AN: Oh wow, guys, I am so sorry it took this long to update, and I know the chapter is disappointingly short for such a long haitus. Life just got in the way, and then there was the wall of writers block my plot bunnies had to chew through...so yeah. It took a while, and I just wanted to get this out there. I will calmly accept all rotten tomatoes thrown, but please avoid the rotten eggs.

Disclaimer: I do not own Transformers, nor am I making any profit from this.

Credits: A big thank you to dglsprincess105 for allowing me to borrow her idea. This story was inspired by her story, All in the Family. And yes, I know these are two very different stories, but I asked her a long time ago if I could borrow Sam as a caretaker to the Autobots-Decepticons-turned-sparklings, and that idea morphed into this one. dglsprincess105 is my inspiration, and the credit goes to her.

I do not own the list of Cybertronian times, and much of the stuff about Cybertronian culture and whatnot was inspired by dozens of other Transformers stories.

Nano-second/astrosecond - .498 seconds
Nano-klik - 1 second
Klik - 1.2 minutes
Breem - 8.3 minutes
Cycle - 1 hour and 15 minutes
Joor - 6.5 hours
Mega-cycle - 1 day
Orn - 13 days
Deca-cycle - 3 weeks
Meta-cycle - 13 months
Vorn - 83 years

Mechanometer - 1 meter
Hic - 1 kilometer

In this chapter italics indicates thoughts. Large blocks of italics indicate POV changes.

"Altor! Oi, Altor!"

Sam glanced up from the freighter he was loading and looked questioningly at the Gamma hiding in the shadows between two stacks of crates. He recognized her instantly as Bull, one of the bots Mock had introduced him to. She'd been cold and untrusting on their meeting several deca-cycles ago, and as stubborn as her earthly namesake. What could she possibly need that she'd leave the slums and risk arrest for? Quickly, he slipped over to her, finding the gap a bit of a squeeze for his larger frame. "What is it, Bull?"

"We found a sparklin'," she hissed. "Under the docks. There's somethin' wrong with 'im, keeps screamin' every time someone even starts movin' in 'is direction. Th' rest of th' time 'e's just blank, starin' at th' ground like 'e's been deactivated."

Feeling a sharp pulse in his spark, he recognized that this was important. Very important. At her description, something had started internally tugging him in the direction of the slums. Is it possible . . . "How long ago was this?" he demanded suddenly.

"Couple'a cycles."

"I get off work in half a joor. Can you watch him until I get there?"

"Shure," she said, somewhat uneasily. "But if there's trouble I'm not stickin' 'round."

"Understood." Altor made to slide back out and paused, frowning. "Out of curiosity, why'd you come to me?"

"...Ya got credits'n ya seem t' care 'bout bots like us. Figured if there's anyone who'd help 'im without questions'n gettin' Enforcers or th' Underground involved, ya'd be th' bot."

He looked at her and said with sincere warmth, "Thank you."

"Yah, yah, get goin' 'fore yer boss misses ya," Bull grumbled, slipping away.

"And Bull," he called softly, continuing when she paused and glanced back. "Be careful."

"'Course," she snorted. "Always am."

He watched until she disappeared, then hurried back to the freighter and resumed working, thoughts churning, focusing on the constant, worried tugging. He would be extremely happy when this shift was over...

There was so much noise. Too much noise. He couldn't hear himself think. He could barely feel his own body move. It abated somewhat when he found an isolated place, but then THEY came, and with them the noise. And it hurt. It hurt so much...he could hear screaming, and he distantly recognized that the sound was coming from his own vocalizer, and it only stopped when they quit trying to get closer, tried to see what's wrong. He wanted to tell them that everything was wrong, that everything hurt, and he couldn't turn it off.

After a while, only one remained, hovering at the edges of the painful range. They waited, and they watched. He didn't know how long they'd been there, until suddenly, another one came. But this one, this one lifted him off the ground, held him close, and after the first rush of pain it was quiet. Everything was quiet.

The connection happened instinctively. It felt like the one that he'd had with his creators, what seemed like forever ago, but this one was soothing, warm, understanding, loving. It called him precious and told him everything was going to be alright.

But best of all, with the connection came something.

And it was unlike anything he'd ever felt before.

He thought it was called...peace.

Sam recognized him instantly. Or rather, the Allspark did. At first he couldn't match a designation to the tiny, limp frame propped up on a support post under the docks, but the almost overwhelming urge to hold and love and precious, precious little spark, my spark, mine had first priority. A designation was not important, the spark call was.

So before anyone could stop him, he'd made himself comfortable on the ground and was cradling the sparkling against his chassis, murmuring soothing nonsense to hush his screams, spark field pulsing and wrapping around the fragile flicker of life.

The brush of a spark against his own, seizing, grasping, clinging desperately much like the sparkling was doing to his frame, latching onto him like a very stubborn barnacle. And Sam got to experience first-hand what the formation of a guardian/creator-creation bond felt like—silk threads wrapping around and connecting.

And he could feel the raging inferno of mental screaming silence into wonder.

"Don't worry, Soundwave," he found himself murmuring as he stood, still holding the precious bundle. His first—the first change he'd made on Cybertron, the first change affecting a life he'd promised to save. It was stunning. It was frightening. It was overwhelming. It was absolutely wonderful, like a heady adrenaline rush. And he had no idea what he was doing. At all. "We'll figure this out together."

AN: So, Sam found his first one. And it was Soundwave. Congrats, people who guessed correctly! ^^ Anyone want to take a guess at who's next?

Um, yeah...hehe...sorry about the really short chapter. Hoped you all enjoyed it, and if you didn't, well, then as I said I will calmly accept all rotten tomatoes thrown. Chapters should start to get longer in the future...