Showdown

A massive blue, metal hand gripped Glyph’s shoulder as it thrust her to her knees. Tap-Out was kneeling beside her, Energon leaking from a dangerous gash on his forehead and crumpled shoulder armor. For her part, Glyph wasn’t nearly as worse off — it seemed that she had only sustained superficial injuries to her armor, with small holes pierced through it only damaging non-essential systems. Their paint had begun to bubble and peel at its fringes, and green corrosion could be seen just narrowly creeping from various cracks, crevasses and various other folds in their armor. They were in rough shape — that much was clear from first glance — and as far as Barricade was concerned, that was enough.

He limped forward, turning a corner around a large crater in the road. Glyph and Tap-Out had given them quite the merry chase, but it was time for the duo to welcome their inevitable defeat. Surely, were it not for the Autobot’s intervention, things would have gone more smoothly, and with less loss in terms of their forces considering the deaths of two Seekers, but losing a Seeker or two was well within what Barricade liked to call “acceptable losses”. Wincing with his piercing red eyes, he staggered forward on a limp, broken knee. A scorched laser mark caressed its shape and Energon trickled down from the wound to his feet. Prowl must have gotten rusty with his aim over the years.

“Mudflap! Report.” Barricade barked, his smooth voice sounding hoarse from contending with the rain.

A massive, blue mercenary stood behind the kneeling car transformers, his green eyes smiling over his yellow face. With the massive crane arm attached under his left arm, he slowly rested it on Glyph’s shoulder, flashing the glowing, green blade. With deep, grumbling tones, the mercenary spoke.

“Caught them trying to wrap their way around back to the Autobots.” Mudflap said gruffly, sparing a moment’s glance to Tap-Out, “They didn’t have the bag with them.”

Barricade paused his approach in shock, “What? Tell me you didn’t destroy it on accident!”

Mudflap shrugged, “They just didn’t have it when I stopped them.”

A flash of orange light interrupted their conversation, then the horrible scream of a choked engine howled from the clouds. The storm thundered and screamed across the sky in an inglorious fanfare to announce its master’s arrival. A yellow and white streak shot out of the clouds and dove toward the streets below. In a flash, the triangular jet whirled in a frenzy of servos and formed a humanoid shape. Two large blasts of fire shot from the heels of a newly transformed Decepticon Seeker, slowing the pace just enough to land next to Mudflap with a heavy thud. Landing braced, the yellow and white seeker looked up with piercing red eyes, then grinned a youthful smile. With a tinny voice, she spoke.

“I think you mean we stopped them, y-y’kn-y’know?” she stuttered and stammered over her words, and sparks shot from around her head for a brief moment as a short circuit redirected itself.

Even on Barricade’s approach, he could see the sickly green lines of corrosion running from every crack and crevasse on her yellow body; even her paint bubbled and peeled at its edges despite the auto repair systems that most cybertronians had. Her face wasn’t much better off — around her cheeks and dribbling down from her eyes, acid rain scoured corrosive tears that ran down her face like mascara. She either didn’t seem to care enough to take notice of the burning sensation, or her pain receptors had been fried out long ago. Rainmakers were a sickly division of Seekers, and Barricade made a mental note not to work with them anymore if he could help it.

Mudflap groaned, “Nova Storm, I stopped them. You tried to kill them.”

Nova Storm cackled, “Oh c-come on! What’s a little acid b-bath gonna d-d-do to ‘em? It’s q-quite r-refr-refreshing. Heh.”

With a snort, Mudflap rolled his optics to glare at Nova Storm, “Well, I’m plenty ‘refreshed’. Mind turnin’ this damn rain off?”

She stifled a laugh, “Pfft. It’s rain, d-d-dum-dummy. I can bring it, but I c-can’t exactly t-t-turn it off like a l-light sw-switch. It’s like, y’know, the weather?”

She paused to knock herself on the side of her head, rattling a loose part within back in place. Glyph and Tap-Out looked mortified at that sight, but their terrified expressions were to be expected at that point. Regardless of the state of his compatriots, he had a report to give. The burning, cold acid rain rolled down his body, stinging his optics and choking his breath — but none of it was a worse feeling than the message that he was about to send.

Barricade sighed, then opened a communication link to the skies above, “Major, we have a problem.”

A dark, groaning voice echoed in Barricade’s head in response, “What is it?”

“We have the VIPs, but we’re missing the package,” Barricade hesitated to continue, “They’ve likely hidden it.”

His commanding officer didn’t respond.

“Major Incinerator? Are you receiving?” Barricade asked into his communicator, ready to flinch.

“I see.” Incinerator responded hollowly, “I am en route.”

Off to his side, Barricade heard Nova Storm mumble to herself, “Why would he be inside of a root?”

Deciding to unpack that statement at another time with a large bottle of Maccadam’s Oil, Barricade’s mind was caught by the incessant thumping of helicopter blades. Heavy thumps in a rhythmic beat rumbled windows not shattered by battle’s past, the street vibrated with the power of the approaching aircraft. A massive black shadow suddenly pierced the clouds with lightning showing every jagged curve of the osprey-like craft. Clearly cybertronian in nature, it was a horrible blend of plane and helicopter, with twin blades twisting at just the right rate to keep from colliding, and keeping the shadow airborne.

With a twist of servos and the whirling of helicopter blades, Incinerator changed from an osprey, to a massive, hulking humanoid that towered a few meters over even Mudflap. With a heavy thud, Incinerator landed on the street. His twin blades folded into his hands with a twirl of dangerous steel, his cockpit folded into his chest to reveal glowing turquoise circuits within, accenting his primarily black and gray features. The piercing white of his visor glowed under the shadowy sky, and he made no motion to signify that he even cared about the acid rain currently dousing his hulking shape.

Glyph looked on behind her mask and visor, but Tap-Out’s face had fallen and had begun to sulk. Seeing as the two of them just barely measured up to Mudflap’s thigh and Barricade’s waist, Incinerator must have seemed like a titan to them.

“Now then,” Incinerator said after a moment, “I take it you’ve dispatched your Autobot tail?”

“I… Did what needed to be done.” Barricade said after a long, painful pause.

“Excellent. Then I take it that you have already started searching for the package? It’s probably close by.”

A pang of guilt shot through Barricade’s body. Why hadn’t he given the order to start searching?

“Well, no, sir, I called you as soon as I found out.” Barricade replied curtly, limping up beside Incinerator.

Nova Storm piped up as she raised her hand to give it a shallow wave, “Hey, bossman — I c-can take a look around if y-y-you like!”

Incinerator paused for a moment, seeming to either measure his response or weigh the odds. Barricade knew Incinerator well enough to understand that it was always a mixture of both.

“Before we rush to action, let us allow our… Ah,” Incinerator took one of his propeller-fingered hands and tucked it behind his back to accentuate a subtle, courteous bow, “Guests a chance to rescind their traitorous ways.”

Incinerator gave a slow glance to Barricade, then nodded with his head toward the prisoners, “I believe this is your specialty.”

Breathlessly, Barricade limped to the pair of prisoners and knelt down to their level. Acid rain washed over his yellow face and burned its way down his purple crest. His piercing, red optics shined through the corrosive rain and peered at the prisoner before him, Glyph. He couldn’t tell much emotion from her visored eyes and a mask that hid everything else, but his trained eyes could already sense her discomfort. Her fear. The minor quakes in her bound hands, her gaze never quite meeting his… She was afraid. Anyone would have been. But she was a civilian, despite her contractors; that much made her easy prey.

“I’m going to ask you this exactly one time,” Barricade said slowly, watching as she traded a shallow glance to Tap-Out to her right, “Where is it?”

Glyph looked down, “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Can you be more specific?”

“You know exactly what I’m talking about.” Barricade said with his smooth, dark voice, “You found something. Something important. It belongs to Megatron.”

“It belongs to Cybertron’s history, not some wannabe tyrant.” Glyph met his gaze with her own, seemingly finding her strength in her studies.

Barricade rested his hands like a bridge between his knelt knees and smiled. They were getting somewhere now, and every ounce of interrogation training that remained in Barricade from before the war told him to push harder. He stood and hobbled lazily to where Tap-Out was knelt with his hands bound. With a hearty slap, Barricade let his hand fall on Tap-Out’s head, rocking it back and forth like a toy.

“Everything belongs to someone,” Barricade remarked darkly, “Even your little green friend, here. He belongs to you! Wouldn’t you agree, Tap-Out?”

Tap-Out was silent, but the squeal of gritting metal teeth was all Barricade needed to hear. The right chord had been struck; now all he needed to do was wait for the crescendo.

“Tap-Out belongs to himself; he’s a free man.” Glyph said stoically, looking away.

Barricade caught words in his throat that would jeopardize his strength. The Autobots and their false sense of “freedom” was appalling to him. Their brand of freedom was pointless chaos. Democracy was built to fail, born to corrupt. Career politicians, soothsayers, bureaucrats… All words, no action. Megatron would create peace through his strength, through his order, not chaos. Sure, sometimes one had to do a few chaotic things here and there to keep that order, but the ends would justify the means — and they always would.

With that tangent held firmly in the back of his throat, Barricade let his face rest in a calm, assured smile. Glyph hadn’t noticed it yet, but she had already fallen into his trap.

“You know what? You’re right. He’s not yours; he’s not important to you, so, then, he’s not important to us, either.” Barricade smiled as he drew his sidearm from its holster on his hip, then turned off the safety.

Glyph’s optics narrowed behind her visor, “You wouldn’t.”

Barricade looked back with an incredulous grin, “Won’t I?”

Sometimes, you just have to prove a point.

Turning the weapon to Tap-Out, Barricade quickly fired off a round. Purple energy screamed from the barrel of the pistol and blasted into Tap-Out’s left knee, bursting the kneecap with a fiery pop. Tap-Out buckled forward and let out a shocked scream of pain, grabbing his knee with his bound hands either to keep the precious, purple Energon from spilling onto the pavement, or to keep the acid rain from falling inside. Glyph screamed out in horror as she lunged with her slight blue frame toward her bodyguard, but Mudflap’s massive hand forced her back into place.

Nova Storm seemed to snap back to reality from whatever daydream she had been in up until the gunshot, then realized why she was standing behind a bound Autobot. With corroded, rusted hands, she grabbed Tap-Out by the shoulder and heaved him back upright. He heard Incinerator take an instinctive step back; whether it was of shock or impatience he did not know.

“Pardon my poor aim — let me try again!” Barricade barked, savoring a glance back to Glyph who could only watch as Barricade once again fired his sidearm.

The second blast came close to taking off Tap-Out’s head entirely, but his aim was true. Just enough to graze the surface, and just enough to cleave one of those two stupid-looking horns off Tap-Out’s head with the blast. It would hurt, yes, but Tap-Out’s pain didn’t matter. It was Glyph’s perception that mattered, and seeing such a prominent feature on Tap-Out’s body being defaced might just send her over the edge. His screams must have hurt Glyph’s very spark to hear. No, it wouldn’t be long now. Perhaps it would take a few more blasts, maybe a beating or two, but Glyph would come around.

Mudflap spoke up suddenly, “Mind if I keep one of his optics when you’re done? I have a collection of, ah, souvenirs back home.”

With a shrug, Barricade responded, “Be my guest.”

Barricade leveled his weapon at the green transformer’s shoulder just close enough to his neck to be dangerous, but not fatal. Nova Storm saw where Barricade was aiming and took a step to the side in order to allow the piercing blow to pass through its quarry and not through her. Sure that his subordinate was clear, he made to squeeze the trigger a third time.

“Wait!” Glyph suddenly shouted, “Wait… Please.”

Barricade glanced at her and gave her a polite, “Why?”

“Un… Unlock me.” Glyph motioned with her bound hands.

A blank stare was Barricade’s only response.

“Listen, I know you’ve barely evolved out of your photosynthesizing days, but if you were paying attention I asked you to unlock my binds!” Glyph barked, finding her strength again before Barricade quickly brandished his sidearm at Tap-Out again.

“Are you going to tell me where the artifact is?” Barricade glared at her, unmoving.

“No,” Glyph responded solemnly, “I’m going to show you.”

Barricade stepped forward and unlocked her handcuffs with a quick whip of his fingertips, pulling them from her wrists. The handcuffs immediately resized to their default form, then folded to be stored in a holster on Barricade’s hip. Glyph stood, rubbing her wrists after the abrasive cuffs had dug in to her armor. She spared a solemn glance at Tap-Out, who shook his head in a feeble attempt to stop her. Ignoring him, she transformed. Barricade wasn’t worried about her fleeing — not with his gun trained on Tap-Out’s head — but he did wonder for a brief moment as to what she was doing.

His questions were answered by her front trunk opening. Inside was a brown napsack, tucked around something large and spherical. Lightning cracked over the sky as the rain poured, unrelenting, onto the group as they stood. They all burned, each raindrop like a bee’s sting, and too much exposure could drive one insane — even kill them — but it was not the rain that made him see a faint, red glow from within the bag. This was something else. This was something… Ancient. Without wasting time, he reached in the trunk and pulled the bag out without taking a glance inside.

“Thank you for your cooperation, Glyph,” Barricade said calmly, tucking the bag under his arm.

Incinerator spoke with his long, yawning voice, “Yes, quite. Now, I’m afraid we don’t have room for… Shall we say, non-essential  personnel  in my hold.”

With a gesture of his propellor-tipped hands, he motioned to Tap-Out. Barricade didn’t like it, but he didn’t have to. An order was an order, and it was time to finish what he started. With a sigh, Barricade turned to Tap-Out and pointed his pistol squarely on Tap-Out’s forehead. The green mech didn’t even flinch. The blueness of his optics stared into Barricade’s, and Barricade felt his spark wrench. Glyph transformed and bellowed in rage, only to be held back by Mudflap’s massive hands. She kicked, screamed and clawed at her captor, but could ultimately do nothing as Barricade pressed the barrel of the gun to Tap-Out’s head.

Barricade took a breath in, and his hand shook in recoil.

Orange light flooded Barricade’s vision as a laser blast barreled its way from down the street into his hand, knocking the pistol clean out of his grip and taking a finger with it. Howling in pain, Barricade grabbed his hand and looked to his attacker with a wrathful sneer. Through the rain, he could only make out a shape, a silhouette against the night. Lightning cracked across the sky and lit the road, revealing the intruder. No… It couldn’t be!

“Freeze! I’ve got you surrounded!” the voice was painfully familiar, and utterly steeped in codes and bylaws.

“Prowl.” Barricade said as he turned, “You’re… Well, alive.”

Prowl stood at the opening of the street, clutching his side with one hand and brandishing his sidearm with the other. Energon trickled down from Prowl’s head and oozed from his side, obvious blast marks from where Barricade had hit him with his shoulder cannons. How could he still be alive after all of that? The wounds he had sustained were fatal! The rain had weakened both of their armor after such a long time out in it; most blows to the abdomen would have killed a normal transformer!

“No thanks to you, ‘Cade.” Prowl said unflinchingly, not seeming to care that Energon had begun to trickle down his face, “Now I’m gonna give you three seconds to lay down your weapons and surrender before we start having problems. We’ve got you dead to rights.”

Incinerator stepped forward, looking from side to side, then at the rooftops. With a smug smirk, Incinerator put his hands behind his back in a courteous, dismissive lean forward.

“I don’t know if the rain has gotten to you, but I don’t think you understand what ‘surrounded’ means.” Incinerator let out a laugh, one followed in suit by Nova Storm and Mudflap.

Barricade, however, knew better. He knew Prowl better. Something was amiss.

“Oh, I know what it means,” Prowl dropped the hand that was clenching his side, “I just didn’t tell you from where you were surrounded.”

Major Incinerator took another cursory glance about, then back to Prowl with a shrug, “Is that so, Major? Do you mind telling me just where we’re surrounded from?”

Movement caught Barricade’s optics on the ground off to his right. No… No, that was just a trick of the rain. He had been in the rain for quite some time; surely he was seeing things at that point.

A smile curved its way over Prowl’s face, “Everywhere.”

Prowl flung his free hand as if tossing something invisible. To an untrained onlooker, it would seem as though Prowl was succumbing to an acid rain-induced insanity, but a flash of light caught Barricade’s attention and held it. There, soaring in the air, were flashing red and blue lights, like the top of a police car. What had Prowl thrown?

Movement to his right again. Then, to his left. Things began to piece themselves together in Barricade’s mind. Prowl didn’t throw anything — he threw everyone!

Barricade turned to Incinerator and barked all too late, “Micromasters!”

Soaring through the air, changing from a tiny police car, came a fist to Incinerator’s face from a very irritated Stakeout. The force of the impact caught Incinerator off-guard and sent him stumbling back, then hurtling to the ground. Before anyone could react, three more Micromasters sprung up from all sides. There, from a puddle of acid, a tiny boat transformed and pulled out a laser rifle. There! Just behind Mudflap, a small fire truck turned into a far larger, far angrier mech. Noise brought his attention to just ahead as a minuscule ambulance whirred its sirens and changed into a red and white mech, leg already cocked back for a kick.

Before he had a moment to dodge, a harsh kick thundered into Barricade’s bad knee, buckling it to the ground, then a knee to the face sent Barricade reeling. He felt the napsack tug free from his other hand as Glyph used the chaos to snatch it back, then he felt the hard street meet the back of his head. An explosion of color filled his vision as he slumped into a haze, cracking the armor around his head and knocking his left optic offline for a brief moment.

He heard Prowl start to give orders, “Fixit, good work on Barricade; get to the Seeker next. Seawatch, take the big one with Red Heat. Stakeout, let’s put this Major down. Autobots — let’s kick some tailpipe!”

What happened next was something of a blur, but from what he could see, it happened something like this:

The one that changed from a boat — one no doubt named Seawatch — started blasting his rifle toward Mudflap, eating into the thick armor on his left arm and bits of the massive crane slung beneath. Distracted, Mudflap didn’t notice the red mech who had transformed from a fire truck behind him, who could only logically be named Red Heat. With a leap, Red Heat jumped onto Mudflap’s back and wrapped his arms around the Mercenary’s thick neck, tossing out blow after blow against the side of Mudflap’s head.

“Get offa me, scraplet!” Mudflap roared as he snatched and grabbed at Red Heat, each swipe missing their mark.

In his clash, Incinerator had already stood from the initial blow that Stakeout (Why was Barricade even surprised that Stakeout was an Autobot? Stakeout always was a softie.) had landed squarely upon Incinerator’s chin. With his small stature, Stakeout had been a hard target to hit, but Incinerator’s propeller hands was proving more difficult to avoid than most. With both hands swiping left and right, Incinerator’s hands had transformed back into their propeller blade forms, and had become whirlwinds of death. Dodging left and right, Stakeout tumbled out of the way from one of Incinerator’s hands just narrowly before the pavement erupted into a shower of sparks and shrapnel, the blades eating it into nothing.

Prowl fired his sidearm in blasts of orange energy, slamming into the hulking shape of Incinerator. The thick armor and the relatively short time that Major Incinerator had spent in the rain had kept his armor strong, and as such, the blasts glanced off the surface of his armor harmlessly. He didn’t even seem to realize that he’d been shot, let alone thrice.

Nova Storm, however, found that she had to take her problem, ironically dubbed “Fixit”, to the skies. She kicked on her boot thrusters and began to hover, blasting acid rain into the air in massive, hot gusts of air. Hovering higher, Nova Storm let out a frankly haunting cackle that gave Barricade a chill, even in the burning rain. Fixit seemed reluctant to chase her, and instead seemed more preoccupied with his teammates’ welfare. This was Nova Storm’s opening, and she took it as quickly as she saw it. Black blasts of energy shot from the cannons placed on her arms sequentially, catching Fixit unaware. The first two blasts caught him square in his chest and knocked him cleanly off his feet as the piercing blasts cleaved holes in his armor. The next blasts struck the ground where he last stood, narrowly missing a death blow.

His wounds cauterized from the blasts, Fixit grit his teeth and barked, “I don’t want to have to shoot you! I swore an oath.”

Nova seemed to be amused at this notion, “H-how’s th-med-medi—!”

She knocked the side of her head a few times to rattle another piece back into place.

“H-How’s that medical oath b-been treating you in th-this, y’know, war zone?” she sputtered, acid rain washing over every curve of her toothy, demented smile, “K-Kind of a bummer if you ask m-m-me.”

Fixit didn’t seem to know how to respond, at least verbally. So, in a flash, Fixit drew his sidearm and started firing from the hip. Wildly inaccurate shots soared past Nova Storm with several that nearly clipped her wings. Either from shock or from reflex, she kicked her boot thrusters in high gear, taking her ever higher and out of the cone of blasts that Fixit was sending her. One blast snagged her right boot, and with a black cloud sputtering from its vents, the yellow seeker took a nosedive. Tumbling through the air, she hurtled into the building to her right with a hollow yelp. Her momentum carried her through one of the few intact windows remaining on the shattered building and burst through it with a shower of glass.

Confident in his marksmanship, Fixit turned away to get a better look at his teammates. He opened his mouth to speak, but was cut off by a yellow blur that had just burst through a wall. Nova Storm had transformed into her alternate mode and had careened through the building in which she crashed, blasting holes big enough to fly through with her alternate mode’s cannons. With those, she fired another barrage at Fixit. One of the blasts dug into his shoulder and sent him stumbling forward in recoil, only to get caught on the nosecone of Nova Storm’s jet mode as it flew mere feet from the ground. With the Autobot draped over her nosecone, she pulled up sharply and engaged her afterburners. With that, she rose into the air, taking Fixit with her.

Mudflap’s battle, however, wasn’t going nearly as well as Nova Storm’s. Red Heat was still clinging to his neck, but was now holding on for dear life as Mudflap had begun thrashing about in an effort to knock his attacker loose. The Mercenary was about as elegant as beached fish, with his crane arm swinging wildly in an attempt to not just take swipes at Seawatch, but to throw Red Heat off balance, too. With each blow to his head, Mudflap yelled and flung another direction, and with each blast from Seawatch’s weapon, he flung in another. The massive blade narrowly missed Seawatch’s head and instead cleaved supports from under the neighboring building across the street, shattering glass and crumbling rusted steel in a shower of mayhem.

Finally, Mudflap seemed to have had enough, “Get over here!”

He switched the blade on the end of his crane arm to a hook, then fired it like a harpoon. A thick, green chain glowed behind it as it sped through the air in a blur. Unable to react fast enough, Seawatch could only yelp as the hook pierced his shoulder and knocked him sideways. Then, almost as soon as it struck, the chain began to reel in. Pulled from his feet, Seawatch was tugged through the air, just in time to meet Mudflap’s punch. The hook was yanked from its place buried in Seawatch’s shoulder and took chunks of steel with it, leaving behind a gash of pooled Energon in its wake.

Knocked into a haze, Seawatch crumpled to the ground, barely conscious. Red Heat seemed to notice this and stopped his barrage of fists in horror, just in time for Mudflap to sense his opening. Swiping Red Heat from his back with his right hand, he pulled the smaller Micromaster from his back and threw him to the ground. Readying his crane arm, he flicked the hook back into the arm and replaced it with the cerated blade. Mudflap grinned.

Glyph, for her part, had taken the chaos in stride and had decided to use it to her advantage. Grabbing the napsack from Barricade as he fell was the easy part, but it appeared that freeing Tap-Out was the hard part. His hands still bound and his wounds still bleeding, he couldn’t exactly aid in his own escape, and Glyph didn’t seem like the fighting type. Regardless, the chaotic battle had devolved into single showdowns, and that made for an excellent opening to escape. She lifted her near unconscious bodyguard and slung one of his arms over her shoulder, likely hoping to make their way across the battlefield unnoticed.

Be it so easy.

Barricade found his focus after the blow to his head, then rolled onto his stomach. Snarling, he tucked his knees beneath him and made to activate his shoulder cannons while Glyph was still unaware. He frowned as he thought better of it; he still needed Glyph alive, so his shoulder cannons simply wouldn’t do. Plus, he could end up damaging the artifact with a stray shot, negating both objectives of their mission at once. He didn’t want to be the one responsible for that screw up, especially during his report back to Megatron. No, shooting them wouldn’t do. He’d have to get up close and personal with them.

Looking about him, Barricade scanned his surroundings for anything of use. His sidearm was fried after being shot by Prowl, so he couldn’t exactly use that to disable or threaten Glyph, and he still couldn’t risk accidentally destroying the artifact inadvertently. The next thing that caught his eye was a stray, black bar at the foot of a broken window: A crowbar.

Unknown to Glyph, Barricade stood and limped to the crowbar. It seemed that every inch of him was soaked in the acid rain as more poured from the sky, burning and stinging at him with every move he made. Drops ran over his injuries and burned at them like alcohol on a wound, with his thinned armor peeling like scabs around the bleeding Energon. He hated the acid rain, but for the moment, it was more of a boon than a curse. It wasn’t raining nearly as hard as it was earlier, but it was just enough to mask his movements.

He knelt and grabbed the crowbar, then stumbled on his wounded leg toward Glyph. With his stumble, he splashed a puddle just loud enough that Tap-Out took notice. Barricade was already raising the crowbar above his head to strike Glyph from behind, however, and with a great heave, he crashed the crowbar with all his remaining strength toward the unsuspecting Glyph. In a startling flash, Tap-Out threw himself between Barricade and Glyph, breathlessly sliding from off Glyph’s shoulder and in the way of Barricade’s blow.

With all his strength poured into it, the crowbar struck Tap-Out on the shoulder, and Barricade felt something crunch. Armor that was thinned by the acid rain crumbled like paper, servos crunched and hoses snapped. Tap-Out let out a triumphant howl of satisfied pain as the crowbar ate into him like a sword, the weakened steel acting more like papier-mâché than armor. The crowbar, already rusted by the rain, buckled and snapped in Barricade’s grip and fell to the ground, useless. Tap-Out followed suit.

Glyph watched in horror to as her bodyguard fall; a horror that soon turned to rage. But before she could react with an assault of her own, Barricade had already reached out and grabbed the napsack that was tucked under Glyph’s other arm. Realizing what he was doing, Glyph grabbed hold of her side and tugged. Barricade thrashed the bag left and right like a crook would when stealing a purse. He tried to push the mental image out of his mind when it dawned on him how ironic it was that he, of all people, would be reduced to such things. But now was not the time for introspection. Now was the time for action.

Barricade howled, “Major! I have the package!”

He spared a glance to his left to see Incinerator continuously swiping at the agile Stakeout with his propeller hands in an attempt to mulch the Autobot. His commanding officer answered the call with a glance, then a pause as he assessed the situation out of reflex. This brief reprieve allowed Stakeout to put some distance between he and the Major, dashing back to Prowl, who hadn’t stopped laying down suppressive fire on Incinerator’s massive form. This, too, caused a pause from Prowl, who suddenly took notice of something above him. It didn’t matter to Barricade, however — with Incinerator’s help, they were going to get both Glyph and the artifact in one fell swoop and then make their escape.

Major Incinerator turned to run toward them, but a sudden flash of light caught their attention. Prowl had suddenly started firing into the building across from Barricade with his sidearm, seemingly at nothing at all. Baffled, Barricade turned back to his struggle with Glyph; perhaps Prowl truly had let the rain get to him.

Incinerator began to speak, “Well done, Barric—”

An explosion knocked him off his feet, coming from the ruined building that Prowl had made a target. Bewildered, the Decepticons looked back to the now burning building and a grinning Prowl.

Prowl let out a laugh, “They really don’t build these things like they used to.”

A second explosion rumbled the street like a drum accompaniment to a melody of shattering glass. An orchestra of steel beams began to fall from the building and slam against the pavement as it slowly, surely, tipped over. It began to pick up pace now, and halfway up, Barricade could see Nova Storm’s duel with Fixit coming to a forceful stop as the two of them were caught in the falling debris. Metal rain poured from the ruined building as it crumbled beneath its own weight, sending Nova Storm hurtling to the ground in a heap of bent wings and shattered steel. Fixit fell on top of her, rolling to the side like a ragdoll. Beams of steel rained down upon them all, chief of which being Mudflap.

Chunks of steel pelted the crane transformer with heavy blows, knocking his stabbing blade off-course just enough to stab the ground next to Red Heat’s head. Distracted from his fight for just enough time, Mudflap left himself open for an attack.

“Seawatch, gun me!” Red Heat barked, and Seawatch gave his weapon a hurl in response.

Snatching the rifle from the air, Red Heat took the opportunity to blast at Mudflap point-blank. Each blast knocked the behemoth backward, stumbling and tripping on debris until, finally, he fell.

With a panicked look about him, Mudflap howled, “Oh frag this!”

The mercenary then transformed back into his crane mode, spun his tires, and screamed down the road.

Incinerator howled in protest, “Coward!”

But there was no time for that. If they didn’t grab Glyph and the artifact now, then they would either lose them or be buried beneath a falling skyscraper. Incinerator seemed to realize this, then activated his propellers once more. The falling debris rained down all around them, and even the Micromasters were retreating. Seawatch had already started to run, while Red Heat had taken the moment to collect Fixit from where he and Nova Storm had fallen. All that remained were Stakeout and… Wait, where did Prowl go?

Barricade turned back to Glyph to see that Prowl had repositioned and had started to aim his sidearm at Barricade. Incinerator, noticing this, howled and thrust his spinning propeller blade downward. The napsack snagged in the propellor and shredded, revealing a shining, red light from within. But the blade went further still, and with the horrid screech of metal, the blades cleaved the artifact within in two. Glyph and Barricade each fell backward with their own half of the artifact, each half spilling onto the ground and into puddles of acid rain.

“Grab it, you fool! We are leaving!” Incinerator began to transform, folding his arms into wings and curling into his osprey-like mode.

Barricade wasted no time and dove his half of the artifact and curled it into his arms. It was — at least when whole — a perfect sphere, glowing red light now becoming a dull, dead crystal. Frankly, Barricade didn’t care to investigate further. He looked over to where Glyph had fallen and made to dive for her half of the artifact. But just then, a large support fell from the skyscraper just ahead, cutting him off before he could move. He looked up to see the building was just moments from freefall. In an instant, Barricade decided: The mission was important, but it wasn’t worth his life.

He turned, then ran back to Incinerator and the relative safety of his cargo hold. A glimpse of yellow and white caught his optic from beneath a pile of rubble just off to the side: Nova Storm’s outstretched hand, grasping for someone — anyone — to pull her out. Without a second thought, Barricade reached out and grabbed hold of her hand with his, then tugged with all his might. His wounded leg wanted to buckle under the strain, his body aching to rest after the fight. If he thought about how much pain he was in, he wouldn’t have any other choice but to collapse.

“Nova, your thrusters!” Barricade howled as he tugged at her, desperately trying to keep the artifact close to his chest.

Nova Storm turned on her only good boot thruster and blasted herself out of the rubble and hurtling toward Incinerator.

Incinerator howled as a piece of shrapnel crashed against his fuselage, “Load in! Now!”

Practically throwing themselves into the hold, Barricade and Nova Storm tumbled to the deck and tucked their legs inside.

Barricade wasted no time, “We’re loaded! Let’s get out of here!”

He could hear the propellers spin to an unnatural speed as Incinerator’s engines screamed to life. In moments, they began rolling forward. Barricade rolled himself into a seat to look outside one of the windows. Hunks of steel fell all around them surrounded by an unrelenting shower of broken glass. The contents of building rained out randomly with chairs, desks, appliances and even long-dead transformers fell to the road below. Metal rained on the fuselage around them and larger chunks cratered the street below.

Their speed picked up, and so too did the falling skyscraper. Incinerator yelled as he kicked his engines into high gear, and finally, they became airborne. Nova Storm grabbed hold of a hanging cargo strap to steady herself as Incinerator banked his wings just in time to avoid another massive chunk of the skyscraper when finally, thankfully, they took to the skies, to safety. A massive boom signaled their escape as the skyscraper finally fell to the streets below, sending a gust of dusty winds in every direction. A pillar of smoke spewed into the sky, a signal of their presence, and now a beacon of their failure.

Barricade looked down at the artifact — or what was left of it — and sighed. All of that for just half of a crystal?

*****

Stakeout looked incredulous as he sat on the barge, sitting on an Energon cube, “All of that for some random crystal?”

Prowl responded with a hollow shrug, looking the red crystal up and down as he searched for meaning. Prowl sat across from Stakeout with Fixit running a cursory patch-up job on his wounds. Prowl insisted to be last in line when it came to treatment, despite Fixit’s best protests. Prowl was a Major, yes, but his wounds were comparatively minor, especially when he could see moonlight shining through a few holes in Fixit’s body. Erector was with half of the survivors with Red Heat on the barge ahead of them while the remaining survivors were with Grapple on the barge behind them. Seawatch had ferried Fixit from each to treat the wounded, but he had spent the most time on Prowl’s barge when he realized how many wounded still remained there.

Glyph, who was seated beside Prowl, tended to a still-unconscious Tap-Out. Fixit had done all he could do with the supplies given to him, but Prowl could tell that making Tap-Out stable was a miracle in its own right, and for that he could tell that Glyph was thankful. She hadn’t said much since they boarded the Energon barges with the rest of the Autobots, and had instead relegated her attention to making sure that Tap-Out survived. Despite her first impressions, Prowl could tell that she truly cared about her bodyguard. If he wasn’t so taken by the artifact, he would have spared a moment to be a bit jealous. It had been a while since he’d cared that much about… Well, anything.

After a moment, however, Glyph spoke up, “It’s not just ‘some random crystal’, Stakeout. It’s definitely more than that.”

Stakeout chuckled, “Oh yeah? You thinkin’ you’re finally gonna tell us what the frag that thing is?”

“That. Is. Classified. You know, as I said before, you brainle—” Glyph started harshly, then relaxed after a moment with a sigh, “… In truth, I don’t truly even know the extent of it. All I know is that I know nothing at all. This damned excavation was doomed from the start.”

Prowl spoke up, “Excavation? You’re an archaeologist, then? What w— Yeouch!”

Fixit poked him with his plasma torch as he patched one of Prowl’s wounds, “With all due respect, Major, quit squirming.”

Prowl couldn’t physically bring himself to argue with that, so he let Glyph assume the rest of his line of questioning.

She looked at him for a moment, then let out a chuckle, “That’s classified.”

Both Prowl and Stakeout groaned in response. Prowl, dejected, looked down the shadowy tunnel, and the glistening mercury that they sailed upon. The mercury seas of Cybertron had long since been relegated to channels below the surface. While some docks were aboveground, most seas had been turned into large tunnels more akin to sewers than any familiar ocean. Some oceans were made of acid, others were made of molten metal — none of which were very pleasant to swim around in — so Seawatch being able to sail through all of the above had made him rather invaluable for efforts similar to theirs, especially with how well-acquainted he was with the tunnel system. Some tunnels were made to become efficient transport from one city to another, but others — such as the one they sailed now — was nothing of the sort, and was barely even registered on maps at all.

The Decepticons could not find them there, and in a few short hours, they would be back at Iacon with a whole lot of Energon, and a whole lot of questions.

 

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Disclaimer: This is a work of free fan fiction, not officially licensed material. Respective characters, names, locations, images and titles are copyright Hasbro and Wizards of the Coast.