"We are at a historic moment in the history of the United States of America. I am here at the point where the army is positioning itself and creating a perimeter in the region!" Said the blonde journalist with blue eyes, making a small signal with her hand for the cameraman to show the dozens of tanks pointing toward the mysterious energy dome. "It's been 12 hours since the first video was posted on the Internet, revealing some kind of energy dome around the forest, stretching for dozens and dozens of kilometers. What caused this is still a matter of debate, it is not known if it is due to some kind of technology from some country or if it is something else."
The cameraman turns the camera and focuses directly on the large number of people trying to see the power dome, many of them with weapons in their hands or others with conspiracy posters, being blocked by soldiers and police.
The journalist runs awkwardly, careful not to break her new high heels, through a careless opening of the soldiers with her cameraman partner, able to get a closer look at the event that had drawn protesters from all over the world, she approaches an older man who seemed to be responsible for the isolation of the region.
"Sir, sir, can you tell us what's going on? What could this mean for our country?" The journalist said, quickly cornering the veteran soldier before he could chase her away. "Is this by any chance an attack from some country? Or some kind of experimental weapon?"
The war veteran looked into the camera with an expression of surprise and astonishment. Fortunately, he realized that he could not just turn them away, because the American people wanted to know the truth about what was happening to their country, and expelling the journalists who were covering the event live could cause panic if they showed weakness.
"We are reorganizing our troops, the forest is huge and the area we need to monitor will take some time to fully inspect to understand the threat level and study what it is." The veteran replied, puffing out his chest with determination and pride for his nation. "Fortunately, our air support is fully operational, with our fifth generation fighters flying overhead, ready to unleash all military might in a possible battle."
"Possible battle?! Do you think this is an attack?" said the journalist, knowing that she was leading the engagement and viewership of the news about the giant energy dome that had mysteriously appeared.
"We are just preparing for the worst case scenario, it is the duty of the army to protect our homeland and citizens." The soldier replied, looking back to make sure the giant metal forest was still quiet, without any unexpected surprises.
"Sir, has the army sent men there to investigate the site?" The journalist asked, using all her experience and charisma to manipulate the pace of the conversation in her favor and get a big scoop.
"We are about to send our soldiers to that place, all trained and prepared for the expedition." The soldier said, seeing in the distance some soldiers in radiation suits. "It is a complex situation that we have called upon the best soldiers of our nation to deal with this incident."
The journalist sighed to catch her breath and brought the microphone to her mouth. "Why not use drones or robots to investigate without endangering the lives of these brave people?"
The veteran soldier sighed, knowing what the journalist was trying to provoke. "We have tried, but anything electrical or mechanical that goes through that barrier will cause serious damage to the system within seconds, so it is best to go in the traditional way."
"Did we have any deaths in this whole incident?" the journalist asked as the cameraman filmed the helicopters flying overhead, lighting up the place, while a fighter jet flew at high speed in the background, almost imperceptibly.
"Unfortunately, some teenagers entered the barrier and exposed their bodies to so much radiation that their organs fried in seconds, so anyone who wants to cross the barrier, do not do so under any circumstances! The amount of radiation in this place will kill anything organic in seconds without proper protection." Said the soldier, looking at his soldiers who were about to jump into unknown territory with regret, because he had a bad feeling.
"If there's a risk of contamination, why isn't everyone wearing protective clothing?" the journalist asked, only a little more tense this time, as she finally understood the risk she was taking by getting closer, even believing inside that she was stupidly exposing herself to deadly doses of radiation, but because of her training she didn't show that reaction.
"Fortunately, the barrier acts as a boundary zone for this radiation, meaning the radiation itself is only within the barrier, with no sign of leakage from outside the barrier." The veteran soldier explained, noticing that one of his subordinates was making a subtle signal, warning that the exploration operation was about to begin. "If you'll excuse me, I have men to manage."
The journalist made a subtle expression of relief, she looked at the cameraman and smiled convincingly. "As you can see, the situation is under control of the legal authorities, now we just have to see what will happen to this forest or how our country will be affected by something so mysterious...." Before she could finish, a large, violent tremor caused everyone to lose their balance and some to scream in terror. "What... was that!" The journalist said, grabbing her microphone and looking towards the forest as dozens of soldiers aimed their weapons, ready to fire tons of ammunition. "Keep filming, don't miss anything!"
The cameraman pointed at the metal forest, zooming in to get more clarity, but maybe that wasn't such a good idea, because his camera saw several figures camouflaged in the shadows of the night between the trees and leaves like razors.
The soldiers using the night vision goggles saw nothing at first, but when they focused their vision on the small, subtle movement, their expressions turned to genuine astonishment and fear.
A novice soldier accidentally fires his weapon, causing his comrades to instinctively fire in sequence, creating a firestorm, discharging the ammunition that hits the barrier, causing the ammunition to disintegrate, easily destroying the molecules in the composition of the projectiles, without the soldiers noticing due to the confusion.
"CEASE FIRE, CEASE FIRE, YOU IDIOTS!" Shouted the captain, slapping his soldiers on the back to calm them down.
After 20 or 30 seconds of consecutive shots, the soldiers and policemen stopped shooting and looked at the barrier, which was intact. The only thing that moved, while everyone was paralyzed with tension, was the smoke from the guns that rose into the air and slowly disappeared thanks to the wind.
The moment of suspense turned into deep terror as small, glowing red eyes suddenly appeared in the darkness. The shadowy figures that had been hiding in the tree trunks or between the sheets of metal became more visible as a small buzzing sound was heard, like a swarm of insects.
The policemen, soldiers or civilians who could somehow see those little red eyes grouped in the trees became even more frightened when they heard a kind of female voice saying something extremely inaudible with a hidden anger that they could not even understand, not knowing that they had angered all the beings in the forest, especially the guardian of the forest.
[°■○■○ ■-■-■-- ■○■○■ ○■-■■-○ □-■-○■■○○■ ○■○○■ ○■-□--□ ○□ ○ ■○■○■-□ -■○□○■○□○■○■○■○ ■○■○■○ ■○■ ○■○■○ ■○■○■○ □--□ ○--■-■]
Before anyone could do anything or fire a shot from a weapon, hundreds or thousands of biorobotic insects flew out of the energy barrier and attacked the humans like a swarm of angry bees to protect the hive.
"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH"
"SOMEBODY HELP ME!!!"
"SOMEBODY DO SOMETHING!!!"
"THIS MONSTER TOOK OFF MY LEG!!!"
"HELP!!!"
( THE TRANSMISSION WAS INTERRUPTED DUE TO TECHNICAL PROBLEMS )
***
Jack turned off the TV, practically shocked by the reflection on his face that clearly showed him what he was feeling. The same expression of surprise was shared by Raf, who was at his side, also shocked, without even looking at his laptop.
"Oh my God, what just happened?" Jack asked himself, still trying to process what he had just seen.
"I think now the whole world knows that robot aliens exist." Raf commented, feeling a great chill as he remembered the human screams of horror and pain.
Optimus watched the television broadcast, worried and afraid for the lives of the people who were possibly injured or most likely dead from what little the broadcast showed.
The feeling of guilt completely covered Optimus' heart, he knew deep down that there was no way to avoid what was happening because the sequence of events had been so sudden that it was impossible to predict or control the consequences. As the last Prime, he felt responsible for protecting all life on planet Earth, not just Earth, but the universe, and now he felt he was failing once again, as he had on Cybertron.
The greatest guilt Optimus felt in his entire life was when he threw the Allspark out of Cybertron to protect it from Megatron. Many could say it was an irrational decision, but it was the right decision to protect the future generation or hope of Cybertron, but the consequences were terrible many years after the war began. Without the Allspark to generate energy for Cybertron, Energon slowly became scarce, forcing the war to spread throughout the universe and prolonging the exhausting time of the conflict.
Today, it can be said that the Cybertronians may be on the brink of extinction. Of course, there are many out there, hidden among the stars, waiting to see who will emerge victorious from the war, but because the war lasted so long, it was difficult to determine the number of survivors who fled or took refuge in small colonies with their own Energon supply.
"Optimus, it's not your fault, there was no way to predict what would happen, it's Megatron's fault, he destroyed our planet and now he plans to destroy this one." Arcee said with crossed arms, because she heard very well what happened in the transmission. She was furious, mostly because of the illusion that the damned leader of the Decepticons was dead, a lie that had falsely relieved her soul for weeks.
"What's going to happen now that everyone has seen this?" Raf asked, adjusting his glasses.
"Raf, it is quite possible that your government and other nations of the world will take some offensive action because of what happened, which would lead to a greater catastrophe, since it is quite clear that the forest reacts when it is attacked." Ratchet said, feeling mentally tired, something rare for him. "The only way I can see to control the situation is to find out exactly what this forest is so that we can have a plan to remedy the situation. We all heard that mysterious voice in the transmission, it's not something random."
"You mean the forest is literally alive and there is a dominant consciousness within it that can control the animals as a defensive measure?" Jack asked, anxiously tapping his foot on the ground. "I don't think there is such a big Cybertronian or Transformer, is there?"
"Well, it's still difficult to determine exactly what this forest is. We don't know if it's an artificial intelligence or a giant transformer." Arcee said, remembering for a moment one of the greatest sacrifices made so that the Autobots could leave Cybertron in the last great battle. "But just so you know, Jack, on our home planet there were beings we called Titans, Cybertronians of great mass, the size of entire cities. Unfortunately, they all died due to the scarcity of Energon. The last to survive was Metroplex, who gave all of his life force to fuel our escape ship."
Arcee's report to the legendary Titan caused Ratchet, Bumblebee, Bulkhead and Optimus to bow their heads for a moment in respect for the last Titan who gave his life to light the Torch of Hope so that the Autobots could survive the final day of the war on Cybertron.
Miko miraculously understood that it seemed to be a more delicate subject, and fortunately kept her questions to herself, even more so when she saw Bulkhead's sad reaction to hearing the Titan's name. Though she was in awe at the very thought of a robot the size of a city, not even imagining that Cybertron itself was already a planetary-scale Transformer.
Before the conversation could return to the main topic, Agent Fowler suddenly appeared, stepping out of the elevator with a less than happy look on his face, as if someone had kicked his ass or stolen his baseball.
"PRIME!!! You got a lot of explaining to do! What the hell is this Forest? Do you have any idea how close my superiors are to cutting my head off!!!" Fowler yelled, slapping his hands hard on the railing.