The Touch Part 15  

City: IACON

Elita-1 led Orion Pax through some alleys, past several buildings, sneaking so that no one would see them, until they reached the most noble part of the city. She didn't reveal where they were going, she wanted it to be a surprise for Orion, so she left him more intrigued than anything else.

"Elita, where are we going?" Orion whispered, worried that they would both end up in trouble.

"You said you trusted me, so I'm going to show you a special, secret place where no one can come near." Elita-1 made sure to provoke Orion's curiosity, as he was an archivist, it was in his nature to be curious.

"I have a bad feeling." Orion did not hide his feelings, for he knew that Elita was a woman who loved adventure.

"Relax, I've been doing this a long time." Elita-1 approached a manhole cover and lifted it, revealing it to be a passageway to the sewer.

"The sewer? Did you lose some screws?" Orion asked, looking at Elita who smiled innocently, but in a demonic way.

Without warning, Elita-1 kicked Orion in the ass, knocking him into the hole, she checked that no one was watching and jumped in. As she fell to the rusty metal floor, the first thing she noticed was Orion's face, comically plastered to the floor, muttering some unintelligible things.

"That hurts..." Orion muttered, the pain he felt was quite obvious, but Elita ignored him.

"Come on, the fall wasn't that big. Now stop complaining and follow me." Elita started to run, leading the way into the dark place.

Not having much of a choice, Orion decided to follow her, unable to help but feel a little uncomfortable at the unusual situation he found himself in.

"So... where are we going?" Orion couldn't help but ask, noticing that the further they got from where they came in, the less it looked like a sewer.

"We're in an abandoned military tunnel." Elita-1 admitted, speeding up as Orion tried to keep up. "When I was a cadet trying to join the High Guard, I accidentally found old map files that led to several underground routes beneath the city."

"Elita, you stole military records?!" Orion was perplexed, but his question was incredibly ignored by Elita for a few seconds, as if it were nothing.

"No, it's not theft if those routes are abandoned." Elita-1 scoffed, wanting to play dumb to irritate Orion. "I don't know why these tunnels existed originally, but when I explored this place, I found something quite interesting."

Elita-1 stopped running as they approached several boulders that sealed off the passageway, where the wall, floor and ceiling were scattered with several black marks and cracks, which Orion quickly identified as the marks of detonated explosions.

"This place has been blown up." Orion reasoned, now completely consumed by curiosity, not even imagining what he might find.

"These rocks are magnetized, so be careful when moving them." Elita-1 picked up one rock and placed it under the other like a magnet in an impossible position to prove that she was telling the truth.

"Shouldn't we literally be drawn to them like a meteor is drawn to a planet's orbit?" Orion asked, watching as Elita casually moved the rocks around, stacking them as if she were creating a sculpture.

"Look closely at the rocks and you'll see." Elita tossed a small stone into Orion's hands, making him use his optical lenses to examine it closely, causing him to open his eyes in surprise.

"This is Energon mineral! But how? Shouldn't it be in the deep layers of Cybertron?" Orion looked at Elita, searching for answers.

Elita smiled, knowing that Orion's questions would soon be answered when he saw it for himself. "You will find it easy to understand when I show you."

Elita and Orion removed a few more rocks, finally revealing a hand-dug tunnel that Elita had made herself while exploring, a tunnel large enough for her to fit through, but through which Orion had to squeeze, inevitably scratching his body armor in places.

As they both crossed the narrow tunnel, Elita looked at Orion and signaled by placing her index finger on her own lips, making it clear that they were both to remain silent.

<[Don't say anything from now on, we have to go through an extremely complicated place.]> Elita hesitated a little and used sign language, it was very clear that she didn't want Orion to panic, because the first time she ventured into this place, she almost died of fright.

<[Okay, but I hope it's worth it.]> Orion replied, knowing very well how to use sign language to communicate, but this left him even more confused as to why this was necessary.

As they advanced, the tunnel Elita had dug with her hands revealed itself to be a large lighted cavern, with several Energon crystals subtly glowing blue, giving the place an exotic beauty. However, Orion Pax's impressed expression slowly faded when he saw hundreds of transparent eggs, more than ten meters high, with familiar faces that an archivist like him could easily identify.

"Insecticons." Orion whispered, barely audible, but enough to make Elita tense and she quickly put her hand over his mouth.

<[Are you trying to kill us both?! The Insecticons are asleep, don't make any noise, let's walk quietly without touching anything.]> Elita signaled, making Orion think for a few seconds before agreeing to follow her.

<[Elita, why are there Insecticons here? They should be in the underground caverns deep inside Cybertron.]> Orion looked at Elita, worried, but mostly at the huge nest of insecticons, and the realization that they were literally under the city made him even more afraid. A swarm capable of destroying an entire city in a matter of hours, sleeping like a roommate under everyone's noses.

<[This group of Insecticons dug a tunnel from underground to here in search Energon and leader. When I first got here, noticed that they were without queen, so had no choice but come up wait for new queen be born them.]> Elita explained, motioning to a purple cocoon attached to the ceiling that glowed a subtle neon color with every pulse of energy it produced. <[The only reason I did not report this was because of the danger causing destruction entire city, but have heard that Insecticons hate being on surface, so it will be long before they return underground when queen's cocoon is completely ready.]> Her explanation made sense to Orion, even though it was obviously the first time in his life that he was as tense as he was right now.

Orion quickly understood that it was not the permanent home of this nest of Insecticons that made him sigh with relief; he also knew how the Insecticons worked, having obviously studied them in the archives and their behavior; The species itself has always followed the orders of a queen to keep the hive in balance in a unified and shared mind, with several important functions for Cybertron itself, such as controlling cybernetic pests that try to devour the Energon that feeds the core of the planet itself, since they are responsible for maintaining the natural release of Energon throughout the planet until it can be extracted and turned into a source of energy to power society, an ecological function.

The problem was that Insecticons were incredibly violent to anyone outside the hive, especially when it came to protecting their own queen. As a result, it wasn't uncommon for confrontations with other groups of Insecticons to occur, always resulting in population control for the species. Even though they were all physically more powerful than a normal Cybertronian, they were looked down upon and disrespected by many bots, who saw them as nothing more than wild, mindless creatures. Although there were studies showing that they could have their own individuality, like the queens of each hive, that they were sentient, this was not really proven because it would be extremely difficult and dangerous to study them without risking a swarm attack.

<[Wait.] > Orion grabbed Elita's arm to get her attention. <[You said they were waiting for the queen to be born, where are we anyway? Why is there so much Energon in this place close city?]>

Elita smiled and decided to keep the mystery, she approached a wall and began to climb it, noticing Orion growing anxious at not having his questions answered. She motioned for him to follow, and since he's not crazy about being alone in a nest of sleeping Insecticons, it didn't take him long to climb.

Orion couldn't help but feel a strange sensation as he looked at the cocoon where the queen was developing, but he decided to ignore it and continue climbing to a small passage where Elita was waiting for him.

When they finally finished sneaking through the passage, they both came face to face with a metal wall that was bathed in a golden color, like gold. Elita pointed to a vertical staircase that led to a golden hatch at the top of which were several ancient symbols of cyberglyphs that did not belong to the dialect used today.

Elita lowered a lever with a little effort and managed to open the passage, causing a pressing sound to be heard as the locks unlocked, revealing a light that forced her and Orion to close their eyes for a moment until they got used to the illumination.

Elita went up with Orion behind her, both of them entering a completely golden room, accompanied by thirteen giant images of various Transformers molded into the wall, with only a single door to this room besides the hatch the two had just used, which was obviously an unconventional passage.

"We're here." Elita put her hands on her hips while her eyes searched for something or someone in the room.

"Where are we, anyway?" Orion looked around the room, not knowing where he was, but recognizing the figures on the walls as the legendary Thirteen Primes.

Elita, looking at Orion, noticed the presence of the only being or object in the room, hovering silently behind Orion, making her smile as she imagined the fright her friend would have. "I recommend not screaming when you look back."

Orion Pax widened his eyes for a moment, suspecting that Elita was playing a trick on him. The moment he looked back, he instinctively fell to the ground and walked a few feet away, unable to believe what his eyes were seeing.

"That... that..." Orion pointed to the golden icosahedron-shaped object that approached and hovered next to Elita as if nothing had happened.

"I'm a woman of my word, I told you I'd take you to a special place." Elita grabbed the Allspark with one hand and pushed it toward Orion, sending him floating toward the archivist, who was clearly afraid to touch Cybertron's most imposing relic.

Orion didn't know what to do, bow down to the Allspark or scold Elita for literally bringing him to a place no one dared to go, right where the Cybertronian life-giver, the main pillar of his planet's society, resided. "Why did you bring me to the Allspark Temple?"

"You were obviously upset by your brother's strange behavior, and I thought it would be good for you to meet the Allspark to strengthen your resolve." Elita-1 sat on the floor in the lotus position and motioned for the Allspark to float to her. She held it with both hands and placed it between her legs as if it were a pet, much to Orion's bewilderment as he watched in disbelief. "He's pretty lonely, he goes a long time without anyone to keep him company."

Orion was still surprised to see Elita casually holding the Allspark as if nothing had happened, as if she had been doing this for a long time. "How long have you been doing this, or rather, how long have you been invading this temple?"

"I started exploring the underground about the same time I left the Autobot Academy. When I found the nest of sleeping Insecticons here and went to investigate in the library where we first met." Elita-1 confessed, finally making Orion understand why she went to the IACON library in the first place, and how their friendship began. "Since Insecticons are only found in places with large amounts of Energon, I investigated why they were there, so you can imagine my surprise when I found the Allspark here."

"The Allspark has been creating a queen for them ever since..." Orion whispered, looking at the Allspark, who was unfazed by Elita's gentle touch. "Now I understand, the tunnel we used is one of the passages used in the war during the Age of Primes to transport the Allspark to different locations so that the Quintessons could not locate it. Therefore, this temple is one of the places designed to hide him."

"I guess that's it, you know I'm not very good at history." Elita-1 looked at the Allspark, feeling the immeasurable titanic power it radiated. "He's a bit lonely, his guardians almost never come to keep him company, it's a shame to have nothing to do in this room, it must be torturous even for him." The gentle way she said it made it clear to Orion that she seemed to have a strange friendship with the relic.

"Does he talk to you?" Orion asked, very curious, as there were rumors that the Allspark had some consciousness, but it had never been proven, as it was usually isolated so that no one could interfere with its continuous donation of Energon and generation of life for new Cybertronians. An extremely strict law that not even the High Council dares break, knowing that the entire population would be enraged.

"No, but I feel it, it's like I can sense his emotions, he just wants a friend to keep him company." Elita grabbed the Allspark and held it out to Orion.

Orion took the Allspark with great reluctance, with obvious fear, but his conflicting emotions quickly settled as he felt the power of the Allspark, its pure and life-giving nature, making him see infinite stars around him as if they were sparks from the past and the future. "It's incredible..." He whispered, but enough to make Elita smile. "Some files said that Onyx Prime was the one who interacted with the Allspark the most, as if he could literally talk to it at any time, but I read another story that Megatronus Prime had a sensitivity to communicate with it when he was protected in the Temple of the Thirteen."

"So it's pretty obvious that part of the story is true, he's quite sensitive." Elita smiled, seeing how Orion was much calmer now that he literally saw the being that created him.

"What do we do now?" Orion asked, releasing the Allspark and letting it float towards Elita. 

"We can stay here for a while, but we should go back the way we came." Elita couldn't help but laugh as she noticed how Orion tensed when he knew he had to return to the Insecticon hive. "Either through the hatch or through this door and be condemned for the rest of our lives for the crime of breaking into the Temple of the Allspark."

"Why do you always get me into trouble?" Orion asked, feeling the bad feeling come back to cover his being.

"Life is an adventure, I won't let you die in that library until you get rusty." Elita replied, making Orion sigh and then smile a little at her joke.