12.May.06
Nominated for "Most Loved Character" '06.
White Fang
By: Blackbolt52003
Part One
“You must be Ghiaccio.” A bot
said. He immediately turned to him.
A male bot, with what seemed to be a gray and red colour scheme, sat at a
desk.
“Yes, I am, sir.” He answered. “And…you
are…?”
“Sorry,” the bot smiled. “My
name is Optimus Primal.”
“Pleased to meet you, Optimus.” Ghiaccio shook hands with him and sat
down on the chair opposing the descendant of the great Optimus Prime, the desk
the only thing between them.
“First thing’s first. Why
do you want to join my crew?”
“Truthfully sir, I really wouldn’t have if it hadn’t been Fuoco’s
last wish.” Optimus wrote
something down in his datapad. Apparently, he knew the femme.
“I’m glad you’re being honest with me.
Now, tell me why I should hire you.”
“Well, I don’t really want to push it, but I’ve always wanted to go
exploring and I’m constantly learning new things.
I was unemployed and well… Before
I knew it, I was setting up a job interview date with you and now, I’m here.
I…” he struggled to find the words to describe his thoughts.
“I…well, it’s kind of hard to explain, sir.”
“I have until 1200 hours, and I’m sure that’s plenty of time to
explain, Ghiaccio.” Optimus said patiently.
Ghiaccio gulped.
“I…I think you should hire me, because I’m good with my science and
I’m pretty good at decoding things. I’ve
learned how to fight since I was 2 stellarcycles, but I don’t know how much
good that’ll do for me because this is an exploration ship.
I’m pretty good at flying a ship, and I’m excellent at the landings,
sir. My one bad thing is that…I
think I’ll get in trouble with your crew.”
Optimus leaned forward on his chair, his optics intent and his audio
receptors listening. “What do you mean?”
“When I was in school, other bots teased me because I never actually
fought. Sure, I did
get into fights often, but they weren’t actually my fault.
The ones who challenged me just wanted to humiliate me for getting better
grades than them. I always managed
to walk away from a fight unscathed, but that only got me into more trouble with
them.”
Optimus was silent for a moment. “I
see.” Then, he said, “How good
a fighter are you?” For the first
time since he walked into the office, Ghiaccio smiled.
“That answer is impossible to tell without a demonstration.”
A smile tugged the corner of Optimus Primal’s face.
“Are you asking to prove yourself in the arena?”
“With all due respect, sir, I’m just asking for a chance to show you
what I’m worth at what I’m best at.”
Optimus sighed at the determined face before him.
“You aren’t going to budge until you get your way, are you?”
Ghiaccio grinned sheepishly.
“So… Are we going or not?”
________________________________________________________________________
“That was fast.” Optimus
commented as they left the fighting arena.
“Tell me about it.” Ghiaccio agreed.
“My opponent went down too fast. It’s
obvious that he barely does any training. Judging
from the way he fights, I can safely assume that he learned to fight without a
proper teacher. I can also assume
that he doesn’t practice regularly and that is why his movements are so slow
that others can see it and that’s why he looks like he’s had one too many
energeon drinks.”
“You mean he wasn’t a challenge for you?” Optimus Primal looked
surprised. “If I was put in the
fighting arena with him, I’d go down for sure.”
“Nah. I think…” Ghiaccio looked Optimus up and down.
“I think you’d beat him easily.
He’s not really a challenge.” A
smiled tugged at the corners of Optimus’s lips.
“I think you’ll be a good person to get along with.
Ghiaccio,” Optimus stopped and put a hand on the youth’s shoulder. “Welcome to the team.”
A grin appeared on his face. “Thanks,
Optimus!” The older bot chuckled.
“Just be sure you’re at the launch port before we take off.
And the ship’s the Axalon. I’ll
see you there.”
As the older bot left, Ghiaccio shouted, “Thanks a
lot, Optimus!” at his departing back.
Once again, Optimus couldn’t stop smiling.
Now if only there were more young bots with the sincerity of Ghiaccio…
________________________________________________________________________
CRASH! The being woke with a start. It felt gingerly for what was above its body, a safety measure filled with you-never-know-if-you-might-need-to-do-this trepidation. A metal wall met its hands and fingers. Suddenly, the wall went away from the being’s hands and its hands and fingers touched nothing but air. It sat up slowly and tried to get out of whatever it was in, but it couldn’t.
Then, a searing pain shot into the being’s entire body and its arms trembled as they tried to lift their host out of the thing the host was in. It fell back into the pod and the wall the being had felt before came back into place.
“Searching for a suitable life form.” The being heard before it lost consciousness.
________________________________________________________________________
“Waspinator, you imbecile! How many times do I have to tell you?!” roared Megatron, slamming his fist onto the chair of his ‘throne’. The wasp muttered an apology, but apparently, whatever he had done had been fatal. “DO NOT touch my personal computer, you—”
Whatever Megatron was going to say next was interrupted by the ship’s computer. “Stasis Pod detected.” The Predacon leader studied the image that the computer brought up.
“Waspinator?” The wasp froze. He had been hoping to escape, but unfortunately Megatron had other ideas. “Here’s a chance to redeem yourself. Bring me the protoform still inside the stasis pod and you will be forgiven. Dinobot will accompany you.”
The wasp shook in fear. Dinobot? The Transmetal II was quite bad-tempered when made angry and Waspinator had no intention of becoming shreds again. As if being blown up by a gunshot wasn’t enough.
“Unless…of course, you prefer to go with Rampage.” Smiled Megatron. Waspinator flinched. Whenever Megatron smiled, you could bet your core processor that it was going to have a lot of hurt in it.
“Wazzzpinator…go…” he whimpered and flew off. The Transmetal II followed. Megatron smirked at the wasp’s quaking figure. Not only was he going to get a new Predacon, but also this new Predacon would be loyal to only him….as a mindless drone with infinite power.
________________________________________________________________________
The ‘mindless drone’-to-be was already out and about of his stasis pod. He was running around, amazed at his speed. He was…in fact, a wolf, with pearly white fangs and with blue and white fur. His yellow eyes missed nothing and his ears could hear the whispers of the wind. His nose was like any other wolf’s nose, good to find scents.
Suddenly, he heard a noise, most unusual for a peaceful surrounding. Out of instinct, and due to the fact that his core processor and memory circuits were on the blink, he hid. After all, he remembered something about: ‘When in doubt….hide!’
A wasp, a very big one was buzzing along to the big metal something he had come out of, accompanied with a metal…dinosaur of some sort. He blinked. What WAS a dinosaur, anyway? How had he known what it was?
The dinosaur sniffed the air and snarled, “I think the protoform is out of his stasis pod. The stench of a Maximal is high in the air.”
The wasp was evidently trying to show who was boss. “Dino-bot will listen to Wazzpinator! Wazzzpinator in charge! Wazzipnator will give orderzzz! Dino-bot follow them! Or Wazzpinator will punish Dino-bot and Wazzzpinator will-”
And…obviously, the dinosaur did not appreciate being given orders from a wasp that was just about squashable. So, he showed it. By squishing the wasp down with his tail and as the bent up wasp was vulnerable, the dinosaur slashed up the wasp with his shiny claws into a million pieces.
The wolf winced. Suddenly, he heard flapping of wings. And…his nose sniffed the air eagerly. The scent…the scent of a brother! He looked around, in anticipation. Then, hearing the flapping of wings again, he looked up into the sky and whimpered.
Yes, the creature seemed like a wolf like him, with green eyes and a wolfish face. But rest of him…his feet were claws and his wings….the brother…had wings?! “What have you done with my comrade?” The wolf could scarcely believe his ears. The brother…could talk like the two other creatures! He backed further behind the boulder he had been hiding behind, his ears going back, showing fear.
“Leave now, Maximal! Even I don’t know!” the dinosaur snarled. “Dinobot…TERRORIZE!” The wolf heard whirring sounds, and out of curiosity, he peeked his head from behind the boulder and his mouth dropped open.
The dinosaur had changed…into a two-legged! Out of instinct from the wolf’s scanned body hat had been his emergency life form; he generally had a fear of two-leggeds. If you don’t know what a two-legged is, think. What mammal do you know that walks on only TWO legs?
“Silverbolt….maximize!” The brother yelled and to the wolf’s astonishment, amazement and fear, Silverbolt turned into a two-legged as well. “What have you done with my comrade?!” he demanded, stepping forward, his wings aiming at Dinobot.
“Oh, nothing YOU’D be concerned about!” snarled Dinbot, bluffing. His left infrared eye began turning red, and the wolf, with a natural instinct of protecting his brother, jumped where he knew, from instinct, where the shot was going to be shot.
His timing couldn’t have been more perfect. The eye beam pierced through his skin and into his ribs. He landed, weak and he coughed up…the red stuff. He gasped. Wolves fear losing the red stuff, the one thing that helped keep them alive. His body heaved and he breathed deep breaths, trying to stop losing the red stuff. It didn’t help. But wait…he inspected the red stuff. It wasn’t even red. It was…silvery.
But still, the fear of losing what helped keep him alive throbbed in his head. He coughed up more, unable to help it. It hurt. A lot. The coughing up the silvery stuff. Not the red beam. The red beam had hurt, but only for a moment. He rested his head on his paws, eyes closing, still coughing up more silvery stuff. With each cough, he felt like he was going to die…very soon.
________________________________________________________________________
Silverbolt was equally surprised, if not more. He had aimed his wing missiles at the offending raptor, only to be in a trap, a to-be victim of Transmetal II Dinbot’s laser eye beam. He had closed his optics and braced himself for the stasis lock, but it never came. He heard the shot, and a gasp and a coughing and he opened his optics and gasped himself.
A blue and white furred wolf was bleeding in front of him, coughing up mech-fluid. He knew right away. This wasn’t a wolf at all, but the new Maximal! He was furious at himself for being safe and unharmed when he knew the laser beam had been meant for him yet the Maximal, who barely knew him a vice versa, had took it. Angrily, he glared at Dinobot and rapid-fired at him.
The Transmetal II had never known what hit him. Surprisingly, it appeared that Silverbolt’s anger had fueled the speed and power of his wing missiles, thus making them deadlier.
He knelt down beside the wolf, who was coughing up more mech-fluid. “Are you alright?” The wolf’s eyes flickered open and as he raised his head to look at him, he coughed out more blood.
His yellow eyes were practically painful. Silverbolt knew the pain his fellow Maximal must have been feeling was terrible. It would have been bad enough for him, but in Beast Mode, his comrade was practically vulnerable to anyone, any beast, any mammal, anything.
“Help me…brother…” he gasped out, before collapsing. Silverbolt watched helplessly as more mech-fluid came out of the wolf’s mouth. Finally, snapping back to reality, he called the Maximal base on his COMM-link.
“Silverbolt to Optimus. Do you read me?”
“I read you loud and clear, Silverbolt.
Is everything alright?” Silverbolt
swallowed silently, his mouth feeling dry.
“The new Maximal…he…jumped in and took a shot that was meant for me…” The fuzor hung his head. “He…is unconscious at the moment… He’s still in Beast Mode, sir, and…I need the CR-Chamber ready when I get back.”
“Very well. Get him back to base safe and sound, Silverbolt. I trust you.” And with that, the Maximal leader cut the connection.
I trust you. What kind of curse was that? Silverbolt had expected a scolding. But, still the three words had the same effect. His mech-fluid went cold as he went to Beast Mode, the injured wolf on his back. He flew back to where the base was.
Why? Why had Optimus chosen not to punish him? What was going on? And why….why had the Maximal called him ‘brother’?
________________________________________________________________________
He awoke, in captivity. Wolf instinct made him feel fear and then anger. But…wait… He looked at where the wound should have been. It wasn’t there. He felt no pain. What…what had happened?
Then, a wall opened and he crept cautiously out. He saw the brother’s head in his hands, sitting down and somehow; he sensed the brother was sad…and…confused…
Memories came back to him: The wasp, the dinosaur, the brother, taking the beam that had been meant for the brother, the loyalty he felt to the brother, the pain from the beam and the coughing up of the silvery stuff, his last words before he went unconscious.
Wait… His eyes narrowed. He…spoke? In the same language as the brother and the wasp and the dinosaur? Was he too…a two-legged? The thoughts scared him, but they made sense. He had heard what the brother said when he had turned into a two-legged. Did he have to say the words too? Couldn’t he do it himself? Without talking?
He tried to imagine himself as a two-legged, but it was difficult. Silverbolt… Could that have been the brother’s name? He tried to think. What was the word, the brother- Silverbolt, had used? What was it?
Maximize. Suddenly, he felt different, like his insides were shifting. He didn’t like this, but it felt…natural. He closed his eyes and let this happen. When he opened his yellow eyes again, he felt himself…on two legs. He was a two legged.
He shakily stepped towards the brother, surprisingly, the steps coming easy. He placed a hand on the brother’s shoulder. The brother- Silverbolt, immediately stiffened and he said, “Please, whoever you are, leave me alone. I do not wish to talk.”
“Are you…” he whispered. “Sure about that…brother?” The brother whirled around.
“You…you’re…you’re alive!” The smile the brother gave him made him smile back.
“Yes… And I don’t want you feeling sad, brother. It does not seem like you. You are you. I am me. We are ourselves, so let ourselves be us. Be unique, and you will always find something. Besides, brother. I know you were worried about me dying but…Death stood above me, whispering what I do not remember into my ear. That was what it was doing…before I fell…into slumber…”
“Why…do you call me ‘brother’?” Silverbolt asked. “I am sure that we are not kin, though I do not mean any offense.”
“None taken, brother. And I call you, ‘brother’, because you are my brother, of the wild, of our kind, for life, for eternity…” he said, the words coming naturally.
“Of…our kind?” The brother- Silverbolt, echoed. He flashed the brother a smile.
“Yes, our kind. Of the wolves. Though you are a mix of a wolf and something else, you are still a brother, and that will never change.”
________________________________________________________________________
“Then, ‘brother’.” The word felt strange in his mouth, but it was ok. He smiled him. “Would you…come with me? Someone wanted to talk to you, after you awoke.”
“Brother, I would do anything for you.”
“I know.” Silverbolt directed his new ‘brother’ to Optimus’s quarters. “Come. Optimus is waiting.”
“Optimus…” The Maximal echoed. “I think…I know him…or….I knew him…once….”
The smile Silverbolt gave him was priceless. “Then you will get along fine with our leader.” They stopped outside Optimus’s door. “What is your name, ‘brother’? And…” Silverbolt noticed that the Maximal’s teeth in Beast Mode still retained when he was in robot mode. “You have very white teeth.”
“Thank you.” The Maximal said, not knowing whether he should be thankful for that. “And my name…is….” Then, he remembered what the brother had said. “Silverbolt, my name is White Fang.”
“How did you know my name?” Silverbolt asked, surprised, knocking on the metal door. It opened.
“I would remember everything I heard from my brother.” Smiled White Fang and together, the two brothers walked in. “Hello, Optimus.” White Fang smiled at the Maximal leader. “Miss me?”
Optimus smiled a rare smile. “What’s your name now? I’ve heard you’ve changed it on several occasions.”
“It’s White Fang, sir.” He grinned. “And if I dare say, it fits me marvelously, doesn’t it?”
“It does.” Optimus agreed. “Welcome to the Maximals, White Fang. And I see you’ve already made a new friend.”
“Not a new friend, sir.” Silverbolt corrected.
“A new brother.” White Fang grinned. Optimus smiled. The sincerity of Ghiaccio had always made him do that, and White Fang was the same…with a new twist in his thoughts.