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In the months that followed the loss of the Allspark, Barricade did his best to keep moving and stay off the Autobot’s radar. There were a hundred thousand different places on this miserable planet that he could safely hide, but he couldn’t do his job from any of them. At least until Starscream returned from his latest mad quest or Soundwave came back into orbit, he was on his own, watching and waiting. It was too dangerous to follow the Autobots themselves, so he stuck to tracking the humans, both civilian and military, finding their communications much easier to unravel.
Tailing Sector Seven, though, finally got him something solid. The organization had been all over the place since sinking his dead teammates into the ocean, moving both files and artifacts between storage facilities. During one of their transfers, he’d succeeded in hacking through their security, coming up with a delivery manifest. There was nothing particularly damning, unfortunately, but he caught wind of their past attempts to find more Cybertronians over the years. A number of vehicles had been seized with this in mind, though none had proven to be more than anything man made. All but one, he was willing to bet.
The files on a particular plane stood out, but were incomplete, which was really just his luck. The rest of the hard records weren’t digitized, and Sector Seven was facing termination from the higher ups. This was where he needed Frenzy – annoying as he’d been, he could get in and out of places that were closed to Barricade. If there weren’t digital copies, he was going to have a hell of time finding more information on their records of this operation. It was a very slim lead, but it had one saving grace: the name Wilton Knight was stamped onto the corner of the one photo of the plane that was digital. Barricade had gotten quite familiar with that name over the past few months, and that link alone made him decide it was worth looking into.
He didn’t know how or why the government allowed Knight Industries to operate or exist at all, but he wasn’t going to question it. They were a resource waiting to be exploited, and Barricade weathered the badgering he received from Michael Knight with this in mind. It was likely a mutual arrangement – a Decepticon didn’t have humanity’s best interests in mind, and FLAG was all about protecting the innocent. If they could keep tabs on him without tipping off the Autobots, they’d have their own resource to exploit. Assuming their association didn’t get them shut down under charges of treason, which wouldn’t hurt Barricade’s feelings in the least.
If the plane belonged to Knight Industries, they’d want it back. If it turned out to be an old comrade of Barricade’s, then that was all the better. Either way, he could get the human and his pet car to do the work that he couldn’t, and peel back their own security while he was at it. So thinking, he sent the delivery manifest to Kitt, knowing the trumped up calculator could parse out the relevant information.
Tailing Sector Seven, though, finally got him something solid. The organization had been all over the place since sinking his dead teammates into the ocean, moving both files and artifacts between storage facilities. During one of their transfers, he’d succeeded in hacking through their security, coming up with a delivery manifest. There was nothing particularly damning, unfortunately, but he caught wind of their past attempts to find more Cybertronians over the years. A number of vehicles had been seized with this in mind, though none had proven to be more than anything man made. All but one, he was willing to bet.
The files on a particular plane stood out, but were incomplete, which was really just his luck. The rest of the hard records weren’t digitized, and Sector Seven was facing termination from the higher ups. This was where he needed Frenzy – annoying as he’d been, he could get in and out of places that were closed to Barricade. If there weren’t digital copies, he was going to have a hell of time finding more information on their records of this operation. It was a very slim lead, but it had one saving grace: the name Wilton Knight was stamped onto the corner of the one photo of the plane that was digital. Barricade had gotten quite familiar with that name over the past few months, and that link alone made him decide it was worth looking into.
He didn’t know how or why the government allowed Knight Industries to operate or exist at all, but he wasn’t going to question it. They were a resource waiting to be exploited, and Barricade weathered the badgering he received from Michael Knight with this in mind. It was likely a mutual arrangement – a Decepticon didn’t have humanity’s best interests in mind, and FLAG was all about protecting the innocent. If they could keep tabs on him without tipping off the Autobots, they’d have their own resource to exploit. Assuming their association didn’t get them shut down under charges of treason, which wouldn’t hurt Barricade’s feelings in the least.
If the plane belonged to Knight Industries, they’d want it back. If it turned out to be an old comrade of Barricade’s, then that was all the better. Either way, he could get the human and his pet car to do the work that he couldn’t, and peel back their own security while he was at it. So thinking, he sent the delivery manifest to Kitt, knowing the trumped up calculator could parse out the relevant information.
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At the moment, he was sucking mightily at them, though. He was tired, but that was fast becoming business as usual. Everything about this job was exhausting. No wonder his dad quit.
Booker DeWitt was idling in a house cleared of Columbia police, Elizabeth muttering in the background, while Mike dozed, one hand still holding the controller, the other wrapped around a can of beer. Kitt's chirp in Mike's ear was easy to dismiss the first three times. By the seventh, he was grumbling. By the eleventh, he jerked the recliner up into sitting instead of reclining and growled, "What?"
"I am sorry to wake you," Kitt said, "but I have received a message from Barricade."
Now that was a reason to wake up. "Barricade? He contacted you?"
"Apparently my display of aptitude with Cybertronian has qualified me to be contacted."
"I wouldn't put too much stock in it. So." He yawned. "What's the word?"
"Apparently he has found Wilton Knight's plane."
"Plane?"
"It is being held by Sector Seven."
Mike shook his head, saving his game with a few flicks of the controls. "Go back to the part where you said plane."
"Before my predecessor was created, there are records of Wilton Knight having built a plane along our similar lines, but it was commandeered by the government when he filed for patents."
"...Shit." His brows raised. "So, wait. Barricade is saying he might've found your long-lost brother?"
"As I understand it, yes."
"And this Sector Seven has him?"
"Yes."
The decision was made that simply. "Not for long.Let's see what we can find in our own records."
Hours later, while everyone else was still asleep, Mike was bundled up in Kitt's passenger seat, soundly asleep while his trusted AI drove. He could sleep when it was just the two of them, and they had some leads to follow up - namely the old Knight Industries stomping grounds in Vegas. In '82, it had been converted into a museum of technology, but Mike knew Wilton Knight's mindset too well to believe that was all he found, so he sent the message to Barricade.
If you're curious, meet us here:, he'd sent, followed by the address.
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Nevada was a bit of a drive from his current position, but he decided it was high time to put some distance between himself and the Autobots for a while. A vacation, actually, though the company would be questionable.
Mike and Kitt had, predictably, arrived first. He’d done some research on the place on the way in, finding little of interest. If it was significant to their target, only they were privy to it, and he’d just have to fly blind. At the very least he already had tracking numbers for the company the military had contracted to move the plane. Everything they did was so messy and unorganized he was still stunned they’d coordinated that attack in Los Angeles.
He kept his low opinion on humans to himself for now, pinging Kitt briefly before sounding his siren once. Mike wasn’t in view, so he was either in Kitt or in the museum itself. Either way, acknowledging Kitt personally would make this… arrangement a lot easier. Whether or not Mike believed it was sincere didn’t matter. He just wouldn’t be wasting time defending it to Barricade, and he could play it off as warming up to the AI. Maybe even be a little friendly, as sickening as that sounded.
Shutting off his lights, Barricade parked alongside Kitt, engine idling.
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He climbed out of the driver's seat with the ease of long practice, flashlight in hand. "Here's hoping your giant metal hands can handle thirty-year-old printouts."
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Information from the source was going to be a lot better than whatever S7 had hobbled together. The fact that they were here was enough proof that Knight Industries had made it, so he knocked the possibility that it was actually Cybertronian down the list. If it turned out to be another fancy AI, then S7's intel was even worse than he thought.
"I can be careful when I want to, which is typically never." He backed up when Mike came out, headlights flashing over the doors. He'd transform once they were inside, if there was room. "Lead the way."
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The space inside was nearly the size of a hangar and full of antiquated equipment: computers with tape reels, arrays of mainframes decked with lights that once blinked in ways that were indecipherable without years of training - the way things used to work, all in one big room. "Goddamn," Mike murmured as he flicked the flashlight on. "This is like the island of misfit tech."
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Barricade was forced to stoop down to inspect anything in the room, pushing aside dusty furniture to accommodate him.
"What kind of hard copies are we looking for here?" he asked. "I'm surprised half of it hasn't disintegrated already."
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He started reading the dates on the little placards on each drawer. "If this ends up in me infiltrating Area 51 again, I am going to be pissed. Hey, supercar, mind closing the door behind you?"
There was no verbal answer. Just the quiet sound of the door reeling shut.
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"Did that have anything to do with those treason charges?" He pulled out entire drawers at a time, finding that he was somewhere in the late 70s. Too soon, probably, and nothing of interest. He doubted the fact that Sector 7 operated out of bases like Area 51 would deter the human, and Kitt would go along with whatever he said. If they were lucky, they could intercept the delivery before it was actually in one of those bases.
They. Ugh. He had the feeling this whole 'teamwork' thing was going to wear thin real fast.
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"Timing is uncertain from what digital records exist," Kitt answered, "but as the first iteration of my current platform was built in nineteen eighty-one, the mid- to late seventies would be the correct time span."
"Kind of what I figured. I'll start in seventy four. Come over here, speed reader. Maybe if I flick through it, you'll catch it faster than I could. What code did you give me to get in here, anyway?"
"Your father's." Kitt idled in Mike's direction, Mike turning off his flashlight so he could use both hands to work on the combination lock on the drawer.
"...Seriously? They've not changed the code since he was around?"
"No one has ever used his code."
"Not even him? God, he was such a slacker."
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He only half listened to their conversation, making a pretty mess of the cabinets he pulled apart and left on the floor. It was cleaner than if Frenzy had been involved. The drone would have shredded whatever didn't fit the bill to help narrow things down.
Barricade shut off his headlights as he stepped back over to Mike's side. "Nice security system you've got if you can't be bothered to lock out ex employees. Is your line of work hereditary, or just the insanity?"
Because really, there was nothing sane about the fact that Mike was close enough to smell the gasoline and energon on Barricade without being afraid.
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He hoped that there wouldn't be a mention anywhere in here of tri-helical MBS. That was the last thing they needed, Decepticons getting ahold of that.
"Hm, first records. This isn't going to help us for where they took it."
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Whether or not they went to the other side didn't matter. If they weren't around to do their job, they were as good as done. Once the next drawer was open, Barricade raked one talon across the tops of the files, filtering through the headers much more quickly than just looking over Mike's shoulder. Though he was blind to what the contents were, the titles were safely stored away in his memory banks for future reference.
"Here," he said, pausing in the next row halfway through. "'Confiscated', with a date that should line up. Give me the other you found."
First records were important - was this thing built from scratch, or found with existing intelligence?
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The file wasn't anything special. Plans, diagrams, nothing that the military hadn't already adopted (unfortunately, thanks to Wilton Knight's engineers' initial genius) but with plans for an AI so a plane could fly on its own, ethical programming, the whole lot. There were manifest lists for what would be needed to construct the plane, blueprints, exacting measurements - and Mike was already looking for the next file in order.
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The information was a little disappointing. The plane, like Kitt, was entirely man made, further deflating the theory that it was one of his own. Still, putting the screws to S7 was part of the game plan, so it wasn't a total loss.
"Different isn't always better," he said, sliding the file back together. He'd already memorized the code Mike had used, though he'd be surprised if they didn't change it after including him in this little adventure.
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But Mike was shaking his head as he pulled out the next one. "Nothing surprising. Same team from the eighties. All of 'em are dead now. Then we've got..."
He flipped open another folder. "First copies of the patent applications. And proof that at least some people in the eighties had the idea of how not to leak information, thank God. And what did you find in that 'Confiscated' folder?"
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"Those angry rants you mentioned," he said. "Looks like the full account of what went down, minus where they actually took the damn thing."
He flipped both files back over towards Mike. If there was a code in the reports, he couldn't find it. Humans knew each other's mind better, so if there was something to overlook, it would be something he considered useless drivel. Which was all of it, actually.
"Is there any other way Knight would have recorded this information? This a lot of paper telling us absolutely nothing."
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His gaze shifted to Kitt and Kitt, upon seeing it, answered, "I no longer have access to the military satellite network."
"Yeah, and we're not supposed to be talking to Mister Tall, Dark, and Scary With Anger Issues, either, but that's not stopping us."
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He was silent a moment, considering the military satellite network. He could try to access it, but with the Autobots watching, he'd be found out in an instant. Starscream had left him more than understaffed on this planet - the amount of intel they were missing because he couldn't safely hack anything was probably astounding. Kitt would likely run into a similar roadblock, but...
"I hate to even suggest this," Barricade started, eyes darting between Mike and Kitt. "Individually, we'd probably get nailed for rifling through the military networks. Hook me up to your talking calculator, and we should be able to get through no problem."
Should. He had an idea as to how much Kitt could do, but Mike was going to have to risk exposing him to Barricade's systems. The virus that had shut down their communication network had come from a Decepticon, after all.
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His gut was saying no. Nobody else would stand up for Kitt, and Kitt had become the closest thing he had to family. He didn't want to put that on the line. He'd rather see himself dead first. But Kitt knew what he'd need to get this done.
"There is a possibility I could do it alone," Kitt said. "It would be logical to exhaust that possibility before taking on possibly-imprudent risks."
"Then give it a stab. Anything weird starts to happen, you disconnect right then, all right?"
"Understood."
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"Knock yourself out," Barricade waved one clawed hand. "It's on you if this goes sideways."
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Mike could've heard a pin drop with how silent everything seemed to be. He could even hear his own blood rushing in his ears, which really wasn't a pleasant sound. That was the kind of silence that he'd come to dread.
It was just when Mike was about to call it off that Kitt said, "There is an opening. I have not been detected."
"Awesome, now we need to hope those records have been brought up to date instead of all this paperwork."
"The search will take some time. The amount of records is extensive."
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"If they have a destination to ship it to, they better have it's current location," Barricade said. "Your government isn't that incompetent."
Too true, unfortunately. Even with the network down their military had managed to coordinate a counter attack in Los Angeles. A highly successful counter attack, which made Barricade thankful he'd been driven off the road before arriving.
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No sense dwelling on it now. He looked bored, reclining against the cabinets as Kitt worked.
"How much time are we talking here? They'll have it delivered by the time it's done."
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Mike smiled, reaching out to pat Kitt's bumper fondly. "That's my supercar."
"The process will take approximately ninety more seconds."
"So, Anger Issues On Wheels, how good are you at decoding?"
in case you missed it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvWGLcdI8o8
"Easier than hacking," Barricade said, which was the truth. If there weren't any active security protocols running around, breaking through raw data was simple for them. "And easier than sorting through this hellhole."
Seriously, he was going to suggest torching the place before leaving. Either store information correctly, or not at all.
Oh lord, it's glorious.
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"Remember we're not friends, here," he said, well aware of what Mike thought of him. "Delusions are a sign of mental illness. Wouldn't want to have to put you down before your prime."
Whatever that was. He waited for them to open the door, watching data unravel at the same time.
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"Unfortunately yes," Kitt answered. "The plane was housed at Area 51."
"...Goddamn it."
"But it isn't any longer. With the talks of declassification of Area 51, the plane was moved to the Wright-Patterson base in Ohio."
Mike rubbed at his forehead. "Whole different kind of goddamn it. Ohio?"
"Yes, Mike. Ohio."
"Shit."
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He pulled up his map of the continental United States and zeroed in on Ohio. Hell of a drive from here, unfortunately. And hell if they thought he was flying anywhere with them in that cargo plane of theirs.
"Whatever you have against Ohio, it might be a moot point," he said. "The schedule's decoded - it'll be shipping out in a few days, ground transport. Makes it easier for us to intercept, at least."
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His heart was in his throat just at the thought of it. A sentient thing disassembled and put in trucks to be taken wherever someone else decided.
"So, intercept or just go and stop the bastards?" he asked, forcing himself into a more flippant tone. If he let himself think about it, he'd just get too angry before it was time to use that anger. He wasn't the Hulk, but rage made killing people easier.
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Besides, being in several pieces wasn't exactly traumatic for cybertronians. Not ideal for most, but not the end of the world.
"Even if we left now, we'd still be cutting it close to meet them at the gate. Catch them on the road, and backup's too far away to catch us."
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That's what it was. He wasn't going to fool himself. This was a rescue, a liberation. Period.
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"I'd suggest somewhere in the Rockies. I don't know what kind of evac system you've got available, but you might want to let your friends know what's going on so they can be ready."
The mountain roads would make a good place for an ambush, though they had to be aware the reverse could be sprung on them. Mike was welcome to suggest a different place. He'd probably only argue against it just because he could.
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But he turned out onto the street anyway, looking through the info Kitt was feeding him. "If there's one thing I know, it's military manoeuvers. You can change shapes, so can Kitt. If we do it just right, we can infiltrate the convoy and slip away with the plane without anybody realising until it's too late."
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"I happen to like my current 'shape'," he retorted. Not a terrible idea, though. Mike would need to get the truck driver out of the way, though Barricade doubted he'd be allowed to run him over.
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"I don't have enough mass to pull off a Hummer," he said. "Unless you've got something smaller that'll work, I can always pose as Colorado's finest."
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"They'll have a front door and a back door. It's easier to take out the back door first. Big truck mirrors are easier to fool. So we find out what kind of vehicles they've got for their front and back door, spoof their shapes, take them out - shouldn't be hard, we're both weaponised to hell and it's not like we can't be covert - and once we've got the truck under our cover, thinking we're with them, we can organise an emergency. Take out a tire, yank out the truck driver and I'll take over the truck while you and Kitt escort. Then we're just a normal convoy going down the road, just to our destination instead of theirs."
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"Tell me again how it is that you're not in jail." Humans didn't know that stuff by screwing around on the internet. With no one else on the road at this time of night, Barricade strayed into the median, taking up as much as space as he wanted. "On second thought, don't, I'll figure it out myself. We'll have to shadow them before they pass through the Rockies if that's where we're going to do this. They have to stop more often than we do."
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