Alright, first chapter of the sequel! I'll admit, I'm kinda nervous about it. The first chapter is always the scariest to write for me for some reason. Hope you all like it.

I don't own Transformers.

For most people, a typical workday involves a nine or twelve hour long work shift at some office, factory, hospital, restaurant, or so forth. They might be stuck in a small cubical typing out statistics all day, running errands, and getting trapped in boring meetings. The worse things that could happen to them are that they might get stuck in traffic, get yelled at by their boss, or get fired.

My typical workday involves tracking down egomaniacal anarchists and trying to prevent them from causing mayhem and destruction. The worse things that could happen to me are I might get captured and painfully tortured, or blown to bits by gunfire and explosions. The latter of which might just become a possibility if the M.E.C.H. agents start improving their aim.

But right now I wasn't too worried. They couldn't seem to hit anything smaller than a Decepticon, and I was in human form.

"Seriously, where did you guys learn to shoot?" I taunted from my hiding spot behind a large boulder. "At one of those target games they have at state fairs?"

Another round of bullets whizzed by me. These guys really hated my guts.

So much for asking them to be Facebook buddies.

"Darby you're really making a nuisance of yourself." I heard Silas call.

"It's what I live for." I yelled back. "My single pride and joy in life is pissing off bad guys like you, Leland."

It got so quiet I could've heard a pin drop.

"What did you call me?" Silas growled.

I peered over the rock and smirked at him. "Leland. As in Leland Bishop, your real name. Though I can't blame you for changing your name to Silas, you must've gotten the shit beaten out of you as a kid with a name like Leland. Maybe that's why you're out to destroy the known world. You know you could just go to therapy for that."

I barely dodged the explosion that disintegrated the boulder. My jacket was actually smoldering. I took it off and started stamping on it.

"Come on." I whined. "Do you know how many of these I go through?"

The only answer I got was another volley of gunfire. I jumped into the trees, using the spirits of Anansi and Bast to scramble along the branches. Waiting high among the pines, I watched as the leather-suited lackeys fanned out, guns drawn as they searched for me. One unfortunate leather-head stood directly beneath me. The tattoo on my right hip tingled as I summoned Anansi. The giant spider appeared in the branches beside me.

I grinned at him. "Let's have some fun, shall we?"

Anansi clicked in agreement. The spirit may not have been much of a talker, but the trickster was easy to get along with and one of the most useful spirits in my arsenal. Anansi poised over the M.E.C.H. member, not so much as twitching then quick as a flash the spider shot a thick web down, ensnaring its prey and pulling the unfortunate agent upward. With one well aimed punch from me, the guy was knocked out. One down, three more to go. I leapt through the branches to where two of them stood. I signaled to Anansi and the spider dropped its hostage down upon them. They went down with a thud. The third member came rushing over. I jumped down from my hiding spot, lashing out in a kick worthy of any good kung-fu movie. The guy went flying, skull smacking into the trunk of a tree.

Geez, these guys were easy to take out.

As I was tying them up with the help of Anansi, I heard the whirr of an engine starting up.

"Shit." I hissed as I sprinted back through the trees.

The M.E.C.H. helicopters were starting to take off. Feeling incredibly reckless, I ran to the nearest one, jumping up and wrapping my arms around the chopper's landing skid as it took to the air. The helicopter was several hundred feet up and above some low hanging clouds before the realized they had an unwelcomed hitchhiker. The door to the chopper opened and I found myself nose to barrel with a gun. Silas grinned smugly at me.

"I commend you for your persistence." He said. "But this is where the ride ends for you."

I grinned. "Okie-dokie."

I let go just as a bullet whizzed past my ear.

There's nothing quite like free-falling from several hundred feet up. It's certainly a rush plummeting towards the ground. Especially when I didn't have a parachute. Then again, it's not like I needed one. In a blur I transformed from Pretender mode directly to dragon mode. The world spun around me as my size grew, my skin shifted to metal armor, my spinal struts realigned, and wings and a tail appeared. Only a few feet from the ground, I snapped my wings opened and soared upward. I broke through the clouds and searched for the helicopters. They were a good distance away. I was tempted to shoot them down with my dragon fire, but killing them wasn't a part of my orders. Chasing them in this form was a no-no too; M.E.C.H. had yet to learn about my new…upgrades, and the Autobots, myself included, wanted to keep it that way for the time being.

A buzzing sound filled my mind as two familiar spirits entered my consciousness.

"We destroy bad helicopters?" asked Euros, the spirit of the east wind.

"No, not today guys." I answered in my mind.

"No destroy helicopters?" Zephyros, the spirit of the west wind, asked plaintively. Those two really had a thing against helicopters.

"How about you cause some really bad air turbulence?" I offered.

The spirits buzzed excitedly. "Yay, air turbulence!"

I chuckled as they whisked off after M.E.C.H. Though Euros and Zephyros acted like toddlers on Redbull, they were nifty to have in an air fight. When they'd discovered that I had become the dragon, they'd been eager to enter into a contract with me. Apparently it was a big honor in the wind spirit world to be allied to the dragon. Guess I was kind of like a celebrity to them.

No autographs please.

Tucking my wings, I dived down to the scene. I transformed to bi-pedal as I hit the ground. The area was littered with spare tools and weaponry, but that wasn't what had my attention. It was the hunks of glowing blue crystal that made me frown. Energon: the substance that makes up the life-blood of all Cybertronians. If M.E.C.H. was mining it then that was definite cause for concern. They had already made their interest of Cybertronian biology known when they had tried to slice and dice Optimus, but then they'd gone after Bumblebee and stolen the poor 'Bot's t-cog. Bee had managed to get it back, though the t-cog was nearly destroyed in the process. And where had I been during all of this? Back in Seattle clearing out my old apartment and visiting my father's grave with Mom. Was I pissed when I found out what had happened? Very. Would I make M.E.C.H. pay for what they'd done? Hell yes. But right now my orders were to simply track and observe. And occasionally harass.

I opened a comm link to base. :Val to base:

Ratchet replied a moment later. :What is your status?:

:Found our M.E.C.H. buddies, they flew off before I could do much damage though.:

:What were they doing?: Ratchet asked.

:I'll give you three guesses.: I said.

I heard Ratchet sigh. :Harvesting more energon.:

:Bingo. And it looks like they picked this deposit pretty clean.:

:I'll ready a groundbridge.:

:Oh, you might want to give a shout out to Agent Fowler.: I said. :I managed to catch a couple goons, they're tied up in the woods.:

:Are they intact?: Ratchet asked.

:Geez, what do you think I did to them? Skin them alive? As tempting as that would be, no I didn't do anything to them. Other than some splitting headaches and a new fear of spiders, they should be just fine.:

:I'll alert Fowler then.:

I turned off my comm and waited for the groundbridge. As I looked around I noticed a small patch of white on the ground. I groaned when I realized what it was: my sneaker, or rather, what was left of it. This made the third pair in two weeks, and the rest of my clothes were probably in no better condition. I smacked my head, mentally berating myself. I knew I'd be entering a situation where I might have needed to transform yet I did not switch to my Pretender apparel. I'd learned that my Pretender mode had two styles to choose from. Either the replica of the clothes I'd worn when I'd died: boots, dark jeans, grey shirt, and black jacket; or butt naked. Fun options there. Despite the convenience of the first choice, it felt odd to me. I mean, the clothes weren't really clothes they were, well, me. I couldn't take them off or change them. And they reminded me of my death which isn't something anyone wants to keep remembering. Furthermore I had all my old clothes back home. So I'd decided to cart the stuff back to Nevada. The upside is that wearing actual clothes is kind of comforting, makes me feel like I'm human again. The downside is that when I transform they tend to get shredded.

Win some lose some I guess.

I sighed, brushing the torn sneaker away with my tail just as the groundbridge appeared. I stepped though and was greeted by the sight of a grumpy Ratchet. Then again, the guy was always grumpy about something so I wasn't too worried.

"So what'd Que and Zig-zag blow up this time?" I asked.

"Nothing yet." Ratchet said.

"Well that's a nice change." I said.

"I said nothing yet." Ratchet huffed. "It's early, they've still got the whole day ahead of them."

"Oh goodie." I grumbled. I was usually the one assigned to help clean up their messes. "So where's the rest of the gang?"

"Arcee, Bulkhead, and Bumblebee are taking the children to school; Chromia and Lola are at target practice; and Optimus and Perceptor are on patrol."

"You just missed them actually." Ironhide said, walking into the main hanger.

I sighed. "Let me guess, Optimus heard I was coming and he made a run for it?"

"I believe the exact excuse was that he wanted to check out some possible subterranean energon deposits in some far corner of Russia." Ratchet said with an eye roll.

"Basically he gunned it outa here like Unicron himself was on his bumper." Ironhide said cheerfully.

For the past month and a half that I'd been here, Optimus had been avoiding me like the plague. He still spoke to me, but only if he couldn't avoid it and only if others were present. The Prime could face an entire army of Decepticons, but when I enter the room he practically runs to the nearest exit.

My shoulders slumped and my wings drooped. "He isn't making this easy for me."

"Give him time, Val." Ironhide said, cuffing me on the shoulder. "He ain't used to this sort of thing."

"It's true." Ratchet said. Oddly enough, the cranky medic had taken my side in this whole crazy situation. "For as long as I've known him, Optimus has never been romantically involved with anyone. Femmes had never shown him any interest when he was a data clerk."

"He had been what humans called a geek." Ironhide whispered to me.

"And after he became a Prime," Ratchet continued. "Optimus had no time to establish any relationships due to the war."

"Not even sure he knows how to establish a relationship." Ironhide huffed. "It doesn't help that you're hands-down the oddest femme this side of the galaxy."

"Thanks, that makes me feel better." I huffed then shook my head. "Ok, pity party over. I'm going to go find something to do. Probably get ready to clean up whatever mess Que and Zig-zag are about to make."

"You know where the cleaning supplies are." Ratchet said, turning back to the monitors.

I rolled my eyes and set off down the hall. Halfway to Que's lab a flash of silver darted in front of me. A sleek fox stood at my pedes. Of course, animals normally couldn't get into the base, but this was no animal. It was a spirit, and it belonged to Ella Longwing.

"My mistress asks that you come to camp as soon as possible." The fox said, speaking as easily as I would. "There is an important matter she must discuss with you. The camp's location is on the western edge of Montana." And with that the fox disappeared.

I stared at the spot as I pondered the message. The camp was obviously not in any danger; otherwise the message would've been more urgent. As I wondered why Ella needed to speak to me, an explosion shook the base. I groaned; looks like Zig-zag and Que got their explosion in for the day.

A faintly smoking Ziggy staggered around the corner, calling over his shoulder. "Yeah, we should definitely use a little less nitrogen next time." His blackened face grinned when he saw me. "Hey Val, you better go get the mop and bucket."

I though it over; see what Ella wants, or clean up duty? Why was I even asking myself this question?

I dashed away. "Sorry Ziggy, but there's someplace I need to be. I'll see you later. Send my regards to the mop and bucket."

I made my way to the roof of the base. I transformed and took off, turning northward. At my top speed I could easily outpace a fighter jet. I knew this because one day I'd gotten bored and followed Agent Fowler while he was practicing flight techniques, flying loops around him. So I should be at the camp in little over an hour. If there was one thing that I truly loved about my new form it was flying. It seemed odd that a metal dragon could fly so quickly with only the power of its wings, yet I cut through the air like a finely honed blade. Flying filled me with a sense of freedom and power. Here in the sky I was limitless. I roared with joy as I raced across the heavens.

I spotted the camp from my position several thousand feet up. Lazily I made my descent, gliding on drafts. I touched down in a small meadow beside the camp. A cry went up and suddenly I was surrounded by kids. The little rascals had been planning to ambush me. Now most kids would see a giant dragon and go "Ahh, a monster, run for it!" Not these kids. They saw me and went. "Look, a dragon. Let's climb on it!" I huffed and sank onto the grass, letting them scramble onto my back. Was I Valiant the Autobot, Valiant the dragon, or Valiant the Spiritus? Not to these kids, to them I was Val the jungle-gym, Val the playground equipment.

A laugh drew my attention to two approaching figures.

Lexie clapped her hands. "Alright kids. Ya'll got to get off Val now. She and Ella need to talk."

A round of disappointed "aws" were grumbled as the kids reluctantly climbed down. Once the last one was off me, I transformed to bi-pedal.

"Thanks Lexie." I said.

"No problem." Lexie called as she ushered the kids back to camp.

"I'm sorry to have to interrupt your day." Ella said.

I laughed. "Are you kidding? You got me out of cleaning duty so no complaints here. So what's up?"

"I believe I have a mission for you." She said.

That piqued my interest. After I'd joined up with the Autobots, I'd contacted Ella. The old woman had been overjoyed to see that I lived. She had been eager to help in any way she could. Ella had many contacts from around the world, so I'd asked her to keep an eye and ear out for any unusual activities that might shout "monster here." When the earth goddess Gaea had gained control of the planet a whole swarm of monsters had been released as a side effect. Some would live peacefully among humanity but others not so much. And it was my job to keep the troublemakers in line or destroy them. So far there'd been nothing out of the ordinary, but it looked like that was about to change.

"What kind of mission?" I asked.

"We've been getting some disquieting news out of Scotland." Ella said. "It appears there's trouble at Loch Ness."

Looks like Val's gonna be heading to Scotland soon. I know, no Optimus in this chapter. Don't worry he'll be in the next one. I'll try and get the next chapter up a.s.a.p.