Chapter 12

A tendril swept out and slammed Nikki into the wall. A throbbing pain shot down from her head all the way down her spine. "I'm sorry!" she cried out.

Soundwave held her datapad in another tendril. Nikki had been working for almost twenty-four hours now. She was exhausted, but apparently that did not excuse the few mistakes she made in the last set of assigned code.

"Please!" Tears welled up in her eyes.

He squished her into the wall more, his blank faceplate staring at her intensely. She cringed even more. I don't want to die… Not like this!

Soundwave swung her back gently to the panel she sat on before, not giving her back the datapad. She looked up at him meekly, wondering what his next move was going to be. He held her gaze silently before lifting up a servo and softly pushing her to lie down.

She watched him with wide eyes. Does he…want me to go to sleep? She did not fuss once she was lying on her side. It felt nice to relax like that. Within moments, her lack of sleep overcame her.

Ratchet tapped his pede on the ground. He had sent a transmission out to WheelJack and had not received a reply. Raf was asleep on the couch. While everyone else had gone home to rest, Raf stayed. He wanted to be there when they found Nikki. In his hand, he held the Energon shard he had found. For some reason, he felt better with it near.

A quick beep startled Raf awake. Ratchet made a b-line to the computer. "This is Ratchet."

"Yo, Doc."

"It's about time you responded!"

"Whoa! Calm down, Doc! What's with the urgency?"

Raf sat there, fiddling with the shard.

"You didn't even listen to the transmission?" Ratchet's servos were up in the air. "One of our human allies has been kidnapped!"

"And this is Autobot concern beca—"

"—By the Decepticons."

Silence.

"What? Are they trying to use it has bait?"

Ratchet shook his helm. "We are not sure yet."

"…Send over a Ground Bridge?"

He was anxiously waiting for that response. He pulled the lever to the bridge and WheelJack dissolved through. He waved to Raf. "Sup?"

Raf shrugged and kept fidgeting.

Ratchet proceeded to explain what had happened. "We need extra scouts. Have you seen the Nemesis recently?"

WheelJack shook his helm. "No. But if the Boss Bot is that concerned, I'll help ya out."

Ratchet nodded. "Thank you. Optimus and the others went out searching. They will be regrouping here soon."

WheelJack began to pace. "Soon" meant nothing at this point. He took notice of Raf and leaned his faceplate over the railing. "Whatcha got there?"

Raf jumped. "I-It's…" He held out the shard in his palm. "I found it earlier…"

Ratchet made his way over for a look. "Where in the Allspark did you find that?"

"Mmm… By the couch."

"What? Are you feeding humans Energon now?" WheelJack joked.

"Wait…this…" Ratchet held out his servo.

Raf placed it in the medic's palm.

Ratchet studied it closely. "This was…the shard that cut her…"

Nikki's hand burned when she woke up to the feeling of a breeze. Her eyes opened and she saw the walls moving. What in the… She sat up groggily. She nearly jumped out of her skin, finding she was sitting on Soundwave's shoulder.

Realizing her awakened state, a tendril wrapped its prongs around her and pulled her off. They reached an automatic door the whizzed open. A short distance away, Megatron stood in front of gigantic screens with his back to the two of them. Nikki held her bandaged hand, which made a crunching noise. Though startled by this discovery, she was still more worried about Megatron.

"Soundwave, report."

He handed Megatron a datapad.

"…Good. Now fix the navigation and flight."

Soundwave answered with one solid nod.

"What are you going on about, Doc?"

Ratchet waved a servo, shrugging WheelJack off. He brought the shard to his workstation. Raf looked to WheelJack who glanced back and raised his servos meaning, "I don't know." Frowning, the tiny human went to the other side of the platform. "Ratchet, what are you doing?"

Waving them off again, he replied, "I'm working." He put the shard into a test tube and began melting it down. He mumbled to himself, "This is insane but it might just work."

Soundwave brought Nikki back to the workroom and placed on the panel she was at before, setting the datapad in front of her. He pointed to it. Nikki resituated herself and reviewed the code. Oh boy… This is starting to get out of my league… She glanced up at Soundwave who was staring down at her. Sighing, she starts typing. What am I going to do if I hit something I don't know?

The lanky, voiceless robot turned to his own work. He was going through the navigation system. That required so much data that a mere human could not possibly fathom it. Every now and then, he glanced over at Nikki. Her pace was much slower than it had been. After an hour, he suspected she might be stalling in some futile hope that the Autobots might triumphantly appear and save her. He paused. She looked…frustrated. She was running a hand through her hand and clenching it. Then, she typed a few more lines of code. As she reviewed the next lines, she pulled her low ponytail over her shoulder, twirling it into knots. Soundwave stared down. She would only write a tiny amount of code and then replace it while sighing heavily.

He picked up the datapad. Nikki spun around and cringed. What did I do wrong? Her eyes widened, for fear that he might throw her into a wall again. Her back still hurt if she moved too quickly. Soundwave tapped the screen rapidly before placing it back. She checked it and scrolled down. Everything she had just worked on had been fixed in some slight way. At the bottom was a relatively large set of code but it was much easier than what she had been doing. She looked up at Soundwave confused. He had already turned away to finish his own project.

Raf and WheelJack sat around, impatiently waiting for Ratchet to say something. Optimus called for a Ground bridge about half an hour in, to which Ratchet switched on in a huff. The Autobots rolled in and transformed. Bulkhead, normally excited to see his old buddy, only said, "Hey, Jackie," and bumped knuckles with him. Ratchet walked away before shutting off the bridge. Optimus looked to Arcee who was the closest to the lever now. She shrugged and pulled it, the glowing of the portal dissipating.

"Ratchet?" Optimus walked up behind the normally grumpy medic.

He waved his servo. "Just a moment. Almost have it…"

Optimus glanced to Raf and WheelJack who had no answers for him.

"Ha-hah!" Ratchet yelped triumphantly.

The monitor in front of him bleeped and ran through the command code. It then displayed a map of Earth and began scanning.

WheelJack vented harshly, "You gonna tell us now, Doc?"

Ratchet spun around with a grin on his faceplate. "I have, theoretically, found Nikki!"