Hold Tight Iacon—Prologue

Skywarp banked sharply to the left, 400 metres above the porcupine skyline of Iacon. His passenger—or payload—felt a charge of vertigo lance through his body as the bloated crown of the Great Dome came into view. Browning, a miniscule Decepticon hand weapon, had been thoughtlessly bolted onto Skywarp’s underbelly with his barrel pointing not quite forwards.

An Autobot guard unit fired into the black sky from Iacon’s defence barricades. Skywarp dodged and weaved through the laser bolts, and Browning was sure he would be shaken loose. Skywarp screamed and whooped into the headwind, seemingly enjoying himself more than concentrating on the mission, or Browning’s safety. Still, what could one expect from a simple-minded, die-cast thug. Browning, on the other hand, was a little more sophisticated. More than that, he was cutting edge.

Skywarp flipped over into a barrel-roll, flew inverted for a moment and then let himself drop into a nose dive. The laser fire rippled the thin atmosphere around him. Browning thought for sure that the mission was going to end horribly with a painful and armour blistering fireball.

“So, what’s the target’s name, again?” Skywarp asked. It was a rhetorical question. Not because he already knew the answer, but that he didn’t care.

“Caapek,” Browning replied, hoping that his voice was more of a reasoned tone than a petrified scream. “He’s on the Autobot Council of Elders.”

“Oh.”

As Skywarp continued to dive, the air around his nose-cone ruffled and then snapped with a momentous cracking sound as he broke the sound barrier. His fuselage shuddered and Browning once again prayed that his harness wouldn’t break free. “So, we’re clear on the plan, then?”

“Of course!” Skywarp laughed. “I dive, you fire, we warp, he dies, we win.”

On the ground, the streets of Iacon were awash with panic. The Decepticons had been razing the city for weeks, but this was the first time the enemy had started suicidal nosedives. Like many Autobots, Councillor Caapek had distanced himself from the reality of war, preferring to believe that though the Decepticons had nigh conquered the rest of the planet, Iacon would remain safe, its bubble unburst. Pompous idiot!

"I have him in my sights. Preparing to fire in 5..."

Ironhide and Sideswipe pushed through the civilians that pointed to the sky open-mouthed and grabbed the Councillor.

"4..."

"Get down," Ironhide barked, throwing his arm onto Caapek’s shoulder, forcing him to the ground.

"3..."

Sideswipe turned and leaned back, lifting his rifle to the sky.

"2..."

The Autobot warrior fired a series of phosphorous flares at Skywarp.

"1..."

Ironhide leapt onto Caapek and shielded the Councillor with his body.

"Fire!" Browning shouted. He fired a round of six bullets from his internal magazine. As soon as the last bullet was clear of his barrel he shouted again: "Warp!"

With only twelve metres between nose-cone and street level, Skywarp disappeared with a shimmer of white hot light, taking himself and Browning outside the city limits.

"You saved my life!" Caapek said, lifting Ironhide’s dead weight.

Sideswipe holstered his rifle and reached down to help lift Ironhide. Six neat bullet holes had pierced his back where the bullets had entered his body, and as Sideswipe lay Ironhide on his back he saw six equally neat perforations on his chest where the bullets had exited his body.

Sideswipe shrugged and spoke into his communicator. "We need medical back up, now." The Autobot reached down to Caapek to help him to his feet.

"I can’t stand, son," the Councillor replied. "Got six bullets in my thigh."

"Be grateful," Ironhide wheezed as his systems came back online. "That Decepticon was surely aiming for your head."

"Impossible!" Sideswipe countered. "At that speed, at that trajectory? No way any weapon was going to aim that precisely." He looked around. "Now, where’s the med—"

With sirens wailing and lights flashing, Fixit arrived on the scene. The Autobot medic didn’t transform. He spun round so his back end faced the casualty. His read door swung open and a loading ramp slid out from above his rear axle. "Load and lock," he said.

"It’s really just a flesh wound," Caapek said as Sideswipe ferried him into Fixit’s repair bay.

"It was an assassination attempt," Sideswipe said sternly. "And besides, you’ll be much safer indoors than parading around a war-zone as if it were a post-electorate clambake."

Inside Fixit’s repair bay, Caapek lay still. The Autobot medic promised a smooth ride to the infirmary. It was a first class trip for a member of the High Council. Repair arms and scanner heads probed his thigh, assessing the level of damage. It was minimal. It was just a flesh wound. With deft skill one of the arms removed the outer casing of Caapek’s thigh while another shone its light into the opening. While he simultaneously drove through Iacon and controlled his repair arms, Fixit searched for the six bullets that had gone right through Ironhide’s body and into the thigh of the Councillor. No doubt Nightbeat would want first refusal of the forensic evidence. An assassination attempt on the likes of Caapek would light the inboxes of the Council like a star. The repair arm paused slightly and the light of the scanner head blinked as if in disbelief.

There was no sign of the six bullets.

To call Browning a super-weapon would be a misnomer. While it was true that he kill could an Autobot with once shot, it wasn’t his aim, or his short-recoil, or even his own micro-sized design that fogged the Decepticon ranks with rumour and reputation; it was the type of bullet that he fired. If they would ever find a trace of their existence, Cybertron’s theologists and philosophers would no doubt argue their sentience for vorns, but the fact of the matter was that Browning’s bullets were sentient, free-thinking, and very, very deadly.

The six bullets that Browning had fired into Caapek’s leg had already transformed into robot mode and begun their journey to the brain module.

"Maintain antibody exclusion zone," one of the minute robots said. It didn’t have a name. It wouldn’t be alive long enough to think of one.

"Copy that."

"This is one old Autobot. I doubt his systems are going to put up much of a fight."

"No time for suppositions, just get on with the job."

Fixit sped east, his sirens and exceptional status affording a relatively clear and safe route to the infirmary. Inside him, Caapek lay motionless, without pain or discomfort or the slightest clue he was less than a breem away from death.

"Ratchet, come in," Fixit transmitted. "I am less than a hic away, are you ready to receive?"

There was a short pause before Ratchet replied. "All ready here. Not that I had a say. Even if Optimus Prime himself was on my operating table in a thousand oily pieces, a Councillor’s flaky paint job would take priority."

"Now, now," said Fixit. "You taught me that all life was important."

"Equally important, Fixit. There is a difference."

The sentient bullets inside Councillor Caapek continued their way up to his brain. The so-called assassination attempt had yet to be attempted.

In less than a breem, Browning’s bullets had moved from Caapek’s leg to his brain. They rode his oilstream via his primary fuel pump and up to the energy transfer bracket that enveloped the brain module. They moved with such stealth and such professionalism, it would put the Mayhem Attack Squad to shame.

"We’re here," a bullet said.

"We have scant seconds before we expire."

"Smash away, smash away!"

"For Megatron!"

Ratchet stood at an entrance to the infirmary. He stood relaxed, with his arms folded. Fixit was late. His impatience was showing and he didn’t care, even if a Councillor was on his way. Before Ratchet could activate his communicator, he heard the sound of sirens as Fixit careened around the corner. He skidded to a halt and reversed towards Ratchet.

"How’s the walking wounded?" Ratchet asked.

"Dead."

"What?"

"His life signs went down about a breem ago. I stopped and tried to resuscitate, but there was nothing there."

Ratchet choked. "Let me see!"

On an operating slab. Ratchet laid Caapek’s body down and moved his tray of tools towards his head. With cool, fluid movements, he unhinged a small panel on Caapek’s forehead and pushed a microprobe into the channel that led to his brain module.

"His brain module has been smashed." Ratchet explained.

By his side, Fixit peered at the monitor screen. "But how? How could something that small even exist let alone get into his head?"

"I don’t know," was all the Ratchet could say. "But look... dust."

"Dust?"

"Infinitesimally small metallic filaments, all over the brain’s housing chamber."

"What do you think it is?"

"A Decepticon super-weapon. Open a channel to Xaaron. Whatever this new technology is, the Decepticons are going to use it again and again until the rest of the Council of Elders are dead."

Fixit dashed across to the comms console. "This is it, isn’t it?"

"Yep. Despite what we hoped, what we refused to accept, the Decepticons aren’t going to stop until they’ve killed us all."

Fixit opened the connection. "Hold tight Iacon."