24TTWI: Came back to edit the A/N. It was out of date XD
Just some warnings, there's quite a bit of swearing, and I suppose "graphic" depictions of torture. It was also a bit rushed when I first wrote it, so apologies for the especially crummy first few chapters.
I also realized how inconsistent I am with perspective in terms of point of view, so, sorry for that if it bothers you.
Putting it in the first chapter now: This is crossposted on AO3, under the same username. A few details are different, I'm working on it.
So, disclaimer: I don't own AOE and I'm just writing this because reasons.
A man waited anxiously in the elevator as he rode it to one of the highest rooms of the building. He quickly adjusted his glasses with an automatic sweep of his fingers before glancing at the paper he held in his hand.
ACCESS GRANTED
The body of Samantha Strange is now under full authority of KSI.
KSI agrees to be held fully accountable for any-
The ding of the elevator brought the man's reading to a stop. He looked back up as the elevator doors parted and he stepped through. Another man, also wearing a suit and glasses, was sitting at his desk, speaking to his assistant. Or at least trying to understand her as she ranted about something in Mandarin.
"How many times have I told you that I simply do not understand what you're saying? Listen, I'm expecting-"
"Mr. Attinger, I know." His assistant didn't look all too pleased with how often her boss and that man met privately. Who knew what kind of "business" was getting done?
"Joshua!" the man stepping out of the elevator called.
Joshua shooed his assistant away before giving the man his full attention.
"We've done it."
Joshua raised an eyebrow. "You've got the Seed?"
Mr. Attinger tossed the paper he held onto Joshua's desk. "No, not yet. But we've got the girl." He nodded as Joshua scanned the paper. "After almost an entire decade, we've finally been granted full ownership of the body. They've already got it hooked up downstairs."
Joshua stood up and started walking around the desk. "Show me."
Attinger nodded once again as he followed Joshua into the elevator.
. . .
"Based on the information discovered throughout the decade," Mr. Attinger gruffly began, "which is, not surprisingly, a miserable amount, Samantha died after absorbing a large amount of raw energy from-"
"I know how she died. I did my homework." Joshua walked down the hall with a frown. "I want to figure out what she was and how she worked. You simply don't survive being crushed by Megatron."
"Well, the Cube's energy eventually did her in." Harold recalled the countless medical records he had read about Samantha's death. "Over the course of a few weeks, both her body and memory deteriorated until she forgot everything and everyone she knew." He grunted. "And then died."
"Tragic," Joshua remarked nonchalantly.
After reaching the end of the hall, the men stormed into a gigantic room that served as a lab, pushing past numerous workers. "Where is she?" Joshua demanded.
A man with wild curly hair rushed up to him. "I'll lead you to her, sir."
The large man led them far across the room, past a little robot with crazy blue hair, past Megatron's head, until they reached a metal table with a corpse strapped onto it. A large machine was aimed at the head, and metal straps were wrapped around its neck, wrists, waist, and ankles beneath the cloth thrown over the body.
"To keep her from getting away," the man joked, but was met with silence. He stood there awkwardly.
Joshua stepped forward and rolled his eyes. "Wembley, I don't have to put up with your pathetic attempts at being humorous." He pointed at the lifeless body on the table. "If we manage to revive that thing, you wouldn't believe the trouble we could potentially be in."
Mr. Attinger gave Wembley a hard glare. "Gill, this is serious business that requires a serious attitude."
The man nodded wordlessly and stepped aside. One of the researchers handed Joshua a remote. "Mr. Joyce, we wanted to let you…" His face twisted slightly. "...do the honors."
Joshua stared at the remote in his hand. It had a single red button on it, similar to the one he used to occasionally electrocute the little Autobot he held in captivity. He gave one last glance to the people around him.
"If I'm correct-" He paused and grinned. "-which I always am, a second dose of this energy should wake her right back up again. The residual energy did appear to heal her after her death, after all."
He contained his excitement and, after counting to three in his head, he pressed down on the button. A beam of electric blue electricity shot out of the machine and into the body's head. It ran through it from head to toe, but the energy seemed to have no effect on the corpse.
Joshua cleared his throat after a minute of silence. "Perhaps she needs a stronger dose." He pressed the button a couple more times, each time holding it down for five seconds, and waited. Everyone waited. There was no indication that the body, perfectly preserved for years, would be waking up anytime soon.
"What's going on?" Joshua incessantly pressed the button. "I thought this would work!"
Gill Wembley spoke up somewhat timidly. "Well, I have reason to believe it doesn't work because the energy is coming from all the Decepticon remains you've collected. This is the energy that killed her. Why would it revive her? Sure, her body healed after death," he rambled nervously, "but there was reason to believe that-"
"Are you insinuating that there is a flaw in my hypothesis... Wembley?"
Joshua turned to face him ever so slowly. "By my definition, you are insinuating that my idea was a complete failure. You do remember that definition, don't you?"
Wembley lowered his eyes. "Yes, sir."
Joshua regarded the man indignantly. "You know what, Wembley? You're really starting to get on my-"
"Uri-! Uri-! Uri-!"
Joshua whirled around to stare at the lifeless Samantha, where the voice was coming from despite her lack of movement. "What-?!" He looked around frantically. "What happened? What did I say? What'd I say?"
Wembley cleared his throat. "It's repeating 'Uri' over and over again.."
"So?!"
"Well, 'Uri' sounds a lot like what you said. 'You're really' without the 'ly' part."
"Voice activation," Joshua concluded quietly. He was gripping the remote tightly, though his finger was off the button. The voice coming from Samantha kept repeating "Uri" nonstop. He nervously glanced at Attinger, who gestured to the remote. Taking a deep breath, Joshua let his thumb press the button down one more time.
The blue electricity zapped the teenage girl and her eyes flew open. She immediately squeezed them shut in pain. She squirmed, but the machine kept feeding the blue energy into her system.
Color was returning to her body, a warm tan tinting her previously pale skin. Her dull hair began to shine brighter. The teen screamed, clearly in immense pain, but Joshua didn't let the button go.
"Mr. Joyce, you must release the button!" someone pleaded.
It was as if Samantha had suddenly discovered how to speak. "Stop! Or I'll-! I wil-! You hav-! Three sec-! 'fore I-!" The constant jolts of electricity continued to cut her off. Three seconds later, Joshua dropped the remote. He instantly bent down to retrieve it, but he didn't press the button.
"My God…" Attinger muttered. He peered at the revived alien suspiciously. Samantha, with heaving breaths, no longer spoke. At least, not in English.
"I will make you regret that," she uttered threateningly. She gasped, recognizing her foreign language. "I told you to stop! Now look at what you've done!"
Joshua somewhat regained his composure. "What the hell is she saying?" he hissed at nobody in particular. "Though it does sound quite lovely," he added randomly. He tended to be like that under pressure. Several people were either monitoring the recording of the room, or trying to identify the language Samantha spoke.
"The language cannot be identified, sir!" a voice replied.
He grew wary as Samantha buckled against her restraints. It appeared she couldn't escape, and her neck ground against the collar holding her in place as she turned to glare at Joshua. Her eyes looked different than the way they had before. They were no longer amber brown, and instead took on a redder hue, becoming cherry red.
"You think she's mad at me?" Joyce asked the ex-CIA agent. He received no response.
Months later
"So, Sam, why don't we try this again?" Harold Attinger eyed Samantha with a scowl.
His prisoner sat inside the back of a black SUV, which was parked by an unused harbor. She had been sitting there for less than ten minutes, but she was already shifting restlessly. "Tell me what you are, where you came from, and why you're here. Or that 'buddy' of yours, dies."
Samantha looked at the screens she sat next to. An Autobot (what Harold had told her it was) was under fire. The Autobot had been driving away from the helicopters, trying to dodge the missiles being fired at him. One missile struck him, and he resorted to running on his own two legs.
She felt a twinge of remorse, and a load of pity, but she wouldn't let it show. "I already told you. I don't know who that is." She took a few deep breaths, her lungs struggling to hold much air. She thought back to how the Autobot had been brought out of hiding. A missile had been launched at the boat he was hiding on.
"You know, a bunch o' your guys were on that boat when that missile was fired," she mumbled quickly. "How'd you know it would hit the Autobot but not them? Or the helicopter in the air!?"
Her hands reached up to scratch her cheek, but they came dangerously close to the metal collar she wore, used to electrocute her. And once her hand got close, Harold sent a jolt down her spine.
"Stop trying to change the subject." Harold frowned at her, clearly anything but pleased with her distracted thoughts. "We both know you and the Witwicky kid were both deeply involved in-"
"I don't know who that is, either!" the teen gasped, out of breath. She glanced sideways in annoyance. "Look. You can't guilt trip me by threatening to kill people I don't know."
"You don't know him? Really?" The second phrase wasn't a question. "Because, according to Samuel, he and you were just the best of friends," he spat, as if the word 'friends' had a foul taste. "Like brother and sister, how...nice." His eye twitched. "And in case you forgot, as you seem to do everything, that thing isn't a person."
Samantha defiantly turned her thin nose away, not wanting to look at Harold or the Autobot. Harold leaned far in and grabbed a fistful of Samantha's dulling hair. He yanked her forward, forcing a choked gasp to leave her, and shoved her graying face in front of the screen.
"Look at him." Samantha tried to pull away, but he only pushed her nearer to the screen with more force. "Look at him and tell me you don't know him." He was growling into her ear. She wrinkled her nose. The way her head was held, pulled backward, made it harder to breathe.
The Autobot had lost a leg at some point. He hopped around for a couple seconds before crashing down. "Hold fire!" He rolled over, keeping an eye on his assailants. "Can you not see? I've been injured."
"Box him in. Box him in."
Holding a large metal hand to his chest, he groaned before identifying himself. "Medical Officer Ratchet! I'm a friend!" he asserted, supporting himself on his left arm.
"It doesn't matter," Samantha whispered, feeling her face grow warm. Her eyes began to sting, and she suddenly had trouble swallowing. She knew what would eventually happen to Ratchet. Having Harold constantly brag about it to her, the brutality of the Cemetery Wind team was no mystery.
"I'm an Autobot!"
Samantha couldn't help cringing. Those words. Those three words seemed to always be one of the last utterances of any Autobot the Cemetery Wind team had killed so far. As far as she knew, there were very few left. She only knew of one confirmed survivor, and that was the Autobot leader.
She didn't want to watch, but she couldn't pull back. A salty taste invaded her mouth. Bile.
"I thought you didn't know him." Samantha couldn't even turn to glare at the man holding her. "You know, I was honestly beginning to believe the 'amnesia' bullshit from ten years ago, but I guess you've regained your memory."
Samantha closed her eyes. Ratchet wore a sort of pleading and innocent look on his metal face, and his large green hand was pressed to his chest. "Optimus sent this distress message," he rumbled out tiredly. A beep rang through the cold night air, and a deep voice followed.
"Calling all Autobots. We are under targeted attack! Cease all contact with humans!"
Ratchet had bent over, but he lifted his head to glare at the men surrounding him. "We are all hiding," he uttered. "All Autobots are being hunted. We are all in danger."
"I lost a sister in Chicago," someone retorted. "You'll get no sympathy from me."
"I thought the Decepticons destroyed the city way before the Autobots got there," Samantha mused, though it put a strain on her throat, briefly putting her grieving on hold as she recalled the news clips she'd seen about "The Battle of Chicago". Harold let Samantha go with a scoff, though he did it by shoving her forcefully away from himself. She toppled over on her side, landing harshly on her elbow.
From seemingly out of nowhere, Harold conjured a large disc-like contraption. "Going in for the kill?" He didn't even look at the device while speaking into it.
"As long as your pathetic excuse for soldiers do not interfere," Lockdown's grating voice answered.
Harold was setting the contraption aside when Samantha gasped.
This scene had played out before her several times, but seeing other Autobots killed had never stirred any feelings within her. No feelings she couldn't hide, at least.
This time, however, she was completely unwilling to sit there and let Ratchet get killed. Not even knowing why, she leapt out of the SUV and knocked Harold aside. "No!" Her bony elbow sunk into Harold's ribs.
The remote Sam despised so much clattered to the ground as Harold lost his balance. "Shit!"
Samantha would later regret not snatching the damned thing. It wouldn't have stopped the electrocutions forever. A replacement would be built, and her torture would resume, worse than ever. As long as that collar remained coiled around her neck, the pain would never end.
But if she had taken the remote, or at least kicked it away while running, then perhaps she would have been able to effectively save Ratchet from his eventual fate. "RATCHET!" she managed to cry out, already out of breath. She felt like she'd been forced to sprint a marathon; she was ready to puke.
The medic's blue optics turned in the general direction of her skeletal, starved body. She hadn't been fed ever since waking up, and though she definitely couldn't die from starvation, her body didn't have the right nutrients, or any for that matter, to maintain a healthy appearance. Still, there was recognition in his voice. "Sa-?"
Lockdown's missile struck his shoulder.
"NOOO!" Samantha's voice immediately grew hoarser from her sudden screeching.
"What's wrong with you humans?" Ratchet cried, glancing around in search of Samantha once more, having remembered the voice. "No! Cease..!"
Samantha's eyes couldn't appear any wider than they already were. Chunks of metal jumped off of Ratchet's body. "No!" she shrieked. "Sto-!"
That was when she regretted not grabbing that remote. She regretted it as the energy, blue despite its Decepticon origin, coursed through her. Her legs locked up, and her running came to a halt as she fell face first onto the asphalt. A single buzzing drone recorded her fall. Harold must have gotten hold of the remote again.
The currant red tinge in her eyes became a full blown scarlet, and with wild eyes, she raised her head and witnessed Ratchet's death. He might have been calling out her name. Maybe not. She wasn't sure. All she could hear was that constant ringing in her ears that came with her electrocutions.
Lockdown's hulking figure came into her line of sight. Half a minute went by, then Ratchet was dead. Lockdown had wrenched something blue out of Ratchet's chest, and Samantha watched the light seep out of Ratchet's blue optics.
"Ratchet..." Sam's voice had grown weak, and she attempted to drag herself forward.
She had deducted, from previous killings, that the blue thing must have been their heart or something. Their life force. She couldn't be killed in such a manner due to her true life force not even being inside her body.
That didn't shield her from feeling pain. Twitching after one final jolt, Samantha's eyes rolled back into her head as it dropped back down.
Shivers continuously ran up and down Samantha's spine. Her teeth chattered loudly and constantly. So much so that Attinger was getting impatient. As if he was ever patient with anyone, much less Samantha; the teen he had tortured whenever he had the chance throughout the past several months.
The electrocutions had become so frequent that her eyes always looked red. There were severe burns on her skin. Her chest always hurt, and she struggled to breathe. She had learned that her heart had begun to beat irregularly. She twitched constantly, and she always felt the sensation of pins and needles in at least one part of her body.
The torture worked, though, in a way. As much as Samantha managed to veil her fear (though not her pain) while in Harold's presence, it was obvious that the now "eighteen" year old was terrified of the old man.
The instant she knew she would be handed off to the retired agent, she would desperately beg anyone but the man himself to keep him away from her.
Next, she'd be rendered silent upon visualizing the agony that awaited her. Then she'd remember how unbearable the stays with him were, and her panicky pleas would resume.
She used to kill people on her home planet all the time. Not natives, of course. Only invaders, and only when ordered to. It was easy. At least, once she had learned to remain indifferent while doing so.
But it was hard to be indifferent when she was the one being hurt. What bothered her the most, though, was the fact that she couldn't defend herself. It was utterly humiliating. Dehumanizing, she'd think, if she were one in the first place.
At that moment though, sitting beside her oppressor in a helicopter, Samantha could only dream of complaining. The pain inflicted upon her had weakened her state of body and mind. Transforming was out of the question. Any chance she ever got was always snuffed out with the press of a button.
"Stop your chattering before I stop it for you," he snapped.
Samantha's eye twitched. "It isn't my f-fault I'm f-freezing," she stuttered, her voice barely a ragged whisper. Nervous, she rubbed her arms, bare despite her earlier complaints, having only been given a tank top and shorts to replace her usual medical gown. (A personal choice on Harold's part for sure.) Her shaky fingers gently brushed over the uncountable scars and burns that covered her body.
Their intricate designs snaked along her limbs, resembling lichtenberg figures, only her scars weren't a product of lightning. "This body wasn't b-built to handle such c-c-cold temp-" She coughed raggedly. "Temperatures." She looked down at the bones she called arms.
Harold listened to her remark, about being "built", but she didn't elaborate. He raised the remote, and Samantha suppressed a flinch as her eyes caught the shine of the bright red button. "Why don't I just fry your insides. You'll be warm then."
Samantha shivered, due to both the cold and fear. "A sweater would be enough," she spat, though it didn't convey her anger very well. She reached up to touch her metal collar. "And this th-thing isn't helping, either." A zap. "Ow…"
She wished she could actually die. Not really to escape the pain, which she had grown slightly accustomed to, but because she was completely helpless and miserable.
That damned collar was choking her ridiculously thin neck as she rocked herself back and forth, the metal was freezing, she only had on a shirt and shorts, ice was clinging to her eyelashes, and she was positive she was going insane. And that wasn't even the worst of it.
She couldn't even remove the damned collar. It was held together with a powerful electromagnet, powered by a portable battery Harold lugged around on occasion. An extensive cable connected the battery to the collar, basically turning it into a freakishly long leash.
Samantha knew the old man didn't have to use the long cable. The battery could be transferred into every vehicle KSI owned by then, except the one's used for scanning. She knew Harold just used the "leash" to treat her like an animal, or some subhuman thing.
At that moment, the helicopter was struck by a gust of icy wind, and Harold was thrown to the side. He grunted as he "unintentionally" jerked Samantha along with him. She coughed as her cold metal collar was pulled even tighter against her skin. As if it wasn't difficult enough to breathe already.
The chopper steadied out, and a couple minutes, and jolts, later, the odd pair finally landed on the metal of a gigantic ship.
Lockdown's ship.
Samantha begrudgingly followed Harold out of the confines of the chopper. It hadn't stopped the cold of the Arctic from biting Samantha's skin, but it had kept most of the wind from knocking her over. They had been riding around for hours, but Sam was too cold to get bored. The girl sucked in cold air through clenched teeth. As usual, it hurt like hell.
"Why's his n-name even Lockdown?"
"Why do you care?" Harold spat back.
Samantha shrugged. "I mean, isn't that a k-k-kind of drill k-kids have to practice at sch-?" The sick yet sweet taste of blood tainted her tongue. She had bitten it rather than cry out as she received her unnecessary punishment. She never understood why she couldn't simply shut up.
At least the energy coursing through her drove the cold out momentarily. She just knew an addition had been made to all the scars "decorating" her body.
"If I get even a single cough from you in the next few minutes…" Harold growled, not even looking at Sam. "You do not want to know what I have in store for you."
Sam unwillingly shut up. She found herself thinking back to the first day of her imprisonment, when the electrocution had robbed her of her ability to speak English. She had regained it by the second day. Shuddering, she looked back up, staring at Lockdown's ship.
Almost immediately, Lockdown's... whatever they were, guards perhaps, stepped out of the ship. It obviously wasn't to greet them, however. Right behind them, Lockdown was walking out into the cold as well.
He hopped off a ledge and though he landed far from the spot in which Samantha, and the person she despised most on Earth, waited. His long strides got him close in no time.
"I warn you, Mr. Attinger of Earth…" The giant's gruff voice made Samantha remember the brutal murder of Ratchet at Lockdown's hands. "An alliance is a contract. And contracts-" He regarded Samantha with disgust for a second. "-like humans, expire." He eyed the "leash", then resettled his gaze on the ex-CIA agent. "I see you brought… them," Lockdown remarked darkly, refusing to properly acknowledge Samantha. "I wasn't aware you had reconsidered my offer."
Samantha, very conciously, did not freak out.
"I'm not here about that," Attinger snappped, removing his sunglasses, which to Samantha, seemed like an inappropriate accessory to wear in the icy hell they were in. She had previously questioned him about it, and had received pain in return.
"On this planet we have a saying." He had to tilt his head far back to squint up at Lockdown. "The enemy of my enemy is my friend."
"I also have a saying." Lockdown turned away from them, again looking disgusted. "I don't care. " Samantha couldn't let the thought of scoffing cross her mind. She was too busy trying to decipher the Transformer's behavior.
Why did he always seem revolted? Samantha was also an alien and sure, humans were different, and yes, she was revulsed by Harold, but she didn't approve of Lockdown's chauvinism. She'd put up with enough of that with her planet's previous rulers.
Harold nodded, accustomed to Lockdown's condescending behavior, unlike Samantha. "So what happened in Mexico City?" he asked, steering the conversation elsewhere. "Thought you had him."
"Three direct hits," Lockdown told him. "A mortal wound." Samantha's brows furrowed, and she squirmed, knowing they spoke of the Autobot leader; the one Harold claimed she once met. "Then your men allowed him to escape."
Lockdown pointed a large finger straight at the comparatively small human.
"You promised me human intelligence." Lockdown sounded accusative. "Or is there such a thing?" Samantha forced her blueing lips to not curl into a smirk.
Ignoring the insult, Harold looked away for a while before looking back up. "You know you've still never told me. Why do you want 'im? Who are you working for?"
Lockdown did not hesitate to reply. "Every galaxy I've traveled," he began, sounding unagitated for once, "all you species are the same." The rancorous tone returned to his voice. "You all think you're the center of the universe."
He looked off into the distance, and his next statement almost sounded pitying, though in a condescending manner. "You have no idea…" Before storming off, he gave them one final glare. Samantha refused to meet his harsh gaze, and turned her scarred face to the ground.
As soon as Lockdown was out of sight, and they were seated in the helicopter, Sam spoke up. "That's why we c-came here? Did I really ha-have to come all the w-way up here with you and freeze my ass off to d-do that?"
She spoke quickly, wanting to squeeze one last sentence in or two before getting zapped, or possibly slapped, as she sometimes was. "You c-couldn't do that over th-that phone thing o' yours? Why does he even need your help? And w-what was the 'offer' he was talkin' about?"
With a grunt, Harold's finger came down on the red button, and through the haze of her pain, Sam heard him utter a few words that effectively shut her up.
TTWI: Yay, new endnote. I edited a few things here and there, and I'm proly gonna go through the next few chapters to fix them up as well. I'm not rewriting them, though. This cannot be saved XD