With the painful changes subsided, Rhinox was able to focus on the retrieval of the supplies that he needed. It took time to learn all the new routes to the surface, but he couldn't have planned for a better location. The network of tunnels above his newest home branched out easily to any point in the main city that he could want. Unfortunately it also meant more Vehicon troop movements he had to avoid while out hunting for supplies. He had yet to run across the huge enforcer that had messed him up before, but the Maximal engineer counted himself fortunate in that bit of luck.

It took more time than he wished for it to have done so, mostly due to having to search out the parts he needed, but he had built a backup of the temporal stabilization device to carry with him. There was also a modification to his usual weaponry that he had added as a precaution in case he ran into his new friend again. Recalling Ruby's new weaponry, he was inspired by the grenade launcher that went with it. If it came down to it, he would introduce his new friend to a new toy of his own.

Rhinox paused for a moment before he grabbed his upgraded weaponry from his work bench, reaching into his subspace pocket. Opening his hand he looked at the tiny needle tipped projectile that rested in his palm as it caught the light, the dark almost black liquid streaked with glowing dark blues and greens. With a nod Rhinox tucked it back into his subspace pocket, grabbed his gun, and headed towards the surface.

In the middle of the night Ruby was pacing around in her room as if she were a caged animal. Honestly, she felt like installing a giant running wheel on the wall for nights like this. A few back flips off of the walls helped, but she still couldn't stay still. Peace had been illusive in the base since her fight with Rhinox. She had never known him to think irrationally which, in her personal opinion, was how he was behaving. If he only knew what she did Rhinox wouldn't have been so harsh on them.

The sound of her armored feet scraping across the floor at her sudden halt was painful to her audio receptor as she came to an abrupt halt as she realized what the problem was. Rhinox didn't know what she did and he wouldn't until it happened. He was trying to protect her from what he thought he knew and would stand firm on that, no matter how much she would fight him on it. Why couldn't he just trust her judgment?

With a groan she rubbed her face as she flopped down in her desk chair. Her fight with Rhinox was inconvenient, but it was her fight with Megatron that would make or break history. If she had to guess he would go after Dinobot in the valley to prevent that major blow to the Predacons. Humans were important to the Great War and it was Dinobot's sacrifice that would insure that they would be there for it. There were also the after events to consider. She doubted that Rampage would be of much use right now since Megatron would be keeping his new soldier close at hand, but could she really afford to trust in the mad Cybertronian?

"Trust in yourself," she mumbled with a sigh. "I need to get him out of the way for a prolonged period of time." Realizing that she was talking out loud she looked at the door quickly to make sure it was closed. Finding herself safe she relaxed a bit and tried to focus on her problem again.

With his Transmetal-2 state she could not easily put him into stasis lock, and burying him in rocks was not only becoming ineffective, but quite repetitive and dull, an expected attack at this point. What could she do that would keep him out of the way for as long as possible with what she had? The only thing that was that potent was Cybertronian spider venom and Rhinox kept all of that information under digital lock and key, only accessible from his main station on the bridge of the ship. The second problem was that the files' had to have two senior officers' pass-codes to access them, in this case is Optimus and Rhinox themselves. It would take time to hack the files and she feared she was running out of it.

With a defeated sigh she rested her head on her crossed arms on her desk. Tricking the two into giving up their codes was going to possibly be more difficult than actually defeating dragon Megatron. Surging to her feet, the femme marched herself out of her quarters and headed to the bridge. If she didn't get started trying to crack the codes now then she would lose what time she had to get it done. Rattrap was on monitor duty, so she wasn't really surprised to find him playing one of his video games to pass the time.

The Maximal infiltrator was rather startled when someone behind him suddenly cleared their throat, not having heard or felt them approach, quickly shutting off his game and turning around just in case it was Optimus. When he only spotted his fellow rodent, his frame relaxed. "Ruby, nice ta see ya! Can I… er … help ya?" he asked as he noted how sad she had become. He might agree with Rhinox about Ruby staying away from Dinobot for a little while, but it didn't mean that he had to like the results of it.

"I came to fill in for you tonight," Ruby told him quietly, looking over at Rhinox's station for a moment.

Rattrap followed her gaze and silenced the hundreds of questions that popped into his head as he got up onto his feet. "Uh, ya sure 'bout dat?"

"I'm going crazy pacing around in my room," she replied with a tired smile. "I'll even sweeten the pot for ya and take off five of the nights you owe me."

He thought getting out of monitor duty tonight was a good enough deal, heck he'd even let Dinobot kick him around like a football if he was stupid enough to pass up this offer. "Deal," he nearly shouted, wincing a bit but kept his smile. "I'll see ya in de mornin'."

With a final wave to her uncle, Ruby sat down at the monitoring station to wait. Utilizing the tricks he had taught her, she could only smile as she listened and felt Rattrap watching her from around the corner of the hallway before eventually making his way to his quarters. Primus bless him, he was probably thinking that Ruby was going to do something mean to Rhinox's settings to get back at him, but her hacking was more benign than that; at least to the Maximals. A quick hop over to the engineer's station and Ruby was bringing up all the program files she was going to need.

It only took two tries before the computer actually threatened to lock Ruby out. The bypass trick that Rattrap had taught her during their training sessions was of no apparent use now. Rolling her optics as she shook her head Ruby realized how stupid her plan really was. Of course the system would have been locked down from this angle and any other angle that the infiltrator could think of, Rattrap was the one that cracked the system when Sentinel went haywire and tried to kill the Maximals off in their own ship. Add to that that Rhinox would utilize his friend's natural talents to further secure the system.

With a sigh, the Maximal femme rubbed her head. Her processer ached terribly and it did nothing to aid her in her endeavor. She was stuck and wanted to scream. Closing her optics Ruby was doing her best to will the pain away and think of a solution, but the rustling in her head would not stop. This was Rhinox! Who knew the bot better than her?

Her frame relaxed as she recalled some of her early solar-cycles with him. He had begun teaching her on a system similar to the Axalon's when she had expressed a desire to follow in his footsteps and become a ship's engineer like he was.

Rhinox smiled down at his young grand-sparkling as she did her best not to bounce around in the seat. She had awoken him bright and early for their first day of training and he wasn't sure who was more eager to start. Clearing his throat seriously, he began to walk her through the systems.

"The ship's engineer will have the most access to all of the ship's systems, but his security clearance cannot exceed the ship's captains. There will be times that the captain's access codes will be needed, upgrades to the programming and the like."

"Yes, sir," she nodded, trying to calm her smile into a serious look.

"I have pre-programed quite a few scenarios for you to work on, but unfortunately there will be times that I will be away while you are training," he said calmly before smiling at her. "I also have a feeling that you'd be sneaking in here as well, so I'm going to make sure that you have both access codes to properly work through."

As she watched him input the codes she became curious. "Grand-sparker, wouldn't we get in trouble if you use your actual code?"

The smile he gave her was kind, far from reprimanding, as she would have expected from any other trainer she might serve under. "They've retired these since, but these were the access codes Optimus and I used on the Axalon when we called it home."

Blinking up at him, the tiny green and gold femme was rather shocked. "You knew your commander's pass-codes?"

Nodding, Rhinox only turned his attention back to the station. "He entrusted it to me because he knew that he would not always be around for what I would need it for."

"Like when the Vok had taken him in that probe thingy near the beginning of the Beast Wars."

He had to quickly curb this back to the training at hand before she started asking to hear more stories. "Back to the task at hand, Little One."

Her hands flew across the system with a mind of their own, the computer happy to grant her the access she needed. "Of everything, how could I have forgotten that?" she sighed and began to access exactly what she needed.

"Computer," she waited for it to beep in acknowledgment, "synthesize both known blends of cyber-venom."

"Please state quantity," the male voice requested.

"Enough to drop a medium sized Autobot," then she frowned. "Slag that command. Make enough to drop a large Autobot, but adjust the formula to condense it as much as possible."

"Warning," the computer stated, "if administered, this amount could cause the target's spark to fail."

"Right now I'll take that chance," she replied quietly.

"Acknowledged."

The CR chamber began to whirl into activity behind her as she moved back to the scanning station. Hopefully this would handle her problem, but for how long she was not sure of just yet.

As Ruby got up from his usual station, Rhinox ducked back behind the CR chamber he was peeking around. The computer had altered him about the attempted access to its systems and he had simply wished to check as to what was going on. To his surprise Rattrap was not on the bridge any longer and Ruby was sitting at the engineering station, apparently frustrated over not being able to access what she wanted. The question he wanted to ask her was: Why?

Of course, he knew part of the why. She was most likely trying to find an edge since her foe was dealing more damage each time their paths crossed. Ruby was needing something only he and Optimus had access to and apparently had utilized something Rattrap had warned him about to do it. They both were apparently stuck. She couldn't proceed without doing damage and he could not openly give her access without reporting it to Optimus and quite possibly the others finding out as well.

It had only taken a single thought of maybe training her in the future about the systems before she muttered something and began to type again. His optics widened as his jaw dropped at her imputing their access codes. He had figured out how to aid her in her mission and not directly involve himself in current events.

As he quietly made his way back to his own quarters, Rhinox frowned. If he was able to change a memory within Ruby's processor, what changes was Ruby making with just her being there?

Can't do anything about it now, he thought to himself, but I can help her with little things here and there.

Author's Note: I don't own the show. Thanks for reading.

A chapter with something important, but I think I really just wrote this to prolong the inevitable…