CHAPTER ONE: ONE BAD DAY
Detroit, Michigan
“Five years until retirement.”
Captain Fanzone sighed as he swigged another drink of coffee. It was the next best thing after alcohol, which he was not allowed to have while on the job. Thankfully, the caffeine was enough to stimulate his nerves and get him through the day… so long as that day consisted of mostly just petty crooks and everyday criminals. Anything more than that, he would need to double or triple his dosage of caffeine.
Today was normal so far as things went; relatively speaking, at least. A man robbing a bank while wearing a suit that gave him superspeed was not exactly the typical person’s idea of “normal.” But after all the things Fanzone had witnessed and suffered from his time in the force, from Sumdac’s blasted automatons to giant alien robots fighting in the city, it was a surprising fresh breath of air. Stressful, yes. But nowhere near as stressful as those damn machines.
“The suit is definitely Sumdac tech,” his sergeant Phil Nicholson was saying as he sifted through their collection of photos from security footage and witness reports. “The visuals and descriptions of whatever this perp was wearing is a match for the speed suit Sumdac was developing before Onyx bought him out and shut him down.”
“Has anyone even heard from Sumdac lately?” Fanzone asked.
Nicholson shook his head. “Not for the last several months. He pretty much dropped off the face of the earth after Blackrock took over. One of our units is looking into his disappearance, but they haven’t come up with much so far.”
Fanzone took another drink of his coffee. “So Sumdac’s missing and this guy’s somehow got his hands on Sumdac tech. Sounds related, if you ask me.”
“Definitely,” Nicholson agreed. “But we don’t have much to go on besides what we already have. He’s already hit the banks on North and West Streets, so he’ll most likely hit the South or East ones next. We’ve already got units laying low in those areas, ready to move once he makes his strike.”
“That’s great and all, but how do we hope to catch him if he’s moving so damn fast?”
“The speed suit is supposed to have a control box on the back,” said Nicholson. “If we hit it with one of our tasers, it should short it out for long enough to get the drop on him. We just need to keep him still in one place so we can hit him.”
“Let’s hope your plan works then, ‘cos I don’t know what we’re gonna do when it doesn’t.”
* * *
“Boy, at this rate, I’m gonna be able to retire early!”
Nino Sexton chuckled to himself as he closed and locked the door to the storage locker in which he was hiding his recent “withdrawals” from the banks he had been hitting. He hadn’t had this suit for more than a couple of days and already he was making a name for himself all across Detroit. Apparently the local newspapers were beginning to call him “Nanosec.” It definitely had a ring to it….
Walking back to his car, he opened the trunk and pulled out the speed suit that had been generously gifted to him by his benefactor. Said benefactor wasn’t asking for much in return; just a fifteen percent share in whatever money Nino made in his thievery. Considering the money he was already making, even after deducting that percentage, he was more than happy with that deal. He also knew that he wasn’t the only one in the city who had gotten his hands on abandoned Sumdac tech; word on the street was that one of Sumdac’s rivals, Prometheus Black, had also gotten his grubby hands on some stuff to enhance his sponsored wrestlers. Nino wasn’t sure if Black also had his benefactor to thank for that, but he also didn’t care enough to dwell on it.
After putting on the suit, he began to speed his way through town towards the last bank that was on his hit list for today. While he was sure the police were on to him by now, he also knew that they wouldn’t be fast enough to stop him, no matter how many obstacles they tried to set up. He had to admit that it was rather amusing to scurry about themselves like squirrels, thinking they could somehow beat him when he was beyond faster than the average human. It was almost kind of pathetic, in a way.
He got to the bank in practically no time at all. Sure enough, there were already plenty of cop cars waiting for him there. But they all became a blur of flashing red and blue lights as he sped past them, probably enough to leave some major dents in them considering the rate he was moving at. Whizzing through the doors of the bank, he paused long enough to ascertain where the entrance to the vaults would be. As he scanned the room, looking past the frightened bank tellers, he heard a pig shout at him from behind.
“Freeze! Put your hands in the air!”
Nino laughed as he zipped away, avoiding bullets as the cops started shooting at him. He quickly made his way to the door that he was certain would take him into the vaults. Fortunately, his benefactor had also provided him with the security codes along with the suit. Clearly, they wanted this heist to be as stress free as possible for him, which Nino had to admit was rather generous.
Just as he was within arm’s reach of the door, something collided into him and he found himself being knocked into a pillar. The speed he was moving at meant that the force of the crash was powerful enough to cause small chunks of marble to break off and fall on top of him. He managed to shake off the debris before looking up to see what had hit him.
Standing in front of him was what appeared to be a young woman clad in light orange armor. Blue energy blades were attached to her arms, their cerulean glow being shared by a light in her chestplate as well as the eyes of the winged helmet she was wearing. In many ways, she looked as if she had jumped off the pages of a comic book… which worked just find for the man that the papers were calling Nanosec.
“So, the cops have gotten themselves their own Supergirl, eh?” Nanosec chuckled as he got up to his feet. “Well then, let’s see if you can—”
He was cut off as the young woman lunged at him and shoved him back into the pillar, holding one of her arm blades to his face. As he struggled to move, he heard something spark and prayed that it wasn’t the control box to his suit.
“Who gave you that suit?” his adversary asked, her tone low and dangerous.
Nanosec snorted. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”
He drew his thin legs up and kicked at her, enough to push her away from him and allowing him to make a break for it. As he started to run for the doors, she tackled him from behind and pinned her blades through the control box on Nanosec’s back, causing it to short out. As Nino Sexton felt his heart pound against the walls of his chest, the mysterious armored woman leaned in until her masked face was right next to his.
“Allow me to repeat myself,” she said. “Who gave you this suit?”
Nino swallowed hard. “Ah, aren’t you supposed to read me my rights first?”
“I’m not a cop.” She dug in the blades deeper, enough for him to feel their heat on his back. “Now talk.”
“Okay, okay! I got it from some crime lord who’s been operatin’ in Detroit for some time. I don’t know his name, I haven’t even met him in person! I’m not even sure if they’re a guy or a gal or multiple guys or—”
“Save it.” With an exasperated sigh, the masked girl retracted her blades as she got off of Nanosec. At that moment, cops were rushing into the bank with their weapons drawn, and kept them raised as they cautiously approached the two of them.
“Ma’am,” one of them started to say. “Put your hands where I can see them.”
The armored heroine raised a hand and from her palm projected the holographic image of some sort of symbol, although from where he was laying Nanosec could not make out its details. “I’m with the E.D.C. This is a sanctioned operation.”
“E.D.C.? The hell is that? Did you just make that up?”
“Obviously you haven’t been paying attention to the news. Look, I would love to stay and chat but I’ve got other places to be.”
“Now hold it right—”
Before the cop could even finish, Nanosec’s assailant kicked on a pair of rocket boosters attached to the soles of her boots and she blasted off, zipping past the other officers and escaping through the open doors to the bank. The cops all stared after her for a moment before returning their attention to the defeated Nanosec, who offered them a weak smile in return.
“Hey, uh… glad you guys finally caught up.”
* * *
The flight from the bank to the abandoned warehouse was a short one, but it felt like an eternity to Sari Sumdac. Indeed, the past several months felt as if they had dragged on for twice their length. In the span of only a few weeks, she had lost not only her father but had also learned that she was in fact a techno-organic being; someone who was part human and part machine. Even after all this time, it still was not something she had come to terms with, even if she had gotten used to her armored form and the abilities that came with it.
It had also complicated her regular life; while her friends like Jack and Miko had been able to return to their daily lives, she had been forced to drop her studies in order to focus on searching for her dad. The fact that she had shown her armored form on campus while fighting Alice also hadn’t helped matters much either; the school probably would have dropped her anyway if she didn’t drop out herself. Even if she did find her father and things somewhat got back to normal, she wasn’t sure if she would ever be able to return to the life she had known before all of this happened.
As she landed in the parking lot just outside the warehouse, Sari retracted her wings but kept her mask on. She didn’t want the others to see her tear-stained face yet, even if it was the one feature she had that kept her human. Emerging from the shadow of the building was a large bot in yellow and black armor. Upon seeing Sari, Bumblebee knelt down until he was as close to eye-level with her as he could achieve.
“How did it go?” he asked.
“Not as well as I had hoped,” she replied. “The guy was using a Sumdac speed suit as I suspected, but he told me he got it from some crime lord who has been operating in Detroit. I couldn’t get a name out of him before the police started giving me trouble.”
“The police wouldn’t work with you?”
Sari shook her head. “Not even after I showed them my E.D.C credentials. Load of help that’s done for me so far….”
“I mean, to be fair, it’s only been a thing for as long as the new President has been in office, and I don’t think people have washed out the bad taste Sector Seven has left in their mouth.”
“Can’t say I blame them,” Sari muttered. “What about you guys? Anything so far?”
“Bulkhead and Gears are still camping out at the Biotech lab we found. I haven’t heard from them yet, but we can head out to join them if you’d like.”
“I doubt it’ll give us any better results, but sure.”
Bumblebee stared at her, no doubt picking up on her melancholy attitude. He seemed as if he was about to say something but thought better of it, which Sari was silently grateful for. Right now, she didn’t want anyone to ask her if she was “all right,” because any answer she gave was either going to lead to more unwanted questions or be an outright lie.
Without saying anything further, Bumblebee transformed to his alternate mode and she climbed into the yellow Ford Mustang. It was only then that she removed her mask—for at that point he could no longer see her face—and allowed her tears to flow freely.
* * *
Bulkhead was getting anxious.
It wasn’t just the fact that he had been trusted with a stealth mission. As one of the largest and, self-admittedly, clumsiest Autobots there ever was, he was the last person he would trust to efficiently and successfully carry out a stakeout. He was lucky that there were other big green military trucks at Biotech Unbound for him to park next to and blend in near a wired fence with while he kept his scanners out for anything that may be of interest, but that didn’t mean he felt comfortable in his disguise.
But no, it was more than just that. Since he had taken position, he had come across more than a fair share of things that were of interest, yet barely any of them had to do with Isaac Sumdac, who was the entire reason he was here in the first place. More than once he had gotten a glimpse of Prometheus Black, the reported head of Biotech Unbound, as he paced back and forth out in the parking lot, talking to someone on the phone. From what Bulkhead understood of human body language, Black came off as rather agitated and somewhat nervous.
“I’ve already told you, they’ll be ready when they’re ready! You can’t rush perfection! If you don’t want shoddy work, then you have to be patient!”
Later, Bulkhead had witnessed a strange dark van pull into the lot, where Black and some of his employees were waiting to unload its contents. Said contents were in large steel crates, most of which required two or more people to carry. While he had know idea what any of this meant, or what—if anything—it had to do with Isaac Sumdac, he knew that it couldn’t be anything good.
And if that wasn’t enough, he could swear his scanners were buzzing out… because they were detecting a Cybertronian that simply wasn’t there.
He knew it wasn’t Bumblebee, since he was supposed to be back at the warehouse waiting for Sari. And Gears was on the other side of the perimeter. The four of them were also the only ones who were supposed to be on this mission; if Elita or any of the Primes had sent someone to join them, they would have radioed him. The signal always went away before he had time to study it. But whenever he did notice it, it was always when a black and gold motorcycle, driven by a fully concealed rider, passed by on the street that was adjacent to the parking lot he was in. The first couple of times it happened, he passed it off as a coincidence. But now he was starting to believe there was something else going on here.
Just as he was about to radio Bumblebee to alert him to everything he had seen and heard so far, Bulkhead received a call from the Autobot in question.
“Bulk, this is Bee. Sari and I are heading to your position right now.”
“Good to know, Bee,” Bulkhead responded. “Just to give you a heads up though, there’s been some weird stuff going on over here. Whoever these Biotech guys are, they’re not up to anything good.”
“Yeah, we kind of figured as much. Just hang tight until we get there.”
“Sure thing. See you then.”
After ending the call, Bulkhead decided to switch his audio channel to his partner in this mission. Gears had been an odd pick to join him, Bumblebee, and Sari in this operation; not only did he not have any connection or personal involvement with finding Isaac Sumdac, having spent most of his time on the Lost Light for the past two years, but he also wasn’t the most… cheery of bots. In the rare times he spoke, it was usually to grumble about how nothing was going right and how he wished he had stayed on Cybertron. While Gears wasn’t nearly as pessimistic and whiny as someone like Huffer, Bulkhead had to confess that he sometimes tuned down his audio receptors when the grouchy blue-and-red bot was going on one of his rants. Still, Bulkhead felt bad for him and felt obligated to talk to him, if only to make Gears feel like he was part of the team rather than a hanger on.
“Hey, Gears,” Bulkhead said. “Anything yet?”
“Nope,” Gears mumbled in response. “Just the same old, same old. You?”
“I’ve seen people talking, but not enough for me to figure out what they’re up to.”
“Still more than what I’ve been getting. I haven’t seen a single organic in all the time I’ve been here.”
“Well, what do you see? There’s gotta be something.”
“Just a buncha military planes. Dark blue with some red logo….”
Bulkhead’s processor whirred as he analyzed these words. What was Biotech doing with military planes? He knew they were a science research organization, but he didn’t think their expertise went as far as military science.
“Wait,” he said. “What kind of red logo? Like an Autobot logo?”
“No, it looks like one of those Earth creatures. What do you call them? Sneaks or something?”
“I think you mean ‘snakes.’ Hold on, I’m gonna radio ‘Bee and Sari and tell them—”
“Hang on,” Gears interjected. “I think I saw movement. Someone might be… oh, scrap.”
“What?” Bulkhead asked, alarmed. “What is it?”
“The planes… they’re—”
The rest of Gears’ words were cut off by a roar of static. If Bulkhead wasn’t already anxious, he certainly was now. He quickly switched his channel back to hail Bumblebee.
“Bee, I just lost contact with Gears. He was telling me he had found some military planes here at Biotech before the line went dead. I’m not sure what happened to him, but it can’t be good. I’m gonna go check on him.”
“Copy that, Bulk’. Be careful.”
“Always am, little buddy.”
With that, Bulkhead activated his holographic driver and revved up his engine. As he started to move from his parking spot, he once again caught sight of the black and gold motorcycle. This time, it paused for a moment, long enough for Bulkhead to catch sight of its blinking headlights, before speeding off in what Bulkhead knew to be Gears’ direction.
Clearly, Bulkhead realized, this motorcycle was no ordinary Earth vehicle and seemed to be a Transformer of some kind… and perhaps was trying to help him in some way? Knowing that there was only one way to find out, Bulkhead drove after the mysterious motorcycle.
* * *
“Gah! Get back you fraggin’ Decepticons!”
Gears had no idea if the large blue and red mechanoids attacking him were in fact Decepticons or not; the only insignia he could make out on their frames were the red serpentine logo. But they sure as Pit weren’t Autobots and that was all that really mattered at this point.
Seeing no sense in keeping up his disguise, Gears transformed from his pickup truck mode and deployed his blaster, firing at the closest of the drones. The plane-bot went down easily, falling back into another one of its model and knocking that one down as well. There were still at least five more of them and all five were drawing weapons of their own. One pointed a Gatling gun at Gears and opened fire, sending several rounds of bullets in his direction. Gears ducked and rolled out of the way before returning fire, striking the drone square in the chest and taking it out. This did little to deter the others as they continued to fire their own guns, forcing Gears to convert back into his truck mode to avoid their firepower.
As he circled around the remaining drones, Gears heard the sound of an engine approaching. At first he thought it was Bulkhead, coming to his rescue, but it sounded too soft and small to be the big green lug. Could it have been Bumblebee? He didn’t think he and Sari would have been gotten here sooner than Bulkhead would, especially since Bulkhead was closer to his location.
He soon got his answer when a black and gold motorcycle suddenly zipped into the open hangar lot, using the back of a sloped truck as a ramp to launch itself into the air. As it fell towards the drones, the motorcycle changed shape: its front and back wheels unfolded into legs as its backseat split into a pair of arms. The windshield lowered to revealed a visored head and a pair of bladed disks (Gears thought there was a human word for them but couldn’t think of it at the top of his head) detached from the wheels on the bot’s ankles, ending up in their hands. They then hurled one of the bladed disks at one of the drones, shearing off its head clean from its torso. They then threw the other at the second one and it cut straight through its chest, revealing its innards (and confirming to Gears that they were not Cybertronian, lacking any sort of spark).
Landing gracefully on their feet, the mysterious bot directed their attention to the remaining two drones. Gears drove up to them and converted back to his robot mode, taking aim at the plane-bots. Without looking at him, the mysterious bot raised a hand to stall him.
“Wait,” the bot said in a voice that sounded awfully familiar.
Gears stared at him incredulously, both at his voice and at what he was saying. “What—” he started to say.
As one of the drones opened fire, the bot jumped up and lunged at it, grabbing onto its weapon arm. He then forced the drone to turn around and shoot at its partner, riddling it with bullets. He then pulled on the arm and tore it off, using it to blast the final drone’s head clean off. Its body then fell to the ground with a loud thud.
“Show off,” Gears grumbled as he lowered his weapon. He then heard the low rumble of an engine and turned around to see Bulkhead driving up. Not far behind him was Bumblebee, and both Autobots transformed to their robot modes, with Sari flying out in her armored form. After marveling at the deactivated drones, the trio then directed their attention to the mysterious bot.
“Nice work,” Bulkhead said. “Don’t suppose you have a name, pal?”
“You should already know me, Bulkhead,” the bot replied. “It’s me. Prowl.”
“Prowl?!” Bumblebee exclaimed. “But that’s not…. No. It can’t be. Prowl’s dead.”
“As if that’s stopped other bots before,” Bulkhead pointed out. “I mean, Impactor and Scoop came back… even if it wasn’t for that long….”
“What about that fake Prowl that lured Rodimus Prime to Planet X? How do we know this bot isn’t another one of those clones?”
“I assure you that I am the same Prowl you know and served alongside with,” the motorcycle ‘bot said. “I can prove it to you and the others later, but first we have more pressing matters.”
As if on cue, a nearby hangar door opened up and a number of security vans and vehicles drove out, all with mounted, human-manned weapons aimed at the four Autobots and their techno-organic ally.
“Stop where you are!” a voice called out from a loudspeaker. “You are on Biotech Unbound property! Raise your hands where we can see them!”
“Your operations here on Earth are in violation of the Tyrest Accord,” said Prowl. “It actually should be you who should be raising their hands.”
“I have no idea what a… what a ‘Tie Rest Accord’ is, but when you’re on our planet, you abide by our laws!”
“Which you are also violating,” Prowl continued. “So, really, it would be in your best interest to surrender.”
The person on the loudspeaker said nothing, likely conferring with someone else. The vehicles still had their weapons aimed at the Autobots and didn’t seem like they would be lowering them any time soon.
“So what do we do?” Bumblebee murmured. “I’m sure we could handle these guys no problem, but the last thing we need is an incident where we’re smashing humans and vehicles. Our relations with the humans have already been strained by what’s happened over the past year-and-a-half; we don’t need another controversy making it worse.”
Prowl merely raised a hand. “Just wait.”
Bumblebee frowned. “Wait for what?”
“He did this to me, too,” Gears mumbled. “He’s probably about to do something.”
As if on cue, a chorus of sirens heralded the arrival of several police and SWAT vehicles coming from all directions, swarming around the Biotech lab. Immediately, the weapons on the Biotech vehicles lowered as their drivers and gunners raised their hands in surrender.
While officers moved in to arrest the Biotech employees, a heavyset man emerged from one of the police cars and walked towards the Autobots, eying them warily. “Were you the ones who called us in?” asked Captain Fanzone.
“That would have been me,” said Prowl. “I have been monitoring Biotech for some time now and have found them to be in possession of Cybertronian technology in violation of both the Tyrest Accord as well as the agreement that has recently been signed between the Cybertron Council and the Earth Defense Command.”
“Uh-huh. Sure.” Fanzone poked a finger into his ear as if to clean it of gunk, an annoyed look on his face. “Look, I’m gonna have to get this all sorted out with the proper people ‘cos I’ve got no idea what the hell is going on. Life was so much easier before you blasted robots started showing up on our planet.”
“Can’t argue with that,” Bumblebee said quietly.
“I fully understand,” Prowl said. “In the meantime, I need to get into contact with my ‘proper people’ to fill them in on what’s been happening. What Biotech has been doing here in Detroit is much bigger than you realize.”
Fanzone snorted. “Isn’t it always?”
Gears groaned in exasperation. “Primus alive, can you guys stop talking in riddles and make sense for once? Bad enough that I nearly got my skidplate handed to me by a bunch of Earth drones, but now everyone’s talking like they’re on the same page while I’m—”
Whatever the small blue and red Autobot was going to say next was left unsaid as he evaporated into thin air, leaving not a single trace of him behind. Bumblebee, Bulkhead, and Sari all stared in shock at the spot where Gears had once been before turning to Prowl, who for his part looked just as genuinely surprised.
“Now that,” he said, “I don’t have an explanation for.”
“Great,” Fanzone muttered. “This is why I hate machines.”
