"How's she holding up?" Leo asked Marina as she came out of the room that we had been given.

"Sleeping, for now." She sighed as she closed the door behind her. "She's taking this harder than I thought she would. Any word on Mikey?"

"Not yet." Leo replied. His eyes still had that stunned look to them, and his hand was firmly holding mine. He still seemed to be taking in what happened not to long ago, and it seemed that he needed me close. He hadn't let me get more than a few feet away.

Marina tilted her head a little as she watched him. "You ok Leo?"

"I'm fine." He said quietly. "Just a little overwhelmed at the moment."

"What happened?"

"He's learning that he doesn't have to hide from everyone, and what it's like to be fully accepted by more than just us." I told her as I looked up fondly at him. "He's having a hard time adjusting to that."

"I can imagine. It's easy for us to just up and go take a walk when we want too. So easy that I think we tend to take that for granted." She laid a hand on his shoulder, then went to go talk to Will.

"Excuse me, sir." A soldier said as he walked up. As he got closer I noticed it was the same medic from earlier, that Donnie almost knocked the snot out of for trying to help Mikey.

Leo turned to face him, his hand tightening on mine a little. "Yes?"

"Ratchet sent me to come and get you, sir. He says it's ok for you to come see him now."

"Thank you." Leo looked at him a moment, not quite sure what to do next, before he turned towards med-bay.

"Um, sir?" Leo turned to look back at him. "I just wanted to say I think that was awesome what you guys did out there. Forgive me if I'm stepping a little out of bounds here, but you think maybe you could show us some moves?"

Leo watched him a moment. "What's your name?"

"Spc. Smith."

"Not your rank, your name."

He looked a little shocked. "Tony, Tony Smith, sir."

"My name is Leonardo, not sir." Leo smiled at him. "Tony, I can't show you much. But maybe a trick or two should curb your curiosity. If we can find the time."

I smiled a little as his eyes lit up like a little kids at Christmas. "Thank you, si- Leonardo!" He said then dashed off to go tell Raph, who was talking to Epps, that we could go see Mikey.

"See, it's not that hard to make friends, is it?"

"We will see if he still wants to be friends after he gets tossed around a few times." Leo grinned at me.

We walked in to a grumbling Ratchet who was fixing up a sheepishly grinning Sides. "Next time I tell you to be careful you better listen or I swear to Primus I'll hook you up to a magnet and hang you up for target practice, and then..." I chuckled as we kept going to where Donnie was at on the far side of the room, with an awake but groggy looking Mikey laying down on a human sized medical bed.

"Hey Mikey." I said softly as we drew closer. In part as to not startle the drowsy turtle and in part not to piss off the grumbling med-bot who wasn't far away.

"Hey guys," He managed his ever ready smile, which made me feel a whole lot better "did we get them all out?"

"Yes, we did. A large part of that because of you. You goof, what made you take that thing on by yourself?"

"Wasn't enough time to wait." He said simply. I just reached out and took his hand and squeezed it gently.

"Will the arm heal?" Leo asked Donnie quietly while I kept Mikey busy with small talk.

"Yeah, it was close but Ratchet is very good at what he does. He managed to save the arm, the mutagen should do the rest now. He should make a full recovery, with a few new battle scars to show off."

"Was it really that bad?" Leo asked and Donnie nodded.

"It was bad enough to where I was honestly thinking we were going to have to take the arm."

"That's two of us now Ratchet has patched back up." Raph said as he drew closer.

"And he was more difficult than the femme." Ratchet said as he also walked over with Sides. "Your complex body structure proved to be challenging."

"Isn't he supposed to be greener than that?" Sides asked, and Ratchet bopped him with a clang. "I was just asking..." Sides mumbled as he rubbed his noggin.

"Hey, doc bot." Mikey greeted him. "Thanks for fixing me up."

"You keeping your arm is thanks enough, youngling. But if you insist on tangling with Ravage you might want to consider more armour."

"I'll keep that in mind." Mikey grinned at him. "Looks like we are going to have to put a hold on our prank war." He then told Sides.

"I think we can manage a small ceasefire." Sides replied with a slight grin.

"You out." Ratchet then shooed the wheeled footed Autobot. "I've got more bots to fix, and you're in my way."

"Yes Hatchet!" He crowed as he swiftly moved out of smack range, but he wasn't quick enough to get out of throwing range and Ratchet nailed him with a wrench as he went out the door.

"Pain in my fraggin' aft mech." Ratchet mumbled as he went to deal with the small Arcee triplet who came in next. "I'm hoping you gave more damage than you took in, Chromia."

"Of course. I had to keep up with my sisters."

Then next bot that came in, a little bashfully, made me grin. With a quick, hesitant glance at Ratchet, Bumblebee came walking in and in his hand he was gingerly holding a bouquet of orange flowers. Ratchet glared at him for a moment and Bee quickly pointed to Mikey as he held up the flowers. Where on earth did he get them at this odd hour? Ratchet didn't say anything but gave him a quick nod and Bee walked the rest of the way in before kneeling down next to us. Then carefully, very carefully, he held out the flowers to Mikey. "Thank you buddy..." Mikey said as he took them. "Don't have nothing to put them in though."

Bee looked around for a moment before grabbing a bucket that sat nearby and holding it out to him. A bucket that was three times larger than needed to hold the flowers. Raph just chuckled. "It's fine, I'll go find something to put them in." Then he left to go do just that.

The yellow bot put the bucket back, then looked at Donnie questionly and pointed to Mikey's wrapped up arm. "He will be fine." Donnie answered the unspoken question. "I'm sure he will be up and pestering everyone in no time."

Bee nodded, then made himself more comfortable on the floor and began talking to Mikey. I smiled as I leaned tiredly against Leo, watching the two as they talked. Mikey easily understanding the radio chatter and responding with his own quips.

"You need rest." Ironhide said suddenly from behind us. We had been so busy watching Mikey and Bee that I hadn't even noticed him coming in, carrying his tire and the pieces of his bumper.

"I wish I could. Someone has to stay up though, kids will be up in a few short hours."

"Then you should use those hours for sleep." He stubbornly said.

"He's got a point, dear one." Leo told me. "You look like you are about to fall over."

"Oh, and you aren't feeling at least a little tired?" I asked him as I raised a brow at him.

"Doesn't matter, he is going to rest too." Ratchet said as he walked over. "All of you out! And don't let me catch you doing anything but sleeping." He pointed to the door.

"But we still need to talk to Optimus about-" Leo was cut of by a wrench waving threateningly in the air above his head.

"Prime will understand. Out! Rest, now!" Ratchet growled. "Or I will see if your head is as hard as your shell is."

Mikey began to laugh from his bed at Leo's wide eyed look as he watched the wrench flying around in the air above his head as Ratchet waved it around as he spoke. "Dude, you better do as he says, or he'll make you."

"That's enough out of you too!" Ratchet glared at him. "You tell your visitors goodbye and go to sleep."

"Yes, Mommy." Mikey muttered as the medbot walked away. Ratchet turned to glare at him a moment, and Mikey grinned right back at him.

"See what you did?" I muttered to Ironhide on the way out. "You got us all in trouble."

"Really? It seems you are perfectly capable of accomplishing that on your own."

"This from the one who lost his tire..."

"Just come on, you." Leo said as he drug me from the room, and away from Ratchet's wrench.

.

.

I have to admit I did feel better after I woke up, snuggled firmly in Leo's arms. Until I noticed that all the kids were already up and out of the room. "Crap!" I mumbled as I tried to sit up, only to be pulled back down next to him. "What are you doing?"

"Waiting for you to tell me good afternoon." He smiled at me.

"Afternoon? Really? No one could wake me up to tend to the kids?"

"I tried." He grinned at me. "You couldn't hear me over your snoring."

"Oh, you!" I smacked him with my pillow.

"Relax." He chuckled as he took the pillow from me. "I was awake already when they woke up. I managed to get them fed and dressed without you, and you were tired."

"So why are you in here with me now and the kids are MIA?"

"I got told to go back to bed, I didn't sleep enough." I laughed at his exasperated expression. "And the kids are with Cris and Marina, outside playing..."

"You actually let them go out?" Didn't think he was ready to let that happen just yet.

"No, they were snatched and taken out."

"By who?"

"Bumblebee." He shook his head. "And Cris told me to shut the hell up and not be such a stiff over it when I tried to get them back."

I laughed, poor Leo seemed to be getting bullied a lot the last few hours.

After getting up and dressed and pretty much ready to face the day, Leo and I walked outside to check on my missing children to find Bee giving them rides around the tarmac. Leo's jaw dropped open when he saw Ty in the driver's seat, yanking on the wheel. He looked like he was about to, taking the term from Sideswipe here, blow a gasket. "You do know Bee won't let anything happen to them right?" I asked him before he started stomping across the tarmac and ruining everyone's fun. "It's not like Ty is actually going to crash into anything."

He just sighed and shook his head. "I'm not sure if I'm ever going to get used to this." He mumbled.

I just laid a hand on his arm. I knew what he was referring to, the fact that his turtle children were outside playing, in the open. I think he was wanting more to bring them inside to shield them, out of habit, than out of any real fear of Ty crashing a car he wasn't even driving. "You will, it took me awhile to get used to you guys at first, but I did. Let them have their fun." I smiled a gentle smile as I watched my obviously happy son as he bounced around in the seat, before the seatbelt snapped around him to settle him back down. "I seriously doubt anyone would be dumb enough to try anything." I told Leo as I pointed to a spot not far away. Ironhide, Jazz, Mirage and even Prime himself were out there with Marina and Cris, watching the children play that Bee wasn't driving around. I knew they were there for more than just the reason of watching for the fun of it.

-We told you we would protect your younglings, Leonardo,- Hide confirmed my suspicions -and so we shall.-

"Autobot daycare..." Epps chuckled as he joined us. "Never thought I'd see the day..."

I chuckled myself a little. "Honestly, I didn't expect that from them either. But I guess it's not unusual for them to be near children, right? I mean they had to have been around their own kind's children before."

"True, but you just don't picture large robots that blow shit up on a regular basis to be good with kids, any kids."

"Maybe because it's all we see from them. It's not like they have much of a chance to raise their own children." I sighed a little sadly. "The things their war must have taken from them, kind of makes our petty squabbles seem pointless."

"Yeah it does." Epps agreed quietly. "I came out here to come get you and Prime. Sally is all rested up and ready to have a nice long chat with us."

"Sure, just let me go check on Mikey." Leo told him.

"I wouldn't risk it. Ratchet just got him to go back to sleep, after he bullied Caitlin to go to bed. Apparently she still wasn't looking too hot for his liking."

"She was just worried is all, I'm sure seeing my brother awake and still kicking was the best medicine she could have gotten."

"Tell that to Ratchet."

"I'd rather not."

.

.

About half an hour later we were gathered in the control room and was waiting for Sally to make her appearance, which didn't take long as she came in with Will. She looked again up at the tall form of Prime with awe a moment before she got herself under control again. "I gotta get used to that. I knew there were bad one's I didn't know about you guys."

"Which brings us to the reason we are all here I suppose." Donnie said from the chair he was sitting in, with his feet propped up on the table in front of him.

She nodded. "I was sent here to meet up with someone who was supposed to know how to handle what's been going on, I just thought it would be some branch of the CIA, I didn't know it was a whole different agency, with Will in the front seat."

"Actually, he's in that seat." Will pointed to Prime. "I'm just in charge of the measly squishable human factor."

"You know what I meant." She smiled at him. "I lost my Laptop in the busjacking, but I didn't have the files on it." She pulled a flashdrive out of her pocket. "I was just going to use it to load this up on it to show you."

"I think I can help you out, let me see it." Donnie said and she tossed him the flashdrive. He quickly hooked it up then looked at Jazz. "Got a screen I can hijack for a few?"

"Tha one next to yah is fine."

"Thanks." Donnie said as he kept working, then the screen lit up with various pictures. They were all of different locations, but the one thing they all had in common were the glowing red eyes that had been caught on the footage.

"Punk ass Decepticons..." Ironhide immediately picked out the otherwise blurry forms.

"Yes, for the last few months they have been breaking into research facilities, all over the planet not just here. They have been targeting mainly prototypes of new equipment, most of them in the medical and research fields, but some military prototypes have also been snatched."

"Prototypes of what?" Leo asked her from where he wa leaning against the wall next to Raph, both with their arms crossed.

"Different things actually. It's confusing to my superiors as well. Some of the stuff they are taking makes no sense to us on why they are taking them. I mean, what would they need with a machine that was developed for monitoring skin cell growth?"

"Why was this not brought to our attention before now?" Prime asked her then.

"We didn't know what we were dealing with until recently. Because of the thefts, security systems had been upgraded and those are the few and only shots we got of them in action before they wiped out those new systems." She sighed. "We had at first assumed it was a terrorist group doing the raids, these bad shots quickly proved us wrong."

"Now what are those blasted Cons up too?" Hide mumbled as he looked over the pictures.

"That is what we would like to find out."

"Sally, not to step on your toes here," Raph said then "But you seem a little young for them to entrust you with this. So I'm guessing there is a special reason for them to send you."

"You're right, the only reason I was sent is because I happened to be on site of one of the raids. I could clearly see what was breaking in and making off with the goods. And because of that, I got nominated. I'm getting the impression only a select few higher ups know about what's going on here, so they didn't want to expose someone who didn't need to know."

"So they sent one who already knew." I guessed as I sat down on the edge of the table Donnie's feet were still propped on.

"Lucky me right?" She smiled.

"Interesting..." Donnie mumbled as he kept digging through the info she handed him.

"What is?" Leo asked him.

"I'm looking over the list of items they took. On their own, they don't seem to harmful, except the military thefts. But I'm wondering if they have the intention of maybe somehow combining all the stuff they are gathering. You know, a piece from this, a gadget from that..."

"Or mahbe combinin' the machines themselvs." Jazz spoke up. "The question is, what are they makin'?"

"Something to cause trouble with, no doubt." Hide answered him.

"Too many variables right now to narrow it down, but I do know I don't like it." Donnie added.

"And are they done swiping shit, or are they needing more parts?" Casey asked.

"The last theft was about four days before I set out to come here." Sally said. "And they are averaging about every two weeks or so. Give or take a few days."

"Go in, grab, make a run for it, drop it off to where ever they are taking them, then head out to the next site, wait for the heat to die down a little, repeat the process." Donnie mused. "But I'm guessing the bus napping might be a sign that they are close to finished with whatever it is they are doing."

"If that is the case, then finding them is a priority." Prime added to the conversation.

"Tha's tha tricky part." Jazz mumbled. "They don' like ta be found."

"Maybe we can have them take us there." Leo replied thoughtfully. "Donnie, do you think you can locate some things out there they might be interested in still?"

"I can try, I'm going to need complete access to the computer systems though. Gonna take some serious hacking to see what else is out there."

"Isn't that like seriously illegal?" Casey asked him.

Donnie shrugged. "Wouldn't be the first time I've broke the law to save the lawmaker's hide."

"I'll have someone write you up a pardon." Sally grinned at him.

"Only if they catch me." Donnie grinned back at her.

"Ya mean 'us'." Jazz grinned at them both.

"Then proceed." Prime gave the command. "The sooner we find out what they are doing, the sooner we can put a stop to it."

"And the sooner I can show them my new cannon upgrades." Ironhide said as he gave his toys a test spin. "Ratchet just installed them and I need to break them in."

I wasn't the only one who facepalmed at that.