Starscream

Tucson, a city nestled in a desert valley and surrounded by mountains.

It lay in Pima County in southern Arizona, United States, nearly across the entire country from Washington, D.C.

Such a great distance, coupled with the need to avoid drawing human attention, meant that even though Barricade's police-car form sped down deserted roads like the wind, it still took nearly fifteen hours to carry Sun Cheng to Tucson.

Having been driven nearly mad by the silence along the way, Sun Cheng finally felt the car begin to slow until it came to a complete stop.

"We're here!"

Barricade said.

Sun Cheng looked out through the window, immediately growing suspicious.

With his eyesight, even though it was deep into the night and there were no lights nearby, it did nothing to hinder his observation of the surroundings.

"This is a mountain area?"

A hundred meters away stood one mountain after another, faintly visible in the darkness, like terrifying beasts lurking there and waiting to devour their prey.

The feeling made Sun Cheng deeply uncomfortable, especially after Barricade opened the passenger-side door. The [Spy Template] equipped within his body suddenly issued a warning.

Though it lasted only an instant, it had caught a hostile gaze from the boundless darkness just moments ago.

"Get out!"

Barricade urged impatiently.

Sun Cheng had no choice but to jump out of the car. After landing, he cautiously went on alert, pushing the two pairs of electronic eyes on his head almost to their limits as he tried to find the figure that had revealed hostility toward him.

Unfortunately, he was clearly destined to be disappointed!

There was a clatter beside him. When the sounds of metal and gears grinding together ceased, Sun Cheng suddenly felt his body grow lighter. Before he could react, Barricade had already grabbed him in his hand.

"Lord... Lord Barricade, who are we going to meet?"

Although Barricade merely held him in his palm this time and did not seem murderous as he had before, the feeling of having his life entirely beyond his own control was awful. Even though Sun Cheng tried desperately to restrain himself and keep his body from making any reaction that might provoke Barricade, his [Core] still throbbed wildly, and warning sounds rang endlessly in his mind.

Apparently very satisfied with Sun Cheng's complete lack of resistance, the cold Barricade did not stop walking as he headed toward the nearby mountains, but he did answer his question. "An important figure. You'll know who he is soon enough!"

Barricade moved swiftly. Even while carrying him, he was not much slower than Sun Cheng sprinting at full speed.

Rather than going up the mountain, he carried Sun Cheng around its base for four or five kilometers before they saw a rust-covered rail line, abandoned for many years, stretching straight toward the mountain ahead.

"An abandoned mine?"

Following the tracks with his gaze, Sun Cheng soon made out the outline of a mine entrance. Was Barricade planning to take him inside?

It was no wonder he felt suspicious. The mine was obviously something humans had left behind, and judging by the rust on the rails alone, it had likely been abandoned by humans for at least a decade.

Just the height of the cave entrance ahead was enough to make it impossible for Barricade to enter in his transformed form.

While he was still puzzled, the two had already arrived before the abandoned mine.

Seeing Barricade stop, Sun Cheng was just about to ask what was going on when the world spun around him. When he came back to his senses, he discovered that Barricade had transformed back into a police car, while he himself had been placed in the passenger seat.

"Vroom..."

With the engine roaring, Barricade made slight adjustments to his wheels so that he could travel along the abandoned tracks, then drove into the mine without hesitation.

"Huh!"

Though they had been installed quite discreetly, Sun Cheng's two pairs of electronic eyes repeatedly detected fluctuations from surveillance equipment after entering the mine. He let out a soft sound, his thoughts turning.

When they first entered the mine, Barricade was clearly not moving very fast. The car body occasionally made one or two collision sounds, perhaps from hitting abandoned ore or something similar, but Barricade showed no intention of avoiding them.

After turning through four branching tunnels in succession, Sun Cheng, who had kept his eyes fixed outside the window, suddenly brightened.

Although the tracks ended here, this abandoned mine had clearly been modified. Not only was it much more spacious, but cables and similar things could be seen all around.

They kept moving forward, driving deeper into the mine. Sun Cheng silently counted the seconds in his mind, and when he reached 129 seconds, the space ahead finally opened up. A massive area, more than ten meters high and likely over a thousand square meters in size, immediately appeared before him.

After leaving the side passage, Barricade stopped. This time, without even a word of warning, he transformed and flung the completely unprepared Sun Cheng away. He first crashed into a metal pillar nearby, then fell to the ground.

"Hey, you idiot! Don't interfere with my work!"

Sun Cheng picked up his phone and stood up. Before he could check whether it had been damaged in the fall, he heard an irritated mechanical voice from nearby.

He followed the sound, and his eyes immediately lit up. The one shouting at him was actually a robot two heads taller than himself, resembling a bulldozer. Sun Cheng had happened to seen its information in his memories and knew that this large fellow, whose [Core] was a [Production Template], was, like him, only a lowest-ranking Decepticon.

"Shut up!"

He snapped back irritably. After confirming that his phone had not been damaged, Sun Cheng began surveying the surroundings with interest.

Hidden deep within a mine shaft somewhere in the mountains around Tucson, this place appeared to be a small Decepticon base. Its scale was obviously nowhere near the Moon Base from his memories, but it was still quite impressive.

In this hall alone, no fewer than thirty or forty engineers equipped with [Production Templates] bustled back and forth. Some carried machinery from several mine branches nearby into the hall, while others were busy assembling it, creating a scene of intense activity.

Because he was equipped with the [Spy Template], he possessed information on quite a few kinds of machinery.

Sun Cheng studied them closely for a while and actually figured out that the machines these engineers were assembling were sets of geothermal generators. This immediately piqued his interest, and he stared at them without blinking.

"You seem very interested in my geothermal generators, little one of the Cassette Corps..."

A voice suddenly sounded not far away. Sun Cheng immediately reacted and quickly turned around, only to be startled.

Not far from him stood a huge Decepticon even larger than Barricade, watching him with a smile.

This Decepticon's body looked rather comical. Though massive, it was somewhat plump and bore a slight resemblance to a crab.

However, although this Decepticon appeared with a smile and looked very friendly, the moment Sun Cheng saw who he was, his [core] nearly crashed in fright. "S-Starscream, sir..."

Sun Cheng's eyes were full of despair. "Damn it, why him..."

If he had known Starscream had also come to Earth, then even if Sun Cheng had ten times the courage, he would never have dared come to see him.

There was no other reason: this Decepticon named Starscream had a truly fearsome reputation within the Decepticon Corps!

Starscream, a Leader-class Decepticon, commander of the [Aerial Squadron] and deputy commander of the Decepticon Corps—his notoriety was second only to Megatron's within the Corps.

Although Frenzy was a new spy only recently created by Soundwave, that did not mean he knew nothing about the targets Soundwave had specifically emphasized needed to be treated with extreme caution during secret missions.

According to the intelligence he possessed, this notoriously ruthless figure had launched at least six rebellions over the past thousand-odd years. Twice, he had come perilously close to overthrowing Megatron's rule.

If he had been human, any country that produced such an ambitious tyrant would surely have had him torn limb from limb by those in power after his failed rebellions.

Yet this man had rebelled time and again, failed time and again, and Megatron had never truly done anything to him. Not only had he remained in command of the [Aerial Squadron], but even his position as deputy commander had never been stripped away.

From this alone, one could glimpse the scheming and methods of the man before him.