DISCLAIMERS: I don't own Transformers. They just came over from Hasbro to visit and be general pains-in-the-aft. All the humans in the story are mine, as are Steelshot and Sola. Rating is T for now, may go up at anytime.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: These stories are character sketches I'm writing to get a feel for some of the NPCs in a Mechamorphosis game I'm creating. I started this to give myself some back-story and origins to the characters in my other Encounter fics. I'm following one of the tables from the 100situations challenge on LJ, which I'm planning on registering for real soon. As soon as I can figure out how to link that table… headdesk.

No one got the rather vague movie reference in the last chapter. Just for reference, the movie was The Best of the Best, which is an awesome martial arts movie. The sequels suck big time but what can you do.

In order for my game to move forward and contain a few surprises, not to mention, my storyline, I'm going to need a few OCs. I know not everyone likes OCs, but bear with me, I need to develop them to interact with the main characters. And I like to think they are interesting characters in their own right, but I'm just biased. ;D

Special thanks go out to Okami-chan for beta reading these for me and finding my typos and grammar errors.


It was another bright and sunny day in the city of Craxton on Mecha Terra. A day when most mechs would pause for a moment and bask in the warm solar bounty.

Steelshot was not most mechs.

Steelshot ducked as he ran, plasma bursts striking mere millimeters from his head. He spotted a maintenance alleyway up ahead and sprinted for it, desperation giving him an extra burst of speed. Angry shouts behind him demanded that he stop and surrender, roaring over the pounding of their feet on the metal walkways.

Surrender? And be sentenced to death in the Arena? Nuh-uh.

He skidded around the corner, systems alerts cluttering his HUD. Fliers weren't meant to run like this but between his busted up wing and the aerial search, flying wasn't an option. So he had to ignore them. He frantically dashed down the alley following the twists and turns. So intent on outpacing his hunters, he nearly ran into the wall, as his escape route became a dead end.

Steelshot cursed as he looked for somewhere to go or someplace to hide. Refuse and scrap littered the ground. An overflowing bin that had long been forgotten sat nearby. In desperation, he squeezed into a gap between it and the wall, hoping they would think he flew out of there. Somehow. Small glinks, annoying little scavengers of fuels and metals, squeaked and beeped at him in fear and irritation as they scattered. He had apparently taken their hiding place. He cursed again. Their squeaking would give him away and there was nothing he could do about it.

He crouched there, tense, audios trained on the approaching pursuit. So intent was he, he missed the soft rustling and clanking coming from within the bin.

"Look at all these glinks! Gah, disgusting things!"

"Something is around here. It's not us disturbing them. Spread out and search."

Steelshot braced himself; so much for any sense of dignity, getting caught cowering behind a refuse bin.

"You sure he's here? He might have just flown out." Steelshot could sense them scanning the area, the static bursts pinging off his passive scanners. He hoped the bin disguised his nexus signature.

"Something is here. Now stop whining and look!"

Grumbling, the hunter mech started kicking at the scrap, knocking it around to presumably look underneath. His superior gave a snort of contempt and walked towards the refuse bin, steps echoing loudly in the alleyway.

Steelshot held himself perfectly still, not even cycling his air intakes. He cringed at the creaks as the hunter mech threw open the lid of the bin to look inside.

A black shadow roared and leapt out of the bin, bowling the startled mech over.

"Aaahhh!!" he shrieked. Sharp claws scrabbled at his armor and fangs snapped at his face. He struggled with it, wings beating at his head. "Get it off me!!"

The other hunter fired off a quick plasma burst. The creature gave a pained yelp and Steelshot heard desperate scrabbling, as if it had released the senior hunter to turn tail and try to run. A second shot sounded out, blowing it clear across the alley, followed by a thud as it hit the wall. It crashed to the ground and lay still, just a couple of meters in front of Steelshot.

"Did it damage you?" From the scuffling and creaking coming from the alley, Steelshot guessed the second hunter mech had helped his superior up.

"Superficial. Let's go. We know what set the glinks scurrying now. The fugitive has eluded us." They left, footsteps echoing hollowly on the metal street covering.

Steelshot could hardly believe his luck. He stayed where he was for a time, partly from disbelief in his turn in fortune, partly out of caution. A soft whimper from in front of him finally drew him from his hiding place. Glancing down the alley to be sure his pursuers were actually gone, he made his way over to where the beast lay.

It was far too dirty to determine its colors from a casual glance but they were dark. It leaked from two wounds where the plasma bursts connected; one on its back between its wings and the other on its flank. It tried to drag itself in to a defensive stance but it was too damaged to stop him from picking it up. It was pretty small, compared to him, all tail, neck and wings. It tried to bite him but was too weak; he could tell its teeth were sharp anyways.

It? She. He could sense the femme programming now. Strange. Stranger than her form, which itself was odd. Quadruped with wings, long neck and triangular snout. Mouth full of fangs and a long tail. Rubbing off some of the grime on its neck, he could see a mark from someone in the Science Guild. At least that explained her a bit. An escaped experiment or a culled one that survived. Though why someone would spark a beast and give it femme programming was beyond him.

No matter, he owed this femme beast his life and freedom, even if it was inadvertent. Let no one say that Steelshot was without gratitude.

"Come my fierce little femme. We'll get you repaired and see what you can do. You belong to Steelshot now and I feel we'll do great things together."

Cradling his new companion, who had fallen unconscious from fluid loss, Steelshot made his way out of the alleyway and into the falling night.