"Where is he? Let me see him!" Scarlet shouted, pushing past Doc before throwing open the door to the med bay.

The man called Snake Eyes laid in a hospital bed, an IV pressed into his wrist to keep him hydrated and sedated. His tattered clothing had been removed, and replaced with bandages across his entire body, many of which were stained red or brown. The parts of his body that did not bleed instead fell away, his burned skin coating the cloth that held him together. He looked up at Scarlet with unblinking brown eyes but did not speak.

"Oh god, Snake, what happened to you?" Scarlet asked, pressing her head to his chest. "Snake? Can you hear me?" she then turned back to Doc and asked, "What's wrong? Why isn't he talking?"

"I don't know," he replied. "His vocal cords and lungs are fine. Ears too, though he probably has tinnitus now. Other than that… it seems like he's just not talking."

"Who did this to you, Snake?" she asked, once more pressing her head to his chest. "Just tell me, and I'll kill them. I promise you."

Snake Eyes slowly moved his right arm onto Scarlet's back, but still said nothing. Doc cleared his throat then said, "There was something else."

"What is it?" Scarlet growled, rising up to glare at him.

"He arrived in a car," Doc nervously said as he pulled on his collar. "Mainframe was checking it out and wanted me to tell you. something's weird about it."

"Whatever," Scarlet said as she stood up. "I'll be back soon, Snake.

A few minutes after Scarlet left, Snake Eyes swung his feet off the bed and stood up, pulling his IV out in the process. "What are you doing? You need rest!" Doc yelled, but Snake Eyes ignored him.

Instead he reached forward and took a pen from Doc's coat before stepping past him. snake Eyes took his own patient chart from the front of his bed and flipped it over, before quickly writing a message on the back. Then he walked to the other side of the bed, stabbed the paper into his pillow with the pen, then turned around and began to walk away.

"Get back here!" Doc yelled after him before sighing and saying, "Why does no one ever listen to their doctor?"

Doc looked back to the message and raised an eyebrow at what it said. "Wnt out 4 KRN, BB soon ||"

Scarlet stepped up alongside Mainframe, who furiously ran a scanner alongside a stationary Kup. After several moments Scarlet asked, "What the hell are you doing?"

"Scanning," he replied.

"No shit," she replied back. "Why?"

"Something's not right about this car," he said.

"And just what does that mean?" she asked.

"Well, Snake Eyes was unconscious when he arrived."

"Oh," Scarlet said.

"Yeah," Mainframe chuckled. "Also, we're about a thousand and a half miles away from that base. And this car got here in less than a day. That isn't possible."

"You think it's some sort of Cobra tech?" she asked.

"Probably. No telling what kind of experiments they had going on there, since Snake had the place bombed," he said. "Speaking of the devil, how's he doing?"

"He's alive," Scarlet sighed. "It was horrible, seeing him like that. And he wouldn't say anything… but I think he'll be alright," The sound of an airplane filled their ears, and they turned to see an old troop transport flying away from their base. Scarlet turned back to Mainframe and asked, "Was anyone scheduled to be leaving?"

"I don't think so," he nervously said.

Scarlet then clenched her fists and growled out, "I'm going to fucking kill him," before the car suddenly began to drive away from them. She then screamed out, "I AM GOING TO KILL HIM!"

Grimlock awakened from his slumber to yelling, which was not unusual for him. Though he didn't know why, it felt almost normal, though it also distressed him. At first he simply rested beneath the tarp that shielded him from prying eyes, hoping the yelling would stop. Instead it only grew worse. He didn't understand most of the words that were said, and even then not everything made it into his ears.

"Stupid dyke!" he heard a damaged human voice yell.

"Don't call ?he a dyke!" a higher pitched though still damaged human voice retorted.

"That's what ?he fucking is, Gloria!" the lower pitch said.

It occurred to Grimlock the higher pitch was familiar to him, but he didn't know quite where. The higher pitch's voice broke as it said, "It's just a phase! No ? of mine is a ? damned les?-!"

"Where do you think you're going, bitch!?" the rougher voice then growled before an undamaged high-pitched voice cried out in pain.

Grimlock was onto his feet before he realized why, his fist tearing through the weak metal shell as the three organics below him began to register. There was Verity, Mother, and Threat. They all looked up at Grimlock in terror, but he didn't process them. As his sight held onto Threat, he began to see his possible solutions. Crush it. Break it. Eat it. Rip it APART DEVOUR IT CONSUME IT DESTROYDESTROYDESTROYDESTROY!

"GRIM!" Verity's voice cut through the air, snapping Grimlock out of his trance. "Put him down, please!"

He looked to the fragile organic in his hand, its red body fluids now staining its mouth, before he dropped it to the ground below. He then instinctively changed modes, his form becoming even more terrifying to the humans, as Verity hurried out the door. Grimlock stepped forward, scared she was leaving him, but instead she ran to him.

"It's okay," Verity said as she placed her hand to his snout. "I'm okay."

"Verity…" Grimlock softly said, looking to the red mark on her cheek. "Hurt?" he asked, rising up to glare back down into the trailer.

"No, Grimlock," she said. "I'm okay. Let's… let's go."

"Go," he agreed, lowering himself so Verity could climb onto his back.

"Well, this is new," she quipped before pulling herself up. "Let's go, buddy."

"Go," Grimlock said once more, before he began to carry Verity away from the only life she had ever known, and into a whole new world.

Gloria Carlo-Rodriquez stood outside the ruined remains of her home, holding back tears. She had no money for repairs, or the hospital bill Glen would get, and her delinquent daughter had run off with the monster that attacked them. Evil, that's what Verity had called it. Her daughter had first fallen into the bed of the homosexual, and now the devil.

"Excuse me, hu, er-um," a voice said from behind her.

Gloria turned to see a rather awkward looking black man dressed in a white and black shirt and strange looking black pants standing before her, with a weird smile on his face. "What do you want?" she asked, sniffling.

"What happened here?" he asked, his smile locked in place. She wondered if there was something wrong with him.

"We were attacked by some kind of… metal dinosaur," she said, realizing just how ridiculous it sounded.

"A metal dino?" he asked in shock, his smile not faltering.

"That's what it was," Glorida replied as she turned back to look at the trailer. The man had not stepped away, yet when she looked back, he was gone. There were no footprints where he had stood either.

Jazz drove away from the entrance to the trailer park, switching to radio to talk to Optimus. "Yo, Prime, we've got some… well, some mixed news," he said.

"What is it, Jazz?" Optimus asked as he searched the town, his own holo-avatar standing inside a café to watch the humans' news program, which detailed increasing tensions between "America" and "Nanzhao".

"I found signs of an Autobot alright," he replied. "Not exactly who we're lookin for though."

"What?" Prime asked in surprise. "Who is it?"

Jazz braced himself then nervously offered, "Grimlock?"

Optimus said nothing, but his holo-avatar disappeared as he thought. After several moments of silence he finally said, "Find Grimlock. Make sure he can't hurt anyone."

"Hurt anyone?" Jazz asked. "He's one of us, ain't he?"

"He is," Prime agreed. "But he's also dangerous, especially to organics. Find him, Jazz. And if you have to, make sure he can never hurt anyone again."

"Understood, sir," Jazz grimly complied.

"Ratchet," Optimus then requested.

"I'm listening, Optimus," the medic sighed.

"They're not here. We need somewhere else to look," Prime stated.

"I'm expanding the radar. This is hard, without any equipment," he complained. A moment later he said, "Well, that's odd."

"What is it?" Optimus asked.

"That signal from earlier, it's gone. But we've got another one, some way's away," Ratchet said. "There's something else… no…"

"What is it, Ratchet?" Prime demanded.

"He's found us, sir," Ratchet gasped. "Scorponok is here."

It was only three minutes before Optimus and his Autobots, aside from Jazz, arrived at the outskirts of Amarillo together. However, three minutes can mean so much when it comes to torture. In those three minutes Scorponok had torn Deftwing's wings from his back and ripped the servos from his arms. He had taken plucked out Deftwing's eyes carefully, making rue the Autobot could watch as his head was crushed by Scorponok's claws, pressing just tight enough against his brain module to send him into fits of pain but not kill him. the Decepticon had torn Deftwing's legs off and tossed them to the ground, before reaching inside of his chassis and pulled out his backstrut before refitting it inside Deftwing's fuel pump while making sure not to cause additional damage, leaving it just functional enough to keep him alive.

"I'm going to be sick," Bumblebee gagged as the group looked at the horrifying sight, to Scorponok holding the limp Autobot by his neck while two other Decepticons stood behind him.

"Bee?" Deftwing asked, looking around frantically as his eyes swung around wildly, colliding with his chassis multiple times. "Where are you!? I can't see you! Help me!"

"I've been waiting for you, Optimus," Scorponok said as he clenched his claws, and cut Deftwing's head from his body.

"NO!" Optimus cried, driving forward while transforming in the same moment. His move succeeded in allowing him to tackle Scorponok before he growled out, "You'll pay for this."

"Possibly," Scorponok said as Bumblebee and Hot Rod began to attack his followers, while Ratchet reclaimed Deftwing's severed head.

Optimus Prime was a warrior. He hadn't been forged by Primus to be one, but war had made sure of it. Four million wars of death and anguish had made him fearsome and powerful. He channeled the anger that he had fostered over those long years as he began to beat Scorponok to death. Fist after fist. Broken glass and dented metal. Spilled energon. He would not be stopped.

Bumblebee and Hot Rod were warriors as well, but even they knew when to stop. "Optimus," Hot Rod nervously said. "You've won."

"No," Optimus growled as he looked back to Hot Rod. "If I don't stop now, he'll," Optimus stopped speaking as he looked back to Scorponok's broken body, too injured to even move. "If I don't stop, I'll end up just like him…" Optimus grimly said.

Cobra was a vast organization, with millions of members. In fact, it was so large, that one of its Commanders had once said "If you ever wonder whether or not you're a member, just ask yourself, do you know who you really work for? If the answer is yes, you work for us." With so many members, only a few would ever be honored to see the Commander in person. Aside from their own personal guard, there had only ever been five people who are still alive to see the Commander, and her predecessor, in person.

One of those people, whose name had been murdered just as effectively as his past, rode up the elevator to Cobra Commander's office alone, aside from the two Crimson Guards that stood behind him. his codename was Overkill, which he had always admired for being a bit too ironic. After all, he was a scientist. Even if his enemies always did end up mutilated beyond recognition, it was technically the soldiers who were responsible.

Overkill dressed not too dissimilarly from the average Cobra trooper, though his own uniform was instead a protective suit for his experiments rather than fatigues. Most of his face was covered by a red scarf instead of a mask like the soldiers, though he did where one of their helmets. It always helped to be prepared. His brown eyes stared out from beneath the blue helmet, cold but humorous, while the small amount of skin visible was a sickly white.

Once the elevator came to a stop a voice ordered, "Identify yourself."

"Overkill," he replied. "Doctor, Overkill."

After a moment's silence the voice said, "You may enter," and the elevator door slid open.

Overkill stepped into the room as the door closed behind him, and the elevator returned to the bottom of the shaft. Twelve Crimson Guardsmen stood around the room; their eyes locked on him from behind their helmets while they held their assault rifles tight to their chests. Any exits out of the room were hidden by black curtains bearing the Cobra insignia that covered the walls. Dead ahead, sitting atop an elevated throne with a backrest in the shape of a snarling Cobra was the Commander herself.

She looked to him with two sharp cold blue eyes hidden behind her red hooded mask. She dressed in what many would assume to be a navy officer's uniform. The only symbol upon it however was the red Cobra over her left breast. Visibly strapped to the Commander's left side was a silver revolver that glistened beneath the lights shining down upon her.

"What do you want, Overkill?" she asked, her voice carrying authority and apathy.

"We've had a… development, with the Cybertronians, Commander," he informed, nervousness creeping up his spine as he looked up at her.

"And?" she asked, the word cutting through him.

"Rattlers SS, TC, and SW are fine, along with H.I.S.S D.B," he said.

"I noticed two units were missing," the Commander said.

"Yes ma'am," Overkill nervously replied. "SS killed one of the inactive units, while the second escaped. It appears as though they weren't as inactive as we first thought."

"No matter," she said. "Proceed with Operation: Heaven Sent."

"Yes, Commander," Overkill said with a small bow, before turning away.

"And Overkill?" she asked, her words freezing him in place.

"Yes, Commander?" he asked in fear.

"If you lose anymore of our equipment," she stated. "You will be punished. Severely."

The sound of chaos flowed through Soundwave's head, but this was not unusual. There was never ending chaos on every world, even those that held no life. Earth was such an interesting planet though, for the chaos was overwhelming. Billions of humans fighting each other, killing each other, procreating with each other, socializing with each other, building together, laughing together, so much noise. That was just the humans. Billions of birds did the same, their own voices louder than that of the humans. The never-ending howl of wolves and barking of dogs. Cats mewing for food. Lions roaring as they pounced on prey. The screech of insects. It was never ending. Never quieting. The organics breathing, creaking, snapping. The fluids rushing throughout their puny bodies with such pressure that they squirt out of the first opening they find.

Soundwave's attention was pulled back to his surroundings as a small elephant brushed against his leg, wrapping its trunk around him. "What are you doing, earthling?" he asked, his voice resonating with several different frequencies.

The elephant then let out a sound which most humans would agree wasn't language, but Soundwave took to mean, "Playing."

"Fair enough," he replied before looking over the endless plains of grass. He spoke not with words, but thoughts, "Return, Ravage, Buzzsaw, Laserbeak, Ratbat."

The four Decepticons that returned to him were much different than the others, be they Seeker or Infiltrator. Ravage bore a form similar to a mountain lion with a black metal body and grey limbs. Three of the others were close to birds, yet obviously mechanical. Buzzsaw's body was mostly yellow and white, with a black head and grey beak. Laserbeak held a mostly black body with red wings and a yellow beak. Ratbat was unique in that his body was shaped more like an Earth bat than an avian, with different shades of purple covering him, while his eyes glowed yellow.

"This place has an abundance of Energon," Ratbat said as he landed upon Soundwave's shoulder, the other mini-cassettes circling overhead while Ravage sat at Soundwave's feet.

"I thought so," Soundwave agreed. "However, the area is occupied."

"The organics?" Ratbat asked with a laugh. "Please. We can take care of them with ease."

"We wait until Megatron arrives," Soundwave said.

"And how long will that be?" Ravage asked.

"Soon," Soundwave said.

"Squawk!" screeched Laserbeak. "We'll have more Energon than we can eat!"

"Squawk!" screeched Buzzsaw. "You drink Energon, not eat it! Moron! Squawk!"

Soundwave looked past his now arguing cassettes, to the sky and beyond. Megatron would soon be here, and with him, the end of this world. Or its beginning, he supposed. It was the same fate as countless other worlds. Yet for some reason, Soundwave didn't want that. He had never enjoyed war, but now more than ever, he simply wanted it to end.