In the end, his power was his curse.

Jolt screamed as the powerful data current ran through his body, sending his sensors into disarray, pinging off agony messages in response to the information being fed into them. Squealing hoarsely, the youngling did the only thing he knew to do: he discharged, hard, without bothering to open his optics. Electricity coursed over his blue and silver armor, dancing and writhing before being torn away down a conduit to places unknown.

He didn't know where he was anymore. The infective drug program made certain of that fact. It was a strange medley of sedation and apathy, tied in together with a sensory augmentation that made Jolt oblivious to his surroundings but all too horrifically aware of what was being done to his body.

The voice that was ever-present sounded in what seemed like the distance, "Again! Again, you pathetic brat!"

But he couldn't hear them clearly anymore. "I c-can't! Stop!" he begged feverishly.

Whoever it was didn't verbally respond to him. Jolt managed to activate his optics and look, trying to put together the pieces of the puzzle that his mind refused to acknowledge. The background was so dark and blurry, he couldn't make out the vast, vague shapes, only the colors of muted blue, silver, and black. Movement gained the Volt's attention as whoever it was came closer; obscurely, he could see clearly up close. It wasn't a mech he recognized.

Then again, he never got a look at whoever jumped him in the field, anyway, so it would have done him little good to know who his tormentor was. All he could remember was being tackled to the ground by an immense weight on his back and then there simply nothing.

The bright green mech snarled and slid closer, tentacle-like data cables slithering over his captive. Jolt shuddered and tried to shrink back in the chair he was bound to – or whatever it was that he was sitting on, in a fruitless attempt at escaping. Starfish-shaped claw-hands fisted and loosened rhythmically, working against what bound him in such a position as though he were sitting in an office chair, slouching in laziness. He couldn't move his arms, and no matter how hard he tried, his body refused to acknowledge his demands to close his legs when the mech walked his cables down his fauld. The youngling felt so heavy…

"I said again. And you will."

Jolt squealed again as they invaded him, finding sensitive data jacks and ports hidden under folds of electric blue armor. By now the mech knew where they were, and attacked all of them at once, forcing connections and bombarding Jolt's computers with pain-data. The ensuing screech was like nails on a chalkboard, tires on hot pavement or brake pads worn to the grinding metal underneath as the Volt writhed, his entire body telling him everything was broken, every wire was stripped bare and surely being set on fire. He screamed, he screamed bloody murder as electricity once more tore across his form, trying to send it back over the connections to give the mech a nasty surprise. But whenever he tried, the white-hot energy never went where he told it to. It left his hands instead of manifesting throughout his frame, and this time, his captor didn't stop.

The Autobot ground his mouthplates together and discharged more and more electricity in his drug-influenced efforts to make the pain stop. Unfortunately, that was exactly what they wanted.

It wasn't so much his concern that he was killing a youngling. Starscream stood back, ever present, merely watching as Gallows used his hacking talents to tease and torture the energy right out of the brat. There was none other on that planet, and none that the Air Commander had ever come across in all of his vast travels that were quite like the Autobot youngling. It truly was a pity to waste such an impressive life, but … one life would never measure up equal to saving his hatchlings.

The Decepticon second-in-command watched impassively as the conduits whisked the electrical energy away, feeding it to the egg sacs in waves. The majority of them perked up visibly at the influx of direct food, squawking and dancing in their prisons. This feeding would keep them alive for some time, a worthy effort considering Jolt had never been able to get a comm. out. It wasn't like he would be returning to Earth any time soon, or ever.

After all, the cold depths of space seemed a fitting grave for one who was not supposed to be found.

He couldn't take it anymore. Jolt's vocalizer threatened to burn out as he shrieked and cried, screaming at his captor and the empty acid atmosphere, begging and pleading for the torture to cease. Straining, he pushed at the connections with his mind, body tight as a guitar string as the young Autobot fought to force every ounce of defensive electricity out in some terrible hope that it would work as it always had and this horrible mech would leave him alone. Agony washed through him in steady whip strokes, pain-code lashing like the cat 'o' nine across his network and finally something gave under the strain. Vaguely, Jolt was aware of the strange multitude of popping sensations, fluid lines bursting like blood vessels around the ports being assaulted so violently, bleeding out in trickles from under plates of armor.

Slowly, his world spun in a static whitewash of sensation that was leisurely numbing, gradually going cold as Jolt's body seemed to just cease responding. No more energy cascaded through his hands; no more screaming, no more writhing, he just … stopped.

"Sir," grumbled Gallows as he pulled back from his victim. "He has nothing left but a bit of reserves. Going after them would cost me more energy than we would be gaining."

"Leave him to live a little longer, then," Starscream rumbled. "The hatchlings will benefit from his efforts until we can fix the chemical batteries. Do what you will with him but ensure he dies, Gallows."

The green mech watched the Supreme Air Commander as he turned and stalked off, igniting his thrusters and disappearing deeper into the maze that was the rotted skeleton of the Nemesis. He could certainly think of a few things himself and the remaining crew members could do with the Autobot's remaining energy…

Jolt was just aware enough to register being unlocked from the sitting position and moved. He was just awake enough to feel the hands, and to push weakly at them as they touched him, just conscious enough to try and fight back when they pushed things down his throat and into his body. The youngling was responsive enough for them to enjoy it, and to realize early on what they were doing to him long before they even tore off the armored plating that covered his interface panel. Jolt knew. He knew, and it hurt, and it was invasive and wrong wrong wrong and he begged them to stop, please, to just leave him alone.

But they didn't stop, and they didn't leave him alone. The blurred images didn't get any clearer even though they touched him until his body ached sharply, until he was sore and used and wished he would just die. He wanted Sideswipe. He wanted Ratchet. He wanted Chevy and Ironhide and Stress so he could curl up and disappear in their arms because they were the ones who made anything okay again.

Time was a strange plane for him. Jolt lay where they had thrown him when they were finished with him, and he stared numbly at the floor, listening to the constant hum of the ship around him. The Autobot couldn't tell if it had been fifteen minutes or fifteen hours, but it seemed altogether too short before his captors saw fit to hoist him up and shove him out into a wall of black and open air.

Open air?

His sensors, as drugged as they were, slowly registered the presence of a stable atmosphere. The stars shone above him instead of around him and gravity held his feet firmly to the cold ground as he stumbled forward, arms outstretched for the building he could barely see ahead of him. It was the bar. Home. Ratchet. Sideswipe..!

He was home! By Primus, they had brought him home! Jolt didn't care enough to ask why; he just pushed onward through the fog and bright lights blinding his optical sensors, feeling along the wall until he got to the door and opened it.

Jolt smiled at the rush of heat from the interior of the Crash Site, unable to see the shocked looks on the patron's faces as he took a step inside and collapsed into a heap of torn, bruised, battered and paintless armor. It didn't matter.

He was home.