Rated: M for adult themes: language, violence, mental rape, character death, mech erotica, torture, gore, and suicidal ideation. This varies from chapter to chapter, so read at your own risk.

Important Note: I started this series of fics before Revenge of the Fallen hit the theaters. This is an AU 2007 movie verse fic, NOT a ROTF/DOTM/AE or soon LK fic.

Disclaimer: The only thing I own in this work of complete fiction is Velocity/Sira and Hardcore. They are mine. Everything else is copy righted and owned by some really rich people. I make no money from this, but wish I could.

XxxX

On a Blanket of White

XxxX

"Go! Go! Go!" yelled Prowl.

The tactician spun on his heels, and leapt away from the trailer. He transformed into a black and white police cruiser. Hitting the sand he didn't slow. Fishtailing around, he followed the Autobots into the desert. Cold terror seeped from his spark and he hoped they wouldn't be too late.

XxxX

The drones continued to calmly relay their images.

In Washington, a small group of elite people watched in stupefied fascination as Optimus Prime handed the black Cybertronian an object, then turned and headed towards the red femme. The Autobot leader never looked back, and never saw the Decepticon shift an arm into a massive cannon and aim.

A file in the SecDef's. lap slid to the floor, scattering pages in a misshapen arch. Miriam did not move to pick them up, her attention riveted on the display screen. She wanted to scream, to tell Optimus to turn around, but the useless words lodged in her throat.

The Decepticon fired. A blast of light rivaling the sun exploded towards the Autobot leader.

Perhaps he heard it, perhaps some sixth alien sense warned him, but Optimus attempted to dodge the attack, launching his enormous mass to the side.

Too late.

The blast caught him. A deadly halo engulfed the Prime of Cybertron, and ripped a gaping wound through his back and out his chest.

The noise of the blast squelched in the speakers, hurting ears, and rolled thunderously around the room.

The human observers gasped, stunned to do much else.

Optimus went down. His legs buckled beneath him, sending him to his knees. Then, he collapsed, landing face down in the pristine sand.

The one called Soundwave didn't move, even though he swayed on his feet as if dizzy. A dark blot in the seemingly endless white watched the fallen Prime with hellish red optics.

A scream filled the speakers. An agonized wail raised goose-bumps along the observers' arms.

The sound chilled Miriam's blood, reminding her just how alien the Cybertronians were.

The formerly passive femme struggled to stand. Clawed hands dug into the sand, searching for support or purchase. She snarled, her gaze unwavering, locked on Soundwave.

With considerable struggle, Velocity stood, weight supported by one leg. Uncurled and upright, the high definition cameras recorded her injuries. Dented, scraped, and gauges marked her red frame, a testament to abuse inflicted by the Decepticons. She shifted her weight to an obviously crippled leg. The limb did not support her and she crumpled on the sand.

Velocity moaned, and began to drag herself towards the unmoving Prime.

"Turn off the damned sound," one of the Security Council demanded. Miriam didn't argue, she did not want to hear anymore.

XxxX

Soundwave gave his systems time to recover.

Wanting to neutralize the Prime as fast as possible, he feed almost all of his available energy into a single shot. A gamble that left him disoriented and underpowered, but the alternative meant actually fighting the Prime, not something he wanted to attempt.

Even though his shot did not hit center mass, it still felled the Autobot leader. He watched Optimus Prime closely, waiting for small shifts in position, any hint of recovery.

Nothing.

The Prime lay inert, the only movement, the spreading of energon and darker fluids.

The keeling noise from the femme annoyed him, and he considered the option of silencing her first. Logic and safety dictated he ensure the Prime had truly joined the Matrix. The femme irritating, the Prime deadly.

Transforming his arm, the Decepticon stowed his weapon. A few more shifts, and a short, wide blade slipped into his hand. He stepped towards Optimus Prime, careful how he sat his peds on the lose sand.

XxxX

Mirage froze. His processor glitched.

Optimus handed the Allspark shard to Soundwave. He gave the source of power for Cybertron to the enemy, then turn and walk towards Velocity. The Prime relinquished the holiest of relics, the essence of their world, the only thing which secured the Autobot rule over Cybertron to a tainted and twisted Decepticon.

That was the purpose of all the strategizing and covert nonsense. A hostage negotiation. The Prime gave up the Allspark to get his dirty hub back?

Shock squeezed Mirage's spark and he blinked back the sting of betrayal.

Had he just witnessed the final battle for Cybertron? Had one of the greatest of Primes just given up and doomed them all? Did a million vorns of fighting and millions of sparks extinguished mean nothing to Optimus. All the sacrifices, all the struggle, all the suffering – all for nothing.

Mirage buried his head in his arms. He did not understand. None of this made sense. He couldn't reconcile what he witnessed with his image of Optimus Prime, his ideal.

::Protect the Prime. Mirage, suppression fire!::

Prowl's orders shook Mirage out of his despair, and vorns of training and conditioning took over. He picked up the rifle he didn't realize he had dropped. He positioned his weapon and looked down the sights. Ignoring the struggling femme and the seemingly lifeless Prime, he focused on Soundwave.

The Decepticon had changed weapons. Instead of a cannon, the dark mech now brandished a short, wide blade. A cleaving tool used to separate limbs and mechanics from a bot.

Mirage cycled his vents once, aimed and fired. He didn't attempt a killing shot on Soundwave. This caliber at this distance, made such a feat near impossible for him. Instead, he fired his weapon stall or deter the Decepticon.

Disbelief and dismay lagged his processor, the Prime sold out the Autobots for a whoring doll. Mirage continued targeting Soundwave, but temptation became too much. One squeeze of the trigger and he landed a shot on the hub. Velocity jerked from the impact.

Once again, Mirage put his sights on slowing down Soundwave.

XxxX

The shots came at him in rapid succession. The first one missed, but another one clipped his shoulder. More rounds from an energy weapon kicked up the sand near him.

He dropped to the ground, becoming a smaller target. Soundwave's optics narrowed, and he scanned the distance. The results came back negative for Cybertronian life, but an Autobot sniper still hid in the distance. Not surprising. Cybertronians quickly learned how to hide from one another, and the best at it still functioned.

The Prime had not kept to his word to arrive alone, and now the cost of retrieving the Matrix increased significantly. The Decepticon calculated the size and trajectory of the energy blasts. Though the rounds could inflect some damage, it would take quite a few of them to truly harm him.

Soundwave jumped to his feet and charged. His peds slipped in the lose sand, forcing him to lose precious astroseconds to right himself. He continued to run towards the Prime. His intentions, to collect the Matrix, transform and leave.

Only a couple of histers separated him from the Matrix, when his world went dark. All of the data feeds he monitored disappeared. All of the information he catalogued and collected ceased. He stumbled and fell to his hands and knees, his processor overclocked, trying to find anything to latch onto.

The Decepticon recognized the null zone, having endured them before. He assumed the Prime had set the field, he just didn't know how or when. Not that any of that information mattered, time wasted on puzzles that distracted him from his goals.

Soundwave turned inward. With a practiced ease, he rebooted receptors and shut others down. He adjusted parameters and shook his head to clear the nothing out of his helm. He didn't enjoy the sensation, but long ago he learned to minimize this weakness.

As his overclocked processor recovered, a new noise entered his awareness. The slow, deepening whistle of an object cutting through the atmosphere warned him of another obstacle between him and his goals.

XxxX

Cosmos didn't think, he simply acted. He didn't consider his own safety. His only concern, stop Soundwave.

He lacked heavy missiles or long-range projectiles most bots carried, but he did have mass and thick armor designed to seal out the void of space. He wouldn't last long in a one on one fight, but he didn't have to last. He only had to buy the Autobots some time.

Shutting down his nacells, Cosmos immediately entered freefall, letting the Earth's gravity pull him downwards. He still directed his decent and a quick calculation told him he had little under seventy-eight earth seconds before impact.

Cosmos locked onto the Decepticon and followed his path towards Prime. Crashing into the Communications Officer offered the simplest way to success, but Soundwave had moved too close to Optimus. Not wanting to risk further injury to either Prime or Velocity, Cosmos fired his nacells downward and outward. The Autobot slammed into the earth behind the Decepticon.

Soft sand absorbed his impact, exploding outward in all directions. Powdered gypsum rained down covering everything and everyone.

Cosmos rapidly transformed, but the attack came before he regained his feet. A cleaving blade gouged a long wound in the cartographer's armor. Stunned by the quickness of the Decepticon, Cosmos stumbled backward, wanting distance between he and Soundwave.

Pulling his own blade, the Autobot parried a downward stroke that would have bit deep into his helm.

Soundwave did not relent; the black mech continued his attack. Swing after swing, he inflicted punishment upon Cosmos, the Autobot desperately blocking some, but not all of the blows.

XxxX

Mirage kept the sights to his optic, but he stopped firing.

Cosmos had entered the milieu, and the spy didn't want to risk injuring another Autobot. In truth, Mirage began to feel the output and exertion. His energy rifle drew from his own reserves and those started to run low.

Flipping to his back, Mirage slid down the backside of the dune. He kept his cloaking shields in place, and his weapon out, but he did not want to watch the scene unfold. Soundwave would make quick work of Cosmos and move onto the Prime.

Mirage wondered if the death of Optimus would be mourned or celebrated since he betrayed them all.

XxxX

It took Soundwave nearly a breem to vent his rage. Nearly a full breem wasted. Nearly A full breem he should have devoted to salvaging the Matrix.

Believing the incompetent Autobot surrendered, the Decepticon turned back to his original plan. Focusing on the motionless Prime, he almost didn't notice the cloud of dust and sand rolling in from the north.

"Soundwave. You will not succeed today," Cosmos hissed in pain. The pale green flyer struggled to his peds, pulling his blade from the sand.

Incredulously the Autobot stood. Leaking energon, sparking from severed wires, the injured Autobot stood and brandished his weapon.

Snarling, Soundwave weighed his options. The Prime had established redundancies of protection, and Soundwave, now, realized the obviousness of his plan and the Prime's determination to keep the Matrix buried within his chest. The noble Optimus had lied and deceived, apparently vorns of war taught the Prime what it took to succeed.

Glancing at the carnage surrounding him, Soundwave conceded. Without both the Matrix and the Allspark, neither side could rule Cybertron, and there would be other opportunities to collect the Matrix.

Not willing to fight all the Autobots, the Decepticon shifted into a sleek Cybertronian jet and shot skyward. But his retreat wasn't in vain, as he exited the null zone, a calliope of data and transmissions flooded into his receivers.

A beautiful chaos only he enjoyed.

XxxX

The Secretary of Defense sat frozen in her seat and watched in horrid fascination as the Autobots converged on their fallen leader. "Turn up the sound," the she ordered.

The first aliens to arrive immediately focused on Optimus Prime. One black and the other a mossy green, they shifted from off-road vehicles into robots. Transformations so fast, the movements nothing more than blurs on the screen.

Miriam remembered their names as Ironhide and Hound. The two aliens spoke in their native, garbled language.

It took both Autobots to move the unresponsive Prime to his back, exposing the gaping exit wound from the Decepticon's weapon. The HD cameras tightened their focus on the ragged heap of metal known as Optimus Prime. Pale energon spurted from deep within the Autobot, coating the white sand and swirled with darker substances leaking from underneath the mech. Raw wires sparked against warped metal.

Mariam could not believe that the massive robot survived the injuries, but the way the other Autobots tended to their leader, survival had to be a possibility. They focused their efforts on clamping hoses and slowing the loss of energon.

"Can these things bleed out?" one of the Security Council members asked. No one answered him.

Mariam tore her attention away from the monitors to gather the scattered papers.

Shortly, another of the Cybertronians arrived.

This one she immediately recognized as Ratchet, their form of a medic or doctor. The thick and highly detailed dossier of the Chief Medical Officer of the Autobots kept Mariam up late reading one night.

Ratchet shooed the others away and shoved both hands into the Prime's gaping chest wound. Optimus responded with a jerk, and raised a fisted hand towards the medic.

Ironhide deftly pinned the Prime's arm in the sand, and spoke in low tones to his leader.

The feed from the second drone showed Hound contending with the femme. She forced him to dodge her taloned swipes when he neared her, but soon as he stepped away, she returned to dragging herself towards Optimus Prime.

The cautious Autobot carefully circled the crippled femme, obviously plotting his attack. With quick sure movements, Hound straddled Velocity. He bent forward, and scooped his hands underneath her shoulders. Then, he lifted her out of the sand.

The femme twisted in his arms and raked a clawed hand along his face.

Instead of harming her, the Autobot wrestled her into a restraining hold. He dropped to his knees, and pinned her back to his front. His arms wrapped around her chest, limiting her movement.

Velocity snarled and struggled, but the Autobot held her tight.

Hound dipped his head towards Velocity's, his mouth moving as he spoke softly to her.

Mariam wished the drones could pick up his soft words. Whatever he said calmed the femme and she stopped struggling, but he didn't release her.

Glancing back at the first drone's images, Ratchet still worked furiously. Kneeling beside the larger Autobot, his hand changed form and the blue-white flame of a torch appeared. He shoved his hand and a good portion of his arm into Optimus's chest.

The Prime of Cybertron arched his back and moaned. His fingers dug deep into the sand tainted with his spilt fluids.

Ironhide shifted his grip. He used his weight to pin Optimus down while Ratchet worked.

"Jesus Christ. I can't take any more of this." Miriam Hernandez whispered, but she could not look away from the tragedy playing out on the blanket of white sand.

A white mech raced to the other side of Optimus and joined Ratchet. Together they applied what equated to first aid.

Flipping through the file, the Secretary of Defense identified the new comer as "Wheeljack". Short notes stated he functioned as an inventor and scientist, along with assisting Ratchet.

Quickly the rest of the Autobots arrived and created a protective perimeter around Optimus Prime. Even the injured flie that stood against the superior Decepticon, took a position. All weapons pointed outward, all optics scanning the sky and the distance. Tersely spoken Cybertronian bounced through the speakers, obvious commands among the Autobots.

A static-filled explosion rebounded around the room, and one of the feeds went black.

Miriam lifted her head in time to witness one of the Autobots raise his weapon and fire directly at the remaining drone. A second echoing explosion followed by the second feed filled with static.

The Secretary of Defense shuffled the papers before her to find what she wanted. An image of the Cybertronian who fired the last shot. In her hand an image of Prowl, Second in Command, glared back at her.

"Get me on a flight to Alpha Base." Mariam demanded, as she finished stuffing the paper haphazardly into the file folder.

"Ma'am, are you sure that is wise? The Autobots just fired upon military equipment, that is an open act war."

"No, shit!" the Secretary of Defense retorted. "Get me out there now, before this escalates and we have a real war."

XxxX

Sam Witwicki blinked against the brilliant sunshine. Having spent the last several days hidden underground, surrounded by cold, florescent bulbs, the sun hurt his eyes.

The man couldn't complain. Being outside felt wonderful. The fresh air filled his lungs, replacing that recycled, stale air from below the base. Even though a chill slipped into the breeze, he enjoyed the sun warming him through his jacket.

Sam wished Mikaela could join him outside, but the doctors had placed her on permanent bed rest. They feared any exertion, no matter how minimal, might send her into labor again.

Heavy footfalls pulled Sam out of his impromptu nature worship. The familiar sound of a familiar Autobot nearing put a smile on Sam's face.

He turned to face his friend. "Hey, Bee. What did you need?"

The yellow and black mech carefully dropped to a knee, a level closer to the smaller human. Anxiety rolled off the Autobot and Sam's joy quickly dissipated, along with his smile.

"I'm – I'm sorry," Bumblebee stuttered. "I have to go."

"What do you mean you 'have to go'?" questioned Sam, worry starting to grip his heart.

"It is bad." The Autobot looked away. "They need me."

Bumblebee stood and took a step back. Within seconds a sleek, yellow Camaro took the robot's place. Without another word, the Autobot pulled away from his friend and headed towards the desert.

Sam watched him go. A myriad of scenarios filled his mind. He wanted to know what happened, but he also trusted the mech. If Bee didn't want to talk about it, then they wouldn't talk.

Sam stayed for a few minutes longer, then turned to go inside. He wouldn't tell his wife any of this. Perhaps later, but not until both she and the baby were safe.

XxxX

Author's Notes:

Thank you to all who still read this.

interwebs for offering the "Splat Calculator" to help figure out how fast something such as Cosmos would fall to Earth. At 30,000 feet he would hit the ground in about 1 minute 18 seconds. This sounds about right considering it took a dude at the edge of space, with a parachute only 4.32 minutes to make it down.

2. Not sure how fast the Autobots could make it over the sand dunes. 6 to 7 minutes sounded about right considering they are on a terrain not conducive to fast travel in a vehicle.

3. I do not believe that Soundwave is emotionless, just extremely practical. But when he loses control he totally loses control.