These Paths We Tread (Autobot x OC)

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Three months and they had nothing. For three, God-forsaken months that had found absolutely no trace of the Decepticons. It was just like how things had gone two years ago, and it was infuriating.

Not only had the enemy continued to evade them, they did so after having nearly completely annihilated most of the NEST bases around the world. It had taken about another month after the battle before they had the total damage and number of casualties, and it had been horrifyingly high. Only been about thirty NEST had been set up in the major countries that had joined the program ,but in the aftermath of the "Cybertech incident"—as it had been come to be called—only about ten were left fully functional and capable of continuing on. All the rest—and the hundreds of soldiers that had occupied said bases—were gone, and showed no signs of returning. In fact, many countries had pulled out of NEST for fear of coming under Decepticon wrath again. It was also in part because the Autobot numbers had fallen to nineteen, with the missing three being the Wreckers whom were once again stationed back at NASA to continue their project.

With their numbers so low and with pressure from the Pentagon, Prime had decided they couldn't allow any of their troops to be spread out across the world. And so, all Autobots were brought back to Washington D.C's building for the Department of Health and Human Services., which—in the wake of Diego Garcia's destruction and subsequent resurrection as a memorial to the dead—had become NEST's new HQ. No Autobot was forgotten, either, and that day was one Catherine knew she would regret for a long, long time. She could barely stand to see Sam and Bumblebee part, but the yellow-armored mech's skills were needed. If there was any silver lining at all, it was that he would be allowed to visit thanks to their close proximity.

All together, the entire clean-up, restoration, and move had taken almost two months, during which they had attempted to try and locate the Decepticons. Wheeljack had recovered quickly from his wounds and so was able to work with Blaster to improve their Energon detectors, but getting them out to other countries had proved problematic due to the negative views brought on by the Cybertech incident. Most leaders did understand it wasn't the Autobots' fault, but there was no longer a sense of security to be had if they placed themselves under the wing of their Cybertronian comrades. Not to mention much of the public had begun to lean more towards protesting against the Autobots. Much to NEST's—and especially Catherine's, chagrin—there was talk of sending their metallic comrades off planet in order to lure the enemy away. However, anyone who had actually fought or encountered the Decepticons knew how foolish it was, and so the redhead did her best to ease the public. It was a slow, tedious, and sometimes impossible process, but she refused to give up.

Of course, the lack of Decepticon findings didn't help them at all. The United States government was beginning to get testy with them, although they were not so open about it this time around. The President was still on their side, but elections would be coming soon and he couldn't focus on supporting them as much as before. To make matters worse, his popularity had gone down quite a bit thanks to the Cybertech incident while his potential opponent in the next election—whom was not a fan of Autobots and NEST—was rising up steadily. Needless to say, things were not looking good for both human and Cybertronian alike.

There was one thing that helped keep them in some good faith, however; while many of the lead traitors of the Cybertech incident had been caught, there were still some at large. Fate and luck had smiled down upon NEST in that third month, as Blaster was able to find almost all the locations of Cybertech weaponry warehouses and traitor locations with ease. It was as if whatever veil had protected them had been lifted, and all they had to do was send out troops to apprehend and destroy the equipment. They did so vigorously and in the hopes of finding some clues to the Decepticons' whereabouts, but, as the third month came to its end and they hadn't found even so much as a claw mark, that hope was beginning to fade. Still, they knew they would not stop. They couldn't stop. So long as the Decepticons resided on the planet, they would continue to hunt them down until they were all vanquished.