Disclaimer: I own nothing.
AN: Another fic that came to me while I was skating. It kind of formed years ago with RiD characters but I never wrote it down.
P(ost)AN: Char is pronounced SH-ar. Calyp is short for Calypso. And Boom-boom is a G1 reference.
"Guys? What just happened?" Sideswipe asked. He, Hot Shot, Optimus, Blurr, Wheeljack, and the kids had been stranded in a canyon after a landslide. Then out of nowhere a bright light had consumed them and dropped them in this strange room.
"No clue. Hey what happened our bodies?" Hot Shot asked, surprised to find himself in a human body.
"You're apparently human now" Alexis said.
"Damnit! Not only am I stuck with Autobots but I'm stuck in a human body too" Wheeljack huffed. Two hours in a canyon with Sideswipe, the kids, and Hot Shot had made him irritable. Optimus and Blurr really hadn't bothered him that much.
"Get over it". This advice came from a boy they hadn't noticed before, who was sitting on a couch that they also hadn't noticed before. Then they realized he looked an awful lot like Rad with a few minor differences. His hair was spikier, his clothes bordered on Goth, and he had three piercings in his left ear.
"Doppelgangers again" he sighed. "You guys first timers?" he asked looking them all over. "Judging by your blank expressions I'd say yes. Here's the Complete Idiots Guide to Doppelgangers. There are infinite dimensions out there; in each dimension there is a different version of yourself and everyone else in your world. We are all bound physically to our doppelganger; if they're in pain you're in pain, if they die you die. Y'all getting this?" he asked. Everyone blankly nodded.
"Ok. Your doppelganger can look nothing like you. They can be male, female, have twelve toes, be in love with someone you hate; it all depends on their circumstances. Your worst enemy in one life can be your brother in another," the boy explained. "You also need to find your doppelganger and touch them to get back home. But you also can't go back unless all the living members of your group have touched their doppelganger too".
"How do we find our doppelganger?" Sideswipe, the first to process everything he'd just been told, said.
"That's the tricky part. I don't suppose you guys got the oh so helpful little crystals that glow when your doppelganger is nearby and point in their direction when their in the same room, did you? They usually appear wrapped around your wrist on a string," the boy said. Everyone looked at his or her wrist. No crystals.
"Damn. So much for this being easy. Stupid balance" he muttered.
"Balance?" Optimus asked.
"Doppelgangers exist on their plane to provide balance. If a doppelganger is sent to another plane for to long the balance is destroyed and all the universes self-destruct"
Everyone's eyes grew roughly to the size of hubcaps.
"Don't worry. You can be off you plane for weeks, sometimes months without causing any major damage" the kid assured them. "Now back to finding your doppelgangers. Since you didn't get those crystals your doppelgangers must look like you. Taking a wild guess I'd say you're my doppelganger" the boy said walking up to Rad, he held out his hand "I'm Shay" he introduced himself.
"Rad" Rad said taking Shay's hand. Their hands glowed when they touched.
"Yup. You're my doppelganger" Shay said.
"Do you have any idea who our doppelgangers are?" Sideswipe asked.
"Well you and Blondie over there are easy to figure out" Shay said nodding toward Hot Shot who now sported blonde hair and blue eyes, he could easily pass for Rad's older brother.
"Really?"
"Yeah. They should both be in the family room," Shay said leaving what the guessed was the lounge. The building they were in had no windows and looked like a smaller, darker, drabber version of the Autobot base.
They followed Shay down a dark hallway that split off in different directions. The one they followed led them to a large room with a big screen TV a couch, a recliner, and a card table. The two occupants of the room didn't even bother looking up as they entered.
"HA!" Hot Shot laughed as he realized which one was Sideswipe's doppelganger. "Your doppelganger's a girl!"
Said girl looked up from where she was sitting at the card table. "Shay, who's the idiot?" she asked.
"Char's doppelganger. Just ignore him Calyp" Shay recommended.
"Char, your doppelganger's making fun of your favorite little sister," Calyp called over to Char.
"Whatever" Char said with little interest as he channel surfed. Calyp glared at him.
"Calyp, you can kill him later. Right now we need to find these guys' doppelgangers" Shay told her.
"Fine" Calyp sighed, gracefully uncurling from her chair and standing up. Hot Shot's stifled giggles stopped as they got a full view of her. She was, in a word, hot. She was wearing a black tank top and a wraparound skirt that looked like it belonged on beachgoer in the Caribbean. She had ice blue eyes, raven black hair, and a pair of blue, visor like, sunglasses pushed up on here head.
"Daaammmnnn" Hot Shot said, mouth-dropping open. This got Char's attention away from the TV.
"I know that 'Damn' wasn't just for my baby sister," He said standing up and marching threateningly toward his doppelganger.
"Ummm. Sister. For real? Not just being really really close friends?" Hot Shot asked backing away.
"Yes. Sister, as in same mom and dad, sister" Char growled. Hot Shot looked at Calyp again.
"Damnit!" He said, looking her over again.
"Ok, less incest, more working. Do you two recognize any of them?" Shay asked.
"That one looks like Shayton" Calyp said pointing at Optimus.
"Shayton?" Optimus asked looking at Shay, recognizing the similarity in the names.
"My Dad" he said with a shrug. "He didn't like Junior and SJ is just stupid".
"Optimus is Rad's dad in another dimension?" Hot Shot said.
"Not really. Shayton found me dumped in an alley behind a whorehouse. We guess one of the employees couldn't afford the five dollar cab fare to the abortion clinic," Shay said. "Although I do have the strangest memory of a really big guy with a deep voice telling me to wiggle safely and he'd be back with the milk soon" Shay said more to himself than the others.
"Hey. This one looks like Boom-boom" Calyp said pointing at Wheeljack.
"Boom-boom?" Wheeljack said skeptically.
BOOM!
A loud explosion rocked the room. The door everyone had assumed was a closet flew open revealing a figure that was quickly pulling off the full body mechanic suit that had somehow caught fire. Once the suit was off the person who'd been wearing it threw it to the ground and stomped on it several times.
First thing everyone realized once the fire was out was that the person was a woman, the second thing they realized was she was wearing very little clothing, the third thing was that she looked like a female Wheeljack.
"Boom-boom?"
"Boom-boom" Calyp nodded.
"Yes?" Boom-boom looked up at the group. She was wearing a small bathing suit top and daisy duke shorts. Her hair was platinum blonde with two black highlights.
"Damn" Hot Shot said, jaw dropping again.
"Eyes off the girl" Char called from the couch. He'd gone back to watching TV.
Boom-boom's attention went to him and she went and stood in front of him.
"Boomer, I'm trying to watch TV" Char complained.
"You'd rather watch TV than me" she said straddling his lap. Char looked at her, picked up the remote, and turned off the TV. "I thought so," She said kissing him.
"Hey! We got the young, impressionable eyes of our boss' son in here," Calyp said. Char and Boom-boom ignored her. "The son our boss wants to see grow up to be a morally upstanding member of the underworld mob" she said. At this Char and Boom-boom, without parting lips or opening their eyes, pulled their wallets out and managed to blindly find a couple of fifties that they then held out.
"I didn't see a thing," Shay said grabbing the bills.
"I did" a dark haired man said from the doorway. Char and Boom-boom jumped up.
"Hi Dad" Shay said counting out how much money he'd just got. He didn't tell Boom-boom that she'd given him a hundred by accident.
"You except bribes?" Shayton asked.
"It's keeps you from having to pay me an allowance" Shay said after pocketing the money.
"Is that where you got the money for the gaming system?" Shayton asked.
"Maaaaaybe" Shay said.
"Umm.. Can we get back to finding our doppelgangers please?" Alexis asked drawing the attention of the group back to her and Carlos.
"Does anybody have any clue who their doppelgangers are?" Shayton asked. Everyone except Shay shrugged.
"Shay?" Shayton asked.
"Umm. Possibly" Shay said avoiding eye contact with everyone.
"Shay" Shayton's voice took on a sterner tone.
"There a couple kids at my school that …could be their doppelgangers" Shay admitted.
A collective groan was heard from the doppelgangers.
"What's the matter? He knows where they're at" Hot Shot pointed out.
"Shay goes to some fancy school up town. It's where the Barons send their kids to get an education," Char said bitterly.
"Barons?" Carlos asked.
"The rich people that live up town. They wouldn't be caught dead around here," Shayton said.
Calyp's face broke out in a huge grin. " Looks like we're kidnapping Baron's tonight".
"Dude! This is awesome!" Carlos yelled as they spun around the corner in Calyp's car, a pretty little blue convertible.
"Are you insane!" Pablo, Carlos' doppelganger, asked as he held on for dear life. Pablo wasn't very happy that the lackey's of one of the biggest mob bosses in town had decided to drop in and kidnap him for reasons unknown.
"Ignore Pablo. He's never done anything fun in his life!" Shay yelled from the front passenger seat. He always rode shotgun with Calyp.
"I resent that!" Pablo yelled.
"Cops. Always freaking Cops" Char muttered to himself as his Mustang went airborne for a second. On the plus side they had the red head's doppelganger. The red head and her doppelganger were clinging to each other in the seat next to him. They were not impressed with his driving.
"Hi Mandy" Shay said as Alexis and her doppelganger entered the Family Room, which apparently doubled as the War Room.
"Hi Shay. Did they grab you too?" Mandy asked looking at the Autobot's doppelganger fearfully.
"I kind of live here. Long story. Have you had any experience with doppelgangers by chance?" Shay asked, somewhat hopefully. Mandy gave him a blank look. Shay's face fell as he signaled Calyp to get the knock out gas.
'So much for getting her to go out on a date with me', Shay though as Mandy passed out.
"Did everyone touch their doppelganger?" Shayton asked eager to have the doppelgangers gone so he could get back to running his criminal empire and raising his family in peace.
"Yes" was the unanimous reply.
"Ok, bye then" Shay waved goodbye as the Armada people vanished.
"Glade that's over", Shayton sighed collapsing onto the couch, then jumping up again as he remembered what Char and Boom-boom had done on it earlier.
Just then the roof was lifted up.
"Sorry it took so long. I got your milk" A voice that sounded like Arnold Schwarsinagger (SP? The governor of California and the Terminator) said to Shay.
"A thirty foot demon with milk, that's something you don't see every day" Blaine, who is Blurr's doppelganger and hasn't been mentioned before because Blurr's so quiet I forgot about him, said.
"You're back? I thought Calyp still had you tied up to her bed-" Boom-boom was cut off by Calyp hitting her over the head with an ironing board.
"I am not just any demon! I am Grandmaster Pooky!" The giant yelled. "Now I'm going to take my baby back!" Pooky picked up Shay and started walking.
"Your baby?" Shayton asked, eye twitching.
"I found him in produce aisle of grocery store" Pooky said.
"Some much for figuring out where I came from" Shay sighed.
THE END!
AN: Guess who Pooky is. Shay's origin will eventually become the focus of the fic that will evetually result from this.