Tales of the Barn (and Base)

Story 8: Miko Can Never Know About This

Nya was quite a bright little human, that much Starscream knew for sure. Her mind was like a computer when it came to engineering, if she had the supplies and the basic idea of something, she could build it.

This fact was only insured by the fact that she spent a large amount of her time working on her plane. The little human femme had unofficially claimed one of the surfaced hangers at the top of the plateau as her domain. There she kept all of her welding equipment, tools, and vehicles. Though everything that was there was kept in what one would call an organized mess. Places like where she kept the jets and any other vehicle that Agent Fowler asked her to look after would be sparkling clean, but places like her tool boxes would be nothing but utter chaos. Starscream was honestly amazed with how easily she found whatever she needed in those boxes of horrors.

Most the time when Starscream found her in the hanger she was working on her own personal jet. Sure, every time he went in there while she was working, made him feel like he was walking in on an autopsy, but it was better than wandering the halls by himself. Though, he did think that the Air Major might have been a little strict with her standers of the air craft she flew, having to do maintenance on the thing after every time she went flying with it. She claimed it was because something was pulling one way or another, but Starscream just thought that she just wanted to take the plane apart and put it together again.

The point was that Nya was a very smart and technically advanced human. Which was one of the reasons why, Starscream was looking over roughly drawn blueprints for a human sized energy rifle. The other reason was that after one too many close calls on an energon scouting mission (Which often ended with them falling into a new decepticon mining operation) that a bullet firing human handgun wasn't going to cut it. Sure, Starscream could and would protect her, but they needed to prepare for the inevitable situation where they would get separated from each other.

It wasn't all that hard to design. With Starscream background in energon, and by proxy turning it into useable energy, and Nya's hands on skills, it didn't take long for them to produce the first prototype model rifle. Today was their first of, hopefully, not too many test shots. After all, the necessary checks and safety measures it was the moment of truth.

"We're sure, that this won't just blast out the back and disintegrate you?" Starscream asked, as Nya loaded a tiny energon crystal into the back of the rifle; her hands covered with heavy duty welding gloves to protect her flesh from the energon radiation.

"Hey, don't diss on my welding. The structure is solid," Nya said.

"As solid as it's going to get with flimsy earth materials," Starscream muttered.

Nya rolled her eyes, "The point is, if anything is going to go wrong it's going to be somewhere in the math, or the design of the internal components. Which I followed your designs to a T," She pulled on ear muffs and placed on plastic safety goggles.

The little human moved away form their work place on a raised platform onto the floor and over to the small target they set up in an empty area of the hanger. Carefully carrying the possibly deadly invention downrange.

"Let's hope this works," Starscream said.

"Cross your fingers," Nya smirked, crossing two of her fingers. Even in the face of possible deadly injury she was still so full of confidence.

Starscream didn't know why he was supposed to cross his digits. Was it some sort of human ritual to send off one whom was about to die? None the less if this was her last wish he complied, and copied the gesture she had given him. She flashed him a smile and stepped in front of the target, which was nothing but a piece of old carboard with a sloppily painted bullseye on it.

Starscream watched as she lined up her shot, he had seen her do it a number of times. Whether it be on a mission or just some friendly target practice. There was a small beat of silence before a large bright burst of green energy shot out of the rifle, the kick back was enough to make the human femme firing it stumble but not fall. The blast flew across the room fast then anyone could blink, and struck the target becoming a fiery inferno of blazing green energy, before it faded leaving nothing but a smoldering scorch mark in its place.

Starscream gaped, as Nya regained her footing. The human femme twisted around so fast that he was worried that she could've broken something. A look of shock etched into the flesh of her face.

"It works!" She shouted, before laughing with a grin sprouting over her face, "First try too! Wow!"

Starscream couldn't help but bark a laugh at her reaction, as Nya did a little jump of excitement as soon as her initial shock war off. But the smile on his face was mostly from relief other then excitement, as he didn't accidentally blow up his partner.

"Are you alright?" Starscream asked none the less.

"Well, I'm not dead or blown up. SO, yeah. The kickback was stronger than what I was prepared for but this should work," She started back towards their workspace.

"I could design a regulator, to restrict the power output, or possibly make it able for you to adjust the output for each shot," Starscream suggested.

"That could work, it would also give me that option of not just using this a weapon. I could use it to clear debris with the ability to shift the power output. Anything else we could possibly do?" Nya asked, a mischievous smirk forming on her face.

"Well, if we made the nose of the gun interchangeable then we could make a number of nozzles that could allow you to have a number of different blast types," the silver seeker contemplated.

"Could one of those possible nozzles turn this thing into a welder, I'm starting to feel bad about only using tin foil on your wounds out in the field," Nya suggested.

"Possibly," Starscream said liking that idea.

For the next hour or so, they discussed possible attachments and ways that they could improve the design's efficiency. Starscream was quite enjoying himself. Nya was the perfect mix of smart an ignorant. She knew enough that she could understand, but not enough that she was an expert in the finer tuning, to which Starscream would happily explain.

Nya froze and suddenly turned to Starscream, her expression complete horrified and serious. Then she uttered words that send chills through his wings, "Miko can never find out about this."

A/N:

This is merely something I did to take my mind off of a few things. Next uploads on my page with be marvel updates, so if you read this and those, hope your excited.

As always suggestions are welcome! Thanks for reading!