Author's Note: Thanks for reading. Transformers belongs to Hasbro and Takara, not me.

A Blessing and A Curse
By: Quetzal1

Chapter 25
Into the Fire

xxxxx

Stormvolt boarded the Vengeance with a heavy sense of trepidation. She had gotten there as fast as possible, fearing the worst. Galvatron must have been hurt badly for Cyclonus to sound as worked up as he had when he'd summoned her. But then it was their leader they were talking about, and any emotion the second in command showed was amplified many times over in that case. A loud crash echoed down the corridor causing her to walk faster.

"REVENGE WILL BE MINE! DO YOU HEAR ME? MINE!" Galvatron roared. Hmmm. Pretty lively for someone who was supposed to be seriously injured. The femme carefully and quietly entered the repair bay.

"Lord Galvatron, please. You must remain calm until your wounds are attended to," Cyclonus said, from the relative safety of his position far out of reach of the tyrant. He held both hands out in a placating gesture that would also allow him to bat away any more projectiles flung in his direction. Several instrument trays were scattered about his general area but none had come too close, as Galvatron's aim wasn't in top form at the moment. Still, it was always wiser to be prepared.

"Don't tell me what I must do," Galvatron snarled. "Not unless you want to receive the same punishment as I am going to deliver to those miserable, interfering slaggers." He was sitting on the repair table and it was obvious from his awkward motions that his left side was almost totally immobilized.

"Who are you going to punish?" Stormvolt asked quietly, but with enthusiasm. Keen interest (or in her case pretended interest) in the mech's crackpot schemes usually improved his mood. Perhaps too, her sudden appearance would be enough of a distraction to calm him a little.

"Why the Autobots, you moron," Galvatron said, suddenly turning his burning glare upon her. Oh, of course! She should have known. It made much more sense than, you know, going after an enemy who was actively trying to do them harm.

"Are they responsible for your injuries?"

"Yes." The mech said, and then eyed her suspiciously. "What are you doing here?"

"I was…summoned to repair you," she said, glancing at Cyclonus apologetically.

"Is that so?" Galvatron replied, turning back to the other mech who was slowly approaching but carefully remaining beyond his grasp.

"I only wished for you to receive the best care available. Her work is better than anything Hook could do."

Hook would certainly disagree with that assessment. Or maybe not, given his current condition. The femme was sure that if the Constructicon was his old self, he'd unquestionably be much more difficult to surpass. Still, it was nice that her skills were thought of so highly.

"Well then, I guess we will find out and I will hold you personally responsible for the results, Cyclonus," Galvatron said, with his standard hateful smile before switching his focus back to the seeker. "But don't feel left out, my dear. You will share in the punishment if there are any mistakes."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Deadend wanted to hurry but caution was advised. He peered around the corner of yet another shattered building and saw no one. Scans didn't reveal anything either. He was hesitant to trust his own systems. That would be just his luck: an electronic glitch that got him caught. The Stunticon wasn't afraid of Swindle, but Brawl was another matter. Occasionally the two of them were together, not often as Swindle's underhanded dealings made it necessary for him to be alone usually, but enough that Deadend would take extra care. Once satisfied that the area was safe, he began to advance on a group of large blocks that appeared to be randomly piled to one side of a nearby ruin. Closer inspection showed that the outsized bricks were fairly clean as opposed to those that hadn't been disturbed since the destruction of Chaar and were coated in loose dirt and small bits of debris. Moving a couple of them aside revealed more stones set into the ground. Those had undoubtedly been a floor at some point. In the middle of that was a trapdoor.

xxx

He had found out about the spot purely by accident. One day he'd been wandering the area and sat down to take a break behind the remains of a low wall. After a while, quiet, furtive noises came to his audio sensors. A cautious peek between the crumbling bricks revealed the sneaky Combaticon trying to move a bunch of blocks as quickly and quietly as possible. What was he doing? It was a commonly known fact that Swindle would avoid manual labor like a raging case of the scraplets. In fact he would put so much effort into getting out of work, he could have saved more time by simply doing the assigned task. He watched, zooming his optics in and then saw the reason for the curious actions. It was a great hiding place, but what was being hidden? Swindle glanced around and then produced a stack of compressed energon cubes, quickly stowing them out of sight. He immediately began replacing the camouflage over the hole. Deadend wanted to chuckle (an extremely rare event for him.) There was ol' Swindle, busting his aft side, thinking he was clever and never knowing he'd been found out. Didn't he know this always happened? After a bit, the Combaticon took to the air and left. His stash of energon remained safe. Deadend decided to save his knowledge and use it when his situation was really bad, and he was confident it would happen. Things always got worse.

xxx

The mech quickly glanced all around him before kneeling and opening the door. If it was empty, he didn't know what he'd do next, but for a change, his luck was in. Resting at the bottom of the hidden space were four glowing cubes of high grade energon, which was even better than what was expected. That rotten Swindle, hiding a stash like this and not sharing. The Stunticon's indignation over this slight was easily aroused, although if he were to come into possession of such a thing under ordinary consequences, he'd keep it to himself too. Three cubes should do the trick. He considered taking the fourth but it was more than he'd need. It didn't take long to replace the blocks and erase his tracks. Of course once this theft was discovered, the hiding place wouldn't be used again. Not by Swindle, anyway. Eventually someone else might discover it, thinking they were the first. Nevertheless, keeping up appearances would delay anyone knowing about it.

The cubes glowed brightly and Deadend admired them a moment, wondering how Swindle had acquired them. It further proved the futility of it all. The Combaticon had probably put in a lot of work doing whatever he did to get them and now it was mostly gone. Too bad, but his own continued existence was more important than the petty thuggery of his colleague. If the idea worked, then he'd get Motormaster's information and hopefully they would leave him alone. Yeah, no chance. Success only created more work and here it was the only option he had. Frag.

xxxxxxxxxxxx

It was quite the predicament to be in. The Skuxxoid had managed to slink his way close to the mine entrance. He was certain that's what it was judging by what he saw and from the noises emanating from beyond the ramp that descended into the gloom. He also knew what they were mining…kind of.

Thus far the chunk of stone had gone unnoticed. Earlier it had been dropped there in the dust and no one had seen it, either that or they didn't care. From his hiding place the alien could clearly see the glowing red lines within it and his curiosity was piqued. At first it wasn't enough to overtake his natural cowardliness, but the longer he stood peering at it from around the side of a large boulder, the more his greed began to supplant his fear. Perhaps it was valuable and he could make a nice black market bonus once he showed it to his employers. The trouble was, it was squarely in front of the mine ramp opening and there was nothing to use as cover. Anyone attempting to grab the prize would be totally exposed for several seconds. It would be bad enough to be caught sneaking around here and worse to be caught stealing. He listened and only heard muffled clanks from within the mine and no talking or engines approaching. This could be the perfect opportunity. The alien glanced around and carefully began to ease himself out from behind the boulder and into the open area. He had covered a quarter of the distance he needed to go, congratulating himself on his keen observation skills as he went, when he remembered something. When they flew in robot mode, the hulking machines were practically silent. In fact, one or more of them could be headed his way... RIGHT NOW! He just about fell as he suddenly reversed direction and awkwardly scuttled back to the safety of his hiding spot.

He peered around the edge of the largest rock. Nothing. He needed to get a grip on himself. In the time he had wasted so far, he could have grabbed the rock and been on his way back to the shuttle. This was stupid. No one was coming, it was safe. He'd zip out, grab the rock and get out of here. The Skuxxoid took a few deep breaths to calm himself and began the process again. The next attempt had taken him about halfway to his objective when he heard voices.

"You think Soundwave's doin' any good?" Frenzy asked.

"I don't know. I hope. Findin' out all of that has gotta be a shock," Rumble replied. If they had happened to glance to the left as they stepped onto the surface, they would have seen a gray blur dive behind a large grouping of rocks.

"I think we're in the clear, though, cuz we honestly didn't know Megatron was tellin' her all that."

"Yeah, but you gotta hand it to him. It worked slicker than axle grease. And some of it's funny. C'mon, evil Autobots?"

Would you guys please GO AWAY?! The Skuxxoid thought. He didn't dare risk a look and besides, he could hear the small 'bots well enough to know they were still around. Their discussion held no interest for him. The only thing that mattered was the rock with the odd glowing stripes.

"I was thinkin'," Frenzy said. "What do we do about the other problem?"

"I dunno. You heard Soundwave. Maybe we should mind our own business," Rumble said in an uncharacteristic cautionary tone.

"Maybe, but do ya really want to?"

"No."

"Glad ta hear it, because I got an idea."

"Which is…?"

"Now don't take this wrong, but I was noticin' that if you compare Soundwave to Cyclonus, there's a couple of similarities,"

"Like what, cuz I ain't seein' it,"

"Okay first…" Frenzy got no further in his explanation before being interrupted by someone approaching a high rate of speed. It was Deadend. He was developing a gift for being a nuisance to the small duo.

"Just the 'bots I wanted to see," he said, switching back to his robot mode.

"What's up?" Rumble asked. The Stunticon looked awfully happy to see them. Ick! What if Frenzy was right and he was gettin' ideas too?

Deadend peered around and saw no one else, but this would be best done out of sight. "Are you guys busy right now?"

"No. Why?"

"You have got to see what I found."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Initially Stormvolt had difficulty concentrating on her job. Galvatron, in his infinite paranoia, refused to go offline while the repairs were made. He did consent to having neurocouplers temporarily disconnected as the femme worked but it didn't put her mind at ease. The mech had some components she didn't recognize right away because of their design and placement and that made it hard to be certain that the disconnects would eliminate any pain. That Unicron had made a lot of internal design changes compared to what she was used to seeing. She was able to figure them out with thought and gentle examination, but it slowed everything.

Fortunately, the damage wasn't as bad as feared upon first glance. Much of the immobility was caused by various sections of armor being bent inward until they blocked gears and actuators. There were severed connections and kinked energon conduits, but a complicated system of lines and valves had already rerouted the fuel. Removing the worst of the dents from the crumpled armor also dragged things out further. During the entire process Galvatron was staring at her like he was willing her to mess up, thereby giving him an excuse to smack her around. That was a pointless fear since he could do whatever he wanted simply because he felt like it. A reason wasn't required. Nevertheless, the seeker was trying very hard to do a perfect job. As much as she could get beat up, Cyclonus would have it even worse and he didn't need any of that.

The second in command had provided assistance with fixing the armor, but mostly stood back out of the way and observed. With Galvatron watching, any attempt at sabotage would be suicide although Cyclonus didn't worry much about it at all. She had received many opportunities for treachery and hadn't taken any of them. He was beginning to trust her, although not totally. Given their current fortunes and his nature, it just wasn't in him to do so. No, not yet, but it wasn't inconceivable that it would happen in the future. All the panels and plating had been replaced everywhere except on left forearm. There was delicate circuitry to be reconnected and a few lines to hook up. He shifted his view to their leader who was still glaring down at Stormvolt. The crimson optics were glowing more brightly than before. It gave him a twinge of anxiety but he reminded himself that it wasn't necessarily a bad sign.

Galvatron was unaware of being observed. He felt better physically, but his mind remained the tangled mess it was before. He watched as he was gradually restored to full operating capacity. The similarities between the seeker and his human were still there. At one point she had come upon something that required further thought and had leaned back and rested one hand on the back of her neck with her arm tucked in beside her head. Erica used to do that too. What had he done to her right before she died? He could remember most of that day up until that point. It wasn't anything he had given much thought until the freakish resemblance became obvious to him. Any effort made to recover those lost memories (or any lost memories) resulted in terrible suffering. But…he was gradually beginning to overcome it in tiny increments.

What had he done? The human was unconscious and dying, and he had stood there waiting for her end. In that state she wouldn't have known if he left or not, but it was such a small thing for him to remain there as she had requested. Scans told him it would be quite soon and there wasn't much else for him to do as he waited for the rest of his troops to arrive. As he lingered, the idea came to him out of nowhere… What was it?

Sensation returned to his arm from the shoulder to the elbow joint. Repairs were nearly complete. The femme carefully picked up a braided metal line that contained the repair fluid and reconnected it to a routing block near his wrist. The system was pressurized and as the quick disconnect end of the line was snapped onto the block, a small amount of the liquid splashed outward, blocked by a hand wielding a wadded rag. Stormvolt cleaned up the slight mess it made and continued with the remaining final adjustments. She didn't see the tyrant begin to smile.

xxxxx

That was it. She was finished and Galvatron would either like it or he wouldn't. There was nothing more to do but wait. Well, that and run through the best ways to block his attacks. It was too difficult to imagine him being satisfied with her work. Stormvolt stepped back and watched as the despot sat up and held his hand out, wiggling the fingers like someone admiring their jewelry. He carefully slid off the table and tested his once damaged leg by shifting his weight around. A feeling of hope began to grow. She glanced over at Cyclonus who was already looking at her with a pleased but cautious expression. Possibly they would escape unscathed.

"It seems you haven't lost your touch," Galvatron said.

How would he know the strength of her abilities well enough to be able to judge that? Whatever, at least he wasn't pissed at her. "Is everything to your liking?"

"Yes, Stormvolt, it is. Or should I call you Erica?"

Cyclonus wasn't familiar with the meaning of to "look like a deer caught in the headlights" but he was witnessing it firsthand. The seeker's expression changed from guarded optimism to utter shock.

"What?" She asked.

"I always said you might make a good Decepticon if not for being a puny flesh creature and I was right. You didn't really think that I wouldn't figure it out, did you?" Galvatron said, continuing to check out his repairs.

The femme was dumbfounded. How did he know? How could he be so sure?

"Lord Galvatron, perhaps you should allow your systems a few moments to…normalize," Cyclonus suggested. This outburst sounded more bizarre than usual. Was one of his processors damaged in the battle and the problem still undiscovered?

"My systems are fine!" Galvatron said, outraged by the suggestion. He further underscored his displeasure by punching his faithful lieutenant in the side before continuing. "Do you think I am so stupid as to not recognize one of my own?"

"No, of course not. Forgive my ignorance, but I do not understand what is going on here." One of his own? He was claiming the flier as one who shared design and programming characteristics, the closest thing to what organics referred to as a relative? How could that be? Galvatron couldn't possibly have had any involvement in her creation.

"Why am I not surprised? But fear not, I'll tell you all about it. Try to keep up," Galvatron said, changing demeanor from angry to cheerful to disparaging in the seconds it took to walk over to the femme and stand behind her, placing his hands on her shoulders. "You are aware of my existence before the intervention of Unicron, of course. For a brief period during that time I kept a human as a sort of pet. It was presumed she died from damage sustained in battle. However, before she ceased functioning, I performed an experiment." As he described the damage and what he had done with the nanites, it all flashed through his mind as clearly as if it happened minutes ago.

"I thought it was a failure, but obviously I was mistaken."

Stormvolt felt very much like a science fair project gone horribly awry, but at long last she had an answer. Never would she have guessed that her metamorphosis was caused by billions of microscopic machines. But what did it mean? Was she like his kid or some other style of relative or neither? She tried not to squirm away from Galvatron as he blathered on, still standing behind her. It made her uneasy to have him that close and out of sight where she would be unable to block if he were to have a sudden mood swing and decide to harm her. She didn't like it, but it would have bothered her much more if not for another, worse, development commanding her concern. Cyclonus was staring at her and showing no trace of his earlier pleased expression. In fact, his reaction reminded the flier of the way people look when they discover they've stepped in dog crap.

Even when happy, Cyclonus appeared as though he were about to do something spiteful. It wasn't his fault, it was the way his face was constructed. The expression that was mistaken for disgust, was, instead, confusion mixed with awe. It was all but too much for him to comprehend. The explanation didn't allow him to understand it entirely but what he did know was that his almighty master was yet more powerful than he had previously thought. Was there no end to his ability? Whether or not he totally understood, it did explain a lot and she wasn't denying it.

"Is this true? You were actually a human?" Cyclonus asked.

The seeker came across as tired and embarrassed before nodding in the affirmative. "Yeah," she said. Damn, there goes the ball game. Galvatron seemed okay with her origins, (he wasn't acting upset as far as she could tell) but this would surely be one of those differences that couldn't be resolved Cyclonus had mentioned when he declared his interest in her. If she were allowed to live, he would probably relegate her to the ranks of the others.

"Why are you asking her? Did I not just tell you?" Galvatron demanded, leaving his spot and advancing on the other mech. The femme was prepared for the confrontation to end in a beat down, but not for what was said next. "And you can wipe that look off your faceplate, oh sparkless wonder. Considering that you are nothing but a reanimated carcass, I don't think you have any reason to consider yourself superior!"

The blue and silver 'bot had considered the possibility that Cyclonus was one of the others who were jettisoned into space with Megatron, but not that they were dead when the change took place. Could he truly be sparkless, or was it only Galvatron being a dick? It was a shocking idea to contemplate, but it didn't stop her from feeling bad for him. The mech shot a quick glance in her direction and appeared absolutely humiliated to have this knowledge flung out into the open. If anyone other than their whack job leader had said it, he likely would have killed them. As it was, the tyrant was smirking cruelly and acting as though he was thoroughly enjoying the pain he caused. Shit, could this day get any worse?