Breem- 8.3 minutes

Joor- 6 hours

Orn- 2 weeks

Deca-orn- 20 weeks

Vorn- 83 years

Danni- TF version of the word "mommy" (Though I don't think I use it in this fic, but just in case.)

Danniluk- TF version of "mother"

Opi- "daddy"

Opiluk- "father"

::Comm. link::

"Cybertronian speak."

"English speak."

Disclaimer: I have seen the term "carrying hold" all over , but I first saw it in Karategal's fic Youngling. So I'm giving her the credit for it. I don't own Transformers, however, I do own the storyline and all OCs.

-Chapter 1-

Solarwind sprinted past the bodies of broken mechs that were scattered across the Autobot refugee settlement. Her spark was thrumming with fear. Fear not only for herself, but for the sparkling nestled in her carrying hold. Not ten joors ago, the Autobot camp had received a message from Optimus Prime himself, inviting all Autobots to regroup on a planet that called itself "Earth". Immediately after the message had been picked up by communication, the small base had started preparing for departure to the organic planet. Before the group could leave, though, the contingent had been discovered by the enemy. All able-bodied mechs had jumped into action, trying to defend the other Autobots. Unfortunately, it didn't take long for the Decepticons to overpower and push past the small group of Autobots.

So, now, Solarwind was fleeing for her life and her creation's life. Claxons blared as she dashed through an entrance only known by fellow Special Ops bots. She sent another wave of love and reassurance through her creator bond to her sparkling, as she had been doing periodically for the last ten breems during the attack. As she closed the entrance to the tunnel, she flicked down her black-tinted visor over her optics and moved her sensory door panels on her back closer together to keep them from scratching against the walls. The left half of her visor brought up specific areas where groups of Decepticons were gathered above ground so that she could avoid those areas, while her other half brought up schematics for escape routes. She sent out a scan to see if there were any Autobots were still alive on the base. When the scan came up negative, Solarwind had to fight back a wave of grief and panic. There would be no one to find and protect her sparkling from the enemy if she was struck down. The panic was quickly replaced by determination, and the grief with anger. If nobody else could protect her sparkling, then she'd just make sure she didn't get caught. After all, she was a saboteur. Disappearing was her forte.

She quickly mapped her escape route and started moving. She was silent on her feet and moved with speed. She was the definition of double-tasking, as she ran scans on her surroundings, sent love to her child, attempted to communicate with any Autobot nearby, and made her escape. She slowed when she got near her allotted exit to scan for enemies, then shot out into the open. Shots were instantly fired as she continued her getaway. Though a few shots nicked her, but none were life-threatening. Solarwind hurtled over the mangled corpse of an unlucky Decepticon and continued her flight, her panel sensors held tightly up as she used them to scan for any enemies around her. She was almost home-free when the crippling shot came. It barely missed her spark, but it ripped through her hold. The sound of her sparkling crying out in pain was the worst torture she could ever experience. She swiftly ran a scan on her offspring and was relieved to find that the shot had only skimmed the child's upper arm. Not lethal, but painful, none-the-less. The wound that the shot had caused the adult femme was lethal, though. She now knew that she didn't have long before her spark left for the Matrix. As it was, blue energon had already been leaking from holes and cuts in her armor, and the newly added wound was beginning to push her systems to the edge. She had to get to Earth quickly. She pulled in her energy to activate her transformation sequence. Her body whirred and clanked as it shifted into her space-travel form. She activated her main thrusters and routed all her energy to her navigation system and those thrusters.

oOoOoOoOo

It was one of the most hated jobs on the base, the one that anyone would pay to avoid: monitor duty. The Decepticons were ridiculously quiet after the Fallen's defeat, and no new bots had come in since Skidz and Mudflap's memorable landing in the Pacific Ocean ("Yo, man, wha's all dis wet stuffs." "I dunno. Yo, Skidz, check out dis organic!" "Hey, now, why dey all runnin' away?" "Hey, organic! Hang out with a real mech! Not that fleshy!" "You idiot! You scarin' dem all away!" Insert typical twin fight broken up by a not-very-amused Optimus Prime). Needless-to-say, nobot looked forward to the twelve monotonous hours they would spend in front of the Screens of Doom. Many Autobots even went as far to claim the screens were a secret weapon of Megatron's, made to drain morale and processor space. If not, then it was simply something created by Unicron himself. If anything, it definitely dragged down the hopes of Autobots waiting for sparkmates or siblings to come to Earth. After all, the Autobot leader had sent that message almost three Earth years ago.

These were Jazz's thoughts as he sat in front of the Screen of Doom. His optics were trained on the screen, taking in information, but his processor was somewhere else completely. It had been last year when Prime had discovered that with the use of the remaining shard of the Allspark, which had been found in Sam Witwicky's jacket, he could draw sparks back from the Well of Sparks. The Autobot leader had ordered Ratchet to repair Jazz's body a quickly as possible, an order that the CMO obeyed with haste. After all, they all missed the charismatic saboteur. The repairs took a week, and then with the help of the shard, Prime had revived his spark.

So where was he now? Bored, and completely tired of fighting. It was strange how dying had changed his thoughts. He felt so torn. He wanted to stop fighting to eliminate any chances of him leaving the world of the living again, but he wanted to keep fighting to keep his friends and any other innocent creature from experiencing death at the hands of their Decepticon foes. So, where did that leave him?

Jazz was wrapped up in these thoughts when the alert rose up on the screen. He glanced up at it, then did a double-take. A Cybertronian was coming in hot. The weak signal meant that the mech was injured. Not good.

::Jazz t' Prime::

::This is Prime. What do you need, Jazz?::

::We got a signal comin' in pretty fast. It's weak, so ya might want t' get Ratch.::

::Acknowledged. I will be there in a breem. Prime out:: Jazz stared at the screen as the signal moved across the large map of America. Whoever it was must have gotten in a pretty big tussle. The signal was moving in a distinct path toward the Sahara Desert, so they'd have to take a jet there and back. His musings were interrupted by Optimus Prime and Ratchet walking in, Lennox in Prime's hand. The two officers strode up to the screen and studied it.

"The signal is, indeed, very weak. We need to be there when he lands if we plan to save him," Ratchet claimed. Prime nodded.

"Understood. Lennox, can you obtain a cargo plane for us?" Optimus asked the human in his hand. Lennox nodded and started barking commands into a communicator. Optimus looked at Jazz. "We'll bring Ratchet, Ironhide, and the Arcee units for backup, in case this is a Decepticon." Jazz nodded and started relaying orders. It only took thirty minutes for the cargo plane to be loaded and launched.

oOoOoOoOo

Solarwind made a low keening noise when the atmosphere started heating up her frame. Her body hurt, and she was now on her emergency supply of energon. It was by a sheer force of will that she wasn't in stasis lock. She refused to let her body shut down when her sparkling needed her most. As it was, her baby was frightened and hurt. If Solarwind went into stasis lock, then it would leave her baby to deal with all its emotions by itself. Solarwind didn't want that. She had been sending a steady stream of love and reassurance over the bond ever since they had escaped. Now, as she moved through the atmosphere towards the barren wasteland of earth, she couldn't help but wonder what would happen when she offlined. Yes, she knew she was going to when she hit the ground. There was no getting around that. She had set aside a small amount of energy to help her transform one last time when she hit the ground so that her baby would have a chance to be freed from her hold. She just prayed that the Autobots got there before the Decepticons did.

She let out a cry of pain when she collided with the organic floor. Sand shot upwards from the impact and, but cushioned her as her travel form as it bounced two more times, then settled into the desert floor. She forced her energon-deprived systems to function as she transformed into her bi-pedal mode. She collapsed with a groan and slowly rolled onto her back, ignoring the shot of pain that went through her sensory panels at the movement.

She placed a hand over where her hold was. She could feel her daughter's fear and confusion. Solarwind ignored her feelings of pain and sent back feelings of love before blocking her bond completely. The sparkling gave a short cry of confusion, not understanding why there was no response from her mother's side of the bond, and tapped anxiously on the latched door of her creator's hold. Her only reply was a small groan, so the baby curled up against her danniluk's spark, shivering in fear and worry. She let out a worried chirrup when the spark behind started to dim.

"It's alright, sweetspark. Mommy's here," Solarwind soothed, even though she knew she wouldn't be for long. The femmebot pulled in some energy and activated her Autobot distress signal. Her spark flickered, and her systems stuttered as energon-loss slowly dragged her death closer. She heard another squeak of alarm from her hold and wanted to cry. Her child was so afraid, but she couldn't open the bond. Her creation would recover if she kept the bond closed. She didn't know if her sparkmate would, though. Perhaps the fact that her child lived would give him the reason to fight for life that he needed to survive the sparkshock.

Her waning attention was grabbed by the sound of a very large plane flying overhead. She forced her optics online and was greeted by the most amazing, if not ridiculous, sight. Optimus Prime was floating from the sky. Ratchet, the best medic she'd ever heard of, was floating right behind him, followed by the one mech that had always been Solarwind's inspiration, Jazz. She had always wanted to meet him, because he was the best in their business. Was this Primus' last gift? Was this an illusion? Solarwind didn't care, because now that they were here, she could pass to the Matrix without worrying about her child be captured. With the last of her energy, she unlocked her hold.

"I'll love you forever, my creation. Remember me." They were her last words. Her optics went dark, and her systems slowed down. She heard one last squeak of alarm, and her warm spark disappeared.

The plane turned and headed toward the ground to land, but Ratchet didn't care. His scanners and sensors were focused solely on the femme lying on the desert floor. He cut himself from the parachutes the moment her systems went offline. He rushed over to the femme's side and knelt down beside her. Optimus and Jazz were not far behind him, and the military personnel were already disembarking the plane. Ratchet ignored them as he ran scan after baffling scan. He sat back on his haunches as he tried in vain to figure out this new medical mystery.

"Wha's wrong with 'er, Ratch?" Jazz asked as he slid to a stop beside the CMO.

"Well, all the femme's systems are offline, yet my scans are still detecting a small sparkbeat," he replied.

"Are you certain she is not alive?" Prime asked. Inside the deceased femme's hold, a small red bundle of wires and metal perked up at that voice. She recognized that voice! He had sent her mommy a message when they were in the camp! With a newly found determination, the sparkling crawled to the door-like hatch that closed off the hold to the rest of the world and started hitting it in an attempt to open it. It wasn't working all that well. If only she were strong like Mommy. Mommy could do anything.

"She is among the Matrix. Nobot could survive these wounds. She likely offlined from energon-loss," Ratchet stated.

"Hold up. Turn up yo'r audio r'ceptors," Jazz cut in abruptly. All three bots looked over at him. The lieutenant's expression was one of extreme concentration. His optics were focused on the femme. Hesitantly, Ratchet turned up the volume capacity of his audio receptors and was shocked to hear the sound of metal tapping metal.

"It can't be," he murmured. Surgical hands reached into the femme's chest cavity and gently pried open the metal door just in front of the spark chamber. The red sparkling inside had resorted to pushing very hard on the hatch. She let out a surprised squeak when the hatch suddenly slid open, and she rolled into the hand of an unsuspecting medic. She gave a sharp intake when the fingers curled around her protectively, and she quickly curled up, a typical sparkling defense.

Ratchet slowly lifted his hand out of the chest cavity to reveal his discovery: a red metal ball with two small sensory door wings sticking out. The sight was almost comical. He started running scans and found that the child was in almost perfect health. She had an injury on her left arm, and she was apparently contracting a virus. Ratchet looked up to see that he was now surrounded by Autobots and a few of the more trusting humans who knew that they wouldn't get stepped on.

"What is that?" a human voice called out from Ironhide's hand.

"Ratchet, is that…?" Arcee trailed off, worried that her words may jinx the situation. Ratchet smiled at the Cybertronians surrounding him.

"Yes, Arcee, it is," Ratchet stated. He carefully started brushing his fingers over sensitive wires on the sparkling's side as he spoke. "This, Major Lennox," he continued. The red sparkling squealed when Ratchet's hand skimmed over a more sensitive wire. She uncurled and giggled as the medic continued his tickle attack. "is a sparkling." Now that the she was uncurled, Ratchet could see the blue energon running in a small stream down her arm.

"Prime, hold her while I seal this," Ratchet ordered. Optimus didn't hesitate to take the femling into his hands. She looked up at him curiously, her panels rising slightly. She blue optics widened as she cocked her head at him and clicked once.

"Hello, young one," the Prime greeted with a smile. The child's optics brightened, and her clicking sped up. Prime chuckled at her antics, as did ever other bot in the vicinity. The sound brought to her attention the other Cybertronians standing around, watching her. She chirped at the attention, then glanced down at the ground. She pointed at the fallen femme with the arm that Ratchet wasn't working on.

"Mommy," she said in Cybertronian.

"I thought as much," Ratchet mumbled as he continued his work. Arcee wheeled over to the child in Prime's hands.

"I didn't know Solarwind had bonded," she murmured as she studied the child. The sparkling recoiled from the scrutiny and curled into the Optimus' hand.

"You knew this femme?" Ironhide asked.

"Yes, we were friends at the academy. Chromia had weapons training with her. 'Wind was terrible with weapons. Amazing at hand-to-hand, though." Arcee frowned. "I hope her sparkmate survives her passing."

"I'm finished. Let's get them back to base, so I can replace that seal with a more permanent one," Ratchet stated. Prime nodded and lifted the small Cybertronian to his chassis.

"Mommy come?" the sparkling asked. Arcee, still having the programming of a youngling teacher, spoke up.

"Mommy got hurt really badly and went to the Matrix to see Primus. She's going to stay there with him and all her friends," Arcee answered softly. The sparkling stared at her, not completely understanding.

"Mommy gone?" she asked. Arcee nodded with a sad expression.

"Yes, Mommy's gone," she replied. Energon tears welled up in the child's eyes, and her door wings dropped downward, signifying that she now understood. She twisted around, trying to look down at Solarwind, but Prime's hands blocked her ability to see her.

"Mommy? Mommy, liars! Mommy, Mommy, Mommy!" The sparkling's cries broke the sparks of all watching. Energon tears were leaking from her eyes as she struggled in Prime's hands, but the four foot sparkling was unable to escape the grasp of the thirty-two foot tall Autobot leader. "Mommy no leave! No leave me!" She broke down in sobs and curled into Prime's chest plates. Optimus frowned.

"It is a pity one so young has to deal with this," Optimus murmured. He hated this feeling. He was Optimus Prime, leader of the Autobots, yet he felt completely useless. Jazz moved to stand by his side.

"There, now, lil' femme. I's okay. She's happier up there. She can't get hurt anymore," Jazz comforted. The sparkling looked over at the saboteur, and her optics widened. She reached out her little arms to him, and Prime hesitated before holding her out to him. Jazz was shocked and slightly confused, but his visor hid his emotions. He lifted the femme into his servos and held her against his chassis over his spark. The child curled up and immediately started calming down. Her sobs turned to hiccups before completely fading away. "See? All betta," Jazz cooed. "Now, can ya tell meh what'cho father's designation is?" The sparkling looked up at him, staring for a few minutes before shaking her head "no".

"Can you tell us what your mother called you?" Arcee chimed in. The sparkling jumped at the voice and curled closer to Jazz.

"Sweetspark," she whispered. Jazz grinned in amusement while Arcee frowned. That hadn't quite been what she was looking for.

"Wha'd she call ya when you were in trouble?" Jazz reiterated.

"Sunburst," she mumbled. Jazz smiled and let out a low thrumming sound to coerce her into the stasis that she was so obviously fighting against. The sparkling, now designated Sunburst, clicked tiredly and curled up in Jazz's claws. Her optics dimmed, and small whirrs were heard as her systems slowed in recharge. The mech holding her looked up at his Prime, awaiting orders.

"We will arrange for a proper Cybertronian burial for Solarwind, and we will care for Sunburst until her mech creator arrives on Earth. Autobots, load up and roll out."

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