Delphian

Disclaimer: Don't own Transformers in any way shape or form, they all belong to Hasbro, Paramount and the comic guys. Not making any money out of this so don't sue me please, I'm only a lowly student with ambitions to be a writer one day. The sparklings are mine though, as well as the new upgrades but otherwise I don't own anything else.

Authors note: oopse, kinda got the last comment totally wrong on my last chapter but uni life has been overtaking everything. Anyway, here's the next part of the story at long last and hope it's been worth the wait.

--

Chapter 2- Planning and Opportunities

A strange silver substance, not quite liquid but not quite metal either, slurped its way along the tubing system and filled the small cube to the brim. Watching it carefully, Stuntz stopped the flow and ran her fingers over the surface. Instantly the metallic tree sap bubbled, popped slightly and then changed into a swirl of colours before turning clear like rain water. Nodding, the little fem headed over to her companions and tilted Proma's head back to pour the drink down his throat.

"What is that stuff?" asked Accel, abandoning the viewing screen with a tone which showed his disgust at what was being played.

She didn't respond at first, watching to see the larger bot cough a few times but then return to a relaxed state. "It's a calming drink, found the recipe in some old disused file. Supposed to be good for the spark and all that"

Accel sighed and rubbed the back of his neck, feeling the joints click in the most annoying manner, "Don't suppose you could brew one up for me could you?"

Stopping the reprimand before it came out, the other shook her head slowly. Glancing around the cave, it was hard to think that such evil atrocities were taking place just a few miles away from where they were sitting. There were silver tree's in this cave, young and strong, stretching their branches out thickly to seek the air above them. The leaves were glass almost, easy to shatter if not given the correct sort of landing area. A long river, small by the old standards but pure and clean, ran the length of the cave system as far as any of them could tell. It wasn't possible to go exploring much further than beyond the safe boundaries of the old Autocity, because the Orate could have picked them up.

Her optics wandered over to Uncle Bucky, the old bot who had stumbled across them after a rather horrible battle on the surface. It was hard to imagine what he had been, just watching him happily tend to the garden where he grew plants and tended the trees. The old tape deck was looking over at them and seemed to know exactly what was going on even though he had hardly walked into the room. With a nod, he lumbered over to them followed by the squeaks of the CD's and the mini-bots who had turned up with Bucky.

Accel caught hold of Gogo and Seeker, rubbing their spines, "Hello you two? Been bugging poor Bucky again?"

"Negative" came the response, slightly monotone but with a hint of a smile, "They have been helping with the planting of new trees. What occurred with Promenade?"

Stuntz looked down, "He went off the fritz after seeing the footage Gogo brought back…though I'm not sure as to why"

The red and silver mech still had yet to come around after being forced to offline; it appeared the little Fem was just a bit too good at doing that sort of thing in a hurry. Maybe it could in handy later on but she doubted it. Accel didn't look up from the two CD's as he spoke, averting his gaze from the pair of them, "I know why"

They waited for a response, knowing better than to ask questions. Finally the truck part of him shifted and let the two CD's go to chase after Roma with Kitsune and Risu. It was quite an odd seen to see a fox, dragon, rabbit and bat chasing after a butterfly but it worked. "They're doing stuff to the Fems…nasty stuff which I thought would never happen"

"Oh Accel" sighed Stuntz closing her optics and offering her hand to him for some comfort.

The yellow and silver bot struggled to stop himself from crying, "They're making them have sparklings, forcing them…all of them. Including…"

"Standard procedure" came Bucky's voice though it was a little quieter than normal.

"Bucky!" hissed Stuntz irritably; not wanting to burst into tears herself. She knew a lot of the stuff that happened in the Death Camp, the little fem had spied on it enough to see the surface stuff but never had she thought that the Fems would be put through something like that. No wonder it was impossible to find them.

There was silence for a long while, everyone contemplating the meaning of those dead words. A groan came from Proma as finally his central computer rebooted himself and he frowned at his two oldest friends, "What the slag did I go and do this time?"

"Looked at the footage Gogo brought back before I got there you big lug-nut" said Accel, kicking his brother's foot none-to-lightly, "Then decided to attack our little star here"

"Accel!" Stuntz looked a little more than embarrassed about hearing her old nickname again. Proma shook his head and hauled himself into a sitting position before looking around the cave and sighing. The situation was hopeless. What were they really meant to do, there was three of them going up against the entire Orate camp. It was pure suicide.

"Don't think negavitly. You three have to free the Autobots or else all hope is lost" said Bucky, looking directly at Proma before turning and lumbering back off to do some tending to his flowers.

Two looked at one and all three understood each other instantly. There was no need for squabbling or argument. They had sworn a long time ago to break the others out of that Death Camp or die trying.

With a fleeting glimmer of hope in his spark, Proma extended his hand out into the centre of the small group, "Till all are one"

Stuntz placed her hand on top of his, "We stand together"

Accel closed the deal with both hands, one on top touching Stuntz hand and the other joining with his elder brothers on the bottom, "Until our darkest hour"

The other two copied the move Accel had made with their free hand and all of them brought the clutch down to the ground quickly. The oath had been sworn many times before and would be said a thousand times more but sometimes they had to remind themselves of what they were doing. It was their bond to keep them going, their hope and love for one another embedded in a single action.

Unknown to the three sparklings, someone was listening to them up high in the cosmos. Someone they all knew but had never met. "Till all are one" said a voice, deep and soothing but filled with authority and might.

--

Choking black trails of smoke curled their way up from the stinking tar that was being burnt down slowly into energon. The work was disgusting and no human could have ever dealt with it. Jazz pushed one of the slabs towards a conveyer belt, wheezing badly before suddenly letting off a loud cough. The rain was not helping the amount of pure steam that had been produced and suddenly he collapsed. Forgetting everything else, Hotrod shot towards his comrade and tried to pull him up back up, "Come on, you can't give up now"

Jazz choked a little, his optic's smarting, "It's okay…just give me a…."

"You don't have a moment…yow!" Hotrod yelled as a large blow was delivered via an energon whip. Celestialsphere growled at the pair as Jazz had now collapsed back to the ground. The red eyes flashed harshly with rows of teeth showing through a disgruntled smile, "What the slag are you fraggers doing?"

Hotrod tried to move back towards Jazz, "He's unwell! I've got to get him to a medic!"

The whip lashed out in front of the younger bot with a savage burning sensation running down his left hand circuits. Hotrod yelled out despite what everyone else had told him to do, Celestialsphere had obviously turned up the pain threshold. Every last system smarted with pain, some almost overloading but not quite reaching that point. Thunderbolt came wandering up, intent on discovering the nature of the disruption, "What's all this noise?" he drawled out. Hotrod and Jazz stared up in terror, one Orate was bad enough but two was enough to reduce them to terrified sparklings.

Celestialsphere grinned and kicked out at Hotrod, who just took it for once as he could not let anything happen to Jazz, "This one seems to think that the other needs to go to a medic"

A drawl of a laugh came from Thunderbolt's vocal unit, "Does he now? Well there's only one thing to do with a beaten up old bot isn't there?"

Before the sentence had even finished being said, Celestialsphere had grappled Hotrod to the floor with his head firmly locked in a position so he could see what was about to happen. Thunderbolt loomed over the now terrified Jazz and started to deliver blow after blow unto the defenceless bot. His yells rang out, mixed in with Hotrod's pleas for mercy across the whole yard.

The other Orate members shouted encouragements whilst those Autobots on the surface could only stare on in terror. The beating lasted a horrifying ten minuets and by the time that Thunderbolt finished Jazz was barely recognisable, though still alive. Just.

Estoilehowl wandered up, glaring at the scene as Hotrod was finally released but didn't move anymore. A snarl passed over the seekers face, "Bump that wreck somewhere useful and get these slaggers back to work before any more acts of insubordination occur"

Hotrod couldn't look at any of the others, though he could feel their optic's on him. All he could see was the mangled form of Jazz before he was hauled off the ground and pushed back into the labour. Trying to keep his emotions in check, Hotrod silently offered his apologises to Primus as the wrecked body was dragged away.

Mirage watched silently, feeling his spark heavy with emotion. Turning to look at the sky, he offered what little prays could be said at a time like this.

--

Solitary confinement wasn't that bad really, just lonely and pointlessly long. Hound leaned back against the wall and thought of all the times on Cybertron with the others before the war. Three were many memories there, some seeking solace in bright light and others causing momentary smiles to cross his face. Hound jolted at hearing a sound, not recognising it at first until the door was flung open with a blinding light and a loud bang.

"Get up!" came an order from someone he couldn't quite identify, "You're going into Tar Processing as of now!"

--

Recondite stared over the work ground with an impassive look on this face. It wasn't that he was really thinking of anything important but today he felt completely bored out of his metal casing. True there had been reports of a death through careless action but otherwise it was just the same old things. Maybe it was due to a lack of re-charging but the Orate leader refused to give into such a pointless thing until the strange dream stopped. A sound altered him to the presence of another and turning, a malicious grin crossed his face upon finding Sideswipe bowing to allow Seismicwave in.

He grinned at his Military Commander, obviously reports were coming in once again which meant the damaged communication system had finally been fixed which was a good thing, "Well Seismic, my old loyal friend, what news do you bring to me today?"

He barely noticed that Sideswipe had backed out of the room but he guessed the red twin was going to fetch their customary drinks; they could always get him later for acting without orders by maybe that meant he was close to breaking. A good sign indeed.

"A mixture I'm afraid my lord" Seismic's eye wandered around the room, picking up the burn marks from another encounter with one of the Fems or possibly the slave it was hard to tell these days, "The communication system has been restored to full working potential which means the other energon planets have all reported back with full confirmations of everything being in order"

Recondite nodded, grinning a little too much, "Go on"

Taking a deep breath, Seismic prepared for the response to the next part of his report mentally, "It would appear that the Terrabots have struck once again, over half the stocks of energon are gone plus…."

There was no response from the other so Seismic kept going, "It is apparent that one of them may have access to the building. There has been a few small glitches around the barracks and…."

A sudden wailing broke off the speakers words and also put a stop on the rage of Recondite. There was only one thing that would set off that sort of alarm. "Prison, report status!" barked the leader into the comms.

"All present and accounted for. Even that runt Bumblebee is here…must be a surface break!" came back the stiff reply.

Recondite growled harshly and took off in the direction of the main work area, joined by Seismicwave and Resonate in quick succession. They passed many different bots who were shouting at their charges and ensuring all of their selected area was accounted for. The Fems were huddled together in a corner of the pleasure facility, terrified out of their minds as to what could be going on so it ruled out any of them.

Upon reaching the main area, total chaos met his optics as Magma slopped over the overflow piping and scorched all who went near it. He could see three bodies in the horrid mess, two were his own men – Osseousgrind and Abscond – half melted and thrashing about wildly with the pain. The other was Ironhide who was apparently offline and was being hauled out by the joint efforts of Prime and Magnus. "What the slag happened?" he barked at Estoilehowl, believing that it was probably a memory fault.

However the other shook his head, "I do not know Lord Recondite. I was fetching Hound out of prison to replace Jazz".

Oilburner staggered forward, looking rather odd with half of his face crushed in so that his optics were virtually forced together, "It was that Mirage…he managed to catch me off guard sir"

"How" the menace was distinct in the others voice.

"Must've reactivated his invisibility circuits or something, didn't see him coming or where he went. Though since the magma managed to overflow it's a safe bet to say he'll be mangled gravely by all of this" replied Oilburner, not sure what would happy if Recondite got anymore mad.

The leader glared around the assembled bots before snarling as lightening forked across the sky. Without warning he sent a blast towards the magma which exploded upwards in a heavy shower, covering Prime, Ironhide and Magnus in smouldering hot lumps of melting rocks. More blasts followed, the magma aiming to hurt the Autobots and any Orate who was stupid enough not to move. Soon every last one of them had some burns from the lethal stuff and was trying to either hide the pain or support others.

Recondite growled, "Let this be a lesson to all of you, no one escapes this camp unless you die!" his yell was loud and horrible.

Watching from a window, Sideswipe clasped a hand on shaking form of Elita and Firestar, whilst Chromi was being forcibly hugged by the other two in order to stop her from breaking down completely.

"Bulwark!" Recondite shouted into the comms system, "Bring their damn filthy medics up and tell them to have all of them fixed up for tomorrow! They will all work triple shifts for this and all rations are to be cut"

As he turned and stormed out, the leader of the Orate failed to notice a symbol glow faintly on his back followed by a simple message written in a language few could read. It said, 'Help is on the way my brothers'.

Prime understood it and closed his optic in shame, Mirage was out in the vast land beyond the camp alone and unaided. He probably wouldn't last the night. "Goodbye old friend, for at least"

--

Stumbling along, Mirage knew he had to keep going or else the others wouldn't survive. Though where he was heading was a complete mystery, all he knew was that in the distance a soft light shone out of a safe haven. At least that was what he hoped it was.

TBC

A.N – I feel so bad about doing that to Jazz, hopefully no one will kill me for it. Please R&R and we'll see where this one goes.