33Disclaimer: I don't own Transformers, I own only my OC Sedna. Takes place after Overloaded Part 2. Beware for violence, hunting, orca behaviors, minor swearing.
Edit: I add more meters for my OC Sedna's height from eleven to fifteen meters on height.
The Encounter
A disturbance.
It was heard for many miles away. The sounds echoed through the water very far into the depths. It sounded like a large ice block had ruptured and clashed against the freezing cold water, then steps on the bottom. Walking feet. Then there were the annoying but strange noises coming from the surface. It reminded like a boat's fast spinning propeller blades but it was not the same familiar ones. No, it reminded like an engine, and then came more echoes of splashes ripping the water.
The beast sensed a threat to its territory.
Who dares to enter my territory?
It searched after the core of the noises. It must come from a near shore with shallow waters, yet deep enough for the beast to swim, though diving can get limited. Listening carefully, the beast tracked the changing echoes that became drums of thudding feet. What was wandering on the bottom?
A Landwalker?
No, Landwalkers were not suitable to walk underwater. They would never survive either the pressure or the ice-cold water. Also, they can't hold their breaths even a single heartbeat. Then voices were heard. The beast became confused over the voices. They were speaking an unknown language.
What kind of language is that?
It wondered as it continued listening. Another noise was heard; a drum. Not from a foot, but from a fist slamming against metal. A mixture of curiosity and threat clouded the beast's interest. It wondered more as it swam in a gently pace when it entered shallow waters. Whatever and whoever the strangers were, it told itself that they were a threat, which the beast didn't tolerate. Unlike the animals, like polar bears, seals, belugas, narwhals and bowhead whales and the Older Landwalker People, strangers were not welcome.
The beast felt its rage awakening from within. Who dared to enter its territory without its permission? It must hunt the strangers and show them who the true queen of the Arctic was!
It paced up faster to catch up, yet the beast remained slow as possible to avoid spoiling its presence. It avoided using its long-distance vocals and echolocation by knowledge that animals living underwater can easily hear the incoming predator and flee within a second. So, the beast relied on its hearing. It swam up to the surface for a blow. Once up, the blowhole exhaled a geyser of steam that gusted after the wind, then the beast vanished under the ice.
Where are the invaders going?
As the waters got shallower, the beast slowed down, then sunk to the bottom and lay still, waiting patiently for the moment to strike with the element of surprise. It heard the drums of feet wandering peacefully, unaware of the beast's presence. The voices with the unfamiliar language triggered the curiosity again whereas it listened on how the drums neared closer and closer to shallower waters, approaching a beach nearby.
Carefully, the beast moved the tail up and pushed forward, again in a gently pace while listening on the sounds when a sudden boom caught it by surprise. It jerked, then it sensed how the water created waves as the drift ice floes trembled as if something had jumped on one and balanced it before jumping over to another one. The beast swung around so its right eye viewed up to the surface where the ice floes made narrow and expended channels, yet some rays of light beamed into the dark and clear sea water.
There!
The beast heard movements three kilometers ahead. It had moved its eyes to see as far as it can when it spotted ice flats swayed and rocked, creating rings and spread them between them. Then it suddenly saw a fast flying object, too fast for it to capture with its eye, but it gave a sharp whirring and buzzing uproar that turned irritating and distracting.
Nonetheless it fixed its focus back on the moving ice packs that told much enough for the beast to take action. It raised its tail upwards, then slammed it down so it pushed forward, swimming in a wave pattern as its stream-lined body accelerated an outstanding speed, heading towards the nearest ice pack where a white figure stood on it.
It was now that it unleashed its sharp call.
Piiiieeeeaaauumm!
None of the Autobots were prepared for the sharp sound that came out of nowhere.
When they reached to the closest beach, Polarclaw suddenly woke up without warning despite after a long time's shutdown by the severe freezing cold temperature. The polar bear Decepticon maneuvered Optimus and managed to flee to the nearest ice floe. However, he didn't transform directly back to his vehicle form. It was like the shutdown had caused his T-cog to be deactivated for a long period of time until it would get hot enough to activate again.
As the three mechs chased after Polarclaw over the drifting ice, they formed a V-shape position with Optimus as the point with Sideswipe and Drift in front of him, the prankster on left and the samurai on right. Jumping and balancing between the ice flats, they ran as fast as they can while the Decepticon ran rather more like a bear than a Cybertronian.
Then Polarclaw stopped on a large flat of ice that rocked unbalanced, stretching up on his hind legs and was about to unleash his sonic roar when the sharp high-pitching sound came.
Instantly, Optimus heard Sideswipe shouting but no words came when Polarclaw managed to turn his head over his shoulder and the entire ice got knocked up in the air, splitting into smaller parts. The attacker leaped entirely over the water and it spun in a spin. Its jaws gaped widely and compressed the stunned Decepticon so his armor cracked and crushed. A massive explosion erupted as the beast vanished into the dark water, sending big waves in rings. Everyone, including Optimus, dropped their jaws in shock whereas they held on their own ice packs, Optimus laying on it because he was closest and the waves almost rolled him over, washing over him.
Just then, Windblade flew over them in a fast circle, gliding down closer towards them, surprisingly not shooting any blasts before she landed on a drifting ice floe next to Drift.
"Optimus, are you alright?" she called loudly, her optics in horror.
"I'm all right," he replied, nodding. Then he questioned the others with a shout: "Anyone hurt?"
"I'm fine," Sideswipe replied as loudly as possible, "except that thing freaks me up."
"Whatever it is, it's not done yet," Drift yelled, checking on all corners with a serious and wary gaze with one sword ready on his servos.
Focused, Optimus tried to locate after the thing that took Polarclaw when he suddenly heard a kooosh sound that forced him to look to the left along with the others. It was quick but he achieved a view of the beast. His optics registered a dorsal fin and steams breezing in the air. He could not get any details on the dorsal fin unfortunately because it dived down too fast.
Then, one klik later, far the distance, the monster appeared again. It leaped up out the water and tossed the Decepticon as far as he flew above the ice, and when the beast smashed against the water, another massive explosion of splashing water blasted like a geyser. The waves got big and spread everywhere, rocking the ice blocks high and low.
"What is that thing?!" Sideswipe screamed, terrified while struggling to balance when the waves hit the packs of ice, wobbling like a cradle.
Just then, they heard how Polarclaw screamed in desperation, splashing in pure fear when a tail slapped him up with such a brute force that he flew outstandingly thirty meters up in the air. Witnessing the brutal force shocked the Away Team even more, watching how Polarclaw crashed again on the freezing cold water, screaming his air tanks out, and then how his screams suddenly died into nothing when the beast charged and took him down once again. Fully focused, Drift shot his gaze over the shoulder to Optimus, seemingly seeking for strategies. Optimus' spark pondered like crazy.
"Optimus, we must consider a strategy and fast," Drift's voice cut in, though Optimus did not hear him straightaway. "That thing will attack at us at any moment now!"
What in the world is that for a creature? I've never seen anything like it before, he wondered in amazement. But before Optimus could think more, his gaze captured a glowing red light deep in the clear darkness underneath them and the white belly shone like silver. It had no longer the Decepticon on its jaws. They presumed he was crushed and good as terminated.
Piiieeaaaa…
A whistling sound was heard.
Piiiiaaaaa…
Another whistling sound came.
Piiieeeaaaaauum…
A third sound followed.
Optimus and the Autobots got puzzled in enchantment hearing the calls. None of them spoke a word or moved a muscle cable while they held their gazes at the shadow that lurked between them. It was then the Prime saw the black and white pattern on the body. He recognized it immediately. He had seen it before.
However, beforehand he could think or send an order to his comrades, the enormous shadow suddenly charged right at him with an alarming speed that neither he nor the others could calculate even a split nano-klik when the ice below him got knocked up by the rostrum of the sea monster's head and Optimus flew high, hearing his comrades screaming his name before he splashed onto the water, swallowed whole.
Optimus sank down to the bottom with his back landing first. Quickly he got up on his pedes, shaking his helmet with a groan. The freezing coldness crewed through his frame like razor sharp teeth. His systems alerted intensely when he heard the attacker swimming around him. Then he saw the attacker that caused him to stare with widely large optics.
It was an outstanding beast he had neither seen nor imagined before.
It had the unmistakably features of a killer whale; the blunt-nosed head, the largely oval-shaped eye patches, the large and falcate triangle-shaped dorsal fin with a round top, the medium-sized lightly gray and closed saddle patch behind it and the long tail with the flat, broad flukes that had two notches on either side and the white pattern on its belly. What appeared to be black on the upper body pattern was actually very dark blue easily mistaken for black.
But it was not just an ordinary killer whale what Optimus discovered.
The beast had legs.
The front legs had five-toed paws while the hind legs had only four-toed paws, and the front legs had rounded extended flippers behind them, stretching up from the wrist to the elbow. The right flipper had a notch. The head had a half ring of icicle horns sticking behind the head, sharp and clear. One icicle horn had two golden rings on the right side of the head.
But the most striking detail he detected was the red glowing tattoos on its face. A large V-shape spread from the horns down to the tip of the rostrum, four tattoos appearing like shark fens on the sides of the face; a couple smaller and closely behind the eyes and the other couple large ones on the underjaw on either side with three dots within them, and finally the six lines on the chin.
Piieeeaaaaaauumm…
A long whistling sound echoed from it whereas it swam in a circle, observing the huge and Arctic camouflaged Prime with caution… and curiosity?
Optimus held his optics on it. "What are you?" he asked.
There was no reply. Suddenly he noticed something else on it. A closer look made him to realize that the beast was not an organic Earth creature. It told him only one thing.
A four-legged killer whale Cybertronian, he thought, seeking after an insignia that will tell about itself. Was it an Autobot or a Decepticon? To his horror, he found none. Then it hit him. No, it can't be possible… is that a Predacon?
Piiieaaaauum?
Somehow, as if it read his processor, the killer whale Predacon inclined its head on one side, then moving to the other side. Yet, it stayed on a safe distance from him. Optimus detected directly that it was wary. It stood on its paws. He observed it carefully and precisely for details. The claws were white and razor-sharp, and the front paws appeared surprisingly more hand-like paws with white webbed skin between the toes.
He estimated the Predacon was twenty meters long and nine meters tall. Its enormous chest was muscularly broad and the shoulders massive in muscle, the neck powerful and thick. However, what puzzled him most was that the four-legged killer whale's stream-shaped body appeared like a bear-like wolf appearance.
Wait a nano-klik, an orca-mixed-up-bear-like-wolf Predacon? What the scrap? There was no Earth creature like that.
"What are you?" he repeated the question.
Still no response.
Then splashes came without warning that triggered the Predacon to move its head to the direction where the splashes occurred. Optimus saw immediately that it was Sideswipe and Drift whom had jumped down and landed on the bottom. As it happened, it unleashed a deafening call in high frequency and revealed the yellowish razor-sharp teeth, then it leaped forward with the front legs pressed underneath between the neck and the chest like a human using the chicken gesture.
It happened so fast that neither Drift nor Sideswipe could avoid before it was already upon them, spinning quickly so the forces around it caused the mechs to get flown away. Thanks to the cold crewing through them, neither Drift nor Sideswipe could make quick and swift actions. Without warning, the Predacon swung swiftly and elegantly and it headed towards them again, now swimming much faster. But this time it left the samurai and the prankster. Unpredictably, it charged right at the Prime.
Piieeaaaaaaauuum!
The rostrum hit right at Optimus' waist so brutally that he nearly flew backward. Then the beast nudged him to swing and the teeth dug through the abdominal and spinal areas. Optimus roared in agony whereas the Predacon made a sharp angle, bubbles escaping from its blowhole. It was swimming out from the shore's shallow waters. It meant only one thing. It was heading to deeper waters!
Just then, plasma beams shot through the surface that caused the four-legged killer whale beast to pull more power on the tail, accelerating faster and faster. Optimus could not see much despite his gaze was straight up but he did certainly hear the whirring blades from Windblade's wing turbo engines even if it was barely hearable. Suddenly the beast drove up to the surface and he heard how it exhaled a huge blow. Even Optimus got a chance to touch the cold air a few nano-seconds before they dived down.
More plasma beams fired, yet Windblade missed every single shot on the Predacon who dodged like it wanted not to get harmed whereas it zig-zagged and held closest on the bottom, starting to spin insanely. Constantly spinning gave Optimus a painful processor ache, making him badly dizzy and it did knock him up into unconsciousness. Strangely to say, the beast seemed attempting a drown attempt at him but did not know that a Cybertronian cannot be drowned. But then the spinning stopped.
Despite the intensive dizziness and the agonizing processor ache that would be described like your brain had bounced on back and forth, left and right, hammering without mercy, Optimus' optics got online. Once woken up, it was then the beast surprised him the most unexpected thing.
It let him go.
The teeth gave a nasty rasping and groaning sound when it separated from his frame. Optimus thought it had spared him from complete termination. But he was very wrong. Just then, he was pushed up to the surface, nearly floating gracefully when the tail suddenly slammed against his spinal strut. What a brutal force it really was. It was just like you got hit by a truck from the front, a cargo train from side and another truck from behind with its trailer angling on a dangerous angle that slammed against the opposite side.
Flying far in the air, Optimus had no idea how high the altitude he really was. His spark pondered intensively while he felt the turbulences twisting behind his spinal stunts, shoulders and legs. His gaze stared on the sea underneath him; large packs of drifting ice, further ahead less ice and more open waters, yet there were large icy covered areas. After all, summer was coming soon and that meant the midnight sun period was not far away.
The moment lasted only less than two kliks before he finally hit against the water again. The collusion was so powerful that it felt like he got hit by a massive train in front of him, and then he sunk without a movement. Still, his spark was still pulsing within him. By then, he was very far away from the shore line. He was out on unknown waters, far, far away from his comrades.
The broad-shouldered giant Landwalker was sinking before the Predacon. It clicked out its echolocation to see any life signs. Much to its disappointment, the spinal column was still intact and the pulsing spark still alive despite the Landwalker was completely knocked down. The Landwalker's body had bad punching wounds which tore through its armor. But then, as it happened, it felt suddenly a couple of similar feelings. It had encountered those feelings many times before.
Regret and empathy.
The Predacon's processor showed the image of him standing before it, speaking the unknown language that came from his mouth. It figured the language must be similar of the small Landwalkers whom known it for hundred thousand of generations. However, it was not the same one it recognized.
His voice was deep.
It sensed a depth of wisdom from him. Also, he was not directly an ordinary Landwalker either. His body was hard as metal, his blue eyes glowing and his tall height made the Predacon seeing him something else that it had not encountered before. A stranger who was a Landwalker that did not belong to the world. An alien from outer space. The Predacon became very curious about him as it created questions inside its processor.
Who was he?
Where did he come from?
How did he and his fellows get here?
Were they hunting the polar bear creature?
And what was he for a kind of species?
Wise Voice.
Yes, the Predacon gave him a name. Slowly, the Predacon shifted itself to its robot form and approached Wise Voice who had already landed on the deeper bottom. It turned to his right side, stretching its arms with the paw-like servos and the extended flippers on the outward sides of Wise Voice's arms.
With a careful gentleness, its servos slid under the Landwalker's metallic shoulders and grabbed the arm pits and then the Predacon pulled Wise Voice up, swimming toward the surface. The Predacon's tail used as much strength it still had despite the aching pains across the Predacon's body after the fast swimming. Once up on the surface, it had Wise Voice over the broadly chest while it swam on its back, pacing to the nearest beach.
It might have taken thirty sparkbeats or less when they had finally reached a beach. The Predacon rose up on its digitigrade legs and dragged unconscious Wise Voice, then laying him down on his back on the rocky sand, still bitten by frost. Unexpectedly something happened with the Predacon. Instead leaving him there, it squatted down with help by its tail to stabilize it and hold it still. It inclined the head on one side.
What are you?
Then it's head inclined on the opposite side.
Who are you?
Piieaaa.
It was the first thing that activated Optimus' consciousness. Then came the system alerts of the severe drop of his inner temperature; he was very close to severe system damages now, realizing he must hurry back to the base again as quickly as possible. As slowly as he opened his optics, the first thing he saw was the red glowing face plates over him from left side. Instinctually, he reacted but suddenly felt the sharp burning pains all over his body, worst parts covering on the abdominal and back areas. He groaned in pain.
However, as strange as it was, he did not shout or punched the Predacon. Instead... he simply stared at it.
No. Her.
The killer whale Predacon was a femme. Her facial features revealed an astonishing beauty. Her round gray face, the light blue lips with a filled under-lip plate, wide cheek bones and the same tattoos she had on beast form. Her entire head was covered with same icicle horns and the two golden rings on the same icicle sticking out behind the underjaw's edge. It gave her the appearance of an ice queen.
Studying with a keen optic for details, Optimus watched her darkly blue and white bulky body. She was broadly chested-and-shouldered, her hips round and wide, her digitigrade legs muscular and extensive ones and her arms with the flippers the exactly same as they were on her beast form. The tail was behind her, holding her steadily. Like on her beast form, she had her white orca pattern on her belly. Even if he did not get a view behind her back, he assumed she had her dorsal fin and the saddle patch there.
But what captured his focus on most was her optics. Unlike the rest he had seen, her optics were dark blue with a lightly blue ring on each one and they had cat-like pupils on the middle within the rings and white spots reflecting the right side of the optic rings. The black optic ridges were arched. Her gaze revealed curiosity, suspicion and guardedness. But there was something else he saw deeper within the optics.
Empathy.
Another groan escaped from him. The pain had spread across his entire frame, radiating through his arms and legs. As it happened, Optimus felt the femme's left paw-like servo pressing on one punching wound. He was not bleeding fortunately to say. But it was a reaction she did. Somehow, she had dragged him up from the depth instead leaving him there and slowly shutting down by the freezing cold and salty water. Why did she do that? Cautiously but curiously, the orca femme neared her helmet closer and closer toward his own, moving her helmet from one side to the other. Her right servo was pressed at his left shoulder. Optimus then saw how the narrow cat-like pupils widened into oval-shaped ones.
Piieeaaa?
A sound came from her. It did not come directly from the mouth though. No, it came from the forehead.
She has a melon, Optimus thought suddenly. He knew whales, dolphins and porpoises had melons inside their heads to send echolocation signals and when an object was hit by it, the signals bounced back through the underjaw into the ears and finally into the brain, showing the images of the objects ahead of them. But what kind of cries are you making?
Growing fascinated over the sound the femme made, Optimus studied her features closely while he arched his optic ridges slightly, which the femme frowned seeing his expression. Then she removed her left paw-hand from the wound, reaching it dangerously to his face plates. Optimus tensed up in an instant, his optics shifting back and forth between her optics and the white claws.
Nevertheless, as Optimus prepared himself for the worst, he received the gentlest touch he had ever felt. A paw digit touched on his chin. Then the femme placed the index, the middle and the ring digits at his under-lip plate and the claws scraped slightly on his sensitive metal feature parts. Three straight lines from the lips to the chin was the thing he received from her. Just like her six lined tattoos on her chin.
Quickly as she removed her servo from his face, Optimus grasped her servo with his right hand, squeezing an iron tight grip on the wrist. It caused her to open her mouth for the first time and barred the yellow carnivore teeth, but then she closed it whereas casting her gaze on his dark gray hand. Instead fighting herself free, she twisted her servo to touch slightly his wrist, which made Optimus losing the grip and their servos met. The femme's paw-like servo was bigger than his. The look of her hand with the white webbed skin between the fingers reminded like a prehistoric amphibian fin with bones within. Optimus fixed his optics on her once again after a short moment staring on her servo.
"What is your name?" he asked.
Almost instantly the femme became confused.
Piieeaaa?
"Do you have a name?"
Piieeaaa?
"Do you even understand what I'm saying?"
Piieeaaauuum, the femme whistled more confused.
She cannot understand what I'm saying, Optimus thought with a questionable frown. Wait, if she can't understand me… is that possible that she hasn't seen a Cybertronian before?
That thought shocked him. If this femme had never seen a Cybertronian before, that meant she had never spoken Cybertronian language either. How was that possible?
As if she read his processor, she made another cry, a different one this time: Eeeiiiiin.
What is she trying to tell me, Optimus thought further, wondering, and why those sounds?
Eeeeiiinn.
"What are you saying?" the Prime wondered, more confused than puzzled.
Eeeeiiinn.
"You do understand that I don't understand you."
Eeeeiiiuuuuum.
An optic ridge rose up on Optimus who did not speak another question.
Piieeeaaauuum… Eeeeiiinn... Eeeeiiiuuuum…
Captivation overcame the confusion when Optimus and the orca femme suddenly got interrupted by a fast approaching plane. It was Windblade. Swiftly, she shifted into her robot form with grace, skydiving straight at the Predacon femme. In response of the Autobot flyer, the Predacon cried a highly pitching cry, barring her teeth and her cat-like pupils narrowed sharply again.
"You leave Optimus alone!" Windblade yelled as soon she landed on the beach, but before she could take any action, the Predacon femme had already leapt over Optimus and galloped straight at her.
Apparently, the femme could not run on two legs; she proved to have adapted to run like a bear. Despite the bulky and huge frame, she turned out to be quick, though not agile directly. But it did stun Windblade much that she did not calculate in time beforehand the killer whale Predacon had swung her left paw and slammed her at the side of her chest plates.
Then she grabbed Windblade's upper arms brutal enough to cause the arms to crack and crush, making the flyer screaming in pain, feeling the pressure breaking through the fragile layer and went through her sealed protoform. She could have never imagined the Predacon's height. She was amazingly fifteen meters tall, high above Optimus himself!
Face to face, Windblade's red tattooed face plates paled when she met the furious optics and the red tattoos that beamed brighter than before. Then she thought she heard the Predacon femme inhaling a deep breath before the femme released the most deafening roar with the highest frequency ever heard before. It got her audio receptors deaf instantaneously. Well, fortunately for her, it will be a temporary before she will hear clear eventually.
Then the Predacon femme threw her aside, completely ignoring the flyer and turned her focus to Optimus and galloped back to him. She met a gaze in horror.
Wise Voice, why are you scared?
As soon the femme met his terrified optics, realization hit her.
He does not trust me.
Without whistling a cry, she rose up, only to feel his servo gripping her own that startled her up. She glared down at him.
"What is your name?" his frightened voice had shifted to concern.
What are you singing, Wise Voice? I cannot understand you.
Her optics had read the lip movements and her highly sensitive audio receptors had listened on the tone of his voice, still she had not a single clue what he was singing.
Landwalkers. I never understand them.
The darkly blue and white femme tossed herself free from Wise Voice's servo and walked nine steps from him. Yet unexpectedly, she turned her head over her shoulder to throw a final look on Wise Voice.
"Tell me your name, Predacon!" he called after her.
No. You can't understand me. Neither can I understand your mouth-language.
She jumped up to make a back-flip and transformed back to her four-legged killer whale beast form, then the last thing she did was galloping straight to the ocean, never looking back.
It took its time until the entire Away Team was finally united, gathered on same spot. As soon they were gathered, Optimus received a message from Fixit who reported them that the Ground-Bridge was finally fixed up, which was blissful news for Away Team. After what they had witnessed, they were ready to get home and warm up as possible as they can get the chance. Later, when the green portal brightened up, Drift, Sideswipe and Windblade helped together to support Optimus since his injuries agonized him and prevented him from walking.
Before walking through the portal, the Prime threw a final glance behind his shoulders to see the ocean. He saw nothing. Then they traveled through the portal, very slowly and carefully. Once on the other side, Optimus collapsed on the ground. Fortunately, Grimlock, Strongarm and Bumblebee hurried by his side and supported him up back on his pedes.
"Optimus, what have happened to you?" Bumblebee was first to ask, extremely concerned. "And where is the Decepticon?"
"Bumblebee… we have encountered a killer whale Predacon over there," was the Prime's only words, shrugging heavily in defeat.
"K-K-K-Killer whale?!" the entire team bellowed in complete fear, staring with widely large optics and jaws dropped.
If you find mistakes, please tell me and I'll edit it directly - take note I'm non-English speaker. I'm open for everything; suggestions, advices and constitutive criticism