"You think this could work?" Bowman asked dubiously.

He had been back to work almost right after the doctors at Nellis had cleared him for duty. There was so much to do, Lennox couldn't be left on his own to deal with it all. Mike had done his best from his apartment, but now that he was officially allowed back again, it was a whole different ball game.

Two weeks had passed since the incident with Howlback and Nellis was still not back to its usual alert status. People noticed. Soldiers had been briefed by himself and by Will Lennox on what had really happened, on what had been going on in the previous years, and across the globe, governments prepared for the now very real, not-too-much-in-the-future day that the mechs would become unclassified knowledge.

Tony Stark frowned. "You doubt my word?"

Stark had been back on what he called a personal matter and had wanted to talk to Bowman. Mike had been curious. His curiosity had turned into surprise and slight shock when Stark had unpacked.

Bowman chuckled. "Kinda. No. Well, a little." He walked around the personal body armor and shook his head. "I know it works for you and you got Jarvis. I know you developed one for Sam, including his technopathy. Why me?"

"'Cause Lennox wimped out?"

The captain frowned.

"Well, mainly because you've become a probable target of the enemy, too," Tony amended.

"I'm not that important, Stark. Soundwave targeted me because a) I'm the liaison and thus know about you guys, and b) he knew someone would be here right away. With so many more now aware of the mechs, chances are I'll never be in that situation again."

Tony's expression showed no humor. "Or you're in more trouble than you think you are because a) you are that important as our prime liaison and b) WiFi."

The Nokia twipped.

Bowman frowned. "Or because you and Will and everyone else are still conspiring to get me transferred out to the Autobot base," he grumbled.

The grin on Tony's face came lightning fast. "Or that."

"So this is what? A gift?"

"Better than flowers on a first date," the billionaire quipped, waggling his eyebrows.

Mike grimaced.

Tony shrugged, then gestured at the small transformer sitting on the work table. "I have Jarvis, you will need him."

"WiFi?"

The tiny bot chirped.

"Yep."

"Why him?"

"He's an artificial intelligence. We need one to help the suit interface with the human component. I don't want to start developing them by the dozen." Stark's expression grew serious. "It's too dangerous. AIs develop, take on a life of their own. I know what I'm talking about."

Jarvis. Yes, Bowman had met the AI once, through Tony and the armor, and he found the computer sentience was rather… unique and individual. So was WiFi.

"So you want to plug him into this?" he finally asked, a little aghast. "He's not some kind of add-on!"

"He volunteered, Mike. And he's not a tool, I know that."

"How can he volunteer?"

"We talked?" Tony answered, making it a question.

"You talked to him?!"

"Yep, Frequently."

"How?"

Tony frowned. "Emails?"

Emails. Of course. WiFi might not be able to speak in any kind of language – and Bowman had gotten pretty good at interpreting the twips, chirrups and warble – but he could write emails.

Bowman looked at his small friend. The spider-like transformer warbled an affirmative.

"Are you crazy?"

Another warble, ending with pointed clicking of one foreleg against the table top.

"What if this whole idea misfires?" Bowman argued, feeling worry rise. He had lived with the tiny bot for so long, he couldn't imagine letting anything happen to him. "It could fry your circuits!"

The argumentative chirping and angry flare of the optics told him that WiFi didn't agree.

"He wouldn't be plugged in directly," Tony spoke up. "Even Jarvis, who is uploaded into the Iron Man armor, is protected by an army of buffers and walls."

"No offense, Stark, but Jarvis isn't physically inside the armor, okay?" Bowman told him forcefully. "WiFi would be, plugged into a socket like some kind of iPod."

WiFi twipped.

"He'll be safe," Tony promised.

"And you want me to test the armor?"

Stark shrugged. "I think he works best with you."

WiFi shrilled his agreement.

Bowman sighed deeply. "Okay. I'll do it. Even it's just to keep you from coercing the little guy into another wild scheme."

"Hey," Tony exclaimed, looking offended, and WiFi argued shrilly again.

Bowman grinned and held out a hand for his little partner. The Nokia clambered onto his palm, then scurried up to his shoulder. He poked his legs into the captain's uniform, bringing a point across.

Bowman frowned. "Call me. I'll be on base." With that he was gone.

Tony gave a mock salute and turned back to his work.

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

Mike was back in his office, trying to work on his reports, but words went by him. He finally pushed the laptop away, together with most of the paper, and met the red gaze of his little friend.

"You are serious, right? About all of this?"

WiFi twipped.

"It's insane, WiFi!"

Another twip.

"You're risking everything if the armor short-circuits or gets blown apart or something like that!"

The Nokia shrilled something, hammering the right foreleg onto the table.

"If this is about being part of something, doing something, no! You don't have to risk your life, okay? You already did, attacking that thing Howlback."

WiFi gave him a long-winded opinion about what he thought, what he had done, and how he wanted to be able to help.

"WiFi, listen… I know you feel like you're missing out on something, but you're not! You just barely survived your birth, damnit!"

WiFi argued loudly, scurrying along the table, optics blazing. Finally he stopped in front of the human and met the frown determinedly.

*twip!*

"You're not useless. You're my friend and I hate to see you hurt or worse!"

*TWIP!*

"WiFi…"

*Chirruptwipwhistle*

Bowman sighed deeply, hanging his head a little. "You're one determined little critter."

The Nokia hummed, pleased, then gently poked Bowman's hand, warbling something.

"I trust you to make the right decisions," the captain said. "And I know Tony wouldn't hurt any of you guys. It's just… well, insane. It's a prototype."

WiFi poked him again, tiny head tilting. He chirped.

"Hey, I'm a test pilot. Well, was. I know the risk. And fact is the armor isn't the prototype, the interface circuits are. You're the one in danger."

WiFi stroked over his fingers, making soft, reassuring warbling noises. Bowman chuckled and scooped him up.

"All right. You work with Stark on that. Don't let him push you into something stupid, okay?"

*chirrup*

"And you're already my hero, right? You defended me against the symbiote and you managed to
inflict damage."

WiFi clicked softly, nodding.

Mike smiled a little more. He was proud of the tiny mech and he had been scared shitless when he had seen WiFi attack something that was a hundred times larger than him without thinking twice. WiFi was courageous, immensely courageous. He didn't need to prove he was useful; Bowman knew.

But WiFi wanted this. And Mike wasn't his keeper, just a good friend.

The Nokia twipped gently, poking at his hand again. The captain smiled. "Yeah. I know. You're not stupid, you know the risks, and you want this. I'll do the armor tests with you."

WiFi bounced, wing-like structures flaring.

"But right now we have the latest crisis to deal with."

He got a gurgle of agreement.

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

Optimus Prime had joined Ratchet in the underground lab and storage facility that was the safest in the whole base. Ironhide had made sure that whoever got in would never be able to get out again. Layers upon layers of security coding, defensive measures and the simple fact that they were underground, surrounded by tons of rock, enforced with a super-hard alloy constructed by Stark Industries, made it impossible to escape.

It was where they had moved Chromia, still locked in stasis. It was where the dead shell of Beastbox had been similarly stored. It was where Ratchet had moved Squawktalk and Howlback, who he had forced to off-line and whose sparks he had disabled from their shells. Without a medic reconnecting them, they were in stasis and unable to access outside sensors. The charred remains of Glit had been put into a holding tank. Megatron's ruined husk of a body shell had been obliterated.

"No sign of the other symbiotes," Ratchet told his leader. "Jazz and Barricade followed the trail Ravage left, but he's gone. Disappeared into thin air. Lazerbeak left traces at the Artic station, but he has likewise vanished. I'm sure Buzzsaw, Rumble and Ratbat are around, but no blip. Soundwave has disappeared off our radar."

Optimus nodded, optics locked on the display screen of the facility. Five active chambers. Five prisoners. And a powerful Decepticon with the rest of the symbiotes was free.

"He might have left," Ratchet continued. "He wanted Megatron. We destroyed what was left."

"He wanted the Allspark," Optimus corrected. "Will could still be in danger. Even with the Allspark, Soundwave could never have revived Megatron's spark as he had been."

"He was looking for a puppet," Ratchet agreed. "Now there's nothing left."

"Nothing but the knowledge that Will is more than just a human who survived a terrible accident."

"Soundwave isn't stupid enough to hunt him. There's nothing to prove that Will could revive a shell. He's not the Allspark, Prime."

Blue optics, ancient beyond his actual age, darkened a little. "We know that, Ratchet. Soundwave doesn't."

The medic sighed. "Ironhide will be protective enough. As for everything else, we can't do more than be on our toes, as we've been for all of our existence ever since the war. Sam is a possible target, too. As is Tony. All of us are. But if we give in to the paranoia, it's over."

"I know that, Ratchet. But I can't but blame myself for this."

"Why? Because you didn't think Soundwave might try to resurrect Megatron?" Ratchet sounded sarcastic now. "Prime, no one thought anyone could think of that! Starscream fled, the Allspark is gone, Megatron is dead. No Decepticon should have a reason to come here, aside from maybe trying to wipe out the last of the Autobots."

Prime snorted. "Yes, maybe for that."

"You might be Prime, Optimus, but you're not omniscient. It happened. Like a lot of things. And we dealt with it. We'll deal with the next attack, too."

Optimus nodded, still tense. He finally turned and left the high security facility, aware that Ratchet followed him. The medic was aware of the new weight on his leader's shoulders, the responsibility for Will Lennox, for his past, for his fate. Optimus shouldered a lot of that, a lot of guilt, and nothing anyone could ever tell him would lighten it.

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

He had left Earth, recalling the surviving symbiotes, except one. Soundwave still wanted an optic on Earth. Right now he was in a stable orbit around Mars. He had by-passed the Ark, knowing she was of no use to him. Sabotaging the Autobot vessel was a waste of time. Right now he needed to recover, let the symbiotes recover, and reconsider his plans. Megatron's shell was lost to him and the human was more than the filed data had let him believe. So the humans kept secrets; secrets that weren't stored in their computers.

Soundwave had been taught a lesson. He had underestimated the enemy. It wouldn't happen again. He had also underestimated the chance that an Autobot might have followed him to Earth; Sideswipe had been identified and his presence added to the data he had on the Autobots already on Earth.

"We could take them," Rumble muttered sullenly, following Soundwave's thought processes.

"Negative."

"Why? We hit them hard now, they won't expect it."

"Attack: unnecessary."

Rumble muttered to himself. They had lost several fellow warriors and it sat badly with the survivors.

"So what now?" Rumble demanded. "We just sit here and wait."

"Priority: recovery."

Ravage, Lazerbeak and the others sent their agreement. For now they had to regain their strengths. Soundwave would mull over what to do next in the meantime. One thing was for certain: the study of the hybrid human would take priority. If he displayed Allspark powers that could be harnessed to revive Megatron, then Soundwave would use him.

Next time he revealed his presence there would be no mistakes, whatever the plan might be.

Next time, the Autobots would pay.

fin!