A/N: This is another very dark chapter. It deals heavily with drug abuse and murder and a lot of dark things, which one should expect if they are reading a Megatron-centric story. Still, I think it prudent to warn anyone now that might be easily offended. This isn't an easy fic to write (which is why there can be a real long delay between chapters), and I don't think it's that easy to read, either, given the content. I was toying with the idea of changing the rating to Teen, but this chapter totally changed my mind. Please DO NOT READ if these topics offend you. There is a reason this is rated "M."

For those that have enjoyed this story thus far, I am very glad that you can appreciate it for what it is. :D I hope you enjoy this next installment. And thank you so much for the reviews! They make this kind of thing easier to write. :)

FF has made some changes to the symbols it recognizes on a page. I used to use "~*~*~*~" to show a change or a break in the story. That is no longer recognized. So now I use "TRFM TRFM TRFM."

As always, I have much love for my beta Razorgaze. Please read her story. The link can be found in my profile page.

Disclaimer: The song this time around is "You Hurt My Soul" by Doro/Warlock. I do not own that song nor do I own Transformers. I claim only my OCs. Please don't sue. This is purely for fun.

She was dreaming again, caught in an ever-shifting landscape of memory and madness. People and places, pieces of a past long buried for the sake of sanity—it washed over her with hurricane force, drowning her reality before she ever realized she needed to fight it. It was an odd sense of comfort, that drowning feeling. A knowledge that the fighting was over, that the struggle between what should be done and what she wished to do was no longer necessary.

And so she sank, laughing and inhaling the putrid blackness of her own deeds as if it were the finest of wine.

Can't find the words
How much it hurts
Don't know how to cry
But like a burning flame
I feel all the pain

You treat me like a stranger
Yet I keep falling in love
On and on with you
On and on
On and on
On and on like a fool
On and on
On and on

It all played out before her eyes, the clear-headed memory of that one night. She fought it, snarled and clawed like a mad thing, filled her eyes and her heart with red anger as she had seen her Master do so many times before. And still it was not enough, still the night focused tighter and brighter, crystal clear when it should not have been. No memory forged during a drug-induced high that powerful should ever have been that clear.

And yet it was. And all because of that meddling, infuriating medic and his injections. She howled his name in the inky blackness of her water-like memories, cursing his spark, his creation, and everything she could associate with him. She did not want to remember this. She was not meant to remember this.

The Master had seen to that. So why in the known universe did her mind call up that specific memory? Why, in the heart of her first clear-headed moment in what felt like forever, did her mind choose that night?

Because you need to see it, she whispered. Because we need to see it, too. Do not fight the memory enhancer, Laura. Let it happen. Let yourself fall. We will catch you. You are not alone.

But she wasn't the one that Laura wanted to catch her. Slender rose-colored armor on silver palms was not the strength, the unrivaled and magnificent beautiful cruelty of her master's hands.

You hurt my soul
But I can't' let you go
I can't let you go
Because I love you so
Why can't you let go of my soul?

The house loomed before her, somehow larger than life and two-dimensional. Like a paper cutout standing wafer-thin in the darkening California night. Three-stories of antebellum architecture, the house itself was like something out of Gone with the Wind. Except, of course, the house in that movie had been a treasure, a flourishing delight of culture and elegance filled with the warmth of family. A house worth fighting for. This house, its dark windows like gaping maws into eternity—like black holes that, instead of consuming and crushing the light around them, viciously kept it captive—turned what was once joyous into terrifying hell.

A house worth dying to escape from...

She saw the pain-stakingly restored spiral trim along its eaves, the too-perfect flower beds that lined the crushed marble walkway, the flowers within like inmates of a prison, unnaturally straight and tall, as if forced to assume shapes that only existed in the imagination. The green, green lawn somehow glowed brighter than the finest emerald, no doubt a product of her stepfather's over-fertilizing. Curtains of the lightest and finest damask wafted in a breeze that did not exist, the one wooden wind chime near the dark mahogany double front doors clanging with soundlessness against the stark white marble columns of the porch.

She recoiled within her mind, though her body stood rigidly before the monstrosity, watching as the house appeared to flex and bow ever so faintly, as if the thing were breathing. As if it were waiting… waiting for her to walk through those doors and into unlimited torment.

And just when she thought she could not take anymore, that her sanity would fragment into a thousand million pieces just by staring at the hated place, a shadow loomed over her. It grew and grew until it eclipsed the hell house, until it dwarfed the stillness and the anticipatory hush emanating from within the structure. A new kind of horror rose within her, standing as she was in the umbra of that shadow. This one was cold and numbing, soul-crushing with the certainty that she could never escape it. Unlike the house, whose horror had been displayed in the racing of her heart and the heat that came with it.

No, the shadow of her master had its own terror, it's own bone-chilling cold and soothing destruction that came with knowing that there was nothing she could do to stop him. It was strange how that was somehow comforting, that knowledge that she did not need to fight because she would never win. There was no hope in his darkness, only endless numbness that she was forever his.

She loved him for that. She hated him for it.

You're cold inside
A ring of ice
The prison of your heart
And when I touch your eyes
I feel all your lies
Waiting for me in the dark

You treat me like a stranger
Yet I keep falling in love
You make me feel
You make me feel so blue

On and on
On and on
On and on like a fool
On and on
On and on

The shadow of her master twitched, contorted in on itself as he bent down. One clawed, massive hand closed over her, sending spasms of pain across her drug-enhanced nervous system as he lifted her from the ground. The house itself, the source of her fear and nightmares until she had met her Master, creaked and quaked on its foundation, as if it, too, knew something far more dangerous and deadly stood before it.

Those razor-like claws cut thin slices on her exposed arms and legs, drawing forth his tribute from her in blood. She trembled in his palm, head bowed, the revulsion twisting in her gut like hot lead. Revulsion for him, for the Master that hurt and killed. Revulsion for herself, for the fact that she did not know if she trembled from the pain or from the pleasure that bleeding for him brought.

"This is the house," he said softy, his voice rumbling through her memories like thunder.

"Yes, my master."

"And those within have caused you pain?"

"Yes, my master."

She felt his head tip to the side, could almost see in her mind's eye how his crimson optics narrowed. One claw from his free hand moved with unimaginable grace, the barest tip of it sinking slightly into the top of her bare foot. A whimper left her lips, teeth grinding together to hold back the screams as that claw started to slide slowly up her foot, over her ankle, rising ever higher over her shin to her knee. Blood followed in the wake, a perfect crimson line.

She dared not move, not so much as flinch, though the agony was intense. Sharp. But she could not stop the trembling, nor the confusion in her soul. Loving it. Hating it. Wanting him to sink the claw in deeper and bleed her for the last time. Wanting him to take his time and bleed her forever.

Wanting to die. Wanting to live. Wanting… she knew not.

"Did you tremble for the human that hurt you, as you tremble now for me?"

Laura's head snapped up, staring at him with eyes filled with unabashed hatred through the film of pain wrapping around her heart. "No!" she growled out. "Never. I hate him for what he did to me. I hate them all. I would never tremble for them. I would never bleed for him. I—"

Her words cut off in a strangled cry as that claw continued its path over her knee, heading ever upwards to the middle of her thigh where metal met the cotton of her thread-bare jean shorts. Her head was thrown back, the agony plain on her features, her mouth open in a soundless scream. Hands wrapped around one of his claws until they shook with strain, bracing against what he was doing to her. And still that claw remained in her flesh, pressing with an aching slowness until a bead of blood formed around it and ran like tears down her white flesh.

It was a parody of ecstasy, of one lover penetrating another, framed in the truth of torture.

"Do you hate me for what I do to you?" he whispered.

His cruelty and malicious enjoyment slid down her spine with each of his spoken words, her body convulsing with it. "Y-yes," she whispered between gritted teeth. "I h-hate you, m-my Master."

He pulled her in closer, until the heat from his glowing red eyes enveloped her, swallowed her whole. "Do you want me to stop, my pet?"

"N-never," she cried, hating herself for telling him that so truthfully. "Please, I-I beg y-you, m-my master. G-give me more. K-kill m-m-me."

The claw pressed even deeper and she gave voice to the scream she had kept locked inside. Her heart leapt within her, the hope rising that he was finally doing it. That the claw piercing her flesh would slice through the femoral artery and end the nightmare of her existence. However her scream ended in a wail of true sorrow as the claw pulled itself free of her leg and his hauntingly horrible laughter flowed as freely as her blood.

"No," he nearly purred, the pad of one metallic finger sliding up the line of scarlet blood he had traced on her skin, hot and faintly burning as he sealed the wounds he had given her. "No, my Laura. I will not kill you—yet. I will not deprive myself of the one life form on this planet that gives me pleasure, even if I do long to hear your voice in its final seconds, screaming devotion to me even as I take your life."

You hurt my soul
But I can't let you go
I can't let you go
Because I love you so

Because I love you so

You hurt my soul
Oh no I can't let you go
I can't let you go oh no
You hurt my soul

He lowered himself only enough to drop her to the ground without causing permanent damage. She hit hard, the wind knocked from her lungs, and lay there a long moment, feeling the too-green grass against her cheek, smelling the rich scent of imported soil and chemical enhancers that peppered the lawn. But it was only for a moment, and only before the whip-like cord wrapped around her neck, locking itself in place like a collar and yanking her to her feet. She did not need to look up to know it was attached to her master's wrist.

"I will not give you death tonight, my Laura. But I will give you a reward. You have pleased me with your offering of truth and blood," he said, and as if to accentuate the point, he sent a pulse of warmth down the tether, taking pleasure again at the way she jerked in surprise, letting the warmth sink into her weak flesh. "Now, I shall give you a taste of my judgment. These pathetic creatures have harmed what is mine. They have touched the flesh of your body, which is mine. They have hurt your so-called soul and mind, which also belong to me. They will answer for their crimes."

Again, the wind was knocked from her, this time not from a physical source. His words filled her with horror and dread, and her eyes jerked towards the house where she had grown up. Where her mother and stepfather and siblings slept in ignorant peace. Her fingers flew towards the collar, for the first time in months actively fighting against her master, against the shadow that stole all hope.

He peered down at her, eyes narrowing and true anger turning crimson optics darker still. "I see you still have lingering feelings for these creatures. It's true that your heart and mind are not mine completely. Another crime for which they shall be punished. Another punishment for you, my pet. See the price of denying me anything."

He said it so matter-of-factly, as if he were discussing the rising of the sun or the absolutely certainty that he would one day rule the universe. He was going to exact a price from her family, a price for the one tiny bit of love and loyalty she still felt for her mother and her siblings, even though they had done nothing as their stepfather had robbed her of her innocence. The words of denial formed in her throat, her mouth opened to speak—

—and then the warm pulsing energy changed, and tiny barbs extended on the inside of the collar, hair-thin and piercing her skin deeply. And just as suddenly her world started to melt, her vision contorting and running like liquid wax. Her legs gave out beneath her, the grass that was once soft now feeling like knives as the drugs played havoc with her nervous system, heightening her sense of touch to near painful levels. She knew this feeling, knew the rush of heroine probably better than she knew the beating of her own heart.

He'd drugged her, pumped the narcotics into her through the barbs in the collar. And in that act once more stole the hope from her heart and left her in the numbing cold of his shadow. All denial in her fled, all resistance to him gone. The tether connected to her collar snaked around her waist and arms at his urging, tightening and lifting her from the ground.

"Why?" she managed to whisper, every nerve in her body alive and pulsing with the rapid-fire beating of her heart.

"I dislike you in this state," he growled, hoisting her up to dangle before his eyes. "But your human mind is still too fragile to appreciate what I am going to do. In time, I will break you of that fragility; harden your thoughts as I have others in the past. I will shape you until you fit, my Laura. And this is the beginning."

His free hand transformed into the cannon he favored. She felt the ground tremble beneath him as his parts transformed and his feet blasted him upward. Wind whipped her to and fro as she dangled, a broken puppet on its last string. And the entire world exploded into sparks as he took aim at the house of her nightmares and fired…

~ TRFM ~ TRFM ~ TRFM ~ TRFM ~ TRFM ~ TRFM ~ TRFM ~ TRFM ~ TRFM ~ TRFM ~ TRFM ~ TRFM ~

"I told you she did not kill her family," Elita said quiety as the last image faded from the monitor.

Ratchet only nodded, his optic guards drawn together in a frown. With a delicacy born of both his programming and that simple, indefinable quality that made him a compassionate doctor, he carefully removed the wire-thin probe from Laura's temple. She stirred on the bed, arms and legs twisting against the restraints as the last of the retrieved memories faded.

"I should not have been able to perform this kind of probe on a human. Their minds do not normally store information like our processors," Ratchet muttered, setting the wire aside and scanning the woman.

"No, you shouldn't have," Elita agreed, crossing her arms over her chest plating. "But she is not a normal human."

"Not anymore," Ratchet agreed darkly, annoyance thick in his tone. "Megatron changed her, somehow. I have yet to figure out how."

"Then I leave her in your care," she replied, striding towards the door. "She's hurting."

"She's not the only one."

Elita froze, glancing up to meet the stare in his optics with a weighty one of her own. "Optimus brought this on himself when he took Laura from his brother," she began angrily, and then looked away. "But I see your point. I will… attempt to talk to him."

Elita strode out of the medical facility, heaviness in her spark, and sought out the mech that was her mate.

You hurt my soul, but I can't let you go.
I can't let you go, cuz I love you so.
Can't let go of your soul…