Alien 8
Alien
Chapter 8
[Transformers, 2007 movie] The defeat of Megatron and the defense of earth has left everyone the chance to relax a little. Now, if only that was all that was out there...
Characters/Pairings: Sam, Mikaela and Autobots, OCs. Gen, but features a little Sam/Mikaela for canon reasons.
Ratings and Warnings: OC-heavy, a very little violence and language, psuedoscience, PG-13/T for safety.
Previous Chapters:
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
FFnet Link
Alien: Chapter 8
Author's Notes: Eternal thanks to mmouse15 for betaing!
oOoOoOo
“They’re all connected,” said Irene happily, slapping the closed lid covering one of the fig samples for emphasis. “They’re all connected because something they’re doing-probably something connected to their metabolic process, judging by how crazy it is-creates a highly toxic chemical, and they need a separate plant to produce the chemical that neutralizes it, and so they’re all tied together via their roots, meaning that this lovely little toxin that Evan and that bastard have cooked up only needs to be injected into each over-all mass of plants, each ‘community,’ to use one of the current lame buzzwords, instead of each one individually. And it means that most plants won’t survive long even if they do end up infected, which looks to be a rare, rare occurrence, from Evan’s and Charles’ work. Thank you, God and the evolutionary process!”
“So what happens next?” asked Sam. “I mean, you know how the plants work, kind of, and you’ve got something that’ll kill them, but if anyone gets too close they’ll attack, and they’re still dangerous. How fast does the poison work? Or can you just use a plane or something to spread it overhead, or something like that?”
“A direct injection’s best, apparently,” said Kristine.
“We-well, the government, really-has got engineers working on mocking up some airtight, heavily insulated full-body suits with something to catch air once it’s been breathed out,” continued Irene. “And once that happens they’ll probably be given to some overly-muscled military team who’ll be given instructions and then dumped off in the Amazon, where we’ll supply them with syringes full of finely tuned herbicide-fungicide-weird-alien-chemical mixtures, a few wind-up decoys so they can find out which plants actually are infected and some more thorough information, and then they’ll go do the deed.”
“And then they’ll stick around and there’ll be regular patrols and then there’ll be a long, angry campaign by some group of all-organic environmentalists that the government will ignore (1), and then we might get medals. If we do, I will seal mine in inert resin and leave it in my fish tank.” Kristine added.
“…Why?” asked Mikaela, a little nonplussed.
“Because otherwise it might upset my water quality, which would be horrible for my poor little tetras.”
“No, I mean why are you-”
Kristine snickered slightly. “Oh, that, of course. Well, displaying anything you’ve won is, of course, vulgar-it’s somewhat acceptable when you’re seven and it’s your parents displaying your music lesson trophy or something, but at my age, it’s just plain unattractive. But then, it feels somewhat wrong to just throw something like that away-and the fish seem to like them. Once they’ve been rendered chemically safe. Certainly it makes for an interesting centerpiece. If I bothered to write something up about how it was a statement about American government I could probably pass it off as modern art.”
Keats, who’d just walked in, sighed loudly. “Kristine…” he began.
“Keats…” she mimicked.
“It’s weird,” said Mikaela. “All that frantic work and then-nothing.”
“It’s science,” shrugged Kristine. “Let me put it like this-let’s pretend we’re in an action movie. There’s a hero. He’s one of the people charged with getting the infected figs killed via injections. There’ll be something about his angsty emotional state, which will almost-but not quite-prevent him from succeeding in his mission and saving the world. Possibly alcoholism. And he’ll have a kid and a wife about to go through with the divorce. In the course of the movie we’ll see their reunion, and it’ll be a touching, emotionally feel-good ending scene. We’ll meet the rest of the team. But everything we just did? It would be a 30-second scene where one of us gives a brief moment of exposition about how the poison works.
“And life’s like that. With a few exceptions-Edison, Einstein-the inventions that change the world, or save it, get ignored. …Of course, it also helps that watching someone defeat great odds to save the day in a very physical, literal way is more interesting than watching sleep-deprived scientists fiddle with bits of greenery. Well, except when Irene was messing around with the wind-up mice.” (2)
“It’s really different from last time,” Sam said.
“Previous to antibiotics, more people died of infections than actual wounds during wars,” added Irene. “Can you name who invented the refrigerator? You’d be amazed how many lives that invention saved. If we’re lucky we’ll be named in a handful of newspaper articles. I prefer that, actually.”
“I understand that,” said Mikaela. “Nobody knows either of us were involved with Mission City at all. It was weird, to save the world and get awarded a medal in a private ceremony by the President and then go back to school, where my chemistry teacher chewed me out for missing our practical exam.”
“I’ll second that,” said Sam feelingly.
“Well, it’s not quite like that for us,” said Kristine.
“We’re all somewhat famous in certain scientific circles by now,” added Irene.
“Let’s just say that Evan wasn’t being entirely unreasonable when he freaked out when he heard who he was going to be working with,” said Keats. “I was more than a little skittish for the first month or so, myself. Of course, he should have calmed down a little by now…”
“He’s young,” said Irene dismissively. “Of course, people like that utter ass Cleve don’t help… Anyways, he’ll grow out of it, whether I have to involve myself or not.”
“What are you all going to do after this?” asked Mikaela.
“I’m back to the lab and my list of projects,” said Kristine cheerily. “I’m working with jellyfish next! Keep an eye out for something revolutionary and world-changing in the next three years or so stemming from them. I’m not telling you anything more, sorry.”
Sam laughed. Kristine looked at him blankly. “What? I’m being serious.” She paused. “Well, mostly. There’s always a chance that it’s another dead end.”
“I’m hoping for a chance to stay in the Amazon a while,” confessed Irene. “I haven’t had a chance to look around yet-and it’s an incredible place. I’d never forgive myself if I just left. I owe myself a vacation, anyways. And it’s not like I haven’t been learning Portuguese for the past ten years for a trip here, anyways.”
“And I’ve got papers I’m working on,” said Keats. “I’d tell you, but the government would be forced to kill me. It’s in the contract.”
“-you’re not serious?” asked Sam, somewhat serious himself.
“Mostly not,” said Keats. “Although I really can’t tell anyone anything. It’s a bother-my mother keeps on giving me the ninth degree. Not to mention you, Irene.”
“Cute. Come on, I just want to know if it’s the same thing that I was working on last year, we never did get it all wrapped up but it showed promise-”
oOo
Sir? sent Coldfront to Optimus Prime.
Yes? he replied, trying to hide his (far-too-obvious) surprise. The ’bot sounded almost hesitant, which made him think that it wasn’t some little, niggling detail or clarification, but instead something more like what they were trying to get him to do-that is, develop something like a personality.
It-occurred to me, he said, stiffly, That several Autobots currently present, including myself, are equipped with temporary heat-baffling systems to prevent detection by Decepticons while in the field.
Yes… said Optimus, nonplussed. The revelation wasn’t anything much-all spies and a few others were equipped with the same program. It had been developed after a particularly bloody period in the war, a long ways back; there’d been a lot of those, moments where one side or the other developed something that gave them an advantage, and then a leveling-off as the other side developed something to counteract it. It was mostly outdated, now, and pretty much ignored.
Then we may be more capable of delivering the fungicide than the humans, and without the current waiting period. Coldfront’s ‘voice’ sounded stressed, harried-Optimus knew that it had probably taken a lot for the Autobot to suggest even that much.
Yes. Excellent point. Thank you, Coldfront.
Yes, sir.
Calling up the stats lists he had for all of the Autobots currently under his command, Optimus scanned them. Bumblebee, Coldfront, Gyro, Ratchet and, somewhat surprisingly, Ironhide. He’d never been outfitted with the program, himself; it was usually for spies and people who needed to remain sneaky and unseen; that was why Bumblebee and Gyro had it. Coldfront was a fairly neutral build, not obviously meant for one function or another (science, spying, fighting) and had probably had any number of functions, over the years-although Optimus didn’t want to imagine what life would have been like under that commander he’d had. Ratchet had probably reasoned that he might need it for field work. It made sense for him to stay out of a fight as much as possible.
And Ironhide? It was highly unusual for a weapons specialist to have that sort of specialized shielding. He’d probably wanted it for the chance to get close enough to do more damage, Optimus thought, darkly amused. A mutual acquaintance of theirs had once described his approach to fighting with “I’d think he was suicidal if I didn’t know him better.”
“Bumblebee, Gyro, Ratchet and Ironhide, over here,” he called back, and there was the slightly awkward shuffle of Autobot bodies switching around in a too-small space. With very few exceptions, human buildings just weren’t big enough to comfortably contain an average-sized Transformer. He could barely move-the smaller ones were more comfortable. The smallest, the size of Gyro down to the thankfully-dead Frenzy and possibly tinier, were the only ones without any real problem. After so many days of restricted motion he was almost jealous.
“What do you want?” asked Gyro brightly, light tone the only thing keeping his question from being insolent. Optimus ignored it, while a stricter commander (Coldfront’s old one, for example) would have made a point. The current situation was hardly the formal military one that had existed since before the beginning of the war and only ended close to the end of it.
“You’re all outfitted with heat bafflers?”
A series of slightly confused looks were directed at him-except from the still-present Coldfront, of course.
“Yes, sir,” came in ragged chorus.
“Good. Are any of you willing to help remove the infected plants? With heat baffles in place, we effectively disappear for them, making it safer for us than for humans, even ones with protective clothing.”
“Absolutely,” said Bumblebee quickly, not bothering to hear the rest of what Optimus had to say.
“Finally! A chance to move,” said Ironhide, looking positively delighted-at least, as much as he ever did. “I’m in.”
“Sure, why not?” continued Gyro, who wasn’t laughing for once, although there was still that deep humor bubbling up through his voice.
“Yes,” said Ratchet simply.
Four pairs of optics turned automatically to stare at Coldfront.
“It was my suggestion,” he said stiffly, glancing quickly at Optimus as if to judge his reaction to that-Optimus muffled a sigh. Oh well. Coldfront was getting better, at least, and he should see even this much progress as more than he could have hoped for.
“Well, then, let’s do this thing!” said Bumblebee brightly.
“I think you’re forgetting something,” Ratchet replied. “Your hands. The syringes are made for humans. Gyro, you might be able to manage, and I could probably cobble something together out of my medical tools-” He sounded, somewhat reasonably, upset about that prospect “-but you three are going to be useless. It’s not a general-application spray, or anything like that.”
There was a brief silence.
“Really big syringes…” said Bumblebee, voice mock-speculative. Gyro giggled, Coldfront frowned deeply and Ironhide jabbed the smaller mech in the side, who glared back in return. Ratchet was rather amused by the mental image that idea conjured, himself.
“We can offer the information to someone in the appropriate position, regardless,” said Coldfront at last.
oOo
Irene walked into the Autobots’ room carrying a large duffle bag, which she dumped carelessly on the ground. It clattered loudly.
“What’ve you got?” asked Solarity keenly, looking over at the woman. Irene half-rolled her eyes. They’d all gotten very used to Solarity’s questions.
“Jab sticks!” she explained, mild annoyance switching quickly to an excited, happy look.
“What?” said Solarity, confused. A few more Autobot heads turned, bored enough to be interested in the conversation.
“Jab sticks-they’re poles with syringes attached to the end. I was using them on some bear research I did once, a good long while ago-it was a vacation, really, I was helping out a friend. So, you can trap a bear, right, but then you need to get close enough to it to knock it out so you can fit it with the radio collar and take a handful of samples and measurements and tag it. And that can be quite exciting when you’ve got a 300-pound enraged animal with claws flailing around as much as it can trying to kill you. So there’s jab sticks-poles with syringes at the end so you can deliver the drugs without getting yourself killed.”
“Alright,” said Solarity agreeably. “Makes sense. Why do you have them, though?”
“When the bear project finished there was a whole bunch of extras, and we were losing the building we were renting so I took ’em with me on the theory that they had the potential to be useful.”
“…Why do you have them here, though?”
“Well, Kristine wants to use them-something about jellyfish-and so I promised her that I’d mail them to her, since I’m not using them right now, but then I heard we were coming here, and it was cheaper to just stick them in a spare duffel bag and bring them like that.”
“‘Here’ as in this room.”
“Ohhh. You should be more specific when you’re talking, you know.” Solarity laughed at Irene’s light teasing. “Kristine was telling Keats about the jab sticks during lunch and Evan overheard and suggested that we see if we could mock something up for you that could let you use them, because you have the potential to be really helpful when it comes to dealing with the figs, and so Toni-” Irene scowled darkly “-is coming along in a few minutes to see if he can do anything, since he’s the most mechanically adept one among us, and then we talked one of the gate guards into getting some supplies-duct tape and wire, mostly-out of one of the janitors, and he’ll bring that around, too.”
“That right there’s what I miss about spending time with other scientists,” said Solarity, tone slightly sad. “The way ideas spring into being like that-”
“You’re a scientist?” Irene asked.
“No-well, yes and no. I never showed huge promise, but I received basic training for the scientific fields. About one and a half years in Earth time before I finished I was switched into a fighting unit.” He shrugged. “It happens. I miss the other… students who were in my group, though-haven’t seen most of them for years, and there’s a good chance they’re all dead.”
“I’m sorry,” said Irene simply.
“No matter. It was a long time ago, but I had a wonderful time. And time heals all wounds-I even remember the punishment details with a certain amount of fondness, now.”
Irene snorted. “Punishment details? Before you say anything, then, I’m going to guess that certain Transformers in whatever-it-is-that’s-your-equivalent-to-college are just as prone to the things that certain human college students are…”
“Probably not what you’re thinking,” admitted Solarity. “Mostly we-my friends at the time and I-got in trouble for doing things like tweaking the other students’ experimental setups so they gave nonsensical answers, or sneaking into the labs during off-hours. -and blowing stuff up, that happened a lot too.” (3)
Irene got vaguely misty-eyed. “Oh, bless. Now I’ve got memories of my own college days playing through my head. I continue to claim, to this day, that the time my best friend replaced our teacher’s demonstration chemicals with dyed water was one of the best moments of my life. It was also the best front-of-the-class example, ever, period. ‘This should be working, damn it!’”
“Mature, much, Irene?” asked Toni, walking in. Irene’s face went blank and then quickly soured before straightening again.
“At least I’m not a sour grape,” she said sweetly.
Toni flushed angrily. “That has nothing to do with this and you know it-”
“Oh, now, I’m not sure I do. And you can seriously say that you’re not the slightest bit bitter I’ve been turning you down since we started working together…?”
“I’m not saying I’m not bitter, and I’m not saying I am, but if I have a problem I’m going to talk about it with the other person involved like the adult I, at least, am-”
“Then what do you call this argument?” Irene especially, who’d had a cooler tone at the start, was beginning to sound angry, but Toni was as well. “Talking it out like the adult you are?”
“I call this argument your childish refusal to act your own age-”
“Fine. I’m immature. What, then, what exactly is it, that attracts you to immature women, Toni?”
Solarity in particular looked utterly bemused.
Toni opened his mouth angrily to reply but paused instead of speaking, then closed his mouth, relaxing abruptly, the tension draining out of him. “You’re right,” he said, voice quiet and intense. “I’m out of line. I’m sorry.”
Irene glared at him one, two, three seconds longer, and then turned and stalked angrily away, heading over to the remains of her lab station-it had been mostly dismantled and the remaining figs had been neglected, both the infected and uninfected ones, languishing in their glass cages: almost all of them were starting to crisp up, drying out. Absently, Irene started watering one of the uninfected plants, slowly trickling the liquid into the clear cube that was still serving as a planter pot, letting it loosen up the constricted dry dirt bit by bit. The one she’d picked had soil so bone-dry that the water she poured in puddled on top of the matted soil, and she felt vaguely guilty.
She looked over as the door swung open and shut again, a vaguely familiar gate guard and a peeved Kristine stepping inside.
“If I don’t get my jab sticks back in good shape, I am going to be highly annoyed,” the blonde announced to the world at large, hands on her hips and a scowl on her face.
“You can always buy more,” said Toni reasonably.
“I’m over-budget as I am. Do you have any idea what custom two-thousand-gallon-and-up jellyfish tanks cost? I didn’t.” She paused for a quick second. “Sadly, I do now. And I’d really rather not have to choose between eating only instant ramen noodles for a month and paying my heating bill. Actually, wait, it’d have to be the ramen, because some of the tanks need heating, too, and we can’t have them getting too cold. Or the cool-water ones getting too hot. Electricity’s a must too, because I need to monitor light levels, although thankfully I can do some of that with sunlight.”
“Jellyfish?” asked the soldier, looking interested despite himself. “Damn, I hate those things.”
“At the moment, they’re my darlings, but I’ll probably feel different when I’ve been messing around with them for a few months,” said Kristine. “The jab sticks here should keep me out of reach of their stinging symbiotic unicellular organisms, and my nasty human impurities-such as hand soap or lotion, say-out of their tentacles as well. And their bells.”
“Bells?” Solarity asked. Technically, it would be very easy for him to just a run a quick search online, but he liked the answers people gave more. They tended to be more informative, even-or maybe especially-when they weren’t correct.
“The blobby part on top,” Kristine qualified.
“Is that a technical term?” Toni asked dryly. “It could be an acronym-BPT, or something to that effect…”
“Too much like BLT,” Irene said; she was walking back over. “You’d have undergrads thinking it means something like bacon, pear and tomato sandwich, or something like that.”
Toni made an expressive face of disgust, although Irene ignored him pointedly.
“Bacon, pea and tomato sounds more likely…” Kristine said thoughtfully.
“Ew, I hate peas,” Irene said, wrinkling her nose.
“-and pears and bacon together are better than peas?”
“Yes, definitely.”
“…I’m sensing a dare.”
“Whooo, damn, we really are immature, aren’t we? I’d totally do it for the right incentive.”
“I told you so!” Toni said, and Irene ignored him. Kristine rolled her eyes.
The soldier snickered quietly to himself, attracting Irene’s attention.
“So, do you think we’re immature-” she paused to read his nametag “-Cahler?”
“Not at all, Ma’am,” he snapped out neatly, everything about him saying ‘repressed laughter.’
“I knew you looked smart,” Irene drawled out.
“Hey, Cahler,” Bumblebee called out from a ways away, making the soldier start slightly and look over at the Autobot, belying his totally relaxed outward appearance. “How are you?”
“Hey,” he called back, and Kristine raised a perfectly questioning eyebrow.
“It’s a long story,” he said, and Kristine nodded.
“Under ordinary circumstances I’d pump you for details, but I’ve had more than my fair share of those in the past few days, and I think I’m starting to understand.”
“Bonding under stress is all well and good, but lets see if we can get these jab sticks rigged,” Toni said decisively, walking briskly forward.
“Can I help?” asked Cahler and Solarity almost simultaneously, both brightly interested.
oOo
“Thank you,” said Keller formally, addressing the five Autobots in front of him: Bumblebee, Ironhide, Ratchet, Gyro and Coldfront.
“Yes,” echoed William. The scientists, a handful of soldiers, Sam and Mikaela and Keller and his retinue were gathered to see them off.
“You’ve all been a big help already-and this makes a huge difference. Thank you.” Irene’s expression was uncharacteristically serious.
Coldfront nodded stiffly at the woman, who smiled at him.
“Be careful,” Sam said from Bumblebee’s feet, a hand on his ankle, looking up at his friend. Mikaela, Sam’s other arm wrapped around her and her hand over his on their best friend, nodded seriously.
“Don’t worry,” he whispered softly to them.
“Let’s go,” whined Gyro insistently, and they did.
Kristine muttered a soft prayer under her breath, to herself.
oOo
Sam had been asleep, but the sirens had woken him up.
His first instinct was to find someone he knew: Mikaela, or the Autobots. The corridor outside his room was just as deserted as it normally was. He knocked urgently on Mikaela’s door, around the bend, but there wasn’t any answer. Halfway to starting to panic now, Sam made his way to the Autobots’ building, hurrying across the narrow strip of muddy, rutted, struggling grass that separated them instead of taking the corridor, which would have kept him dryer, but would have taken longer.
He didn’t notice the way the earth bulged unnaturally behind him a few seconds after he entered the building, as if some giant creature was heaving, spasming beneath the surface.
Mikaela was there, looking shocked and a little frightened, her face pale and her eyes wide, with a tense look in her jaw.
“What’s wrong?” he asked immediately.
“The figs have gotten into the building,” Gyro said promptly. His tone wasn’t laughing, or even light: for once, it was deeply serious, as was the Autobot’s body language. Sam looked at him askance, the huge change in personality more unnerving (because it was on an easier scale to manage, some back corner of his mind whispered) than the fact that he’d just announced that killer figs had made their way into the refugee base they’d formed. “Lives in danger aren’t a laughing matter,” he said, grimly, in an aside to Sam.
“I need to help,” Mikaela announced.
“It’s not safe for you, little weak thing,” said Landslide.
“None of you can manage the syringes.”
There was a short pause that felt like an eternity. “Solarity, go get the gate guards,” Optimus said at last. “Sam, Mikaela, I need you to prepare as much of the chemical as you can. After that-you’ll be safer with one of us, even if you’re fighting against this. I’m assigning you to Solarity, once he’s back. Gyro, go see if you can help fight back the fungus in its main break-through point.”
“Why’s he here?” Mikaela asked Sam quietly, most of her attention still fixed on Optimus.
“I came back when my jab pole fell apart,” he said. “Coincidence. I need to go.” He nearly blurred into motion.
“Landslide, go help with that as well. Fight back the infected figs as well as you can, and remember that your primary purpose is to help the humans escape safely, to save lives.”
“Yes, sir,” said Landslide, promptly for once, face unusually open: there was something almost nervous about the eyes, and his stance was determined as he left, ducking through the now-opened doorway, not bothering to transform. It was too late for a subtle approach to work: you couldn’t fight as a car.
“Nimbus.”
“Sir.”
“Help them as well, once you’ve found Keller. If he has other orders for you, they override mine. Tell him he needs to organize the camp: panic will only cause more deaths.”
“Acknowledged.” The ex-Decepticon strode away.
“And you?” Sam asked, looking over as Mikaela led him over to the store of fungicide-herbicide.
“I’ll do whatever I can,” he said, and left as well.
Solarity was back minutes later, a double-handful of nervous soldiers with him.
“We’re with you,” Mikaela said, not bothering to look up from the syringe she was readying. She added it to the pile she was forming. There was one next to Sam as well.
A soldier stepped forward and joined them, then another-there wasn’t room for more than four people around the table. Solarity fidgeted, looking worried.
The room was empty minutes later.
oOo
It was hellish chaos: people screaming, and the relentless drumming of rain, and jostling crowds and the eerily silent wall of greenery snapping at the outskirts.
Irene caught a glimpse of Gyro slashing at a tangle pulling a panicked man into the darkness, single-minded and intense, before she slipped in the slick mud and went down, grunting as a foot glanced across her ribs. She’d just started to panic before Evan was there, pushing people away from her and pulling her up.
“What’s happening?” she half-heard and half lip-read, the screaming crowd too loud for her to hear him well, even when he was half-yelling.
oOo
Mikaela waited, calm, as the vine reached out and grabbed, hold almost gentle but impossible to stop, to resist, wrapping around her arm and moving out to catch the rest of her, then stuck the tip of the syringe into the branch, as close to the main stem as she could reach, and pushed the plunger down fully. The branch tightened, convulsed, ready to drag her away and grow into her and through her, digest her without ever eating her, but then the toxin took affect and the branch fell away. The effect traveled, until she was in a strange zone of calm. It had been a big bush, this one, she thought quietly to herself.
Sam stepped over towards the human figure slumped over a little ways from them, but stopped before he reached it, backed away. He shook her head as she looked at him, face grim.
Solarity stepped over both of them, snapping the twining strands that had reached their way around him. He bent quickly and they worked what they could of the plant out of his joints, and then they moved on.
People were still screaming. The forest was still alive.
oOo
The four of them forced their way through the thick jungle, still watching for signs of movement.
There was only so much they could hurry over terrain like this, even knowing what had happened. Optimus had commed them.
How could things have gone this utterly wrong? They’d run patrols, they hadn’t come across anything abnormal in the forest surrounding the base.
They’d done something wrong, then, or missed something.
Ratchet tugged aside another branch and slid between two trees, and his audio receivers caught a blur of unexpected noise.
“They’re up ahead. Hurry.” His voice was tense and worried.
oOo
Kristine was trying to force someone to take charge of the frightened child she’d found and rescued, but nobody was calm enough to listen. Besides her, one of the lab assistants-they’d mostly been helping Charles and Evan, she didn’t know them well-was trying to keep people calm and organized.
Landslide, towering above them, was trying, uselessly and desperately, to keep back the forest with its thousand-million grasping hands. He only had two.
He moved seamlessly aside as Gyro moved in, three soldiers fast behind him, armed with syringes. The mob of people surged forwards again, although there was nowhere to go, fighting to get away from the figs and from the Autobots.
An emergency vehicle she recognized as Ratchet pulled in, followed by Ironhide.
“Where do we take them?” growled the truck, his hologram (and Ratchet’s) enough to make her blink, exhausted.
“Main bunker. It’s concrete all the way through.” She shoved the sobbing child into Ratchet’s front seat and went to help Toni try to keep people from mobbing the cars. Two of Keller’s secretaries-cum-bodyguards jogged over to help.
oOo
William squinted, trying to get a clearer look at the arm he was bandaging-his glasses were currently fragments mixed into mud, lost somewhere between the bunker and his room-and frowned.
He’d had basic emergency training for dealing with lab accidents. He’d never expected-or wanted-to put his knowledge to this sort of use.
“Thank you,” said the harried doctor a short ways away from him, wiping blond hair out of his eyes. He couldn’t see the doctor’s face, but his voice sounded like he was on the edge of desperation. He might have said something else, but the words were lost in an outbreak of yells and startled screams a ways away, as someone tried to make a break for the door, looking for someone they’d lost.
The elderly botanist wondered where the other scientists were.
oOo
Bumblebee was searching frantically for Sam and Mikaela. He couldn’t find them.
He’d found Solarity, and when they’d found a calm enough minute he’d asked about Sam and Mikaela. He hadn’t seen them, but that didn’t mean much in the crush of people and his own concentration on the one-sided battle. He could easily have missed them.
Solarity had told him that he’d left them with Gyro, but Bumblebee had just talked to Gyro; he hadn’t said anything and directed him towards Solarity even though he’d mentioned who he was looking for in particular.
He hurried along as well as he could without endangering the humans pressing through the complex until he caught a silvery glimpse of an Autobot-
Only it wasn’t an Autobot. Not exactly.
“Mikaela,” said Nimbus tightly as he caught the obvious warning in Bumblebee’s glare, and a small human figure a short ways from his feet looked up. She was mostly unharmed, no serious injuries: there were a few scratches, but nothing worse.
“Bee!” she cried, running over to him and wrapping her arms around what she could reach of him in an impromptu hug.
“Mikaela,” he replied, relieved, texting Nimbus with a polite, if slightly terse, apology. “Do you know where Sam is?”
“With Landslide,” said Nimbus, voice still cautious, and Mikaela choked on the mouthful of water she’d been swallowing, nearly dropping the bottle.
“How’d that happen?” she coughed out.
oOo
Sam had no idea how he’d ended up with Landslide. The two of them, Mikaela and himself, had been shuffled around a lot, first connected to one Autobot and then another, for one reason or another.
He’d been pretty nervous at first. He was sure (well, almost sure) that the Autobot wouldn’t purposefully hurt or kill him, but he sure as hell didn’t trust him to keep a good eye on him over the course of the conflict. Actually, he was surprised the Transformer was bothering to help at all…
…But he was. He really was. And he was very good at this: he seemed to be in two or three or maybe more places at once, always helping, always knowing exactly what to do, and they needed that: the figs were everywhere. Sam had seen him plunge into the heaving forest after people who’d been dragged in, the ones who still had a chance of being alive: some people were already pierced through with vines, clearly dead, as they were pulled in. He'd seen one person who had seemed fine, just unconscious maybe, until he’d gotten close enough to see the roots piercing his back, stretching up from the earth, and the wriggle of the feeding vines bulging underneath his tight-stretched skin, like the maggots that had been filling a dead bird he’d found as a child.
That had been the second time he’d thrown up.
Sam began to look for Landslide again. He needed more syringes-
He didn’t even know if there was any more of the mixture: they hadn’t planned for something like this. And they couldn’t wait for it to travel through the full network of plants, even though it would use less of the potion. It was too slow, and there were people dying.
People were dying.
He hoped one of the scientists had mixed some more. He didn’t know how much they had used and how much more they would end up using and how much more they needed to use at all.
A vine reached him, appearing out of the darkness with surprising speed, and he reached for his last syringe and fumbled with it. He felt something in him sink as it dropped to the muddy ground.
-and then he was moving, being pulled upwards and out and away, but it was by Landslide and not the figs, so that was okay.
He was glared at once, quickly, roughly and thoroughly, and he had the same sense he got off of Ratchet sometimes, that the Autobot looking at him was seeing more than any human could-without specialized equipment, at least.
Sam was set back on the ground, but away from the figs, away from the threat. People around him scattered as Landslide knelt, moving close enough that Sam could hear his voice over the noise. The figs were quiet, but nothing else was.
“You’re useless tired,” the Autobot said, eyes narrowed, and Sam knew that he’d been watching him far more closely than he thought, to notice how his movements were starting to slow with exhaustion. He also had the irrational feeling that Landslide was worried about him, at least a little, and that that was his way of telling him to get some rest before he got himself killed. Adrenaline could only do so much.
oOo
Bumblebee was in motion before Landslide’s message was even fully registered: he got the coordinates and reacted.
He didn’t trust Landslide. Having Sam around him in such a hazardous situation worried him almost as much as having Mikaela under Nimbus’ eye. Why had the only two humans directly in the line of fire and not currently in service to the U.S. military ended up with the two least trustworthy members of their ranks? Nimbus couldn’t even be called that much-he wasn’t an Autobot-and he was probably more reliable than Coldfront.
And then he realized that the message was a snidely-worded deeply-worried request to get Sam out of danger because he-Landslide-was worried he wasn’t doing well and, in his words, ‘he didn’t want anyone blaming him if anything went wrong.’
Huh. Maybe he wasn’t bad as he tried to make himself seem. Or maybe he was even worse at dealing with other people than Ironhide was, and nobody had realized it.
-or maybe he was a smug bastard who was finally realizing, for the first time, that maybe he didn’t really think that the world would be a better place sans humans. That seemed more likely.
Hey, even the stupidest ’bot had to learn sometime, right?
oOo
Keller let himself relax a little. From the reports that were coming in, he thought that things were starting to calm down. The battle was beginning to ebb, like any tide.
oOo
Everything was motionless, except for the still-falling rain, when the late dawn began to work through the slowly-forming cracks in the clouds that were filling the sky.
The figs had stopped moving around three in the morning. The fighting had stopped at four, when the last of the panicking crowds and half-formed mobs had dissipated. They’d had two hours since then, and the fallen bodies on the compound grounds and the ones littering the edge of the forest had been removed, taken away. Later they would see what they could recover from the forest itself. Even a body riddled with dying vines was more of a comfort than a never-answered question.
But for now, everyone was sleeping.
oOo
(1) Brief disclaimer: I, myself, am something of an environmentalist, but I’m also something of a humanitarian. Real-world example: there are people up in arms about a new plan that uses judicial applications of DDT (painted on the walls of houses) to help prevent malaria in Africa. I am all for this, because it has the possibility to save hundreds of thousands of lives and yes, DDT has some negative environmental impacts, but it also doesn’t cause terrible birth defects (in people) and the way it’s being used isn’t the no-holds-barred blunt-force mass-amounts-everywhere approach that inspired Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring. (End ranting. Sorry ’bout that.)
(2) I may be getting slightly self-referential here.
(3) Side-reference, anyone? Take a guess.
--end Chapter Eight--
Chapter 8
[Transformers, 2007 movie] The defeat of Megatron and the defense of earth has left everyone the chance to relax a little. Now, if only that was all that was out there...
Characters/Pairings: Sam, Mikaela and Autobots, OCs. Gen, but features a little Sam/Mikaela for canon reasons.
Ratings and Warnings: OC-heavy, a very little violence and language, psuedoscience, PG-13/T for safety.
Previous Chapters:
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
FFnet Link
Alien: Chapter 8
Author's Notes: Eternal thanks to mmouse15 for betaing!
oOoOoOo
“They’re all connected,” said Irene happily, slapping the closed lid covering one of the fig samples for emphasis. “They’re all connected because something they’re doing-probably something connected to their metabolic process, judging by how crazy it is-creates a highly toxic chemical, and they need a separate plant to produce the chemical that neutralizes it, and so they’re all tied together via their roots, meaning that this lovely little toxin that Evan and that bastard have cooked up only needs to be injected into each over-all mass of plants, each ‘community,’ to use one of the current lame buzzwords, instead of each one individually. And it means that most plants won’t survive long even if they do end up infected, which looks to be a rare, rare occurrence, from Evan’s and Charles’ work. Thank you, God and the evolutionary process!”
“So what happens next?” asked Sam. “I mean, you know how the plants work, kind of, and you’ve got something that’ll kill them, but if anyone gets too close they’ll attack, and they’re still dangerous. How fast does the poison work? Or can you just use a plane or something to spread it overhead, or something like that?”
“A direct injection’s best, apparently,” said Kristine.
“We-well, the government, really-has got engineers working on mocking up some airtight, heavily insulated full-body suits with something to catch air once it’s been breathed out,” continued Irene. “And once that happens they’ll probably be given to some overly-muscled military team who’ll be given instructions and then dumped off in the Amazon, where we’ll supply them with syringes full of finely tuned herbicide-fungicide-weird-alien-chemical mixtures, a few wind-up decoys so they can find out which plants actually are infected and some more thorough information, and then they’ll go do the deed.”
“And then they’ll stick around and there’ll be regular patrols and then there’ll be a long, angry campaign by some group of all-organic environmentalists that the government will ignore (1), and then we might get medals. If we do, I will seal mine in inert resin and leave it in my fish tank.” Kristine added.
“…Why?” asked Mikaela, a little nonplussed.
“Because otherwise it might upset my water quality, which would be horrible for my poor little tetras.”
“No, I mean why are you-”
Kristine snickered slightly. “Oh, that, of course. Well, displaying anything you’ve won is, of course, vulgar-it’s somewhat acceptable when you’re seven and it’s your parents displaying your music lesson trophy or something, but at my age, it’s just plain unattractive. But then, it feels somewhat wrong to just throw something like that away-and the fish seem to like them. Once they’ve been rendered chemically safe. Certainly it makes for an interesting centerpiece. If I bothered to write something up about how it was a statement about American government I could probably pass it off as modern art.”
Keats, who’d just walked in, sighed loudly. “Kristine…” he began.
“Keats…” she mimicked.
“It’s weird,” said Mikaela. “All that frantic work and then-nothing.”
“It’s science,” shrugged Kristine. “Let me put it like this-let’s pretend we’re in an action movie. There’s a hero. He’s one of the people charged with getting the infected figs killed via injections. There’ll be something about his angsty emotional state, which will almost-but not quite-prevent him from succeeding in his mission and saving the world. Possibly alcoholism. And he’ll have a kid and a wife about to go through with the divorce. In the course of the movie we’ll see their reunion, and it’ll be a touching, emotionally feel-good ending scene. We’ll meet the rest of the team. But everything we just did? It would be a 30-second scene where one of us gives a brief moment of exposition about how the poison works.
“And life’s like that. With a few exceptions-Edison, Einstein-the inventions that change the world, or save it, get ignored. …Of course, it also helps that watching someone defeat great odds to save the day in a very physical, literal way is more interesting than watching sleep-deprived scientists fiddle with bits of greenery. Well, except when Irene was messing around with the wind-up mice.” (2)
“It’s really different from last time,” Sam said.
“Previous to antibiotics, more people died of infections than actual wounds during wars,” added Irene. “Can you name who invented the refrigerator? You’d be amazed how many lives that invention saved. If we’re lucky we’ll be named in a handful of newspaper articles. I prefer that, actually.”
“I understand that,” said Mikaela. “Nobody knows either of us were involved with Mission City at all. It was weird, to save the world and get awarded a medal in a private ceremony by the President and then go back to school, where my chemistry teacher chewed me out for missing our practical exam.”
“I’ll second that,” said Sam feelingly.
“Well, it’s not quite like that for us,” said Kristine.
“We’re all somewhat famous in certain scientific circles by now,” added Irene.
“Let’s just say that Evan wasn’t being entirely unreasonable when he freaked out when he heard who he was going to be working with,” said Keats. “I was more than a little skittish for the first month or so, myself. Of course, he should have calmed down a little by now…”
“He’s young,” said Irene dismissively. “Of course, people like that utter ass Cleve don’t help… Anyways, he’ll grow out of it, whether I have to involve myself or not.”
“What are you all going to do after this?” asked Mikaela.
“I’m back to the lab and my list of projects,” said Kristine cheerily. “I’m working with jellyfish next! Keep an eye out for something revolutionary and world-changing in the next three years or so stemming from them. I’m not telling you anything more, sorry.”
Sam laughed. Kristine looked at him blankly. “What? I’m being serious.” She paused. “Well, mostly. There’s always a chance that it’s another dead end.”
“I’m hoping for a chance to stay in the Amazon a while,” confessed Irene. “I haven’t had a chance to look around yet-and it’s an incredible place. I’d never forgive myself if I just left. I owe myself a vacation, anyways. And it’s not like I haven’t been learning Portuguese for the past ten years for a trip here, anyways.”
“And I’ve got papers I’m working on,” said Keats. “I’d tell you, but the government would be forced to kill me. It’s in the contract.”
“-you’re not serious?” asked Sam, somewhat serious himself.
“Mostly not,” said Keats. “Although I really can’t tell anyone anything. It’s a bother-my mother keeps on giving me the ninth degree. Not to mention you, Irene.”
“Cute. Come on, I just want to know if it’s the same thing that I was working on last year, we never did get it all wrapped up but it showed promise-”
oOo
Sir? sent Coldfront to Optimus Prime.
Yes? he replied, trying to hide his (far-too-obvious) surprise. The ’bot sounded almost hesitant, which made him think that it wasn’t some little, niggling detail or clarification, but instead something more like what they were trying to get him to do-that is, develop something like a personality.
It-occurred to me, he said, stiffly, That several Autobots currently present, including myself, are equipped with temporary heat-baffling systems to prevent detection by Decepticons while in the field.
Yes… said Optimus, nonplussed. The revelation wasn’t anything much-all spies and a few others were equipped with the same program. It had been developed after a particularly bloody period in the war, a long ways back; there’d been a lot of those, moments where one side or the other developed something that gave them an advantage, and then a leveling-off as the other side developed something to counteract it. It was mostly outdated, now, and pretty much ignored.
Then we may be more capable of delivering the fungicide than the humans, and without the current waiting period. Coldfront’s ‘voice’ sounded stressed, harried-Optimus knew that it had probably taken a lot for the Autobot to suggest even that much.
Yes. Excellent point. Thank you, Coldfront.
Yes, sir.
Calling up the stats lists he had for all of the Autobots currently under his command, Optimus scanned them. Bumblebee, Coldfront, Gyro, Ratchet and, somewhat surprisingly, Ironhide. He’d never been outfitted with the program, himself; it was usually for spies and people who needed to remain sneaky and unseen; that was why Bumblebee and Gyro had it. Coldfront was a fairly neutral build, not obviously meant for one function or another (science, spying, fighting) and had probably had any number of functions, over the years-although Optimus didn’t want to imagine what life would have been like under that commander he’d had. Ratchet had probably reasoned that he might need it for field work. It made sense for him to stay out of a fight as much as possible.
And Ironhide? It was highly unusual for a weapons specialist to have that sort of specialized shielding. He’d probably wanted it for the chance to get close enough to do more damage, Optimus thought, darkly amused. A mutual acquaintance of theirs had once described his approach to fighting with “I’d think he was suicidal if I didn’t know him better.”
“Bumblebee, Gyro, Ratchet and Ironhide, over here,” he called back, and there was the slightly awkward shuffle of Autobot bodies switching around in a too-small space. With very few exceptions, human buildings just weren’t big enough to comfortably contain an average-sized Transformer. He could barely move-the smaller ones were more comfortable. The smallest, the size of Gyro down to the thankfully-dead Frenzy and possibly tinier, were the only ones without any real problem. After so many days of restricted motion he was almost jealous.
“What do you want?” asked Gyro brightly, light tone the only thing keeping his question from being insolent. Optimus ignored it, while a stricter commander (Coldfront’s old one, for example) would have made a point. The current situation was hardly the formal military one that had existed since before the beginning of the war and only ended close to the end of it.
“You’re all outfitted with heat bafflers?”
A series of slightly confused looks were directed at him-except from the still-present Coldfront, of course.
“Yes, sir,” came in ragged chorus.
“Good. Are any of you willing to help remove the infected plants? With heat baffles in place, we effectively disappear for them, making it safer for us than for humans, even ones with protective clothing.”
“Absolutely,” said Bumblebee quickly, not bothering to hear the rest of what Optimus had to say.
“Finally! A chance to move,” said Ironhide, looking positively delighted-at least, as much as he ever did. “I’m in.”
“Sure, why not?” continued Gyro, who wasn’t laughing for once, although there was still that deep humor bubbling up through his voice.
“Yes,” said Ratchet simply.
Four pairs of optics turned automatically to stare at Coldfront.
“It was my suggestion,” he said stiffly, glancing quickly at Optimus as if to judge his reaction to that-Optimus muffled a sigh. Oh well. Coldfront was getting better, at least, and he should see even this much progress as more than he could have hoped for.
“Well, then, let’s do this thing!” said Bumblebee brightly.
“I think you’re forgetting something,” Ratchet replied. “Your hands. The syringes are made for humans. Gyro, you might be able to manage, and I could probably cobble something together out of my medical tools-” He sounded, somewhat reasonably, upset about that prospect “-but you three are going to be useless. It’s not a general-application spray, or anything like that.”
There was a brief silence.
“Really big syringes…” said Bumblebee, voice mock-speculative. Gyro giggled, Coldfront frowned deeply and Ironhide jabbed the smaller mech in the side, who glared back in return. Ratchet was rather amused by the mental image that idea conjured, himself.
“We can offer the information to someone in the appropriate position, regardless,” said Coldfront at last.
oOo
Irene walked into the Autobots’ room carrying a large duffle bag, which she dumped carelessly on the ground. It clattered loudly.
“What’ve you got?” asked Solarity keenly, looking over at the woman. Irene half-rolled her eyes. They’d all gotten very used to Solarity’s questions.
“Jab sticks!” she explained, mild annoyance switching quickly to an excited, happy look.
“What?” said Solarity, confused. A few more Autobot heads turned, bored enough to be interested in the conversation.
“Jab sticks-they’re poles with syringes attached to the end. I was using them on some bear research I did once, a good long while ago-it was a vacation, really, I was helping out a friend. So, you can trap a bear, right, but then you need to get close enough to it to knock it out so you can fit it with the radio collar and take a handful of samples and measurements and tag it. And that can be quite exciting when you’ve got a 300-pound enraged animal with claws flailing around as much as it can trying to kill you. So there’s jab sticks-poles with syringes at the end so you can deliver the drugs without getting yourself killed.”
“Alright,” said Solarity agreeably. “Makes sense. Why do you have them, though?”
“When the bear project finished there was a whole bunch of extras, and we were losing the building we were renting so I took ’em with me on the theory that they had the potential to be useful.”
“…Why do you have them here, though?”
“Well, Kristine wants to use them-something about jellyfish-and so I promised her that I’d mail them to her, since I’m not using them right now, but then I heard we were coming here, and it was cheaper to just stick them in a spare duffel bag and bring them like that.”
“‘Here’ as in this room.”
“Ohhh. You should be more specific when you’re talking, you know.” Solarity laughed at Irene’s light teasing. “Kristine was telling Keats about the jab sticks during lunch and Evan overheard and suggested that we see if we could mock something up for you that could let you use them, because you have the potential to be really helpful when it comes to dealing with the figs, and so Toni-” Irene scowled darkly “-is coming along in a few minutes to see if he can do anything, since he’s the most mechanically adept one among us, and then we talked one of the gate guards into getting some supplies-duct tape and wire, mostly-out of one of the janitors, and he’ll bring that around, too.”
“That right there’s what I miss about spending time with other scientists,” said Solarity, tone slightly sad. “The way ideas spring into being like that-”
“You’re a scientist?” Irene asked.
“No-well, yes and no. I never showed huge promise, but I received basic training for the scientific fields. About one and a half years in Earth time before I finished I was switched into a fighting unit.” He shrugged. “It happens. I miss the other… students who were in my group, though-haven’t seen most of them for years, and there’s a good chance they’re all dead.”
“I’m sorry,” said Irene simply.
“No matter. It was a long time ago, but I had a wonderful time. And time heals all wounds-I even remember the punishment details with a certain amount of fondness, now.”
Irene snorted. “Punishment details? Before you say anything, then, I’m going to guess that certain Transformers in whatever-it-is-that’s-your-equivalent-to-college are just as prone to the things that certain human college students are…”
“Probably not what you’re thinking,” admitted Solarity. “Mostly we-my friends at the time and I-got in trouble for doing things like tweaking the other students’ experimental setups so they gave nonsensical answers, or sneaking into the labs during off-hours. -and blowing stuff up, that happened a lot too.” (3)
Irene got vaguely misty-eyed. “Oh, bless. Now I’ve got memories of my own college days playing through my head. I continue to claim, to this day, that the time my best friend replaced our teacher’s demonstration chemicals with dyed water was one of the best moments of my life. It was also the best front-of-the-class example, ever, period. ‘This should be working, damn it!’”
“Mature, much, Irene?” asked Toni, walking in. Irene’s face went blank and then quickly soured before straightening again.
“At least I’m not a sour grape,” she said sweetly.
Toni flushed angrily. “That has nothing to do with this and you know it-”
“Oh, now, I’m not sure I do. And you can seriously say that you’re not the slightest bit bitter I’ve been turning you down since we started working together…?”
“I’m not saying I’m not bitter, and I’m not saying I am, but if I have a problem I’m going to talk about it with the other person involved like the adult I, at least, am-”
“Then what do you call this argument?” Irene especially, who’d had a cooler tone at the start, was beginning to sound angry, but Toni was as well. “Talking it out like the adult you are?”
“I call this argument your childish refusal to act your own age-”
“Fine. I’m immature. What, then, what exactly is it, that attracts you to immature women, Toni?”
Solarity in particular looked utterly bemused.
Toni opened his mouth angrily to reply but paused instead of speaking, then closed his mouth, relaxing abruptly, the tension draining out of him. “You’re right,” he said, voice quiet and intense. “I’m out of line. I’m sorry.”
Irene glared at him one, two, three seconds longer, and then turned and stalked angrily away, heading over to the remains of her lab station-it had been mostly dismantled and the remaining figs had been neglected, both the infected and uninfected ones, languishing in their glass cages: almost all of them were starting to crisp up, drying out. Absently, Irene started watering one of the uninfected plants, slowly trickling the liquid into the clear cube that was still serving as a planter pot, letting it loosen up the constricted dry dirt bit by bit. The one she’d picked had soil so bone-dry that the water she poured in puddled on top of the matted soil, and she felt vaguely guilty.
She looked over as the door swung open and shut again, a vaguely familiar gate guard and a peeved Kristine stepping inside.
“If I don’t get my jab sticks back in good shape, I am going to be highly annoyed,” the blonde announced to the world at large, hands on her hips and a scowl on her face.
“You can always buy more,” said Toni reasonably.
“I’m over-budget as I am. Do you have any idea what custom two-thousand-gallon-and-up jellyfish tanks cost? I didn’t.” She paused for a quick second. “Sadly, I do now. And I’d really rather not have to choose between eating only instant ramen noodles for a month and paying my heating bill. Actually, wait, it’d have to be the ramen, because some of the tanks need heating, too, and we can’t have them getting too cold. Or the cool-water ones getting too hot. Electricity’s a must too, because I need to monitor light levels, although thankfully I can do some of that with sunlight.”
“Jellyfish?” asked the soldier, looking interested despite himself. “Damn, I hate those things.”
“At the moment, they’re my darlings, but I’ll probably feel different when I’ve been messing around with them for a few months,” said Kristine. “The jab sticks here should keep me out of reach of their stinging symbiotic unicellular organisms, and my nasty human impurities-such as hand soap or lotion, say-out of their tentacles as well. And their bells.”
“Bells?” Solarity asked. Technically, it would be very easy for him to just a run a quick search online, but he liked the answers people gave more. They tended to be more informative, even-or maybe especially-when they weren’t correct.
“The blobby part on top,” Kristine qualified.
“Is that a technical term?” Toni asked dryly. “It could be an acronym-BPT, or something to that effect…”
“Too much like BLT,” Irene said; she was walking back over. “You’d have undergrads thinking it means something like bacon, pear and tomato sandwich, or something like that.”
Toni made an expressive face of disgust, although Irene ignored him pointedly.
“Bacon, pea and tomato sounds more likely…” Kristine said thoughtfully.
“Ew, I hate peas,” Irene said, wrinkling her nose.
“-and pears and bacon together are better than peas?”
“Yes, definitely.”
“…I’m sensing a dare.”
“Whooo, damn, we really are immature, aren’t we? I’d totally do it for the right incentive.”
“I told you so!” Toni said, and Irene ignored him. Kristine rolled her eyes.
The soldier snickered quietly to himself, attracting Irene’s attention.
“So, do you think we’re immature-” she paused to read his nametag “-Cahler?”
“Not at all, Ma’am,” he snapped out neatly, everything about him saying ‘repressed laughter.’
“I knew you looked smart,” Irene drawled out.
“Hey, Cahler,” Bumblebee called out from a ways away, making the soldier start slightly and look over at the Autobot, belying his totally relaxed outward appearance. “How are you?”
“Hey,” he called back, and Kristine raised a perfectly questioning eyebrow.
“It’s a long story,” he said, and Kristine nodded.
“Under ordinary circumstances I’d pump you for details, but I’ve had more than my fair share of those in the past few days, and I think I’m starting to understand.”
“Bonding under stress is all well and good, but lets see if we can get these jab sticks rigged,” Toni said decisively, walking briskly forward.
“Can I help?” asked Cahler and Solarity almost simultaneously, both brightly interested.
oOo
“Thank you,” said Keller formally, addressing the five Autobots in front of him: Bumblebee, Ironhide, Ratchet, Gyro and Coldfront.
“Yes,” echoed William. The scientists, a handful of soldiers, Sam and Mikaela and Keller and his retinue were gathered to see them off.
“You’ve all been a big help already-and this makes a huge difference. Thank you.” Irene’s expression was uncharacteristically serious.
Coldfront nodded stiffly at the woman, who smiled at him.
“Be careful,” Sam said from Bumblebee’s feet, a hand on his ankle, looking up at his friend. Mikaela, Sam’s other arm wrapped around her and her hand over his on their best friend, nodded seriously.
“Don’t worry,” he whispered softly to them.
“Let’s go,” whined Gyro insistently, and they did.
Kristine muttered a soft prayer under her breath, to herself.
oOo
Sam had been asleep, but the sirens had woken him up.
His first instinct was to find someone he knew: Mikaela, or the Autobots. The corridor outside his room was just as deserted as it normally was. He knocked urgently on Mikaela’s door, around the bend, but there wasn’t any answer. Halfway to starting to panic now, Sam made his way to the Autobots’ building, hurrying across the narrow strip of muddy, rutted, struggling grass that separated them instead of taking the corridor, which would have kept him dryer, but would have taken longer.
He didn’t notice the way the earth bulged unnaturally behind him a few seconds after he entered the building, as if some giant creature was heaving, spasming beneath the surface.
Mikaela was there, looking shocked and a little frightened, her face pale and her eyes wide, with a tense look in her jaw.
“What’s wrong?” he asked immediately.
“The figs have gotten into the building,” Gyro said promptly. His tone wasn’t laughing, or even light: for once, it was deeply serious, as was the Autobot’s body language. Sam looked at him askance, the huge change in personality more unnerving (because it was on an easier scale to manage, some back corner of his mind whispered) than the fact that he’d just announced that killer figs had made their way into the refugee base they’d formed. “Lives in danger aren’t a laughing matter,” he said, grimly, in an aside to Sam.
“I need to help,” Mikaela announced.
“It’s not safe for you, little weak thing,” said Landslide.
“None of you can manage the syringes.”
There was a short pause that felt like an eternity. “Solarity, go get the gate guards,” Optimus said at last. “Sam, Mikaela, I need you to prepare as much of the chemical as you can. After that-you’ll be safer with one of us, even if you’re fighting against this. I’m assigning you to Solarity, once he’s back. Gyro, go see if you can help fight back the fungus in its main break-through point.”
“Why’s he here?” Mikaela asked Sam quietly, most of her attention still fixed on Optimus.
“I came back when my jab pole fell apart,” he said. “Coincidence. I need to go.” He nearly blurred into motion.
“Landslide, go help with that as well. Fight back the infected figs as well as you can, and remember that your primary purpose is to help the humans escape safely, to save lives.”
“Yes, sir,” said Landslide, promptly for once, face unusually open: there was something almost nervous about the eyes, and his stance was determined as he left, ducking through the now-opened doorway, not bothering to transform. It was too late for a subtle approach to work: you couldn’t fight as a car.
“Nimbus.”
“Sir.”
“Help them as well, once you’ve found Keller. If he has other orders for you, they override mine. Tell him he needs to organize the camp: panic will only cause more deaths.”
“Acknowledged.” The ex-Decepticon strode away.
“And you?” Sam asked, looking over as Mikaela led him over to the store of fungicide-herbicide.
“I’ll do whatever I can,” he said, and left as well.
Solarity was back minutes later, a double-handful of nervous soldiers with him.
“We’re with you,” Mikaela said, not bothering to look up from the syringe she was readying. She added it to the pile she was forming. There was one next to Sam as well.
A soldier stepped forward and joined them, then another-there wasn’t room for more than four people around the table. Solarity fidgeted, looking worried.
The room was empty minutes later.
oOo
It was hellish chaos: people screaming, and the relentless drumming of rain, and jostling crowds and the eerily silent wall of greenery snapping at the outskirts.
Irene caught a glimpse of Gyro slashing at a tangle pulling a panicked man into the darkness, single-minded and intense, before she slipped in the slick mud and went down, grunting as a foot glanced across her ribs. She’d just started to panic before Evan was there, pushing people away from her and pulling her up.
“What’s happening?” she half-heard and half lip-read, the screaming crowd too loud for her to hear him well, even when he was half-yelling.
oOo
Mikaela waited, calm, as the vine reached out and grabbed, hold almost gentle but impossible to stop, to resist, wrapping around her arm and moving out to catch the rest of her, then stuck the tip of the syringe into the branch, as close to the main stem as she could reach, and pushed the plunger down fully. The branch tightened, convulsed, ready to drag her away and grow into her and through her, digest her without ever eating her, but then the toxin took affect and the branch fell away. The effect traveled, until she was in a strange zone of calm. It had been a big bush, this one, she thought quietly to herself.
Sam stepped over towards the human figure slumped over a little ways from them, but stopped before he reached it, backed away. He shook her head as she looked at him, face grim.
Solarity stepped over both of them, snapping the twining strands that had reached their way around him. He bent quickly and they worked what they could of the plant out of his joints, and then they moved on.
People were still screaming. The forest was still alive.
oOo
The four of them forced their way through the thick jungle, still watching for signs of movement.
There was only so much they could hurry over terrain like this, even knowing what had happened. Optimus had commed them.
How could things have gone this utterly wrong? They’d run patrols, they hadn’t come across anything abnormal in the forest surrounding the base.
They’d done something wrong, then, or missed something.
Ratchet tugged aside another branch and slid between two trees, and his audio receivers caught a blur of unexpected noise.
“They’re up ahead. Hurry.” His voice was tense and worried.
oOo
Kristine was trying to force someone to take charge of the frightened child she’d found and rescued, but nobody was calm enough to listen. Besides her, one of the lab assistants-they’d mostly been helping Charles and Evan, she didn’t know them well-was trying to keep people calm and organized.
Landslide, towering above them, was trying, uselessly and desperately, to keep back the forest with its thousand-million grasping hands. He only had two.
He moved seamlessly aside as Gyro moved in, three soldiers fast behind him, armed with syringes. The mob of people surged forwards again, although there was nowhere to go, fighting to get away from the figs and from the Autobots.
An emergency vehicle she recognized as Ratchet pulled in, followed by Ironhide.
“Where do we take them?” growled the truck, his hologram (and Ratchet’s) enough to make her blink, exhausted.
“Main bunker. It’s concrete all the way through.” She shoved the sobbing child into Ratchet’s front seat and went to help Toni try to keep people from mobbing the cars. Two of Keller’s secretaries-cum-bodyguards jogged over to help.
oOo
William squinted, trying to get a clearer look at the arm he was bandaging-his glasses were currently fragments mixed into mud, lost somewhere between the bunker and his room-and frowned.
He’d had basic emergency training for dealing with lab accidents. He’d never expected-or wanted-to put his knowledge to this sort of use.
“Thank you,” said the harried doctor a short ways away from him, wiping blond hair out of his eyes. He couldn’t see the doctor’s face, but his voice sounded like he was on the edge of desperation. He might have said something else, but the words were lost in an outbreak of yells and startled screams a ways away, as someone tried to make a break for the door, looking for someone they’d lost.
The elderly botanist wondered where the other scientists were.
oOo
Bumblebee was searching frantically for Sam and Mikaela. He couldn’t find them.
He’d found Solarity, and when they’d found a calm enough minute he’d asked about Sam and Mikaela. He hadn’t seen them, but that didn’t mean much in the crush of people and his own concentration on the one-sided battle. He could easily have missed them.
Solarity had told him that he’d left them with Gyro, but Bumblebee had just talked to Gyro; he hadn’t said anything and directed him towards Solarity even though he’d mentioned who he was looking for in particular.
He hurried along as well as he could without endangering the humans pressing through the complex until he caught a silvery glimpse of an Autobot-
Only it wasn’t an Autobot. Not exactly.
“Mikaela,” said Nimbus tightly as he caught the obvious warning in Bumblebee’s glare, and a small human figure a short ways from his feet looked up. She was mostly unharmed, no serious injuries: there were a few scratches, but nothing worse.
“Bee!” she cried, running over to him and wrapping her arms around what she could reach of him in an impromptu hug.
“Mikaela,” he replied, relieved, texting Nimbus with a polite, if slightly terse, apology. “Do you know where Sam is?”
“With Landslide,” said Nimbus, voice still cautious, and Mikaela choked on the mouthful of water she’d been swallowing, nearly dropping the bottle.
“How’d that happen?” she coughed out.
oOo
Sam had no idea how he’d ended up with Landslide. The two of them, Mikaela and himself, had been shuffled around a lot, first connected to one Autobot and then another, for one reason or another.
He’d been pretty nervous at first. He was sure (well, almost sure) that the Autobot wouldn’t purposefully hurt or kill him, but he sure as hell didn’t trust him to keep a good eye on him over the course of the conflict. Actually, he was surprised the Transformer was bothering to help at all…
…But he was. He really was. And he was very good at this: he seemed to be in two or three or maybe more places at once, always helping, always knowing exactly what to do, and they needed that: the figs were everywhere. Sam had seen him plunge into the heaving forest after people who’d been dragged in, the ones who still had a chance of being alive: some people were already pierced through with vines, clearly dead, as they were pulled in. He'd seen one person who had seemed fine, just unconscious maybe, until he’d gotten close enough to see the roots piercing his back, stretching up from the earth, and the wriggle of the feeding vines bulging underneath his tight-stretched skin, like the maggots that had been filling a dead bird he’d found as a child.
That had been the second time he’d thrown up.
Sam began to look for Landslide again. He needed more syringes-
He didn’t even know if there was any more of the mixture: they hadn’t planned for something like this. And they couldn’t wait for it to travel through the full network of plants, even though it would use less of the potion. It was too slow, and there were people dying.
People were dying.
He hoped one of the scientists had mixed some more. He didn’t know how much they had used and how much more they would end up using and how much more they needed to use at all.
A vine reached him, appearing out of the darkness with surprising speed, and he reached for his last syringe and fumbled with it. He felt something in him sink as it dropped to the muddy ground.
-and then he was moving, being pulled upwards and out and away, but it was by Landslide and not the figs, so that was okay.
He was glared at once, quickly, roughly and thoroughly, and he had the same sense he got off of Ratchet sometimes, that the Autobot looking at him was seeing more than any human could-without specialized equipment, at least.
Sam was set back on the ground, but away from the figs, away from the threat. People around him scattered as Landslide knelt, moving close enough that Sam could hear his voice over the noise. The figs were quiet, but nothing else was.
“You’re useless tired,” the Autobot said, eyes narrowed, and Sam knew that he’d been watching him far more closely than he thought, to notice how his movements were starting to slow with exhaustion. He also had the irrational feeling that Landslide was worried about him, at least a little, and that that was his way of telling him to get some rest before he got himself killed. Adrenaline could only do so much.
oOo
Bumblebee was in motion before Landslide’s message was even fully registered: he got the coordinates and reacted.
He didn’t trust Landslide. Having Sam around him in such a hazardous situation worried him almost as much as having Mikaela under Nimbus’ eye. Why had the only two humans directly in the line of fire and not currently in service to the U.S. military ended up with the two least trustworthy members of their ranks? Nimbus couldn’t even be called that much-he wasn’t an Autobot-and he was probably more reliable than Coldfront.
And then he realized that the message was a snidely-worded deeply-worried request to get Sam out of danger because he-Landslide-was worried he wasn’t doing well and, in his words, ‘he didn’t want anyone blaming him if anything went wrong.’
Huh. Maybe he wasn’t bad as he tried to make himself seem. Or maybe he was even worse at dealing with other people than Ironhide was, and nobody had realized it.
-or maybe he was a smug bastard who was finally realizing, for the first time, that maybe he didn’t really think that the world would be a better place sans humans. That seemed more likely.
Hey, even the stupidest ’bot had to learn sometime, right?
oOo
Keller let himself relax a little. From the reports that were coming in, he thought that things were starting to calm down. The battle was beginning to ebb, like any tide.
oOo
Everything was motionless, except for the still-falling rain, when the late dawn began to work through the slowly-forming cracks in the clouds that were filling the sky.
The figs had stopped moving around three in the morning. The fighting had stopped at four, when the last of the panicking crowds and half-formed mobs had dissipated. They’d had two hours since then, and the fallen bodies on the compound grounds and the ones littering the edge of the forest had been removed, taken away. Later they would see what they could recover from the forest itself. Even a body riddled with dying vines was more of a comfort than a never-answered question.
But for now, everyone was sleeping.
oOo
(1) Brief disclaimer: I, myself, am something of an environmentalist, but I’m also something of a humanitarian. Real-world example: there are people up in arms about a new plan that uses judicial applications of DDT (painted on the walls of houses) to help prevent malaria in Africa. I am all for this, because it has the possibility to save hundreds of thousands of lives and yes, DDT has some negative environmental impacts, but it also doesn’t cause terrible birth defects (in people) and the way it’s being used isn’t the no-holds-barred blunt-force mass-amounts-everywhere approach that inspired Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring. (End ranting. Sorry ’bout that.)
(2) I may be getting slightly self-referential here.
(3) Side-reference, anyone? Take a guess.
--end Chapter Eight--