Chapter Two
Firm Opposition

And every time you hear the rolling thunder
You turn and run before the lightening strikes
And does it ever make you stop and wonder
If all your good times pass you by.
~Sheryl Crow, "Good is Good"

Not a few days later, Alina rolled out of bed and turned on the TV to see a news report of the first Decepticon attack in weeks. She sat there, hunched in her blue jammies, a box of Cheerios and a glass of milk sprawled on the floor beside her, staring intently at the screen. The camera panned in real-time across the barren fields, pock-marked with impressions of giant feet and scored with laser blasts. Bits of metal and glowing pink pools of some liquid were strewn with negligent care.

“Last night,” the reporter relayed in quick succession, the ABC News symbol tight in the corner, “a band of four Decepticons met in battle with a contingent of Autobots in a cornfield not six miles from Des Moines. At this time, we do not know what it is they were after, but we are trying to see if we can get an interview with the leader of the Autobots, Optimus Prime.” The camera zoomed over the man’s shoulder to a large figure looming in the distance.

The box of Cheerios tipped over, spilling their grainy ovoids all over the carpet, as she shuffled forward to sit directly in front of the television. Faintly, she wondered why she was so concerned all of a sudden – over the past year and a half since they’d arrived, she’d not been too interested. She would catch the odd report, but since no one was storming Portland – yet – she, like every other citizen, had been lulled into a false sense of “it’s not going to happen here”.

On-screen, the great patriotic bulk of Optimus Prime was captured in three-quarter’s view, one arm extended and pointing at the destruction. A smaller black and white robot, with his car-mode’s doors jutting over each shoulder like a pair of stubby wings, was seen to be nodding and writing on a pad. Other Autobots were sweeping the fields, picking up debris and stuffing it into large canisters, which they then loaded onto a flatbed.

Suddenly, the camera’s view was obstructed by the enormous blue leg of an Autobot who had simply appeared. “Mirage,” Alina found herself whispering, hands planted in the mass of breakfast cereal. There was an undignified squawk from the reporter, and an ever higher-pitched yelp from the cameraman at the mech’s sudden arrival.

The camera zoomed backwards furiously after a few moments of staring intently at the scorched ground. “Ah – ah,” the newsman gibbered, trying to regain control. “Here we have one of the Autobots now.” With the sun gleaming almost regally behind his pharaonic head, Mirage’s face winked into view. “Sir, would you mind telling us what occurred here last night?”

The white and blue robot tilted his head down and peered directly into the camera’s lens. “I’ve been told to inform you that this area is unsafe for humans, as there might be some contamination left from Decepticon weaponry. For now, you are required to vacate the premises. Brawn and Windcharger will escort you to your van.”

“Ah –”

There was a scuffle off-camera, then a deep bass voice proclaimed: “Okay, buddy, let’s pack that thing away. Here we go, march nicely …”

“Ah – back to you, Peter!”

Quickly, the picture flashed to Peter Jennings looking slightly confused. Alina sat back and turned off the TV, memories of her one encounter with the Autobots still fresh in her mind. In that one moment, they had not appeared as monsters or irreprehensible war machines, but, as Hoist had noted, people. Metallic and massive, but people with distinct personalities. That much she had been able to discern.

An ancient cuckoo-clock in the corner peeped the hour, bringing Alina back to reality with a jolt. Realizing that she might very well be late, she scrabbled a few Cheerios into a bowl, doused them with milk and slurped the whole thing.

When she arrived at the office not thirty minutes later, her presence wasn’t immediately noticed. It seemed that all of her coworkers had been watching the very same program as she had been caught up in.

“Sooner or later, some of those aliens are going to come stomping through here,” Joe in Management was affirming to the Advertising crew. “And where will we be?”

“Relocating?” Katrina joked, folding her arms over her rather pert breasts. Alina slid past them, uncomfortable with joining this line of conversation. The whole office had a decidedly anti-Autobot feel to it.

“Hey, Alina!”

Startled, she turned around, hand on the railing that led to Mr. Harper’s office. “What?”

Joe was waving her over – not a good sign, she told herself, gritting her teeth. “We want your opinion. You’ve always been good at seeing both sides.”

Forcing herself not to grimace, Alina pushed a lock of black hair from her face and resorted to that age-old excuse: “Mr. Harper will want me to call up the mayor’s office or something, Joe,” she replied. “You know how things are – the Autobots hurting the city’s image and all.”

Joe’s mouth twitched, brows furrowing. “Actually, that’s where Harper is – he and Bell are stuck at city hall right now. They called about fifteen minutes ago. There’s nothing pressing at the moment, so we don’t have to do anything except stay until they release us.”

She blinked. “We’re getting paid to talk?”

Katrina laughed. “Isn’t that what public relations is all about, honey? Oh, I forgot, you were an English major …”

Alina smiled sweetly at the tired, old jab. “Yeah. Well, I’m going to go upstairs. Call me if you need me.”

Harper had a TV in his office and he’d occasionally turn it on if there was something he was interested in. During lunch, Alina was free to use it; seeing that Harper wasn’t in, she supposed that there was no harm in having it on while she did some light secretarial work while the others slothed about downstairs.

After returning a few phone calls and typing up some referrals, Alina found herself bored. With no call from Harper or Bell, many of her coworkers were contemplating packing up and heading out before the lunchtime crowd.

At one point, Josie and Nancy tried to coax her down to join in whatever discussion was currently running, but again, she refused politely. Something told her that it would inevitably turn to the Transformers, and for some reason, she didn’t feel like telling them about her encounter. Not with the animosity that Joe had displayed.

With the TV providing white noise, she sat in the window and looked down at the few people milling below. In the distance, a siren began to wail and the pedestrians stopped, craning their necks; cars pulled over to allow a cruiser to pass, its lights flashing. The window of cruiser was down, and – there was no one driving! Alina jumped, pressing her nose to the glass. The police car was moving slowly enough so that she could just make out the red symbol on its hood – an Autobot!

“Hey!” someone yelled up the stairs. “Autobots are coming!” Forgetting herself, she leapt from the sill and almost skidded down the staircase to reach the bottom. Her coworkers were flooding the narrow strip of sidewalk in front of the firm, pressing against each other to catch this unusual sight.

“I wonder if they’re coming from Des Moines,” someone murmured.

“That quickly? They must have rockets in their asses or something. It’s too far!”

“What, you think they guzzle the shit we have to put in our cars?” another person scoffed, sniffing with disdain.

The Autobot cruiser turned the corner, followed closely by two Lamborghinis: one red, the other yellow. The fancy automobiles were flanking a yellow-purple mini-truck pulling a flatbed with several barrels strapped to it. Sitting in the back was a small, stout yellow Autobot, no bigger than a very tall human – and Spike. Stunned, Alina could only stare as the two swung their feet off the back of the flatbed, talking amongst themselves. It took no eagle-eye to notice the gun strapped to the little fellow’s back.

And then, much to her chagrin, Spike called out: “ALINA!” and waved furiously. The yellow mini-robot turned his head and waved, too, a large smile plastered on his face.

Later, she would reflect on the day: was she embarrassed to have been in their company? No. Embarrassed to know the Witwickys? No. But it was the looks on her coworkers’ faces and the inevitable words they would be having with her in short time that wished that Spike had not done that. There were many people not in favor of the Autobots at Harper-Bell – except (now) her.

Meekly, lest she be impolite, Alina lifted her hand and waved back.

“See,” she could hear Spike telling his Autobot friend, “that’s the lady I was telling you about.”

“Yeah, pretty cute, just like you said …”

Alina had just enough time to catch Spike’s horrorfied expression before the trailer was pulled out of view and around the corner. And that was enough to bring a smile – albeit shortlived – to her face.

Katrina nudged her as the others began to disperse. “You know them?” It was an accusation bordering on bigotry.

Alina kept her face turned towards the corner as she replied, “I baby-sat Spike.”

Her coworker sniffed, contemplating her next words. “Really. Then I guess you should call up that boy’s parents and tell them to smarten up and not let him run around with war machines.”

The barb hit home. Would Katrina ever know how good a parent Sparkplug was? How deeply he cared for Spike, his only connection to his dead wife? Alina turned on her heel, chin raised to retort when there was another murmur from the retreating crowd. Around the corner came four more Autobots: the first, she immediately recognized as Hound, followed by a ladder truck; close on the engine’s figurative heels was another familiar figure: Mirage. And closing the gap was a massive red cab-over semi pulling an equally-massive grey trailer, emblazoned with the Autobot symbol. A beacon for all to see – and to acknowledge. And who was lounging in the cab of the semi but Sparkplug himself!

As they passed, the older Witwicky looked over, smiled, and tipped his hard-hat in recognition.

Feeling decidedly snarky, Alina stepped up to the curb and waved back. “Kind of hard to discipline your son when you’re running around with them yourself, eh, Kat?” With a turn of her heel, the raven-haired woman walked away from the spluttering older lady and into the building.

She managed to get to the stairs and shut the door to the office before they came clamoring after her. Being the youngest hire in recent years did not make her many friends, but she had found a few affable souls with whom to pass the time and idle chatter. However, those likeminded individuals were more likely to be swept away by bigger personalities such as Joe and Katrina.

The TV was still on and, wonderfully, broadcasting the caravan. Alina watched a moment before the phone rang.

“Hello?”

“Alina? Is that you?”

“Oh, Mr. Harper – how are things going?” She slid around her desk and sat down, cradling the phone against her ear.

“Not good,” he admitted. “The mayor’s having an aneurysm over this whole convoy thing that the news is reporting. We’ll have our work cut out for us, that’s for sure.” He paused, and in the background, Alina could hear passionate shouting. “Look, Alina, we’re not going to be out of here anytime soon, so there’s no point in any of you staying. We’ll have to work double-time come tomorrow to sort this thing out, but for now, why don’t you go home?”

Well, there were certainly a lot of things she could be doing before lunchtime arrived! “Are you sure, sir?” she asked, as was expected.

“Definitely. Let them know that there’ll be a meeting promptly at 7AM tomorrow – and come prepared with any idea they can muster. We need to save this city’s image, Alina, and it’s not going to be easy erasing the stigma of ‘Autobot Central’.”

Eyes downcast, she murmured, “Of course, sir,” and when the line went dead, settled the phone back into its cradle. Grabbing her coat and purse, she stood quietly in front of the closed door, gathering strength before flinging it wide.

“We’re loose!” she called out, making a bee-line for the exit. Someone grabbed her by the arm.

“What’d Harper say?” Joe asked.

“7AM meeting tomorrow, come with ideas for how we’re to erase ‘Autobot Central’ from Portland’s image,” she parroted back easily enough, tugging free.

“Humph,” was all he said, and promptly let her go.

Twisting around the door, Alina made for the parking lot, jumped in her car and promptly pulled out into the street. As she drove, people were still walking up and down the sidewalks, talking and pointing. Some of them made eye-contact with her, which made her a little uneasy. She supposed that the population was a little tired of being under constant fear of attack, but it wasn’t as if she had anything to do with it. All she’d done was wave …

Sighing, she turned on the radio and headed for home.

Meetings at Harper-Bell were a casual affair, much like their dress code. As Mr. Harper’s assistant, she wasn’t required to add anything to the conversation or provide any ideas as to their current client’s needs. However, with recent events, Alina found herself very much the participant. She sat near Mr. Harper at the head of the table, off to the side with a legal pad in one hand and a pen jutting over one ear. The senior staff was arranged around the table, ending with Mr. Bell at the opposite end with his assistant, June.

Harper leaned forward. “All right. You’ve all had the better part of a day to come up with ideas as to how we can change Portland’s image. There’s nothing we can physically do about the Autobots, but we can bring back the tourists. The city is giving us a huge grant in order to do this, along with a sizable check if and when we succeed.” He stared pointedly around the table. “And we will. There are a lot of firms out there, but they came to us.” He paused, catching their eyes. “Yesterday’s events didn’t help us any, not with that stunt they pulled by coming down this street with their toxic waste.”

Joe tapped his fingers on the table reflectively. “I think what we need to do is force the Autobots to reconsider coming through the city in the first place. There are a lot of back roads and fields they can run rampant over – hell, they can walk, they don’t need to drive.”

Harper nodded for him to continue. “We need to make them feel unwelcome. I did some research last night … our economy has dropped by ten percent in the last six months due to their continued presence in the streets. People aren’t feeling safe; they’re afraid that they’ll be squished, run over, or blasted.”

“Interesting,” Harper murmured.

Alina hunched over her pad, noting the main points of the conversation as words flew all around when she suddenly realized that she was being addressed. “Sir?”

Harper leaned over. “Katrina was just telling me that you happen to know two people who deal with the Autobots on a regular basis. How did this come about?”

Shocked, Alina glanced over at Katrina, who wiggled her fingers at her from the table’s edge. Why, that bitch … she snarled under her breath. Calming herself, she set her pad on her lap and faced her boss. “Well, I used to baby-sit Spike Witwicky when he was younger, and I spent a lot of time with them later, after his mother died. I wasn’t aware of their connection to the Autobots.” … until a few days ago, she silently finished.

Harper was scribbling something, and as she glanced over, saw that he was writing Spike’s name on a napkin. “And what is this youth’s father’s name?”

Really, how many people out there are named “Witwicky”? she wondered wryly. “I don’t know what his real name is – my parents always called him ‘Sparkplug’. No one else has ever referred to him as anything different.”

“Mr. Harper,” Joe interrupted. “What good is knowing these things? If these Witwickys are close to the Autobots, they’re useless in our campaign.”

Mr. Bell was nodding. “True, Finnegan, but it’s worth knowing in the long run.” He leaned forward. “How close are you to the Witwickys, Michaels?”

Alina had been in Public Relations long enough to know the dark side, but never had she been called upon to fuel it. “We’ve drifted since I went to college.” This line of questioning was concerning her – very deeply. It was wrong, she knew it. “Sirs,” she began, looking around, “I really don’t see how this is going to help the firm.”

Harper and Bell looked at each other; Mr. Bell folded his arms. “Michaels has a point. We’ll pursue another vein for now, but we’ll keep her involvement with the Witwickys in mind.”

Almost relieved, but not, Alina took her pen and got back to making notes as she was supposed to be doing. What she was being paid to do.

The meeting drew to a close with some answers, but most were unpolished and probably wouldn’t help matters. It was lunchtime as Alina was gathering up her notes; everyone else had left, except for June, who followed the same ritual. Stuffing her things in a satchel, Alina waved to June and left, turning her card over for lunch.

Sweet spring air with just a touch of old winter mixed in, blew across her face as she exited the firm and began walking down the street. There was a little café not too far from here that made the best sandwiches, and she could clear her head with a cool drink.

“Can an old man buy you lunch?”

Alina turned around to see Sparkplug leaning up against one of the buildings. “Oh!” she exclaimed. “Why – of course.”

The elder Witwicky grinned and took her arm, tucking it in his own. “Spike’s running around with Carly so I thought I’d try and catch you for a quick snack.”

“That’s really nice of you.” How ironic was it that the man she had almost implicated moments before would be out here, treating her to lunch? Her job was important and one of the best around, but she couldn’t let them be kept in the dark about matters – whatever the consequences might be. Glancing around, and eliciting a concerned arch of the brow from Sparkplug, she drew close and told him about the meeting.

“That’s real nice of them,” he said at last. “Here the Autobots are, trying to save their butts, and they want to kick them out because of a few bucks.” The older man shook his head in disgust. “Yeah, I know you probably shouldn’t be telling me this, but I appreciate it. I don’t know what Prime’ll make of it, but he’ll be glad you did.”

She nodded a little sadly. “What happened in Des Moines?” she felt compelled to ask, knowing that it was something she could have over the firm.

“Oh, that.” Sparkplug indicated a small deli and helped her into her seat under a neat little umbrella. “Old Megs got into his buckethead that he needed some experimental cells from a plant that was converting corn into fuel. So he sent Starscream and his airheaded Seeker buddies to snatch the plans. Skyfire happened to be out there at the time and he relayed their coordinates. It all went down pretty smoothly, considering.”

The names and terms, baring Megatron’s, were unfamiliar to her, but she acquiesced all the same. “And what about that little parade past my workplace?” She tried not to sound accusatory, and put a little smile into the query.

Laughing, Sparkplug motioned for a waiter. “That was Hound’s idea. He said you mentioned that you’d never seen Autobots on the street before, so he managed to convince Prowl to make a pass on our way back to base. Prime thought it was a nice gesture. By the way … nothing in those barrels were toxic, if anyone asks at your firm. Just broken bits and pieces from the battle.”

Alina passed her order to the waiter after a quick perusal of the menu. “I just don’t know why they’re jumping on me all of a sudden,” she admitted. “It’s as if they’re all Autobot-phobic or something.”

“Money’s the root of all evil,” Sparkplug quoted wryly. “Don’t do anything that makes you uncomfortable, Lina – but I don’t have to tell you that. We’ll back you up if they want to fire you.”

She shuddered at the thought. “I hope it doesn’t come down to that – but they sure are riled up. What you did yesterday didn’t help matters.”

“Well, let them whine, they’re not going away,” he replied, sipping at the drink the waiter unobtrusively put before him. “Like it or not, the Autobots are here to protect us. And they’re doing so in the midst of their own personal war. It’d be nice if people could understand that.”

Alina leaned on her elbows. “True. I got that much from them the other day.”

“You’re more than welcome back, you know,” Sparkplug told her, smiling. “And no matter what Sunstreaker says, Hound doesn’t collect people. He’s a social ’bot, bringing folk around now and then, but a lot of them don’t like what they see – either that, or they try to exploit his generosity. Leaves old Hound pretty hurt.”

The offer was pretty tempting, and Alina found herself nodding in acceptance. “Only if you promise to make your famous chili,” she joked, digging into her sandwich with a wink.

Barking laughter rolled from deep within Sparkplug’s barrel chest. “You know, you and your father are the only ones who like that stuff. Spike still refuses to touch it.”

“I told him, he doesn’t know what he’s missing.”

Running his fingers through his thinning hair, Sparkplug’s face suddenly turned somber. “But seriously, Alina, I think the Autobots need more friends. Spike, Carly, Chip and I can’t do it by ourselves.”

Bits of lettuce and tomato dribbled down her chin at the change in tone. Hastily, she dabbed at her face with a napkin. “I … I don’t know what I can do.”

Sparkplug shrugged. “Educate them, I guess. Let them know that they mean us no harm.”

“I can … try,” she finally allowed. And that seemed good enough for him. The rest of her lunch hour was passed in idle conversation, and though he’d brought up some heavy topics, Alina was sad to hug him good-bye. Alone, she walked back to the office and found that things were back to normal, at least on the surface.

The evening news was no different than the program that had been broadcast the night before – indeed, it was no different than from what she had watched that morning. Alina lay curled up on her couch, a mug of tea and a good book sitting beside her, both untouched. Sparkplug’s words rolled over in her mind, and that of Harper’s and Joe’s and Katrina’s.

Really … how could have one rainy day and a flat tire spiraled into such uncertainty?

Your job or your friends, she mused miserably, listening to the chatter of the news-anchors in the background. Images of the Ark flashed by along with a montage of chaos. Commentary included how badly the Autobot-Decepticon war had disrupted familial life all over the world. There was an interview of various people who all seemed to have the same opinion: the Transformers had to leave.

Their deep-set animosity rankled Alina. Chaos was a part of war; it wasn’t as if they’d consciously chosen to be here. With a low snarl, she flicked off the set and rolled around on the couch, images and words floating past her eyes.

A good night’s sleep would settle her. And so, she turned off the lights and lay right there on the couch, drifting uneasily, but slowly, into sleep.