Predatory

Something Wicked This Way Comes

Tarn seemed to hear it too, he took a cautious step, still holding his servo up to tell us not to move. He slowly descended the steps, to the landing, then peered around the wall. He motioned for us to follow him. Vos ducked around me, and padded quietly down to Tarn. The rest of the DJD and I followed suit. I looked up at the number tag written in bold, black lettering on the landing wall. 

248B NE

This was the barracks sector of the Northeast facing wing of the 248th floor. There should be a training room, and an armory down this hall. 

The broken hum of the generator sputtered out. A hollow silence echoed through the stairwell as the light died. 

"We need to get to the armory down this hall, then we can find torches and get to the basement." Tarn's voice came from about an arm length away, his voice was quiet, but firm.

The lights flicked on, but they were dim. With a building as large as this, that generator wasn't going to hold much power for very long. 

This was the least of our concerns however, when everything was bathed in a haze of red. Sirens began to wail, their screaming overpowering my sensitive audio receptors. I clamped my servos around my audio receptors and hurried to turn the sensitivity dial down. 

Apparently Kaon was having a similar problem, he was doubled over, denta gritted in pain, his servos one either side of his helm, in a failing attempt to keep the blaring noise out. 

The loudspeakers came on, a prerecorded and disjointed voice ordering for everyone to make their way in an orderly fashion to the safe rooms. This was a lot bigger than I had first thought, this was a full blown evacuation! I took deep intakes as we ran down the steps to clear my head, this was not the time to panic. 

"Follow me, and hang left! We're taking a detour!" Tarn ordered over his shoulder, as he began to Sprint down the hall. I was about to follow Vos, Helex, and Tesarus as they took off after him, but I noticed Kaon hadn't moved from his spot, still doubled over in pain. In a moments decision, I grabbed Kaon, and threw him over my shoulder. Then bolted down the hall at full speed to catch up with the rest of the team. 

Tarn led us  down the hall to the armory, he typed a few numbers into the keypad by the door, then threw it open. Vos and Tesarus ran inside to help him look for any torches. Helex remained by the door with me, Kaon was still out of it. The noise seemed to be interfering with his echolocation, so at this point he was basically blind. I set him down, and he adjusted his audio so it wasn't so loud. He was still blind, but he was in less pain now. 

Vos ran out of the door, triumphantly waving a torch in his servo. Tesarus and Tarn also had one each. 

"We only found three, so buddy up!" Tarn shouted, somehow managing to be heard over the din. Tesarus grabbed Kaon's arm. I felt something tugging at my servo, and looked down to see Vos pointing up at my shoulder. I raised an optical ridge, unsure of what he meant, and unable to hear him because of the screaming sirens. He visibly sighed, then he leaped onto my shoulders, wrapping his arms around my neck. Apparently he had wanted a ride.

Tarn nodded, and waded through the flashing red light, Helex doing his best to keep close. The rest of us followed without hesitation. He took us down a few more doors, and stopped at a large Decepticon symbol on the wall. He checked to make sure we were all present, then turned and pushed the optics of the symbol into the wall. I hear something click internally. The wall slid further inside itself, then moved left, creating a hallway for us. Tarn motioned for us to follow, then flicked the switch on his torch, shining the light beam into the soupy darkness. Helex followed quickly, then Tesarus and Kaon, then Vos and I. After I was through, the wall slid back into place. Vos and Tesarus flicked on their torches. 

We wandered through the hall, around several corners, and finally came to an elevator. Hopefully this one worked. We all filed inside the metal box, and Tarn pushed the button for the first floor. Why he didn't just go to the basement, I didn't know. 

As we descended, I noticed that Kaon had returned to us. He no longer was doubled over in pain, and nor did he seem as blind. Hopefully he could "see" better now that he was away from the sirens. 

My servo threatened to shake, I had serious claustrophobia. And being surrounded by mechs I barely knew wasn't helping. I clenched it, and tried not to pay attention to it.  

When the elevator opened again, we walked out into the main Decepticon war room. This was where all of the top secret planning was done! I couldn't help but widen my optics in awe. The other members of the DJD didn't seem to be nearly as impressed as I was. They walked on through the room as if it were nothing. 

We stopped at a huge and very sturdy door. Tarn pushed something into the pad by the door, and it swung open. The door was as thick as something on a Bank vault! 

We stepped through, and found ourselves in yet another hallway. Tarn took another left, and then he stopped at a door with stairs leading down. He turned around and did a helm count then, satisfied opened the door for us to go down the stairs. 

Trying to walk down stairs in the dark was not at all what I would consider a fun time. At least we had torches though. 

When we finally reached the basement, it was clear we had a huge issue. The entire bottom of the stairs and the floors, were flooded with some mysterious liquid. It looked like energon by-product, but I couldn't be sure. All I knew, was that wading in it was a horrible experience. 

We saw a light on in a tiny office near the end of a hallway. We trudged through slowly through the mire until we reached the door. The red light from the emergency breakers reflected across the water eerily. I understood why Kaon had left the Pet back on the ship, he would've struggled to swim through the thick fluid. The door to the office was elevated at the top of a ramp. So we when we finally reached the door, we wouldn't flood the only dry room.

Tarn knocked firmly on the door. Something shuffled inside, a few ticks layer, the door opened to reveal Soundwave. His masked face expressionless, yet somehow I felt that his face was grim. A heavy, fearful feeling hung in the air like a thick soupy haze. Something was terribly, terribly wrong.

Two other mechs were in the room. Megatron....and Shockwave, my servo trembled. This was certainly a surprise. The scientist was much much taller than expected. His presence formidable in the smoky red haze. I swallowed the bile rising in my throat.

"Finally! Glad you all made it down in one piece! I wasn't honestly sure if you would." Megatron  said, trying to make it sound  lightheated. But something in his tone had a pained edge to it. And I got a weird feeling he meant the not coming in one piece bit. I felt a shudder run through my frame.

"I have to agree with Lord Magatron, with as quickly as the vermin are spreading through the walls, they should have devoured your group hours ago." Shockwave remarked in a monotone that was not comforting in the slightest.

"Vermin?" Tarn asked quizzically.

Megatron sighed, "Yes, someone let loose several sparkeaters in the basement, as well as over three hundred scraplets into the walls. Then they turned off the power and flooded the halls, we need to get to the breaker room to restart the system, but the breaker room is on the other side of the water, and the sparkeaters. Which is kind of a problem. But not as big as the problem we haven't discussed yet. Because basements don't just flood themselves, sparkeaters don't just decide to move in, and scraplets don't just infest the walls on their own accord. Which means-"

"We've been infiltrated." Tarn concluded quietly.  

Hey hey hey! Look who managed to complete their goal aaaaaaannnd keep up with school! This author! xD It's been a rough week, but I have managed to not only get the chapter done on time, but also double the size of the chapter! Woot Woot! So this is probably how long all of my chapters are going to be....until I get really ambitious and try for 3 thousand words..... we might wait on that for a while though. So what do you think is going to happen in the next chapter? What are they going to do? Well....we're just going to have find out! Next Monday! Anyway...School calls! ugh. Wish me luck guys before I drown in a sea of paperwork! xD Nah, just kidding I like school. Talk to ya'll next week! Have a great day and God bless!

~swordsandroses