What Barricade never expected was that, even in this situation, Saitama showed not a flicker of fear.
"This looks like a crisis to you," he said calmly, "but it hasn't reached my crisis yet."
With that, Saitama stamped hard on the pangolin mech's back and launched himself—like a human bullet—straight toward Vivian.
His speed punched through the sound barrier.
Boom!
Barricade and his crew only heard the thunderclap; by the time they refocused, Saitama was already there—Vivian wrenched free from Starscream's grasp—and the would-be captor was pinned beneath Saitama's heel, yelping for mercy.
"Vivian, don't worry. This ends now."
Saitama didn't look back at her. His eyes stayed on Barricade.
"If you'd only invaded Earth and occupied human cities, I might've shown a sliver of mercy and just knocked you back to Cybertron. But the trick you pulled today?" His voice hardened. "I'll have to take this a bit seriously—and blow you away."
Barricade's servos creaked as he forced a laugh. "Human, your bragging is hilarious! Take this!"
He feinted forward—then, terrified, triggered Plan C to run.
Boom!
A massive blast ripped through the ghost town. The building where Saitama and Vivian stood shuddered on its foundations, ready to come down.
"Cough—"
Saitama wrapped Vivian in his cape and shielded her from the collapsing debris and smoke.
"Hahaha! Didn't expect our backup, did you?" Barricade's voice crackled over the din. "We didn't beat you today, but there's always next time!"
He and his lieutenants flipped to vehicle mode and gunned it.
Saitama kicked his motorcycle to life, Vivian riding pillion, and gave chase.
He raised a hand. A red high-energy cannon formed over his forearm—and he let a shot fly straight at Barricade's tail.
"What—?!"
They were dumbstruck. However they racked their processors, they couldn't figure out where Saitama had gotten that cannon. And then the shots kept coming—one after another—leaving Barricade nowhere to run.
At last they spotted the problem: the cannon's casing was painted red and stamped with a Decepticon sigil.
Their optics narrowed in realization.
"Starscream," Barricade snarled. "That treacherous—!"
Truth was, they'd never gotten along with Starscream. If not for today's clash in the ghost town, they wouldn't have joined forces at all.
And now it seemed they were going to die because of him.
Screech—
Barricade and the others transformed back to bot mode, staggered and leaking fuel. On a human, the damage would've been called "critical."
Transformers were strange—wounded, they bled fuel; relieve themselves, it was still fuel. Just… odd.
Saitama braked the bike one-handed and kept the cannon leveled in the other. "So you finally found the guts to face me."
"Heh… never thought a human would push us this far," Barricade grated. His forearm folded into an energy cannon. "Saitama, I'll admit you're strong. Maybe you can tank a direct hit. But can the beauty behind you?"
"That's not my question," Saitama said. "My only question is whether I can finish you before you fire."
He flicked his red cape wide. "Like this—can you still threaten her?"
Watching Saitama's broad back, Vivian felt herself falling even harder. She knew she already liked him—she just hadn't realized how much. Her heart hammered in her chest.
"There was a movie that said a real man dares to fight for his woman on top of a skyscraper," she thought. "Mine beats Transformers right in front of me."
"Saitama, don't worry about me—fight!"
"Then let's bet our lives!" Barricade roared. "Brothers, fire!"
Energy cannons boomed from every angle, their arcs forming a lethal crossfire around Saitama. One of the mechs spat a rack of homing missiles for good measure.
"Die, Saitama!"
Saitama hurled Starscream ahead as a decoy to soak the front salvo, slung Vivian tight behind his back, and charged straight through the barrage toward Barricade.
"You're insane! You'd dare tank our energy cannons?!"
Barricade remembered the day those same cannons chipped a planet's crust. Now several blue beams converged as one—surely even Saitama couldn't—
He wasn't certain. But he hoped.
Starscream, sailing through the air, had no such faith. "You crafty human! You promised to spare me!"
He snapped up a shield—but ricocheted like a kicked ball, crashed, and lay smoking. "Ack—dead!" he squeaked, playing possum while peeking at Saitama's back.
"Is he actually going to die?"
His HUD filled with question marks. Across the Decepticon intranet, processors whooped: "He's finally done for!"
A lattice of blue light intertwined—then, a heartbeat later, a string of thunderous explosions.
And then came the impossible.
Saitama didn't die. He wasn't even singed.
Every Decepticon who'd fired—the whole firing line—lay scattered and sparking on the ground.
How? How was that even possible?
Across the intranet, cores spun hot as every Decepticon began crunching the footage, desperate to compute the answer.
(End of Chapter)
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