Transformers Prime: Through Hell & Back Again

by xXBlack'BladeXx

She is his daughter; he loves her with his entire spark. He would do anything to protect her and keep her safe. Now both her fate and that of the universe lies in his hands. He will be tested, and he will not fail. He can't. He will do whatever it takes to bring her back home again safe and sound... even if it means going through Hell and back again.

29. The Moment of Choice is at Hand

Wouldja look at that! I actually managed to get another chapter up before a whole entire year went by! Well, what'd'ya know, huh? Maybe I can actually keep this updating thing going in a semi-timely fashion. Who wants to take bets?

I hope this is a nice way to either end August or start off September—whenever it is you guys read this. I had a pretty good time with this chapter once I finally got going with it and got into a good flow. I needed a good bit of family drama again, and this chapter definitely delivered. I'm also quickly falling in love with Cyrus the more I get into his head. And I think his and Eve's relationship might be one of my favorites alongside Comet Thunder's a Quinn's—it's just so sweet to think about!

Anywho—on with the show!

REMEMBER, I OWN NOTHING EXCEPT MY OCS AND THE HYBRID PEOPLE.

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"This will be the day we've waited for. This will be the day we open up the door…" Jeff Williams; This Will Be the Day (Acoustic)

27

Quo Electio est in Manu

(The Moment of Choice is At Hand)

She was going to do it. Optimus had told her 'no', that it was too dangerous, but she was going to do it. By the time she'd finished her shift that day after meeting with Optimus and Atlas, Ally had decided that she was going to do it, in spite of the danger and unpredictability of it all. She had to; the world was in danger—her cousin was in danger. It was true she didn't know Hunter—her only information was what Optimus had said—but Ally couldn't help but believe that, had their situations been switched, Hunter would do everything in her power to help her: In fact she was sure of it. They were family, and family took care of each other—saved each other if need be. Unless you were Luna; but every family had a black sheep, and Ally refused to let that witch tarnish their family any more than she already had.

So yes, Ally was going to do it: This evening, she was going to enter Steel's dreams and try her damnedest to find the Lunation's location. No, not try—she would find it. She had to.

As she exited the front doors of her high school and made her way to her car in the parking lot, Ally went over her plan in her head again. She wasn't working this evening, so she didn't have to worry about getting out of that, but she did have to get out of her chores at the very least. Her parents were big on responsibility; they wouldn't just let her get out of any of her chores without a good reason. And she couldn't wait until nightfall to start trying—she had to get into the dreamscape as soon as possible. The teen figured her grandmother had taken the cult somewhere overseas, which meant it would probably be night—or close to night—wherever they were. That meant Steel could very well be asleep and dreaming or close to that point; he'd always been an early-to-bed type.

"Get home, get into bed, get into the dreamscape, get into Steel's head, find the info, and get out," Ally murmured to herself. That was it. It was that easy. And it was that difficult. Any number of things could go wrong with this endeavor. But now wasn't the time to think about any of those things—now was the time to just focus on the first hurdle: playing her parents.

"Migraine," the word went off like a lightbulb in Ally's head as she unlocked her car and slipped inside. "Mom and Dad'll let me lay down and nap with a migraine—they wouldn't risk that again." It had been a long time since Ally had actually suffered from a migraine—several years—but the last time she had, it had gotten so bad that every single thing on their street that hadn't been anchored down to the ground somehow had ended up floating several feet in the air. It had all quickly been remedied with a spell by Eve, but it had been a nerve-wracking situation regardless, not to mention Eve hadn't been at all happy to be forced into using her powers. So needless to say, a migraine was Ally's best chance to get around her parents.

"Well," Ally sighed, looking at herself in the rearview mirror, "let's hope all those acting awards I've gotten through the years really mean something."

Apparently they did, because about fifteen minutes after she'd arrived home, Ally was in her pajamas and climbing into bed, her parents having all but ordered her to lie down and rest. "Okay, she sighed, slipping under her covers and settling into her fluffy mattress and pillow, "here goes." Taking a slow deep breath and releasing it even more slowly, the seventeen-year-old closed her eyes and waited for sleep to overtake her.

She was standing in darkness—darkness so black she couldn't see her hand in front of her face. But then she was emerging into color and light and open air. She was standing in the middle of a wide, open field full of tall, green grass and spotted with flowers of all kinds and colors. A comfortable breeze stroked the field, turning it into a gently rippling sea of lush green. The cloudless sky above her was awash with the deep, rich colors of a sunset—orange, scarlet, violet, sapphire, gold—and glittered brilliantly with stars that might have been diamonds. Little lights flew around her, like multicolored fireflies. But these little lights weren't fireflies.

Closing her eyes, she breathed deeply and outstretched her arm and hands as if to embrace someone. She focused as hard as she could. Around her the little orbs slowly moved away from her, except for one. A single, silvery-purple light surged towards her, only stopping once it was between her outstretched hands. Once there, it grew and swelled until it fit perfectly between them, touching both.

She smiled at the familiar warmth of the orb and opened her eyes, gazing into the soft, silvery-purple light. "I thought you'd be here," she murmured softly. She pulled the orb closer, bringing it to her face and whispered into it, "Aperire ostium." [Open this door.]

The orb responded to the phrase, shooting out of her hands and flying off a ways in front of her before stopping. It remained stationary in the air for a moment, completely inactive. Then the orb, which was roughly the size of a basketball, shrank and shrank and shrank until it seemed to completely disappear, before surging and growing enormously in size. It released a bright flash.

She closed her eyes against the flash, and when she opened them again, a large, ovular portal hovered before her. The edges of it were glowing with the silvery-purple light of the orb, but the center was a spinning black vortex, peppered with glittering star-like sparkles. She smiled and moved towards it. When she was standing right in front of the portal, she reached out, attempting to reach into the portal, and her hand went through resulting in a slight, watery sound to emit from the portal. She smirked. "Still haven't put up the mental blocks yet, huh, Steel?" she murmured. "Not your smartest move. Thank Primus for that." Without a second to spare, she slipped through the vortex, the sparkling black swallowing her up with a soft slosh.

She found herself in a very strange place on the other side of the portal. It wasn't any unfamiliar place—it was completely familiar in many ways—but it was still very strange for the simple fact that it seemed to be a mashup of two familiar places: her home and a Lunation mansion. The foyer she was standing in right now was definitely the one she stood in everyday when she walked through the front door, as were the stairs that led upwards to the second story of the house. But looking through the opening that should have led to the living room of her home, she found a massive library that was twice as large as her house and full of magical artifacts, books, and gothic décor.

She walked into the library and looked around, her nose wrinkling in disgust. Dream or not, she had never wanted to see or stand in a room like this ever again. There were too many bitter memories in places like this.

"No!"

A sudden, angered yell startled her and she crept back towards the entrance of the library and peeked out into the foyer. Her gaze drifted to the top of the stairs to see a girl standing there. The girl's back was too her, but she was tall, slender, and had long, fiery red hair that was quite a bit darker than her own. "Hunter," she whispered. She knew she had to be right; the description, the fact that she was in Steel's dream— there was no one else this girl could possibly be.

As if to prove her theory right, a boy appeared at the top of the stairs now. He was a bit taller than the girl was, had gold-blond hair, and striking electric-blue eyes. While he looked more haggard that she could ever remember seeing him—his hair disheveled and his clothes ratty, torn, and dirty—there was no mistaking him. Her spark clenched. Tears bit at her eyes. "Steel…" she whimpered, voice quivering. It was him. She was finally, actually seeing him again for the first time in so long. Dream version of him or not, it was him; it was her brother.

"Hunter, please!" Steel pleaded, reaching out towards the redhead. Guilt was written across his face and pain was shining in his eyes as he tried to talk to Hunter. He looked so broken—so ashamed. "Hunter, please, I'm sorry! You have to believe me—please!"

"No!" Hunter barked, sounding just as hurt and broken as Steel. "I'm hurt, Steel! I'm hurt and it's all your fault! You! You did this, Steel! It was all you!"

"I didn't mean to!" Steel exclaimed beseechingly. "I never meant to! I never wanted to hurt you, Hunter—that's not what I was trying to do!"

"It doesn't matter—you did! You hurt me, Steel! You hurt me worse than anyone ever has! I thought you loved me! I thought I could trust you! I loved you and trusted you and you hurt me!"

"I do love you, Hunter!" He moved towards her. "If you would just let me try to help-"

"No!" Hunter stepped backwards, closer to the steps. "Don't touch me! Don't come near me! You betrayed me! You hurt me, Steel!"

Steel backed away from the redhead, but he looked extremely hurt by it. "Hunter," he said, voice soft and calm now, "I know I did some things that made you angry and caused you pain, but I never meant for that to happen. I never meant to make you angry and hurt and I'm sorry! I'm so, so sorry." Tears were streaming down his cheeks now. "I love you, Hunter, and I want to earn your trust again. Please… just let me prove it to you. Let me help you."

"Why would you ever think I could trust you again?" Hunter asked in disbelief. "Or that I would trust you again?"

"Hunter, please, believe me—I-"

"No! I'm done, Steel! I don't want anything to do with you ever!" With that, the redheaded girl whirled around and began to storm down the stairs.

"Hunter!" Steel called after her, looking alarmed. "Hunter, you can't leave! If you try you'll get punished again! You can't leave!"

"Watch me!" Hunter bellowed, stomping towards the door.

"Hunter, stop! You can't leave! Don't open that door—you can't leave! They'll hurt you! She'll make them hurt you again! I don't wanna see you get hurt again!"

But Hunter wasn't listening; she kept right on for the front door. And then she was seizing the handle and throwing it right open.

Just like that, a hoard of Field Acolytes surged through the door, tackling Hunter and dragging her down to the floor. Without warning they were circling around the girl and beating her, pummeling her into the floor as she screamed and wailed in pain and anger, forcing her to stay down even as she fought to stand.

She couldn't help but cringe and back away from the scene, wanting to get away from the brutality of it all. Dream or not, it was violent and bloody and excruciating to watch.

And then, as if it couldn't get any worse than it already was, it did.

Looking utterly incensed, Steel came barreling down the stairs and lunged himself into the thick of it all. He was grabbing Acolytes and throwing them away from Hunter. "No!" he screamed. "Don't touch her! Get off her! This isn't right! You can't hurt her like this—it isn't right!" He kept trying to pull the Acolytes away, but it was no use; every time he threw one off them away another appeared in its place and the previous one leapt back into the fray as if nothing had happened at all. It was completely fruitless. But Steel didn't stop for even a second in his endeavors

Then she appeared.

Coming from behind her, passing straight through her like an apparition as all dream figments apart from that of the Dreamer did, Luna strode onto the scene. She shivered at the sight of the woman, both unspeakable fear and anger rising up inside of her. She wanted to cower away from the witch, but at the same time she wanted to unleash the most terrible curses she knew upon her. But she couldn't. For one, this was a dream—her attacks would do nothing. For two, such an attack would undoubtedly alert Steel to her presence in his dream. Steel wasn't an idiot; no matter how she tried to play it, he would guess why she was there, and then there was the chance he would rush to their grandmother and tell her what was going on. Luna would take precautions to make sure that she would never be able to try this again, and she would be absolutely no help to Optimus and Hunter or anyone for that matter.

Luna approached the scuffle, paused, and then pointed down the hall. "Take her to her cell," she ordered, voice somehow calm and vicious all at once.

The Acolytes immediately ceased their beating and grabbed up Hunter, carrying her off down the hall.

Beaten and bloody as she was, Hunter still fought and strained against their grips, though it was no use. "This is your fault, Steel!" she shrieked, her voice fading as she disappeared down the hall. "This is all your fault! You monster! I hate you! I hate you!"

Steel stood there helplessly in the foyer, watching after the Acolytes and Hunter. He looked absolutely stricken. "No, Hunter," he murmured. "I didn't… I was just… I…." his voice dropped off as he fell to his knees in the center of the ridiculously large puddle of Hunter's energon on the floor of the foyer, still staring heartbrokenly down the hall. Tears began streaming freely down his face, and it took everything she had to not run into the scene and embrace him tightly.

Luna approached the boy, stopping to stand beside him. "You did well, Steel," she cooed. The woman reached down to gently brush her fingers through Steel's golden hair. "You did very well."

"But I didn't do anything," Steel quivered, not looking up at Luna. "I didn't… I didn't tell you…. I didn't stop her…. I… I didn't want her to get hurt…." The boy buried his face in his hands and began to sob wretchedly.

Her spark broke, tears welling up in her own eyes. "Steel…."

"Oh, my darling boy," Luna crooned in a sickly sweet voice. She placed her hands on his shaking shoulders and leaned down so that she could speak directly into his ear. "Whenever will you learn that, no matter what you do or how hard you try, you will always hurt those you hold most dear."

"But I don't want to!" Steel wailed helplessly, doubling over as he slammed his fists into the energon-stained floor. "I don't want to hurt the people I love! I don't want to cause them pain! I don't want to be a monster to them!"

"But you already are, Steel," Luna hissed. "You already are." She moved around to the front of him now, always keeping one hand on his shoulders, and knelt down in front of him. The witch reached down to take her chin in his hand and lift his head so that they were face to face once more. "And that is why you must stay with me, my darling," she purred. Luna wiped tears from his cheeks and smoothed Steel's hair as she gazed into his tear-stained eyes. "I am the one person you cannot hurt, Steel," she declared. "I am the one person who will love you no matter what you do. I am the only one who won't turn their back on you, Steel—the only one you can trust."

He was still crying, but Steel was much calmer now, and looked—not happy—but resigned; like he accepted this fact because it was all he had—like that was the cards he'd been dealt and there was nothing to do for it but play them as best he could. "Yes, Grandmother," he whispered, sounding completely defeated.

"No!" Unable to contain herself anymore, she burst out from her hiding place in the shadows of the library and lunged for her brother, tackling him away from the dream figment of their wretched grandmother. She didn't care that he would know she was there. She didn't care if he figured out what she was trying to do and went to tell Luna. In that moment she cared about nothing except getting her brother away from that thing and letting him know that what it was telling him—what he was dreaming—was completely wrong. They hit the floor of the foyer with a heavy thud, her lying on top of him, as if sheltering him. She made no move to leave her position. "No, Steel!" she cried. "No!

Steel lay there, gazing up through ginger strands of hair that had fallen over his face, too dumbstruck to move. That voice, that hair, that touch… there was only one of each and dreams didn't copy them like this—didn't make them feel this real… but it couldn't possibly be her. Could it? He was back on Earth again, yes, and he'd been in the dreamscape once, thinking he'd caught a brief glimpse of her but… but they hadn't been together like this in years! They hadn't been in each other's dreams since before Ally had left the Lunation with Hunter! He'd tried, but she had always tried as hard as she could to keep him out, so he'd just stopped trying. And then he'd been banished to space and they'd been too far apart from each other to attempt it—neither of them were quite that skilled in dream-walking yet. But now, after all this time, could it really be? "Ally?" he breathed, sounding in complete disbelief.

She pushed up so that she was on her hands and knees over him and able to look down into his face. She stared down at him through watery eyes, tears starting to drip from her long lashes. Her hair hung around their faces like a curtain, blocking them off from the rest of Steel's dream. "You can't believe that, Steel," she whispered, voice shaking. She bit her lip and shook her head. "You can't."

"A-Ally?" Steel repeated, sounding just as shocked as ever. Slowly he reached up and touched her face, just barely brushing her wet cheeks with his fingertips, afraid they would go right through her. But they didn't. And she didn't feel any more like a dream now than when she had tackled him to the floor. Emboldened by this, the young man quickly moved to hold his sister's face in his hands, cupping her cheeks and brushing her hair away from her face. "Ally," he breathed, believing she was really there now. His mouth started to stretch into a grin so wide it was almost a grimace. "Ally!" Without a second thought, he sat up and embraced his little sister to him as tightly as he could, fresh tears welling up in his eyes and running down his cheeks. "Ally!" He couldn't believe it! He just couldn't believe it!

She hugged him back just as tightly, smiling and crying as well. So long…. For so long she had been waiting to get the chance to do this again, to get the chance to see her brother again, to hold her brother again. It was a dream, but it was still real for them. The only thing better would have been if it were in the physical world.

"You're here!" Steel exclaimed after a long moment, letting the girl go to face her again. "You're actually here!"

"I am," she agreed with a sniff. She wiped her eyes as she smiled at her brother.

"I… I thought… you'd never come back here again after… after everything…." Steel trailed off, his gaze falling away from hers, a sadness creeping over his face again.

"Hey," she said, taking his face in her hands and lifting it back to hers. "Hey. This is our realm, Steel—ours. It doesn't matter what happens—I will always come back here. Maybe it won't be, like, right away, but I will always come back here, because this is ours-" she bit her lip as tears stung her eyes again and she stroked her brother's cheeks with her thumbs, "-and you're my big brother, and I love you." She shook her head. "And that's why," she whimpered, "I couldn't let you listen to that anymore. That's why I couldn't let you keep dreaming that bullshit 'cuz it's not true! None of it! Luna's not the only one who loves you, Steel. She's not the only one you can trust." She placed a hand on her chest emphatically as she declared, "You can trust me, Steel. Me. I love you."

"I hurt you," Steel murmured, looking shamefaced.

"Yes, you hurt me, Steel. You hurt me and I was angry and upset, but I still loved you—I still love you—and, like, literally all I wanted these last five years was to have my big brother back. You're a person, Steel. You're gonna cause people who love you to hurt sometimes, but that's totally normal—it doesn't make you monster! And it doesn't make me wish you weren't a part of my life."

"I hurt Hunter, too," Steel said, not seeming to have heard what his sister had said. In fact, an entirely new level of pain seemed to shadow his eyes. "I caused her to hurt… so much, Ally," he continued, meeting her eyes again. "She hates me. She has to hate me."

"She doesn't hate you," She said softly, shaking her head. In all reality, she had no way of knowing whether Hunter hated Steel or not; for all she knew, Hunter could very well be one to hate anybody that caused her pain, whether they were family or not. But for whatever reason, she strongly felt that Hunter couldn't possibly hate Steel. For one… it just didn't seem like the Hunter she'd heard of. For another, no person with any level of decency in their soul could hate Steel. Maybe she was a biased baby sister, but her brother—for all his flaws when it came to anything involving Luna—was totally, 100% un-hateable. He could be infuriating, and irksome, and sometimes dislikable, but there was no way anyone could hate him. It wasn't possible. "She might be angry with you, but she doesn't hate you. She can't." She smirked and rolled her eyes, attempting to lighten the mood and make Steel smile. "No one can. Believe me—I've tried, like, a million times."

The attempt, however valiant, didn't work, not even a little bit. There wasn't even the faintest twitch of a smile on Steel's lips, or the faintest breath of an amused snort. "No," he insisted, shaking his head. "She has to hate me. There's no way she can possibly not hate me after everything I've done and everything I didn't do."

She looked carefully at her brother. "What are you talking about?" she asked quietly.

Steel's lips drew themselves into a thin line as guilt flashed into his blue eyes. He couldn't say it. He couldn't bring himself to say anything to explain what he meant.

She understood this, and she also recognized it as a golden opportunity to get what she'd originally come for. "Can I look?" she asked hopefully.

Steel looked pensively hesitant for a moment before finally nodding.

She nodded back and slowly moved her hands from his jaw up to his temples where she cupped her hands and gently pressed her finger tips into the sides of his head. She met her brother's gaze, staring deeply into it, and concentrated. It had been a while since she'd attempted to read someone's conscious mind while already being inside their subconscious mind. It was quite possible, and having the consent of the person made it easier, but it was still a bit trickier than simple dream walking or telepathy on their own. But she had to at least try—for Steel and Hunter both.

It took a moment, and a lot of focused concentration, but finally memories of Steel's began flashing through her head. She was just happy that her brother was well aware of how this sort of thing worked, because he focused right away on just what she was looking for without being prompted. This way she didn't have to spend time sorting through random memories that weren't needed.

From her brother's viewpoint, she watched as he scrambled up a pile of rubble to a hole in a wall and looked out in a banquet hall of a mansion. Across the hall were their grandmother and a girl with long red hair in a blue dress: The girl was pinning their grandmother to the wall with an Acolyte hatchet. "Don't talk to me like I'm some love-starved, desperate little girl anymore—I'm not!" the girl—who could only be Hunter—was screaming. "You can't manipulate me anymore! And I won't let you use me!"

She didn't hear what else was said, because at that moment Steel's wand was being held out in front of him and he was casting a spell. He sent it flying across the room and it nailed Hunter right in the back, causing her to cry out. Then Hunter slowly slumped to the floor, obviously asleep.

Steel was crossing the room to stand beside their grandmother now. She began to praise him, but her words were lost on him as the sensation of guilt swirled around inside of him. And when he finally looked down at a now unconscious Hunter, that guilt became even more evident.

That memory faded away and switched over to a new one. She was still in Steel's viewpoint, but now they were outside on the grounds of an estate. She could see, a fair distance away, an army of Field Acolytes converging of an Lunation cemetery that looked like it had been reduced to cinders. Despite the distance, she could very clearly see a mane of fiery red hair that was unkempt, tangled, and wild this time around: Hunter. This must have been an escape attempt—there was no other explanation for why Hunter would be out on the grounds and not locked up. She watched on as Steel watched on from a distance. She could feel his desire to help, to rush to Hunter's aid, but they continued to remain where they were beside their grandparents and the other members of the Inner Circle because Steel withheld his desire and stayed resolutely in place beside Luna—beside his Mistress.

She watched on as a sudden purple-black beam streamed down with a boom from the sky in the spot where Hunter was standing. The beam disappeared and a torturous cry echoed across the expanse from where Hunter stood, soon followed by a distant rumble.

"We must retreat below grounds!" Luna suddenly exclaimed, voice filled with terror. That was definitely a new thing; Luna, as a rule, feared nothing. "Steel! Hurry now!"

They remained firmly in place for a second as Steel didn't move. But then he teleported, and she was looking around one of the underground bunkers of the estate.

The scene quickly flashed forward and she found herself staring down at Hunter, unconscious, naked, lying in snow as snow fell around them. Steel's gaze pulled away from Hunter for a moment, and Ally was looking around an irradiated wasteland that had just moments before been a beautiful estate. She was looking at Hunter again now and watching Steel reach out, waving a hand over the girl so that a blanket appeared and covered her. Then he was picking Hunter up and cradling her in his arms. "I'm sorry," he murmured. "I wanted to help you but… I couldn't. You understand, Phoenix—I couldn't. I couldn't…." But she knew just how much her brother had wanted to, because she could still feel that guilt and shame swimming around inside of him, growing stronger within each memory he shared.

Now she was facing a different scene again: They were standing in the dungeons of an estate, and standing in front of them was Hunter—bloody, beaten, wrapped in a ratty sheet, and looking bowled over. She reached out with a hand, and a harsh slapping sound echoed around the cell, followed by a sharp twinge of pain.

"You bastard." Hunter hissed harshly.

Steel looked back at her through watering eyes. "Hunter, please…" he said beseechingly.

"You bastard!" Hunter yelled, looking absolutely enraged now. She backed away and her voice became soft as she asked, "How could you?"

"Hunter, I-"

"Do you have any idea what you've done to me, Steel?! Do you know what you've put me through—what you're putting me through?! You took me from my family, Steel—from my family, my father! How could you?!"

"I-I never thought that Grandmother would actually utilize my idea. I swear to you, Hunter, I didn't—I swear!" His voice sounded as desperate as she could sense he'd felt in that moment.

Hunter bellowed, "That's not the point! You came up with the idea, Steel! You found out I was getting adopted, came up with the idea to stop it with a fake adoption using your parents' names, and gave it to Luna! It doesn't matter if you thought Luna would use it or not, you knew it would hurt me and you gave it to her as an option anyway!" Tears were cascading down the girl's face now. "I just… I don't… how could you even think of…?"

Steel's vision shifted so that they were looking at the floor and not Hunter. He sounded so very regretful as he said, "I'm sorry, Hunter. I am. But you don't understand. You don't know what this life is like; you don't know what you have to do to survive here—what I have to do to survive here. Grandmother is righteous and incredible… but she isn't merciful—she can't be. She has rules and standards and…. She has a destiny that is great and taxing. How can she expect any of us to act any differently than she has to?"

Because they were looking at Hunter again, she could see the utter disbelief that crossed Hunter's face—disbelief that she honestly felt herself. "What I don't understand," Hunter replied, "is how she could have done this to you. How she could have just broken you and reigned you into line so tightly that you think what she does—all of this—is justified, and you'll defend her no matter what she does!"

Steel finally met eyes with Hunter again, and his vision was more watery than before, causing their cousin to swim before them. "You don't understand, Cousin."

"You're right," Hunter agreed, looking resigned to this fact, albeit bitterly. "I don't. And I don't want-" she broke off, face twisting in pain as she hissed.

Steel was moving towards Hunter again, arm outstretched with his palm glowing. "Here. Let me help…" but he stopped as Hunter stepped away from him glaring like she would kill. "Hunter…."

"I think you should go. I think you should go before I do something I regret."

"What?"

"I'm not exactly in any kind of mood for your company right now, believe it or not."

"Hunter, I'm sorry-"

"'Sorry' doesn't fix this, Steel."

"But-"

"Go, Steel. Get out of here. Now."

"Hunter-"

"I said leave!" Hunter thrust a hand out towards him.

There was a painful sensation and they were being pushed backwards out of the cell to crash to the floor across the hall. When Steel looked back up, Hunter was coming after him in a rage, and he returned the favor by blasting her back into his own cell with magic. Then he was on his feet and they were lunging back across the hall to slam a hand down on the control panel to put up the energy barrier to the cell. After that they simply stood there for a moment, staring down at Hunter in pity and sympathy and guilt, their vision growing more and more watery by the second. Finally Steel whispered with utmost sincerity, "I'm so sorry." With that he finally turned away and they were walking down the long hall of the dungeons.

Not long after there was the soft, choked sound of a sob coming from behind them, and Steel's spark cracked with remorse, and he faltered for a minute wondering if he should go back, before continuing to move on down the hall, tears trickling down his cheeks now. He finally walked through the door that exited the dungeons. Once on the other side, they finally stopped as Steel leaned heavily against the door. A sharp, ragged breath that sounded like a long suppressed sob escaped him. Then another. Finally he was sobbing outright, and his legs gave out from underneath of him so that he sunk down to sit on the floor. He closed his eyes and they were cast into darkness for a long moment as he covered his face and cried; cried for his cousin, cried for his guilt and shame, cried for the emotional pain he'd been holding onto for so long.

When he finally opened his eyes again, they were gazing up at the ceiling of the hall that led away from the dungeons.

She stopped and looked closely. Those looked like Egyptian carvings above them in the ceiling. And she swore she could just make out the gold heads of Anubis statues on either side of them by the door!

Taking careful note of this, she finally pulled out of Steel's memories, letting go of his head and falling back to sit on her knees. She stared at her brother and saw the tears trickling down his cheeks. She noticed her face felt wet, too. "Steel…" she murmured, shaking her head, "… I…."

"Now do you see what I mean?" he asked bitterly. "I've hurt Hunter and allowed her to be hurt too much—she hates me now. She won't even let me try to help her when I offer!"

"No," she insisted, putting a hand on his, "I don't think she hates you. But she is angry, Steel, and she has every right to be." She shook her head in disbelief. "Using our parents to make a fake adoption claim?" she whispered. "How could you even think of something like that?"

Steel looked away sheepishly. "I was ordered to look into her life," he murmured, "find out what was going on and try to think of some way to bring her back. And when I found out about the adoption…." He trailed off and looked up at her again, sorrow and desperation in his eyes. "I never meant to hurt her, Ally," he declared, voice shaking. "I never meant to hurt her—I never wanted that—I just… you know how it is here—you know what Grandmother is like. If I didn't do what I was told-"

"You'd be punished," she finished for him. "Hurt. Yeah, I know. But, like… it wasn't just Hunter you hurt, Steel. I've met her spark-father—Optimus: He's devastated."

A look of surprise came over her brother's face. "You've met the Prime?" he inquired.

"Yes," she answered carefully. Steel would have figured that Optimus and his team were looking for Hunter by now, she was sure, but she didn't want him knowing that she had given them some information regarding the presence of the Lunation on Earth. Nor did she want him discovering the real reason she was here. But she wasn't going to completely lie to him either: He would be able to see through that anyway. "He came to our house the other day. Apparently the guy Luna, like, recruited to play the service worker in the whole thing gave up our address and Optimus came here. I think he, like, wanted to see if that part of the story was true and to see if we could, like, give him any information if it was. Mom and Dad talked to him—they sent me outta the room, but I did listen in. They didn't have much useful info. for him—they still think you're all, like, flying around space somewhere."

"Let them keep thinking that," Steel stated firmly. "It's safer for them that way."

"Yeah, until Luna accomplishes whatever the hell she wants to accomplish."

"Grandmother won't hurt them—they're family."

"She's hurt you—you're family."

"She punishes me when I deserve it."

"Punishments from family don't typically result in blood being shed, Steel."

Steel stubbornly set his jaw and pointedly looked away from her at that. No. He would not pursue that argument any further. Ally was just like Hunter; she would never understand why their grandmother had to do what she did to keep her followers in line.

Realizing her mistake, she sighed and backed off. "I'm sorry," she murmured. "I don't wanna argue—that's totally not what I came here for."

"Why did you come here?" Steel asked voice a little harsh.

She couldn't tell him why. Or, at least, she couldn't tell him the whole reason why—but she could tell him part of the reason. "Because…" she said softly, tears coming to her eyes again, "… I wanted to see my big brother. It's been five years, Steel. Five years. I haven't been able to reach you like this because you've been too far away, and when I thought I finally caught a glimpse of you a few weeks ago… I had to find out. I had to try." Tears were falling down her face now. "I miss you, Steely. Mom and Dad miss you—we all miss you. Please come home."

"The Lunation is my home," Steel insisted, giving her a hard look. "I'm needed here, Ally; I couldn't leave even if I wanted to. But why would I want to anyway? To go from this—where I can use my abilities and be what I am all the time—to… that—where I have to hide who and what I am every day? I could never live like that again. You're still there in it, Ally—you know how hard and painful that is! Tell me why I would ever want to go back to that?"

She remained quiet, unable to say anything. He had a very valid point there.

Taking notice of the silence, Steel nodded firmly. "The Lunation might not be an easy place to live, Ally," he admitted, "but at least I can be a Hybrid here."

"… We can change things at home," Ally said softly after a moment. "It would be easier to do now that we're both grown up."

Steel snorted. "You honestly think Mother and Father would allow that to happen—allow us to start living like what we are? They hate anything Hybrid, Ally. They'd sooner let us commit mass genocide than allow us to have anything to do with our heritage."

She gave him a hard look. Steel wasn't wrong; just as she told Optimus, their parents were very much against living as a Hybrid, acting as a Hybrid, doing anything that was remotely Hybrid-like. It was a very much taboo concept in their household, but to make a claim as severe as what Steel had, that seemed a little much. "I think that's a little dramatized," she remarked, raising an eyebrow.

"That's not the point," Steel sighed. "The point is you and I both know we can't be ourselves with our parents, but here-" a look of serenity came over his face, "-I can be whoever I want to be whenever I want to be."

"As long as it goes along with Luna's groupthink and you don't disobey her, right?" she thought bitterly. She didn't dare say such a thing though, because she knew that would definitely trigger an argument that she wasn't in the mood for at the moment. "Can I at least tell Mom and Dad you're okay?" she asked.

Steel snorted. "Do you really think they'd care if I was or not?"

She looked at him in disbelief. "Of course they would! They do! They're our parents, Steel. They have a totally backwards way of thinking about anything Hybrid and they disagree with us, but they're not, like, bad parents. They still care about and love us."

He gave a skeptical look. "Even though I chose Grandmother over them?"

"Of course. I was just as angry and upset as them, but I'm here. I still love you."

Steel remained silent, his eyes as cold as his name implied, and then he finally looked away. "I think you should probably go," he murmured.

She reached out for him, taking hold of one of his hands. "Steel…" she began but then faltered as she could think of nothing else to say right then. She felt like she'd said it all already.

Steel looked back at her. A brief flicker of fondness flashed through his eyes as he met his sister's gaze again before it disappeared in the coldness once more. "Yes?" he asked.

Finally she said, "At least… think about coming home?" She couldn't phrase it as anything else but a question, and she couldn't manage to keep the desperateness out of her voice. "Please? We all miss you."

"I need to be where I can be myself, Ally," Steel said slowly. "And I'd like to be where I can be the best version of myself."

"And you really think the Lunation is that place?" There was just the hint of a challenge in her voice.

Steel's gaze hardened at that and he opened his mouth to retort, but quickly found himself unable to respond. Immediately the memories he'd shown his sister—and more—came flashing back through his mind and, with them, all the guilt and pain that he'd felt during each event. They had all happened while he was in the Lunation. He'd abandoned his little sister and cousin and chosen the Lunation over them, even after they'd all made promises to always stick together and be there for each other. He'd found out about Hunter's adoption because he'd been ordered by his grandmother—the very core of the Lunation—to look into her life and had derailed it to get Hunter away from the people she loved to bring her back to the Lunation. He hadn't gone to Hunter's side to help her when she'd needed it because his teachings taught him to stand with the Lunation at all costs—to be loyal to it above everything and everyone else. He'd allowed their grandmother to hurt Hunter in horrible ways even when he knew it was to an unwarranted extreme and had misgivings about it because she'd taken a stand against the Lunation.

All of these occurrences caused Steel to pause and wonder: Was the Lunation really the place where he could be the best version of himself? All of that didn't feel like his best version. Or, if it was, he didn't like it. In fact, the last time he could recall feeling like his best version most of the time was before he'd left Earth with the Lunation, and he, Ally, and Hunter had all been together, working on their powers together, playing together, being a family together. Being the oldest, he'd guided and protected them. They'd come to him for love and support and reassurance more often than they'd ever gone to their grandparents even before everything had gone haywire and fallen apart. He'd felt so happy and proud when they'd done so because he was their big brother and cousin and they knew he would take care of them, and he had to the best of his abilities. He'd been loving and kind and protective and grown up—the very best version of himself. They'd loved him and he'd loved himself. He couldn't remember feeling that ever since the fall out. The closest he'd come to feeling that again was when he'd smuggled Hunter food and when he'd come to her rescue and protected her from Tiberius. It had been brief and weak but it had been enough to make him remember what he'd felt all those years ago. It had been enough to make him realize how far from that version of himself he was.

But the Lunation wasn't all that bad. It had made him what he was today; he was strong and powerful because of his time with the Lunation. He could be considered a Master Sorcerer now (in fact he was just weeks away from taking the test) and that was all thanks to his grandmother and the Lunation. He could do everything he could do now because of the Lunation. However, the problem was he could only do everything he could do now because of the Lunation but not what he had once been able to do because of his familial ties. He wanted both, but because of the Lunation and what he'd been taught, he couldn't have both. It wasn't possible.

So was the Lunation really the place where he could be his best self? He wasn't sure. Part of him said, "Yes, of course", but an even more insistent part of him said, "No way in Pit." And he didn't know which one was right.

"Leave me, Ally," he said softly. All the anger and harshness and bitterness had seeped out of his voice like it had seeped out of his body. Now he was just tired sounding. "Please."

She gazed at him for a long moment, waiting—hoping—for him to say something else or give her some sort of sign that maybe he really was thinking about coming home even just to visit. But she saw nothing. Steel was quite good at hiding everything if he wanted to. It was another effect of living with the Lunation; stone masks. Finally, seeing she would get nothing, she sighed. "Okay," she conceded. "I'll leave." She stood up and looked down at him sadly. "Can… can I at least get one more hug from my big brother before I go?"

Steel sighed heavily in defeat. He couldn't very well say 'no' to that, and—when it came down to it—he didn't want to. So he wordlessly stood, turned to his sister, and opened his arms, even as he kept his eyes fixed determinedly away from her.

Smiling ever so slightly, she quickly clutched onto him, snuggling into him just like she'd always done growing up but hadn't been able to do the last five years. She nuzzled into his chest, wishing the scent she smelled was real and not just from memory, wishing the arms around her were physical and not just a dream version. But this was the best she could get, so she wouldn't waste it. It was far better than nothing after all.

Steel was wishing much of the same thing. He'd all but completely melted into her embrace, a small part of him overcome by joy and relief and contentment. Even if it was a dream, it had been so long—so long—since he'd been able to hold and be close to his sister like this. Growing up they'd always been affectionate. In fact they're whole family had been fairly tactile, as their mother had grown up the exact opposite and had vowed her children would never have to earn affection. They'd remained that way clear up until the fall out, adding Hunter into the fold as well, when she'd joined them.

Then they'd been separated, and the last time he and Ally had embraced had been before she'd fled to the Council for safety and to alert them to the Lunation's plans. There'd been nothing after that. No more hugs and kisses; no more affectionate teasing and play-fights; no more tickle wars; no more sneaking into each other's rooms in the dead of night because of nightmares or storms and simply because Ally was in a snuggly sort of mood; no more anything brother-and-sisterly. It had all just stopped. They hadn't even gotten to say goodbye to each other. Everything had been left in a bad state between them when they'd gone their separate ways, and they'd never had a chance to try and sort it out.

So this… this was incredible. Even more so now that he was aware his beloved little sister wasn't holding a grudge against him, even if she might still feel hurt and angry with him.

"I love you, Big Brother," she murmured, voice sounding small and childish.

Steel tightened his grip on her and pressed his lips to her hair. "I love you too, Little Sis," he murmured.

Ally quickly sat up in bed, completely awake despite the fact she'd just been in a deep slumber. She had it! She had the information she'd gone in for—she knew where the Lunation was! She had to get this information to Optimus as quickly as possible—he needed to hear it. The girl thought she'd done a good job of hiding the fact that she'd found out the Lunation was in Egypt when sifting through Steel's memories, but you could never be careful. Steel might have sensed something and just acted like he hadn't. Like she'd told Optimus, Ally loved her brother, but when it came to him and their grandmother, nothing was to be trusted. The sooner Optimus and his team were told about this, the better. Even if Steel rushed to Luna and told her that he suspected Ally knew their location and they began moving again, if she rushed to tell Optimus at the same time, they might be able to intercept the Lunation before they got away into hiding again. At the very least they wouldn't be as far behind them this time as they had been before.

Then another thought crossed Ally's mind, making her pause as she moved to get out of bed. Steel hadn't had to show her that part of his memory. He hadn't had to let it continue on so that she saw the carvings or the statues. He could have stopped allowing her to see at any time; he could have stopped sharing long before the memory got to that part. But he hadn't. He'd let it play on to where she could get a glimpse of where he was and then he'd stopped it. Had that been intentional? Had he let her see that on purpose to let her know where he was? Or had he been so clouded by emotions at that point that it slipped by him? While it didn't happen often, when Steel was very overwhelmed by his feelings, it wasn't beyond him to be a little sloppy and less controlled with whatever he was doing. But surely something like this wouldn't have slipped by him unintentionally, would it? He'd always been so careful and meticulous when it came to anything that involved protecting the cult and their grandmother. Surely he wouldn't let her see something like this by accident—it had to be intentional on some level, whether consciously or unconsciously. Right?

Ally shook her head and got on her feet. That didn't matter at the moment—she could think on and drive herself crazy with it later—what mattered right now was letting Optimus know about her information. That meant calling the number he'd given her that she put in her cell phone. That meant leaving her room and going down to the kitchen to get her phone, as it was house policy that phones were to be kept there to charge overnight to ensure everyone slept soundly. While it wasn't night yet—a quick glance at her clock said she'd only been asleep for about three hours—her parents had definitely been expecting her to sleep until late because of her "migraine" and had made her leave it there. They would undoubtedly figure out that she'd been lying about everything when she went down there to get her cell. Then they'd make her tell them what was going on. And then she would be grounded until she could finally leave the house, and probably even after that.

But none of that mattered either. Hunter's fate was on the line—the entire world's fate was on the line and probably the universe's too! (She put nothing past Luna.) Optimus and his team needed to know the Lunation was in Egypt now. So she needed to tell him now. Angry parents, groundings, and any and all punishments be damned!

With that determination stuck firmly in place, Ally marched out of her room, down the hall, and descended the stairs with purpose. She didn't allow herself time to stop and question and worry as she came upon the swing door to the kitchen, she simply pushed it open and strode through. Her stomach fluttered a bit with nerves when she saw her parents sitting at the table just about to eat supper.

They both looked up at her in surprise. "Ally?" Cyrus asked, looking at her strangely. "We expected you to sleep a while longer—is everything all right? Are you feeling better?"

"Fine, Daddy," Ally replied, not looking at them. She made her way over to the "electronics" corner of the kitchen where her phone was plugged in.

"Are you hungry?" Eve asked, looking her daughter over carefully. "I was going to set aside some stew and cornbread for you, but if you want it now-"

"Thanks, Mom, but I don't need food right now." She swiped her phone up off the charger and pressed and held the button to turn it back on.

"I think you should stay off that for a while, Ally," Eve said firmly. "Give your eyes and head a break from it—we don't want your migraine coming back."

"Sorry, Mom, but I need to make a call right now." Why did it take so damn long for these phones to turn on sometimes?

"But your migraine-"

"Is gone now. I'm fine, Mom, I swear."

"And just who are you calling?" Cyrus asked suspiciously, raising an eyebrow at his child.

"A… friend," Ally replied carefully. It wasn't a lie; she could consider Optimus a friend now. It was perfectly normal to be friends with your aunts and uncles, right? Damn it! An update? Now?!

"What friend?" Eve asked, sounding demanding.

Ally felt her stomach clench harder in dread at that tone. She kept her eyes trained on the loading bar on her phone screen as she kept her head ducked so her hair would fall over her face. She had a crap poker-face—she'd been told that a million times: One look at her expression and everything would be given away. While she knew her parents were going to find out in the long run, she didn't want it to be just yet. If they found out too soon, they could potentially snatch her phone away from her before she'd even made her call to Optimus and then where would she be? She needed just a little more time. "Come on!" she hissed impatiently at her cell. "Hurry up and friggin' upload already!"

"Alchemy Solaris Prescott?"

Ally flinched, all confidence she'd previously had draining away. Oh great—the full name!

"I'm counting to three," Eve continued on. "One… two… th-"

"Optimus Prime," Ally answered, her voice hardly above a hoarse whisper. She cringed at the pitifulness of it. Really? She couldn't even fake anymore bravery than that?

A heavy silence fell over the kitchen, letting the teen know that, despite the softness of her voice, her parents had heard her. For a long time nobody moved or spoke. Even the clock seemed to have stopped altogether in stunned silence.

"What did you say?" Eve asked, in disbelief.

Ally quivered, knowing a horrible storm was about to be unleashed, but she wouldn't stop and turn back now. It was too important! Drawing herself up to full height, the seventeen-year-old turned around to face her parents. Her resolve quaked a bit under their gazes—particularly her mother's—but she forced herself to remain as strong as she could. Clutching her phone closer to protect it from getting snatched away, she cleared her throat and declared more loudly and firmly, "I'm calling Optimus Prime."

An utterly incredulous look crossed her mother's face while her father's expression remained even but firm. "And just why would you be doing that?" Cyrus asked slowly.

Trying to keep her eyes on her calm looking father rather than her irate looking mother, Ally slowly answered, "Because I can help him; I found out where the Lunation is."

"The Lunation is gone!" Eve hissed savagely, pain and anger rising in her pinkish-raspberry eyes. "They've been banished from Earth for five years—they're not coming back."

"But they did," Ally insisted. "I don't know how they got back without anybody, like, being alerted or something, but they're back on Earth, Mom. I know they are!"

"And how would you know that?" Cyrus questioned, rising to his feet now and coming to stand between his wife and daughter, gaze never leaving Ally.

Ally focused even harder on her father's electric blue eyes now, determined not to look at her nearly irate mother because she knew that would be the end of what little courage she had left. Her father was intense and stern and didn't look happy, but at least he was reserved and in control. For the moment. He'd always been more even tempered than her mother, but even he had limits to be reached and buttons that could be pushed to make him quickly loose his cool. And, unfortunately, she knew what she was about to admit was one of those buttons. "I… I walked into Steel's dreams…" she murmured, her voice dropping off.

Cyrus didn't even have a chance to respond to this information before Eve jumped on it. "Alchemy Solaris Prescott!" she roared again.

Ally flinched. "Mom-"

Her mother wouldn't let her finish. "You dreamwalked?!"

Ally could just start to feel the beginning of tears bite her eyes. "I… I just wanted…"

"How many times do we have to go over this, Alchemy?!" Eve groaned. There was a look of desperation in her eyes now, along with the anger. "How many times?! You know you're not supposed to use your powers—any of them—except in emergencies!"

Vision starting to blur now, Ally looked down at her phone. It was still uploading. What could possibly be taking so damn long?!

"That's not how we live here, Ally," Cyrus stated firmly. He sounded angry, but at least he wasn't yelling for the moment. "Whatever our genetics are, we are humans in this world. Do you understand that? We are humans and we will always be humans."

"B-but…" Ally stammered softly, still looking at her cell, "… but that's not how I wa-wanna live."

"And when you were four you wanted to be a rabbit!" Eve snapped. "It's not about what you want, Ally—it's about what's best for you. We're your parents and we know what that is. Being a Hybrid is enough trouble as it is; living like one will only assure pain and suffering. How many times must we explain that to you? Living as a Hybrid just isn't worth it!"

And with those words, something in Ally finally snapped. She didn't know what it was; maybe it was the fact that she was sick of being told not to be herself after all this time; maybe it had to do with what Optimus had told her; maybe it was the fact that this attitude was at least partially to blame for why her brother left and refused to even come back to visit. But whatever it was, Ally had had enough! "Shut up!" she exploded. She jammed her fists forcefully down to her sides—her phone clutched tightly in one—and glared up at her parents once more, hot, angry tears starting to trickle down her cheeks now. "Shut up! You're wrong! You have no idea what you're talking about! Being a Hybrid and living like one doesn't cause pain and suffering, Mom—you do!"

The rage in Eve's eyes burned tenfold at that. "Alchemy Solaris!"

"You're a Hybrid, Mom! We're all Hybrids and it's stupid to act like we're not! I hate acting like a human! I hate having to pretend to be something I'm not! I'm sick of it and I don't wanna do it anymore! It's bullshit!"

"Language, Alchemy," Cyrus growled warningly.

"No!" Ally snapped. "I won't watch my language! It's bullshit! I'm done with it, and I'm done with you!" She looked down at her phone again to see that it had finally finished updating and was on. It was about time! "Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a call to make," she said, keeping her gaze on her phone. She had some control on herself now, and she knew if she looked back up at her parents she'd lose control and start wailing and screaming all over again. The teen made to move by her parents.

Apparently Eve had other ideas. "We are not done talking, young lady!" she insisted, stepping in her daughter's path to stop her, hands on her hips. "You give me that phone and sit down at that table right now. We are going to have a serious discussion."

Ally froze in place, head still held resolutely down as to not face her mother. She clenched her hand even tighter around her phone, both in defiance and the fear that her mother would reach out and snatch the device away. "No," she said softly but firmly. "We are done talking, Mom, and I won't sit down. I have something more important to do. Now would you please move out of the way?"

"You're disobeying me?" Eve murmured a dangerous edge in her voice.

Ally unconsciously flinched, her mind flitting back to the days spent in the Lunation. How many times had she heard those exact words come out of Luna's mouth with that exact tone? How many times had those words and tone led to a painful punishment? The teen felt sick to her stomach with dread.

There were times when Ally wondered if her mom knew just how much she actually sounded like Luna and what she would do with that information if she found out. Her parents had spent so much of their lives distancing themselves from the Lunation, and her mother, in particular, had tried so hard to separate herself from Luna. But there were just some traits that didn't go away. Eve could be the sweetest, most doting, and most loving mother a child could ask for; but then she could flip right around and be one of the most terrifying. It really wasn't much of a surprise; Eve was Luna's daughter, and Luna was the single most terrifying mother ever. How could she not produce one just as terrifying?

"Alchemy. Solaris. Prescott. You answer me right now: are you disobeying me?" Eve pressed. She sounded absolutely deadly.

Ally cringed again and kept her face staunchly turned downwards, but she refused to back down. This was all much too important. Clenching her phone tighter in her grip, the seventeen-year-old lifted it up and clutched it protectively to her chest with both hands. If her mother tried to take it away, it would be now. "Yes," Ally answered her mother softly. "I guess I am."

Smack!

Ally wasn't sure what happened. One second she was standing there in defiance against her mother and the next she was falling, a sharp sting aching in the left side of her head and face. She seemed to hang in the air forever before she hit the wood floor of the kitchen with a hard thud! her phone clattering across the floor as she'd let it go in her complete shock. "Ack!"

"Eve!" Cyrus bellowed in stunned horror.

"You little brat!" Eve seethed at her daughter. She was completely blinded with anger now, unable to do anything but yell and berate, unable to see anything but red. She would have jumped on her daughter if her husband hadn't rushed forward and grabbed her, holding her tightly to him to restrain her. "I've given you everything, Alchemy! I've done everything for you! From the moment you were born I've loved you with all my heart and made everything about you and this is the thanks I get?! You ungrateful, disrespectful child! I am your mother! How dare you disobey me! How dare you!"

Curling into a ball on the floor and cringing away from her mother's screams, Ally pressed a hand to her stinging cheek, fresh tears prickling in her eyes. She'd been slapped! Her mother had actually slapped her! Her mother's anger was terrifying to a point that it rivaled Luna's, and she could make you feel just as small and insignificant as Luna could, but she'd never crossed the line of physical punishment—never! Not once! Ally and Steel had never even known a single spanking or pop on the mouth growing up, so for Eve to suddenly lash out like this now, with such ferocity, and the only thing holding her back from dealing out more being her husband…. Ally had never seen her mom this angry before.

Yet, the teen couldn't bring herself to feel guilty about that, though she knew it was of her doing. What she could feel was anger and hurt and betrayal and desperation to leave. Not to just get out of the house and go hang out with her friends for a few hours, or go to the mall and walk around for a while until she'd calmed down enough to come and deal with the situation at home; no, Ally felt the need to leave. Leave the house, leave her parents, leave home. She didn't know for how long, but it didn't matter, she just felt she couldn't stay in that house under those rules any longer. And she felt she knew where she would go—where she had to go.

Scrambling to her feet, Ally skittered over to where her phone had disappeared under the table and flipped the heavy, wooden table out of the way with ease to get to the device, almost throwing the table across the room with her efforts. She'd already admitting to dream-walking, was already in serious trouble, and wasn't planning on sticking around anyway, so she may as well have just started using her abilities as she wished now. The teen scooped up her phone and held it close again. Before darting out of the room, she dared to turn back to face her irate mother, who was still being held tightly back by her father. Ally glowered at her mother, anger and betrayal boiling up inside of her, making her tears stream lava hot down her cheeks. Unable and not wanting to stop herself, she screamed: "You're just like Luna! You think you're so different and so much better than Luna by being everything she isn't, but you're wrong! You're just like her, Mom! You're everything she is and worse, 'cuz at least Luna doesn't try to force anyone to deny what they are!" And with that she bolted from the kitchen, heading back up the stairs.

Wrenching away from her husband, Eve stormed after her daughter in a rage. "ALCHEMY!" she shrieked. "ALCHEMY SOLARIS PRESCOTT, YOU BRING YOUR ASS BACK HERE RIGHT NOW!"

"EVIE!" Cyrus bellowed, hurrying after his wife. "EVE, STOP!"

But Eve didn't stop. She barreled up the stairs after Ally, screaming at the teen the entire way, demanding she come back and face her. Of course Ally didn't, and that only made Eve all the angrier. Blind with desperation and rage, Eve instinctively threw out her right hand, index finger rigidly extended and pointed towards her daughter, and did something she hadn't done in ages: use magic. Whether it was completely on accident and spurred by her emotions or there was some underlying desire to use it, it was unclear, but before Eve could stop it a stinging jinx was flying from her fingertip and zeroing in on Ally.

Ally cried out in pain and alarm as the jinx pelted into the small of her back with a sharp zap. She fell to the floor with the shock and the impact of it. It wasn't as painful of a stinging jinx as the seventeen-year-old had been dealt before—probably because her mother was rusty after going so many years without using her magic—but it still hurt, and the small of the back was a nasty area to be hit in with a jinx like that. What's more, her mother had just used magic! Her mother had just used magic on her! Whether to intentionally hurt her or not, Ally didn't know—and she was willing to bet her mother didn't either—but it didn't matter. Her mother had used magic on her and hurt her, just like her grandmother had so many times years ago, and such bitter betrayal the ginger girl and never felt in her life. Not even when Steel had abandoned her in favor of the Lunation! And that feeling solidified Ally's determination to leave, turning it into a "need" as opposed to a "desire".

Gritting through the ache in her lower spine that caused the muscles in her back and down her legs to spasm and twitch annoyingly, Ally pushed herself back up. She moved up to sit on her knees first, hissing against the pain and leaning forward to stretch out and try and relieve it a bit. Then she slowly got on her feet. She finally turned to face her mother, finding her still standing on the stairs about three quarters of the way down completely frozen, staring at her hand in horrified amazement, like she couldn't believe she'd actually just done what she had. Her father was standing at the bottom of the stairs, looking just as mortified.

Ally drew her quivering lips together in a thin line. The sight of her mother only made the emotional pain of betrayal sting all the more and far worse than the jinx had. "You really are just like her," the girl murmured, drawing her mother's attention. She spun on her heel and continued on towards her room.

"Ally!" Eve called after her desperately. Her voice was shaking now and she didn't sound angry anymore but sorrowful instead. She scrambled the rest of the way up the stairs after her daughter. "Ally! Please, I'm sorry! I'm so sorry—I didn't mean-" she was cut off as a door slammed sharply in her face. Her hands flew to the knob, but when she tried to turn it she found she was unable to do so. Still trying, she began to throw her weight against the door, intermittently pounding on it as she called out beseechingly to Ally to let her enter. "Ally!" she practically sobbed. "Ally, sweet-pea, please open the door—please! I'm so sorry—I didn't mean to hurt you! Please open the door, please!"

But Ally wasn't going to open the door, and she'd made sure that nobody else was going to either by putting up an impregnable charm around the perimeter of her room—another bit of magic that she'd forced herself to learn and perfect way back when she'd been under her grandmother's care (if that's what you could call it). And now, safe from her parents' interference, the teen turned her attention back to her phone. Ignoring her mother's constant pleas from the far side of her door, Ally focused on finding the contact she needed in her phone, which turned out to be easier said than done as her eyes continuously filled up with hot tears, making it hard to read the long list of names she had to scroll through. After much scrolling and eye-wiping she finally found it and quickly dialed.

---

Optimus was hurrying as fast as he dared through the streets of Denver towards the Prescott residence. The conversation he'd previously held with Ally over the comm-link kept replaying in his head. He hadn't known how to react when the girl had contacted the base claiming she knew where the Lunation was, partially because he couldn't believe she'd gone against his counsel to not go looking for the information due to the danger. Then again, he shouldn't have been surprised because it was something Hunter would have done and Ally was of Hunter's blood. He also hadn't known how to react because of what he'd heard over the phone. Apart from Ally's own shaky, frantic voice that had clearly pointed to the fact she'd been crying, the Prime had heard the voices of Eve and Cyrus screaming in the background. What they'd been screaming about he didn't yet know: What he did know was that Ally was in distress and needed help, and he would provide it. So, before Ally had had a chance to tell him her information, Optimus had told the girl to wait for him and had headed out without a second's thought. It just would have been nice if bridging right in front of the Prescott's house had been an option….

Optimus glanced in his rearview to see the headlights of Bumblebee following closely behind him. The scout had been there at the time Ally had called and had requested to accompany the Prime. Optimus had agreed. While he was positive what he was heading into wasn't particularly dangerous it was always nice to have a bit of trusted backup with you. Besides, the Prime wasn't all that enthused about meeting Eve and Cyrus again face to face alone. Particularly Eve; she didn't seem to care for him much. And it was highly unlikely her opinion of him would change after this meeting

Finally both Autobots were pulling up and parking along the curb in front of the Prescott house. They switched on their holoforms and crossed the street, eyes forever warily lingering on the pretty and deceptively quiet little suburban home. They both had the sense it wouldn't be so calm once they entered.

"I do not know what the situation here is yet, Bumblebee," Optimus murmured as he opened the front gate, "but it did not sound desirable when I spoke with Ally. As such, I would like for you to try and stay out of the way of Mr. and Mrs. Prescott as much as possible. I'm sure I'm the one they will want to speak with, but if they are upset it would not be out of the ordinary for them to come after you as well. I do not believe they will hurt us—they refuse to acknowledge that they are Hybrids and, thus, will unlikely use their powers—but you never can tell."

Especially considering they're Hunter's family, Bumblebee signed with a slight smirk.

Optimus couldn't stop his small chuckle at the mention of that. Hunter was notorious for lashing out when she was upset, though she usually restrained herself from becoming very physical with those she cared for. If the same could be said for the rest of her family… well… he and Bumblebee weren't exactly who the Prescotts cared for. "Yes, that temperament may very well run strongly through the entire family," he admitted. "So it is far better to be wary."

What do you want me to do then, exactly?

"Depending on the situation, I may have you remain with Ally while I speak with her creators. She sounded as though she needs company."

Got it. But how am I supposed to talk to her when I'm like this? Bee motioned to his holoform. He couldn't make any sort of noise through his holoform; communication was strictly limited to sign language when he was like this, and the sign language he used was Cybertronian. Even if Ally could understand sign language, he strongly doubted she could understand Cybertronian sign language. Of course he could always write out what he was saying… but that took a lot longer. And was far more annoying.

"Ally is capable of telepathy," Optimus answered as they approached the front door. "I'm sure she will oblige you if you inform her you cannot speak." He reached up and pressed the doorbell.

Not two seconds after he'd pressed it did the door come flying wide open, replaced by a very irate looking Eve. Optimus had never seen anyone look so frazzled as Eve did now. Her blonde hair was a mess as if she'd been pulling at it and rubbing her hands through it continuously. Her light raspberry eyes were wide and wild as well as puffy and red looking as though she'd been crying. Judging from the stains on her cheeks, she had. Just as the Prime had suspected, whatever was going on in this house at the moment was not something of any great joy.

Bemused, Optimus tried to smile placatingly. "Mrs. Prescott-"

"You!" Eve snapped disparagingly, effectively shutting the mech up and causing both he and Bumblebee to stare at her in surprise. "This is your fault! You've done this!"

Bumblebee blinked and looked between the furious Hybrid female and his commander, completely lost.

Optimus wasn't any savvier about Eve's claims. "Mrs. Prescott, I'm afraid I don't-"

"Don't pull that shit on me!" Eve hissed even more angrily, too incensed to mind her language at this point. "You know exactly what you've done, Prime!"

At this point Cyrus appeared at the door. While he looked upset and disheveled as well, he was much more calm and put together than his mate, which definitely spoke to Eve sharing blood with Hunter. "Evie," he murmured firmly to his wife, a hand on her shoulder, "let's bring this into the house before we disturb the whole neighborhood."

Eve whirled on him. "No!" she spat. "I don't want him in this house, Cyrus! Not after what he's done!"

"And I don't want the neighbors calling the authorities on us and having to explain everything or using more magic than we've had to tonight," Cyrus returned gravelly. The look in his navy-rimmed electric blue eyes was sternly resolute, clearly meaning that he wasn't about to back down from this and his wife would allow their guests to enter the privacy of their home, however unwanted they might be.

Eve's mouth twisted in annoyance and she seemed to try and glare her husband down for a moment before finally—grudgingly—relenting. "Fine," she growled, moving away from the door.

Cyrus nodded after her than turned back to the holoforms standing in the doorway. "Come in," he said. It sounded like an order as opposed to a polite request, and it was obvious Cyrus wasn't thrilled about the concept.

Nodding back, the Autobots entered the house. When the door had closed behind them, Optimus felt Bumblebee step a bit closer to him, and he couldn't blame the scout for doing so. He felt the eerie sense of being trapped in enemy territory as well. As such, the Prime could already feel himself tensing as if he were waiting for an ambush, and he wouldn't have been completely surprised if one happened what with how Eve was acting.

There was no time for pleasantries as Eve immediately let into Optimus once again, her voice raising to an alarming volume. "How dare you!" she shrieked, getting right up in Optimus' face. "How dare you come back here after what you've done!"

Optimus faced the enraged woman down unflinchingly, keeping his face impassive even while the emotions inside of him were swirling. Surprise, annoyance, anger, anxiety, confusion—they all mixed and mingled together leaving him feeling very disoriented with all of it. What had he done exactly? Something told him it all went back to Ally, considering she'd been the one to call him, and—from the looks of it—this had everything to do with why she'd sounded the way she did. "If you don't mind my asking," the Prime replied calmly, "what exactly am I being accused of?"

"No!" Eve bawled, her voice somehow going higher. "You're not going to stand here in my house and play innocent with me, Optimus Prime! Not after what you've done to my daughter!"

Ah, so it did have to do with Ally. "I've done nothing to Alchemy," Optimus answered carefully.

"Liar!" Eve accused. "You've done something to her! She never would have done this on her own! You put ideas in her head—made her think to do things she wouldn't do! It's because of you she's acting like this!"

Optimus gave the woman a hard look at that. Sympathize as he could with worrying over one's child, he didn't much care to stand there and be yelled at and accused of horrible things by an obviously hysterical person who had no idea what they were saying. "As I've stated, I have done nothing to Ally," the Prime repeated a bit more harshly. "All I have ever done is spoken with her, and it was done so at her request. I did not seek your daughter out on my own or pressure her for any information she wasn't willing to give. I can assure you that is all I have ever done with Alchemy."

"You brainwashed her!" Eve insisted.

"Your daughter endured several years under the wing of your creator and her cult," Optimus responded, just barely managing to keep his deep voice from dropping into a snarl. "Years that—from what I understand—were filled with all forms of conditioning and brainwashing. She came through with her mentality and sense of self fully intact. And you believe that I—a Purebred—have any sort of power or sway to brainwash her into doing my bidding when I have spent only a few hours with her?"

"Manipulated her then!" Eve retorted.

Optimus outright glared. This obstinate femme! He was quickly losing patience and sympathy with her. "You do not give enough credit to how strong-willed and minded your daughter is, I think," he rumbled.

Eve had never looked more affronted. "Don't you dare tell me what credit I do or don't give to my daughter!" she hissed savagely. "Don't you dare!"

Cyrus and Bumblebee were butting into the conversation now; Cyrus grabbing his wife's arm and pulling her away from Optimus, whom she'd been nose to nose with, and Bee grabbing Optimus. Both males stepped between them.

"Let's try and keep this somewhat civil, shall we?" Cyrus requested, giving both Eve and Optimus stern looks. "We're adults here—I think we're all entirely capable of that, right?" He received no replies, but seemed to take that as a confirmation anyway. "Optimus," he said, turning his full attention to the Prime, "as you can see my wife has a… less than desirable temper."

"Cyrus!" Eve snapped in offense.

"Typically she does well with keeping it under control," the man went on, ignoring his wife, "but when she does lose it she has a strong tendency to jump the gun. Which brings me to the question that should have been asked in the first place: Did you or did you not instruct Ally to go searching for information about the Lunation?"

"I did not," Optimus said with a pointed look at Eve. "As I've said, Alchemy approached me with the information that the Lunation is, in fact, on Earth. She freely told me everything she knew about the cult—she was never forced and could stop speaking at any moment she chose, but she never did. She admitted dream-walking to me and offered to find the location of the Lunation in this way, but I instructed her against it for it seemed far too risky. If that is what she has done now, I did not ask it of her or push her in any way to make such a decision—she obviously made it on her own."

"Lies!" Eve spat. "Ally wouldn't do that; she knows she's not supposed to. She will attempt to use her strength or speed or the basics sometimes, but she knows abilities such as her magic or dream-walking are strictly off limits. She would never-"

"But I do, Mom," a voice from above cut into the conversation.

Everyone stopped and looked up towards the top of the stairs to find the subject of their conversation standing there, listening intently.

"Ally," Eve said, her voice shaking despite being forceful, "put your pajamas back on and go to bed!"

Ally shook her head as she started to come down the stairs. "No, Mom," she said softly, voice also trembling the slightest bit, "I won't." Her gaze slipped away from her mother's and moved in the direction of the Autobots, catching and lingering on Bumblebee for a moment—who in turn stared back at her—before moving over to Optimus and meeting his eyes. In that moment the leftover remnants of uncertainty in her gaze seemed to disappear in the little blaze of determination that burned there. She was ready to do battle… in a manner of speaking.

"Ally, sweetheart," Cyrus murmured, moving towards his daughter, "please just go back upstairs."

Ally's eyes whipped away from Optimus' to meet her father's. Her lips thinning into a dogged line, she shook her head once more. "No, Dad. I'm sorry but no." She turned her attention back to her mother and lifted her head a bit higher as she finally touched the ground floor. "I use my dream-walking all the time," she said to the entire room though she appeared to be addressing Eve specifically. "Magic, too, but only certain spells since… well, you know how I am. But dream-walking—I do that, like, practically every night. I've been in your dreams, Mom; you just never caught me. You, too, Dad."

Eve looked like she'd been punched solidly in the gut with this revelation: She actually grabbed at her middle and seemed to sink towards the floor. "Why?" she rasped. "Why, Ally?"

Ally's two-toned eyes hardened even as tears pricked at them and her bottom lip trembled. "Because it's part of what I am—who I am," she answered hoarsely. "I'm a Hybrid, Mom. And… I like being a Hybrid; I like acting like a Hybrid and feeling like a Hybrid and doing Hybrid things! Maybe denying it all works for you and Dad, but it totally doesn't work for me—I feel like a total fake if I try." A tear trickled down the girl's cheek. "And that's why… I have to leave," she declared, voice barely audible. "That's why I have to go with Optimus."

"No!" Eve barked. "I won't hear of it! You're staying here, Alchemy, you're not going anywhere! Least of all with this mech!" She shot daggers in Optimus' direction.

But Ally paid her mother no mind and instead focused on Optimus and moved towards him. "I can go with you, right?" she inquired. "I can help you out with finding Hunter; I know where the cult is and I know how the estates work."

"Alchemy…" Optimus muttered, not entirely sure how to respond. Ally may have been a Hybrid, but she was not trained for battle—at least not in the way Hunter was—so he could not, in good conscience, advise her to come with him. Yet he could not force her to stay if she didn't want to either. Ally was not his soldier nor was she his child. At best she was his adopted niece, and that gave him neither the say over her wellbeing nor the right to tell her what she could and couldn't do. All he could do was make suggestions and his own feelings known. "I… I do not wish to cause trouble between you and your creators," he stated. "Neither do I wish to pull you into danger, which is most assuredly what will happen if I allow you to come with me. It is up to you, of course, but I do believe that it would be best for you to stay where you are, out of harm's way."

At that a cold, hard look came over Ally's face. "You told me that I'm not my mother or my father—that I'm only me," she told him. "You said that it's time for me to start making my own choices and deciding who I wanna be and that I'm the only one who can do it. You were right, and I'm making my decision. I'm deciding that I'm done with trying to be something I'm not; I'm choosing to be and live and act like a Hybrid, whatever it brings me. I'm choosing to go with you and help you find Hunter 'cuz I've decided I can't let Luna totally destroy the world or something. I've decided I can't be someone who just sits by with my thumbs up my ass—that's not who I wanna be. I wanna be a fighter… a warrior… maybe hero. I gotta, like, at least try. Hunter might the Fuser, but I don't think she can do it all by herself—not yet anyway. And you're totally gonna need me if you want even, like, a chance of getting into the estate to find her."

Optimus inclined his head and regarded the girl before him. It was all there; the stoniness of the face, the gleam in the eyes, the firm set of the jaw, the slightly drawn lips, the squared shoulders and stance, the slight upwards tilt of the chin, the crossed arms—all the telltale signs that the teen was serious about what she was saying. They weren't as practiced on Ally as they were on Hunter, but they were there. Ally meant every little bit of what she was saying, and if he didn't take her up on the offer, the Prime was sure she'd be going along with him anyway. Or maybe even launch her own campaign to try and rescue Hunter. Sighing heavily, still not feeling comfortable with the situation, Optimus finally conceded. "All right," he said. "If that is your decision, Ally, I will support you."

A slight smile broke out on Ally's face, which caused the Prime to smile back in turn.

"No!" Eve yelled. Without warning the woman surged forward and grabbed her daughter, wrenching her away from Optimus and back into her arms where she held the girl protectively. "No! I won't allow this to happen! I won't let you take her!"

"Mom!" Ally shrieked, trying to pull away.

"No!" Eve repeated. "No, you're not leaving this house, Alchemy! I won't let you!"

"It's my choice, Mom!" Ally exclaimed, sounding entirely fed up with it all. "It's not up to you!"

"The hell it isn't! I'm your mother! I won't lose you, too! I'll keep you in this house forever if that's what it takes to keep you safe!"

"Enough!" Cyrus' bellow cut through the female's screams. He moved towards his wife and daughter and wrenched them apart, holding them as far apart from each other as he could. "That's enough," he rumbled, looking harshly between his mate and child.

"Daddy?" Ally murmured apprehensively.

"Cyrus?" Eve said at the same time, looking confused.

The man looked between them one more time before letting go of his wife and turning his full attention on his daughter. The harshness that had shadowed his face one second ago was instantly gone and replaced with softness. "Ally," he said quietly, gently taking hold of her shoulders, "do you know what you're saying?"

Ally nodded, looking more serious than she had ever looked in her life. "Yes, Dad," she answered. "I've been thinking about this kinda stuff for, like, ever. It's just that now's the time to actually do something instead of just think."

Sadness shone in Cyrus' eyes, but so did understanding as he nodded wordlessly, his face somber. "And you're sure?" he pressed further. "You're absolutely sure that this is what you want to do?"

Again the girl nodded. "Absolutely." She glanced back over her shoulder to the Autobots, taking her time to look between the two of them, before turning to her father again. "I've literally never been more sure about anything."

A slight, amused smirk quirked Cyrus's lips even as the melancholy look in his eyes became even more pronounced. He inclined his head. "Okay," he whispered, sounding hoarse. He lifted a hand and cupped one of his child's cheeks, stroking it with his thumb. "As long as you're certain."

"What? No! Cyrus-"

"She's right, Evie; She's almost eighteen—old enough to start making her own choices about her own life." The man turned to face his despairing wife.

"I don't care how old she is!" Eve raged. She seemed even more frantic now knowing that she had no real allies in this fight anymore. "Ally is our child! It's our job to set the rules and boundaries and make her realize the consequences for not obeying them!"

"And we've done that, Evie," Cyrus responded, looking and sounding exhausted. "We've done that and more time and time again, and, yet, here we are. Let's face it—it's over. If we haven't succeeded in raising her to our way of life by now it's not going to happen, Darling. The Prime's right; Ally isn't either of us—she has to live her own life at some point, and clearly"—he looked back at Ally once more—"this is the life she's decided on."

"No!" Eve insisted. "I won't allow it! I won't!"

"You can't stop me," Ally said firmly, giving her mother a hard look.

Cyrus turned back to his wife looking rueful. "I believe it," he admitted with a humorless chuckle.

Head held high so that she was looking down her nose, Eve looked between her daughter and husband in what appeared to be bemused and disgusted anger. "I can't believe it," she hissed furiously. "I can't believe that after everything we've gone through, everything we've done and promised, that you would just give in that easily, Cyrus." She spat her mate's name like it was some sort of epithet. "I thought I married someone strong!"

A brief shadow of hurt came over the man's face. "You did," he assured her. "But you also married someone who knows when to pick his battles." He gave his wife as significant look as he added a bit openly, "As well as someone who loves you and can understand and forgive your flaws and weaknesses."

Eve had enough grace to look a bit guilty for a moment. "Cyrus," she said slowly, earnestly, "if Ally walks out the door with them, we could lose her."

Once again Cyrus turned to his daughter and regarded her before looking to Eve once more. "If we don't allow her to, Eve," he retorted softly, "we will lose her, and you know that."

An uncomfortable silence permeated the room.

Eve looked like she was still about to continue arguing when Cyrus stepped towards her, a dark look on his face. "Eve Starbright," he began gravely, "I love you with every fiber of my being—have since we were kids—and I will love you to my dying day." The man swallowed hard and looked as if what he was about to say next wounded him deeply: "But if you make me lose another one of my children… I will leave you."

The pain on Eve's face was practically palpable. "Cyrus!" she breathed the exclamation.

"I've already lost my son, Evie," Cyrus voice sounded so broken and strained, "please don't force me to lose my daughter, too."

Eve fell completely silent, staring at her mate in sheer horror, fresh tears beginning to shine in her eyes. After a moment she looked from Cyrus to Ally and held her gaze there for a moment before looking back to Cyrus again. She did this several times, as if trying to decide what to do, or comprehend the situation she'd suddenly found herself in, or maybe trying to judge if both her husband and child were being completely serious. Whatever contemplations she was making came to an end after a few minutes. Sighing heavily and looking completely defeated and pained, Eve's stubborn resolve finally seemed to crumble. She made a single nod.

That seemed to be the signal for everything to get started.

"I'll go grab my stuff," Ally said softly, making to go back upstairs, her voice quivering again.

Optimus turned his attention back to Bumblebee only to find the young mech staring reverently at Ally. He placed a hand on the scout's shoulder. "Bumblebee, why don't you go and assist her?" he suggested.

Jumping as if he'd just been woken from a trance, Bee shook himself and looked between his commander, over to Ally who was mounting the stairs, and back again. He nodded seriously before following off after the seventeen-year-old.

The adults watched as the young ones disappeared up the stairs. When they were out of sight, Eve made a sobbing sound, covering her mouth with both hands. She looked as though she was about to collapse to her knees when Cyrus rushed forward and wrapped her into a tight embrace. Eve clung to him desperately, wailing hysterically into his chest, as if she'd just lost a child.

In a way, Optimus supposed she had. In fact, she'd technically lost two now: Steel had left years ago, lost to the Lunation's brainwashing ideology; and now Ally was renouncing all she'd been taught growing up and was leaving home. Both of Eve's children had abandoned her and for very similar reasons, all of which had the Lunation at the heart of the matter. Forgetting his previous annoyance and anger with the femme and feeling empathetic towards her once again, Optimus decided that, among numerous other reasons for bringing the Lunation down, he would do his best to try and bring it down for Eve as well. After providing the deciding blow for Ally to choose to leave—however inadvertent it had been—he owed Eve at least that much.

Things stayed this way for several moments—Eve and Cyrus clinging tightly to each other with Eve sobbing her grief and Optimus silently watching on—until noise at the top of the stairs drew everyone's attention again. Ally came marching down the steps, a unicorn printed messenger bag slung over a shoulder and a stuffed giraffe and elephant held in the crook of one arm. Bee came right after her, lugging a large, pink suitcase with him. He was staggering a bit with awkwardness of it, but he didn't seem to be minding the task at all.

A choked whimper escaped Eve as she watched her daughter. Clamping a hand back over her mouth she pulled out of her husband's arms and hurried out of the foyer and down the hall. The sound of a door slamming closed signaled her exit through the back entrance.

Ally had frozen on the stairs upon seeing her mother's reaction, and she continued to stand there now, staring in the direction Eve had disappeared, a haunted look on her face. Tears were welling up in her sapphire-rimmed raspberry eyes again. She looked down at her father. "Daddy?" Her voice was small and uncertain.

Cyrus opened his arms in response and Ally rushed the rest of the way down the stairs into them. The pair hugged each other tightly.

"I'm sorry," Ally whimpered into her father's chest, tears starting to trickle down her cheeks. "I'm so sorry, Daddy."

"No," Cyrus soothed, sounding like he was starting to cry a bit now, too. "No, I'm sorry, Ally. I'm not saying I approve of your actions and attitude leading up to this, but it's clear your mother and I are the ones who should be apologizing." He began to rub Ally's back and rock her ever so slightly. "We've spent all these years trying to put as much distance between ourselves and the past that we never stopped to think about how our actions and feelings would affect you kids: We never stopped to think that maybe it was all hurting you and not allowing you to grow into yourselves. … Maybe if we'd realized that sooner, your brother would still be here with us now, too." The man released the girl and pulled away a bit, still holding onto her upper arms as he met her eyes. "This is hard for us because of what we've been through—your mother especially—and it'll hurt for a long time… but we're strong and we've got each other—we'll come to terms with it." He smiled encouragingly even through his tears and reached up to stroke Ally's cheek with a thumb. "Don't you worry about us. You've made your decision and you've got a mission now—go make yourself proud."

Ally's lips quivered into a small smile for a brief second before faltering once more. "But… will I make you be proud of me?" she dared to ask.

Cyrus chuckled lightly. "That's all you've ever done, Gingerbread Girl," he stated adoringly, smoothing a hand down the girl's hair. The man winked. "Go get 'em."

Smiling ever so slightly, Ally dipped her head in a nod and continued on towards the door, Bumblebee following after her once again. The two exited the house, closing the door behind them.

Optimus and Cyrus watched after them before turning to meet each other's eyes again. They regarded each other in silence for a second.

"Take care of her," Cyrus finally said.

Optimus nodded firmly. "I promise to look after her as though she were my own," he vowed.

"Because if you don't—I don't care if you're my niece's spark-father or not—I'll kill you. And then Eve will resurrect you to torture you and kill you again."

"Perfectly reasonable."

They both shook hands, grips firm in seriousness and understanding, then they turned and moved towards the door themselves, Cyrus seeing Optimus out of the house. As they stepped onto the porch, they looked down across the street to see Ally and Bumblebee standing beside the scout's vehicular form. They were currently embracing, Ally sobbing into Bee's chest. One would reasonably expect for anyone to look and act awkward by being put into a situation in which they had to comfort, by all rights, a stranger; but Bumblebee didn't seemed to be fazed by his situation at all. He was just calmly standing there, holding Ally as she clutched on to his holoform, eyes closed with the girl's head tucked beneath his chin, a hand gently rubbing her back. He seemed perfect comfortable with it all. It was almost as if he'd been going through these sorts of things for a long time—as if he'd been going through these sorts of things with Ally for a long time.

The two men stood on the porch in silence for a moment, simply watching the pair.

"She's very tactile," Cyrus commented after a while. "Evie and I were basically starved of physical affection in the cult, so we vowed not to let the same thing happen to our kids. … We might've overdone it a bit."

"That is nothing new to us," Optimus replied. "Hunter is much the same way."

Silence fell again for a few seconds before Cyrus stated in a casual "discussing the weather" sort of tone, "She loves gingerbread cookies; she can eat pounds—and I mean pounds—of chocolate mints before any other candy; and her favorite flowers are pink peonies." The man turned away and began to retreat back into the house.

Optimus whipped around and stared after Cyrus, raising an eyebrow in perplexity. What did that have to do with anything?

---

Egypt;

Steel shot upright in bed, wide awake. He was shaking and breathing heavily, and when he lifted his hands to rub his burning eyes he found that he was crying. In any other circumstance, the young man would have felt embarrassed by this because it was the third time that week he'd awoken from a dream in complete tears and he wasn't supposed to let dreams get to him; but at the current moment he was too busy focusing on what had just happened. Or what he thought had just happened. Had it really happened? Had Ally actually been there in his dream? Had she actually talked to him? Comforted him? Had he actually shared his memories with her?

After taking a second or two to collect himself, Steel decided that, yes—all of that had really just happened. There was no way it couldn't have. He'd dreamed of his sister before, but she'd always appeared as she had looked when they last saw each other: a gawky little preteen with braces. But this time…. She'd been all grown up, this time, with no braces. And she'd talked to him—really talked to him! No snippets of things she'd said in the past, no senseless dream mumbo-jumbo—actual words and phrases and sentences in an actual conversation!

Ally had been real and she'd been there! After so long, his sister had finally come back to dream-walk through his dreams, just like she used to most every night when they were younger and they popped in and out of each other's dreams to continue talking or playing or to comfort each other from nightmares. She was back!

But why? Ally had said that she'd dream-walked to see him; had she been trying to reach him all this time and just now finally managed it because he was back on Earth? Had the only reason for her visit really been because she'd missed him? How could she possibly miss him? How could she possibly miss him after what he'd done—after he'd betrayed and abandoned her? You had to love somebody in order to miss them: How was it possible to still love someone after they'd betrayed and abandoned you? Then again… he'd felt betrayed and abandoned by Ally and Hunter when they'd left the Lunation… and he still loved the both of them just as much as he had before they'd left.

"I need to get up and walk," Steel muttered to himself, wiping away the remainder of his tears. "Clear my head. Yeah." Throwing back his covers, the nineteen-year-old pulled on his dressing gown and slipped out the massive doors of his bedroom to the hall beyond. From there he started walking. He had absolutely no plans of where to go, no destination in mind whatsoever, he just walked, letting his feet take him where they wanted. He walked down hall after hall and stairway after stairway. Every now and again he passed a Field Acolyte making their nightly rounds and did his best not to cringe as they bowed low to him with a greeting of "Master Steel". He hated it whenever they did that—always had. And he hated that he was "Master" Steel. He didn't feel worthy of that level of respect or title, especially not when he was literally the youngest member of the Lunation. And that feeling had only increased since Hunter had arrived back in the fold. To be honest, ever since she'd returned, he didn't feel worthy of much of anything at all, let alone the respectful bows and the title of "Master". Not after he'd caused her pain and allowed her to hurt, not after she'd made his faith in the cause waver, not after… just everything.

Before he really even knew it, Steel found himself in the lower levels of the manor, heading towards the private library. There were many libraries in the mansion—practically every floor boasting one, though the sizes varied—but this one was only ever used by Luna and the few she dared trust to enter into her Inner Circle. Only the most important and powerful of tomes, texts, and artifacts resided here, cherry-picked by the Mistress herself. Many private meetings could be held within the confines of the walls—Luna had made sure the room was heavily protected and warded. The place had an atmosphere that was heavy, dark, and foreboding, and it sent a chill down Steel's spine and made his skin crawl. So he really had no idea why he'd come here.

The boy was about to turn around and walk away when he heard muffled voices coming through the cracked door of the library. Raising an eyebrow, he crept as quietly as he could towards the room and crouched on the floor by the crack in the door. Steel quickly peeked around the hall to make sure he was alone, and then quickly casting invisibility and silencing charms on himself before peeking through the crack into the library. His field of vision was extremely limited, but he could see the library was bathed in purplish light from the lit fireplace, sconces on the walls, and ornate candelabra dangling on fine chains from the ceiling in the center of the room. In the chairs and sofas arranged by the fireplace he could see twelve figures plus his grandmother and grandfather seated. The Inner Circle was having a meeting.

Steel pursed his lips and narrowed his eyes, feeling a little irked. Supposedly he was part of the Circle: Why hadn't he been notified?

"Maybe because you're too young," a mocking voice sneered at the back of his mind. "Or maybe because Grandmother knows your unworthy."

"Shut up," Steel sneered back to it. He turned his full attention back to the meeting. Grandmother really should have made sure the doors were completely closed; none of the wards and spells worked with them cracked like this.

"-it's quite close to being finished now," Luna was saying as she stood in the center of the group. "With the time of its completion drawing upon us we now must focus on the next part of the plan: my own union with a celestial being."

A murmur went through the group.

"Mistress," a slight, pale-skinned, mousy-haired woman named Heavenly, spoke after a moment, "if I may, there are many celestial beings—all of who have varying levels of power: does this mean that you have found the correct being to merge with?"

Luna inclined her head, a slightly haughty look on her face. "I have," she replied.

Another, more excited murmur went through the group.

"But... have you discovered how to utilize the pendant then, Mistress?" Heavenly pressed onin her tremulous voice, looking completely enraptured.

Luna's face fell a bit at that. "No," she admitted, "unfortunately I have not." A wicked smile twisted her painted lips then and she added, "That is why I have called all of you here tonight." She looked knowingly towards her husband, who sat at the head of the group next to her unoccupied chair.

At this point, Ray's face split into a maniacal grin and he chuckled darkly.

"M-Mistress?" someone murmured uncertainly.

"You see," Luna went on, "I could very easily have acquired the information along with everything else I gleaned from the old man this afternoon." She looked around the circle a bit patronizingly. "But I refrained, because the rest of you must know the secrets of the pendant as well. After all, you will all be there with me during the ritual as I cannot perform it alone. And I know that I could simply learn the information myself and share it with all of you," her raspberry eyes were absolutely alight in malicious joy now, "but I thought it might be better for the lot of you to participate in the interrogation of this matter in order to hear the information come straight from the source itself. After all, there's nothing like performing a bit of torture to keep something firmly planted in your mind."

The group broke into a fit of dark, cruel laughter at this statement, sending a shiver down Steel's spine.

"Never say I am not generous," Luna remarked. She snapped her fingers and, with a brilliant flash, Scarface Malice—or at least what was left of him—appeared in the center of the group. The ancient Hybrid was beaten, bruised, burned, and bloody, looking as though he was hardly clinging to life as it was. He was gagged and bound to a heavy chair, completely unable to move.

Steel's stomach churned. He was a fairly dark when it came to sorcery, and he wasn't against torture when the right circumstances arose… but this? He hated Malice and believed the world would be a far better place without him, but Steel just couldn't get behind the idea of torturing the man. The old geezer had already been tortured anyway, what with being killed and resurrected and all. Not to mention all the times he'd already been beaten through the years since being resurrected.

Luna approached Malice, a sickly sweet smile on her face. Almost too gently she pulled the gag from the old man's mouth and traced his thin, bony jaw with delicate fingers. "Hello, Grandfather," she practically purred, her tone like deadly acid despite being so mellow. "How are we feeling tonight?"

"P-Please," Malice panted, sounding like he was struggling to hold onto consciousness. "Please, Luna… n-no more." He looked in Luna's general direction though his eyes were almost too swollen shut for him to see anything and shook his head tiredly. "No mo-ore. Pl-please no more. No… more…." His head drooped as if he was about to pass out.

Luna scowled and flicked a finger.

Malice jolted awake again with an agonized yelp.

"You will stay awake, Grandfather," Luna hissed, seizing the man's jaw in a crushing grip as she glared into his swollen eyes. The fact that he was screaming and writhing in pain the chair made no difference to her. "You will stay awake for as long as I desire it. I have a few more questions to ask you, you see; and you will answer them for me just as nicely as you did this afternoon. Am I understood?"

"Ach! Ahh! Ugh! Y-Yes!" Scarface groaned, struggling to form words. "Yes, of course—whatever the hell you wanna know! Just please take this godforsaken curse off me! Or better yet kill me! Just kill me! Please! Anything to make this stop!" He continued to scream and howl and writhe and jerk.

Luna's face was impassive, cold, unfeeling. The man's pain and pleas had no effect on her whatsoever. "Now that would just defeat my purpose," she commented. "I need you alive, Grandfather—at least for a little bit." The evil sneer returned. "But take heart: Maybe if you answer all my questions in a nice and timely manner, I can make sure your death isn't quite as slow and painful."

Another peel of laughter arose from the circle.

Steel finally peeled himself away from the horrid scene, the notion of sitting there and watching a torture session forcing him to move off. Getting back up on his feet, he hurried further down the hall and around the corner before casting a silencing charm so he wouldn't hear any more of the screams. For a long moment he stood there, back pressed against the wall and spark racing as he panted. He didn't have to worry about being found; the previous spells he'd casted on himself were still functional. What he did worry about, though, was getting sick right there on the floor. Steel didn't know if it was because of seeing Scarface in such a pathetic state and knowing he was only going to slowly get worse before finally—maybe—being put out of his misery, or because of what he'd heard about his grandmother fusing with a celestial being, but he felt absolutely sick to his stomach.

"The machine's almost complete," Steel murmured to himself. Much to his chagrin, the nineteen-year-old had been kept out of a lot of things when it came to Grandmother's "master plan" but the machine he knew of… though… he still had no idea what it was actually supposed to do. And as for this whole merging thing—that was completely new information. What purpose did that part of the plan serve? Something told him it had something to do with the machine, and not for the first time did he wish he knew what the machine was and did. If he did maybe he could figure all of this out! Giant, mysterious machines, potential fusion with celestial beings, some sort of pendant that connected to the merging concept somehow—what did any of it mean?

"Whatever it means," he thought, "it can't be good for Hunter."

Hunter…. All of a sudden he had to see Hunter. He didn't know why, but he just needed to see her now. So, pushing off the wall, Steel teleported down to the stasis room. He reappeared in front of the doors to the room and quickly typed in the code to allow him access. The boy looked around the room as the doors opened. There were only two technician Acolytes on duty this late at night, both of which were sound asleep. Apparently they felt secure enough in the fact that the sole occupant of the room was in far too deep of a coma to worry about her trying to escape again. Had she known, the Mistress would have had their heads. Steel, on the other hand, found this completely to his advantage, as he could visit his cousin without having to worry about interruptions or questions.

Casting a few quick spells around the room including a privacy ward and an extended sleeping charm on the Acolytes to assure their slumber, Steel approached the sole stasis chamber in usage. As he approached the pod, he looked sorrowfully up at Hunter as she floated lifelessly in the green-hued liquid. If it weren't for the steady stream of bubbles rising from the respirator around her nose and mouth and the slight twitch of her eyelids—as well as the steady beep of the spark-monitor over on the panel by the technicians—you could almost think she was dead.

Eyes never leaving his cousin, Steel raised a hand and pressed it to the cool glass of the pod. He wished more than anything he could actually spend time with Hunter—talk to her, hug her. He could really use one of her sassy quips and a hug right about now. It was funny: He was the oldest of the three of them and had made Hunter and Ally feel safe and comforted when they were children, but… he'd always felt just as safe and comforted by them as well—Hunter in particular. There had just always been something about her that made him feel protected when she was with him—even when she'd been significantly smaller and frailer than him. Maybe it was the fact she was the Fuser. Or maybe it was just her.

"I don't know what to think, Hunter," Steel whispered after a moment, gazing forlornly at his unconscious cousin. "I don't know what to do. I don't know what any of it means and I don't like that. I've tried asking Grandmother for answers but she refuses to tell me anything beyond what I "need to know". I'm supposed to be part of the Inner Circle but… I don't think I really am. I don't think Grandmother actually trusts me at all. … Maybe I don't deserve it—haven't truly proven myself worthy of it. … Or maybe she just doesn't want me to know any of her plans. But why?"

Steel's lips quivered as his spark and stomach twisted around into one big knot of anxiousness. "I'm… I'm scared, Hunter," he admitted. "I feel like I have to do something—make some sort of decision—but I don't know why or what or how to. I don't know anything." He was quiet for a long moment as a new, very frightening realization suddenly made itself known. "I… I don't even know… if I'm on the right path anymore."