Experiment X

by Nightshade2917

An experiment had gone horribly wrong for the Cons. They thought that their nightmares were over when nearly five years had past. Now she has returned, but this time she needs their help in saving her life. Will the Autobots and Decepticons help this poor unfortunate soul before it's too late? Note that the rating may change. Genres also include Family, Si-Fi, and a little Romance.

36. Chapter 36: Unlikely Friendships Part 1

Sorry for the long wait everyone. I was quite busy with things. I had to finish an art commission for someone on DA as well as focus on my classes at school. Those classes drove me insaneOMo But now I'm back and ready to continue where I left off in this story as it comes to a conclusion, in the next couple of chapters or so. Oh boy, why do I curse myself to write so much? Anyway, enough of me rambling and all. It's time to read the next chapter of this epic fanfic.

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Chapter 36: Unlikely Friendships Part 1

The Autobots, humans, and ex-Decepticons resumed watching more memories of Miko and Anna's past. Everyone was starting to get tired because of how late it was getting, especially for the humans. Fowler was already passed out for about two hours from watching the girls' memories. June already left over an hour ago to go to bed for her shift in the morning at the hospital. She tried to get her son to come home with her, but he told her that he had to stay under Miko's orders if something were to happen. The same thing applied to Raf were he also had to stay here on Cybertron if something went wrong during the boys yawned loudly before Jack went into his backpack to get something.

Arcee and Bumblebee noticed that their human friends were exhausted from all that's been going on today. That's when Arcee suggested, "Hey, why don't you boys take a nap. You look like you need a long power down."

"I agree. You don't have to stay up all night to see all of this," Bee said to them.

Jack gave out another yawn and replied tiredly, "No, it's alright. We can manage."

"Besides, Miko would kill us if she found out that we've been slacking off," Raf said.

"Why would she kill you if you guys took a little nap?" Arcee asked.

"She wants us to stay up and watch the candles so that they don't burn out," Jack replied to her while he took out two energy drinks for him and Raf.

"What happens if they burn out?" Bumblebee asked them.

"If they burn out, then Miko would have roughly about three minutes per candle she used for this astral projection spell until her soul is forced back into her body," Raf replied as he took a sip of his energy drink Jack gave him.

"Miko put us in charge of replacing the candles if they ever burn out so she would have more time if it ever comes to it," Jack said while the two guardians just nodded their heads.

Time passed by as everyone watched even more memories of Miko and Anna's moments until Miko started to ask her friend about what she is. Some of them weren't surprised when Anna/Saphira told her that she herself doesn't really know since she was adopted and all. The only thing that they were surprised by was Saphira retelling the story of how her parents met. The Cybertronians were baffled by the fact that a holy femme would fall in love and then marry an unholy being. But once Saphira explained that her father was a good man, or in this case demon, they began to realize that he was indeed a good man, father, and husband despite what he was.

Then the girls talked about Anna's two siblings and how they drive them crazy sometimes. Everybody thought it was ironic how Anna's older brother, Damon, was similar to Knock Out whenever something happened to their appearance.

"Hey Knock Out, looks like you have a human twin who's exactly like you," Arcee commented with a smile.

Knock Out rolled his optics and replied, "Hahaha, very funny." He returned back to work on trying to analyze how the synthetic mixed with dark energon wasn't affecting Saphira much like it did to the others.

After awhile, Anna started to ask Miko questions on how she met the Autobots and how they've been treating her. Miko showed her friend her first encounter with an Autobot.

"So this is how you encountered the humans," Starscream said teasingly.

"Sadly yes. I should've checked my rear view mirror if a human was following me, but I was only thinking about catching up to Jack to persuade him in coming with me," Arcee said.

"And that's when Miko showed up and we had to take her with us," Jack added in before saying, "Boy, she was more than thrilled to be coming with us to see the rest of you Autobots."

More scenes played on the screen of Miko getting involved in dangerous situations as well as her relationship with Bulkhead and the others. Then a memory came up of the scraplet infestation the Autobots had to get rid of.

"I see that you found a scraplet trap," Megatron said out loud.

Bulkhead narrowed his optics and said, "Yeah, so what? It's not like you never had to deal with a couple of scraplet invasions at one point or another yourself. Besides, we took care of the bug problem a long time ago. Sent those pests back to the Artic where they belong."

"Well, at least we Decepticons weren't foolish enough in taking a possible trap back with us at our base of operations, Autobot," a former Con trooper retorted back at the Autobot wreaker.

"Oh yeah? Then what do you say about all those times where there was a bomb attached to something that you wanted. Huh, Con?" Wheeljack asked.

"Why you Autobot scum!" the trooper said as he was about to wrestle with Wheeljack when his two comrades held him back.

"That's enough," Megatron finally said to the trooper.

The Con trooper calmed down and shrugged off his fellow cohorts' grip on him. He mumbled something in Cybertronian that neither Megatron nor the rest of the Cybertronians catch.

Everyone looked back at the screen to see Miko shrieking in fear. Later, they figured out what Miko was so freaked out about.

"What's a spider?" a Con soldier asked out loud.

"A spider is a tiny eight-legged creature that preys on flying insects or other small creatures trapped in their sticky webs," Bumblebee replied.

"Oh," the soldier said before asking, "Then why are humans so afraid of them?"

"Well," Raf began as he continued to say, "some spiders are very venomous where they could kill a human with a single bite of their leathal venom. Scientists have theorised that arachnophobia, or the fear of spiders, or any kind of fear in that matter was derived either from learned experiences from our ancestors or even from our genes to avoid them."

"Or in Miko's case, they don't like spiders at all because of what they look like," Jack added in.

"I see," the Con said to himself.

Once that was over, their attention was back on the screen where Saphira/Anna began to laugh at Miko because she was still afraid of spiders. That's when things took a turn for Saphira/Anna when Miko started to talk about what scares her the most.

"Ooo~" Knock Out chimed in before saying, "This is going to be entertaining."

"Yes," Starscream agreed before he said, "Time to see what her deepest darkest fears are."

Every Decepticon in the room, except for Shockwave and Megatron, crowd around the screen to watch and see what the little devil was afraid of. One of the Con troopers got out his data pad and started recording it so that he could send it to the others. They saw Saphira calling out to Miko to tell her to stop this but there was no answer. She continued to walk in the room to find her friend as she started to mumble, "I'm so scared." That's when an eerie sound filled the room where Saphira began to chant very rapidly, "Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God. What the frag. What the frag. What the frag."

"Who taught her that?" Arcee asked.

"Eh, who cares where she picked that up from, things are getting really juicy!" Knock Out said out loud with a smile.

"Well, the kid sure is feaking out to be able to swear like that," Wheeljack mumbled to himself.

In the next moment, Saphira screamed when she saw the zombie clown. Every Con near the screen burst out into a fit of laughter at her reaction and screaming "What the frag" over and over again. Even Smokescreen started to chuckle at this.

The rest of the Autobots stared at him as he said, "What? It's funny how she reacts to seeing a zombie clown."

"Funny to you, but not to her," Arcee said with the look.

"Okay, okay. I get it, Mom," Smokescreen replied to her in annoyance.

The Cons all settled down from laughing almost to death as Starscream said, "I never knew that the dead coming back to life was her weakness all along. If I knew that sooner, then I would have threatened to summon an army of the undead after her."

The group laughed again before Knock Out said, "Or we could have one of the soldiers transform into one of those clown cars and have him curse around her cell startling her to death and making her obey."

Again, the Cons laughed at the idea of tormenting Saphira/Anna with her fears of zombies and clowns. The Autobots, on the other hand, were not amused by this. In fact, they were looking at the laughing Cons like they've gotten some sort of malfunction in their systems. After the clowns calmed down and started to send the video to the others, Miko showed even more memories of some of her "adventures".

One, in particular, made Saphira very upset. It was the memory of how Miko went up against the Cons as well as a Predacon.

"Oh scrap," Starscream muttered to himself before he said, "Um, I better go now. I have something very important to -uh- attend to."

He was about to make his escape when Megatron called out, "And where do you think you're going to hmm? You weren't planning on leaving because of your defeat against the Autobots are you?"

Starscream stopped and turned around to face his former master. He laughed nervously for a moment and said, "Uh, no I wasn't going to leave because of my minor setback."

"Then why don't you stay here and watch. Maybe you could learn something from this," Megatron said to him.

Starscream sighed as he mumbled, "Alright, then. I will stay." He limped over to the nearest wall to lean up against and watch the humiliating memory of how a mere human defeated him in combat.

The screen played of Starscream's battle against the human girl. Every time there was a humiliating part of him being pushed over by a human wearing the apex armor, he would mumble to himself while shaking his head from side to side. Some of the Autobots' jaw dropped in astonishment at Miko fighting back and actually getting the upper hand in the battle against three Decepticons.

"Whoa," Smokescreen said before saying, "who knew that the kid could put up a decent fight against a commander and two trained soldiers?"

"I did," Wheeljack said with a smirk. "I knew from the moment we met that she had potential to be a wrecker, right Bulkhead?"

Bulkhead snapped out of his thoughts and replied, "Ugh, yeah….sure….I guess? I mean I don't know, Jackie. She's rather young to be a wrecker."

"Oh Bulk, don't worry about it so much. The kid can take care of herself. I mean just look at her fight and beat the scrap out of Starscream and two Cons," Wheeljack said while resting his arm on Bulkhead's shoulder.

"I am standing right here you know!" Starscream yelled.

"Yeah, we know, Screamy," Wheeljack mumbled.

Starscream just grumbled to himself while folding his arms across his chest. Once the memory of the Decepticons' defeat by the hands of a single human girl was over, the girls started to talk about Starscream being a coward as well as the news that Miko was the one who killed Hardshell.

Saphira nodded her head before saying, "So is it true?"

"What?"

"That you really killed the Insecticon called Hardshell?"

"Well yeah, I literally just said that I did," Miko replied.

"Huh, interesting," Saphira muttered as she brought her hand to her chin in thought.

Miko looked at her and asked, "Why is it so interesting?"

Saphira turned to face her and replied, "It's interesting because that caused a huge commotion among the Decepticons."

"Really?" Miko said in disbelief.

Saphira nodded in reply before saying, "Really. Heck when they heard that a human girl killed Hardshell, they automatically thought it was my doing and that I have returned for vengeance."

"You Cons really thought that Saphira was the one who killed Hardshell?" Wheeljack asked.

"We did," Megatron replied.

"Why?" he asked.

"In the past, Saphira would always do something like this to leave a message for us by killing a soldier or many of my soldiers," the ex-Decepticon leader replied.

"At the time, we didn't know which human girl the Inceticon trooper was talking about," Knock Out said.

"You Cons didn't assume that Miko would accompany Wheeljack in exacting revenge for Bulkhead?" Arcee asked while arching a brow.

"No. We were focused too much on the possibility of her return to what she started years ago. To think that your human pet was the one who eliminated the Inceticon was preposterous," Starscream said.

Everyone turned back to the screen and watched Miko laughing her head off when her friend told her that the Cons panicked after finding out a human girl killed an Inceticon.

"How do you know all of this?"

Saphira smiled and replied, "I would sometimes hack the Decepticon's radio and computer chatter to listen and read what's been going on for the past three to four years now."

The Con's optics widened in shock at this new information.

"….She's been listening to our communication with each other this whole entire time!" Knock Out said in shock.

"Apparently," Bumblebee said.

"Gaaaah!" Starscream yelled in shock while putting his servos on the sides of his head. "She knew everything that we were planning for years now!"

"But more importantly, she knew about Unicron rising as well as the relic hunt," Knock Out said out loud.

"So why hasn't she stopped us?" Megatron asked. "Or why she didn't side with the Autobots on those missions?"

"Ugh, are we forgetting one important detail here?" Smokescreen asked.

"What?" Starscream replied.

"Oh I don't know maybe how in the pits did she learn how to hack into your computers and communication, which might I add is alien to the humans. Raf gets a free pass on this because Ratchet was teaching him our technology, but Saphira didn't have anyone to teach her. So how is it possible for her to learn our language and technology without any help?" Smokescreen said.

"You're right, how did she get into our system without Soundwave knowing it," Knock Out said in thought.

"Hmm, maybe she'll explain how she managed to get into our communications without our knowledge of it," Megatron said as he faced the screen.

"Wait a minute," Miko said before asking, "You actually hacked into an advanced alien species' computer and radio to just get the Decepticon news?!"

"Basically," Saphira replied.

Miko's jaw dropped as she said bluntly, "How?"

"That's for me to know and you to find out," Saphira said with a wink.

"Well," Knock Out said before saying in a sarcastic tone, "so much for her explaining how she did it."

Everyone listened to Saphira/Anna's explanation of where she's been for all of these years. It became clear that she likes to live and hide in the forests to avoid being detected by the Decepticons or anyone for that particular matter. She talked about how she had to steal in order to survive this long with nobody to help her. Or that's what everyone thought it was the case.

Miko cleared her throat. "Anna, were you really all alone for five years with nobody to help you in any way possible?"

"Of course I was all alone," she replied before saying, "The only times that I wasn't completely alone was with Soun…" She stopped herself from exposing the truth.

"Who?" Miko demanded while looking at Saphira to see if she would say it.

Saphira became stiff while avoiding eye contact and she said, "No one. It's no one. Just forget I said anything."

Miko looked at her friend and noticed that her left eye began to twitch. She looked at Saphira with a straight serious face, "Ann, you're lying."

"What! I'm not lying," she said a little bit too loudly while trying to have some kind of poker face.

"Yes, you are, Anna. Your left eye always twitches slightly whenever you try to lie to me," Miko said.

Saphira sighed in defeat as she mumbled, "I knew I couldn't lie to you about anything."

"Yup, I have a sixth sense for detecting a lie a mile away," Miko said before she leaned forward to Saphira and asked, "So, what's the deal with you and Soundwave?"

"Soundwave?" the Autobots said in surprise.

"Ha, that's very unlikely," Starscream said. "He would never dare help that pathetic creature behind lord Megatron's back. He's just too loyal to even think about betrail."

"Unlike you," Arcee commented.

"I'll admit that I have been power hungry and seeking the throne to Cybertron for myself, but I'm over it now," he replied.

"Sure you are," Wheeljack said.

"Guys, could we get to the point where Miko thinks that her best friend is secretly communicating with a certain mute Con," Jack said.

"I agree with the youth," Knock Out said, "for a silent mech like him, he would never turn his back on the Decepticon's cause for anything. He would rather die for Megatron than betray him."

"Okay, if he's so loyal to you," Smokescreen said before saying, "then how come he is always there when Saphira, aka Anna, is in trouble?"

The Decepticons became silent in deep thought.

"You do have a point there," Knock Out said. "He would come to my laboratory rather frequently whenever she was being examined or when she nearly dies on me."

"What?!" Megatron said in complete shock.

Knock Out turned to his former master to say, "Yeah, I would always catch him hovering over my shoulders as I perform anything on the girl in my lab. I thought that you gave him orders to keep an optic on me or Starscream in case either of us messed up."

Megatron shook his head and replied, "I've never given him any orders to watch you two fools."

"If you didn't give him orders to watch out for the girl…." Knock Out said.

"Then he did it out of his own free will," Starscream finished for Knock Out.

"Well, that explains a lot of how protective he seems in Anna's memories on the days of being experimented on," Bee said.

The rest of the Autobots nodded their heads in agreement with what Bumblebee just said.

---

"…..What about him?" Saphira said after a long time of silence.

"You know what I mean Anna," Miko said while putting her hands on her hips.

Saphira closed her eyes and let out a loud sigh. Several minutes passed by until she said while opening her eyes slightly, "I guess our little secret is out about our relationship." Another sigh escaped her lips as she whispered, "Well, it was only a matter of time till someone were to discover about us. It's now or never about the truth, though in the end, it really doesn't matter if I tell you everything."

Miko looked at her friend in curiosity at what she was talking about. Saphira faced Miko and asked, "Now, where should I start? It's been five years of our strange friendship."

"How about from the day you escaped the Cons," Miko said.

Saphira closed her eyes for a brief second. "Very well, though I'll warn you that I wasn't quite myself that day or any of the other days that passed since my escape."

"I can handle it," Miko said as the scene played again on the day she escaped from the Decepticon warship.

Scenes of how she freed herself from her cage played before they transitioned to her battle against a few Decepticon soldiers until the final scene played her battle against Megatron himself. Miko's eyes widened in awe at how the friend she knew to be timid and shy has become so ruthless and merciless. Her mouth was agape in shock of the transformation her dear friend changed into. She watched Anna battle against Megatron where she was about to kill him when a missile flew passed her head.

Starscream, a few Con soldiers, and Soundwave entered the scene. "Stay away from him, monster!" Starscream shouted as the soldiers tried to fire their blasters at her.

She sneered at them hatefully for a moment before looking back at Megatron and said, "I will spare your life for now. But the next time we cross paths, Megatron, I will show you no mercy and I will kill you. And if you send your loyal dogs after me, I will hunt them down and kill them one by one until there are no more soldiers protecting you from me. This is your only warning!"

She then flew off of Megatron and into the blue flames to make her escape. The soldiers continued firing on her tail as she flew down the hallway. She twisted and turned elegantly in the air until her wing got hit by a rogue blast. Saphira screamed in pain as she swerved to the side and crashed into the wall. She slid down the cold metal wall in pain. She got up from the ground slowly before heavy metal footsteps were heard coming towards her direction.

A hiss mixed with a low growl sounded through her clenched teeth while leering at the Cons following her. She reverted back into her human form for now so that her injured wing could rest. In a rush, she dashed further down the hallway until she reached the landing docks of the ship. Blasts of engergon fired in her direction with every step she took towards her one and only escape.

"Close the hatch!" Megatron ordered.

A Con pressed the button to close the open hatch of the landing dock.

Saphira bolted into a sprint in order to try to get out of the ship. She ran towards the hatch at a very fast pace where she was nearing closer towards her freedom while at the same time ignoring the burning pain in her legs. The hatch was almost closed so Saphira had to take the risk and slid on the metal ground.

With barely a second to spare, she made it outside of the Decepticon warship. She breathed heavily right when she came to a stop. The hatch started to open up again for the troops to pursue her. She got up from the ground and dashed towards the edge before she stopped. Saphira noticed that this ship was several hundred feet in the air were a sea of gray clouds surrounded them on all sides.

"Surrender yourself, human!" Starscream shouted as he approached her.

She turned around and looked at him in hatred.

"You have nowhere to go, and you certainly can not fly," he said with a smirk.

"On the contrary, Starscream," she said with a sly smile. "There is one way I can go and that is down." As she said this, she walked backward towards the edge where she felt her body tilting back until gravity pulled her down and off the ship.

"Transform and retrieve her you fools!" she heard him order.

The cold chilled air stung her pale face like a thousand needles digging into her skin. The fierce winds whipped and lashed at her bare skin. Every strand of light blue hair flowed wildly in the wind.

Heavy drops of water splattered and drenched her body while she continued to fall in the endless abyss. She closed her eyes for a moment before she opened them again when she heard a few aircrafts. Saphira looked up to see five Cons diving right at her. Her yellow eyes widened in shock. She narrowed them into a glare before she flipped herself forward so that she could look where she was going. She put her arms to the side and tighten her legs together to increase her speed as she dove further down towards the ground.

The Cons were gaining on her tail until a flash of lightning hit one of them. The one that got hit by lightning swerved to the left and crashed into the others as they all fell out of control. The rest that were uneffective by the lightning still pursued Saphira's decent. She turned her head and noticed this, so she had to use her air bending skills to make herself propelled to the opposite side to evade them. They still followed after her in the pouring rain.

The ground was only less than fifty meters away in the air. Saphira grinned her teeth together tightly as she focused all of her remaining strength in slowing her decent into the forest bellow. A swirling tornado twisted around her body as she leveled out and slowed down her rapid decent. She crashed into the trees.

"Gaah!" she said out loud while tumbling from branch to branch until she finally grabbed ahold of a thicker branch to hold onto. She pulled herself up and crawled towards the trunk of the tree. A sigh escaped her wet lips as she leaned back in exhaustion.

The Cons that were pursuing her had to pull up so that they wouldn't crash. Under the cover of the brush, Saphira saw them ascend and disappeared from sight. She finally started to relax as she leaned against the rough bark to sleep.

"Dang, that was intense," Miko said out of the blue.

"Yeah, but I was so tired and afraid," Saphira/Anna replied.

"I would be too if Cons were chasing after me nonstop," she said. She paused for a second before asking, "So what happens next and where on Earth did you land to?"

"At the time I didn't know where I was, but now I know that I landed somewhere in Minnesota."

"Oh," Miko said out loud to herself.

The memory resumed of Saphira/Anna's result after she had escaped the Decepticons. Saphira, who was asleep in the tree she landed in last night, woke up upon hearing trees rustling as well as familiar voices.

"Search the perimeter for any sign of the human girl," a Con soldier said to the others. They nodded their heads in reply as they began to search for her in the trees.

"I need to get out of here and fast before they find me," she whispered to herself. She carefully climbed down the tree while being careful to not make a single sound to give away her position. Once she was on the ground, she dashed out of sight until one of them spotted her.

"Stop right there!" he shouted while powering up his blaster.

Saphira just ignored him and continued running. He shot a few rounds at her but missed each time. She sprinted deeper into the thick woods while the Cons chased after her. Several minutes of running has gone by before she tripped on a root.

One of them bent forward to pick her up when she breathed a long stream of blue flames at his servo. He reared back in shock while the others tried to get her, but she slipped away from them. Once again, she disappeared into the forests out of the Cons' sight. After she escaped the Cons, she stopped to catch her breath. A low growl sounded as she rubbed her stomach in hunger.

"Wish there was something to eat around here that is edible," she mumbled in hunger. Saphira sighed before she started to walk again to find some kind of shelter for her to hide in. Hours and hours passed by from wandering around in this seamlessly endless forest. She sighed out loud in exhaustion, hunger, and thirst.

Walking around aimlessly, she didn't notice that someone was following her. A snap of a branch caught her attention, but it was too late. A Con snatched her up in his servo and held her in a vice grip. She squirmed around.

"Let me go!" she yelled in a dry voice

The Con ignored her as he pressed the side of his helmet to activate his comlink. "Commander Starscream, I have the human girl in my possession."

"Bring her back to the ship at once!" Starscream commanded.

The Decepticon started to walk to a clearing so that he could transform and fly back to the ship. Saphira roared in detest until she ceased to breathe a blast of fire at the soldier. He dropped her as she landed on the ground painfully. She dashed to the nearest tree and hide behind it.

"Human scum where are you!" he shouted.

Saphira pressed her back against the tree when she felt something digging into her skin. She looked behind her and saw that she still had two swords on her. A plan formed in her head of a sneak attack from the air by using the trees to get her up high enough to attack the Decepticon. With the idea in her mind, she climbed the tree at a fast pace.

The Con searched for her but couldn't find her anywhere. Saphira, meanwhile, climbed high enough for her to see him wandering around. She waited for several seconds until his back was turned. Once that happened, she leaped and dove straight for the cords in between his armor around his neck. She slashed the cords deep enough to paralyze him as well as kill him. He fell forward and landed on a few trees that were in his path.

Saphira got off of his back and landed on the ground to see that his v-shaped optic dimmed before shutting off. Heaving in an out from exhaustion, the two swords started to disappear into thin air. She looked at her bare hands and said, "Guess I used up all of my aura already."

Another rumble of her empty stomach made her groan in frustration. She slowly slid down to sit next to the lifeless body of the Decepticon as she wrapped her arms around her knees and buried her face in her chest. After a few minutes of sitting there, her nose started to twitch as she smelled something delicious. Her head shot up as she sniffed the air again.

"What is that smell? It smells good." She got up and tracked down the smell to the leaking energon pouring out of the Con's wound. Saphira cringed upon seeing the disgusting blue glowing liquid, but her stomach rumbled again. She sighed again before saying, "Well, it's better than nothing at all I guess." Cupping her hands together, she gathered the blue liquid and pulled it up to her lips as she took a big gulp.

Her eyes widened in surprise that the second time she tasted this liquid, it tasted better than the first time. She cupped her hands and collected more of the liquid again and again until her stomach was satisfied.

Miko turned to her friend and asked, "So what does energon taste like?"

"Ugh, that depends," Saphira replied with a disgusted look.

"Depends on what?"

"Depends on how or where I got it as well as what form I am in while consuming it."

"Huh?" Miko said in confusion while tilting her head to the side.

"If I eat energon in its raw state, it would taste sour and mildly sweet to me. If the energon was processed into a liquid form, then it would taste bitter where it reminds me of drinking gasoline but only ten times worse."

"Eww," Miko said while cringing at how her friend described the taste of processed energon.

"Yeah, and finally, if I drink energon from a Cybertronian, it would taste like blood where it has this iron sweet taste to it. All of this is when I am in my carbon form."

"What happens if you drank energon in your Cybertronian form?"

"It tastes very different than when I am in that form. For example, if I eat energon in its raw state, it would taste awful and very bitter, but when I drink it from its process state, the taste is almost bland but has this fresh minty sweet aftertaste."

"Really?"

"Yes really."

"What happens if you drink Cybertronian 'blood' in that form?"

"Eh, it still tastes the same metallic sweet taste in either form I transform into."

"Huh," she said in interest.

"Yeah I think it's because I have energon coursing through my veins that things taste very differently now. Even some regular carbon food tastes different to me," Saphira said.

"No way," she replied in disbelief.

"Only to certain foods that my taste buds sense it differently."

"Okay, like what?"

"Like eating a dark leafy green vegetable would taste rather sour than bitter."

"That's weird," she said while arching a brow.

"Yeah I know I'm a mutant freak," Saphira said sulkily.

"You're not a freak, Ann, you just adapted certain tastes differently than others," Miko said while patting her friend's back.

"But I'm still a mutant freak of nature," she mumbled before saying, "Anyway, moving on."

After having her fill with the energon, Saphira began to walk again but this time she stayed alert to her surroundings like a predator on the hunt. She walked for about an hour until she stopped suddenly. A rushing sound of water caught her ears. Saphira rushed towards it to find a rocky valley with a waterfall pouring down from the slope to fill this large pool of water. A cave was hiding behind the rushing water.

Saphira instinctively went towards it because she knew that it would be dark soon and this is the only safe spot she could spend the night in without being detected by the Decpticons. She went into the cave to see that it was so much bigger than she thought it was. The tired girl sat down on the ground and pulled out her shrunken backpack. She casted a spell to enlarge it to normal size. Once that was done, she pulled out her blankets and wrapped herself around them to keep warm from the cold.

"Tomorrow, I'll go get some firewood. Right now, I just want to sleep," she said to herself. Curling into the soft warm blankets, she fell fast asleep.

"Anna, this doesn't explain how you and Soundwave reunited after you escaped," Miko said.

"Just be patent, we're getting there," Saphira replied as she explained, "Five days past after spending the first night in that hidden waterfall cave. The Cons were still pursuing me, but I would always find away to escape them or even hunt them down and kill them like a predator. Each day that passed by made me enjoy hunting the Decepticons down in the middle of the night as a warning."

The scene transitioned to a night time setting were a thin crescent moon rose high in the starry sky. The serenity of the night was interrupted by an onslaught of shots from firing Decepticons. A dark blur zig-zagged from one tree to the next to avoid being hit. The blur reappeared again to cut the vital cords of the Con's energon veins.

He collapsed on the ground as the other two surviving soldiers backed away in fear. Saphira's yellow eyes illuminated the darkness of the night as she stood on top of the dead Decepticon. Her eyes narrowed into slits. Both Cons fired at her in hopes of hurting her, but she deflected their attacks. Then she ran at one of them at top speed to cut off his arm.

The Con screamed in agony before his servo on his other arm was cut off too. The remaining unharmed Con watched in horror to see his comrade being torn apart piece by piece until he fell down when she cut through his spark chamber. Saphira was covered in the fallen Con's energon that she glowed in the darkness. The last Con standing trembled in terror as he tripped and fell over to the ground.

She growled at him as she wiped away the dripping energon from her swords' blades by slashing the air. She walked towards him with murderous intent.

He crawled away from her until he started to stutter, "P-please don't kill me! I-I don't want to be offlined yet."

She chuckled darkly before she replied, "Then you Cons should have thought this over more about capturing me if you don't want to die by my hands. You see, I'm on the road to getting vengeance over what you Decepticons did to me and my family. I will not stop until it is fulfilled with its sweet taste of satisfaction."

The Con was trapped between her and the forest trees. That's when he said, "Please, be merciful."

"YOU DIDN'T SHOW ME ANY MERCY SO WHY SHOULD I SHOW YOU SOME, CON!" she barked at him.

The soldier bowed down to her on his hands and knees and pleaded, "I'LL DO ANYTHING!" He then softly said, "But please, spare me."

"Anything?" she asked after pausing for several minutes.

The Con nodded his head. Then without him realizing it, he was on his back while Saphira stood on top of his spark chamber. He shook like a leaf as he stared into her burning eyes. She then leaned closer to him and said, "I'll spare your miserable life so that you could deliver a message to your master."

He just nodded his head for fear that she would slice his pipe if he spoke a single word.

"Tell Megatron that he's next if he won't leave me in peace. If he fails to do this, then I'll retaliate by destroying all of his mining operations one by one before I seek out his warship and kill him in person. Do I make myself clear?"

The Con nodded his head as she got off of him. She landed on the ground with elegance before she said with her back towards the messager, "Now leave before I change my mind!"

Without a single word, the Decepticon quickly got up and fled to tell Megatron the news of her demands.

---

Meanwhile, the group of ex-Decepticon soldiers stood in the room in silence. One Con, in particular, was rather aloof from the group. He had his head turned away from the screen at the reminder of that day he saw his comrades perished by her hands.

"You spared a Con's life?" Miko asked in shock.

Saphira closed her eyes and nodded slowly in reply.

"Why?" she asked in curiosity

Then he walked out of the room to clear his mind of that night.

"Where are you going?" one of his fellow Decepticon members asked in worry.

He stopped to say, "I'm going for a drive. Be back later."

Megatron stopped him and said, "I think you should stay and hear what she has to say."

"Why should I?" he said in anger. "So that I can hear her gloat about how her threat of the mining operations was just brushed off or how she still continued to kill many more comrades of mine?" He then said while leaving the medical room, "Now if you excuse me, I need to go clear my processor of the remembrance of my sudden weakness on that fateful night in battle."

He was almost about to leave the room when he heard Saphira say, "I spared his life because I saw a piece of myself in him." The Con turned around to face the screen again. She continued on by saying, "When I saw fear in his optics because of me, it made me feel guilty of what I've been doing for the past couple of days since my escape." She looked at the ground at her feet while saying, "Eventhough I didn't show it on my face," Saphira's eyes darted up to look into Miko's eyes and said, "I felt ashamed at what I've become. Advenging the death of my family would never bring them back from the dead, it's just not possible."

---

She closed her eyes. "If he didn't beg me to spare his life or even show me his fear of me going to kill him next, then I would have killed him merciliessly like a soulless creature would do without the painful feeling of regret." She opened her eyes and looked up to continue to say, "I really should be thanking him as well as apologizing to him for what I've done."

Miko started at her friend when Saphira said, "He was the second Con to form a crack in my black heart that was full of spite and malice for his race. He made me question why I was even going on this vengeful rampage in the first place. When I meditated on this question, I came to realize how hatred changed me and made my heart feel so cold and devoid of life after thinking about nothing but dark and evil thoughts about how they would pay for their crimes."

"After some more time in thought, I grasped the true meaning of vengeance," she said.

"What is the true meaning of vengeance?" Miko asked.

---

The Con Saphira spared years ago stayed in the room listening to her with interest.

---

Saphira sighed as she began to speak. "People say that revenge is sweet when you get back at those that hurt you so much." She paused to say, "So tell me, Miko…." Saphira turned to face her friend. "Why does it leave a bitter gall in my mouth?"

Miko's eyes widened at what she said. She remembered the feeling of how she killed Hardshell after what he did to Bulkhead but didn't feel the satisfaction or relief from it. She only felt the same as she did before she killed the Insecticon. "I don't know," she replied out loud.

"I do," Saphira said. "Vengeance is this endless cycle of hatred and hurt that can never be healed by hurting others. It's like willingly drinking a poison in your cup of tea."

"How do you get rid of it?" Miko asked.

"The only cure for this position of malice is forgiveness, which would set you free."

"Forgiveness. But what if they did something that is so horrible, or they don't feel the same touchy-feely way about it? Would you still forgive them?"

"I understand where you're getting at," Saphira said as she continued on, "but the answer is yes."

Miko was about to say something when her friend interrupted her.

"I know what you're going to say. 'How could you forgive someone who has done something so unspeakable?' My answer to that is," she said before saying, "haven't I done something so unspeakable? Didn't I kill many Decepticons out of spite of the hatred I was feeling towards them? You may think I did it out of self defeanse and that it was just of me to do so, but you're wrong. In my eyes, it was murder. I killed them because I wanted to not because I had no choice to. I was like a wolf hunting the stray lambs from the flock. I didn't care about the Cons in the slightest. I only cared about my patetic revenge for my dead family, not even thinking what they wanted me to do after their demise."

She paused for a brief moment. "I didn't think what they truly wanted me to do when they died by the hands of their perpetrators."

"What did they want?" Miko asked.

"They wanted me to be strong, strong enough to face my grief and dark thoughts of the poison called revenge. My father's last wish was for me not to get physically stronger, but mentally stronger to just survive and live my life as myself and not as a monster. I learned that lesson the hard way many, many times. To put all of my constant philosophical ranting in other words, forgiveness is the potion to the ill effects of the painful wounds of the innocent blood being spilled. Yes, the perpetrators do need to be brought to justice for their crimes, but wishing ill thoughts of them will only hurt you even more. And surely the innocent people that were afflicted by this want justice too, but they also want you to forgive them and move on in your life without the weight of despair hanging on you like heavy chains of hidden hatred. They still want you to forgive them even though they might not feel the same way about it and would brush it off."

Miko was silent for several seconds before she muttered, "Dang Anna that was really deep there."

"Yeah…" she said while rubbing the back of her neck.

"I swear you are a philosopher or something with all of that wisdom you got inside your brain there," Miko said while ruffling Saphira's hair.

Her friend stopped playing with her hair. "Wisedom comes from experience, Miko."

---

The Con was silent in thought of what he had learned today from her. He looked back at the screen for a second before he turned to walk out of the door of the medical room. He needed space to process the new information he had heard from the creature that had spared his life years ago. Nobody stopped him because he needed time to think.

---

"No kidding, but what happens next and when is Soundwave going to show up?" she asked while putting her hands on her hips.

Saphira smirked as she said, "Someone's a bit impatient here. Okay fine, I'll fast forward to the moment that we found each other."

The dark forest of the night switched to the early morning hours of the day with birds chirping and singing their lovely songs. An aircraft was flying above the peaceful forest until it transformed and landed into a clearing. The Cybertronian that landed was none other than Soundwave himself. He servade the area before walking into the woods looking for Saphira. After walking further into the dences forest, Soundwave stopped in his tracks.

His head perked up when he heard a familiar young girl's voice singing a sad unlyrical song. Soundwave stood in a complete petrified state as if he were turned into a stone statue. The slow soothing sober song continued its chorus. That's when he decided to walk towards the music to see who was singing such a melancholy melody. Making sure not to disturb or alert the singer of his presence, the Decepticon walked further into the forest until he reached a small meadow clearing.

The meadow seemed so serene in beauty with the light mist still lingered in the field. Soundwave skimmed the surrounding area but couldn't see who was singing the song. He was about to give up when the singer started to sing again.

His head turned to the sudden noise of the grass being brushed against someone walking by. ~ "Harmony?" ~ he telepathically asked out loud.

"He speaks?" Miko asked in surprise.

"Not really. This is just him telepathically speaking out loud not verbally," Saphira replied.

"Oh, is it so that I can hear what he's saying?"

"Yup. Or else it would just confuse you to what we are talking about if you only heard me speaking."

Miko nodded her head as she watched the scene.

The song abruptly stopped as everything became silent. Soundwave looked around in the meadow until his optics caught sight of a light blue color hidden in the golden tall grass. In the middle of the field, Saphira was looking straight at him in utter surprise and confusion. Her yellow eyes shimmered in the morning sunlight while the golden grass swayed against her form in the gentle breaze.

They both looked at each other for several minutes in peace until she decided to run away from him. Soundwave stood up, reached a hand out to her, and called, ~ "Human girl, wait a minute!" ~

Saphira did not listen as she continued to run back into the thick thickets of the forest. Soundwave ran out into the field to transform and take flight to catch up to her in the air. After several minutes of looking for her in the air, he lost sight of her and decided to go back to the Nemesis so that Megatron wouldn't suspect him of anything.

Little did the Decepticon know was that she was watching him in the cover of the dark forest vegetation. Saphira breathed a sigh of relief as she went back to her safe haven to eat a meal she had prepared for herself.

Miko turned to her friend to say, "Dude, why did you run away from him? I thought you trusted him?"

Saphira glanced at Miko and replied, "I ran because I didn't trust him. He was a Decepticon who would do anything to take me back to his master just like every other Con I've crossed paths with."

"Oh really," Miko said in disbelief while she folded her arms over her chest and posed with her hip out to one side. "because last I read was that he was the only one taking care of you when you were sick with the summer flu years ago."

She sighed. "I only trusted him to an extent that time. I only relied on Soundwave to bring me food and water so that I could regain my strength enough to break free of my prison."

"Ah huh," Miko said while blinking at her unsatisfied with her answer.

"It's the truth, Miko. In the beginning, I couldn't allow myself to trust another soul because I was afraid that I would be hurt or even betrayed. That's why it took me so long to come to trust Soundwave after he spent weeks trying to connect with me."

Miko nodded in reply.

The early morning shifted to the afternoon of the same day. Saphira was busy trying to stalk a deer that came for a drink by a river. She was so focused on the hunt that she didn't realize that she was being watched by Laserbeak nearby. The Mini Con hovored in the air for a few seconds before flying back to get Soundwave.

A moment later, Soundwave silently appeared behind Saphira. He watched her moving her sword up a little. Before he could speak, a loud crash disturbed the calmness of the forest. Soundwave turned around to see a Con soldier coming his way.

The soldier looked up to see his Communication's officer standing before him. "Officer Soundwave," he said before asking, "What are you doing here?"

Soundwave turned back to where Saphira was to see that she had disappeared, again.

"I-is the savage human girl down there?" the soldier asked in fear.

Soundwave sensed his fear because he had heard reports of many soldiers going offline recently by her hands. He decided to shake his head no in reply.

"Alright," the soldier said. "It's a good thing that you're here because now she has no chance of escaping. You were once a power gladiator back on Cybertron after all."

Soundwave didn't say or motioned anything back to the soldier. That's when the soldier made his leave to search for the escaped human girl. After he left, Soundwave looked around for Saphira in the area to see if she was hiding in the brush. He couldn't see any sign of her until a snap grabed his attention. Turning to the source, Soundwave caught sight of blue hair before it disappeared.

~ "Wait!" ~ he called out to her. He then started to run after her.

For a human, she was pretty fast for him. She always tried to vere him off course by zig zagging from one direction to the other. He didn't want to launch Lasserbeak to retreaive her because he was afraid she might accidently hurt her. She ran towards a river right next to a large waterfall.

When he arrived there, she disappeared again on him. Soundwave looked around again as he sighed to himself. He walked towards the edge of the water. He saw his reflection on the surface but noticed someone above him. Looking closer at the image, Soundwave obserbed that the girl was perched high in the tree on a cliff. He turned around to see that she hid herself from his view. He played along in this cat and mouse game by having her chase him for a change.

Once Saphira felt like it was safe to look back again, she peered around the trunk of the tree to see that the Con was nowhere in sight. Her yellow eyes widened in shock as they moved around everywhere to see if she could spot him. Cautiously, she climbed down the tree, crouched down low to the ground, and stalked over to the spot where she last seen the Decepticon. A growl emited from her throat as her animal instints told her that she was being watched. She got up and started to skip on the rocks in front of the waterfall. Little did she know was that Soundwave was behind the rushing waterfall.

He saw her skipping from one rock to the other until he was certain that now was the time to make himself known. Soundwave walked out from behind the waterfall and stood on the rock that Saphira originally jumped from. She was crouched down on the rock before she slowly stood up and stared at him. The wind flowed wildly across her face with her light blue hair twirled like small waves from the beautiful blue sea water of an ocean. The mist from the crashing waves of the waterfall created a mysterious and magical moment in time.

Both just stood on their rocks they were standing on in a tranquail and serene silence as they stared at each other. To them, time seemed to have slowed down. Soundwave disturbed this moment when he took a step forward towards her. Saphira stepped back before she darted away back into the forest like a doe fleeing from something.

Immediately, Soundwave followed after her. He called out to her to draw her attention of his intent of pursuing her for this long.

~ "Human, please stop! I'm not here to harm you," ~ he yelled out loud.

He lost sight of her, but he continued to run in a straight direction to find her. In that moment, leaves from the tree above him rustled and fell to the ground. He stopped to look up when he jumped back with a start from a creature roaring and hissing at him. He yelped in shock and fear of a scaly creature jumping right out of know where in front of his face. The creature was Saphira in her dragon form, hanging by her tail in the tree, snarled as well as clawed the air at him like an angry feline. Her yellow cat like eyes narrowed into slits at him.

Soundwave backed away from her while her humonguous wings flexed out to make an illusion that she looked bigger than she was. She growled saviagly while baring her sharp teeth at him. The Decepticon just stood there in front of her as if he was not going to run away. Finally, she said, "Stop following me, Con!"

Soundwave replied tellipathically, ~ "I will stop only if you stop running away from me." ~

Saphira snarled even louder. "What the hell for?! So that you can grab me while my guard is down for you to bring me back on that god offial ship? Ha, I think not." She folded her arms over her chest.

Soundwave shook his head. ~ "No, I promise you that I will not do that to you." ~

"Then why are you so percesiant in following me everywhere I go?"

~ "Because I want to protect you from them." ~

This peeked her interest as she raised a brow in confusion.

Soundwave sighed as he continued to say, ~ "I don't want to see you getting hurt or even suffer by their servos anymore." ~ He paused for a moment ~ "You seem like a nice little human girl whose carefree, kind, and generous. You are not the techno-organic war machine that my lord Megatron wants you to be. Every day I would watch you on the monitor and see you cry when you are alone." ~ He then put his hand on his chest. ~ "It made my spark ache in pain for the first time in centuries because I know how you feel when you are all alone in this world."~

She looked down at the ground for a brief moment when her attention was back at the Decepticon.

~ "That's why I want to help you as much as I can to keep you away from my master," ~ he said.

Saphira snorted at him. He looked at her in confusion as why she is laughing at him. "You would risk your life to keep me away from Megatron even though you are one of his loyal soldiers that, might I add, whould never dare think of betraying him?"

In reality, every Con in the room nodded their heads in agreement to what Saphira's past self just said.

"She does have a point that Soundwave whould never betray our lord Megatron," Knock Out said out loud.

"It seems unlike the communication's chief would risk execution for betrayal just to protect one human girl," Shockwave commented.

"Well, people can change or in this case be really good at hiding the truth from you," Jack said.

"May be, but it's still a shock to us that he would be willing to do such a thing for just one human girl and get nothing in return from her," Knock Out replied to Jack.

They all looked back on the screen to hear what Soundwave has to say.

~ "It's true that I would never betray my master for anything, but this is an exception." ~ Saphira looked at him as he continued to speak. ~ "You are an innocent bystander, who has no ties with the enemy that you, unfortunately, got caught up in the middle of this war we have between the Decepticons and the Autobots." ~

"You're at war? For what?" she asked.

~ "Mainly for energon since my native planet is depleted of its natural resources." ~

She nodded in reply.

~ "Also, we are at war for leadership of our planet called Cybertron." ~

"Huh, reminds me of the American Civil War in a way," she mumbled to herself.

~ "Now that you know about my kind and why I am willing to help you, will you be able to trust me to protect you?" ~ he asked her.

Before Saphira could say anything, the branch she was hanging on by her tail cracked before snapping, which made her lose her grip and started to fall. Soundwave lunged forward and caught her in time. She looked up at him.

~ "Are you alright?" ~ he asked in concern.

She nodded in reply.

~ "So," ~ he started to say. ~ "Do you trust me now that I am not your enemy?" ~

She turned her head to look away from him for a moment in thought. She turned to look back at him and replied, "If I am going to trust you, you have to earn my trust first." Soundwave nodded his head in understanding of her demands. "I will tell you this, Con, it's not easy to earn my trust. You have to prove yourself to me first not by your words but by your actions. I will be keeping an eye on you even when you think I am not even around. Do I make myself clear?"

He nodded again.

"Good," she said before demanding, "Now if you would be so kind enough, please put me down."

~ "You're not going to run away now are you?"~ he asked hesitantly.

"No."

~ "Alright," ~ he said while bending down on one knee to place his servo on the ground for her to hop off. She jumped out of his servo as he straightened up. She began to walk away when Soundwave asked, ~ "Where are you going?" ~

"I'm trying to find out where the heck am I and how to get back home," she replied while looking up at the sky.

~ "Why?" ~

"So that I can get ingredients to make a spell that would form an exact copy of myself so that I can make Megatron think that I have perished." She stopped in her tracks when an idea started to form in her head. "Or…"

~ "Or what?" ~

She turned to face him to tell the Con her idea. "Or you can do a recording of my supposed demise of me 'falling' off the edge of the cliff."

~ "I don't know that's a good idea." ~

"Well, what do you propose I do then to get your comrades off my back?"

Soundwave paused in thought to think of a plan that would convince Megatron to lose interest in her as a techno-organic war machine. ~ "Hmm… I don't know, but maybe you should just wait him out until he believes searching for you is a lost cause." ~

"Yeah, like that's going to happen anytime soon," she said sarcastically while twitching her tail back and forth.

~ "Believe me, I know my master very well to anticipate that he will lose interest in you once it starts to become tiresome to track you down and retrieve you back to the ship. He sometimes becomes impatient when he's wasting valuable energon to something so pointless." ~

Saphira just stared at him for a long while until a long sigh escaped her chapped lips. "Very well then. I will wait this ordeal out until the heat of the search becomes ice cold."

Soundwave nodded his head until he heard her mumble, "Though it would be nice to find out where I am and even maybe even go back home to get a few things."

~ "We're in Minisoda," ~ he said to her as she looked up at him. ~ "And if you want to, I can ground-bridge us to where you used to live." ~

"You guys have the aura to teleport us anywhere?" she asked while arching a brow.

~ "I don't know what you mean by aura," ~ he replied.

"Never mind then," she muttered under her breath.

~ "But yes, we do have the technology to transport anyone and anything to anywhere on this planet in a matter of seconds." ~

"I see," she said while rubbing her chin in thought. "And you can do that right here and now in an instant I presume?"

He nodded his head in reply.

"Okay," she said. She shapeshifted into her human form and then glaced up at the Decepticon to say, "Transport us to my home I used to live in."

He made a quick nod as he had his arm stretched out. On his screen visor, a map of the location appeared when a huge portal appeared out of thin air.

~ "I will go in first just in case there are any soldiers looking for you at your burn downed house." ~

She didn't protest at the idea because she wanted him to go into the portal before her. He walked into the portal first. Saphira followed in after him so that she isn't left behind. They appeared at the once beautiful house in Michigan she used to live in for a couple of years, which is now reduced to a burned crisp. She looked at the remains of the house with a sad look on her face. Saphira closed her eyes for a moment to take in what she was seeing in front of her.

~ "Are you alright?" ~ Soundwave asked her.

She opened her eyes again as she replied in a dry, sad, and angry voice, "I'm fine. Let's just get this over with before your master suspects that something is amiss with your absence." She started to walk ahead of him towards the house. He followed.

She couldn't believe that everything she and her family owned was all reduced to ashes or are so charred that they looked like they could fall apart from even the slightest touch. Her heart sunk in her chest from the pain of grief and heartache. She walked to where the staircase that lead to her room was. Surprisingly, it was still intact, but she didn't dare want to risk falling through the floor and hurting herself. She allowed her wings to spring out from her back as she flapped them until she was airborne.

Soundwave stood in silence as he watched her in curiousity at how a human girl could do that. He saw her hover to the second floor of the house to a small room, which he assumed was hers. He noticed that her yellow eyes seemed to dim in color to what she was feeling at this moment. It made his spark ache even more to see her looking like this. He put a servo on his chest plate.

Saphira picked up a picture frame of her and her best friend laughing together. The picture burned off half of Miko's face and body as well as the other side of the picture. She held onto the picture tightly as if it was the most precious thing in the universe. She put it away for safe keeping. Then she glided back downstairs to where a tall charred grandfather clock stood. Landing on the ground next to it, she started to push it with all of her might.

~ "What are you doing?" ~

"I need to move this so that I could get into our secret underground storage in case of emergency," she replied while struggling to move the heavy object.

~ "Here, let me help you," ~ he said as he walked over to help her move it.

She let him move it, which was too easy for him to do since he was a robotic organism as well as a giant. He stepped away once he fully moved the clock. She gave him a nod in gratitude as she turned the combination on this metal safe that looked like a door to somewhere. It gave a click sound. She opened it to reveal a shoot going down.

Turning to face the Con, she told him, "I will be back after I grab the things I need. Wait for me by a large boulder next to two cherry trees to the west of here. You can't miss it in the forest."

He nodded in reply as she stepped on the platform of the shoot. She pressed a secret button in the safe. The platform on her feet dropped to the side as she entered in this long piped slide. A few minutes passed by until she landed on a soft cushion.

She got to her feet as she looked around the dark underground room. She chanted a spell until she clapped her hands together once. Suddenly, lights came on and filled the large room. Everything was untouched and just as the way her family left it. She took in a deep breath as the scent of her family still lingers here. Tears threaten to form in her eyes as she choked back a sob, but she failed to suppress the urge to cry her heart out. Falling down on her knees, she billowed into a fit of tears. Her fingers dug into the soft carpet of the room. Warm tears flowed from her eyes and dripped down to the ground like little drops of rain.

She calmed down after crying for about five minutes. Getting up from the floor, she walked over to a closet to grab new clothes to wear, new shoes, and a hiker's backpack. She went into the bathroom and changed into a dark blue-green hoodie and jeans with her black and purple gym shoes. She tossed her worn out dress to the side.

Several minutes passed by of Saphira packing her bag nonstop. Her backpack contained: a sleeping bag, tent, canteens, a small pot, a pan, bowls, cups, nonperishable food, several pairs of spare clothes, jackets for the coming fall and winter, small and large towels, hunting knives, medical supplies, spell books, a bunch of reading books, her sketchbooks, art supplies, rain gear, a couple of mess kits, spell ingredients, her archery set, a sewing kit, and a portable solar powered charger. She couldn't fit everything in her one backpack so she had to go find another one to fit the rest of the items she needs to survive out in the woods.

Miko looked at her friend to ask, "Hey Ann, could you tell me again why you couldn't go seek help from the law officials or something instead of hiding yourself away from people?"

"I was afraid that they would either see my story as a delusion due to stress and imagination since I was a young child at the time, or they would take me away to do experimental things on me if I showed them my true form or they do a biological examination on me. I did not want to risk trusting someone so that they can stab in the back again," she explained.

"And the Autobots?"

Saphira shook her head and replied, "Still didn't want to risk trusting them, human or otherwise."

"But you trusted Soundwave?" Miko said while eyeing her friend suspitiosuly.

"To an extent. I was still weary of him at the time," she said before saying, "Besides, I wanted him off my back and not following me like a lost puppy as well as using him to get information about whether of not Megatron lost interest in me."

---

Meanwhile, the Autobots were amazed that Saphira wouldn't trust them to keep her safe or anyone for that matter. The Decepticons, on the other hand, were not surprised by this since they were the reason why she couldn't allow herself to trust another soul after Megatron broke his promise he made to her all those years ago.

Wheeljack gave out a long whistle. "Man, the kid sure has some major trust issues here."

"No kidding. I kind of see why she wouldn't trust anyone, but at the same time, I still can't see why she would put her trust in Soundwave out of everyone all around her," Smokescreen said.

"Well, she did say that she didn't trust him so much," Knock Out said.

"In the beginning," Arcee mentioned. "So the question is what happened afterward once she gotten to know him?"

Everybody mumbled amongst themselves when Knock Out said, "I know this is so cliché and all, but what if Soundwave saved her life from something to the point where she began to trust him?"

Silence filled the room.

"You might have a point there, but how do you know for sure," Bumblebee asked.

Knock Out was about to say something when Starscream said in a mocking tone, "He watches too many human movies at drive in theaters."

Everyone turned to look at the red Con. He nervously smiled at them in embarrassment before he turned to Starscream and said harshly, "I thought we shook on it that after what happened during the Terrorcon epidemic that we would not say a word of anything that we both said during that horrifying time?"

Starscream chuckled for a second as he replied with a smirk, "What can I say, I'm not known for keeping promises."

Knock Out pouted at his fellow Decepticon when Megatron said sarcastically, "Ah, that's the reason why you always wanted to go on patrol."

"Sometimes…" Knock Out said before admitting, "Okay, maybe most of the time I would but only to see certain human films to do a little side research."

"Sure you were," Arcee said playfully before she giggled.

Knock Out looked flustered.

"Knock Out, I need a fresh sample of the patent's energon!" Ratchet called out to him.

"And I need some here as well," Shockwave added.

"I thought I would never say this, but thank Primus for those two giving me orders to retrieve something," Knock Out muttered as he started to get energon samples.

---

Back to Saphira's memory, she just finished packing all the things she needed to survive out in the wilderness as she hauled everything to the secret stairwell that lead to the outside forest of the property. She was almost to the top when she heard muffled voices above her. The voices sounded familiar to her. Carefully, she cracked opened the hidden door behind the rock to peek at who was there. She saw Soundwave facing off with Starscream and two Decepticon soldiers in a heated argument.

"Soundwave for the last time, you are to be at your station, not going around on this search party for this little human scum. Leave that to the search troopers," Starscream said to him.

Soundwave didn't move for a long time as if standing his ground.

Starscream growled in irritation as he threatened, "You know I will report you to Megatron himself of your stubbornness and refusal to obey my orders that I am giving you."

~ "Go ahead. I like to see you try to tell him that, Starscream. I know he will just dismiss it," ~

He growled again as he turned away to call his master to tell him what's going on.

Saphira looked at the Decepticon she had required as a valuable asset to her benefits in amazement. ~ "Wow, he's confident all of a sudden." ~

After she said that in her head, Soundwave turned to her direction and stared at her in shock.

~ "Human!? What are you- never mind. Just stay there and keep quiet so that they don't see you." ~

Her brows furrowed in anger as she retorted, ~ "You're not the boss of me, Con." ~

~ "No time to argue, child. Do as I say and hide so that they don't find you! I will let you know when they are gone and if it's safe to come out."~

She glared at him for a long time before giving in to lay low until they left. While she closed the door, Soundwave mentally breathed a sigh of relief that she'd listen to him. Starscream was having an argument with Megatron for a long time until he finally gave in. Starscream sneered at Soundwave, which gave him the impression that he had won the argument.

"You're off the hook this time, Soundwave," Starscream said before adding, "but if I see that you are not at your post again, I promise you there will be consequences." With that said, Starscream and the two Cons that accompanied him transformed and took off into the skies.

Once they were out of sight, Soundwave turned to where the human girl was hiding and walked over towards the place. He bent down near the entrance and gently knocked on the rock doorway. ~ "It's safe to come out now. The annoying Starscream and his two comrades are gone." ~

The hatch opened to reveal an unamused human girl staring at him. "Really? I'm not a meek helpless child you know. So, don't treat me like one." She hauled in her other traveling backpack with her while walking past him.

~ "Hesh, what crawled up your engine and died?" ~ he said.

She turned around and gave him her death glare. "Aren't you going to teleport us back to Minnesota?"

He stood up and asked, ~ "Why do you want to go back? The state is filled with Decepticon troopers looking for you."

"I need to get the rest of my stuff that I hid away."

The Decepticon looked up into the sky. ~ "It's late. We will get them in the morning." ~

"Remind me why we can't just do it now to get it over with already?"

~ "Because there would be more Decepticon troopers looking for you at night rather than during the morning hours." ~

"Why, are you robots nocturnal or something?"

~ "No. It's because we have other duties to attend to in the morning." ~

"Oh," she said while dropping her bag to the ground with a loud thud. Then she grabbed her tent and started to set it up.

~ "You're making camp right here?" ~

"Well yeah. Where else can I go to make camp before it gets dark?"

~ "Good point," ~ he said as he watched her putting the metal rods together. He sat down a few feet away from her. ~ "Do you need any assistance, human?" ~

"No," she said bluntly.

After about ten minutes, the tent was up. Soundwave watched in silence at how the little human child was organizing her things. He even watched her go collect branches to set a small campfire in this small hole pit she had dug up with her hands. Curiosity filled his processor at how she can breathe fire from her mouth when the humans he researched couldn't. Once the fire caught on the wood, the girl started to prepare her dinner. He continued to observe at her in silence, which made Saphira creeped out.

"Must you stare at me? It's making me uneasy," she said while cooking some soup.

~ "Sorry. It's just I've never seen a human sprout wings and a tail or even breathe fire before," ~ he replied.

"What makes you say that I'm even human?" she asked without even looking up at him.

This shocked him. ~ "You're not human? Then why do you have a human disguise?" ~

"Why do you have a vehicular disguise?" she rebutted.

~ "To avoid being seen by humans in my true form." ~

"Exactly my point."

~ "But why?" ~ he asked.

"Because humans are afraid of me for what I am," she replied while stirring the soup in the pot. "A monster," Saphira mumbled while her eyes were closed.

~ "You're not a monster," ~ he said.

She huffed in amusement at what the Decepticon said. "Ha, after what I've done to your kind?"

~ "You were only protecting yourself. I cannot blame you for that." ~

When she heard that, she chuckled darkly. "If keep telling yourself that I was 'protecting myself', then you might just believe it."

Soundwave was about to say something when Megatron called him on his commlink.

"Soundwave, I need to have a word with you," Megatron said as he ended the call.

The Con sighed as he turned to the girl and said, ~ "I have to go. I'll try to be back here later." ~ She didn't say anything as he walked away to transform and take off into the air to ground-bridge back to the ship.

The rest of the evening was peaceful to her. The warm meal filled up her stomach to satisfy her hunger. Crickets and frogs chirped and croaked in the night hours on this cool summer's evening. A sigh escaped her lips as she looked up at the clear starry night sky. The twinkling tiny stars shone and shimmered in the dark blue sky. The cool wind brushed against her bare skin, but she didn't care that her skin felt cold for a moment as the glow of the warm burning fire provided her a shower of warmth.

A howl of a pack of coyotes caught her attention. She turned to the direction of the high pitch calls and decided that they weren't much of a threat since they were still a great distance away from where she's spending the night. She brought her knees to her chest and rested her chin on them while watching the fire dance and twirl in the air.

"I need to get stronger, but how?" she asked herself while being hypnotized by the flames. "It's my soul duty now to protect the innocent beings on this planet from the Decepticons. I cannot allow them to take over the world for their own twisted use or allow them to hurt more people in their sick inhumane ways." A growl emanated from her throat when she remembered her days suffering on the ship. She thought about what and how she's going to save the whole world from Megatron's claws when she remembered something. "That's it! I can go look for The Fifteen Jewels of Harmony. But how am I going to find them? There's no map leading me to them nor in just any book." Her eyes lit up as she said, "No wait, there is a book that could give me a hint in finding the jewels, but it is back in Toyko." Just as her eyes lit up, they dimmed when she thought of Miko and their promise in finding the jewels together.

There was a long pause in silence as she debated whether or not she should get the jewels to defeat Megatron and save the world. Closing her eyes and sighing, she finally whispered, "Miko, my dear friend, I am sorry I have to break our promise in finding the jewels together, but I don't want anything to happen to you. If I lost you in this crossfire of my battles with the Cons, I would never forgive myself. Please find it in yourself that you could forgive me, my friend."

"That's the reason why you have the jewels?" Miko asked.

Saphira nodded. "It was that and a couple of other reasons why I needed to find all of them for the past four years or so."

Miko looked at her in curiosity at what other reasons her friend had in finding The Fifteen Jewels of Harmony. She let her friend continue on with the memory of the beginning of her relationship with Soundwave without pestering her to explain the other reasons of her searching for the powerful artifacts.

It was morning. The sun shone brightly over Saphira's campsite as she decided to get up to make some breakfast. The fire from last night was already reduced to mere ashes and charred pieces of wood, so she went out to gather up more wood as well as some water to boil. Once she was done, Soundwave showed up. She only glanced up at him for a second before turning back at the task of putting things back in her hiking backpack.

~ "Megatron was holding me up to do a little debriefing of what I found so far in the search for you," ~ he said.

"So, you told him of my location then. All the more reason I shouldn't trust you," she said with a hint of detest in her voice.

~ "I didn't tell him that I found you. I just told him that I was checking things in unlikely areas where you could be hiding in. And if you wanted to know, I haven't told him that I was here near you old living quarters in Michigan." ~

"Good," was all she said. She put the last of her things in her bag before standing up. "You ready to transport us back to Minisoda to get the rest of my things as I lay low for a couple of weeks?"

He gave a short nod in reply. He opened a portal for them as they both walked into it.

"Question," Miko said while watching her friend in the past walk into and out of the portal without looking dizzy at all from the experience.

"Yes, Miko?"

"How come you don't look dizzy from walking into and out of a ground-bridge portal?"

"Well, I'm used to transportation spells and portals, so I'm not always nauseated from the experience of being transported to great distances in seconds. My family would sometimes do spells like that if we were late to an important event we didn't want to miss."

"No wonder you are always just on time for things," Miko said with sarcasm in her voice.

Saphira smirked at what her friend said. Then she turned back to watch more of this memory.

The duo appeared in the forest where they formed an alliance. The girl lead and walked deeper into the forest while dragging one of the bags behind her. Soundwave pitted her that she had to carry all of her things without any help, so he decided to help carry at least one of her bags. He grabbed the dragging bag without her permission.

"Hey!" she yelled at him when she felt that her bag was being taken away from her.

~ "You looked like you need help carrying your things." ~

"Without my conscience?" she asked while narrowing her eyes at him.

~ "You would refuse my help, so I took it," ~ he said with a shrug.

"Right you are. Now give it back!"

He lifted the backpack higher as he wagged his index finger. ~ "Not until we get to your safe haven. Once we do, then you may have this back." ~

A snarl reverberated in her bare teeth before she barked in annoyance, "Fine! Have it your way." She walked on ahead of him. He shortly followed after her in steady steps as to not accidently step on her.

They have been walking for a long time without rest. Soundwave looked worried at his companion because he had noticed that she slowed down her pace.

~ "Do you need to rest, human?" ~

She stopped walking. She sighed before saying, "It won't hurt if we take a break for a while." Then she took off her backpack and put it to the side so that she could sit on a log.

Soundwave took a seat on the forest floor despite that he wasn't tired himself. He noticed that she was digging into her bag to grab a canteen of water. She drank it greedily, but she stopped herself from drinking too much water too fast. She put it back in her bag. They didn't speak to each other for about half an hour or so. He wanted to break the silence but decided against it when he saw that she was taking a nap. This made him smile underneath his visor at her peacefully sleeping in the warm rays of the sun on this nice day.

An hour and fifteen minutes passed by. The girl was still fast asleep. Soundwave debated if he should wake her up or not. He released one of his tentacle cords to gently wake her from her power down. As he was about to wake her, she shifted in her sleep in her curled-up position on the log with her head resting on her backpack. He mentally sighed and thought that she deserves to sleep a little more. Instead, he used his tentacle to stroke her rosy colored cheek. This made her breathe in a deep breath of air and then slowly exhaling. She grunted while leaning into his touch. Of course, it shocked him that she did that, but he ignored it and continued stroking her.

"Awww, I'm not the only one who finds you irresistible cute when you are asleep," Miko said while cupping her hands together in a ball so that she could lean her head on it.

"I'm not cute nor irresistible," Saphira muttered. She blushed as Miko giggled at her being very embarrassed.

---

While Miko chuckled at her friend denying that she is a cutie when asleep, the Cybertronians couldn't help but agree with the enthusiastic human child.

Smokescreen chuckled while smiling. "I have to agree with Miko. Her friend is really cute when she's asleep."

"No going to argue there," Techna said while passing him by with some equipment.

Arcee chuckled before she said, "Yeah, I think both of you and Soundwave will agree with Miko that Saphira is quite adorable when she's asleep."

This earned a few chuckles from some people.

"Blah," Starscream complained. "She's not cute when you never know if she's going to attack you at any second in her sleep."

"Oh Screamy, you're so paranoid," Wheeljack said.

"Hey, I'm talking about this from experience," he retorted before explaining, "Every time I was about to grab her while she was sleeping, she would always attack me."

"Has she done this to anyone else?" Arcee asked

"No," he replied.

"Then she just does it only to you because your special," she said with some sass.

Starscream was going to comment on that when he couldn't come up with any witty comment.

Arcee just smiled at him for her victory.

"Ugh," Bulkhead began as he said, "is it just me or does it seem that Soundwave is acting too friendly to her?"

"It's not just you, Bulkhead, I see it too," Bumblebee said.

"Wonder why he would show affection when they only met yesterday," Ultra Magnus pondered to himself.

"Whatever the reason is," Knock Out started to say. "I bet one hundred credits for everyone in this room that Soundwave has feelings for this human girl."

"Explain your reasoning, Knock Out," Ultra Magnus said.

"Can't you guys see it?" he asked as everyone shook their heads in reply. Knock Out slapped himself in the head that they couldn't figure it out. "I'm not going to explain it to you guys if you can't see it with your own optics." Then he folded his arms over his chestplate.

"What, that he cares for Saphira as a friend?" Bee asked.

"No, more than just 'friends'," Knock Out said.

"Are you suggesting that Soundwave and Saphira are tight?" Wheeljack asked.

"Naw they can't be that kind of tight," he said before yelling, "Of course I'm suggesting that! What else am I talking about here?"

"You got to be joking, Knock Out," Starscream said. "This is Soundwave we are talking about. He wouldn't go that far and have that kind of feelings towards a human girl."

"You wanta bet a hundred credits on this, Starscream?"

"Gladly so that I can prove you wrong about this."

"Alright, let's put our money on the table, even though I will be the victor of this bet."

"Ha, in your dreams. I will be the one who is victorious. I know Soundwave better than you do, and I know for a fact that he'll never have any romantic feelings towards the human monstrosity."

"Ehhem," Bumblebee said to get their attention. He turns to Knock Out to ask, "Knock Out, what makes you so sure that Soundwave and Saphira have that kind of relationship?"

"Because, it's so cheesy that it's obvious. Soundwave is not acting like his normal silent and distant self. Instead, he is chatty and social for once in her company. Even Saphira, Anna, oh whatever the girl calls herself is acting different too. She was so cold-hearted that she teaches ice how to freeze from the cold. Also, she is silent and distant from others too. But when she's with him she puts up this invisible guard to protect herself from him wanting to know her true self," he replied.

"Okay, they share some similarities with each other. So what?" Bulkhead said.

"So, they start to eventually fall for each other if they haven't already. Have you not seen her always trying to protect her relationship with Soundwave by avoiding the topic?"

"I said this once and I'll say it again. This is Soundwave we're talking about. It doesn't mean anything if he has a slight curiosity in her," Starscream said.

"Besides, what makes you the 'love expert'?" Arcee said while folding her arms.

"I have seen human romantic movies," he replied as everyone stared at him in disbelief.

"I thought you only watched human horror movies," Starscream mumbled.

Knock Out looked offended as he retorted, "I watch other movie genres besides horror. I even seen The Fault in our Stars movie recently." He wiped his optic as if trying to hold back the lubricant that was threatening to fall from his optics. "I'm still trying to recover after watching it for the first time."

"What at how bad it was?" Starscream said.

"No, at how sad and depressing it was," Knock Out said.

"Have you read the book yet?" Jack asked while Raf was fast asleep on his shoulders.

"No, I haven't yet. Is it as good as the movie?" he replied.

"Yes. You should have read the book first before the movie because of the details and all," Jack said.

"I'll do that the next time a movie version of a book comes out," Knock Out replied.

With that said and everyone still can't seem to comprehend the red Con's analysis on the techno-organic and the Cybertronian's relationship, all eyes looked back to the screen to watch more of Saphira's memories.

---

Soundwave brushed his tentacle around her smooth pale skin. The feel of her skin felt soft and warm to him like a warm blanket. Suddenly, his sensors detected the presence of a fellow Decepticon nearby. He grabbed the human girl, who yelped in surprise, and tossed her in his opened chest plate to hide her as well as her bags. Then he stood up in time to see a soldier walking around the forest on patrol. Soundwave didn't want to draw attention to himself, so he hid behind a tall tree.

He could hear her muffled cry as he said in a whisper, ~ "Shh, please keep quite, human. One of my fellow comrades were nearby." ~ She became silent after hearing that.

Once the soldier was gone, Soundwave stepped out from behind the tree. The girl's fist hammered against his metal body as if knocking to get out. He opened his chest plate to see the girl climbing up halfway. She let out a sigh before she gave him an angry face in disproval for disturbing her from her nap. A growl vibrated in her throat as she said in a harsh and grumpy tone, "Never do that to me ever again, or I'll hurt you."

~ "Hesh, I was only trying to hide you from my comrades," ~ he replied to her.

"Then why didn't you wake me up or telepathically say so?"

~ "You were just sleeping so peacefully that I just didn't have the spark to wake you up," ~ he said as she huffed to herself. ~ "Besides, you look just too cute when you are sound asleep." ~ Soundwave was about to boop her on the nose when she tried to bite his finger.

"I'm not cute, I'm fierce!" she growled at him.

Soundwave chuckled at her. ~ "Not to me you are." ~

"Anyway, how long was I asleep for?"

~ "Hmm, about two hours." ~

Her eyes widened in surprise as she exclaimed, "TWO HOURS!? We better get moving." She was trying to climb out when Soundwave stopped her.

~ "I think it's best if you stay in there until we reach our destination. I don't want to be worried about how you're going to hide from my fellow Decepticons out here." ~

"What are you? My kangaroo mother trying to hide me in her pouch?"

Soundwave tilted his head in confusion. ~ "What?" ~

A sigh emanated from her mouth as she muttered, "Never mind. Let's just go already. I'm still a bit tired from walking all morning anyway."

~ "Okay, you direct me." ~

"Go to the right," she ordered and pointed to the direction for him to walk to.

They journeyed together in silence with the only exception being of Saphira giving him directions. Hours went by for the two. Soundwave wanted to have a conversation with the human girl, but he sensed that she was in a bitter mood and just wants to enjoy the silence. He didn't mind the silence between them. All he wanted was to know the girl better like her name for example. He thought that would be a nice way to start the conversation.

~ "So, human," ~ he began which got her attention. ~ "What's your name or what are you called by?" ~

"I'm not telling you."

~ "Why not?" ~

"Because I don't trust you."

~ "Ugh, again with the trust issues. When are you going to trust me that I am your ally?" ~

"Hmm, let me think about it. Hmm, oh never."

~ "Never seems like a long time, human." ~

She just grumbled.

The walking continued. The rays of the sun began to become more and more duller signaling the setting of the sun was near. Saphira convinced Soundwave to put her down on the ground so that she could get some exercise as well as relieve herself in the bushes far away from the Decepticon. Darkness began to cover the remaining light from the sunset. The coolness of the evening lingered in the air. A harsh wind blew by the traveling pair as she stopped in her tracks to sniff the air.

~ "What's wrong?" ~

"I smell rain," she replied while turning to face him.

Soundwave checked the weather forecast and confirmed with the human. ~ "It's going to be a storm they say. We better get to your safe haven and fast." ~

"Not going to argue there," she whispered as she hurried to find a short cut to the waterfall.

Another half hour later, the sky grew pitch black as the duo reached the rouged rock side of the valley leading to the waterfall she resides in. It was so high up that they'll have to climb up and over to get to the other side.

~ "Ugh, is there another way around this?" ~ he asked in worry.

"This is the only quickest way we can get into my place. You aren't afraid, are you?" she asked.

~ "For me, no. For your sake, yes." ~

"Tich, don't worry about it. I'm an excellent climber."

~ "But I still think it's much safer if I climb and you stay in my chest plate, or I can fly us over to the other side of this." ~

"No flying kangaroo mama. It will draw attention to the others. Besides," she said when she felt a cold drop of rain water slash against her cheek as she wiped it off, "it's starting to rain and soon it'll turn into a storm. All the more reason for us to start climbing right now."

He nodded in agreement as he began to climb up. Saphira followed after him. They climbed for a good amount of time until the light drizzle of the rain became a downpour. Saphira pulled up her hood to cover her head from the rain. The rain came down on them harder and harder to the point where the girl could hardly see what's in front of her. Water soaked her clothes to her skin in a wet clinging embrace. Harsh winds slammed against her body to where she had to huddle close to the cliff to shield herself.

~ "Are you alright human?" ~ Soundwave asked as he reached the top to only then notice how far behind she was.

~ "Yeah, I'm alright, speedy. Just give me some time and I'll be at the top shortly." ~

~ "Are you sure that you don't need my help?" ~

~ "I don't need your help, Con. I said I'll be there shortly and I will," ~ she said while climbing up faster than at the pace she was going before. ~ "I just need ti-" ~ she said right before the rock she was holding on to crumbled. She yelped as she fell.

~ "Human!" ~ Soundwave shouted in horror to see her fall that he was kneeling at the edge of the cliff.

Saphira transformed in her dragon form. Humongous wings stretched out as she dug her wing thumbs as well as her claws into the hard stones to slow her decent and cling onto something to support her weight. She stopped falling and breathed a sigh of relief.

Soundwave also breathed a sigh of relief that she has stopped falling. He was going to transform when the crackling of white lightning struck him nearby. A boulder became loose and tumbled down towards Saphira's direction. He looked at the falling rock in horror while Saphira looked up in terror.

"Noooo!" He shouted as booming thunder roared in the dark foreboding sky.

~ To Be Continued ~