It was going to be another one of those days.

Rattrap stood upon the gangplank, held in place by energon restraints, powerless to move. He looked up at the vast alien landscape of the chamber that was his prison. He stared down at the water, which was filled with ravenous sharkticons and fanged citrus fruits snapping in anticipation.

C'mon Rattrap, he cajoled desperately, find a way out of this mess.

He looked over as the tentacle-ridden prosecutor spun around, exposing its long head-chamber to Rattrap's view. It's face bore a great resemblance to that of Finback, Rattrap's old university lecturer. Oddly, this did not seem too surprising.

"Has the imperial magistrate reached a verdict?" it hissed perversely. The great behemoth of a Quintesson spun around yet again, showing the face of the accident-prone Predacon Waspinator. Again, this did not seem to surprise Rattrap.

"Wazzzpinator hazzz." he buzzed coquettishly.

"Guilty or innocent?" the prosecutor asked redundantly.

"Guilty!" he shrieked with relish. "Of being a nazzzty zztinking rodent!"

"You're free to go." hissed the prosecutor

"Really?" Rattrap enquired incredulously, not daring to believe it.

"No. Feed him to the sharkticons!" the prosecutor shrieked. Its toothy maw was a picture of savage triumph. Oh slag thought Rattrap. I knew it. This is it. My number's up. But, just as Rattrap felt the steel plank collapse from beneath his feet, he was grabbed by a powerful reptilian arm. He was being held like a child, sitting on his saviour's forearm. He sped through the air, horizontally this time, and looked up to see a familiar face.

"D-Dinobot?" The warrior in question was hanging off a rope ladder, suspended from an aircraft that looked suspiciously like a slice of Camembert, being flown by a calm-looking Rhinox (Who was wearing a rather magnificent pair of purple shades.) The three of them laughed as they left the indignantly shrieking Waspinator behind them, bursting out of a hole in the chamber's ceiling. Dinobot stared fondly into Rattrap's eyes as they breezed around the fuchsia skies of Quintessa, strafing around oversized floating rubber ducks with inappropriately murderous expressions.

"My hero!" he said rapturously as he planted a kiss on the warrior's cheek, who blushed in response.

"WHAT?" Rattrap sat bolt upright. He had awoken hot and sweaty. It took him several cycles to calm down. He lay on his back, staring at the ceiling of his room. The only sound was the faint, heavy beating of his fluid pump, filling the silent room. His head was a veritable hurricane of confusion. What the slag, he wondered, was that all about? I-I kissed Chopperface? And he blushed! Yeah right! In real life, he'd have torn my head off! B-but why? Why in the Pit did I dream that?

For the next few cycles, Rattrap tried to get to sleep, but his attempts proved thoroughly unsuccessful. Eventually, he decided to go on a walk to clear his head.

Whilst he was treading his way through the dark corridors of the Axalon, he made not a sound. He was experienced in the ways of silent infiltration. Twas the night before Christmas, and all thorough the house, not a creature was stirring, not even a...rat? Nah, needs work. He then briefly wondered what a "Christmas" was, before he almost jumped out of his skin. Dinobot was sitting in the console chair, a serene sneer upon his blue, pointed face.

"Ah, Vermin." he said in his trademark guttural growl. "I recognised your foul stench long before I saw you.

"Ch-chopperface! He-hey! Whatcha doin' up so late?"

"Pondering on the vast mysteries of the universe." he mused casually, raising a cup of liquid energon to his lips. "Yourself?"

"Pretty much the same, I guess. Say, Chopperface, what would you say if I told you I had a dream about you?"

It was perhaps a combination of the copious amounts of sweat running off his rodent beastflesh, his quick, short breaths, force of habit and the vague creepiness of the situation that led to Dinobot's response.

"I'd say you have five seconds to stop my skin from crawling."

Rattrap chuckled at the comfortable familiarity of the prospect of an insult match with the warlike theropod. But after a few cycle's silence, Dinobot said something unexpected.

"So, what exactly did I do in this dream of yours?"

Rattrap blushed instinctively. He hoped that Dinobot couldn't see his face in the near-total darkness. He decided to keep his description low on detail and high on ambiguity.

"Y-you rescued me. From a bunch of Quintessons. They were gonna throw me into a pit of sharkticons and, er, limes with teeth. "

"Strange." replied the warrior.

"Why, because limes don't have teeth?"

"That depends on who you ask. No, strange because I turned down a perfect opportunity to have you out of my scales forever." replied the smiling Predacon.

"Hey, you ain't foolin' me with that one. That honour thing you keep goin' on about? I'm pretty sure it forbids abandoning a comrade to his undeserved fate, or some slag like that."

"I think I could make an exception for a "comrade" as annoying as you." the raptor replied."

"Oh yeah? Well at least if I let them slag me, I wouldn't have to put up with your disgusting eating habits!"

"Look who's talking vermin! I've seen rabid turbofoxes that eat with more finesse than you."

"Is that so? Well, I bet they smelled better than you, sewermouth!"

"You're a fine one to talk, garbage dwelling rodent!"

"Oversized lizard!" Rattrap yelled, capitulating to their verbal conflict's inevitable descent into name calling.

"Squamous scurrying shrew!

"Primitive scaly birdbrain!"

"Malodorous mammalian motormouth!"

Rattrap collapsed, laughing.

"But you're right of course. However tempting it may be to free me of your constant prattling, I would have to rescue you. Besides" he said smiling, "if I let you die, who would I have to insult?"

Rattrap was rather taken aback by Dinobot's genuine admission. "Heh, whatever you say. G'night chopperface!" he said as he tip-toed back to his room. "Goodnight, vermin" rasped the raptor to Rattrap's rapidly retreating rear.

Rattrap lay on his matress in beast mode, his small pink legs splayed out. Now get it together, slaggit! You're not in love with the fraggin' chopper; it was just some weird-ass dream. But even as he began to drift off to sleep, his small rodent head resting upon his spartan yet comfortable mattress, he couldn't help but not feel entirely convinced.