The Veiled Threat

by Alan Dean Foster

  Relief and confidence were evident among the conference participants as they exited the room. They felt reasonably sure that they had explored all obvious possibilities. Whether or not the theory of reviving Megatron had any merit, they simply could not allow it to be tested.

  Having been built to accommodate large corporate aircraft, the hangar in the southern mountains admitted the sleek jet with ample room to spare. As its engines cooled, it taxied to a halt in the center of the building. Anyone familiar with landing procedures for advanced jet aircraft might have remarked on the complete absence of waiting mechanics, the nonpresence of a refueling tanker, the exceptional smoothness of the fighter’s metal skin, which appeared to have been melted rather than riveted together, and the ease with which the newly arrived craft pivoted inside the hangar so that it was now facing the exit.

  The fact that there was no pilot was also notable.

  Several minutes passed in deepening silence. Then a small door opened in one side of the hangar and a man in his middle fifties appeared. He was alone, casually but elegantly dressed, white-haired, and with enough of a bulge in the vicinity of his stomach to mark him as an epicure rather than a glutton. His eyes were deep blue and hard, and missed nothing. His fingernails were as neatly manicured as a model’s, and his shoes cost more than most of his fellow Italian citizens made in a year. In defiance of doctors and reason, he was smoking a cigarette that had been laced with several drops of liquid narcotic. This improved his mood without affecting his perception.

  His name was Bruno Carerra, and while much of his wealth was inherited, he had acquired his personal obnoxiousness all by himself.

  Taking his own good time he strolled completely around the parked aircraft before returning to the spot where he had started.

  “Well, you are as striking in person as the secret reports insisted.”

  The fighter jet responded with a clash of virtually frictionless internal mechanisms. Twisting and turning like a ball of expanding aluminum foil, it contorted upward and outward until it had changed itself into a looming, menacing, bipedal shape.

  “In order for flattery to have an effect, it must first originate from a source whose opinion is respected,” the hulking figure growled.

  “Ciao to you, too, Starscream.” Carerra had not retreated, did not flinch. Instead he took a languorous puff on his artfully doped cigarette.

  The Decepticon leader leaned closer. “You are not afraid?”

  The industrialist shrugged. “What is the worst you can do? Kill me?”

  “Humans die sooner than most. You are a conspicuously short-lived species.”

  “All the more reason then,” Carerra replied, eyes glittering, “to make the most of what time is available to us.”

  This response appeared to satisfy Starscream—at least for the moment. “You have shown exceptional persistence and skill in managing to make contact with me. I was informed that you have offered to be of assistance in the task of cleansing this world of Autobots.”

  Carerra’s head bobbed in a slight nod. “That is correct.”

  “You realize,” rumbled Starscream, “that doing so would leave myself and my fellow Decepticons in full control of your planet.”

  Carerra let his gaze drift to the view outside the hangar. No casual hikers would find their way to this place. No lost travelers would be allowed to pass beyond the heavily guarded outer perimeter. Any who somehow did manage to find their way in would find it far more difficult to find their way out again.

  “Someone has to control it. The present governments do not seem to be doing any better than their predecessors. Perhaps it is time to”—he smiled—“bring in outside consultants.”

  Starscream stood back. “You would submit willingly to Decepticon rule?”

  “Why not? Much of our civilization is currently directed and controlled by machines, and they’re not even intelligent.”

  “You might not care for the kind of rule we would impose.”

  Carerra’s expression tightened, and he restrained himself with an effort. “I don’t care for the rule the current governments impose. Most importantly, they don’t include me.”

  “Ah. You do seek something for yourself. That kind of motivation I can understand.”

  Carerra reluctantly flicked the stub of his cigarette aside. “Then despite our differences in origin and physical makeup, we have something in common.”

  Starscream pointedly ignored the industrialist’s attempt to establish a bond. “You say that you can help us to eliminate the Autobots.” The massive metal shape leaned forward again. “How? What possible assistance could you offer?”

  As Carerra spoke he contemplated the forest that flanked the runway outside the hangar. It was a beautiful time of year in southern Italy.

  “I have been studying you and your opponents ever since the first reports of your presence on our world reached me via my covert—and very expensive—contacts. This Optimus Prime individual is very powerful, but I believe that I have discovered his one weakness.”

  “Really?” Starscream did not try to keep the sarcasm from his voice. “And what might that be?”

  The industrialist turned back to his alien visitor. “He is handicapped by an excess of morality. If he can prevent it, he will not allow humans to be killed by Decepticons, even if his intercession presents a risk to himself and his own colleagues. I propose to have you lure him to a city I know well. Know not just from border to border but, more importantly, from top to bottom. There is a place there I have unique access to because of a current municipal development in which several of my companies are participating. I have already set in motion a means and a method I believe is capable of trapping him, at least for a short time. With you and your own underlings positioned appropriately, that should be long enough to enable you to destroy him.” He waved a hand grandiosely.

  “With their leader eliminated, I would not think it would take long for you to deal with his disheartened followers.”

  Starscream was silent, but not for long. “You seem very sure of yourself, human.”

  “Please, call me Bruno. If I wasn’t sure of myself would I risk standing here talking to you all by myself?”

  “Humans are not known for good judgment of their actions. Yet I must admit I find your proposal intriguing. I would learn more.” The Decepticon leader’s voice darkened. “If you are wasting my time, you will join the other stains on this floor.”

  “I apologize for its appearance. It really needs a good scouring. Oil stains and all that, you know.” Carerra was as unfazed as ever.

  “Assuming I approve of your proposal and choose to participate, what reward would you seek?” Starscream was watching the human closely.

  “Nothing much.” Clearly Carerra had already thought everything through. “As masters of Earth, you’ll need satraps to administer the different parts of your new domain. I’d like Europe. It’s been overdue for an emperor ever since Napoleon.”

  Starscream could not help but find the human’s presumption amusing. “You think very highly of yourself.”

  “Could I stand here making this offer if I did not?”

  It took less than an hour for the Decepticon leader and the human industrialist to finalize Carerra’s plan. When all had been agreed upon there was no shaking of hands, no farewell. Everything had been decided: time, date, modus operandi. The meeting concluded, Starscream shifted back into his Raptor shape, fired up his engines, and blasted down the private runway to soar out of sight into the blue sky of southern Italy.

  Flying higher than most human aircraft, but not so high as to draw attention to himself, Starscream pondered the details of what had just been decided. The human’s proposal was certainly clever. Perhaps even clever enough to fool the Autobots. Now final preparations needed to be made. If it worked it would mean the end of Optimus and subsequently that of all Autobots on this world. Then it would be the Decepticons’ to exploit at their leisure while they concentrated on the
process of regaining full control of Cybertron. He growled with satisfaction.

  Autobots were not the only ones capable of making use of human allies.

  Starscream banked sharply toward the Adriatic. Megatron had referred to the local dominant species as insects. Based on the discussion he had just concluded with a powerful human who had proven himself willing to sell out his own species, he decided that such a comparison would be unfair to the tiny arthropods in question.

  Simmons could not move everything at once. Not only the partial skull of the small Decepticon, but his entire setup with its monitors, tools, research materials, computer, and more took time to shift from the basement of his apartment. He did it a little bit at a time, unobtrusively moving a box or two after hours or on one of his days off. Almost as much time and effort again were required to unpack and laboriously reconstruct his research in its new location.

  But when the last wire had been reconnected and the final switch thrown, he was convinced he had found an environment for his investigations that would draw no attention from the outside world. In its current location even the occasional electrical surge or outage could be attributed to other causes, for which he had already prepared a number of ready excuses.

  It was a slow Saturday when he found himself sitting in front of one of the monitors and decided to ask a question that had been lingering in the back of his mind for nearly a year.

  “This place you come from—what’s it like? No people there, obviously. Just you mouthy toasters.”

  The incomplete head on the table crackled. After moving it from his apartment Simmons had not only bolted it more securely to its tabletop, but also screwed the table to the floor.

  “Home … beautiful, once. Then war, dissension. Weak rule. Megatron deciding. Optimus objecting. Dissension. Fighting, war. Allspark lost. Searching, searching …” The voice sputtered out.

  “Yeah, right. We’re all searching. I can see why you tin toys wound up here. Trouble for you guys is, this dirt is already mortgaged. And we ain’t movin’ out.”

  One partial eye socket glimmered briefly. “Insects. Submit or die! Megatron will—!”

  “Megatron sleeps with the fishes.” Chewing on a strip of kosher beef jerky, Simmons tapped several keys. The partial skull on the table twitched. “Bunch of your other buddies are car parts now. But we still gotta worry about that Starscream. Nasty character, that one. It worries me what he might be up to. The new guys, this NEST bunch, think they can handle ’em.” A flicker of undeniable brilliance flashed in the ex-agent’s eyes. Or maybe it was just madness.

  “But Starscream, I saw enough of him in action to know better. He’s not just powerful. He’s smart. He’s tricky. And you don’t eliminate smart and tricky with brute force. ’Course, you think they’d listen to me? Listen to Seymour Simmons, with all my years of experience? Nah. Office boys in Washington think they know everything. Wouldn’t transfer me over to the new division.” He subsided for a while. Then he looked up at the table. At his prize.

  “That’s all right. I’m still here. Plenty I can do on my own. Maybe it’s better this way. No desk jockey looking over my shoulder asking what I’m working on. Nobody sending me off to Stockholm or Sheboygan to check out some jittery junk heap in an old farmer’s garage.” Turning away from the computer, he picked up a thick sheaf of papers and shook them at the skull on the table.

  “It’s all here, what’s gonna happen! I know it is. I can feel it, I can sense it.” Some of the papers slipped to the floor. He left them lying there as he sagged in his chair. “I just don’t know what it is. That’s why I need your help. And you’re gonna help me, half head, whether you like it or not.”

  But the battered metal shape on the table did not respond, and certainly did not offer any answers.

  The police gave chase even before the two cars headed the wrong way up the one-way street. Moving fast, barely missing startled pedestrians, they alternately slowed and sped up as the pursuit behind them gathered strength. It was almost as if the pair of street racers were daring the traffic cops, in their Fiats and on their bikes, to catch them.

  How the pair managed to negotiate the narrow streets, byways, and heavily congested lanes of downtown Rome without smashing into other vehicles or overhanging structures was something to behold. When the police finally appeared to have them cornered, they eluded their pursuers by abandoning the narrow road they were on and careering wildly down the Spanish Steps, scattering panicked tourists and locals alike while nearly destroying the famous fountain at the bottom of the stairway. Speeding off, they continued with their own rivalry as seemingly half the traffic police in the city closed in around them.

  They were finally cornered in the wide Piazza del Popolo. As police and hastily summoned carabinieri surrounded the square and cleared it of civilians, the two street racers zoomed around and around the obelisk in its center, their drivers acting for all the world as if it were their private racetrack and dozens of guns were not now pointed in their direction.

  It was left to a captain of the carabinieri to step forward and shout at the speeding cars through an amplified megaphone.

  “Drivers! You are both under arrest! Stop your racing, pull over, and exit your vehicles! I repeat, you are under arrest for endangering tourists, citizens, important national monuments, and yourselves! Kill your engines and pull over!” He did not add that between them the two competing drivers had broken every traffic law on the Italian books. There was not enough time to recite all their transgressions. That he would leave to the judges.

  But despite his increasingly threatening entreaties, the two sleek, customized cars continued to speed around and around the square’s famous central pillar. Occasionally one would lurch into the lead only to soon surrender it to the other. The captain knew he could wait until they ran out of gas, or …

  He turned the volume on the megaphone all the way up. “You have exhausted the patience of citizens and police alike! Under the authority vested in me by the government of the city of Rome, I demand that you now pull over and cease this senseless activity or I will be forced to give the order to shoot at your vehicles. I repeat, pull over and stop or my men will shoot. While we will aim at your tires and engines, I cannot guarantee the accuracy of my sharpshooters. Your lives are in danger unless you pull over now!”

  Finally, he thought as the two cars began to slow. A reaction. He did not like making threats, but it was his responsibility to ensure the safety of those few citizens who had persisted in remaining in the area to see how the confrontation played out—and possibly to applaud the antisocial boldness of the two racers. If it was up to him, he would have the applauders arrested as well.

  At least, he thought as first one car came to a stop and then the other, no one had been injured in the course of their wild binge through the city. And the square had been cleared of nearly every gawking tourist and local. Given a decent, honest judge, both drivers would not only have their licenses permanently revoked but also spend enough time in jail to properly contemplate their transgressions. As he stepped forward, one hand holding the megaphone and the other resting on the butt of his service revolver, he was accompanied by a full squad of his men. Halfway across the wide square, a voice emerged from the nearest vehicle. It sounded—odd.

  “Allow us to differ, human, but it is your lives that are in danger!”

  As the eyes of the captain and his subordinates grew wide, the pair of street racers began to change shape before their eyes. Rising to heights that dwarfed the approaching officers, the two gleaming, boldly highlighted giants bellowed their defiance at the encircling police.

  “Fire.” The captain found his voice and his pistol at the same time. “Open fire!”

  The crackle of rifles and pistols discharging erupted around the square. Screams burst from those few citizens who had hung around to observe the outcome of the confrontation. Seeking cover, these isolated civilians scattered into the surrounding churches, restaurants, and
shops.

  The salvo of small-arms fire had no effect on the two lustrous machines. In contrast, their much more powerful weaponry began to take an immediate toll on the now rapidly retreating carabinieri as well as on the surrounding historic structures.

  By the time heavier ordnance arrived in the form of Italian and American helicopters from bases outside the city, the two intruders had reverted to street racer form and vanished into the warren of ancient, narrow alleyways that honeycombed the ancient metropolis. Behind them they left death, destruction, chaos—and more than a little bewilderment.

  “It doesn’t make any sense.”

  Standing at the table in the heavily secured hangar inside the US–Italian army base, Lennox studied the map of Rome that had been laid out before him. On it had been traced the route of the two Decepticons as accurately as the demoralized city police had been able to record it. Epps and Kaminari stood beside him while Petr was on the other side of the hangar deep in conversation with a tow truck. Ratchet was divesting himself of insights into Autobot metallurgy that the Russian found endlessly fascinating.

  Two European NEST operatives, one American and the other Italian, stood on the other side of the table opposite Lennox and his companions. In the center of the hangar Ratchet and Ironhide relaxed in terrestrial guise and conversed quietly as a thoroughly bored Knockout zipped back and forth while popping an occasional wheelie. Nobody paid him the least attention.

  “I agree, Captain.” Leaning forward next to him, Kaminari let one finger trace a line on the city map. “What could the Decepticons possibly be seeking here in Rome? Certainly not some kind of power source. We are a long way from Etna, or even Vesuvius.”

  The Italian NEST officer did not try to hide his bewilderment. “There are large power plants here, but nothing exceptional. All the big hydroelectric dams lie far to the north, in the Alps, and there are far more nuclear facilities in France and Germany.”