Notes Of A Precious One (Volume A1)

CHAPTER 10

Sarissa ex-vented for the umpteenth time in an hour, trying to steady her nerves.

She and Vector were supposed to head home, but right now, she had instructed Bumblebee to take them both to the back of the forest clearing her husband owned and used for their annual gatherings. Why?

"What's a Decepticon doing so close to our place anyway"? Vector asked her. "What's he even going to find there"?

"I reckon its something to do with whatever Amalia was planning to sell on eBay the other day", Sarissa mouthed, servos still clenched in her lap.

"Wha-? That"!? Vector gave his wife an incredulous look. "What would the Cons want with a pair of glasses? They couldn't just buy them"?

"Knowing Barricade, probably not", Sarissa replied.

"I can't imagine a cop car being that brutal", Vector mused.

Sarissa whipped her helm around to look at him, so fast and so hard he actually heard her neck plates snap, and it was a miracle she hadn't decapitated herself in the process. Her cerulean eyes glared at him in a way that made his spine ready to curl up in his back, and her bangs flared out not unlike the hackles of an angry cat.

"Vector, you don't know Barricade like I do", Sarissa hissed, rapidly typing a text to their daughter on her gauntlet, though she kept her glare on him. "He's known for being extremely brutal with his interrogations. Hell, he's the type to peel a human like a banana and squeeze their internals between his fingers while they scream for the torture to end"!

"First, *retch*, that's a pretty graphic description of torture", Vector gagged, then sobered up. "Secondly, are you sure you're not describing Bonemusher? Because that sounds way more like him".

"It's Bonecrusher, and no, I trust none of the Cons to interrogate a human in a way that leaves them still in one piece", Sarissa hissed back, then leaned forward in her seat. "Can't you go any faster than this, Bumblebee"?

"Sorry ma'am, one speed only", the scout replied in an attempt to placate her, only to be met with a hard fist to his dashboard that made him yelp.

"Step on it, Bee! The longer that cop car calling himself a Con stays there, the more anxious I get"! Sarissa demanded.

"Aye aye"! Bumblebee replied nervously, before flattening his gas pedal to the floor and taking off down the road.

-

"Are you sure you don't wanna go home just yet"? Stephanie asked. "What if your parents are already home"?

"I'll call and inform them that I'll be home a little later", Amalia assured her friend. "This isn't the first time I've visited the waterfall at night".

"Let me go with you", Ryder offered, then yelped as Aprilynne yanked him back.

"Nuh-uh. Juniors aren't allowed near the forest at night", she reminded him.

"I'm 16 years old"! Ryder protested, wrenching his arm out of her grasp. "I'm not that much of a junior".

"Let him be, April. I'll keep an eye on him", Amalia assured his sister, then whistled for Azura. The dogbot padded up to her mistress and sat by her feet, waiting for her next move. Ryder removed his tie and stowed it in his back pocket before following Amalia into the forest.

"There's something I want to show you", she told him as they plodded along.

The waterfall wasn't too far away from the clearing, but the ground about it was littered with twigs that cracked and snapped with every step, even more so when it was dark as no one could see them well. Ryder clung to Amalia's arm gamely as they walked, fearful of losing his balance and landing face-first into something gross on the forest floor, until they reached a set of steep wooden steps leading up to the dock. Amalia skipped up the steps with little effort, then extended her hand to Ryder.