I'm keeping up, keeping up with the time-lapse lifeline. And they can run, they can run from the font to the last rites. And we can hear, we can hear the first beat to the flat line. I'm keeping up, keeping up with the time-lapse lifeline. And once it's done… Oh, we dreamed a life. It was just like that, was just like that. And just like that, and just like that, it's done.

Time Lapse Lifeline by Maria Taylor is literally my favourite song at the moment. May use it at some point.

Geez, I need to stop taking forever with these updates.

REVIEW REPLIES!

Just a general reply: a (belated) Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you guys too!

TheDeadly-Z: You essentially nailed Talida.

Awesomo3000: You just became the King of One-Liners!

3luv4eva3: I'm just that evil.

Esperanza Hyde the Vamp Queen: I can tell you that Cayden will live. I think I made them suffer enough by killing their unborn child.

Guest: I guess you can say I'm the queen of them.

Guest: haha!

Guest: Writer's block. What can I say?

UltimateFan-girl15: Binge-reading, eh? I'm guilty with that with some of my favourite authors on here. And I'm honored.

OK. You know the rules. I know nothing apart from Talida.

ENJOY!

…or not…

"How are we going to go about this?" Smokescreen whispered.

Optimus, Smokescreen and Talida had spent the remainder of the afternoon slowly sneaking their way towards Darkmount, taking care of a few sentries that went to notify Megatron of their presence along the way. It was now sunset and they were so close, they were practically at the front door.

"There's always a gap when they do their rotations. We go in there," Talida responded, earning a strange look from Optimus, "I've spent a lot of time observing them when it was Smokescreen's turn on guard duty for you."

"We going to have a talk about your freelance behavior when this is over, young lady," Optimus proclaimed.

"You never had a problem with it before," Talida retorted.

"I always have had a problem with your freelance behavior. You just never listen to me," Optimus shot back.

"Well, sometimes, if we listen to you, things would never get done," Talida snarked.

"Do you think you two can continue this when we rescue our friends?" Smokescreen cut in.

Turning back to the scene before them, they saw the patrol rotation taking place…

Leaving the gap they were looking for.

"Now."

"Where are we?" Bulkhead demanded.

"We're in Darkmount's prison," Wheeljack answered, kicking at the door in frustration, "Never thought I'd be back in one of these things."

"Why are they letting us run free?" Arcee demanded, "I mean, they should know that the first thing we're going to do is blast them and try to escape."

"Haven't you noticed? They are holding the humans, Malita and Cayden in a separate location! They're going to threaten to harm them if we try to escape!" Ratchet snapped.

"Or they're using them as bargaining chips for someone else," Ultra Magnus said darkly.

Everyone turned to look at Ultra Magnus as he said that sentence. Jack, Miko, Raf, Malita and Cayden wouldn't be only be used as bargaining chips against them.

They would be used as bargaining chips against Optimus, Talida and Smokescreen.

"Is there any way out of here?" Raf inquired.

"They never open the doors wide enough for me to try to escape," Malita sighed, "And they never fully enter. They know the first thing I would do is blast them and take the first opportunity to escape."

"We can't just sit here!" Miko snapped, "Who knows what they're doing to Jack?!"

"I'm not saying that we just sit here and do nothing either, Miko!" Malita retorted, "We just need to be smart about this."

"We need Mum, Optimus and Smokescreen," Raf proclaimed, "But where are they?"

Malita and Miko glanced at each other as Raf asked the million-dollar question.

Where is their only hope?

Knock Out chuckled as he cleaned one of his tools while watching his patient. The patient's shirt had been destroyed, allowing him to admire his handy work.

From Jack's lower back slinking up to his shoulders and going over until they covered his collarbones and completely covered his right arm was made of metal with the veins glowing blue, signifying the Energon he had infused him with.

"I would say that this experiment is a success," Knock Out leered as he stood over him, "I mean, fusing two completely different biological structures has never been done before in laboratory conditions. Usually, the only way to get a fusion of your condition required a Cybertronian to mate with a human…or two Cybertronians to mate in human form, but that hasn't happened in a hundred years."

Jack moaned, lacking the strength to open his eyes and glare at his captor. Whenever he moved, excruciating pain would shoot through his body – even through the new metal skin Knock Out had infused on him. Everything hurt, but Knock Out had taken extra care to make sure he remained alive on Megatron's orders.

From the sounds of it, he had done this on unsuspecting lab rats before with unsatisfying results.

"Cayden," Jack moaned.

"Don't worry about him. He was suffering from malnutrition and a severe respiratory infection that was beginning to spread throughout his body. I've administered the medicine and Energon needed to save him," Knock Out shrugged, "He'll be terrorizing his parents and older sister by the time his mother gives birth to that new sparkling providing he's given the opportunity to rest."

"Why are you…?" Jack began to ask, but couldn't finish the question as he began coughing up a combination of blood and Energon.

Knock Out ran a scan on him as he answered, "In terms of curing Cayden of his illness, Lord Megatron wants at least one of his bargaining chips viable when Optimus, Talida, Smokescreen or any of the captured Autobots attempt a rescue. As for why I chose to experiment on you…well, you were always special, Jack. The Autobots are not the only ones who could see Optimus Prime in you. And the fact that you already had a half-sister who was a techno-organic helps matters."

"If you think this is going to make me join you, you can frag yourself to the pit," Jack snarled.

"Hey. You survived the experiments. I'm taking every small miracle I can get," Knock Out shrugged.

Yes. Jack may have survived the experiments.

But will he survive the aftermath?

"OK. That was too easy," Talida remarked.

Fallen Vehicons surrounded the three Autobots as they stood in the middle of the hallway. Limbs and heads were torn from bodies, holes were ripped through chests; it truly was a bloodbath.

"A little too easy. Not one alerted Megatron!" Smokescreen pointed out, "Usually, that's a bad sign."

"For now, we are going to press on as though we have not been caught," Optimus proclaimed, "Our family is at stake."

"They're probably going to be held in separate locations," Talida stated before deciding, "I'm gonna head up to the Nemesis in case anyone's being held there. You guys check out the prison levels."

"Need I remind you I'm in charge?" Optimus asked you dryly.

"Need I remind you I outrank you?" Talida retorted cheekily.

Optimus only vented. His daughter was right. She outranked him. Unfortunately.

"Master," Starscream began as he walked in, "We have intruders."

"Optimus?" Megatron asked with a cruel smirk.

"And his new recruit. They're scouring the prison levels. No sign of Talida Prime," Starscream reported.

"The most logical action would have been for them to split up to cover more ground," Shockwave piped in.

"And make it more easy for us to pick them off. One. By. One," Megatron smirked,

"DESTROY THEM!"

Yeah, yeah. It's short. I know. Before you start coming at me with blasters and pitchforks, please be happy that I actually managed to get a chapter up. Things haven't been easy.

As I'm sure I mentioned (if I haven't, here it is for you), my nearly 90-year-old Grandma has been in hospital in Sydney since early December and things haven't been great. She's been having trouble getting excess potassium out of her system (and yet, the hospital keep giving her foods high in potassium). Then, she had to have surgery due to gall bladder complications and the doctor's stuffed up, so she kept having to go in for surgery to stop internal bleeding (which, for someone as frail and elderly as my Grandma, is NOT good). She was meant to be released weeks ago from her rehabilitation centre, but something always stopped it – the first one was the surgery to remove the stents for the internal bleeding got pushed back and the most recent one was she developed a UTI. Fortunately, she's being discharged tomorrow and one of the carers from there actually lives down the road from her and given Grandma her phone number in case something happened.

But yeah. There's that.

Oh. I'm gonna conduct a poll…which will essentially give away the rest of the series. Maybe.

I don't know if, after this story is completed, I will continue this series because I am looking forward to do the Talida Prime reboot. I will continue it by popular demand.

Here it is:

Towards the end of the story, Jack and Talida are going to end up in a life-or-death situation. Haven't decided if they end up in Darkmount and cornered by the smelting pit or cornered on the Nemesis by Shockwave's cannon thingamajig. But basically, they end up dead…or have everyone thinking they're dead.

I kind of mentioned in this chapter about how Knock Out tried the fusion of CNA with other test subjects, but Jack's the first experiment to be fully successful (as in, he didn't die during or after the fusion). What I'm thinking – if it's voted that the story be continued – that Jack and Talida fake their deaths and go into hiding for an unspecified amount of time (I'm thinking a year) to give Jack time to get used to his new techno-organic status without him and Talida having targets on their backs (and unknowingly uncover a new conspiracy). After they come back, the rest of Beast Hunters will continue as normal, but because of disguising themselves (like M.E.C.H.'s soldiers did), nobody would know it's them until the very end.

What do you guys think? I'll keep it open for a while and buy some time, but your opinions will be awesome. For how Jack and Talida die (or fake die), I'll take suggestions in the reviews, but as to whether to go with the 'fake death' idea or end the series and do the redux, I'll only count the votes on the poll.

Buh-bye!