Disclaimer: I do not own Transformers

Hasbro owns Transformers

I want to apologize for the late update but my writer's block seems to be gone and I'm getting this story going again. I wanted to make these chapters as perfect as possible because they are leading to something really big. I'm also a perfectionist and wanted to get every emotions down to the tee.

Also~

I want to announce with much excitement that there will be a third and final story to this universe called "A Shadowed Dawn". Very, very, excited about the events to happen in this story that will be revealed in the epilogue of this story. So hide yo kids, hide yo wife, because it's going to be a bumpy ride.

With love, enjoy!

Chapter 20 Fit to be King

Lennox had ran alongside the gurney along with the holoform that he didn't even know Ratchet had acquired. He was middle aged, his strong and still lively frame wearing a lab coat and medical uniform. He had gray slicked back hair that fell in front of his face whenever he looked back down to the younger woman in concern. A quip curtly left him. Something about staying strong. Lennox wasn't aware. Felicity's health had gone south in the middle of transport. It was taking a dive since they found her but it turned for the worst so suddenly.

She was barely hanging on, pulse weak and breathing slow. Her skin was so pale against her once beautiful emerald green dress. Her skin was cold yet damp with sweat. It was terrible to see her like this. Not after so many years.

They turned into the makeshift medical area of the hanger. The holoform turned around switching the grip on the gurney with ease to face them. He told the other medics to leave. Lennox too.

The holoform had looked him in the eye. Blue eyes that told everything would be alright. Eyes that knew they needed to assure a seemingly strong and collected man's worry. The Major slowed and stopped watching her go. He reluctantly did what he was told. A heavy curtain was pulled around them both cutting off his worried gaze upon the woman.

Her surroundings were fuzzy. Her body saw or felt no threat when she was near other mysterious people. She was coming to when she saw the ceiling above. Strange rusted metal high and large moving to pass behind her. Another support beam for another. It was dizzying how fast they were coming and going. Sounds echoed around her.

Felicity's eyes were barely opened. It felt like she had tears in them. No matter how many times she blinked they wouldn't go away or make her vision less blurry.

It was like when she was child. The human would open her eyes underwater as a dare. It was like that. Burning and strenuous. She closed her eyes, her head falling limp to her side.

Felicity felt a burn and twinge of pain every so often as she was jostled. She was moving, she supposed. Or so it felt. Her body felt weightless and heavy.

"Get out."

A rough voice.

There was no need to be so mean. Not after what...oh. The forest. Sunny. That terrible, terrible living nightmare. Her left leg. Memories came and went.

A cold prick in her arm and then ice traveled up into her arm and neck. Her head swam. Time seemed to have passed.

Two loud shallow sounding cracks woke her.

Numbness and then sensation in her left leg. And then coldness.

The little human felt dizzy, empty and sick at the same time. Her lungs hurt and her head continued to swim. Felicity tried to speak but something was obstructing her mouth from doing so. She closed her eyes. Something pulled her back under. A black veil that was no longer comforting. Something came through the dark. Slow and curious like an unsure stray.

Who are you?

Oh, it was that voice again. It was curious and repulsed. She felt something, no someone, digging in her head. Was it Sunny? No. It was too rough. Digging. Like a morbid movie they went through her memories. She flinched. Now wasn't a good time to look at the past few days. No. Past few years.

Get out of my head. A warning she said to the intruder as she felt consciousness come to her.

The digging became hurried as if it was running out of time.

It became too much. She woke up calling for Sunstreaker to save her.

It was at least a few days. That's when Ratchet allowed him to see her. His holoform was nearby, arms crossed, lips pursed as if he was unsatisfied with something. He did the best he could to help her.

"Why isn't she waking up?" Lennox was sitting in a nearby folding chair. His face was held with stressed hands.

"Sunstreaker. The bond. Exhaustion. I don't know, William. I did everything I could. She can't breath on her own and she is getting worse..."

"Worse? Ratchet I thought you said-?"

He shook his head. The holoform walked around to the other side of the woman laying prone on the medical bed. She looked pale and exhausted despite her resting persona. "Something is happening. Sunstreaker is doing something. Or she is. I do not know..." His name was called over by an approaching soldier. Asking if it was bad time to drop in to deliver supplies he called for. Ratchet walked away with a forced smile. Their voices became murmured, echoing dully across the small hanger.

Lennox looked over at the monitors keeping steady record of Felicity's vitals. "She seems alright..." He tisked, blinking in confusion. She was breathing alright. Her leg was in a cast and levitated. Her wounds had been stitched and dressed. X-rays and other test were done to make sure no other injuries were untreated. She was on the road to recovery. What was so bad about…?

A spike on the monitor indicated a heightened heartbeat. He sat up straighter. "Ratch'..." He called in an uneasy tone.

It continued to increase and so did her breathing, as if she was fighting against the endotracheal tube...or something else. "Ratchet!" He yelled a bit louder.

He sat up and ran over to the two. He didn't bother excusing himself from the other soldier when he saw Lennox running over to him. He was already briskly walking.

They were halfway there when a yell came from behind the curtain. A pained and panicked yell. Lennox ran faster.

The Major jumped into action, his arms around the to help her stay still, to not hurt herself as she flailed. The tube that helped her breath and feed was ripped from the throat and tossed aside in a small puddle of vomit.

She sobbed uncontrollably. "Ratchet?" He looked up to him in well hidden panic. His jaw was set as he struggled to keep her still.

The medic however was already siphoning a liquid from a vial into a syringe. He flicked it before moving to her side. "Keep her still!" He ordered in a gruff tone.

Lennox pressed a hand to her chest and wrapped his arm around her whole body including the arm of which the sedative was given to her.

Her struggles became weak and timid. Pathetic and sloppy. She had choked one word that made the Major's blood run cold. Slowly, Lennox lowered her back down onto the bed, pity in his eyes. "I'm sorry, Felicity." It was all they could do to help her.

Ratchet was a few steps away clipping the needle and placing it into a bio-hazard container.

He remained frozen. William looked down to her. "She said his name. She called for him."

"The bond. It's being blocked."

"How? Why...?" He murmured.

The medic didn't make a move to place the ETT back into place or reinsert IVs that were ripped from their holdings. Ratchet stared at the monitor, a grim expression over aged skin. He hated it when he didn't have the answer to questions asked.

"My Sunstreaker...please awaken."

The sweet but poisonous voice coaxed him forth from a terrible dream into another one. A living one. His newly repaired optics dimly onlined. He tilted his helm with a struggled motion as too many warnings, messages, and error scrolled across his vision. There was a shadow that shifted among the dim red lights. A shimmer caught his optics. The unmistakable lace of Hypogeum's dressings. Sharp purple optics looked down to faded crystal blues

"You..." He hissed. He still couldn't believe that such a nightmare of a femme was still alive. Still staining the living world with her presence. He offlined his optics in fatigue before forcing them back online.

Hypogeum walked up next to Sunstreaker trailing her finger's over his helm fins. "Yes, my gladiator, it is me." She hummed sweetly. She didn't understand his words were heated and not in relief.

She kissed Sunstreaker upon his jaw. Because Sunstreaker had such memories of Hypogeum molesting him, manipulating him, and having that power over him that made him freeze, make him feel as if he could do nothing, he remained where he was staring up at the ceiling.

And the femme knew this. She held no fear of coming so close to the mech and trialing clawed fingers over his chest. "How I missed you, my gladiator of Kaon." The dark emerald femme leaned in close trailing her glossa over his chest.

Sunstreaker flinched, but remained frozen in place. His vents were choked and stuttered. His hands twitched with a mix of fear, aggravation, and the absolute hate of someone controlling him with just their presence.

The Pit Master looked down to him with lust, her helm abruptly ticking unnaturally. The golden twin flinched. Her lips were lowered just a breath away from his own. Sunstreaker offlined his optics. "Damn you..." He breathed against the soft metal.

"None of that Sunstreaker." She plucked a medical energon line from his arm, rusted and bent. He flinched as it was taken out. His frame felt heavy. The damaged inflicted upon him from such prior "matches" were repaired with unhealthy metals and half-hearted repairs. It was as if she wanted him to remain in some state of pain. Both mental and physical.

He tilted his helm to the side. Her breath was poison against his lips. "Energon." His voice was dead. Numb. "I need energon."

Hypogeum circled around him disconnecting wires from the back of his neck. "Of course my gladiator. The finest I have. Stand." She ordered.

And because Sunstreaker reminded himself, through the fog of such a torturous stasis, that he would play her twisted game, he did as he was told. He sat up biting back sudden yells of pain when something shifted uncomfortably. His frame felt so stiff. He wanted to purge upon the sounds of joints grinding because of rust or flakes of...Primus knew what were in them. His hydraulics sounded sickly and unchecked as he stood. He stumbled forward, wounds still fresh and burning.

The mech hated how he fell forward into her arms. She held him, hand upon his helm in a soothing and disgustingly motherly manner. She pushed him back up, trailed hands down the sides of his abdomen, and then thighs where they slowly traveled inward. He grabbed her hand with a firm hold. "Energon." He reminded her.

She smiled, a toothy grin that made unpleasant shivers run down his spinal strut. "Perhaps this...can wait later."

There would be no later. Sunstreaker promised himself this. Her skirted plating clicked against her thighs as she began to walk. With a struggle he slowly followed after her. He tried to stand tall and proud but it was difficult. Groggy and unbalanced. He walked close to the walls of the countless hallways they traveled.

Other mechs and femmes, smaller, weaker, timid, or scared, paused in their travels and bowed toward the femme. They did so with haste as if their lives were dependent on it. Which he had no doubt of. He withheld any pitiful glances towards them. He made sure to not meet their optics. They were innocent. He had killed one of their own upon the grounds that were an arena. The sickly mech that held a weapon with no prior experience.

Perhaps death...was a blessing for such a mech. No living creature should suffer under Hypogeum. He looked up watching her back. Her frame walked with practiced ease. Hips moving in a supple way that repulsed him. Suffer under...Hypogeum….

So why should he?

It was a simple realization, but to Sunstreaker of Kaon it was a realization that seemed all too complicated, made thoughts run wild.

"You are quiet, my gladiator." She looked over her shoulder as they turned a corner in the hall.

Another femme bowed. Her arm hung by a few muscle relays. Sunstreaker would not tear his optics away from the sight. A reminder of what this thing before him inflicted upon others.

They were innocent. He continued to remind himself of this.

"Merely taking in my surroundings." He murmured, lost in his thoughts. It was half truth. He would outline every possible hallway he traveled as a reference for when he escaped...if he did.

"This ship is a masterpiece. A bounty hunter I had grown close to had, hm, should I say given it to me as a parting gift?"

She spoke much and highly of this mech. It wasn't the first time she had mentioned him. It seemed she had forgotten. "You killed him." He blandly guessed.

"His spark was not given to me wholly." She sighed. She took a cloth from subspace and dabbed underneath makeshift plating on the side of her helm. He noted how sickly the melting substance was.

"I...see..." Sunstreaker noted that the hall was coming to end.

Hypogeum paused at a large door and so did the golden mech. He made sure he kept a good distance away from her. Not because of mortification or any other emotion he felt and swirled within him. He was afraid he would ruin his ploy and tear her apart right then and there.

"Therefore, do not make that same mistake, My Sunstreaker of Kaon. You had yielded to me perfectly. Do not forget." She smiled as a delicate hand pressed a touch pad to open the door.

Sunstreaker lifted his helm and glanced inside. It was a terrible trip into the past. Or so it seemed at first.

High pillars and beams were draped with dusty, rotten silks. A Kline sat between two large crumbling statues of a ruling mech and femme of long ago. Two of which resembled Hypogeum in the most curious of ways.

The golden twin looked forward. Femmes awaited her with trays of delicacies and energon. The room was dark and set in what seemed to be a secondary engine room.

It was ironic.

Sunstreaker followed after her.

What was once magnificent, shiny, and new, was degraded, rotten and rusted. The glory of the pits from so long ago would never be recreated. Her throne room would never be as great as it was back then. It was a joke. Something that gave Sunstreaker confidence. Something that assured him that this nightmare would never be recreated again.

It symbolized her very own degradation. She was no longer great. She had dying mechs and femmes as slaves. She desperately made this very ship to be a recreation of her glory days. Her very own mind was melting and charring away. What she saw was great, was merely rotten and disgusting to any other optic.

Sunstreaker...felt silly suddenly. It was as if he was a sparkling again afraid of the shadows in his berthroom that shifted so suddenly when it turned out to be just the old bright street light shorting out. No monsters or ghosts of cybertron's past. Just imagination and naivety

And it made him lighter in a way. Empowered.

Hypogeum reached out to delicately grip energon cubes from a femme that could barely stand.

Sunstreaker stopped just so from her. Hands were clenched by his side. His frame was weak. But he was strong. She slowly walked towards him, a smile that was so sweet and poisonous. She raised one cube to her lips and the other to his own. He slowly looked down to the energon. It was the murkiest, sickliest slag he had ever seen. Careful optics flicked back to her as he slowly pulled away.

"I am afraid I do not much care for this kind of energon, Pit Master." It took much effort from spitting such a name.

The warning of low energon continued to bother his vision. He dismissed it.

"Perhaps a blend from crystal city?" She offered.

"Perhaps later." He mused watching her sit.

It was silent as Sunstreaker watched her drink. It was disgusting. It made his tanks roll.

"Leave us." She had finally said. Her voice echoed.

They bowed and quickly did as they were told. They were like micro-mice scurrying away from a cyber-cat. He stood still, simply standing before her.

She set down her energon cube with a gentle click of glass on metal. Purple optics dimmed and became mischievous. "Come. Stand closer."

Reluctantly he did as he was told, fists clenching tighter.

She was quiet moving a hand to his chest, dragging her nimble fingers down to his stomach plating and then to pelvic armor.

He tipped his helm just a bit higher. He focused his optics forward.

"You have remained just as you were so long ago." She purred. Fingers delving into wires at hip joints. He took in a harsh vent.

She smirked tilting her helm. "And now...I have you for myself. All these years..." Hypogeum leaned forward glossa licking at his lower stomach plating.

Sunstreaker held his vents. He felt nothing.

"Sideswipe…is gone." A hand cupped between his legs.

A shaky ex-vent. Fists began to whine in stress. Metal cracking and strained. Each touch set flames through his frame. He stared forward.

"Master...is gone." Unmoving.

"That human you so foolishly had affections for..." Harsher motions upon plating. "...Is gone." She whispered on his plating.

One would mistaken him in stasis if his optics were not online.

Each mention of his human, each mention of his brother fueled the untamed revenge swirling within his spark. He promised he would wait for the opportune moment to strike. His frame would never give into her disgusting touches. No living creature should suffer under Hypogeum. Under anyone.

His helm tipped higher. Wasn't that what he believed? Wasn't this why he fought every living moment of his life for this war? Fighting for innocents being controlled by fear?

Was this why he agreed to the Autobots? Was this the reason he...lived, survived?

"And now," She sang in a light relieved voice. "You are mine. We can be king and queen...so perfect..." Fingers trailed pelvic plating clasps. He gasped.

Enough. Was enough.

An arm shot out. Within clawed fingertips he held her neck. Slowly he rose her to her feet. No longer would he suffer. No longer would their deaths be wasted. No longer would their deaths be in vain.

The bond that he held with Felicity was suppressed and forgotten. She was gone. He wouldn't hold onto something that was gone.

Just like Sideswipe.

Just like his creators.

And now Felicity.

He accepted her fate. Sideswipe's fate. Everyone he ever knew. He forgot and grieved in that short moment.

Now it was his living nightmare turn to accept her own.

No living creature should suffer under Hypogeum. Under anyone or anything.

"Your words are nothing." His expression was stone. Clear and void. Deep down anger bled through. His frame emitted dangerous power and strength. Even in his weakened state nothing would stop him from taking what was rightfully his. "You are and will be nothing."