Disclaimer: I only own my OCs.


Megatron: *angry* Human! Where are you?

Authoress: *calls in on video screen* Why?

Megatron: *furious* Why? Oh, I'll tell you why! It has been over a year since you last updated us! What do you have to say for yourself?

Authoress: *pauses* *nervous* Um...well, I'll say that I am not telling you where I am! *closes out of call*

Megatron* *enraged* AUTHORESS!


AN: And here are the review answers I couldn't answer through PMs.

Guest: You left me two reviews. Firstly, I am glad that it finally let you open the chapter. Also, thank you so much for the review. Thank you so much for taking the time to read this story. I do enjoy writing them when I get a chance and now I get to update this one again! I hope you continue to enjoy it.


Chapter 7: Concern

Megatron's 1st P.O.V.

As I stood in the washracks, preparing for the solar, I let my processor drift to our current prisoner. Dunce, in his actions, seemed to mirror much of what bots like I experienced during the functionalist era of Cybertron...better known as the end of the Golden Age. Terrified of things that he shouldn't be. I still wasn't sure what caused him to panic during our talk. But, he had devolved in our talk and I had to end it before I could find out all that I wanted to. There was more in his helm than even Dunce was aware of, of that I was sure.

Well, there was only one way to find out. So, I turned off the water and dried off before making my way to the brig. Blitzwing would not be up this early, so I didn't have to worry about stressing Dunce out over multiple visits back to back. Also, I found myself hoping that Dunce was going to be awake. I wasn't sure how Dunce would react if he was to wake up to find me standing there. He was jumpy enough as it was, and waking up to me might make him even worse...if that was even possible. Honestly, the mech seemed like his nerves would offline him at any click when he was talking to me.

Soon, I had arrived at the brig. This was it. Time to find out if Dunce was still in recharge or if he was an early riser. However, as I arrived at the row of cells that held Dunce, I felt my optics widen. Quickly, I moved to the open cell door and felt anger as I looked inside. Empty! How did this happen? The lock was electronic, and Dunce didn't seem like the kind of mech to risk escape. Frag, he was afraid to even have a conversation with me, let alone try and escape. I needed to look over the security footage.

"Shockwave," I spoke into my comm as I made my way to the throne room. He would be able to start pulling up the footage as I made my way there. Wasting time would not be accepted right now. I was going to figure out what happened.

'What's wrong, Megatron?" Shockwave must be able to tell I was upset.

Upset was putting it mildly.

"Dunce has escaped," I relayed to him as I moved closer to my goal. "Meet me in the throne room and pull up the footage from his cell last night. I need to know what happened."

"Right away," Shockwave answered before he closed the comm.

A few clicks later, I was entering the throne room and I noticed that Shockwave and I were not alone. Starscream, Blitzwing, and Lockdown were standing next to the intelligence agent. "What the frag is going on here?" Starscream asked as I came to stand next to Shockwave.

"Dunce escaped sometime last night and we are trying to find out how he escaped as well as when he was able to leave." Hopefully, that would keep the questions away until I could see and hear the footage from last night. Thankfully, the cells had sound-recording in their footage. This would make this go by easier.

Of course, I still couldn't believe that Dunce had been able to escape. It was my fault, of course. If I had posted a guard instead of letting them all recharge through the night, then Dunce wouldn't have wanted to escape, if for just wanting to get caught. That, however, didn't mean that I didn't want to find out what happened.

When the monitor finally showed the holding cells, I left those thoughts and watched the scene as it unfolded. For the first cycle of footage, which Shockwave was fast-forwarding, Dunce seemed to be laying on his berth. From the mech's chassis language, I could see that Dunce looked somewhat more comfortable there than he had on the first solar of his arrival. But, he wasn't at the point of total comfort...yet.

When Shockwave finally played the clip at its normal speed, I watched as Dunce talked to himself. I found it strange how the mech was asking Primus to help him escape. More importantly, he was asking this to help him think around his enemies. Fair point. Being stressed did tend to make thinking harder. This line of external thought coming from the Autobot surprised me. Even after all of Blitzwing's visits, I didn't think that we were making any progress with converting Dunce. But, from the way that the Autobot was talking, we had made much more of an advance than had been seen.

Thunder and lightning crackled in the audio and, nearly in the same instant, Dunce was on his pedes with a scared look in his optics. Must have thought he insulted Primus with his ask for help. But, I was almost positive that it was just by chance that the lightning had crackled as soon as Dunce had asked that. It was even more luck being seen when the cell seemed to open.

I took a nano to study that until I realized what had happened. The electricity from the storm must have disrupted the locking mechanism on the cell and had opened the door. That must have encouraged Dunce to leave. Seeing the door open in front of him, without having to risk trying to open it himself, it must have seemed like the perfect opportunity for the mech. We then watched as the mech slowly made his way out of his cell before he made his way out into the storm.

The footage then turned off, but I couldn't find the words to speak at the nano. Dunce had only escaped out of pure luck, and my lack of security outside of the electronic systems on the cell doors.

"Megatron," I glanced to my side at Blitzwing as the triple changer spoke. "Are ve going out now to recapture Dunce?"

There was a part of me that wanted to do just that. I wanted those answers. If we hadn't just watched the security feed, then I would have immediately sent my Decepticons to retrieve Dunce. However, we had seen the footage and, while the wait for answers was going to bother me, I knew what had to be done.

"No," I made sure to look at them all before continuing. "Dunce needs this time away to think about everything that we have been trying to tell him. You all saw the footage. He seems to be confused and being in a familiar setting for a small while will help him sort through those thoughts. While Dunce is making progress, we do not want to push him too hard. If we do, then we will not be able to convince him of the truth. We will wait for one solar cycle to allow him to recover from the storm and to think. Then, we will reclaim him."

They nodded and Starscream got on his comm to spread that information. Since not all of my troops were in here right now, that seemed like the best idea. We all needed to be kept informed if we were going to succeed. We were going to succeed. My Decepticons would once again be able to set pedes on their true home, free bots who were all equal to each other.

Once Starscream finished his calls, I was about to dismiss them when the video comm system received a ping. Strange. Last we had heard, there were no troops near this section of space. The closest, who was on his way, was still at least eight solars out from the planet. He wouldn't be contacting us until he was at least three solars out. So, who could this be?

"Shall I answer this?" Shockwave asked.

Well, there was nothing to lose by answering this call. So, I nodded toward Shockwave. As he connected us to the caller, I studied the screen as the bot on the other side came into sight. Who was this? I didn't recognize the faceless bot on the other side and, judging from the looks on the other faceplates in the room, this bot was a mystery. "Who is this?" I asked, seeing if the bot would answer.

"Soundwave reporting, Lord Megatron."

Soundwave? I had to think back about our last campaign to Earth before I realized who this was. It was the bot that I had helped evolve through the use of the Allspark Key on one of Isaac Sumdac's inventions. The mech seemed to have given himself quite an upgrade. "Soundwave, address me as Megatron." It seemed better to get the mech started on the right pede. "You have changed since I last encountered you."

The mech with a screen for a faceplate nodded slowly before showing clips of what happened. We all watched as the Autobot Optimus Prime defeated Soundwave with a strange guitar bird. Did Soundwave create symbiotes to help him? If so, I needed information on them. However, I held off on that question as the recordings continued. After his defeat, the bird flew off with Soundwave in some sort of hibernation form. Then, two small mechs appeared in the clips who worked on this current chassis for Soundwave. We then watched him acquire a new, flying, alt mode. That would be useful in gathering information.

Once all the clips were done, I took stock of all the symbiotes we saw, including the names that Soundwave provided at the end with their information. The bird guitar from before was called Laserbeak and was the first one that Soundwave had made, followed by the bat keytar called Ratbat. Then, Soundwave had created a feline symbiote that could turn into a portable media player called Ravage. From the looks of that symbiote, Ravage could potentially be useful in the field for more than just information. Lastly, there were the two mechanoid symbiotes. A black and red one called Rumble along with his twin called Frenzy. These two, unlike most symbiotes, seemed capable of cognitive comprehension. We would have to look into that later.

"What am I to do Megatron?" Soundwave asked, causing me to focus on the mech once again.

Well, having any advantage over the Autobots, especially with us working on Dunce and his conversion, would be very beneficial. So, I smirked. "I am sending you the coordinates of our base. Come straight here and do not engage the Autobots. When you arrive, I will debrief you on what the situation is."

The faceless mech nodded once before the line was cut. Once the screen was dark, I allowed a smile to come on my faceplate. While I had lost Dunce, the Decepticons were now six members stronger and that would help us in the long run. Now, I just had to wait for Soundwave and his symbiotes to arrive.

Ratchet's 1st P.O.V.

I felt my spark beating rapidly in my chassis as I prepped the med bay. Twenty clicks ago, Captain Fanzone had called Optimus. He had found Dunce and the mech was in rough shape. That was the human's description of the mech. He wouldn't know what to look for. However, given that Dunce had to have escaped the Decepticons to be found, I was expecting to be busy when the team returned with the mech. I had debated on whether or not to go with them to retrieve the mech. However, the med bay was in no shape to take in the mech and his possible injuries. My processor flashed to the thousands of injuries that this war had caused that I had personally seen. The Decepticons were capable of great harm, and I needed to be ready to repair that damage.

At the beginning of the war, the Decepticons were much more passive. However, that passiveness gave way to the ruthless and merciless bots that left bots so disfigured that many times it was more ethical to put the injured out of their miseries. Even though Optimus had reported that Dunce didn't seem as injured as Fanzone had hinted at, I still needed to be ready. I would do my own scan of the mech to make sure.

The sound of the others arriving caused me to snap out of my thoughts as I rushed to meet them. I had sent Arcee with them, to help load and transport the mech. Once I helped her get the mech out, I immediately started to scan him. Once the scan was complete, I did a quick visual check on Dunce's physical state. To my surprise, from what I could see from around the dried mud and grass caking his vents, Dunce seemed relatively unharmed.

Once my scan was complete, I looked over it. This was just a basic scan, and I would be doing more scans once I started to clear the dried mud and grass from his chassis. However, the scan surprised me yet again. Nothing serious was showing up. A low temperature was the most serious issue, and that should start to resolve itself once I got the mech's vents cleaned out.

"Is he going to be okay?" Jazz asked in an almost panicked tone. Given that the mech seemed close to Dunce, that was to be expected.

So, I would give him the best answer that I felt safe giving. "From what I have seen so far, he should be alright. I'll know more once I get him inside of the med bay."

And the sooner I could get him in there, the more likely it was that I could delay a certain bot from interrogating Dunce right away. The poor young bot was probably going to be traumatized by his capture. Most bots would and Dunce, given the nervous nature that I had seen in him, would be even worse off than those other cases. As a medic during the Great War, I had seen the worst injuries and I also saw how many bots handled being in the same situation as Dunce.

Some of the more nervous ones like Dunce, who had been captured by the Decepticons for information, returned heavily affected by the experience. Many of those nervous bots had taken their sparks shortly after because of the grilling that the command would give them about the said experience.

Time needed to be taken while dealing with bots like Dunce. I would have to be slagged before I let that idiot question Dunce before he was ready. "Come on, Arcee. This isn't as bad as it could have been, but we still have work to do." I then moved to follow Arcee as she started to take the gurney through the med bay doors. However, the sound of a vehicle pulling up caused me to turn and internally sigh. Frag it Sentinel had caught news that something was going on.

"Ratchet?" Arcee started to hesitatingly ask me. Quickly, I motioned her toward the med bay. It was better to get Dunce out of reach than leave him out for Sentinel to have access to him.

As soon as she got through the doors, I stood in front of them as Sentinel transformed. "What is going on here?" It also seemed like Sentinel was in a bad mood. Great. Just great.

Thankfully, Optimus answered the other Prime. "Dunce escaped the Decepticons during the storm last night and was found on the outskirts of the city."

It was strange to see a flash of fear travel across Sentinel's optics. What did he need to fear from that statement? However, I couldn't spend much time thinking about that as he turned to me. "I need to hear from him about his captivity before anything else happens."

"I don't think so," I stood my ground as the Prime glared at me. "Dunce is currently in stasis lock and won't be waking up for a while."

Sentinel didn't like that at all. "Then go and wake him up! I need to find out about the situation before he forgets or clams up."

"I'm only going to say this once young bot, so listen up," I then folded my arms in front of me as I continued. "Seeing as I am the only medic on this planet, I outrank you in this situation and I am not going to wake Dunce up just so you can grill him. It may cause him to snap. So, you just keep your vocals on mute until I give you clearance to speak with him. From the looks of his injuries, that is going to be at least a solar cycle of waiting. So do us all a favor, and mute your vocals for a while." I then turned and walked into the med bay. Once I was inside, I turned and immediately locked the doors. He was not getting in here without my clearance.

Of course, my locking of the doors seemed to snap the Prime out of the shock I probably put him in as I soon heard him slam his fist against the door. "You unlock this door right now or I am going to have you court marshaled!" Of course, I didn't respond. "Do you hear me medic?"

I rolled my optics at that before I grumbled, "Blow it out of your exhaust port," Then, I turned my attention to the med berth, where Arcee was already at work cleaning the mud off of Dunce. "Good, you've cleared the area around his chest plates. I am going to have a look inside to make sure that the Decepticons didn't damage anything internally and just fix him on the surface."

Arcee nodded at that. "Okay, Ratchet." Then, she returned to cleaning the mud off of his chassis, starting at his knee joints.

So, I moved my focus to Dunce before I opened his chest plates. I needed to check around the area of his spark. If any damages needed immediate attention this would be where I needed to start. However, as soon as I started to look at the damages inside his chassis, I barely held back a growl of anger. This damage was extensive and affected multiple points in his chassis. How he could even go through his solar to solar activities was a surprise to me. These past few solars must have…

My anger ebbed away as I looked at the injuries more closely. Something wasn't right with the timeline. If these injuries would have been caused during Dunce's time, they would be more irritated than this. Instead, there were obvious signs of deep healing on most of the injuries. The others had healing on them that had to have started before Dunce's capture. That could only mean one thing. That some of the injuries I were seeing in Dunce's chassis had to have happened during his stay on Earth, but before his capture. "Slagging pit-spawn,"

"Ratchet, what's wrong?" Arcee asked me as she came to sit next to me.

"There are injuries on Dunce's chassis, but they had to have occurred before Dunce was captured by the Decepticons but after his arrival on Earth," There was no need to bring up the previous injuries right now.

"But...but that would mean…" Arcee started to speak.

I nodded before answering her unasked questions. "Yes. That means that Dunce is getting attacked here, and on Cybertron, by beings that are not Decepticon. They may be Autobot, but there are so many Cybertronians out there, and quite a few here, that it is hard to say for certain that it was an Autobot." Though, I was now even more suspicious of Sentinel's fear of Dunce not seeing him first. Something was going on, and I was going to find out what that was. But, I would have to work with Dunce slowly. Dunce seemed very hesitant when speaking about certain things...many things actually, and after his experience with the Decepticons Dunce was going to be even more hesitant. But, I was going to find out what was going on. I had to.

Icy's 1st P.O.V.

I couldn't stop tapping my digits against my berth as I sat on it, backplates against the wall. This wasn't fair. After the talks between Dunce and myselves, I thought I was making a connection with him. While I know I had bots who were my friends in the Decepticons, Dunce just seemed...different.

'Und jou are supposed to be zhe smart one between zhe zhree of us.'

I let off a slight groan of annoyance at that. 'Oh, und how vould jou describe it? I know jou felt it too. Despite popular belief, I do understand feelings.'

'Ahhahhahahaha! Und zhe shot heard 'round zhe vorld hast been fired!' Both Hothead and I felt annoyance toward Random's take on the situation.

Of course, he wasn't wrong. 'Zhat might be true, but I didn't get to talk at all.'

'Zhat's because jou are not as funny as me.'

I was sure Random seemed to be doing this just to get Hothead riled up. 'Enough. Ve just need to focus right now. Und vhat ve should be focusing on is zhe fact zhat we can't see Dunce.'

It did bother me. When I first visited the mech, I just felt like having a Decepticon who was not an officer talk to him would be the best step. However, as our other visits happened, I found myself enjoying talking to him. He didn't open up much, and many of our sessions ended like our first one. However, I had noticed that, with each session after the first, he would let us talk with him longer and longer.

Most of the topics didn't have anything to do with the mech. It was apparent from our first session that he didn't like talking about himself. So, Random and I had talked to him about everything we could. Everything. We talked about the time before we were separate...when we were just Blitzwing. No Icy, nor Hothead, not even Random. Instead, each of us were just different ways that we as Blitzwing expressed ourselves. We told him about our best friend growing up, Octane. We told him that one of our favorite places to hang out when we were growing up was Tembre Merles. It was a secret island hidden in the sea of rust that you had to time to get to since the rust storms made it difficult to travel to the island without knowing when it was smart to fly, and when one should drive. Also, the island itself would only come up to the surface once a week for four cycles.

'I miss visiting Tembre.' Yes, I did too. We used to have so much fun there.

'Maybe ve can take Dunce zhere one solar? Zhen ve can all vin at quidditch!'

Of course, vith Dunce's mistrust in us, zhat might take a long time. Added into zhat Dunce having just escaped from us, zhen zhat vould take even longer. However, zhere vas always a reason to give hope. Plus, it vould be nice to take Dunce zhere. He seemed like he vould appreciate zhe island.

'Maybe one solar.'

Of course, we would need to convince him that the Autobots had been brainwashing him for his entire existence. With how hesitant Dunce was, then that might take a while. However, thinking about one of the few smiles I had seen from the mech caused my spark to flutter. I wasn't sure why that happened. It was strange for my spark to feel like that at that thought. I would have Shockwave look at that later.

'...or not?'


Authoress: *singing* Time to do some sketchy scrap, do da, do da.

Megatron: *appears with cannon* I found you.

Authoress: *gulps*...*runs singing* Did not get away with it, fragity, frag frag frag!


AN: And here is the next chapter! There really is no excuse for how long this took me to get another chapter out, so I do apologize. I hope you all liked it though. Some serious moments mixed in with some cute moments. Also, if you read the original, the ending scene was new and I enjoyed adding that little bit in there. And yes...I used a Tiktok reference at the post-story scene. I think it is adorable and all rights to whoever owns the original sound. The actual version pops into my head all the time now.

The next chapter (when I get to it) will be entertaining and have some hard choices for at least one bot. Until then though, here are the names of the next chapters (tentatively).

Chapter 8: Back and There Again

Chapter 9: Chance and Fear

Chapter 10:...(and I'll see you next time!)

So, that's all for now. Drop a review to say hi or let me know how this story is going. Until next time though, TTYL! *should totally be in bed right now*