[ti]Ep 2.5[/ti]Up to Mars (closed)

[Deleted]

Week 2 Day 6 – Time: 1430
Location: R-4809

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Carly crossed her fingers and prayed for a cool Autobot.

I mean, she had a cool Autobot right in front of her. Okay, ex-Autobot. The tank sat in the shade of a nearby Joshua tree in its blue and black urban camouflage paint and loomed very impressively. Even at low idle the rumble of its engine thundered through the ground. She had personally witnessed that tank wipe out a bunker on a cratered hillside two miles away with a single howling shot from its main gun. Once he had walked out of the desert with a bleeding wound under his arm, patched up with a ROAD SIGN, zero rounds left in his machine guns, and four fresh kills to his name. He could be cool and even a bit intimidating!

Just…

Not at this particular moment.

Carly leaned back on the hood of the car, kicked her heels against the bumper, and resignedly listened to the unfolding grown-ass adult discussion.

“Look, I don’t claim to have any great insight into the argument,” said the grown-ass tank. “I acknowledge my ignorance on the subject. I’m just saying that the moment she put an entire lit cigarette into her mouth was the moment she won my vote.”

“Okay, yeah, that’s fair.”

The grown-ass man sitting beside Carly nodded diplomatically. “That's fair, and you’re entitled to your opinion. But can we at least agree that Shelley Long paved the way for the introduction of Kelsey Grammer’s character, and that she was irreplaceable for that fact alone?”

“I didn’t like her. Carla was right. Too stuck up.”

“Okay, well, consider this! Through the Grammer connection we also got Neuwirth. I know you like Lilith. That's gotta be worth a point in Long’s favour, right?”

Grudgingly, the tank said, “Yeah, maybe.”

Carly resisted the urge to put her face in her hands.

She really couldn’t have predicted her day would go like this. Breakfast granola, coffee at the base admin office. A two-hour briefing about the upcoming series of test trials that Black Rock aimed to perform in coordination with willing Autobot volunteers, all very grim and professional. Now there was highly sophisticated equipment crammed in the trunk of Agent Washburn’s car, a top secret military satellite was monitoring their transmissions for a top secret military field trial… and she was sitting out in the desert listening to a Department of Defence agent and Black Rock's own Murder Machine argue over casting choices for an eighties sitcom. What was her life! Christmas with the family was going to be interesting this year. How is your new job with the military going, honey? Great, mom! I designed a bunch of drones and made a Netflix account for a giant space robot. He's getting a bit intense about it. Pass the gravy, please!

And this was only the first trial! A prelude, sorta.

Carly silently prayed for the assistance of an Autobot who was nice and friendly, and maybe also a bit of a badass. Max said he had specifically requested a scout, if one could be spared. Scouts were quick and shrewd, which was exactly what they were looking for. Please be cool, please be cool. Max himself had lost a few cool guy points the instant he'd bought that cell phone. And where had he gotten that from anyway? When she'd asked him he'd just said Vegas slot money. Good Christ. Some days it was difficult to remember that he was a death tank from an alien planet ravaged by war. Then she'd remember the time he bare-handed snatched an interceptor missile out of the air and deliberately allowed it to detonate in his fist just to prove a point, and it all came rushing back to her. That had been an exciting day on the test range, wow!

She became dimly aware that someone was asking her something. Oh, it was Agent Washburn, hooray.

“Don’t look at me!” she said. “I'm trying to internally go over my notes for the test. Besides, I’m a Woody fan. Did you see what Harrelson looked like back then? Rawl!”

She made squeezy motions with both hands and grinned. She was a proper grown-ass woman sometimes. A grown-ass woman who was gonna meet another Autobot in like five minutes! Not gonna lie, this job could be pretty amazing sometimes.

Carly leaned back and smiled into the blazing Nevada sunshine. She was happy to wait.

[Javelin]

Freedom.

Engine humming as the blue vehicle moved along the highway, Javelin’s spark was like a bird, soaring.

Freedom.

Being able to get away from the base, to really put some serious cycles on her wheels, had been like a dream come true to the scout. She understood the buddy system was needed, understood the need to remain low profile.

She understood all of it.

But it wasn’t easy.

Javelin had always been fast, eager to just take off and go. Breaking speed records wasn’t the point, just going was. Being free. Not having to be anywhere, just enjoying the utter joy of the wind over her mesh, the satisfying connection between road and wheel. Just seeing what was around the next corner, what was over that hill.

And she had been forced to lay low.

The blue scout, upon being asked if she would consider volunteering for this, jumped at the chance, and was quick to ask that she not be ground bridged all the way to the rendezvous point. Just enough to be safe if she were attacked, but leave enough space for just driving.

Even when she had left the tarmac and eased down onto the sandy, rocky ground, it had been enjoyable. Ignoring the occasional pings of rocks against her undercarriage, she had been free to open up completely, not worry about traffic, catching some human police officer’s eye. And oh, the drifting was so sweet...

She kept moving in the needed direction, however. Javelin knew they were waiting for her, and didn’t want to keep them.

So it was almost far too soon that she topped a slight ridge and saw what appeared to be two human vehicles and an Earth mode tank.

Well...either this was going to be the site of a very strange party, or these were her contacts.

A quick scan of the humans, and Javelin turned her attention to the tank.

Fortress Maximus.

She had certainly heard of him. Who hadn’t? If even half the rumors she had heard were true, she was about to meet what was practically a legend among Autobots and Decepticons alike, though for different reasons. No matter where you travelled, you heard something about the one time warden of the prison, and what had happened.

Rumours circled that he was a danger to everyone around him, that he could snap at any moment, that he had gone insane due to his torture.

Javelin wasn’t sure what she believed. As in most cases, she decided she'd make up her own mind.

Dropping her speed to a more respectable number, Javelin slipped up her holoform, and carefully made her way over to where the others were gathered.

The telltale cloud of dust still following her slightly, the blue vehicle gently rumbled up to stop alongside the human vehicles. There was a slight pause, the driver’s door opened, and Javelin’s holoform stepped out.

At 5’3”, the holoform was short. Slender frame, she had copper shoulder length hair. A khaki safari booney sun hat worn at a slight angle back from her face. Black tank top, covered with a black and white checkered short sleeved blouse, tied at the waist. She wore dark green cargo shorts that fell just above the knee. On her feet were what appeared to be battered army boots. Around her neck she wore a ball chain necklace, the pendant being a rough rectangular piece of silver metal. It looked old, and like it had been handled a great deal, the shine no longer upon it. Her skin was pale, and damn near every inch of it was lightly freckled. Her eyes were a vivid green.

Walking towards the gathered humans, Javelin raised a hand in greeting, smiling broadly.

“Hi! Uh....I think I was sent to help you guys with something you’re working on?”

[Deleted]

The two humans gawped at her.

They sat side by side on the hood of a silver sedan, as if comfortably waiting for the show to start at a drive-in theatre. The girl wore a dusty white button-down shirt over a pair of khaki shorts, and black runners. Her blonde hair was drawn up into a springy ponytail at the back of her head. Her blue eyes were pop-bottle wide with awe. She grabbed the arm of the man sitting beside her, and he winced.

"Oh my god!" she blurted. "Yes! You are! Hello! Oh my gosh. You're the Autobot! Oh my god! You're a girl! There are girl Autobots!" An inner twelve-year old shone through her delighted gaze as she shook the man's arm.

The man gently tried to pry his way loose. He wore most of a suit – the jacket and tie were long gone, and his shirt was pulled out of his dark trousers, the sleeves rolled up to reveal long pale forearms. In sunglasses and shirttails, his brown hair tousled, he looked very much like a debauched rock star.

"Believe me, Carly, I noticed," he said, grinning. "Erm, sorry, Miss – er, Autobot. We've been out in the sun a lot today. It's nice to meet you."

Carly slid off the hood of the car and approached Javelin shyly.

"It is! It's great to meet you," she said. "I'm Carly! I work as a private contractor for the Black Rock base. Um. Engineering! And this is Peter – uh, Agent Washburn. He's with the Department of Defense."

The DoD man's feet hit the dirt. He brushed dust off the seat of his pants and gave a little wave with an easy-going smile.

Carly turned. "And that back there is Maximus! I don't know if you two have met or not...?"

The tank transformed. Dust flew off his plating as joints and armour shifted around itself and reformed into the massive figure of the stone-faced warden. He straightened to his full height as the treads of his vehicle mode settled and locked into position on his back. His red optics fell upon Javelin and studied her.

"We haven't," he said. "Thanks for coming out."

[Javelin]

At first, Javelin thought she had goofed a goof of the highest order. The way they stared, silent. Had she forgotten to make clothing on her holoform? Had she accidentally used an incorrect version and was standing there looking at them as a walking, talking ball of ooze?

How fast could she run away and pray they thought it was some weird dream?

But the human woman’s sudden blurted response gave her an overwhelming sense of relief.

The two humans seemed pleased to see her, and that gave the blue scout an even better feeling of relief.

Smiling at the woman’s apparent sense of surprise, Javelin spoke, gently laughing.

“Oh, uh..yes! Autobots come in girls too! All Cybertronians do. Lots of different makes and models!”

She wondered if she should offer her hand to shake, but from what she could remember of that ritual, it was more formal, and she didn’t think it really fit here. Certainly the two humans here seemed informal in their greeting to her.

After they introduced themselves, Javelin committing their names and features to memory, she spoke, resting her hands on her hips, head slightly tilted, a smile on her face.

“Carly and Agent Peter Washburn. A pleasure to meet the both of you.”

Although she didn’t look at him directly, the blue scout had been keeping the tank in her peripheral vision while speaking, so when Maximus suddenly lurched into transformation, she was ready.

When Javelin would go over the meeting again at a later date, she would pride herself on the fact she had been able to keep from gawking herself, much as the two humans had when she first arrived.

Oh Primus he is big.

Javelin had spent a lot of time in the company of large mecha. Time spent in some of the bars of Kaon had introduced her to the larger classes; miners, construction workers, drillers. She was comfortable around the big bots.

But she had never seen one as large as Fortress Maximus.

When he spoke, she turned, looking up to meet his optics, nodding politely. Then, she smiled brightly, her usual inner self rising to the surface.

“No, thanks for asking! I’m glad to help allies out, and downright happy to be out of the base for a while! I think I was starting to get a little confinement fever.”

Looking back towards Carly and Washburn, she nodded again.

“So, what is it you need me to do? I was given a slight idea of what you guys are doing, but a little more information wouldn’t hurt.”

[Deleted]

Maximus gave a wry but understanding nod at the mention of cabin fever. Agent Washburn lounged up to join Carly, his hands in his pockets.

"Are you gonna answer the lady, or catch flies?" he said.

He gave her a playful nudge with his elbow. Carly quickly snapped her mouth shut and blinked.

"Oh! Oh, sorry," she said sheepishly. "Sorry, this is all just a little new and – super cool to me. Oh man! Okay, lemme give you the lowdown."

Looking contrite, she folded her hands together in front of her. "Okay! So! Without going into huge detail, since those are seriously like two hour briefings that nobody wants to sit through, we've figured out that we have a hard time tracking you guys while you're on Earth."

"Which is good for the Autobots, since I sorta gather you want to keep a low profile anyway to avoid alarming the general population," said Washburn. "Which we really appreciate at the DoD, seeing as it makes our jobs a hell of a lot easier. 'Ahh, a giant robot is standing in the middle of Busch Gardens, help!' 'Eee, aliens are invading New York, more news at eleven,' 'Aagh, a dinosaur is drinking out of my pool, call the Feds!'"

With a look of mock horror he theatrically raised his thumbs and forefingers in the shape of a picture frame, as if storyboarding a scene of disaster, before letting his arms drop. "Seriously, we get those calls a lot."

Carly nodded.

"But on the downside, it also means that in a combat scenario, it makes friendly fire really hard to avoid," she said. Her manner grew serious. "And… we want to be good allies. We want to be able to potentially assist in a fight without getting one of your people accidentally shot. Or help search for them if someone goes missing. Does that make sense? I hope we don't sound like… creepy stalkers or something."

[Javelin]

Listening to Carly, Javelin nodded, taking in the information.

As she listened, her processor mulled it over. While the idea wasn’t new…Javelin honestly wasn’t sure what she thought of it.

She had been on many other planets. It was part of her job, seeking out Decepticon bases hidden among alien cities and cultures. And while both the Autobots and Decepticons didn’t share their technology with other, less developed races, it didn’t mean they didn’t leave a mark when they left.

There was a reason there were planets in the universe that did not allow mecha, and especially Cybertronians, on-world. No exceptions.

There were a few planets where Cybertronains would be shot on sight.

There had been times Javelin had been forced to lie extremely low, and once she had had to be rescued from an extremely hostile planet under cover of darkness.

Javelin didn’t think Earth would turn on them. Certainly she knew Fowler’s people wouldn’t. But look at MECH already. Was it a good idea helping an alien species - even a currently friendly one - gain the ability to bypass their disguises?

All this ran through the femme’s mind within seconds, before she silently brushed it off and put it away. She had to trust. She had to trust Optimus and these humans who certainly seemed friendly enough. She couldn’t allow paranoia and distrust to come creeping into her mind and set up shop.

That way lay darkness. And she had already been there once. The path back had been difficult, and long.

Meeting Carly and Washburn’s eyes, she smiled, and nodded, “Oh, no, no stalker. It’s all good! Hey, anything that helps, right? Gotta work together - makes sense to do it right."

The smile half slipped from her face, “Oh, hey, gimme a sec, don’t really need this now, do I?”

The holoform flashed them a reassuring smile, then lowered it’s head, as if studying her shoes. There was a pause, and it suddenly fizzled out, almost appearing like a test pattern on an old TV before vanishing.

The blue vehicle eased back a few feet so as not to crowd the humans, and then Javelin transformed.

She was much quieter than Max had been - there literally wasn’t as much to move about, but there was still a dizzying, oddly familiar yet unrecognisible pattern of plates shifting, parts expanding or contracting, small gears appearing and vanishing within the blink of an eye, and suddenly the blue scout stood before them, looking down. Javelin gave a brief, almost cat-like mini shake of her left leg as if shaking out a small cramp, and then she smiled.

“Much better.”