TIME MEASUREMENTS:
Astrosecond: .5 seconds
Nano-klik: 1 second
Klik: 1 minute
Breem: 8 minutes
Cycle: 1 hour 15minutes
Deca-cycle: 4 weeks (one month)
Mega-cycle: 96 hours (four days)
Meta-cycle: 12 months (one year)
Stellar Cycle: 6 months
Vorn: 83 years
Very AU after Revenge of the Fallen. Jazz lives. OOC tying back to the AU. This was supposed to be a part of 'Spare Parts' but it demanded its own fic. Oops?
I really liked the idea of a BAMF Sam with no bots close by to pull him outta the fire, and just…him being a BAMF in general.
WARNINGS: Bloody, gore-ish, death, just the aftermath and process of living though a life-and-death, end of the World 'Zombie Ragnorok' scenario. Disturbing imagery.
Drabble series. (IT WAS SUPPOSED TO BE A ONESHOT BUT MY MUSES ARE SCREAMING IDEAS) which means SHORT CHAPTERS.
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When it happens, Sam isn't at the Base.
He had been visiting an Elementary school, with a normal car and no Bee or Autobot close by. It had been a part of the agreement with the government after the Fallen announced the presence of Cybertronian life on Earth. Sam had found himself in the position of Liaison and a kind of 'human relations' officer. Part of that was Sam visiting various places and talking about Cybertronians, their customs, and what he had been through with them.
When dealing with children- as he was at the Elementary School- Sam was to spend his first day there talking about the Autobots and showing off pictures but have no actual bot there on the premises just in case. It was supposed to help with any 'fear' if Sam introduced them to pictures and talked about them before any introductions.
It was a lovely idea, and the last eight Elementary Schools had loved it when the last two days of Sam's stay rolled around and he was allowed to bring a bot along to introduce them. Sam still laughed about the competitions that broke out deciding who would go with Sam those last two days to show off to the children.
(Ironhide seemed to enjoy his turn the most. The bot had a soft spot for children no matter his blustering, and he was especially smug when the children were excited to see his cannons.)
Sam could remember laughing as he explained about some of the funnier interactions between the bots and the people at the Base when the screaming started.
The children had gone silent even as Sam cut himself off, his eyes darting to the teachers who looked just as worried and confused as he felt. After that it had been instinct to take command of the situation.
Sam had been in too many out of control life threatening situations with Decepticons to take any chances with children. Especially when he knew, as sure as the sky was blue, that those were screams of pain and terror echoing down the halls.
"Everyone back against the walls now." His voice was steady- strong and even, none of his worry or the twist of fear in his gut showing in his voice or on his face "Stay low, out of sight of the windows." He turned to the teachers next "You" he nodded at the assistant teacher "go sit with the children. Keep them calm, and quiet." Then he turned to the teacher "Lock that door. Don't open it for anyone but me you understand? Don't move from here. Don't open the doors. Don't look out the window. Don't turn on the lights. Alright?"
"Your leaving?" the woman's voice squeaked on the last word as she shook.
"I am. There's more children out there. I need to see what's happening. Just stay in here and be quiet okay? I'll be back, I promise. If someone comes to the door that looks like me, but doesn't knock this pattern on the door" he paused to tap a quick 3-pause-2-pause-1 beat on her palm "do not open that door, no matter what I say, you understand me?"
Sam wasn't sure what was happening, but the idea of Decepticons sat in the back of his mind, and he knew they could project his appearance and voice if nothing else. He tried not to think about what it would mean of it was Decepticons when there were no Autobots in the vicinity.
The teacher- a Mrs. White- was shaking, but she nodded all the same.
"Good." Sam ripped the suit jacket off his body, leaving him in the dress shirt and tie beneath, and darted out of the room.
The hallways echoed with screams.
Sam shoved that thought into the back of his mind, carefully, delicately sneaking his way down the halls, searching for the gunman, the snapped person with a knife or something, that he was sure was somewhere in the school even as he keeps an eye out for children and teachers and sends them to the classroom next door to the one he had just left.
The halls are mostly empty, the screams and panic leading the people inside to react in a herd mentality and flee. Those still inside are hiding carefully, or still screaming further in the school.
And Sam is the fool rushing towards the danger.
O~O~O~
It's not a gunman. It's not a man with a knife, who had snapped and was killing people. It's not Decepticons. (And what does it say about the situation that Sam honestly, truly, wishes that it were Decepticons instead?) It's not anything Sam could have thought of.
His mouth is open with silent horror as he watches the corpse, the eviscerated body of a teacher stagger around the corner of the hallway. His eyes are white with death, his stomach is ripped open, what remains of his intestines trailing behind him like a banner, and yet his mouth still moves, moans leaving his mouth, and his nose completely gone.
Sam has to swallow the bile that works its way up his throat, every horror movie he has ever seen flashing through his mind, complete disgust and the beginning stages of a slow terror clawing its way up his spine.
"Oh god" he whispers it, slowly backing towards the halls he has just left, but he freezes before he gets far.
A little girl- she's no older than nine- rushes from one of the classrooms, her face red and blotchy as she screams, crying. Sam can hear the screams coming from the classroom she had just fled.
The zombie teacher turns her way, slow and cumbersome, and the little one freezes. Sam doesn't think. He lunges forward, an arm reaching out to snag the girl around the waist and lifting her off the ground. "Hold on to my shoulders okay?" he rushes to speak, eyes on the teacher as it begins its hobbling way towards them "Like a piggyback ride. Don't let go. I've got you." He has no idea how his voice is so steady when his dread and horror is sitting like a stone in his stomach, but the little girl listens to him, her hands sliding around his shoulders and her grip as crushing as a terrified nine-year-old can make it.
Sam runs.
He has no weapons on hand, and now he has a child clinging to him like he is the answer to life's questions and there is what can only be a zombie on his heels.
Sam is not stupid enough to charge into the school with a kid, not when the screams are dying, not when he has nothing to protect them with.
He knows what he needs to do.
They need to get out of the school.
He needs to get everyone to the Autobots. If he can get to them, he knows they'll make it. If they can get to them, they can get to the Base and everything will be fine.
He remembers the week of horror movies that had sent Red Alert into a frenzy. The security bot had prepped for this. The humans had laughed about it, told him not to worry that the Zombie moves were fiction, but Red Alert had done it anyway, and the humans had jokingly gone along with it.
Sam had never been so grateful for the paranoid reaction.
If he could get there, get these kids there, everything will be fine.
Sam glances over his shoulder, eyes wide and feet flying over the ground as he watches the zombies pile out of the rooms a hulking mass of blood covered violent deaths. Tears gather in his eyes even as the bile finds its way back into his mouth at the sight of the many, many children who hadn't made it out of their classrooms.
The little girl on his back buries her face into his shoulder, shaking with sobs, and Sam murmurs soothingly as he can manage, his throat constricting so hard his voice is only a whisper "I've got you. It's going to be okay. I've got you. We'll get out of here, I promise."
He chokes a bit, before whipping back around, eyes forward continuing to whisper to the little girl on his back "Don't look back. Close your eyes." He knows the girl on his back will see horrible things in the future, but here, right now, he murmurs the words, hoping she listens so she will not see the faces of her teachers, of the children she knew, of the kids she passed in the hallways, twisted into expressions of hunger, their bodies ravished and broken but moving anyway.
He runs, death on his heels, and thanking every deity he can think of that the zombies seem to be slow moving. It gives him distance, and time he needs when he gets back to the classroom he had left, quickly tapping the pattern he had given on the door. He opened the door to the classroom he had sent the other children and teachers he found, closing his eyes in relief when terrified but living eyes look back at him.
"Come on." He leads the two classrooms together, and flings open the nearest windows. "We have to go right now."
He sends two teachers out first and then begins helping the children out whispering "Stay quiet and against the wall. Don't make any sound okay?" as he does.
He prays he is making the right choice as he moves, the little girl clinging harshly to his shoulders refusing to get down. Sam doesn't have the heart to ask that of her, letting her cling to him if it makes her feel better, feel safe.
He rushes to grab a permeant marker, quickly scribbling a message over the outer wall, knowing that one of the bots may come looking for him and that they'll check around this classroom first as it was where he was supposed to be.
He shoves the marker into his pocket and then turns to the group of children and adults looking to him for leadership.
He's going to be sick.
But he will not, cannot, let them down.
"Alright" he breathes. "Okay."
He's not with the bots when it happens, but Sam swears he'll make it back to them alive, Ragnorok or no. And he'll bring as many as he can with him.