Debt

Hatred is contagious. All it takes is for one individual to take a dislike to something, and for them to pass that feeling on to someone else. The second individual agrees – either scared to form a differing opinion or never having thought that way before. The cycle repeats until the initial prejudice spreads throughout the collective, giving power to the original hater. The power is used as a means to an end, allowing the individual to dominate those he hates. Hatred becomes power and power becomes domination. It happened to Star Saber, it happened to Megatron and it’s about to happen to David.

David called Jennifer’s name as he entered his family home, clutching his newly modified Cryotek cannon. Tow-Line was most impressed by the human’s ingenuity and suggested a few improvements. David jumped at the chance to utilise highly advanced, not to mention alien, technology.

“I’m upstairs,” Jennifer called, her voice muffled and coarse.

David followed a trail of dried mud up the stairs and into Jennifer’s room. It was strange to see her in such uber-feminine surroundings: soft toys at the foot of the bed, flowers in a vase on the dresser and a straw hat hanging beside the mirror. “You’ve been crying,” he noticed.

“We need to talk.”

“About?”

“Your father.”

David sat on the bed beside her, she took his hand, and he stroked her cheek.

“This is difficult for me,” she said with a dry throat. “But you deserve to know the truth about his death.”

David furrowed his brow. “He was killed at that charity gala. The hot air balloon, the leak… it was an accident.”

“It was sabotage.”

“What?”

Jennifer began to tremble. “Do you remember when you first met Wroblewski and Lavelle?”

“Yes, in 1998 at that symposium. They were looking for funding to find the Axalon.”

“And you had just inherited the entire Siddons estate and corporate shareholdings.”

David looked down and stroked the corners of his mouth with his thumb and index finger. “It’s not true.”

Jennifer reached across and stroked the back of his neck. “I have computer files and documentation, it’s all here.”

David stood up suddenly and walked to the window staring into the grounds where he and his father played football. “They took him. They took him from me, and they got away with it.”

“There’s more,” said Jennifer.

“All those months I prayed to god, asking why he took my father,” David spat, ignoring her. “So many questions, and all along it was those bastards that took him away from me.”

“David.”

“Only god can take a life, they don’t have that right.”

Jennifer raised her voice. “There’s more to the story.”

“What? They’re in jail right now, being used as contraception by some steroid-gorged bodybuilder named Vincent?”

“Calm down, please.” This was the bit Jennifer dreaded saying: “Lavelle is missing, but I—“ she paused, “I dealt with Wroblewski myself.”

“How do you mean?”

“He’s in the garden,” she said, gesturing to the window.

David noticed a mound of fresh dirt by the tool shed. “You killed him?”

“I was angry.”

“This is too much,” David exhaled, sitting back down.

“You have to understand,” Jennifer was crying. “I did it for you, to avenge your father’s death.”

He glared at her. “Oh well, that’s okay then! So where’s Dad, then? Did killing Wroblewski bring him back?”

“No.”

“Has it made me feel better about it all?”

“No.”

“So what good did it do?”

“It was revenge, David. Simple revenge. An eye for an eye.”

David looked up at Jennifer’s cybernetic eye implant and laughed. “That’s not how it works.”

Jennifer inched closer to David and clenched his thigh. “Tell me you don’t feel it.”

“Feel what?”

“The hatred. The hatred for Wroblewski and Lavelle coursing through your veins like a runaway train.” Her voice had changed, lower, quieter, and darker.

“I’m feeling a lot of things right now.”

“But you feel the hatred.”

“I guess. I don’t… Yes. Yes, I do.”

Jennifer made to speak, but David cut in: “But that doesn’t give me the right to take a life. Only god has that right.”

“You would think differently if you had power like me.”

“But I’m not like you, I’m a weak man. You’re the fighter, and I’m the thinker.”

“So, what are you thinking?”

David stood up and walked to the door. “I’m torn. Yes, I want revenge. But what you did makes you as bad as them. I don’t—“

There was a sudden knock at the front door. David and Jennifer froze where they were. Jennifer activated her ORB in X-ray mode and whispered, “Oh shit. It’s the police.”

“Lavelle?” David whispered back.

Jennifer closed up her laptop and pushed it into David’s arms. “You get out of here now, I don’t want you implicated in any of this.”

“But—”

“You were right. I didn’t have the right to take a life, and whatever happens to me now, I deserve.”

“Why the laptop?”

“There’s still the small matter of saving the world. I’ve been monitoring the Autobots’ movements. By all indications the one called Mach Alert has tracked a Predacon back to the Axalon.”

“I can’t leave you.”

Jennifer’s heart was racing. “Yes you can. You’re the only one I trust to save the world. All the info you need is there.”

There was a large crunch at the front door; the police were breaking the door down.

“Please, just go.”

The police stormed the house, charging up the stairs and shouting Jennifer’s full name. David threw the laptop and his Cryotek cannon into Jennifer’s backpack and climbed out of the window. There was nothing he could do for her now.

Jennifer relaxed her killer instincts, yielded to her arrest for the murder of Ethan Wroblewski and cursed herself for letting David down, Godspeed.