Author's Note:
I know! I know! I haven't updated in forever! I got stuck with writer's block (over how the interrogation scene would go) and then real life got in the way and I more-or-less forgot about my own fanfiction! It's terrible! But anyway, here is the next chapter, finally. I've got an outline drafted for the next chapter, but I'm still in something of a writer's block. It just won't flow... it reads really 'chunky', if that makes sense.

Chapter 8

When Harry came to, he found himself staring at the dark green ceiling of a tent. Blinking slowly, he tried to recall what recently happened. He turned his head to the side, looking for any sort of a hint.

He was in an infirmary, that much was clear. There were other patients in beds beside and across from his. There didn't seem to be any medical personnel at the moment, but he could hear murmurs just outside the door flaps of the tent. Suddenly, a giant boxy shadow moved across the entire tent covering. It looked like a robot.

Robots! Or rather, Autobots!

Everything rushed to Harry's consciousness and he groaned. Another war! That's right, but with giant robots this time, Autobots against Decepticons!

Feeling relatively alright, he slowly sat up. None of the other patients – soldiers, I guess they are – paid the slightest attention to him. Finally, Harry remembered the odd occurrence with the ghostly Autobots and putting the so-called Matrix of Leadership in the one called Optimus Prime but nothing after that. Musing on the fact that he was still alive, as were the other humans around him, the wizard assumed that the Autobots won. He stood up and went outside, looking for confirmation to his assumption and a recount of what happened after he lost consciousness.

Upon leaving the tent, Harry was greeted by orderly military chaos. Many other tents had sprung up and people were dashing back and forth between the tents. The Autobots were also striding about on the outskirts. A couple of Autobots were climbing up and down on the ruins of a pyramid off in the distance. Bewildered, Harry simply stood in front of the medic tent with no idea as to where to go or what to do next. A soldier finally spotted the civilian standing around.

"Hey, you!" the soldier hollered.

Harry turned towards the shout.

"Yes, you! Come with me!"

With no other direction, Harry followed the soldier and was brought before Major Will Lennox.

[break]

Will Lennox had a headache.

He had defied direct orders from his superiors and brought the body of Optimus Prime all the way to Jordan on the words of a civilian who just reached his majority. Thankfully, everything had worked out according to the way Sam had said it would, but he still had to deal with the aftermath of it all.

His superiors were split between giving him a dressing down or pretending the idea was theirs all along. Attempting a conference call when everyone seemed intent on arguing over every little thing was bad enough, but since Lennox and his group flew out so urgently, the equipment they had was rather primitive and the phone kept making high-pitched whining noises on top of all the static. He was ready to throw down the phone, superiors be damned, and simply not talk to any of them until everyone was back in USA.

Fortunately, relief came in the form of the unknown civilian who somehow managed to revive the Prime. Quickly making excuses, he hung up on the conference call.

Lennox stared without speaking at Harry, and after several minutes, Harry began to squirm. Just as he had had enough with the silent staring and was about to speak, Optimus Prime peered into the tent and spoke.

"Ah, the human is awake. Thank you, Lennox. I will speak to him now."

Lennox frowned at Sergeant Robert Epps, who was standing under the crouched form of Optimus. He had wanted to speak to the civilian alone before the Autobots got to him but he couldn't blame the Sergeant for following the Prime's orders either.

He simply said, "We'll come along, too."

[break]

Harry found himself out in the desert surrounded by Autobots and humans alike. There were two humans in uniform (Lennox and Epps) and the four he met before all the fighting started (Sam, Mikaela, Leo and Simmons). He recognized the yellow Autobot (Bumblebee) as well as the large red-and-blue one (Optimus Prime) he saved with the Matrix. The two other Autobots he only briefly caught a glance of during the fight, a black one (Ironhide) and a lime-yellow one (Ratchet).

Feeling pressured by all the people and Autobots surrounding him, Harry began to babble.

"I'm just a guy on holiday, going on a road-trip across America when my car suddenly started driving on its own! Then there was some giant robot at some aerospace museum and the next thing I knew, my car had been thrown about somehow and was largely buried in sand. When I finally got it out, it drove off all on its own again and I ended up with even more giant robots. After that, I found myself in this crazy warzone with a bunch of other giant robots, I had no idea who was who or which side anyone was on.

"All I want is for my car to be normal again and to get back to USA so I can either finish up my vacation, get back to work, or get the hell out of the country because this is just insane. I've had enough of war to last me several lifetimes by now!"

"And where's your car now?" asked Lennox, who was not sure what to believe, as Harry's story sounded rather incredible.

"That ruined pile of silver metal over there. Do you know how long it took me to get it back to running order after I picked it up from the scrap yard? Almost a year! I not only had to fix the whole engine, I had to learn welding to fix the chassis and shell, too. I can't believe I'm going to have to do it all over again!" Harry ranted.

Everyone, humans and Autobots, looked over to where Harry gestured.

"Oh my God!" Sam screamed, "I totally forgot about JAZZ!"

Lennox, Epps and all the Autobots began talking at once.

"Jazz? No way! It can't be, he's dead!"

"Jazz! Jazz! Is it really you?"

"Impossible! I checked over Jazz after Mission City – there was definitely no Spark left in him then."

Sam ignored everyone and ran towards Jazz. Ironhide had a different idea and grabbed Harry rather roughly, pulling him up to the Autobot's eye-level.

"Where the Pit did you get Jazz, boy! Did you steal him off our base?"

Harry, panicked and with nerves strung out by the interrogation, shot off a spell in reflex in Ironhide's face. This had the unfortunate effect of offlining the Autobot's optics and vocal processor, startling him into dropping Harry.

Optimus Prime yelled out, "Ironhide!" in admonishment while rushing over to catch the young man from falling to his death, but before the wizard even got close to his hand, Harry had pointed his wand down and cast a spell to slow his fall. As such, he gently floated down on the ground after Optimus' dive sent the Autobot past him. When both his feet were firmly on the desert sand, he looked up to the astonished faces of both humans and Autobots. All were shocked speech-less.

"Alright! That's it! I want to know how you're doing that!" Simmons yelled.

Harry contemplated on how well an Obliviate would work on the Autobots. But before he could do anything, Ratchet caught on to the direction of the wizard's thoughts and shot a sedative at the human.

Seeing the movement out of the corner of his eye, Harry quickly casted a Protego and the dart bounced off the lightly glowing shield. With a snarl at the sneak attack, he turned his wand on Ratchet, a blasting curse on his lips when Lennox interfered. The Major shoved Harry's wand arm up, letting the curse shoot off in the air as he pushed the wizard back and away from the Autobots.

"Enough! Enough! There's no need to fight. Let's all calm down now. Ratchet, don't shoot anything else. Optimus, please keep your Autobots in line. Let's break this up." Lennox calmed ordered.

However, the damage had been done. Any other questions they had for Harry had him glowering mutely at the group or repeating 'classified information' in a snooty voice. Since there was nothing NEST could hold Harry accountable for, they were unable to force the required information out of them. Nevertheless, none of their threats would have worked, seeing as the supposed civilian had some sort of power which was capable of defending himself from Autobots and was also able to knock the giant robots out. They decided to let him be for the moment while they organized their departure from the desert.

Harry, now that he was free to wander around, made his way over to Jazz. Looking around discreetly, the wizard subtly cast Reparo on his ruined silver car to minimize the damages. Jazz, having seen the human approach but was otherwise helpless to do anything, offlined once again. When he awoke, the Autobot mistakenly assumed it to be due to his injuries, thus stayed unaware to Harry's abilities.

While Harry was finishing up his limited repairs via magic on Jazz, Ratchet came over to make sure the injured Autobot was stable. Harry watched on with interest as the lime-green robot (Now what was this one's name again? Harry thought to himself) appeared to nurse over his car. However, the medic did not have the necessary equipment or materials to repair Jazz back to working order. When he finished, Ratchet, stared down at the small human standing beside Jazz with a somewhat quizzical expression on his metal face. Harry, unable to decipher Cybertronian facial expressions, glared back at the robot. Ratchet vented briefly and left without a word.

"How rude," muttered Harry to himself.

Ratchet caught the words but wisely decided not to respond in any manner.

[break]

Several hours later, all of NEST personnel were ready to move out and return to base. Harry pestered a soldier into pointing out the mess tent and finally got something to eat. His last meal had been breakfast in Brooklyn. While military food wasn't gourmet meal by any standard, the young man still enjoyed his meal, digging heartily at the relatively unlimited food (the kitchen staff did not deny his request for seconds and thirds).

Lennox popped by while Harry was eating to inform (more like ordered) him that he would be travelling with the group back to the NEST base in Nevada. Annoyed at the lack of options, the wizard-in-hiding gave up on his food (he was, by then, on the last half of his third tray) and left the mess tent, completely at a loss as to what to do until they were ready to leave.

He saw Sam and Mikaela with two older adults who seemed like parental figures to either of the teenagers. Leo was hanging on the outskirts of the four, and from the expression on his face, feeling extremely awkward with the discussion/argument between the four. Harry decided to steer well away from the group.

The wizard also found Simmons pestering various military officials, and from said officials' expressions, they weren't too happy with the man's interference. Feeling extremely lost, Harry wandered back to Jazz and simply sat in the shadow of his car and waited, doodling in the sand with his finger.

He couldn't wait to leave.

Next Chapter:
Harry gets dragged off to the NEST base.

Please Read and Review! I'll do my best to come up with the next chapter soon-ish!