaps it hadn't spotted him.

But within minutes another pair of helicopters had swarmed into the sky over his abandoned ship.

These two were much bigger than the first, and noisier, matte black brutes with twin weapons pylons mounted on either side of the fuselage. One pylon carried a rocket pod. The other bore a .50 calibre machine gun. A knife-like wire strike blade jutted over each of their cockpits like a horn. Like the first helicopter they were unmarked, from the tips of their tail rotor to each blunt and well-armed nose.

Together, they flew one circuit around the ship. If they were communicating between each other Smokescreen would not be able to detect it over his own radio; whatever frequency they used was unknown to him. Then, with a throaty roar of their engines, they peeled off. They did not bank and turn back and forth over the treetops like the little observation helicopter had, searching for him. They flew together in an attack formation, straight for his heels as he ran through the thicket.

In this strange land of green trees and green foliage and mossy brown rock, Smokescreen's crisp white paint gleamed through the branches like a beacon.

[Deleted]

No spark signatures. Damn.

Smokescreen kept running, weaving amongst the pine trees as the two air vehicles followed him. In his young life, he'd never encountered Spec Ops and the likes and so and did not know spark signals could be masked. To him, the vehicles chasing him lacked sparks, therefore they were not living Cybertronians. They could be drones or, he recalled the alien info-net he'd brushed past on the way down, they could belong to whatever native lifeforms lived on this planet.

If they were native, attacking them without provacation would be breaking the Code of Interplanetary Conflict. Smokescreen had most of rules and laws drilled into him after he'd been awoken from stasis in Iacon's ruins and rescued. That old mech who never gave Smokescreen his name had educated the young bot on a lot of things.

They hadn't engage in hostilities yet but that didn't mean anything. Until he could he was certain of their intentions, he would treat them as possible hostiles. Smokescreen wasn't ignorant to the weapons aboard the hover vehicles. Those he could recognize even at a glance, despite their alien design.

Engaging in combat should be your last resort. Smokescreen could almost imagine Razorbolt, his old instructor, staring down all the new Elite Guard recruits. If there is any uncertainty in your processor about who you are dealing with, then withdraw. You must be certain of hostile intent before you choose to attack, lest you risk harming an innocent party.

The insignia on Smokescreen's armor might not mean anything anymore, the Elite Guard could be gone for all he knew. But he would not tarnish the training he'd been given or taint the name of the Elite Guard.

So running it was, keeping an optic out for any places he could hide. And-

::Unknown fliers, state your designations and intention:: he could try to communicate. ::Designation: Smokescreen. Status: non-hostile::

Of course, Smokescreen had not had the chance to download a language pack and it did not occur to him that the natives wouldn't be able to understand him. Both the Autobots and Decepticons had a presence on this planet, so why wouldn't they?

[Deleted]

Smokescreen's well-intentioned radio call was met with silence.

Behind him, the helicopters were drawing near. Hindered by trees and rock, he could not run as fast as they could fly; the sound of their rotors thumping the air grew louder and louder. The big pines offered him decent shelter at least. Their trunks were broad, their branches thick with needles that formed a bitter-scented canopy overhead. Rotten stumps and fallen trees lay across the forest floor, their roots torn up and their limbs broken.

Sunlight flickered down between the trees as he ran. Scraps of blue sky could be glimpsed through the tops of the trees. Insects hummed in the warm valley air.

The little observation helicopter buzzed directly overhead. It weaved back and forth above him before peeling off sharply.

A moment later a concentrated burst of gunfire fire tore through the trees.

The bullets shredded branches and struck hard into the trucks. Bits of mulched bark peppered against Smokescreen's armour as the bullets spat into the soft earth around his feet. Two seconds later another burst rippled down into the forest somewhere to his left. The line of gunfire walked through a dead tree and ripped it apart, throwing a haze of splinters across his path.

[Deleted]

The air vehicles hadn't responded. Drones, maybe? Smokescreen had never been on an organic planet before nor had he ever seen an organic species. He knew they existed in a textbook sort of sense. If he was receiving readings of the native creatures it was highly unlikely he'd even understand or recognize what his sensors were picking up.

What Smokescreen did know was that he was under attack. Whatever ordnance the fliers were loaded with, it had ripped apart the brown and green things he'd been eying up for cover. The Autobot cursed, throwing himself into a roll to dodge the gunfire, coming up with his blasters pointed straight at his attackers. Without hesitation he started firing as he acquired a targeting lock. On his pedes once more, he also started weaving through the forest, sticking close to whatever could provide cover but knowing it could fall apart at any moment meant he was leery of keeping still for more than a few astroseconds.

Okay, there's only three of them. I can take 'em down, no problem. This is my chance, a shot at real combat. Just need to keep moving and keep firing.

If he did somehow -Smokescreen internally scoffed at this- manage to get over his head, that's when he'd start broadcasting an Autobot distress signal.

[Deleted]

The little observation helicopter whined above him again, flying directly over his zig-zagging path.

Whatever it radioed to the pursuing gunships made them veer smartly to avoid Smokescreen's blaster fire as it lanced up through the trees. Neither helicopter was hit, but they were forced to break off their attack. He would hear the shrill roar of their engines as they banked away, each in a different direction, trying to make themselves a harder target to hit.

Meanwhile, ahead of Smokescreen the terrain dipped into a narrow gulch, at the bottom of which ran a cold and rocky creek. The water ran quickly, flowing cold and swift from the mountain peaks. Few trees grew along the pebbly shore. The creek bed was shallow enough that it would be easy for him to run at a quick pace through the water, but fewer trees meant that it was more open to fire from above. On the opposite bank the ground rose up steeply again, climbing into a dense copse of pine trees. It would be harder to run in the trees, but they would offer the white Autobot better cover from the helicopters.

Meanwhile, one of the gunships had circled back around into an attack position.

The black helicopter was quite nimble. It flew behind Smokescreen, pursuing him easily. It's gun chattered again, spitting tracer sparks into the ground behind him. Then, with a burst of noise and smoke it fired two rockets directly at the Autobot and broke off pursuit, banking hard to get itself away from the explosion.

The rockets streaked down into the trees. Whether he Smokescreen could avoid them before they struck something and detonated would be up to timing and reflexes...!

[Deleted]

Yeah, that's right. You better run. There's a lot more where that came from.

Smokescreen's smug elation over forcing the chopper vehicles to break off their attack and onto the defensive didn't last long. The terrain in front of him dropped and suddenly he was out of cover.

Across from him, more of those odd organic structures. They were clustered more strongly together. More cover but at the cost of his manuoverability? Smokescreen frowned as he weighed up the costs. He couldn't go back, more enemies might be on their way. But there was that steam of something...

The only water Smokescreen had ever encountered before had been Cybertron's acidic rain, capable of stripping a mech down to his protoform if he was exposed to it for too long. This didn't look like the same stuff nor would it take him long to cross it. But still, the young Autobot baulked at the unknown substance.

The decision was taken out of his servos when one copter flew out on behind him, guns blazing. Smokescreen plunged down into the gully, bullets biting into the dirt behind him. There was a loud sound, Smokescreen's helm jolted up, his optics widening at the sight of two rockets heading straight for him and the chopper banking away.

The Autobot threw himself to the side, rolling to his pedes. The missiles sank into the ground and detonated, spraying bits of the creek into the air. Smokescreen quickly scanned the air in case the chopper was coming back for another round.

That's it. No way I'm staying out in the open.

Smokescreen dashed across the clearing, praying that he hadn't doomed his pedes to corrosion as he splashed through the water. The Autobot's pace slowed when he reached the forest again, the foliage was thicker now, branches and pine needles breaking as he moved through. His optics were fixed on sweeping the sky, alert for another round of attacks.

This isn't over yet.

[Deleted]

The trees closed in around Smokescreen, green and thick. Towering trunks barred his path and knotted roots snatched at his feet. Branches scraped across his limbs and scratched his paint as he ran. Needles pelted down and crunched unpleasantly into his joints, sticky with sap. It would take effort to push and struggle through the forest.

But it did the trick.

Smoke rose up behind him from the blackened crater in the ground where the rockets had struck. It blew with the wind and formed a layer of haze over the top of the forest. One of the gunship helicopters hovered over the smoke, sending it whirling up through its rotors. It pivoted, searching for signs of fiery wreckage in the trees.

It was looking to see if the rockets had struck and killed him.

The pine needles were dense enough that they nearly blocked out the sun overhead. But in the distance Smokescreen would be able to pick out the dull roar of the second gunship as it prowled along the creek bed, following the path the water made as it cut through the valley. If he had bolted that way he would have been spotted for sure. The trees were awkward and hard to jostle through, but they were giving him cover.

Better yet, while the helicopters could not yet see him, he could still hear them.

The little observation helicopter was buzzing at treetop height less than a mile west of his position, seeking in vain to pick up whatever trail he was mangling through the brush. But the hovering gunship had not yet moved from the smoking crater. The sound of its rotor echoed loudly down through the trees, clear enough for his sharp audials to track and locate its position based on sound alone.

A slim window of opportunity.

[Deleted]

He'd lost them. Smokescreen had stopped, kneeling down beside a large pine to make himself a harder target to spot amongst the trees. For the moment, the copters didn't have his location. He could continue forward and hope that they didn't pick up his path again or-

He could go on the offensive.

Smokescreen was listening intensively, the choppers' rotor blades were loud and a clear indication to where they were. One of the bigger ones had split off, heading down the valley before it quickly faded from his audials. Mentally, Smokescreen mapped its path vector, it was following that stream of liquid. The Autobot glanced down at his pedes, which were still doing fine and hadn't corroded off yet. Whatever that stuff was, it seemed harmless.

He could hear the much lighter engine, the smaller craft sweeping somewhere along the tree line to his west. That one hadn't joined in the assault for him and it was smaller and quicker than the others. Smokescreen's optics narrowed. Scout. Tracker. But taking it out wouldn't achieve much, it was faster than the others yes, but they still had enough speed to catch up with him. Smokescreen couldn't outrun them. He had to take them out.

That left the bigger one he could still hear back at the clearing. It was much closer than the rest, its loud rotor chugging away. Attack it. Disable it, destroy it. Then, he'd need to change his position before the others were drawn back to their location. Maybe travel up the stream, up the mountain and then re-enter the thick forest on this side of the stream. Or even head back across it, to the thinner forest and see if he could take them out from there...no, it'd be easier to spot him on the other side and that wasn't worth the unexpected angle of attack. He couldn't rely on the cover the thicker forest provide forever but he could use it to hopefully take down both of the heavier choppers and then simply take out the scout copter at his leisure. Or, if it fled, then put as much distance between this place and himself.

The debate had only taken him an astroseconds to resolve. Smokescreen began to backtrack a bit, listening to that rotor. He made no efforts to be quiet, after all there was no way for the copter to hear him, but he did try to prevent the foliage from shaking and giving away his position from above. When he felt he was close enough, not so close that he could actually see the fragging thing but was still concealed, Smokescreen stopped and listened. His targeting systems began to build a lock simply from the audial data alone. He'd shoot, then push through the forest back to the clearing because there was no way he was dodging another round of missiles down here. If he was lucky, he'd have taken down the copter in one hit and would be free to move on. If not, then it was a firefight on his servos.

Smokescreen raised both blasters. A shot built up in both weapons. Then he started firing.

[Deleted]

Smokescreen was young, but well trained. And his aim was good.

His blaster shots lanced up through the trees. Guided by the sound of the thumping rotors alone, he would be able to draw a bead on the large black gunship that lingered over the clearing.

The first shot missed, the blast scorching just over the helicopter's glass canopy. But before it could wheel about and escape his second blast struck it squarely in the tail boom and exploded through it, effortlessly ripping the helicopter in half.

The results were catastrophic.

Metal debris hailed down into the trees as fire rippled up through the fuselage. The tail boom fell spinning into the forest, where it struck the dense and shredded everything it touched, tearing and collapsing through the trees. The rest of the helicopter spun helplessly into the trees, where it impacted with a deafening roar and collapsed into the thicket, tearing and collapsing as it fell. Fire gouted up through the branches an instant later, heaving black smoke into the sky.

Immediately the little observation helicopter came whining in, swirling over the crash site. Though Smokescreen was not on any frequency it was using it was not hard to imagine that it was broadcasting frantically, calling for survivors or calling for mayday - one or the other.

In the distance the second gunship roared. It sounded like it had broken off its search over the creek and was doubling back.

[Deleted]

Smokescreen cleared the forest in time to watch the chopper explode. Lip-plates drawn sternly together, he started running up along the tree line, not standing around to watch it crash. His head was tilted though as he ran, out of the corner of his optic, he was peripherally aware of the copter going down across the stream.

The slope began to tilt as he gained a bit of altitude, heading up the mountain. He could hear the other two choppers gaining in the distance, they had to be investigating the crash site. It was time for him to vanish again, Smokescreen ducked into the forest, pushing through and breaking thick foliage and branches in his path. His armor was getting coated in the organic stuff, pins and leaves were getting trapped in the sap sticking to him.

That was one enemy down. Now just two to go.

He could trek back towards the clearing and try to take out the second chopper using the same trick. They hadn't seen how he'd taken down the other copter. But-no. Too risky. They were aware that Smokescreen had managed to destroy one and would be on their guard for another attack. So long as he remained in the forest, he held the slight advantage in that he'd be able to hear them long before they would see him and could -possibly?- shoot them down before they got to him. Hopefully.

The young Autobot began to move again, slowly, carefully through the tangled forest. Time to put some distance between him and his pursuers. Maybe he could find a better position for defending himself.

[Deleted]

The sound of the helicopters faded behind him as Smokescreen climbed the slope.

The dense branches overhead hid the gunship from sight as it thundered past, heading towards the crash site. The little observation helicopter had broken off and was already beginning to circle, searching for him. It was still at least half a mile southwest of him however, and the longer Smokescreen ran the further it faded behind him.

It would likely not take long before it discovered his trail, however. The Autobot left a path of trodden branches and underbrush in his wake, though luckily much of it lay hidden beneath the pine trees.

By the time he had slowed to pick a path through the bramble he had arrived at the foot of a rocky incline. Beneath his feet the forest soil turned into a layer of grass and moss on bare stone. Broken shale lay scattered upon the hill, which steadily climbed for thousands of feet until it peaked into a jagged mountain ridge, draped in snow.

Less than five hundred feet ahead of him the trees began to thin, growing stunted and sparse. It looked as if the further he climbed up the hill the less cover he would have. But from his position he could turn back the way he had come and look down into the valley. If he looked carefully he would be able to see the black gunship helicopter prowling over the treetops, keeping low and fast in order to use the terrain to shield it from attack.

And then... Smokescreen would be able to hear a new sound.

A distant roar at first, but growing louder by the second. It reverberated off the valley slopes in bellowing echoes. Before long he would be able to pinpoint where it was coming from:

Somewhere high above him.

[Deleted]

You have go to be fragging kidding me.

Smokescreen had travelled far enough that he was able to turn around and survey down into the valley. The black gunship was still far beneath him, flitting above the tree tops though the scout had disappeared from view. One enemy position marked, the young Autobot had been pondering his next move -what would Razorbolt do?- when his audials had picked the roar of what Smokescreen was certain was another enemy. Or more, even. Bearing down above him.

That immediately ruled of the slope. Cover was scarce up there and he really hadn't been considering continuing on his upward path anyway. So he started heading east through the forest instead, away from the gunship, his audials alert for this new threat. Head east, then start a wide loop to see if he could flank the gunship and attack.

He couldn't stay on the defensive forever. Smokescreen knew it was only a matter of time before they found him in the forest. He'd made good use of it as cover but it wasn't going to last him much longer. With another enemy incoming, his best bet was to try and shoot down the gunship before they could regroup and concentrate their efforts. Smokescreen's position was still unknown to them, though the path he left behind him might be visible from the air. He, on the other servo, could easily hear the roar of those rotors and engines and it was this he used to navigate through the thick foliage.

Given that his enemies were airborne, Smokescreen had made the unwelcome realisation that he probably wouldn't be able to exit the valley without being seen. They needed to be taken down first before he could escape.