Disclaimer: I only own my OCs.

Authoress: And you all know what time it is! Let's give a big birthday greeting to Mrpeepington!

All OCs: *sings* Happy birthday to you!

All Cannon Characters: *sing* Happy birthday to you!

Knockout: *being center of attention* *sings* Happy creation solar

Starscream: *shoves Knockout out of the way* *sings* Mrpeepington!

*two starts fighting*

Everyone else: *sing* Happy birthday to you!

Megatron: *primes cannon and walks toward Knockout and Starscream*

Chapter 43: A House Divided

Starscream's 1st P.O.V.

Just when things seemed to be getting back to as much normality as they could without Pandimala on the ship, this had to happen. Two signals had just picked up inside of Earth's mesosphere. While one of them wasn't sending out an identifying signal, the one that was showing closest to the planet was broadcasting a Decepticon emergency beacon. While we had some beneficial bots come from off-planet since Pandimala's time on the Nemesis, we had also had a servo-full of not so trustworthy ones. Frag it felt like we were playing with slagging grenades every time we had more bots come to the ship.

"Starscream," I paid attention as Lord Megatron started to address me. "You will lead the retrieval team. Shockwave, Skywarp, Breakdown, Ransack, and Hook will accompany you along with a small squadron of drones. I do not doubt that the second signal will contain Autobots. Be prepared for a fight. Your goal for this mission is to simply retrieve the Decepticons that may be there. If this is a false beacon, call in reinforcements if needed until you have an opening to retreat. There is no need to waste our time with a conflict against the Autobots." He then turned to Soundwave. "Soundwave, do you have the estimated landing coordinates?"

Soundwave gave a nod before displaying the coordinates on the main monitor. Great. A forest. That would limit what Skywarp and I could do from the air, but given that the Autobots didn't have any flyers, that would at least keep the fighting in the area of the crash. Knowing where all of our enemies might be could be just as useful as flying. If there were Decepticons at the location, and this wasn't just a false beacon, Skywarp would be able to move them quickly from the wreck and to Hook. The rest of us would give cover fire to keep the Autobots off of our chassis.

"The objects have landed Lord Megatron," Vox brought my attention to the monitor as it did show that the signals had hit the surface and stopped moving. This was it.

"I'll prepare the medbay for when they return, Lord Megatron," Knockout spoke up.

Our Lord gave a nod. "Very well Knockout," Knockout then left before the ground bridge opened. Taking that as the hint to get moving, since we had the drones for the squadron in the room, we made our way through.

On the other side, I couldn't help but give off a shiver as the air hit my wings. The moisture in this area was causing my sensors to have random spikes. I couldn't wait to retrieve whoever this might be so we could get back to the ship. "Shockwave, how far is the crash site?"

The intelligence mech glanced around before he spoke. "About eight clicks north from here."

"Ransack, move ahead with Skywarp and scout out what we might be coming upon. Make sure you two stay in sight of each other."

"You got it 'Scream," My brother nodded before he and Ransack started to move ahead.

Once they were gone, I turned to Breakdown. "How has training with the drones been going?" Since I mainly focused on aerial movements with the drones when I had the nano, I wasn't sure how servo-to-servo combat training was progressing as well as I should. Since we were about to go into battle, this seemed like a good time to get a brief update.

"I wouldn't go as far to say that they can go out in small groups yet, like we can, to retrieve the relics. But sending in about ten or twelve of them should allow us to send them for the relics. I do want to start giving Bunker some personal lessons in using a hammer. He seems to have a natural swing. Could be useful later on."

By this point, most of us officers had found ourselves a drone that seemed to excel in the areas that we had better capabilities. With this revelation that Breakdown had finally found a drone to start giving personal training to, the only ones left to find one were Ransack and Hook. I had a feeling that those two wouldn't be able to last long before they found drones to work with.

I couldn't wait for Pandimala to return to us so we could show her the progress that we all had made. When she was taken, those three, along with Skyquake, Crumplezone, Blitzwing, and I had not taken in a drone to train. With that number down to only two of us left, she was going to be ecstatic. Thinking about the situation we were in now, I had to put a hold on that number. Depending on how many Decepticons we retrieved from this mission, that was bound to raise.

My comm unit activating caused me to focus. "Starscream, we have confirmed sighting of Optimus Prime, Arcee, Cliffjumper, Sentinel Major, Prowl, Seaspray, and Ratchet." Ransack's voice was barely loud enough to be considered a whisper. He had to be close to them and that meant that Skywarp was just as close. "Both pods are here but neither of them is opened yet. Possibly jammed from the crash."

"Keep out of sight. If the contents of the pods contain allies, support them until we arrive. We are two clicks away. If we push it, we can cut that in half." I then canceled the communication before turning to the troops with me. "We need to pick up the pace. The Autobots are already at the location. The pods are not open yet, but our potential allies may need support."

We all then started to run toward the location. Curse these woods and not being able to just fly to the location. But, even if I could get into the air safely right now, there was no guarantee that I would be able to land. Frag this. But, we needed to get to the site before Ransack and Skywarp had to intervene so we could give them proper support.

Thankfully, some deity was on our side as, when our force arrived, the Autobots had managed to open one of the pods. Frag it that had better not be the one that was showing the beacon we picked up. "Skywarp, get to the second pod and get it open. Everybot else, give him support." I ordered before opening fire on the Autobots.

In no time, both sides were in a fight. I moved forward until I found myself locking servos with Cliffjumper. The mech that had at one point been at my mercy. With the look in his optics, he had wanted to fight me. But why?

Once we entered our first deadlock, it seemed like he was ready to tell me. "What did you do to Lizzie? You couldn't just keep her as a prisoner, could you? Had to have your ways with her." He then growled and shoved against me, pushing me back slightly and breaking our lock.

This was about Pandimala. Of course, it was. With what information we had received from Pandimala, Cliffjumper was Paul's guardian. Given the fact that Pandimala refused to speak to the god-in-human-flesh, then they would think that we were responsible.

"We didn't do a thing. Maybe you should evaluate how your lot has treated her and go from there." I threw back before I took out my blade to counter his. "Of course, that would mean that you Autobots had to have a processor that could look at your own situations...instead of blaming us for everything that goes wrong."

"We are just fine," Even though he responded to that, I could see from his chassis language that it wasn't. Plus, given the reports that Pandimala had been giving to us, that was even more obvious. They were barely holding themselves together. Honestly, from what I heard and saw, it was their Prime that was keeping them from fracturing. "And nothing is going to stop us from taking you 'Cons out."

"Except yourselves," I shot back before I continued to fight with him. I barely held back a smirk as he seemed to be lashing out at me. I hit a sore point for him. Things must be even worse at the Autobot base than Pandimala had reported.

"Cliffjumper fall back!" I was thrown back from Cliffjumper right as their Prime yelled that. Once I got my bearings, I looked around to see if I could find out what caused the sudden need to withdraw. It didn't take my optics long to lock onto two new Autobots gathered by the Prime.

One was a white mech with blue markings. He seemed to be looking at the Prime in awe. Great. Now we had to deal with one of Prime's fanbots. That was going to shake things up at their base. Of course, it was the bot on the other side of the Prime that caused me to feel worried. It was Elita-1. Optimus and the femme were known to be close. She would be another level-helmed bot in the base. If she was able to use her influence right, then maybe the drama at their base would calm down for Pandimala. That would be a very good thing. However, I knew that there were other bots at their base who would be able to overturn the sway the femme could have if they banded together.

"Starscream, we need to leave now!" I turned to my brother as he warped next to me and grabbed hold of me before he warped away.

We reappeared at the treeline behind me and I was able to gain my focus back enough to see that the leaking energon from the pods had been set on fire during the fight and caused the pods to explode. "The other pod, who was in it?" I assumed that the two Autobots were in a pod together. They wouldn't have set off a Decepticon beacon if they were in separate pods. That would have brought us down on them, possibly before their help might have arrived.

Skywarp motioned to his left and I took the chance to look. The one mech out of the two there that I recognized was Scavenger. The bulldozer mech was a well-known veteran of the fight, and last I heard he was supposed to be near the planet Cyteen and was going to be staying out of the fight given what happened back on Cybertron during Tyger Pax.

Of course, his being here might be explained by the young mech that seemed to be attached to Scavenger's side. The black car mech with red markings seemed to be tensed as his helm seemed to swivel between all of us. He had blue optics and they eventually focused on me. I was fairly easy to recognize given that I was the second-in-command of the entirety of the Decepticon forces. From the markings on his white faceplate, he must have got into a scuffle with one of the Autobots.

"Let's call in a bridge to the Nemesis," I said to Shockwave as I looked across the field. From the chassis I could see, we lost four of the drones in that encounter, though if that was from the Autobots or the explosion I wasn't sure. From what I could see of the Autobots, they all seemed to come out of that unscathed.

"I'll be seeing you eventually, Decepticon," Sentinel Prime yelled toward us as their bridge appeared behind them. I looked toward where he was looking and saw that the car mech attached to Scavenger was focused on the mech, and his optics were wide with what looked like fear.

Before I could ask anything about what that was about, our bridge opened and so I motioned for everybot to go inside. I would be able to get my answers when Lord Megatron inspected our two new arrivals.

Pandimala's 1st P.O.V.

I sighed as I leaned against the wall. With the retrieval team going to get who I was assuming was Smokescreen at least, I knew that things at the base were going to get even tenser. I had been venturing more and more out of my room for the past few solars and, from the different conversations I had been in, I realized that the Autobots were barely keeping themselves together. If something wasn't done, and soon, the Autobots here on Earth were going to fall into anarchy before I could ever hope to create peace between the two factions.

"You look pretty deep in thought femme," I glanced to my right to see Zarron join me. The mech had been great in watching out for me during this week. "Want to share?"

Well, it would be nice to get some of these thoughts out. "The Autobots seem to be falling apart. Why is that?"

Zarron shook his helm. "Well, from what I have been able to gather around the base, it didn't start to get as bad as it is until I showed up with Springer, Ironhide, and Flamewar. With Flamewar added onto Pitch and Sentinel, and myself eventually joining with Wheeljack, we can't seem to find a peaceful middle."

"And what about any sort of compromise?" I wanted to suggest why didn't Prime cast those three out of the Autobots, which would fix the problems for the most part, but I already knew the answer to that. Optimus wasn't a mech to cast out the problems in his faction. He wanted to fix the problems without losing any of his troops. While that was one way to go about it, it did lead to a longer time than your troops were on the edge like this, if they would ever leave it. While the Decepticons were short on troops compared to the Autobots, outside of the drones, we were unified and that would help us in the long run...especially if the Autobots couldn't get their acts together.

"There is no compromise with them. I'm surprised that you are the one suggesting that, given what those three did to you. If Wheeljack hadn't realized who you used to be, then you might be in stasis lock or, worse, offline." He then motioned vaguely in front of him. "What about you, Paul, and Miko? Are you willing to compromise there?"

I flinched at that. He was right, of course. While I eventually wanted to be able to get along with Paul and Miko, what they did...especially Paul, ran too deep. I was never going to be able to fully trust him again. "Not so much compromise I guess...but at least tolerate them enough to move forward. Letting differences split how the faction is running is going to lead to the faction's destruction faster than anything the Decepticons could do."

Zarron nodded. "True. Is that why Astrotrain and Airachnid haven't been seen in battle for a while?"

Well, it was time to stop holding out on that. It didn't hurt the Decepticons for the Autobots to know that those two were gone, though that also included Thrust though I wouldn't be giving that up. "Right. They couldn't tolerate certain aspects of me being on the ship and it came to a point where the Decepticons were better served with them off of the ship."

"And we've all noticed how well the Decepticons have been working together recently." I was wondering if the Autobots had noticed that. There was my answer. "And here we are, barely able to scrounge through a fight. I bet that this retrieval is going to go just as well as every other fight lately." He sounded pretty annoyed at that. It was probably time to change subjects.

So, I decided to talk about our spar the other solar. "So, how did you block my kick during our spar the other solar?"

Zarron smirked at that. "Throughout my existence, I've studied many of the Cybertronian martial arts. I'm not the best at some of them, but Diffusion was the one that I clicked with easily. But, I have to say that you kept me on my pedes more than I thought you would."

I smiled at that. "Yeah, when I turned into Pandimala, the mechs up there wanted to make sure I could fight if I needed to so most of them took turns training me. I picked up a little bit of everybot's fighting style, plus the self-defense I learned when I was human. Even though I'm pretty big, I latched onto Starscream's technique and incorporate it into how I move when I fight."

"I saw that," Zarron agreed with a nod. "Of course, it took me about half-way through our fight to do that. Triple changers shouldn't be able to move like you do...and in saying that don't change a thing. It's a great lesson to always expect the unexpected. A triple changer light on her pedes is something unexpected."

We both laughed at that before some of the others came into the room. Guess the others were about to be coming back from their mission. "Ratchet said we have two more bots on our side, and the Decepticons got the same." Balm said as she and Wheeljack walked over to us. Wheeljack had been having his checkup with Balm and they must have finished up when Ratchet contacted Balm.

So, I was going to need to get their names from the Decepticons when I went to the bar for my next check-in. As for the Autobots, I guess I was going to meet them soon. Of course, the last time I met Autobots, it didn't go well. Now that I thought about it, it might be best for me to make sure that I wasn't about to get shot by whoever these bots were. "Balm...do you know if the other Autobots told these two new bots about me?" I then motioned toward my Decepticon insignia in emphasis.

All three of the Autobots by me glanced at where I was pointing before glancing at each other. Balm finally found her vocals and answered me. "I'm...not sure."

I frowned. Thanks, Balm. Love the confidence in that.

When the bridge opened, the four of us, along with the rest of the Autobots in the room, turned as the retrieval team came through. And of course, fate was back to hating me because guess what? Non-other than fragging Smokescreen was the first to come through. While I didn't hate his character when I was human, his impulsiveness was known to get him in trouble...and I had a feeling that was going to happen now.

"Decepticon!"

Yep.

Thankfully, before the mech could launch at me, Optimus put a servo on his shoulder, stopping the mech. "Pandimala is a guest among us. She is an ally." Well, I wouldn't go that far, but it did get Smokescreen to stand down. Once the rest of the team made it through, along with the femme next to Optimus who I was sure I knew who she was, Optimus and the others told the two new bots about my situation.

After that was done, Smokescreen walked up to me before holding out his servo. "Hey, sorry about that. Didn't mean any harm. The designation's Smokescreen by the way."

Well, I was just talking to Zarron about compromise. So, since he didn't attack me and was apologizing on top of that, I'd let it slide. So I shook his servo. "No hard feelings. My designation is Pandimala."

"And that just leaves me," The femme then walked up to me and offered her servo, which I took before she continued. "My designation is Elita-1." Yeah, I was right about that. She seemed close to Optimus and he didn't seem to mind that closeness. So, that lead me to guess who she was.

Now, I just needed to find out who the Decepticons were if they knew who they were. Of course, I couldn't be the one to ask. I would find out eventually, but hopefully, I wouldn't have to wait. Thankfully, Balm had my back on that one. "Ratchet, you mentioned that there were two new Decepticons as well. Do you know who they are?"

Ratchet nodded. "While the younger-looking mech wasn't familiar to me, I did recognize Scavenger. We're going to struggle with him back in Megatron's circle." Scavenger. Since Hook didn't mention him as a Constructicon when I asked about his gestalt, then I was lead to believe that he was probably more like his Armada form...unless he was completely overhauled in this universe. Could be. I'd have to ask the others at the bar for a physical description.

While the others looked worried about that, the fact that Sentinel looked happy about something caused me to shiver before the mech spoke. "I know about the other 'Con. Knew that little brat was lying to me back then. It'll be nice to reacquaint myself with that useless scrap. Teach that car mech to lie to me like that. Skittish little thing too. Didn't bother to remember his designation though." Something about Sentinel's look about the mech made me doubt that he couldn't remember the designation.

"Do at least remember what the mech looked like? Or is your short-term memory deteriorating as well as your long-term?" Wheeljack jabbed at the mech.

Sentinel frowned at that before he answered. "My memory banks are just fine Wrecker. He was a tall mech. Black plating with red markings. White faceplate and blue optics. First met the mech on Kinmoku. Unclaimed world but heavy Decepticon presence at the time I was there. Took the mech prisoner and kept him at our holding facility on Cyteen. Mech always insisted he wasn't a 'Con. Knew he was lying about that."

Sentinel continued to speak but I didn't pay any attention. From how he described the mech...my spark beat picked up as I zoned out the chaos that was developing around me. There was only one mech that came to my processor with that description. A wave of guilt washed over me as I thought about the mech. It was my fault. He was one of mine...and he didn't deserve to be hurt like I felt he was by Sentinel. Even when I created him, the Sentinel of that universe had it out for him. If I was being honest with myself, I put him through more pain and suffering than I even put Pandimala through. And that said a lot as I know I put Pandimala through the wringer at times.

As Zarron and Wheeljack started to throw punches back at Sentinel and Pitch for whatever caused them to fight, my processor just focused on who I was sure was now on the Nemesis with the others. I needed to make up for what happened. I would protect that mech however I could.

It was the least I could do.

Zarron's 1st P.O.V.

The femme was stressed again. She was hiding it better than she had been the past few solars, but Pandimala was worried about something. Frag it and we told her to keep herself as calm as she could. The last thing that we all needed was for the femme to get as close to processor shock as she got. Not after everything, the previously human femme must have gone through.

Though, I wasn't sure I could say much about her time with the Decepticons. She never really reacted in a concerned way when speaking about her time with the Decepticons. From what Wheeljack and Balm were able to uncover, outside of a few incidents, the femme was surprisingly well taken care of while she was with them. Were they strict; yes. But, from what I could see, that was paying off for their cause. They were organized, and they were training. It had not escaped my notice that even the drones were getting more proficient. From what I heard, they were even causing us difficulty during our missions in groups of twelve. When there was an actual officer on the field, we were having difficulties.

And speaking of difficulties, there was a rising issue that I noticed with Cliffjumper's report from the retrieval mission. Starscream had gotten him angry, and for reasons that I knew were coming. The Decepticons had noticed that the Autobots were fractured. Of course, the femme, who still would not allow our medics to take her Decepticon insignia off, had noticed our fracturing teamwork. It was making her uncomfortable.

I would need to make another report to the bots who asked me to do this. They needed to know that the mission was becoming very complicated. Frag it all! I just needed something to make sense for me. Just one slagging thing!

"You okay?" I jumped when Pandimala's voice came from next to me and I studied her. When had she gotten here? I almost always knew when other bots were around me. How did shed do that?

"When did you get here?" I asked her as I looked around, making sure that there were not any other bots around that I missed.

She shrugged her shoulders. "Only a click or two. Most of the others have gone to retrieve some relics from signals that have popped up. A few more went to look for energon. As for the humans, Jack is getting help from Raf with his homework while Paul is working with Miko on some training. Good for them. If Miko runs out even half as much as I have heard about, then she needs it."

"You've been stressed lately. Care to share with me?" When she looked hesitant, I decided that a little blackmail wouldn't hurt. "Or I can tell the medics and have them do another full psych eval."

Her helm snapped to me. "You wouldn't."

I smirked "Try me. Between getting you angry or the medics angry, I'm going with you every time femme."

She let a smile crack on her faceplate at that. "True, though the same applies to you."

"I'd expect nothing less." I then focused on her. "So tell me."

"It's the Autobots," She leaned back against the wall. "Between all of the mistrust around here and a clear lack of discipline for when a bot does get out of servo, then I'm surprised you all have lasted this long. I want peace, and I want the fighting to stop. But, if they Autobots fall to themselves before that can happen, then it'll all be a waste." While I could see that she was telling the truth, I could see that there was something else as well. But, while I wanted to prevent her from going into processor-shock again, I also shouldn't push her. "What about you? You haven't seemed like the kind of mech to let somebot sneak up on them as I did. And I wasn't even trying."

"Same as you. I worry about the Autobots." I then looked at her and noticed that her cannons seemed to be gaining some wear. "Have you been taking care of your cannons?"

To her credit, the femme didn't waste a nano before she shook her helm. "No, Ratchet commented on how we are low on supplies so I didn't want to ask for something just for my cosmetic needs."

I shook my helm before grabbing her servo and pulling her behind me. As she tried to complain, I interrupted her. "Femme, not dealing with cosmetic damage now might let it turn into something more serious, and might cost more resources."

But, the femme shook her helm. "I'm fine Zarron. I can file them later if they start looking too bad."

That was it! "Nope. You are going to Ratchet right now!" I then continued to yank the femme down the hall. I would have Ratchet also check her systems. If she reacted like that in regards to taking care of her chassis, then I wanted to make sure that she didn't take up the same thought when it came to her energon rations as well. She was a bigger femme and would need more energon. But, if she got this self-sacrifice idea in her helm, then she might have started taking less than she needed if she heard any of the number of bots complain about them. Maybe I needed to be more worried about her physical health than her mental at the nano.

Of course, she did make a point. The divide in the Autobots meant that, if there ever was a chance at peace, we might not make it to that point before the Autobots collapsed. I had been researching human history for my time here on Earth, and it seemed to fit the state of the Autobots quite well. The human was named Abraham Lincoln and his words seemed to transcend beyond even what he probably imagined. Our house was divided and, if we didn't get our act together, we wouldn't be able to stand. If peace was possible, we needed to be ready.

Pandimala: *glares* You brought him in. I can't believe you did that.

Authoress: *glares* Why don't you focus on the Autobots for now. They are the closest concern for you.

Pandimala: *growls* You're avoiding the topic.

Authoress: *nods* Yep. *runs*

Pandimala: *snarls* Get back here Authoress!

AN: And here is the next chapter! Again, happy birthday to Mrpeepington and best wishes to you! This chapter had a little action in it and seemed to touch on a few subjects. Pandimala makes known her goal to have peace between the sides and Zarron is seeing that the Autobots might not be ready for peace if the chance comes up. Of course, we also get four more characters, three of which I have introduced by name. I wonder how many of my readers know who the fourth one is?

Well, that is all for now. Here are the next chapters for your knowledge!

Chapter 44: Training Habits

Chapter 45: Possibility

Chapter 46: (Find out next time!)

Okay, so please drop a review, either to say hi, leave a review or to wish Mrpeepington a happy birthday! Until next time, TTYL! *tries to survive Rainbow is Magic*