CHAPTER NINE
Unspecified location, Cycle 9315 (around 500 years ago)
“Luna 2? What’s on Luna 2?”
“A hot spot that has not yet been tarnished by the war,” answered the holographic gear-shaped insignia floating in front of Anode and Lug, casting a bright light on the pair. “It is perhaps the only place where you can find a sample of widowed metal.”
“Widowed metal?” Anode was familiar with the term. In rare instances, if a newborn spark was not harvested in time, the sentio metallico surrounding it would survive as a specially shaped piece of metal. While she was not aware of any uses for the little “snowflakes,” she did know such metal fetched very high prices in certain markets. Especially the less-than-reputable ones….
“I mean, no offense, but the chances of finding something like that are… astronomically small,” Anode went on. “Not to mentioned how long it would take.”
“Then I suggest you start as soon as possible,” replied the hologram. “I have full confidence that you will find what I am asking… and I assure you that the reward will be well worth your time.”
“What kind of reward are we talking about?” asked Lug, crossing her arms.
“Somewhere in the realm of a million Shanix. The half of it upfront.”
Anode’s optics gleamed at this number. Lug, for her part, still remained skeptical.
“What exactly is it that you want with this widowed metal?” she asked. “Are you selling it to hungry Centaurians or something?”
“It is none of your concern,” the hologram said sharply. “Do we have a deal?”
“We sure do,” Anode said before Lug could speak. She gave off a half-hearted salute to the hologram. “Pleasure doing business with you, Techy.”
With that, she switched off the hologram before turning to Lug, a wide smile on her face. Said smile instantly fell when she saw Lug’s expression. “What’s wrong?”
“I still think you’re too trusting of this guy,” Lug muttered. “I mean, we don’t even know what he looks like and already you’re accepting jobs from him that are taking us close to Cybertron. I thought you never wanted to go back there.”
“I don’t,” Anode said. “But a million Shanix, Lug! That would pay off at least five debts in our name.”
Lug huffed, looking away. Paying off their debts was always the thing Anode dangled over her head whenever she objected to a job they had been thrown into. “It would,” she grudgingly admitted.
“And,” Anode added, raising a finger, “there just might be enough left over to get you that rare Cyber Key you were eying back at Big Hoss’ shop.”
“I don’t want it that bad,” Lug mumbled.
Anode placed a hand on her shoulder. “Relax. We’ve taken on jobs more dangerous than this. It’s just one little trip to Luna 2. It’ll be fine.”
Lug glared at her. “That’s what you said last time about the Ideji—”
“It’ll be fine,” Anode repeated, stressing the last word. “When have I ever steered you wrong?”
Lug bit back the very colorful retort she was about to release. Instead, she took Anode’s hand off of her shoulders and clasped it between her own servos.
“All right,” Lug sighed. “Let’s get moving.”
The Lost Light, en route to the Muta-Gaath Nebula, present day
“That’s pretty much it,” Anode said, standing before Star Saber on the bridge as she finished her story. “Never saw Techy after that since we went to Luna 2 and… ended up five centuries in the future.”
“You didn’t gather much from previous interactions with him?” Star Saber asked.
She shook her head. “Only met him once before that point and it was mostly just introductions; telling me how he calls himself ‘the Grand Architect’ and all that rubbish.”
“Any ideas on what he was planning on using the widowed metal for?”
Anode shrugged. “Honestly, it could be anything. All I know is that I wasn’t the only blacksmith he hired, and that he wants me and the others dead for knowing what little we do. I wish I could give you a better answer, but….”
“I understand,” Star Saber said gently. “Thank you for your time.”
Anode nodded before departing from the bridge. Star Saber turned back around to face the front of the ship’s bridge, staring at the hyperspace tunnel through the main viewport.
“How much longer, Skyblast?” he asked the white and red pilot.
“Little less than a mega-cycle, cap,” Skyblast replied. “We’re gonna have to be extra cautious when we drop out. Nebulae like the Muta-Gaath can be unpredictable when it comes to stability. We might have to drop out just out of its reach.”
“Do whatever you need to. So long as we get there.”
“You seem pretty confident that we’ll find something there,” said Wing Saber, standing nearby. “Any particular reason?”
“Call it a hunch, brother,” Star Saber replied. “Something in my spark is telling me that we will find the answers we need here.”
“Uh-huh.” A small smirk crossed Wing Saber’s gold face. “Just like your hunch told you that trying to sneak stink-grenades into Kup’s office was a good idea?”
Star Saber sighed heavily. “More like my hunch telling me that the Academy life was not the life for me.”
“And how well has that worked for you so far?”
Star Saber stayed quiet as he tried to decide on how maturely to respond.
* * *
“Why are we still here?”
“I don’t know,” muttered Krok, walking alongside Nickel as they headed down one of the Lost Light’s hallways. “Why are you still here?”
Nickel rolled her eyes at him. “I asked first.”
“You asked why are ‘we’ here. I know why I’m here, but I don’t know why you’re here. So I can’t faithfully answer the whole ‘we’ part.”
“Did Misfire’s snark rub off on you or something?”
This earned her a glare and the Mini-Con slightly scooted away from him. “Okay, okay. I’m sorry,” she huffed. “I’m here because I don’t want to join the others on Earth and everyone on Cybertron would think I’m up to something.”
“Same,” Krok grunted.
“Okay. There we go. See how easy that was?” He did not answer her, not that she was expecting him to. “Of course,” Nickel went on, “that doesn’t explain Spacewarp.”
“I think Star Saber asked her to come along,” Krok said. “He probably thinks her Transwarp Blaster may come in handy.”
“Mm.” Nickel went quiet as she tried to think of a subject to shift the conversation to, or whether she even should. The point became moot, however, as a topic of conversation immediately presented itself when the pair turned the corner.
The apparition vanished almost instantly but it had stuck around long enough to make the two Decepticons freeze in their tracks. Staring the spot where the ghost had once been, Nickel slowly looked craned her head to look up at Krok, watching his expression carefully.
“I wasn’t the only one who saw that, was I?” she asked quietly.
Krok shook his head. “No. I saw it, too.”
“What — or who — did you think it was? I didn’t get a good enough look at them….”
“Neither did I. It was definitely a bot, to be sure. Big, bulky, well-armored….”
“Do you know if this ship has a reputation for freak hauntings?”
“I don’t,” Krok murmured. “Though I don’t suppose it would hurt to ask around….”
* * *
“Is this really necessary, Red Alert?”
“More than you know, Pipes,” Red Alert muttered as he adjusted the camera in Pipes’ personal habitation suite. “After everything that’s happened on this ship, tighter security is extremely called for. We can’t have any more freak hijackings or Destructon invasions or whatever.”
“Yeah, I get that,” Pipes said. “But… why my room?”
“These are going in everyone’s rooms,” Red Alert replied.
“Um… isn’t that a major invasion of privacy?”
Red Alert stopped to look at the blue bot, his optics narrowing. “How so?”
“It’s just that… I’m not sure how comfortable I am having a bunch of cameras watching my every move.”
“If you have nothing to hide, then you have nothing to fear.”
Pipes blinked. “That… uh, that completely misses my point.”
“Doesn’t matter. These things are here to stay.” Red Alert stepped away from the camera and appraised its current position. Satisfied, he swiftly exited Pipes’ suite, leaving the exasperated minibot behind.
As he strode down the hallway, Red Alert took a moment to assess the list of habitation suites he had yet to install cameras in. The work was spread out between him and the rest of his security team, making the list a lot less overwhelming than it would have been otherwise.
Huffer, done. Gears, done. Pipes, done. The next name on the list was Dipstick. Red Alert could only hope that the little green bot wouldn’t give him too much grief. He remembered the last time he gave Dipstick’s room a security sweep, he had too readjust his audio sensors and add a few new words to the “Too Vulgar for Polite Conversation” list.
As he turned the corner, Red Alert suddenly got the impression that he was being followed. He stopped to turn around, only to find nothing there. Frowning to himself, he enhanced his audio and visual sensors, scanning the space in front of him no one was there under some kind of cloaking shield or using invisibility powers. Still not seeing anything, he reluctantly chalked it up to being a trick on the mind and turned back around… and screamed.
Standing there was the apparition of a navy blue, teal, and gray robot. Its entire body was see-through, fading in and out of existence in the span of a few nanoseconds, as if it was not part of this world; not meant to exist.
The face was familiar but the body-type was different; rather than being a standard Triorian Guardsman body, the ghost instead had a larger build suggesting the alt mode of an armored truck, with a rocket launcher adorning his shoulder. His face, however, was one Red Alert remembered. Black helmet over a blue faceplate, red optics staring into his. Red Alert had seen those eyes before; about a year ago, to be precise, when he—
“Killed… me.”
Red Alert remained frozen in place as the ghost of Doubledealer floated towards him, hand outstretched, mouth open in permanent agony as it howled.
“You… killed… me.”
All Red Alert could do was screamed as he transformed into his car mode and peeled off down the way he had came.
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