HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME :D! I figured I'd update for YOU guys, even though it's MY birthday because I love you guys and all the support you give me! I did spellcheck this, but my program is a little screwed in it's (legit) processor so there's probably typos and typos-spelling errors. My apologies, if they bother you just point them out and I'll fix 'em up. Enjoy and don't forget my poll ;)

Also, for some people who may be confused this writing is the voice, this is Lacey's own thoughts.

Little teaser of some kind of backstory in here, but nothing too massive. Just enough to make it a little interesting in this chapter ;) Have a good rest of your day! School starts soon - barf - but I'm going to try and write more. For you guys! :D

Enjoy!

It was quiet right now. The voice was silent at the moment. She'd noticed that the voice spoke the least whenever she was around the dino guys, so she tried to be with them as much as possible.

I'm still here, idiot.

Then again, it never left her alone long enough for her to forget that it was there. Just enough that she had some space to think.

There was a chuff from beside her, where she looked up at Strafe, who sat in... giant bird form. He looked out at the water that surrounded the entire island calmly, from where they sat on the top of the dino base, like he didn't have a care in the world. They'd gone up earlier when she had gone to the base to see them, only to find all of them sleeping. Well, almost all. Everyone except for the two headed flier who had been sitting in the corner, staring at her. After a two minute stare off between the two, he walked over, placed her on his back, and the two flew up to the roof. That was a little while ago.

She enjoyed the silence; it was comforting for her. To know that she could actually get out of the noise, and into the silence where she could escape into her own little world.

"Lacey?"

She looked down at the ground as Strafe chuffed again, where the twins stood at the base's wall.

"What are you doing up there?" Sunstreaker asked. Wait, no. Sideswipe. Sunstreaker was the taller twin, the yellow one. Or was that gold with light hues? Either way, it was Sideswipe who asked the question.

Oh wow, you now some human terminology. Good job slag face.

Slag?

It's a negative slang word used exclusively by Cybertronians. It's human counterpart is the negative swear word, shit, which is the curse word for human defecation.

That was.. really proper.

Yeah, and? Did you think I was-

"Laceburner!"

The voice stopped talking and she focused back on the twins who stood below her.

"How'd you get up there"

Once the question was registered, she looked up at the two headed bird beside her, who opened his mouth and screeched quietly, stretching his wings and flapping them a few times to air them out.

"Well, can you come down please?"

She furrowed her brow at the red twin. "Do you.. do you not trust them?"

He shook his head. "That's not it, it's just-"

"They're idiots. They're clumsy, and don't pay attention to what they're doing. They hurt a lot of people because they don't watch where they're going and don't do what they should. So no, I don't trust them." the yellow twin cut in. "Come down before you get hurt."

That shocked her a little; not long ago, that one had tried to kill her, now he was worrying about her.

Suddenly, Strafe was in the air and grabbed her shoulders in his claws, and gently placed her on the ground, before swooping into the base.

"Primus, those guys are going to hurt someone else soon." Sideswipe shook his head.

Sunstreaker eyed her. "Why were you even up there with him?"

She felt her cheeks get hot and she looked down at the ground instead.

Sideswipe laughed loudly. "We aren't mad Lacey. Sunny's just wondering."

"Sunstreaker, idiot. Don't call me that." he corrected.

"Why?" Sideswipe persisted.

She shrunk in on herself a little bit with a shrug. "It's..it's quiet when I'm around them."

Sunstreaker snorted. "They're never quiet."

Again, Laceburner shrugged. That wasn't exactly what she meant, but she wasn't about to correct him.

"Well, Sunny and I-"

Sunstreaker hit his twin upside the head.

"-were wondering if you wanted to come for a drive with us over on the main land, seeing as there isn't many placed to go around here." Sideswipe finished.

"Sideswipe!"

"What?"

"Sunstreaker." the yellow twin emphasized.

"Whatever, you want to come Lacey?" he asked.

She hesitated in her answer, then nodded.

"Awesome! Come on, we already had Ratchet get the ground bridge ready." the red mech smiled.

He transformed down eagerly, and she watched Sunstreaker do it as well. She furrowed her brow as her HUD pinged, and offered her the option to transform down, which she accepted. She folded down on herself until the thing keeping her body off the ground was her wheels, and her engine revved, ready to go.

"You're a little show off, Princess." Sideswipe said with a laugh.

"S-Sorry." she said quietly.

"It's o-"

"He's just joking Laceburner, it's okay." Sunstreaker reassured.

"Coming from you, Sunny?" Sideswipe asked.

"Are-are you sure you want me to come?" she asked.

"Yeah, why not?" Sideswipe asked.

"Well, I'm.. I'm not exactly the-" she cut herself off with silence.

"Are you talking about the incident with Moonracer and Ratchet?" Sunstreaker asked.

"How'd you know about that?" she asked, embarrassed.

"It's fine, ok? That won't happen, ok?" Sideswipe promised.

She faltered.

"Easy." she heard a deep voiced mumble, and she figured it was Sunstreaker from the vibration in his voice.

"Come on." Sideswipe said, and he began driving away. Sunstreaker, however, didn't move.

"Go on, Laceburner." he said, and she almost shivered at his voice.

Starting up her engine, she followed behind Sideswipe, and noticed Sunstreaker follow behind her.

He's like the head male of the wild herd. the voice said, and she would've nodded.

He was; he let his most trusted - his twin - take the lead and bring them where they were going, and he brought up the rear to protect them.

He was a steady mech, and it brought her a sense of.. comfort, in a way. As if she knew him before she lost her memory, and the way he was acting seemed to bring her a sense of relief, almost.

Sideswipe led them into the same room from before, where they drove through the blue tunnel and ended up in an alleyway again.

"Primus, listen to your engine Lacey. That's fragging amazing." Sideswipe said as they left the alley way.

Don't blow our cover and be careful. They might try to kill you. the voice chose to speak up, and she pressed the break slightly in shock, but kept going.

{:: You okay Laceburner?::} Sunstreaker's voice asked.

{::Um.. ye-yeah, sorry.::}

{:: It's no problem::} he responded.

{::What is this?::} she asked.

{:: This is a private comm link. It's the only way the three of us can communicate without the humans knowing what we are. I'm sure if you ask Prowl, he can explain everything to you.::} Sunstreaker explained.

{::O-Oh-okay.::} she stuttered.

Sideswipe suddenly pulled up to a red light, Laceburner beside him, and Sunstreaker moved around her, stopping beside Sideswipe, then his engine revved.

{::You think you can keep up Laceburner?::} Sideswipe asked suddenly.

{::I-I-I think so.::}

{::Good, because you're gonna have to follow me.::} Sideswipe said, then laughed.

{:: Laceburner, you stay on Sideswipe's aft, okay? Don't lose us.::} Sunstreaker ordered.

{::Y-yes sir.::} she said, and suddenly the light turned green. Sideswipe and Sunstreaker took off, their engines practically snarling, and Laceburner took off to follow them.

Jesus, this is going to be a quick drive, isn't it? the voice asked rhetorically.

For the first time since she woke up, she agreed with the voice.

It was only after almost four hours of following them around, racing with them - and mostly losing due to her lack of experience driving - and a lot of laughs did they make it back to base, and she realized that the voice was wrong.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X

Laceburner sat on a couch, in the partial darkness of a room she didn't recognize. Her paint was dark black, with little to no highlights but it looked good - she managed to pull it off. She had a cube of Energon in her servos.

The door suddenly opened, and a mech with broad shoulders, dark brown and black in color walked in, his optics a dark red. Behind him, two other mechs, one a rusty orange-brown color with similar red optics, and one a tall, muscular mech with gold colored armor, and dark blue optics similar to hers. The gold-colored mech smiled at her.

"Hey 'Burner." he said as he sat down on the couch beside her and wrapped his arm around her shoulders, his large frame practically consuming hers.

"Hi 'Chief. Did you guys get whatever Blacklurk was looking for?" she asked, pulling his arm off and he chuckled.

"You'll never let me, will you?"

She shook her head.

"I promised Cori, and she hates you." Laceburner pointed out.

"Hated." the rusty colored mech, Rustbreak, corrected.

"Rustbreak!" the dark brown mech, Ripple, said.

"She's out there." Laceburner insisted.

"Then where?" Rustbreak asked.

"How would I know? But she'll be back." Laceburner insisted.

Rustbreak went to open his mouth, but the door opened again and a bright blue femme with black highlights walked in.

"Rusty, leave her alone. Corinthian is out there, and she'll come home one day. Don't doubt that."

"Thanks Bellbreak." Laceburner smiled.

Another couple of bots entered the room, among them being Vega and Blacklurk.

"Hey guys." Vega smiled, sitting beside her fellow femme.

"Hey Vega, hey Lurk." Laceburner smiled.

"Evening Laceburner. How was your orn sweetie?" the dark, matte black mech asked, sitting beside Bellbreak on the two seater.

"Did you get what you were looking for?" Vega asked.

"We did in fact, Vega. Goldchief was the one who found it. He caught it's energy signal and pinpointed it's location."

The golden colored mech with black highlights sat up straighter, proud of himself and puffed his chest out, Blacklurk's words boosting his ego a couple notches.

"What exactly was it you went for?" Laceburner asked.

"It was a.. precautionary step." Blacklurk said.

She didn't press on with the matter. Blacklurk would only tell her information she needed to know, and would get angry if she kept going, so she dropped the subject.

Hey, get up idiot. she froze. That was the voice. Why had she not heard it until now?

Get. Up. Before they break the door.

She blinked.

"You okay Burner?" Rustbreak asked.

Laceburner suddenly blinked, and the room returned to her view, empty. Where the hell was she?

Wake. Up.

She opened her eyes to find herself on her bed, in her room, the lights off. She remembered that she and the twins had gone out to drive around for a bit. They'd had some fun, but when they got back she was really tired so she decided to go take a nap in her room.

There was a bang on the door.

"Laceburner, open this door or I will." she heard a deep voice that she recognized as Ironhide's yell.

Don't, maybe they'll kill you.

You were just the one telling me to open the door.

Yeah, and now I'm saying don't.

Ignoring the voice, she opened the door.

Optimus Prime stood behind Ironhide, who was next to Jazz, with Prowl behind him.

"Are ya okay?" Jazz asked.

"Sorry, I-I was sleeping." she apologized.

"It is of no bother Laceburner, I assure you. Everybot needs their recharge." Optimus said. "We were just hoping to teach you a few things today. Would you be willing to come to the training room with us?"

She hesitated for a second.

You sure that's what they want to do?

She'd gotten accustom to the voice in her head always questioning the safety of her situation, and if the move she was making was the right one.

Of course I do. You hurt yourself, you hurt me. it said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

She nodded at Optimus minutely, just enough for him to notice, and he nodded back.

"Alright, come on."

She followed behind the four mechs obediently. Anything to get that dream out of her head.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X

Laceburner stood in the hallway in front of Sideswipe and Sunstreaker's room, confused. Sideswipe had used that comm link thing earlier, telling her to come to their room after she was done in training with the bots.

This time around they'd gone with shooting instead of sparring. The femme, Arcee, was in there. As usual, she was smiling and bouncy, as if excited about the day for some reason.

"Laceburner! There you are!" she smiled upon the small, blue bot entering the room.

She smiled tightly. "Um.. hi."

"Did Ironhide tell you what we're doing today?" she asked.

Laceburner shook her head. "N-No."

"Well, we're sharpshooting today. I'm one of the Autobots' best sharpshooters. So, here. We're going to start you off with a small weapon, something that can't kill someone." Arcee said, handing her a gun. "This is filled with things called foam darts. They're human inventions, and are perfect for target practice. So here, watch me." she instructed.

From there it was almost four hours of watching her whenever she said to, and shooting at targets with little, orange darts.

"Wow, you're not too bad at this Lacey." Arcee complimented, and she smiled.

Optimus dismissed her, and she left, remembering to head to the twin's room.

She knocked on the door, but nobody was opening yet.

"Who are you looking for?"

She turned to see a mech, if she was correct and her memory was serving her properly, Mirage walking down the hall, towards her.

"I-um-I-"

"It's okay Laceburner." he chuckled. "If you're looking for the twins, they're in the brig right now. Prowl caught them planting a prank, and sent them down."

"B-Brig" she asked.

"Yeah, it's- nevermind. I highly doubt you'll ever end up down there. Anyways, if you want, you can come with me. I was gonna head over to the rec room and play a few rounds of Halo with Hot Rod, but you can come and we can watch a movie. If you want to, that is."

You sure we'll never end up in there? We can be pretty fragging stupid.

With a hesitant nod, she followed the red mech down the hall, away from their room. They were walking for about a minute, Laceburner following behind him obediently until Mirage stopped suddenly.

"Laceburner, you can walk with me." he said.

She tensed, and saw her visor glitch green on the shine of his armor.

"Do you know when your visor glitches, or are you unaware of it?" he asked.

She froze, blinking. "Um.. n-no. No, I only know if I see it happening, or someone makes it obvious." she answered, looking down.

Suddenly, a finger propped her chin up, her optics looking with Mirage's bright blue ones from behind her visor.

"Hey, don't hide your face." he smiled. "It's too pretty to be hidden."

She felt heat rise to her cheeks as she smiled a little.

"There's the smile." he said lightly with a large smile, and she felt her cheeks heat up more. "Come on, Hot Rod will start wondering where we are."

She followed beside him this time until they made it to the recreation room, where the door was open. The red and orange mech, Hot Rod, sat on the two seater with a controller in his hand, the clicker stick thing on the arm rest beside him.

"Hey Hot Rod." Mirage said.

"Hey 'Raj. Oh, hey Laceburner." he said.

She offered him a small, closed smile.

"You coming to play too, or are you just watching?" he asked.

"She came to watch. I found her by the twin's room, but they're in the brig so I invited her to come watch." Mirage said as he sat down beside Hot Rod, leaving Laceburner to sit on the floor in front of them, one the other two seater, or the big couch.

She opted for the big couch, crossing her legs to get comfortable. She watched as they started the game up, chose their avatars, and went on to play.

In short, Hot Rod kicked Mirage in the ass. Like, hard. Hot Rod won about fifteen matches, and Mirage won two. She could see the frustration planting itself on Mirage's face, and felt really bad.

She watched Mirage's part of the screen in an attempt to help him, but about ten minutes into looking, something in her head seemed to click.

"Mirage, enemy's in your right corner. Approximately fifty feet away, ducking behind that pillar. Use the building to your left, duck and roll. There's a Sniper Rifle in the corner, use the window to pinpoint his exact location. He's not wearing any sufficient head armor to help him withstand a shot like that, use the rifle to take him out. He'll either be forced to camp out behind the tree, where a grenade can flush him out, or enter open ground where he's exposed." she said suddenly, then her optics widened.

Where had that come from. And why was it so easy for her? Like riding a bike. She found it easy to analyze his surroundings, and the potential outcomes on how he could win, then go with the most likely one.

The screen on the TV suddenly moved to the pause screen, and she knew they were looking at her.

"What?" she heard Hot Rod asked, and she blushed, bringing her legs up and hiding her face in her knees.

Suddenly, the springs of the two seater to her right groaned in relief as it was obviously relieved from weight, and she felt a servo on her knee. She peeked out a little, seeing the color change of her visor on her armor.

"Laceburner, how did you do that" the accented voice asked, and she knew it was Mirage.

"I-I-I-I don't know." she stuttered, embarrassed.

"Laceburner, this is serious. How did you do that so quickly?" he asked.

"Prowl's on his way." Hot Rod said, and Laceburner felt something wet collect in the ridged of her optics, and something dribbled on to her face plates.

"Hey." Mirage said softly, lifting his servo and placing it on her head. When he brought his hand back, there was what looked like Energon on his thumb. "You don't need to cry, okay? We aren't mad. We just want to know how you did that. If you're any good at this stuff, you might be able to help Prowl, and maybe even us on the battlefield." he tried to comfort her. "You don't have to be scared."

She registered his words, and she was listening, but they didn't help. How had she done that? Where did it come from? What the hell?

How do you not remember doing that back home? the voice asked, but all that did was make things worse.

"I'm here, what happened?" a voice asked, and she looked past Mirage to see the black and white mech, alongside Optimus Prime, Ratchet and Jazz.

"Here, watch." Hot Rod said, inserting something into a projector, and the video played.

The four newcomers watched without blinking, and Laceburner turned her head away in order to not see their reaction. She felt an arm wrap around her shoulders as the weight on the couch shifted and Mirage got on the couch beside her.

"Laceburner." a deep voice said softly, and she saw Jazz sit beside her. "This is by no means out of anger, frustration or anything beyond pure curiosity. How did ya do that?" he asked.

She whimpered a little, something that her vocal processor did before she had to chance to stop it, and sunk further into the red arms around her.

"She doesn't know, Jazz.." Mirage said for her.

"Ya don't have a single clue? Not even... a left over feelin' or sense? Maybe a picture in yer head, or a name?" he asked.

She shook her own head. Nothing besides that stupid voice.

I can hear you, you know that right?

Should she tell them about the voice? Maybe they'd be able to help her.

No. They don't need to know. They wouldn't care either. None of them actually care. We, we're just another body in their stupid little war for them to toss in front of the oncoming bullets. the voice hissed in anger.

She shivered.

"N-No. No, I-I-I don't know how I did it-t." she stuttered.

"Hey guys, what's - what happened?" She looked up to see Sideswipe enter the room.

"Sideswipe, should you not be in the brig where I left you and your twin?" Prowl asked.

"Nope. First Aid said the timer went off, and let us out." the red mech smiled.

The golden mech grunted as he walked into the room. "Oh Primus, who did what?" he asked, and she watched him tense when his optics landed on her.

"Watch the video, you'll find out. If it isn't already obvious enough with the massive projector on." Hot Rod said snidely.

Sunstreaker suddenly grabbed him by his chest armor. "You speak to me like that again and I'll make sure to shove my hand so far down your aft that it attaches to your processor and pulls out your neuro sensors just in time for you to not feel me tear your spark out, you two bit, half-processored fragface." he threatened, letting him go.

"Sunstreaker!" Prowl said in a warning.

"What happened?" he asked.

"We were playing our game, and I was losing horribly-"

"No surprise, continue." Sideswipe said.

Mirage gave him a look, but continued. "Anyway, Laceburner was just sitting on the couch quietly the entire time until she.. well, watch the video." he said.

Sunstreaker hit the play button, and the two, along with Prowl, Jazz, Ratchet and Optimus -who were probably re-analyzing it to see if they missed something - turned their heads to watch the video.

"Whoa." Sideswipe said when the video ended.

"It must be an instinct or something from before she lost 'er memory." Jazz said.

"Jazz, she's seventeen aon cycles. For a Cybertronian to pick up a habit or have an instinct stick with them through their entire life, even past her data banks being emptied, she would've had to start doing this when she was around nine or ten aon cycles." Ratchet explained.

"Yeah, and?"

"You really think she was doing that stuff when she wasn't even a teen?" Sunstreaker asked.

"What were you and Sides doing at that age?" he asked rhetorically, and Sunstreaker huffed, crossing his arms.

Ooh, what were they doing? the voice pondered. Probably mech-hoes.

Laceburner purposely glitched her visor red in frustration.

Frustration at her voice. Frustration at that stupid dream that hadn't left her head yet. At her situation, and her seemingly endless amnesia. At her life at the current moment.

Better get used to it, suck it up and get past it. It isn't a fatal wound, and even if it was, you aren't dead yet. Deal with it. the voice said.

Yeah, and how exactly was she meant to deal with it? She couldn't remember anything at all, but apparently she had her instincts from a past she couldn't remember, no matter how desperately she wanted to.

You deal with it in the exact same manner as how you tried to help Mirage. You look at the facts, analyze the scenario, your surroundings, then come up with possibilities, and what do you after that? the voice asked.

She froze; the voice was giving her advice now? Two seconds ago, it was hating her.

Yeah, well we're stuck together for the foreseeable future. Might as well get along, right? Now answer my question kid.

She thought back to the question. After she came up with all the possibilities for Mirage to win, what was her next step?

Choose to most likely course of action to win.

Exactly. Now stop moping and figure everything out before I kill you trying to claw out of us.

That sounded so weird; she almost smiled.

Almost.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X

Yay! I hope you all enjoyed this! Have a good one everybody!