Megatron is losing his marbles, big surprise. The autobots discover where the last omega key is...but Knock Out already knew where it was, didn't he?

The new autobot? He was the remaining key? Or did he know its location?

Megatron growled.

There had to be some positive here. Yes, Optimus could destroy him and this very warship in battle now. Yes, his infernal enemy had access to three of the keys. But there must be something, some way to turn the tide of the war again.

He had to be the one to revive Cybertron. He had to. He was Cybertron's savior; he always had been. Its destroyer as well, but what point was there to saving and creation without destruction? Primus existed so Unicron could as well. Megatron just happened to play both of the god's roles. How amusing.

Oh, Optimus would be unamused to hear him think so. The Prime had gone all self-righteous on him in their last fight. Disgusting. It was disgusting that such a weakling could wield godly power while Megatron had to scrape for ways to keep up (hadn't he always? the thought was shoved aside). He'd meant what he said; they should have both ascended, both wielded the power of the cosmos, both battled until one finally fell. It would have been legendary. And legends were never forgotten.

"Soundwave," he spoke up and drew the lanky mech's attention. Of course, he trusted that Soundwave's attention had always been on him. The rest could fail him, but the carrier could be trusted.

Regardless of recent slip ups. Although, if they were to continue...

Well, it would have been very typical; the mechs he trusted most were always the most likely to inevitably fail him.

Why else had he so quickly determined that Orion Pax would have to die? That deadly force would be required to make him finish the Iacon Database? Megatron knew what a delight it had been to hear the mech call him Megatronus and trust him so absolutely once again; but he also knew the inevitable. The upcoming failure, the eventual betrayal. He'd merely been prepared. No matter how delightful it had been to initiate Orion Pax into the decepticon fold, he'd known it would never last.

But Soundwave would not betray him in such a traditional sense. The mech had no purpose to living except to serve him. He was passionless and apathetic to life or death; as cybertronians with mutilated sparks often were. And Soundwave was missing five chunks of his spark, although he'd done a commendable job keeping the sixth alive. Really, Megatron ought to praise him for it one of these cycles; he knew how much the spymaster thrived on his commendations.

So no, if Soundwave were to fail him, as it seemed most inevitably likely to occur, it would not be a traditional betrayal. It merely would mean he was no longer doing his jobs, no longer being the perfect decepticon. Slip-ups and failures would amount to the only betrayal of trust the apathetic mech would commit.

"We need that mech. Have you pinpointed the location of the autobot base?"

There was a beat of silence. And then Soundwave shook his head once.

Megatron stood there and looked at the reaction. Then he thanked his TIC for his work and left the bridge.

Slip-ups and failures indeed.

The command to return to the main room summoned every autobot.

Arcee bridged in from the Darby's garage, which she had wheeled out to once the command reached her. She'd been laying on the floor once again; it seemed that the ruined carpet didn't matter so much as the feeling of protection both Darby's needed to fall asleep. Either that or June just didn't want Arcee touching her new government issue car. The two-wheeler was pretty sure the latter was not it.

Bulkhead drove to the base, since he knew it would not take him long and their energon reserves would appreciate the lack of groundbridging. He hadn't given Miko the heads up he was departing from the curb. The girl was already fast asleep, or should be. She would no doubt try to join him in whatever new mission Optimus had anyways and the mess with Airachnid had shown him that it was better she not be able to do so. Still, as much as he wanted to return to Cybertron, the wrecker could only hope this was not the last time he'd drive away from the girl's host parent's house.

Bumblebee hadn't been able to take Raf home after the human school was over earlier that day; he'd been busy helping secure one of the omega keys from Soundwave, after all. He hadn't been able to guard the curb by the Esquivel home either. Because of a pretty bad shot to the back, Ratchet had managed to trap the scout in the medbay until well beyond the young human boy's early bedtime. He sent an apology email to Raf and received reassurement in exchange. Bumblebee knew he'd miss such quick messages from his little friend.

Ratchet was already there. But despite being near Optimus already, his old friend had not shared whatever news that apparently warranted the rest of them to come. In their room, Breakdown was putting a buffer and other polishing tools away while Knock Out stretched. The job was only half done, but neither planned to ignore the Prime. Smokescreen was playing in the training room, making play pretend punches at an imaginary Megatron and then congratulating himself after every good 'hit'. When the message came, he felt relieved. Life was boring without spending it with other people.

Flying overhead, Wheeljack piloted the Jackhammer towards the small desert base. He'd planned to leave after coming back with Bulkhead, but as per the norm he was getting dragged right back. Almost surprisingly, he didn't mind. He had a good feeling about the war lately. Maybe it would end and he'd settle down. No more fighting, much fun as it was. No more running from pain because no more cons to cause that pain. He was allowed to wish, wasn't he?

And agent Fowler returned his jet to the top of the old missile silo; he'd left after the three squadrons had returned with their relics, only to get the message that the last key had been located. Much as he wanted to sleep, he still felt like it was his duty to see the war off Earth. Escort it to the door and give it the boot, even if he'd miss its fighters.

"You called us?" Arcee spoke up first. Optimus nodded.

"I have decoded the final entry to the Iacon Database," he said gravely, before pointing at the screen. "However, the coordinates are odd. I will show you and we can discuss what it likely means."

A few moments later and the rest of the team realized why he had acted so confused.

The 'coordinates' were a picture. The picture was of a certain autobot. That certain autobot was currently staring at the screen and making a noise of surprised awe.

"Wait..." the femme frowned in confusion. "What is destiny's child doing up there?"

On the catwalk, Fowler snorted. "Is this some idea of a joke, Prime?"

Of course it wasn't. Optimus did not 'joke'.

"No, agent Fowler, it is not."

Bumblebee tried his input next. "Is Smokescreen the key? Or does-" he turned to the still speechless rookie. "-Smokey, do you know where the last key is?"

The silver mech finally regained the ability to speak.

"No? I mean, I wish I did, but..."

Unnoticed by the others, Knock Out slid closer to the rookie. At the same time, Ratchet had moved towards the screen.

"Perhaps the key was hidden in the same escape pod as him," the old medic suggested. "Or maybe it is hidden somewhere in him or his subspace. I will conduct a full scan and plan an operation, in that cas-"

Any further planning was interrupted by the younger medic in the room.

A scan and operation would've taken too long, after all. So Knock Out decided to grab the phase shifter off Smokescreen's arm, ignoring the protesting "hey!" from the rookie, and then plunged his own servo into the silver mech's chest.

The rest of the base had gone shock still before they started making their own gestures.

"Grosss..." Bumblebee groaned. Smokescreen was ineffectually trying to hit the red mech.

But then Knock Out's arm retreated and it tugged along a rusty device with it.

The last omega key.

That was rather quick thinking. Almost oddly quick thinking.

Optimus narrowed his optics at the unfolding scene.

The decepticon bridge contained all of its highest ranking officers. None of them had answers or suggestions of any use. Starscream wanted to use the humans the autobots kept around as hostages to demand the rookie and the keys. The plan was cold-sparked, bringing younglings into danger, and would have likely worked. But Soundwave had not discovered the location of these human's homes yet.

Dreadwing remained mostly quiet, asking his Lord on occasion if they could not fight off the autobots and prevent them from leaving the planet. There was no concrete plan suggested in such words and so Soundwave ignored them.

Finally, Lord Megatron decided on their course of action. It was far from ideal, but it was all they had.

"If they have already taken all of these keys," Lord Megatron narrowed his optics dangerously, "-then we shall construct a barricade around this omega lock, wherever it may be.

His air commander's wings hiked. His formal 2IC frowned.

"How?" the big mech asked.

The answer was simple, or would have been if the bulky seeker was privy to the many decepticon constructs on and near this planet.

"Prepare my spacebridge," the warlord growled.

Behind him, Dreadwing startled. "We have a spacebridge, my liege?"

Their commander didn't turn to face him. Instead, the only reply the bulky seeker got was from his much smaller counterpart.

"You mean to say the loyal decepticon second-in-command does not even know of our two spacebridges we've built here?" came Starscream's predictable taunt.

Three, Soundwave noted. But the small seeker did not know of the third one yet. He had gone rogue before the second had finished its construction, let alone been attacked by autobots and thereafter dismantled.

The mocking served its purpose. Dreadwing bristled up and growled at his fellow 2IC.

"Silence!" came the roar of their leader.

Soundwave could have been smug at how easily he obeyed the command. He was always silent, after all.

The vow he took was rather easy to uphold. He'd never done much talking. And, while its remaining difficulty sufficed for a showing of his honor for the cause, he had chosen it because his leader did not want to hear him speak during the war. Perhaps when it was over, they could return to...but that was unimportant. What mattered was that Lord Megatron did not like to hear talk unless it came from himself. Soundwave would oblige. He would always oblige.

Doing so never gave his Lord what he needed, but it was all the spymaster could offer.

He was just as hollow a replacement as Starscream was for that young mech who'd visited the small Kaon apartment so often. Soundwave knew that. Starscream did not, but the former gladiator did. But the decepticons were hollow replacements for his lost symbiotes and this war was a pale patch for the emptiness around them all.

Such truths would not stop him from trying for his best.

His old companion deserved nothing less than utter loyalty.

The autobots did not have a way of reaching their planet. Fowler thought that meant the plan was doomed at this present time. Maybe he could get them supplies to build some sort of space ship or they could try to take down one of the decepticon 'spacebridges' again, but other than that?

Luckily, Ratchet had ideas. He was more enthusiastic than ever as he approached the problem. It seemed the promise of seeing his homeworld again made the cranky medic a little less cranky.

He tried to do some sort of engineering trick to the autobot groundbridge. Wheeljack helped, since apparently the loose canon had a decent knowledge of mechanics. More than once, Fowler caught Ratchet saying he wished Raf was there to help.

The experiment failed. The human had sighed and prepared to pitch his own ideas to them.

And then Prime had stepped up to the task.

Fowler didn't think he'd been more impressed than when he'd seen that fancy hammer go down on the alien technology. The action itself was nothing fancy, but the mere fact that something could do what basically qualified as 'magic' blew his mind. If only humans had toys like that, he couldn't help but think.

Then the whole team joined up by their new spacebridge.

They would go now, while they had the upper hand. It was logical. The kids, probably even June Darby, were going to skin him the next morning for letting them leave without saying goodbye.

Optimus Prime looked out over them all; Fowler included.

"We plan now to bring this war back to Cybertron; not, as we have in the past, to fight it- but to end it through restoring our homeworld." His optics landed once again on Fowler and then Ratchet, who would stay behind with the bridge controls. "But Earth will remain our home as well. It is with sorrow that we leave this second home behind; but with great hope that we look towards the future of both Earth and Cybertron."

A year ago and Fowler would've thought the big guy was just blowing exhaust. Now, he felt his own pride in this team swelling up. The agent threw a standard salute. "You're always welcome back here, big guy," he said. "All of you."

Even the loose canons of the bunch.

Prime nodded.

"Many thanks, agent Fowler."

Damn, he was even going to miss that specific way Prime always thanked him.

"Stay in touch," he replied. "I mean it."

And at that last sentence from their human contact, Prime gave the smallest of smiles.

Then he'd turned towards the bridge and ordered it powered up before anyone could notice the expression.

The team stood in front of their new and improved teleporter with weapons out. That sword was in its hilt on Prime's back. Bumblebee fastened the weird claw 'phase shifter' thing on his wrist. Smokescreen was tossing the weapon of mass destruction known as the spark extractor up and down. Knock Out spun the immobilizer. Bulkhead gripped the forge like it was always meant to be used as a battlehammer. Arcee stuck the gun they called a resonance blaster onto her own arm. Breakdown held the unactivated polarity gauntlet. Wheeljack clipped a grenade on his hips. They'd evidently ran out of fancy relics by the last one.

Ratchet pulled down the lever for the spacebridge and stepped back to shield Fowler from the gusts of air. This couldn't have been easy on the guy, since being left behind never was. But here he was smiling; he'd never seen the medic so happy.

The bridge roared; Arcee was right when she'd told Jack that spacebridges were more intense than their ground based alternates. Its noise tore through the small base. The only human present had his hands pressed against his ears. They remained there to block off noise, but he kept his eyes open despite the air pressure.

He would see this through.

Prime disappeared into the green. The four smallest bots followed. The last three took up the back of the party.

And then the aliens were gone, swallowed up into the flare of light.

Fowler wished them all luck.

AN- The title is a slight reference to a different franchise. If you recognize it, kudos to you.