Just one brief piece of Info: They are on Cybertron at the beginning of this story. I just had to say that so you wouldn't be confused.

CHAPTER 1 Techno-organic

His eyes opened in a cramped, dark place. He tried to move but found couldn't go far. He trapped. There wasn't much air in this tight little place and he found he couldn't breath. Panic rose inside him and he cried out, smacking at something in front of him that clanged loudly. At least his arms could move, even though everything else seemed to be wired down. Spurred on by this realization, he hit the thing again and again, his panic increasing. Something wasn't right. Why was he stuck inside such a small place? Why couldn't he breath? What was going on?

He smacked at the metal thing again, using more force. He had to get out. Now!

This time it gave way, popping open so quickly that he didn't have time to brace himself. He fell out of the cramp space and hit the floor, landing on his hands and knees.

He stayed in that position for a long moment, breathing deep gasps of air.

Wait!

Breathing?

Robots don't breath!

Then why am I breathing?

That's when he got a good look at his hand. It didn't look like he how remembered it. It wasn't even the right color and it felt funny. He could see his fingers, five digits covered in a lose tanned substance. The rest of his hand was covered in something soft and black. Like material. He moved the hand, brushing his fingers against each other. They made a strange scraping noise and the black substance wrinkled when he moved it as well, like it wasn't even a part of him. But, when he looked at the rest of his arm it too was covered by the same soft, black material.

What?

A scream yanked him out of his thoughts.

Startled he raised his head. Across the room a girl with red hair, dark skin and wearing a yellow and orange dress stood with her hands slapped against her cheeks. Her bright blue eyes were wide with horror. He knew this girl.

"Sari?" he said.

"Wh-who are you?" she demanded. "And how do you know my name?"

"It's me, Sari," he said. "Prowl."

"You are not!" she exclaimed, sounding angry. "Prowl's dead! I attended his funeral!"

Funeral? But if I'm dead... How am I? he looked at his hand again. What am I?

This didn't make any sense. If he was dead why was he here now and why did he feel so strange? What was going on? He could not comprehend it. This was beyond his understanding.

Sari stayed where she was, studying this person. He claimed to be Prowl did he couldn't be Prowl. Prowl was a giant robot. This guy wasn't a robot and he looked nothing like the hologram Prowl used either. She'd gotten so used to seeing Prowl's human hologram that she figured that's what he would look like as a human, if he ever got turned into a human. "Look, mister," she said, still keeping her distance. "I don't know who you are or how you got here but pretending to be one of my best friends, especially one that died, is just plain distasteful." she opened her hands, exposing her wires. She formed a blue orb of energy in her hands. "You take it back right now!"

Prowl's eyes widened. She was actually going to shoot at him?! "Wait, Sari!" he shouted, scrambling to his feet. "I really am Prowl!"

"You are not!" she fired at him. "Stop lying!"

He dived to the floor, avoiding the blast. "Sari, if I'm not Prowl, how do I know your name?"

"Everyone knows my name," she shot back, firing another bolt.

He hit the floor once more, trying to come up with a way to prove that he was really Prowl. Nothing came to mind. She fired at him again and he dived out of the way but part of the orb hit him in the arm. He cried out, surprised at the jolt of pain that shot through him. He hit the floor, gripping the wounded spot, cursing under his breath. Why was it so painful? He'd felt pain as a robot but not like this!

He looked up to see Sari charging up another shot. He didn't want her to fire at him again and desperately tried to think of a way to prove that he was who he said he was. Then it came to him. "I sneaked into your father's tower and found out you were a protoform," he said, quickly ducking to avoid another hit. He didn't want to feel that kind of pain again any time soon. "I'm the one that told you you were part robot." When she still didn't look convinced he shouted. "I was the very first robot you used your key to repair!"

She paused. "Okay," she said, panting. "If you know that much; what did Prowl say after I repaired him and he sat up? What are the first words he ever said to me."

"That is quite the cure," he said instantly.

Her expression changed. She closed her hands, snuffing out the light. "Prowl?" she said, the expression on her face changing to something much less hostile. "You really are Prowl."

"Yes," he replied, getting to his feet, and still gripping his arm. It hurt but not as much as it had.

She gaped. "But.... but how and why," she stammered.

He shook his head. "I don't know." he looked at his hands, once again taking in the tanned skin and the black and gold clothing. "I wish I did."

She walked toward him. Her expression still one of disbelief. She reached out her hand and touched his face. His skin felt soft against her own. It wasn't a hologram. This really was Prowl. "You really are here," she said, rubbing his face. Part of her hand brushed his hair, it was soft too, almost like a newborns. Her face was full of wonder, as if she was looking at something she had never seen before. After a moment, she took her hand away and let it fall to her side. "But how? How can you be here and like this? What happened when you died?"

He thought for a moment. He tried to remember but drew a blank. After the incident on the top of Sumdac Tower there was a void. He shook his head. "I don't remember," he answered. "I only remember a bright light and, after that, nothing."

That's when he caught his reflection in the shiny surface of the door of the thing he'd fallen out of. What he saw looked nothing like how he'd looked in Soundwave's dreamworld or how he would imagine himself to look. He looked much younger and was clean shaven. He had short black hair, blue eyes that glowed in the dim light, and a tanned face, not as tanned as Sari's but close. He was wearing a black turtle neck black tunic like top with gold designs sewn into the black material, similar to the patterns he had as a robot. He also had on a pair of sand colored pants with gold bands going down the sides. When he turned his attention back to his face he noticed the gold colored band tried around his head and the pair of blue tinted glasses that were similar in design to his visor. He reached out and touched the shiny surface. Is this me? I mean really me?!

It was only then that he realized he'd fallen out of a stasis pod. Whaa? A stasis pod?!

He looked back at Sari. She was watching him with interest. "Sari?" he said.

She met his eyes. "Yes?"

He started to say something but the wound in his arm lashed out with another flash of pain. He cried out and grabbed it, nearly falling over. "Prowl!" Sari exclaimed, touching his shoulder worriedly. "Are you all right?"

"No, I'm not all right," he ground out. "This wound you gave me hurts like the Pit!"

"I'm sorry!" she said, sincerely. She reached out to touch his arm. "Let me see."

He jerked away from her touch. "No!" He looked up at her and said through clenched teeth. "Just take me to Ratchet. Where is he?"

Ratchet was in another area of the building. It was only two days after Prowl's body had been buried but they were all still on Cybertron. Ultra Magnus had come back online a few days before Prowl's funeral and had asked Optimus and his crew give him a briefing on what had happened since he had been in a coma. The story had taken a long time to tell and they wound up staying longer than they'd planned.

Of course Ultra Magnus wanted them all to stay on the planet but Optimus had told him that there were still a few things left undone on Earth and asked for permission to return to resolve them. Magnus had willingly given him the authorization saying, since he'd done so much, he didn't have to ask him.

Because of this, the medic was busy in his old office updating his equipment. He knew what Optimus had meant but "unresolved issues" so he had to be ready for any kind of trouble. He was in no mood for any strange surprises so when Sari came into the room followed by a young man he'd never seen before he nearly dropped his tools. "What in Cybertron?" he exclaimed, staring at the young man. "Who is that and how did he get here?"

"Ratchet," Sari said, looking up at him then back at the young man. She grasped the man's arm, pulling him forward so the medic could get a better look at him. The young man seemed to wince as she drug him forward. "This is Prowl."

The medic gaped at her. "Prowl?!" he exclaimed. "Have you slipped a gear, Sari? Prowl's dead! We buried his body!"

"I know," she replied. "But this really is Prowl! Only... you know, smaller and uh.. human."

"Human?" Ratchet knelt down for a better look. The young man stared up at him through strangely shaped, blue tinted glasses. He didn't look a thing like Prowl but there was something about the expression he was making and his eyes...

"Do you mind?" the man asked in a voice that sounded familiar.

Ratchet blinked. This human's mannerisms were familiar too and so was that voice. But... It couldn't be.

Sari saw the doubt written on his face and insisted. "It is Prowl!"

"How can you be sure of that?" he asked her.

Sari looked at Prowl. He looked up at Ratchet. "When you tried to use the key to repair Bumblebee and it didn't work I told you you didn't need a key to do what you were already capable of doing," he winced again then said. "You shouldn't have been so hard on yourself."

Now recognition dawned on the medic's face. Nobody else had been around to witness that scene except Prowl. "It is you," he said. He knelt down again, studying him better. "But how did you-"

"I don't know," the cyber ninja replied. He stepped closer to him. "I need you to do something for me."

"What?"

Prowl rubbed his arm, his face scrunching up in pain, and looked away. "Could you.. um... scan me.. and uh.. repair me?"

"Scan you? Repair you? What for?"

The look he gave him said it should have been obvious. "My resurrection, so to speak ,,scared Sari," he explained, looking down at his arm. "She attacked me and kind of damaged my arm..."

"Oh," now the medic understood what he meant. He'd been wondering why Prowl had been favoring the left arm the way he had. Ratchet put out his hand. "Come on up."

Both humans, or sort of humans, stepped onto his palm. He stood up and let them get off on the examining table. He turned and picked up one of his tools, powering it up. He then turned back to them and saw that Prowl had moved the black substance further up his arm, exposing the tanned skin underneath and a large red burn mark. Ratchet walked over to him and gently grasped the arm between two fingers. He studied the wound a moment. "It doesn't look too serious," he told him. "I don't think it will stay for very long. But I'll see what I can do for it after I scan the rest of you."

Prowl nodded and allowed the medic to run the scanner over his body. The image that appeared on the screen nearly made Ratchet drop it. "Ma.. ma.. what?!"

They looked at him. "What is it?" Prowl asked.

Ratchet looked down at him with optics so big that they nearly took up his entire face. "How in the name of Cybertron did you manage to become that?!"

"What?" Prowl demanded, getting impatient. "Become what?"

The medic pointed at Sari. "One of those."

The cyber ninja looked at Sari, confusion written on his face. "One of..." then he realized what he was saying. "Techno organic?!"

Sari didn't look surprised at all. "I could have told you that," she said, folding her arms and giving him a look. "It was kind of obvious. You should have figured it out yourself." then, before he could protest, she added. "After all; I did see you fall out of a stasis pod."

Prowl was still having a hard time figuring out how it even happened. "But.. what... how.. I?"

Ratchet looked curiously at Sari. "Did you say stasis pod?"

She nodded. "You know those three protoforms we've been keeping here?" she asked him. "Well I went to look at them and I heard this yelling and banging. When I entered the room I found him." she pointed at Prowl. "On the floor in front of an open pod. Incidentally the pod protofrom was gone or should I say-" she poked Prowl's arm, the uninjured one. "it's right here."

"That doesn't explain how he could have come out of one or how he wound up like that in the first place," Ratchet protested.

Sari shrugged. "Maybe it was the protoform I touched back on the moon," she suggested. "Maybe it scanned my DNA or something..."

Neither Autobot could help her come up with a better answer. Ratchet could see that this discussion was only making Prowl more confused. He kept looking at himself and then back toward the protoform room with a lost look on his face. "We can figure that out later," he told her. "Why don't you both uh... let the others know that a special someone came here...?"

"Okay," she said. "Sure." she smiled at Prowl. "Won't they be surprised?" She grasped his hand and started to lead him away.

"But first," Ratchet said before they got more than two steps. "Let me see what I can do about that damaged arm."

They were surprised all right. Bumblebee nearly fell out of his chair when Sari came in with Prowl following closely behind. "Whoa!" he exclaimed, staring at the Prowl. "Who is that? and how did he get here?"

Sari looked at the young man. "Prowl. How he got here is a little harder to explain."

"That's not Prowl," Bee protested, frowning at her. "Prowl's a robot like me and he's dead."

"This is Prowl!" she insisted.

Prowl was starting to grow tired of this game of are too, are not. "Still stating the obvious I see," he said.

Bumblebee stared at him. "Prowl?"

"Yes, I am Prowl," the young man said, sounding annoyed.

"But I.. you," Bee started gesturing. "But you're so.... What? I'm dreaming, aren't I? Or this is some kind of cheap trick you cooked up to psych me out." He looked at Sari. "Come on. Where is it?"

She didn't know what he was talking about. "Where's what?"

"The holoprojector," he said, looking around. "Where are you hiding it?"

"I'm not a hologram!" Prowl shouted. "If I was a hologram could I do this?" He kicked Bee hard in the foot.

"Yeowch!" Bee exclaimed, grabbing his foot and hopping around.

Prowl hmphed and folded his arms. "Believe I'm real now?"

Sari giggled.

"Well hologram's can't do that," Bee admitted, rubbing his sore foot. He looked at his friend again. "But how'd you end up like that?"

Prowl and Sari looked at each other. "We don't know." they said together, like they'd been practicing saying saying that fraze.

Just then Optimus and Bulkhead came into the room. "What's all that yelling for, Bumblebee?" Prime wanted to know.

Bumblebee ran over to him, nearly crawling up his chest with excitement. "Look who's with Sari!" he said, his face holding a very weird expression. It looked halfway between happy and freaked out and it made Optimus nervous. "It's Prowl! He's alive!"

"Prowl?!" Optimus looked startled. He looked around, as if expecting to see the cyber ninja come walking into the room. "Where?"

"Right there!" Bee said, pointing toward the floor. "He's right there!"

Optimus and Bulkhead looked down at the floor. Sari smiled and waved at them. Beside her stood a young man with clothes on that had a familiar gold pattern on the front. "Who?" he pointed at the young man. "Him?"

"Yes, him!" Bee exclaimed, looking exasperated at Prime's slowness. "Who else would I have been talking about?"

Bulkhead stared at the young man for a moment then burst out laughing. "That's not Prowl," he said, smacking Bumblebee on the back, nearly knocking him over. "He's not tall enough. Quite kidding around."

"I'm not kidding around!" Bee protested. "It's really Prowl!"

Optimus looked doubtful. "That can't be possible. Prowl's dead."

"I'm not dead!" the young man shouted.

Bulkhead stopped laughing and looked back at the young man. Come to think of it, now that he got a better look, the human's stance looked very familiar and so did his voice. "What?"

"I am not dead," Prowl repeated himself, walking over to the other robots. "I'm here." he spread his arms and looked at himself. "This is me, only different."

"But how is that possible?" Optimus asked him. He was having a hard time letting it all sink in. "I mean you died by giving up your spark. How could you possibly be back and like that?"

"I don't know," Prowl said, shaking his head. "Maybe the AllSpark decided to give me a second chance...."

Nobody else could think of a better answer so they didn't argue. Instead Optimus asked. "You didn't happen to fall out of a stasis pod did you?"

"Uh.. well.. yes," Prowl said, looking over at Sari. She met his gaze and shrugged. "I woke up in one and fought my way out of it." he saw the look on Optimus face. "Why? What's that face for."

"Uh ..oh..."

Suddenly Sentinel Prime came charging into their quarters. His optics were wide and he looked freaked out. "Somebody's stolen one of the protoforms!" he shouted. "I bet it was a Decepticon!" he looked at Optimus accusingly. "I knew you didn't catch them all!"

"Calm down, Sentinel," the other Prime said, putting up his hands. "Nobody has stolen any protoforms."

"How can you say that?!" Sentinel demanded. "There's only two left in the-" that's when he noticed Prowl. "Who let that organic in here?!"

"Sari?" Bumblebee said, not knowing who he was referring to. "She's allowed in here!"

Sentinel shot him a look. "Not Sari!" he corrected. "The organic standing next to her!"

Bumblebee looked at Prowl. "You mean Prowl?" he said.

"Don't play games with me," Sentinel snapped. "We just buried that poor excuse for an Autobot days ago!"

Optimus started giving him a weird look. "Sentinel," he started to say.

"What?" Sentinel snapped, glaring at him.

"I wouldn't be saying that out loud if I were you," he said.

"Why not?" the dark blue robot demanded. "It's true!"

"I beg your pardon!" another voice broke in.

Sentinel looked around. "Who said that?"

"I did!"

He looked down at the young man. Prowl had his hands clenched into tight fists at his sides and his face was a mask of pent up furry. "I'll have you know that I am not a poor excuse for an Autobot," he said, trying to speak in a calm voice but it came out tight. He pointed a finger in the dark blue robot's face. "You shouldn't be insulting somebody who gave their life to save a city when all you did was cheat to catch Decepticons by hiring a no good bounty hunter."

"How do you know about that?" Sentinel demanded.

Prowl folded his arms. "I'm sure you can figure that out for yourself."

Sentinel lost him temper. "I won't stand here and be insulted by a filthy organic!"

Prowl stared over the top of his glasses with eyes like blue ice crystals. "The stand somewhere else and I'll insult you there," he said.

Sentinel sputtered something, flabbergasted and at a loss for words then turned on his heal and marched out of the room. Everyone looked at Prow with mouths hanging open.

"Wow," Bumblebee said, looking impressed. "I never expected that from you."

Now Prowl was sorry for what he'd said. "I shouldn't have said anything," he realized. So why did I?

"No," Sari protested. "You had every right to say something."

"Sari is right," Optimus agreed. "Sentinel's words were out of line. He had no right to say that about you after all you did."

He still looked uncertain. He could see their point but... "I guess you're right." Why do I get the feeling that my reaction was manipulated by my new form? His new body seemed to have heightened his emotions. It felt weird.

"So anyway," Optimus said, changing the subject when he noticed Prowl still looked upset. "Why don't you tell us what happened and how you wound up the way you are now?"

"Yeah," Bumblebee agreed. "Because this is just weird."

Prowl sighed and nodded. "All right." it was better than dwelling on what had just happened. "But it's not very exciting."

A/N

When I began this, it was only a collection of art pictures in my deviantart gallery. I got the inspiration from a short gift story a friend of mine wrote for me after Prowl died to make me feel better. So while I drew up the pictures I started getting comments that I should make this into a fanfic. After much deliberation and a lot of hesitation; here it is. The start of a different way of bringing our favorite ninja back to life. Enjoy.