Chapter Twenty-nine: The Final Battle

The tender moment of a family hug was broken by a familiar voice that roared through Optimus Prime's comm. "PRIME!" Optimus sighed and turned away from his reunited family. "Yes, Agent Fowler?" Prime responded as calmly as he could manage. "Have you turned on the news lately?!" The addressed Prime sighed and quickly checked news feeds from the Internet. What he saw shocked him. Optimus was about to respond when he saw a vehicle approaching. June blinked her optics in surprise. "It's a news van from the local TV station." She said as she looked at the mech with fear in her optics. "What do we do, Optimus?" Trickshot asked. "We tell the people of Earth the truth, Jackson." He said calmly. "It is about time we step out of the shadows." All in attendance nodded at the red and blue mech while Fowler was flustered beyond intelligible speech. Jack, I think you should take your human form. Arcee told Jack silently. Trickshot nodded in agreement, transformed, got out of his alt mode and waited. Raphael took a cue from Jack and also took on his human form in preparation for the news crew.

As the dust cleared from the desert winds, Emily Garcia couldn't believe what she was seeing. Five large robots stood and looked at her while two guys stood by their cars and chatted with two of the robot females as if that was normal. "What are you?" She mumbled completely unaware that she could be heard easily. Jack smiled and walked up to the reporter. "They…" He trailed off and started again. "We are robotic autonomous organisms from the planet Cybertron. You may call us 'Autobots' for short." He said calmly. The woman just stared into space in shock. Arcee giggled. "Jack, dear, I think you broke her." Jack sighed and snapped his fingers in her face until she came out of the daze. "Excuse me…" Emily said with a sigh. "It's just a lot to take." Raphael smiled at the reporter. "Believe me," Jack answered. "When you're raised to be human and you find out different, it's quite a shock." He said with a laugh. The reporter smiled at Jack. "Saving the world probably just made you the most eligible bachelor in the world." Arcee bristled at the reporter's statement. That glitch! She growled. Easy, Arcee. Jack soothed. "Actually, ma'am. It wasn't just me. My fellow Autobots deserve more credit than me. They've been fighting 'Cons much longer than I have." The woman gave him a sideways look. Arcee just shook her head in aggravation at the woman's needless prodding. She's worse than Sierra. Jack thought to himself.

At that moment, there was a sonic boom. The reporter just about jumped out of her skin which made everyone laugh. All laughter died when they saw Crystal slam into her Daddy. "You know it's not healthy for you to fly so fast, young lady." Jack admonished with a fatherly look. Crystal hung her helm. "I know, Daddy, but Uncle Ratchet has been trying to contact you!" June glared at the dirt for a moment. Finally, she looked up with wonder in her optics. "What is it, June?" Optimus asked with concern in his own optics. 'The composition of the dirt here creates a natural radio barrier with the addition of Energon." She said as she produced a Bot-sized test tube, took a sample, and put it away in Subspace. "What's going on, Crystal?" Arcee asked her daughter with a look in her eyes. The little femme sighed and produced a picture in her optics. "Inverse Portals…" Jack growled in anger. Heavy footfalls made the group turn. Jacquelyn shivered. Then, her eyes grew determined, and she charged toward an as of yet undetermined enemy.

As Jacquelyn's blades crossed with the other bot's, a deep rumble echoed from the foe's throat. Then, he threw Jacquelyn to the dirt. This sent Raphael charging in. The little mech surprised everyone as he began to kick aft. The boy's optic's glowed purple. "You. Don't. Touch. Her. You. Slagging. Scrapheap!" With every word, a new punch battered the assailant. The last punch was a violent uppercut that sent the attacker to the dirt. Then, with a roar of rage, the boy powered up his blasters and cut loose. The bot raised a digit to his comm. in the middle of the beat down and ordered, "Move in!" The order was answered by four beat up engines. Jacquelyn got up and glared at the oncoming vehicles. "Crystal, get back to Ratchet now!" Arcee ordered. The young femme didn't try to argue her way out of this one and just sprinted off. Negative Optimus glared at the dust cloud Crystal left in her wake until a sick smile crossed his faceplate. Trickshot glared at the dingy bot and growled. "Don't even think about it." Then, Trickshot started to bash Negative Prime with a fury like no other.

Meanwhile, Optimus and June tag teamed the Mad Doctor. He was fast and cocky. June moved quick and landed a few hits. Each hit made Hatchet grin wider. "Oh…this one's got some fight in her." With his mind distorted by Synth-En and the rest of his functional processor distracted by June's looks, the medic didn't check his six until a punch sent the bot sprawling. "Do not dare to speak to her like that, Monster!" Hatchet's polluted green optics went wide as Optimus "took the gloves off', picked up Hatchet, and slammed his chassis into the dirt with enough force to cause a localized quake. Optimus put his ped on Hatchet's chest as the bot struggle to get up. "Do you yield?' Optimus asked with a glare. "Never!" Hatchet roared as two Energon prods jumped out of each of his wrists. Hatchet then jolted Optimus until he went down. Hatchet looked up at June as he threw Optimus to the side like a ragdoll and smiled at her. The femme turned into a blur of motion and began to attack faster than the optic could track. Hatchet groaned and grunted as repeated strikes hit the butcher. With a yell of fury, the pissed off femme shot backwards over a mile and used all that kinetic energy of the running start to ram the Mr. Hyde to Ratchet's Dr. Jekyll. Hatchet sailed through the air on impact and slammed into a wall twenty miles away with enough force to carve a crater as deep as his chassis into the rock.

Arcee, Trickshot, and Airacnid had their servos full with Bulkhead and RC. Apparently, those two recently came into contact with the Polarity Gauntlet and had yet to be separated. Trickshot suppressed laughter as they fought the Siamese twins. The two had drastically different battle styles and kept getting in each other's way. The same could be said for Airacnid as she fought on the side of Arcee and Trickshot. The Bonded pair fought seamlessly and exploited the situation to the fullest. "Your Carrier leaks like a sieve!" Trickshot taunted. That got the reaction Jack hoped for and sent Bulkhead into a rage while RC struggled to get a shot off. "Hold still, you pile of scrap!" RC's roaring slur didn't stop Bulkhead as the massive bot charged the pair. Arcee punched and kicked at the massive bot, but he took every bit of damage she could give. RC smiled sweetly at Trickshot. "Hello, Muscles." Jack fought his gag reflex and glared at the femme as she trained her blasters on him and kept shooting at him. Due to Bulkhead's erratic motion, RC's shots missed every time. Jack smiled. "I don't date glitches like you! You'd interface with an offline chassis, if it had a spike. Even if it didn't, I bet you'd still frag the slag out of it!" He said calmly. That brought out scary strength in the femme. With a grunt, she hefted Bulkhead and used him as a club to bat Jack away. As the hybrid sailed through the air, he thought, Yep. She's a Valve Chaser.

When Jack slammed into a boulder and slid to a stop, Arcee started to sprint to him. The femme felt slim servos grab her peds and kicked at the grip. When it shook loose, Arcee continued her sprint to Jack. Before she could get to him, however, a certain bot walked up with Crystal struggling in his grip. "*grunt* My Daddy is going to kick your aft!" Negative Optimus directed the femme to the cliff where Jack laid, unconscious. "I do not think so." He said with a dark smirk. Crystal glared at her captor's servo. "When you gotta, you gotta." She mumbled as she pushed out of his grip and shot out Lord Optimus' optics before she flew to Jack in worry. "Please, be ok, Dad." The little girl pleaded as she landed and laid her head on the chest of Jack's suit. Crystal was startled when the suit sat up. The first thought through his head was: I wonder if RC and Good Airacnid ever… The thought was stopped cold as Arcee glared daggers at Trickshot and slapped his helm. "What?" Trickshot protested. "I am a mech." He told her as he got to his peds. "We'll talk about this later." Arcee said as Jack gulped. He would definitely be in the doghouse when this was all over.

Back on the battlefield, things were starting to look bleak for Lord Optimus and his Negative Autobots. Instead of having the desired effect of making his counterparts freeze when they saw the youngling in his servo, it made them go wild on their opponents and bend a few rules he knew Goody Two Shoes Optimus held close. He watched in fascination through hazy vision as his underlings were offlined. Then, the mech's optics succumbed to the damage they received from the femme's blasters and winked out forever. At the moment he lost his sight, "Lord" Optimus showed his true color: yellow. "Retreat!" He ordered only to discover, to his horror, that he was the only one of his band left online. Emily, who recorded the entire fight, threw her voice and made it as deep as she could. "Run, 'Lord' Optimus," She ordered. "Run away and never return!" The coward yelped like a femme and ran off before he transformed and tore up the nearby road out of town.

All the bots walked up to the woman as Jack, Arcee, and Crystal met her from a deferent direction. "Nice Scar impression." The little girl praised with a smile. Emily smiled at her, said, "Thank you," and noticed Jack and Arcee. The two parents glared at the reporter. "We will tell you our story and you can air it on one condition." She looked at Jack and Arcee in slight worry. "Tell the world we are not to be feared. We are here to protect our homes and families just as any other person would." She nodded with a kind smile. With that settled, Jack and Arcee began to weave the tale known as "From Liability to Lover and Beyond".

Please read and Review. I felt I left this story too open with the previous chapter. I hope this is a better wrap up.