Alright this is my first Transformers fic ever, so please be gentle on me and I promise it will get better as time goes on. The only major pairings at the moment are Predaking x OC and Knockout x Breakdown but there be very well could be more as time goes on. And as to be expected I don't own anything except for the original characters and the plot bunny…

Predaking was not the only Predacon that was presented to Megatron; there was a second that had seemed doomed to die before its first mission… only what happens when it resurfaces years later stronger, smarter, snarkier and caring for two human children? Chaos on the Nemesis that's what!

Prologue

The Songbird

In the beginning there had been two…

But one had been weaker…

…oh so much weaker…

When the space bridge had first opened and Shockwave brought his creations through it, there had not been just one beast but two… The first one to come through the bridge was the ideal specimen, the large and formidable dragon whose eyes burned with the flame of life roaring behind them and it clearly held power that was far beyond measuring! This creature inspired such fear and awe in those who looked upon its form that even Megatron was shocked by it!

The second beast was not…

Not as big as the first, nor as fierce but still it did look rather formidable… In fact this creature was not a dragon at all, but appeared to be the strange amalgamation of two of the earth's native animals, a lion and an eagle. This Predacons metallic body was as black as night and adorned with light gold streaks and large golden eyes. It had a pointed birdlike head with a single decorative crest right in between its eyes, very similar to that of Starscream's. It also had two large pointed ear like audio protrusions that slicked backwards; its front talons were long, sharp and clearly dangerous. And its long tail ended in a truly lethal looking scythe-like blade. Its wings were massive and designed to look like a bird's feathery wings, but each 'feather' was as sharp as a swords blade and aglow with the same faint golden light that adorned the rest of its sleek and deadly body.

Shockwave had then explained that the humans had called such a beast a gryphon. And also unlike the first beast... this one was visibly weaker. Quite frankly Shockwave was amazed that it had even come online when he'd activated it. As it had been his earlier attempt at creating a Predacon, and he had perfected his technique with the other. Nonetheless it was still capable of serving its purpose, as it was nothing more than a simpleminded and obedient beast just like its companion. And once both of the Predacons were presented with the sample of Wheeljack's energon they both took to the skies with the intent on hunting down their Autobot prey…

Shockwave did point out that it would be most unlikely that the gryphon Predacon would survive its first mission and it was only logical to assume that it was not going to return…

And for all accounts he was right as his second beast did not return with the first, having apparently been in an accident before even reaching its target...

What Shockwave did not know however was that this Predacon did not die…

She evolved…

On a moonlit night, deep in the snow laden forests of Alaska, a little girl no older than seven was running as fast as she possibly could…

She ran and ran clutching a bundle of blankets tightly to her chest and although she was sorely tempted to, she did not look back… far too afraid of what she would see. This little girl was not dressed for the weather by any means, wearing only a pair of somewhat warm blue plaid pajamas and her small feet were bare. The temperatures were deathly cold, but no matter how deep the chill in the air was it was no match for the frozen terror that gripped this child down to her very soul. She kept running, the only sounds she could hear were the thundering of her heart in her chest and the disgruntled and unhappy cries of what she held in her arms. A small baby girl; only three months old and just as ill-equipped for the freezing temperatures as the girl who held her. Mere hours ago the seven year old girl had been inside a small cabin that her parents had rented while they were staying in Alaska to hunt. Of course only one 'parent' was really related to the little seven year old and that had been her mother… her real father had died some years before and then this new man had come into their home. (Never once did she call him father… as he scared her far too much and had hit her far too often...) The baby in the blankets was his; but that didn't matter now… all that mattered was getting as far away from that cabin as possible.

The child didn't really know the full extent of what had happened, the only thing she had seen and heard was her mother arguing with that man. She heard a few things they said and she knew her mother screamed something along the lines of: 'I'm not taking this anymore!' and 'I'm leaving you!' That had been when the man had struck her hard in the face with his fist. Her mother had fallen backwards and hit her head on the side of a wooden table and gone very quiet and still whilst a pool of blood had begun to form underneath her. The seven year old didn't know what to do, but she knew to be afraid… Very afraid. And it was in this fear that she had grabbed up her little sister and slipped out of a window.

And then she ran…

The girl was so scared and at this point and she was also tired, freezing and lost… She didn't know what she was expecting to find out in the woods, all she knew was that it was away from that man. Her own tears streaked down her face as she thought of her mother lying there motionless in a pool of her own blood. Still she trudged on, knowing that if she stopped that man would find them… and she didn't want to think about what would happen then. She tried in vain to shush her little sister's cries, but the baby was far too cold and her wails were only getting louder… The poor child continued on that way for over an hour; running whenever she found the strength but at this point her said strength was nearly nonexistent. The cries of her little sister were also beginning to grow weaker as the baby instinctively huddled closer to the only source of warmth and the infants all to noticeable trembling caused another wave of fresh tears to fall from the girl's eyes… tears that quickly froze in the blistering cold wind.

Finally there was a break in the forest and it opened up to a vast snow-covered meadow. The moon shone down upon the snow with such radiance that it seemed as though the snow itself was glowing. As the young girl finally cleared the forests tree line and set her small frozen eyes upon what to her resembled a sea of pure white, she suddenly became aware that there was something else out there with them…

For standing less than 30 yards away from the children was the gryphon Predacon…

An accident…

It had been an accident en route to her target that had changed her fate. An accident that she did not allow her thoughts to linger on lest she would find herself becoming lost within them. She bore the scars of that accident to this day… if one can truly call them scars… Her once golden eyes and highlights had taken on a different color and were now a beautiful shade of electric blue; although the accident had indeed taken something from her… namely all of her memories up to that point. Leaving this Predacon to survive alone using only her own primal instincts.

It was needless to say that she had been very successful by herself. Managing to find a rich supply of food and a warm lair to dwell in, hell she'd even managed to claim quite a vast domain of territory deep in this wilderness. However… there had only been one constant nagging metallic thorn in her side; those ignorant humans always seemed intent on trespassing! Nary a day went by that she didn't have to scare them off or in the cases of the idiots who were dumb enough to fire their crude weapons at her, she'd disembowel them with a single swipe of her razor-sharp talons…

Yes, she had grown powerful and had a vast territory in which she was free to do whatever she wished in. Even if it was nothing more than chasing down and butchering some pathetic lesser creature for sport… only now it seemed as though she was always discontent… always empty, devoid of purpose and of reason. She often felt restless; and that was the reason why she had ventured out of her lair on this particular night… thinking that perhaps a brief walk outside in the cold air might clear her tired processor and allow her to recharge in a bit of peace. Only now imagine her irritation upon stumbling across a human youngling of all things! Must this species always be such an annoyance? She set her large sapphire optics upon the tiny form that dared to approach her and she took on a more intimidating stance. Spreading her large wings out to their maximum length, whipping her bladed tail from side to side in an aggressive manner and lastly lifting up one of her claws and fanning out her lethal talons.

Unsurprisingly the youngling stopped dead in its tracks, but rather than turn tail and run, the small creature fell to its knees before the mighty Predacon; curling its little body around something that it carried in its arms before looking up at the irritated gryphon with large pleading eyes.

"P-please…" The weak little voice shook undoubtedly from the mix of freezing cold and soul gripping fear. This was unexpected and for the first time the Predacon took notice that this youngling was exhausted and had obviously been running from something that had scared it terribly. And in its tiny mind it had somehow reasoned that she was less of a threat than whatever it was running from. "p-p-please… h-help us…" It pleaded, barely managing to find the strength to speak. It was then that a weak muffled cry escaped from the baby in the child's arms.

But it was this sound that triggered some dormant programing deep within this Predacon…

Her stance eased, no longer entirely sure if she wanted to scare this youngling away. She took a single step towards the child before her and brought her head down for closer look, it was then that she truly saw the pathetic state of this youngling… and the state of the little sparkling it was carrying in its arms. It was all too clear that this sparkling would not last much longer out in this harsh environment… although why this bothered the Predacon at all she didn't know, having been thinking just a few minutes ago how there already were too many humans in this world. Why should these two pathetically weak creatures matter anymore than the rest of their species? Some part of her just wanted to turn and walk away and leave the children to their own devices. But that one persistent protocol kept nagging at her processor… telling her to do something and that she could not just leave them out there to off-line alone in the cold!

"…p-p-please Songbird… please help us." The child whispered with the last glittering shard of hope shining through in her voice. Hoping, praying for a miracle and that this quite monstrous birdlike creature would help them. Thoughts only a child would dare to think in a situation like this.

…Songbird?

In spite of the fact that she knew that she was no mere song bird… the gryphon Predacon found that she could not get angry for the youngling's somewhat strange misconception as to what she really was. The little one was half dead at this moment anyway… So inwardly sighing and determining that she would figure this out at another point and just give in to the instinct that threatened to give her a terrible headache should she choose to ignore it. Her attention focused to a more well… vocal problem…

Since she had never spoken out loud before, certainly not in the humans' language… It took her several long minutes of making bizarre and incoherent growls, chirps and clicks before she managed to get her mouth and tongue to function in an acceptable manner.

"…co…me…" She managed to choke out hoarsely, before suddenly finding it unacceptable and trying again. "...come…" This time the word came out considerably clearer and the youngling took notice of it. Those small tired eyes seemed to get a small flicker of life back in them when she spoke that word. "Come." And with that she turned to leave, intent on leading the children back to her lair. Of course after three steps she looked back only to see that the youngling had not moved from the spot, having tried to get her frozen legs to work but had no strength left to do so. Irritated all the more at the situation, the gryphon walked back and carefully scooped the small human up in one of its claws, although was quite careful not to accidentally injure either the youngling or the sparkling. The Predacon then spread her massive wings and took to the sky; but before she actually left the area she noticed that yet another human had just come sprinting out of the woods angrily screaming something that she could not quite make out… But one thing that she could clearly see was that in this humans hands he held a weapon. A shotgun to be precise and it didn't take her half of a second to realize that this must've been the individual who had scared the youngling so. She gently she placed her other claw over the two children, figuring that this would keep them warmer… and they also really didn't have to see what was going to happen next.

The human had been so intent on following little girl's tracks in the snow that he didn't even notice the Predacon until she entered his line vision, diving from the sky straight at him whilst an eerie blue light was emanating from the center of her chest. This light traveled up her long neck before a blast of brilliant blue lightning exploded from her open mouth! Not only did it incinerate him in an instant, but she must have leveled no less than 20 acres of the forest with this single powerful blast!

Feeling in particularly content with what she had just done, the gryphon altered her course and flew away from that snow filled meadow. And after a quick flight, the Predacon finally landed at the base of a towering mountain covered in snow and ice. There was only one way into her lair and it was through a very narrow passageway that was difficult to notice unless you know exactly what to look for. She carefully slipped inside before placing the human youngling on the ground so she could better see where she now was.

The Gryphon's lair was an enormous cave. Big by her standards, but positively colossal to a human! Especially a human child! Not only was this cave massive in size, but it was illuminated by dozens no, hundreds of blue glowing crystalline growths that were scattered all around it. Looking around there were also dozens of other tunnels that undoubtedly went deeper into as well as underneath the mountain. Although the child did not know this, what she was in the center of was an undiscovered vein of energon. What the gryphon Predacon fed off of… But that did not really matter to her right now, all that mattered was that this cave was safe and warm. Having only warmed up slightly in the great creature's claws during the flight, this cave felt like heaven. A slight cooing sound indicated that the baby too was enjoying the sudden increase in temperature.

The Predacon began silently fixing up a section of her cave. Digging a small hole and throwing in some dried wood and brush into it, then slamming her claws into the nearby stone wall causing it to rain a shower of sparks and igniting the contents of the pit. The human youngling eagerly scampered over to the warm fire where she sat with the little sparkling. Feeling the pain of the cold starting to leave her tired and weary body. The gryphon then settled herself down and began inspecting two children she had just brought into her home. Although clearly still a bit nervous, the little girl looked up at her and smiled a weak smile.

"Thank you Songbird." She said softly just as the baby in her arms began to squirm slightly. Again the Predacon wished that she could correct this child and say that she was not a song bird. But with her current limited vocabulary she was going to have to start small…

"N…name?" She questioned, happy to find that she was getting a bit better with this whole talking thing. The seven year old blinked once before realizing what this great creature was trying to ask.

"My name is Felicia. Felicia Johnson… and this is my little sister Chloe." She explained and moved the blanket so that the Gryphon could get a better look at her baby sister. The Predacon snorted loudly and shook her head.

"Bad names…" She stated bluntly. Why must all the human's names always sounds so strange and stupid? They really were a species without much taste in her opinion… that aside, she was very much aware of how tired these youngling's must be. After all they had been through a great deal tonight. "Sleep…"

"Will you be here when we wake up?" Felicia asked fearfully, as she did not want to wake up all alone in the strange cave, no matter how beautiful it was. She also still feared the man coming for her and her little sister… (Completely unaware that he had been blown into oblivion…) But she knew if this creature was there, she would frighten him away. She had saved them after all and even though she was really scary to look at… Felicia was not afraid of her…

The younglings request was such a strange and simple one that it really had the Predacon staring. This situation was so… odd… a human youngling and a sparkling; two weak creatures whose lives she could easily snuff out with a single wave of her claws; they were looking to her for protection. She did not have to give it to them… So why did she want to? Why did she want to help them?

Perhaps it was because they were just as alone as she was…?

After what felt like forever, the Predacon nodded to Felicia's question. Wordlessly assuring her that she would be there when she and Chloe woke up. Content with this, Felicia walked over to the great gryphon's side and laid against her. Careful not to hold her little sister too tightly or roll on her while she slept.

"Good night… Songbird." And just like that, the little girl fell into a deep dreamless sleep…

…Songbird…

She could live with that…

And over the course of five long years, Felicia would gain a truly fitting name…

…Freefall…

And little Chloe grew quickly, seemingly a little more by the rise and set of the moon…

Thus that became her new name…

…Moonrise…

Yes that's it for now, again I'm sorry if this chapter seemed a little bit off but I do promise this that will get better as time goes on. Please note that reviews and creative criticism are always greatly appreciated! So please remember to read and review! ^_^