Chapter 270: Rescuing Carly

Deep within the bridge tower of the Nemesis, the moment the concussive blast rattled the bulkheads, Skygnaw shot up from his throne, his optics narrowing with sudden alarm.

“What was that?”

Before he could pull up the telemetry, Razorclaw rushed into the command chamber.

Skygnaw caught sight of the warrior’s scorched plating and battered joints. He considered asking about the damage, but the priority took precedence:

“Razorclaw, where did that explosion originate?”

Right on cue, several more violent blasts echoed through the lower hull, sending a noticeable shudder through the massive warship.

Skygnaw’s faceplate darkened completely. “Find out what hit us!”

“At once, my Lord!” Razorclaw barked, turning on his heel to leave.

Skygnaw sat back down, sweeping his gaze across the ship’s integrated diagnostic monitors.

Oddly, no external hull breaches registered on the screens, and the automated sensors showed no human scramjets or cruise missiles in the immediate airspace.

While Skygnaw was turning over the anomaly, Razorclaw hurried back into the chamber:

“Lord Skygnaw, an Autobot has infiltrated the lower deck! He is currently—”

An Autobot?

Could Optimus Prime have led an assault team straight into his home base?

“Razorclaw, is it Optimus? How many are aboard?”

“It is not Optimus, my Lord,” Razorclaw answered, shaking his head. “Only a single scout—Bumblebee.”

“Just one?” The tight scowl on Skygnaw’s face relaxed slightly, though he kept his guard up.

“Take your Predacons and neutralize him. Whatever his objective, crush him where he stands.”

Skygnaw ran the tactical variables through his thoughts. Bumblebee’s presence could mean one of two things: either he was scouting the warship’s layout in his traditional vanguard role, or he had come to help Sam extract his girlfriend, Carly.

The bond between the boy and his scout ran deep.

If Sam was along for the ride, Skygnaw wouldn’t put it past Bumblebee to tap into an absurd reserve of willpower the second the kid shouted for help.

Razorclaw saluted and strode out, rounding up the Predacon shock troopers to hunt down the intruder.

What Razorclaw didn’t realize was that as his unit swept past the auxiliary service bays, they brushed right past the second half of the problem.

Near the access ramp of an open exterior deck, a small silhouette carefully poked his head around a bulkhead.

Using Bumblebee’s fiery distraction and his own small frame, Sam had followed the coordinates on his handset, slipping through the maze of maintenance tunnels all the way to the upper terrace.

“Safe or not, being stuck on this metal monster makes my skin crawl.”

“Think we can ask Skygnaw when we’re allowed back on the ground?”

“Back down there? Are you suicidal? The mob would tear us apart with their bare hands!”

“Between these giant machines and those weird soldiers walking around, if you want to ask, go right ahead…”

Muffled voices drifted from just above him. Sam recognized the speaker instantly—it was the very guard who had driven a fist into his gut at the museum two nights ago.

His stomach still throbbed at the memory. There was no mistaking that voice.

Deep breath, Sam. You’ve got this.

Steeling his nerves, Sam gripped the service pistol with both hands, charged up the steps, and burst onto the open flight deck:

“Nobody move!”

Dylan’s private security detail, out catching some air along the rail, froze in utter disbelief. Crouched near the deck plating with her arms wrapped around her knees, Carly’s eyes went wide:

“Sam?!”

They were gathered in an open corner of the terrace. Dylan was standing closest to the stairwell, leaving Sam’s barrel aimed dead center at his chest.

Seeing the weapon leveled at their employer, the guards grabbed Carly by the arms, dragging her to her feet. “Back off, kid! One wrong move and your girl pays for it!”

You brought a gun?

We have four.

Seeing Carly manhandled, Sam’s vision turned red with fury. He stepped forward, keeping his sights locked on Dylan. “Let her go! Step away from her right now!”

Facing down the muzzle, Dylan didn’t show an ounce of panic. Instead, he chuckled, shaking his head in mock admiration. “Sam, your courage is truly something to behold.”

“I have to hand it to you—how did you even get aboard? I assume that lovely commotion below was your handiwork?”

The sudden troop movements and the rattling gunfire down in the hangar bays had made it obvious to anyone with a brain that the ship was under attack.

Sam didn’t answer. He simply kept shouting, demanding they release Carly.

In this corner of the deck, the tension was balanced on a razor’s edge. Yet across the rest of the terrace, the alien forces carried on as if nothing was happening.

The Martian infantry couldn’t tell human friend from foe; to their eyes, the carbon-based locals all looked identical, frail and insignificant compared to their own reinforced frames.

The Decepticons shared the same indifference. Glancing over to see an insect holding a piece of crude metal against another insect, they looked away. Their duty was to defend the Nemesis, not babysit human contractors, and none dared step out of line without Skygnaw’s direct command.

It created a surreal standoff: Sam pointing his weapon at Dylan in a life-or-death deadlock, while towering mechanical giants looked on with detached boredom before returning to their patrol routes.

The guards and the aliens might not have cared about the squabble.

Someone else did.

Just as Sam’s finger began to tremble against the trigger, a mechanical bird dropped silently out of the gray clouds, slamming a heavy steel wing across his back with concussive force.

CRACK!

Sam crashed hard against the alloy decking.

“Lord Laserbeak! He’s the Autobots’ pet! He’s the one sabotaging the ship!” Dylan shouted, anxious to ensure the scout recognized the target.

Laserbeak didn’t need the reminder.

“Human worm! You slipped through my claws in the city, but you will not walk away today!”

Laserbeak drove his razor-sharp talons deep into Sam’s jacket, hoisting him off the deck like a hawk snatching prey, and banked hard toward the open precipice.

“Get off me, you oversized vulture!”

Sam thrashed violently, firing wild rounds into the sky, but the small-caliber slugs merely glanced off the assassin’s armor.

Carly’s brief relief turned to sheer horror. Seeing Sam dragged toward the edge, she screamed at the top of her lungs: “No! Sam!”

She fought to break free, but the guards pinned her arms behind her back.

All she could do was watch in agony as Laserbeak opened his talons:

Whoosh—

The screams fell away into the rushing wind. Everything went quiet.

Carly’s eyes went vacant, the world turning gray around her. The man who had crossed the country to pull her from the fire, the boy who had saved the world twice over… dropped into the abyss?

Dylan let out an exaggerated sigh, stepping up beside her and offering a thin, rehearsed grimace of sympathy.

“You can’t lay this at my feet, Carly. He brought it upon himself.”

A sudden surge of adrenaline ripped through her limbs. Breaking through the guards’ grip with desperate strength, Carly sprinted toward the edge of the terrace.

Without a second thought, she threw herself into the open air.

“Grab her!” Dylan lunged forward, throwing his hands over his head as he turned to scream at his detail: “What are you doing?! How did you let her jump?!”

The men traded uneasy glances, hanging their heads. How could they admit that seeing their boss step up had made them lower their guard?

“Incompetent idiots!”

Dylan cursed, a cold knot tightening in his chest. Skygnaw had explicitly instructed him to keep Carly secure, and now she had plunged to her death right before his eyes.

Just as he was debating how to spin the catastrophe to the alien commander, a guard gasped, pointing a trembling finger over the parapet.

“Boss… look!”

Dylan turned around, his jaw dropping in disbelief.

Rising above the ledge were Sam and Carly, safe and sound!

“What?! How?!”

The two were perched on Bumblebee’s shoulders, while the scout maneuvered a commandeered open-cockpit Decepticon skiff.

Down in the hangar, upon realizing the Predacons were boxing him in, Bumblebee had cut his losses, hijacked an armed gunship, and punched through the lower magnetic seal—clearing the hull just in time to catch Sam mid-fall, before diving to scoop Carly out of the air.

“Bee! That’s the scumbag who took Carly!”

Bumblebee banked the craft, bringing the heavy nose cannons level with the open terrace.

“Get down!” Dylan yelled, hitting the deck as his composure shattered.

RAT-TAT-TAT-TAT!

Twin heavy blasters chewed through the terrace plating, spraying molten sparks. Dylan scrambled on hands and knees toward the access hatch, while his guards caught the full brunt of the volley, torn apart by heavy energon rounds.

“Bumblebee!”

Watching the skirmish unfold from the high viewing deck of the bridge, Skygnaw’s fist slammed onto the armrest of his throne, leaving a deep dent in the metal.

A flash of genuine annoyance crossed his face.

“A deck full of useless rust-buckets!”

With Skygnaw’s fury shaking the bridge, the garrison below snapped to life. Stationed Decepticons opened fire with heavy rifles, while Lo-Ha directed the Martian auxiliary troops to lay down suppressive fire.

Plasma rounds and heavy kinetic slugs pelted Bumblebee’s craft, filling the air with acrid smoke as rounds whistled inches above the humans’ heads.

“Hold on to me, both of you!”

Bumblebee threw the flight stick forward, dropping the nose into a steep vertical dive to break through the tracking net.

Just as they cleared the primary firing arc, an enraged screech pierced the air.

Humiliated by the rescue, Laserbeak plummeted from the upper clouds, crashing claws-first onto the cockpit cowl.

“You again?!”

Sam locked his hands around the assassin’s throat cables, throwing his head back as the beak snapped viciously toward his faceplate.

Having lost his pistol during the fall, he had to fight with bare hands.

Grappling wildly against the wind, Sam dragged the assassin’s helm across the cockpit cowl, pinning the mechanical skull right before the starboard gun muzzle before shouting at the top of his lungs:

“Bee! Fire the main gun! Right now!”

Carly leaned across the console, screaming over the wind: “Bumblebee, shoot it!”

With no time to check his sights, Bumblebee slapped the firing stud on the console.

BOOM!

The heavy muzzle flared, obliterating Laserbeak’s head in a blinding flash of energon and shattered metal. The thrashing frame went limp instantly.

Clatter.

Sam shoved the headless chassis over the side. The smoking scrap clipped the glowing exhaust of the starboard engine, kicking up a shower of sparks before tumbling into the gray fog below.

Laserbeak was dead, but the struggle had taken its toll on the hijacked skiff. With its stabilizers chewed to ribbons and an engine coughing black smoke, the craft spun out of control, careening toward the pavement below.

SKRRR-CRASH!

The craft plowed a deep furrow through the asphalt of an abandoned avenue, kicking up shattered concrete before grinding to a halt against a curb. The moment the skiff settled, Sam grabbed Carly’s hand, leaping down to the street.

“Sam!”

Carly threw her arms around his neck, brushing a smudge of blood from his temple, her eyes brimming with tears.

“You found me.”

“I told you. Wherever they take you, I’m coming to get you.”

As they held each other close on the empty street, the rumble of heavy engines broke the quiet.

A convoy of sports cars rounded the corner, with the red and blue semi-truck leading the pack.

“They’re here,” Sam said, letting go of Carly as Optimus came to a halt before them.

Epps climbed down from a tactical truck, jogging over to plant a playful fist into Sam’s shoulder. “Kid, you are completely insane! certifiably out of your mind!”

“I watched that bird drop from the clouds half a mile back! I thought you were finished!”

He glanced at Carly, his broad grin returning. “So this is the girl who caused all the noise? She’s stunning, man. I take back what I said earlier; she was definitely worth the trouble.”

Epps rambled on with more excitement than the survivors themselves.

Sam smiled, but his attention drifted toward a piece of mangled machinery resting on the sidewalk nearby.

In the heat of the moment, he hadn’t noticed it.

“What is that, Robert?”

“Looks like… a downed military reconnaissance drone?” Epps stepped over, squinting at the olive-drab casing.

“Can you get it working?”

“Let me take a look.”

Epps ran a quick diagnostic over the housing, his eyes lighting up. He waved toward the soldiers standing watch along the perimeter:

“Hey! Get over here!”

The men gathered around. A bearded soldier raised an eyebrow. “Epps, you’re telling me that piece of scrap still has juice?”

“The battery cell is alive. The rotors are snapped, but the internal link is intact.”

“Help me angle the camera pod forward.”

“You’re the Air Force tech here, man. Lead the way.”

They wrenched the crushed nose assembly upright, positioning the optical dome toward the street. Epps leaned right into the lens, rapping his knuckles against the glass:

“Control desk, do you read me?”

“Come on, give me a pan. Give me something…”

Washington, D.C., The Pentagon.

Deep within the underground operations center, a technician stared at a flashing telemetry window on his console. An auxiliary signal had just pinged from a drone marked destroyed thirty minutes prior.

He routed the visual feed to the primary projector while raising his hand to call the desk:

“Command! We have a live patch from sector four!”

Footsteps hurried across the command floor. Lennox strode to the front of the room, recognizing the scarred face taking up the display instantly:

“Bring up the volume! Cycle the optical servo!”

Back on the streets of Chicago, the spherical lens inside the drone pod tilted down, then back up.

Epps shouted with triumphant relief:

“It moved! It moved!”

“They’re watching us!”

The link was one-way, meaning they could send visual and audio telemetry but receive no voice return. Epps pushed his face closer to the mic port, cutting straight to the operational realities:

“Command, listen to me carefully: Chicago is fully compromised. The entire sector is crawling with Decepticon units, do you copy?”

“The Autobots are on the ground with us. Optimus Prime is alive and leading the vanguard. We are mounting an extraction run on the spire, and we need an external feint on the perimeter to draw their fire!”

Before he could finish his brief, Carly squeezed past his shoulder, her hair brushing against the sensor glass:

“Sentinel Prime is here! He has the hundreds of pillars, but he also holds the master control unit!”

“Their plan is to open a cosmic bridge to drag their homeworld directly into our orbit, then round up our population as slave labor to rebuild it!”

“Sentinel has set up his node at the peak of a high-rise along the river, southeast quadrant!”

“The lockdown over Chicago was staged specifically to mask the activation of that pillar! You have to scramble every asset you have—air wings, ground armor, whatever is on the line, scramble them right now!”

“That master pillar must be destroyed before the transit locks, or our sky will be swallowed whole! Do you understand me?!”

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