This delay really is inexcusable, 83 days, bloody hell, but, better late then never right? Honestly not sure what I think about this chapter, I think that's because the first part was written a good month or so ago and I finally finished it yesterday... so yeah, it may be a bit crappy, but at least things are starting to get moving, there's gonna be quite the time skip between this chapter and the next though.

Well, now that's all said and done, normal disclaimers, and I hope you all enjoy.

Chapter 20

The next year was relatively uneventful, no more sudden arrivals, safe a few appearances from Derrick, who Aria quickly swept away to some unknown location to talk and the like.

It had become the norm for Aria to disappear for hours on end, coming back without a single explanation outside of Feedback getting used to being on things other than herself or wanting to explore more and get more accustomed to the world she hadn't seen for a good portion of her life.

They bought it, but then the frequency increased and she was gone for longer and longer.

She once vanished for a solid week.

It threw Ira and Kia into an uproar, followed swiftly by the sparklings, and the concern of the others quickly grew, until she came back, completely unscathed, and told them she'd gone back home.

That had confused them until she elaborated that she'd only gone to the place her home was back in their former world, which, here, was just an abandoned warehouse district.

Aria had refused to speak more on it, and, with time, the matter was dropped.

They'd all become aware at this point, that, at some point, likely in those six months when she'd been cut off, something had happened, something she wasn't willing to share, and was handling on her own, possibly with Feedback's help, but the laptop sparkling seemed to of adopted her guardians wish for secrecy when it came to this matter.

Ira was, at present, enjoying the company of Sideswipe, Sunstreaker, Trackster, Sonic, Bia, Terra and Nano, as they all watched Orion Pax part 3 from the TFP series, Ira, despite having watched it more times than would be deemed healthy for one's own sanity, was poised, frame locked and tri-colour optics drinking in every little detail as Sideswipe tried, and somehow failed to pull her back into the couch, despite him normally being stronger than her to quite a degree.

"Damn fangirl power boost." He grumbled.

"It's over nine thousand." Ira mumbled, cuddling Trackster and Sonic to her chassis, whilst the three, now tablet sparklings, chittered around on her shoulderplates, undisturbed by the red twins attempt to pull her back into the sofa.

The twin mechs exchanged a confused look when they heard Kia make something which sounded a lot like a choked laugh.

"Ira! That's my thing to quote Dragon Ball! Not you! When did you last watch an episode?!"

Ira shrugged, still not looking away from the show in front of her. "Never have, just thought it would fit, so I said it, now calm down, no need for you to go super saiyan on my ass."

Kia huffed, going back to taking care of Sprite and Xabia, Roadblock currently content with having a bit of a nap curled around the three of them.

Sunstreaker leaned over to Ira and tried to push her back, grunting when he realised Sideswipe hadn't been exaggerating the peregrine femmes sudden boost of strength.

"I shall not move." Ira responded.

Aria then strode into the rec-room, along with Wheeljack and Artemis, the two, despite having had a bumpy introduction to the three Harpies, had become quite at ease with them, Jolt remaining more with Ratchet in the Medbay to help out in any way he could, claiming that he was a little unnerved by the group as a whole,

Aria's disappearances were also something that both Wheeljack and Artemis joined in on, Well, when they were able to catch her leaving, sometimes at the most ungodly hours of the night.

When they did go with her, Artemis would fly alongside in her alt mode, a Sukhoi Su-4, one Ira had talked her into acquiring, Wheeljack would hitch a ride within Aria's bombbay, despite the fact that some of her sudden movements, namely barrel rolls and sudden nose dives, left his ingested energon in the wrong place within his anatomy, or flying through the air if Aria opened her bombbay enough in time.

Each time it happened, he quickly waved it off saying that the processed energon Ratchet made was better out than in them anyway, taste wise that is.

When the two of them went with her, she and Feedback would take them all across the world, showing them all Earth had to offer, after the incident at Niagra though, they avoided water based landmarks, such as similar waterfalls, Artemis was getting ice out from her armour for a good few hours before they could get back in the air, resulting in them almost getting spotted by the Canadian guard a few too many times for comfort.

That also meant, that when Feedback would tell the other sparklings of their adventures, Oz would then spread the word, and it seemed each different trip garnered a different response from the members of base.

The Niagara incident got Artemis stuck in Medbay as Ratchet fussed over trying to find water in her systems which had long since dripped out of her frame.

The trip to Russia had resulted in Wheeljack getting into quite the vulgar altercation with a drunk driver who'd rammed his side when the man had gone through a red, Aria and Artemis had certainly had fun with trying to break that fight up, Kia, who'd come with them that time as well, was content with just sitting on the road barrier next to the incident, Xabia peeking out other her shoulder from where she was hidden within the Harpy in disguises backpack, and cheering on the near fight whilst Roadblock sat in the traffic jam the two had caused with their little spat.

Take note they'd all been in holoform at the time.

Yet for some reason the drunkard had started raving about aliens anyway.

The whole fiasco had resulted in a complaint from the Russian Transit Authority, and strangely enough a whole crate of Vodka for the mech involved.

The soldiers had greatly enjoyed it for him.

Aria was still trying to work out what those officers had been on them for them just to hand Wheeljack an entire crate of the alchoholic beverage in the middle of an intersection and crash incident.

The next trip, had been to Texas, under Kia's influence of wanting to go see a rodeo.

Aria hadn't enjoyed it nearly as much as the others, the volume and everything going on giving her crown quite the struggle in keeping up with everything, so, she, Feedback and Artemis, who had gone with the two, had instead gone to a local park so that Aria could cool off under the shade of an old oak tree.

This was also the time that Artemis found out that Aria was in no way fond of heat, if the four separate ice creams she'd gotten were anything to go by.

It was also the reason why instead of going to Death Valley with her trine, she instead flew up to Alaska to go Orca watching, whilst Wheeljack, who had once again been in her Bombay during the flight, enjoyed racing across the frozen bay a few miles down the coast.

Most times however, they weren't able to catch Aria's departure, and tracing the bomber was nigh impossible, and so, knowing where she went, why she went and other such questions, were left unknown.

Some on base, found this more suspicious than others, a good portion of the newer human recruits gave the largest Harpy a wide berth, despite her now much more welcoming personality.

She didn't mind though.

It was fully expected they would act like this.

But she couldn't let anyone know what she was doing.

"Hey! Aria! You ok up there!?" The sudden shout jolted the Harpy femme back to the present, taking note of how everyone else had already settled down to watch the rest of the episode playing, the caller being Sideswipe from his place draped partially over the back of the sofa, one arm wrapped around Ira's shoulderplates, but by how she was too focused on the show playing, she didn't seem to notice, otherwise the femme would be reacting a very differently.

Shaking her helm lightly again so as not to jostle Feedback, she started moving again. "Just fine Sideswipe, got lost in my own head again, enjoying looking into another reality?" She joked.

He groaned. "It's so weird! Where the hell am I in this series! How could the creators not want to put me in there?! Or you Sunny."

"They put you in the sequel remember." Kia piped up.

Sunstreaker snorted out a growl. "But not me, all though you have to admit, they got your immaturity down to a 'T' brother… That is the correct human term, right Ira?" He asked, poking the femme in the downy feathers on her shoulderplate.

"Huh? Oh, yeah, yeah… YES! KICK HIS ASS OPTIMUS!" She was suddenly standing, jostling the sparklings hanging off her as she thrust a wing up, which in turn hit the ceiling and smashed the light above, causing glass and sparks to rain down for a moment. After a moment more of everyone just staring, she turned her helm up to look at the damage herself. "….Awwwwww scrap…"

Aria sighed, glancing at Artemis, who she'd decided to sit next to, and Kia. "Add another light to the repair bill… that's seventeen items in the last three weeks… Six of them being ceiling lights…"

Ira huffed, flopping back onto the Cybertronian sized sofa and crossing her wings over each over, in result covering most of her frame. "And every time, I said I was sorry!"

Aria jolted back from the table she sat at with Artemis, now joined by Wheeljack and Kia. "Hey! I was just making an assessment of the situation with a bit of humour! No need to bite my head off!" She called back, muttering under her breath as Feedback scampered down the side of her helm and onto her shoulderplate.

'What's eating her?' She typed.

"No idea, Ira, relax, ok?" Aria sighed, moving her wing up so the dexterous feathers could stroke Feedback's side, causing the sparkling to let off a happy trill.

Ira huffed and got up instead and strode off, much to the confusion of the twins sitting either side of her.

Kia nudged Aria's side and gestured to the corner of the recroom, the two got up and went to speak after a moment.

"It's the… you know, anniversary…" Kia whispered.

Aria's optics widened behind her visor, starring into the pitch black one of her trine mate. "…Oh… Oh, ok, what are we going to do?" She asked, crown lowering down against her helm as Feedback stared up at her in concern from her shoulder.

Kia paused for a moment and rested the second joint of her right wing against her chin guard. "We need to distract her… a party maybe?"

"No, she'd take offense to that… think we're celebrating… it…" Aria responded with a shake of her helm. "Maybe… movie marathon?"

"She does that every day nowadays anyway, there'd be no difference?"

"Convince the twins to take her out on a date?"

Kia just stared at Aria for a moment, and Aria pressed her wing into her helm. "Right no, bad idea, those guys don't seem to see her like that, and we promised never to try and partner her with someone, she want's to be independent… Though, it's pretty obvious she's smitten…" She sighed. "And of course Sideswipe had to friendzone her four weeks ago…"

Kia nodded. "What about a one-shot?"

"No, just no, that would be too weird for everybot."

"Have you actually been writing anything recently?"

"What do you think? I'm… I don't have the time…"

"You do when you disappear off without a word." Kia pressed.

Aria frowned and rose up slightly on her pedes. "Kia, my private business is my private business." She huffed.

Kia's frown just grew. "You're hiding something from us."

"It's not something you should be concerned about."

"I can be damn well concerned about it when it's putting strain on our trine!" Kia snarled.

Aria just stared at her, but that was when Kia spotted something, Aria's leg was shaking, heavily, as was her right wing. "A…ria?" Aria was already storming out of the room, her seven blade like tail feathers swaying jerkily from side to side as her claws hit the floor harshly.

"I'm going for a flight, no one follows me. Artemis, Wheeljack sit back down." The femme called from down the corridor when Wheeljack and Artemis went to follow.

Kia moved back to the others, resulting in Wheeljack, Artemis, Ira, the twins and the sparklings all turning to her. "Something's wrong with Aria, she's hiding something, we need to go see Ratchet." She declared.

The door to the med-bay had only just slid open, and a wrench already slammed into the point between Sideswipes optics. "What the frag was that for Hatchet!" He shouted from where Ira and Sunstreaker had caught him.

The medic just growled. "Aria's medical reports, I just found out from the mechanic team who's been doing her checks for me that she's showing some worrying symptoms, which had been hidden in a file highlighted as 'cosmetic' Cosmetic my aft." He snarled.

That sent a wave of concern through all of them. "What do you mean Ratchet, what's wrong with Aria?" Artemis spoke up, striding forwards.

Ratchet growled and slammed his servo into the table. "It's not good… fraggit… why wasn't I more suspicious when she suggested that mechanic team to do her checks? Giving me more time to check everyone else! More like giving her all the time she needed to hide the results, I haven't had the time to train that team in checking internals yet… I should of made that a priority… then they would of recognised what was happening."

"What's happening Ratchet?" Wheeljack spoke up, stepping up next to Artemis, followed by Ira and Kia.

"What's happening to our trine mate?" Ira demanded.

Ratchet sighed. "I don't know. That's the truth, her frames showing signs of… something, it's slowly destroying her though… breaking down at the atomic level."

"She was shaking Ratchet, her right leg and pede, and she… just went for a flight…" Kia declared.

"And with her scanning range… she knows exactly what we're saying… she knows we know something's wrong…" Ira muttered, flaring her much smaller crown. 'She way out of my scanning range now, Kia?"

"About to hit the edge of mine, she's heading for… by the looks of it… and she's out of range, but she's heading North East towards India." Kia sighed.

Sunstreaker spoke up then. "She's a clone right? Made by humans, Ira you mentioned it to us ages ago."

Ira nodded. "Yeah… and human cloning is still in its… infancy… oh god… something's wrong with her… Human cloning is… it's not perfect… no clone has ever lived the full duration of its life… and Aria's almost twenty…what… Kia, what was Amy's age when she was killed?"

Kia shrugged. "Aria, or Wren, never said… you don't think…"

"That Amy was in her twenties and Aria's running out of time… No wait, Amy was older than her twenties…" Ira growled and shook her helm. "There's too many unknown variables! Ratchet! What happens when a bot is cloned?"

Ratchet went to answer, but fell short. "I… I don't know, it was never deemed as ethical to clone a bot, due to the effect it could have on the sparkmate of the one cloned… it was debated heavily if it was even possible to clone a spark… if my memory serves, illegal attempts, even with the best technology, failed horribly, sparks can't take that kind of strain.

Artemis spoke up then. "He's right, I studied Cybertronian biology to be a medic before the war, I gave up my studies because of the war, but… I know for a fact from my professor, a brilliant mech called Quark, that a cloned spark had a far shorter lifespan, if any, than a normal bot, orns if it was lucky…"

"That's only a few human years…" Sideswipe spoke up.

Sunstreaker frowned and nodded, glancing over to the Harpies. "And who knows what kind of extra strain was put on her frame when you lot became Cybertronian, and your odd ability to turn into organic forms, the strain on her coding must be immense…"

There was a beat of silence as all the information sunk into everybot.

"We have to find her…" Kia declared, seeming to rise to her full intimidating height. "Ira, get in the air, try and follow Aria's trail, and do not stop until you find her or you need to refuel."

Ira nodded and sprinted out of the room.

Kia turned to Artemis. "Get Optimus and the others, let them know what's going on, then join Ira in the search." She commanded as she jerked her helm to Wheeljack. "You're good with inventing, and the like, try and see what you and Ratchet can put together which might help her." The two mechs nodded and Ratchet got on the com-link with Jolt.

Kia then turned to the twins. "You two, get your afts in gear, I want you to search every media outlet there is which may coincide with her flight path, a frame her size and her model is bound to be spotted by somebot, now move!" Kia shouted at the end, watching as the two mechs made a speedy getaway from the med bay and the femme who had seemingly become someone completely different.

Ratchet glanced over at the femme who was now venting hard, not even getting a moment of time to react before her pede slammed into the wall in front of her. "You idiot! Aria! We're your bloody trine, why, why did you never say anything?!" She kicked the wall again and hissed as the metal there was dented. "Fraggit…" She snarled out.

Ratchet continued to stare at the femme for a moment, moving over to lead her to the closest berth so he could check her pede, but her wing slapped him across his front before he even got the chance. "No, don't touch me." She snarled. "I'm going and finding that idiot."

She was storming out a moment later, limping slightly and hissing with every other step.

Wheeljack gave the medic a concerned look. "I think it's more than just Aria out of that group that's hiding something." He mused.

Ratchet nodded and turned back to the wrecker and scientist. "It would seem so."

"How the frag are we even supposed to help Aria when we have no idea what's wrong with her?" Wheeljack growled, already pulling open all the data files he had which could help.

"I don't know Wheeljack, 'successful' clones where never a group I had a chance to try and help before."

That was when he noticed something in the mechs optics. "Wheeljack, don't tell me you having…"

"Feelings for a femme who is probably falling apart in silence?! Then yes!" He snarled.

Ratchet froze up. "Why? How? Wheeljack…"

"I don't fragging know, all I do know is that whenever she even looks my way my spark pulses that bit brighter and… Primus I don't know what draws me to her, maybe her fun nature? When she's not being all cryptic? Her odd outlook on life…"

Ratchet interrupted him there, "By that you mean?"

"I mean, she's… kinda… happy about it… Primus that thing she said that time in Alaska makes so much more sense now!"

"What makes more sense Wheeljack?" Optimus inquired as he strode into the room.

The two mechs visibly jolted, but they were quick to right themselves and for Wheeljack to answer him. "Aria said once, 'Life is like a bucket, the older it gets, the more holes form in it, if the buckets got holes from the beginning due to a botched production, it'll never hold its water long…"

Ratchet shook his helm, understanding what Wheeljack was talking about. "And this didn't ring alarm bells back then because?"

"Because she dumped a bunch of snow on my helm a moment later, I only just remembered it now… after this revelation…" He sighed.

The newly arrived bots all gave the two concerned looks. Ironhide speaking up. "What's wrong with the Harpy? She looked pretty damn fine to me when I saw her taking off in her vehicle mode not twenty minutes ago…"

Wheeljack shook his helm. "All a trick, everyone, Aria's got something wrong with her, we think it's because of the fact she's a clone, to put it simply, she hid from all of us… the fact of the matter is, she's slowly offlining. And if what Kia's quick observation revealed, she may not have long, and now, she's vanished."

A few beats of silence occurred before Optimus turned to the others. "Autobots, locating Aria is now high priority, unless there is Decepticon activity, we cannot rest, until Aria is returned to base and healed, I will not have a member of this team, suffering an injury." He called out.

"It's not an injury Prime." Ratchet spoke up. "It's her frame, I don't have any scans to base my assumption on, but I can safely assume her frame is ageing, or breaking down, either one, this isn't an injury we can fix, it's a complete shutdown… potentially, only something we can slow down…"

Optimus starred at the medic for a moment before giving a firm nod. "Autobots… Ratchet, where are the Twins, Artemis and the Harpy's?"

"Already way ahead of you Prime, Ira, Kia and Artemis are already hot on Aria's trail, the Twins are scanning the media for sightings, and Wheeljack's here helping me in brainstorming possible ways to slow the degeneration that the idiot femme may be going through… Problem is, we need to have accurate data first…"

Optimus nodded, and followed the rest of the team out of the med bay. "Then I will alert the humans we are in need of aerial transport. We will spread out and search as much as we can on the ground."

Ratchet and Wheeljack nodded, watching the med bay doors slide shut, even Jolt had gone back out to help with the search.

Ratchet placed a servo on the other mechs shoulder plate when he noticed how slumped over Wheeljack had become. "When did it start?"

"Not sure, first it was good friends, now it feels like way more, I was planning to tell her next time we went somewhere cold whilst the others go somewhere hot, you know... just her, me… Feed…back… Feedback! That sparkling never leaves her damn frame! She must know what's going on!" His digit almost crushed his com he was so rushed to press it. "Feedback! Come in Feedback! … Nothing… little thing's probably deactivated her com… Aria has too… fraggit, if something happens to those two… I swear… Now I know how Jazz feels…" He huffed.

Ratchet nodded. "Those three do seem to just love stirring everything up around here… But I never thought it would be like this… Why didn't the fact that she's a Cybertronian clone ring any bells before?!"

Wheeljack shrugged. "Probably Aria's ability at hiding it."

The two lulled into a silence which allowed them to migrate to two of the work benches in the med-bay, both of them setting to work sifting through all the medical records they had with a fine toothed comb.

Kerala, India

Feedback chittered as she clambered up the stairs Aria had just finished, optics wide and fearful as her big sister managed to stagger through the doorway at the top of the large and overgrown temple.

When she reached the top, her big sister was on her side, side heaving and falling in shuddering breaths as her maw hung open from where her head was barely lifted off the ground, two of her four eyes trained on her from behind dark blue permeable membrane. "I… I'm… fine…"

'No, you're not… these transformations are taking their toll on you, why are you even doing this… It's killing you, faster than…'

"Faster than how my bodies shutting down? Yeah, I know… but it'll be worth it… by the time I die, I'll have fixed everything…"

Feedback just turned away, after shooting a glare at the multi-hued fiery oval which sat on Aria's left armour gauntlet. 'Why you… why'd it have to be you?'

Aria just let out a sigh and let her head fall to the ground, the armoured feeler like appendages coming from the sides of her armoured head clanging against the stone.

"Because… I'm the closest thing they have to what they need… And I'm not letting Ira and Kia suffer my fate… they deserve better…"

Feedback just let off a distressed whine, before scampering over and nuzzling down against the thick organic white and grey splotched hide. 'I don't want you to die…'

Aria's right arm moved to wrap around the laptop sparkling, the massive metal blade stretching out from her wrist screeching along the ground for a moment before she'd managed to tuck Feedback up against the back of her jaw and beginning of her neck.

"I know… I know… but… I was never made to live long… I plan to die on my terms… not those set by my creators…"

'I wish you weren't a clone. I wish you weren't her clone…'

"Nothing we can do now… now… recharge… we need all the strength we can muster to get across the rest of the Indian ocean, and over the Middle East no way am I running the risk of us getting shot down… maybe it would be safer to fly through Asia… yeah… let's do that… avoid the danger completely…slow us down in getting to the homeland…"

Feedback just let off a low whirr, snuggling down as best as she could, but she wasn't used to sleeping in anything but her big sisters downy feathers, and now, they were gone…

At this point, probably for good.

Yeah, make of it as you wish, I'm not sure about this chapter, and I've locked everyone in the cubboard because they tried to maul me earlier, the Yeti's were not easy, at all.

Oh well, hope you enjoyed, hopefully I can get the next chapter out sooner than two months, until then, see yah! 'Bolts off somewhere'