Plot Bunny: "Sleeping is the realm where nightmares come to life. Where our mistakes haunt us and our failures stay and taunt us. Within every dream lies a million dark shadows waiting to swallow you and your screams are unheard."

Sleep

Things were bad. Had been bad for days now and only seemed to be getting worse. They were running out of time. Sam was running out of time and they were out of idea's.

"Isn't there anything you can think of Ratchet? Anything that can help him?" Blue optic's turned to look at the crouched form of the Autobot leader.

"We've tried just about everything and the things that are left to do aren't worth doing. In Sam's current state of health they'd kill him faster than they'd help him." Ratchet stated as his gaze shifted from Optimus down to Sam's still form.

Beads of sweat trickled down the boys face and the eyes hidden underneath eyelids flicked back and forth as if he were watching something. He'd been like this for nearly four days now and everyone was just about to the breaking point. Four days was a long time to be trapped in a nightmare and they knew it was a nightmare.

No one screamed the way he had unless whatever he was seeing was bad. They did know though that the dreams weren't normal. Normal dreams didn't leave symbols burned into skin. Symbols that had no way of getting there because no one had been able to touch him for days except Ratchet.

Ancient Cybertronian burned in black and white. Black on his left side and white on the right. It meant something they all knew it did but for the life of them none of them knew what. The only thing worse than the symbols had been Sam's screams. There where times when it had sounded like he'd been trying to say something but they hadn't been able to understand what it was he was trying to say. The words were jumbled as if they kept getting mixed up before they made their way out of his mouth. Not that it mattered anymore.

Sam's voice was completely gone. Now all that was left was an unnatural type of stillness. If it weren't for the heart monitor and the clear fact that he was breathing they'd have thought he'd died. Whatever was going on wasn't good. The bond wasn't working either. Optimus could reach out but nothing ever made it through to Sam and nothing came through to Optimus either. Not even by accident. Sam had been asleep like this for four days.

At first they had simply thought that his exhaustion had caught up with the boy and his brain was forcing him to sleep. They'd been wrong and they hadn't even known it until hours later when Lennox had gone to see if he could rouse the boy so he could get something to eat. The scene the soldier had walked in on hadn't been what he'd expected to see at all. Sam had actually thrashed so much he'd fallen of the bed. Blood had been running down both arms from scratch's. He'd been clawing at the symbols or so they had to assume and Ratchet hated assuming.

Lennox had tried for almost fifteen minutes to get Sam to wake up and nothing had helped. Not even dumping the boy in a cold bath had managed to shock his body enough to wake him. Whatever had a hold of him didn't want to let go. To make things even weirder not worse just weirder the Matrix was acting strange as well. When at the base the Matrix was kept in a vault much like the fragment of the Allspark had been kept in. It had always twisted and turned in it's casing and sometimes it had seemed to pulse like it had a heartbeat of it's own.

Now the twisting and turning was almost frantic. If they didn't know any better they'd have thought it was scared of something but that was absurd. Wasn't it? Optimus had a theory about the Matrix's seemingly state of chaos. When asked he'd simply mention Sam's own state of being. The theory was that the Matrix held something of Sam within it and whatever was happening to Sam was either affected by or affecting the Matrix.

Very few understood that Sam had a spark much like a Transformers. Even fewer understood that it wasn't housed in the boys body but in the Matrix. And only five new of Sam's true status amongst the Autobot army. That he was in fact a human Prime. Perhaps that had something to do with his current state of being. They would never know for sure and they could only hope that the boy would wake up soon. They feared what would happen if he didn't.

oOo oOo oOo

He was running. Then again he was always running. Now was no exception to that rule but what he was running from was unsure. He couldn't see anything except the ground a few feet in front of him. He vaguely wondered if he was asleep but if he was then why hadn't someone woken him up. He felt like he was trapped in a nightmare. Every thing seemed to be going wrong. He'd watched them all die again and again. Over and over in a never ending cycle.

The only time they didn't die was when the black around him burned a white so bright that nothing could be seen or heard. Even then there was no peace. He'd watch as his failures were laid out in front of his eyes and shown to him. He knew that there were times he'd screwed up and screwed up very badly. But then there were the voices. Only voices and they didn't belong to the past Primes either. He could never understand these voices.

One was light as air and so very kind while the other dark was dark as silk and well there was something about the voice that shook him to his very core. These beings that whispered in his ears were old and powerful. These voices were opposites and yet they seemed to form a complete whole. Perhaps they were something of a ying and yang. One light and one dark but together they formed a whole. Or perhaps like Optimus and Megatron they were brothers. Only one thing ever appeared in his vision and those were symbols. Familiar and yet unknown. Bright blue in the burning white and blood red in the deep darkness.

He had something that they both needed and one wanted to take it while another wanted it to be given. They needed something. But what? He had what they needed but still. Just knowing that didn't help him find out what it was they wanted from him. The black Sam was running in shifted to grey before it turned white once more and he found himself watching past failures. That voice was back as well and this time he could make out what the voice was saying.

"Let go of your past failures young spark. For soon they shall come and you hold part of what they are. Beware of Unicron and watch for Primus." Primus and Unicron? The names sounded familiar but he couldn't place them. It was almost like trying to remember the name of a story books hero or villain. A book that had been read to him long ago by his mother or father. There was something about the names however that filled him with both a profound sense of peace and dread. He knew that one promised something good and another something bad. Understanding bloomed in his brain for a few seconds. He was a warning. The only warning that the Autobots would get before this new stage in the war happened. He had a job to do and he'd do the best he could to get it done. The white around him dimmed for a moment before it burst in front of his eyes and symbols ,both red and blue, filled the space in front of him.

Sam gasped as his eyes shot open taking deep breaths as if it was his first time breathing. Both Ratchet and Optimus started moving at the same time but before they could do much of anything both stopped. Something had caught their attention and the attention of every other being in the room. The humans and Transformers in the room were amazed all of then staring at Sam's eyes. For one eye was a deep red and the other a bright blue.

Authors Note's for 12

No clue where the hell this one came from but oh well it serves it purpose and well that's actually about it I think. I actually have half a theory that Sam will end up having something to do with Primus or something. You don't play around with powerful alien things and not have anything happen to you. I am also a firm believer that Sam may be a Prime in his own right. Not that Optimus would let him fight or anything.