Fate Calls Chapter 43: Broken, a transformers/beast wars fanfic

I managed to get this done by the end of the month. Honestly, I'm shocked by that - I had about 4,000 words of material when the 1st rolled around.

I have little to say up here.

I thank those who reviewed in the time of the last chapter profusely. I means so much to me that so many of you took the time to read my lengthy note and address what it said, and in general just reviewed. Seriously, thank you all.

And please, don't quit on me. You'll understand.

Gabby M - I am glad you like it so far. And I also hope you've stuck around with it all the way from where you were to where we are now. There's a lot of material to read.

Thanks for the review.

anubis (Reply to Chapter 18) - I assure you I did not. Though there is debate about whether my way was worse.

(Reply to Chapter 19) - Hmm. That's a pretty good one. I will remember that.

Thank you for both of your reviews.

The Silent One - You are welcome. I hope you enjoy this update, as well.

Guest 1 (Chapter 27) - 1: I found the story of Rise of the Dark Spark to be almost comically bad. It introduced an object purely to make a game related to it, and yet didn't properly explain anything about it beyond it was the bad version of the Matrix of Leadership. That's not storytelling; it's a cash grab.

2: Any writer that has any interest in telling their own story is not going to throw away all their plans in order to fit with the desires of a single reader. That's the blunt truth. I am not going to toss out everything I've set up to randomly put in a plot line that doesn't fit.

And 3: What you are asking for isn't even the Rise of the Dark Spark story. You want a story you've already made up in your head. If you want to write the story, go head and do that. But I (and my story and characters) are not going to be involved in it.

Thank you for the review, and I am sorry that I'm not going to be of help in writing the story you've come up with.

Guest 2 (Chapter 27) - I am going to say this once and only once: No.

For one, you are arrogant in believing that your taste in music fits better with the chapter. I tried listening to the song you listed in your review, and I found it both unappealing and not fitting with the either ending of the chapter (there's a reason why they are called Credit Songs; the only ones that I consider Themes for the chapter are the ones I mention as fitting more than the ending).

And for another, being rude to the author doesn't gain you any points or credit in the decision-making process of credit songs. It makes you look foolish, in fact. Being honest.

Good day.

Thanks go to Crystal Prime for beta reading.

Disclaimer: Transformers belongs to Hasbro. I only take credit for this story and my OCs.

Fine.

The flower sitting on my workbench fell apart, jostling me into action. I reached out and reformed the flower, reattaching the petals to the stem. Why had I been clumsy enough to drop the flower in the first place? It was supposed to be perfect and beautiful—just like Arcee; I shouldn't have handled it so carelessly.

My servo bumped into one of the petals, and it fell through one of several holes in my workbench and down to the floor. I reached down and picked the flower up, shaking my head in amusement that I had to reach through the workbench to do it. Why did I think these holes would be helpful in the first place? They had no purpose, and they made it difficult to store things on the workbench. What had I been doing, thinking these would be useful? Silly me!

A light hanging above my workbench suddenly went out and fell to the floor, its power line snapped. I knew should have fixed that thing! Always hanging around, never staying on. There aren't any other working lights on this side of the room, and the other side of the room would make it too bright for me if I adjusted my optics. Now I have no way to work over here. That won't do!

I took a piece of metal next to me and used it as a mirror, deflecting light from the other side of the room to be focused on the flower in front of me. Much better.

I finished reassembling the flower, being extra careful not to jostle it too much. It wouldn't be good to make it fall apart again—then I'd have to put it together again! That'd be frustrating. I'd probably hit something I'd be so annoyed!

Once the flower hadn't fallen apart again, I went back to my deep thoughts.

Fine.

A sound—more like a faint vibration—came from the floor. It had been so quiet that I barely heard it. I didn't know what it meant, but something was telling me the vibration had been from the space bridge. Maybe Arcee was finally back from her mission. If she was, then I could give her the flower I made for her! That would be nice.

Warnings and deafened shouts echoed around in my helm, screaming at me that nothing about how I was feeling now was real. That Arcee had returned from her mission already and left my quarters. That I needed to fight against something—that no matter how I felt, I was not fine.

"That's a lie," said the dark mech at my side, presence cooling the very air.

That was a lie.

"You're fine."

I'm fine.

"You need to stand up."

I stood up.

"You need to leave your quarters—something in Storage Hanger Echo-3 needs your attention."

I just remembered, I have that… Thing in Storage Hanger Echo-3! I should get over there. Urgently, I walked to the door, stepping around bits of shelving, souvenirs, and lighting spread out around the floor. I should really fix all that. It's a mess in here!

I unlocked the door, then started moving down the hallway. A freezing feeling entered my helm as I walked, numbing my CPU and making it hard to process anything. I continued down the hallway at a steady pace, despite how my processor wasn't working properly. It was then I realized I wasn't even telling my pedes to move—they just did seemingly on their own. The same thing happened to my servos.

A voice in part of my CPU—a very, very small part—was telling me I should be very worried I wasn't controlling my own frame. It was saying I needed to stop ignoring what was right in front of me and act.

The voice was shoved aside mercilessly, and I heard a distorted version of my own voice echo around the hallway to a line of an unfamiliar song.

"Light breaks, Good shakes

When the Night Awakes."

Arcee flexed her servos as the space bridge opened, emitting sounds of battle from it as Ultra Magnus and Optimus returned to base, Omni Saber in the Prime's servo still glowing and crackling with dark red energy. They both appeared moderately damaged, but nothing their auto-repair systems wouldn't handle by themselves.

She was impatient to move, to get to Shadow' and fix whatever was wrong with him. Her emotions were demanding she run back to his quarters, now that Optimus and Magnus were there with them. But her logic—and her sisters—told her she couldn't do that yet. Prime and Ultra Magnus needed to be informed of the situation before she acted. With someone or something controlling Shadow', they needed to act as a group.

That didn't keep her from wanting to virtually sprint back to Shadow's quarters and start breaking things until she had answers.

"Your message said it was urgent," Optimus said, placing the Omni Saber on his backplates.

"Seems Flightstorm and Cyberfrost were wrong about the kid's Protocol," answered Ironhide, servos crossed, Cannons nearly touching one another. "It's been activating on its own. And we have footage that proves it."

Arcee frowned at the tone used by her brother-in-bond. As soon as they had seen the footage of Shadow' in the hallway last night, the emotions she had been getting from him were blunt, grim, and angry. He may have hidden it from her, but Arcee knew Ironhide had been watching Shadow' closely in the last jour, silently testing him. In his optics, the camera footage showed Shadow' failing his test. Arcee disagreed. She sent the appropriate emotions to him through their bond.

Ironhide scoffed and looked at her. "Don't you give me that. I've had no problems with Shadowstreaker up until now."

"No, but you're so convinced he did something terrible that you're ignoring anything I say that doesn't fit with what you think."

"You're in a relationship with the kid—ya have a biased viewpoint. Love like yours will do stuff to your helm."

"I'm not some love-struck youngling, Ironhide," Arcee said, biting back the fouler words she wanted to use for that comment. "You've known that since he and I started courting. When I say you're wrong, it's because you are. Not because I'm defending Shadow' out of blind emotion."

"Enough," Optimus cut in, quickly bringing an end to her argument with Ironhide. The Prime looked at Prowl. "What has happened?"

The SIC explained the unusual behavior they had all witnessed in Shadow'—and the security footage—in his usual, to the point fashion. Without wasting words, he also managed to fit in a condensed explanation of the Quriomus Protocol for Ultra Magnus' benefit.

"Do you know what is wrong with Shadowstreaker?" Optimus asked Prowl, faceplate impassive.

"I do not. I believe his Protocol is involved, but given the questions raised by the footage—and what the Field Commander witnessed in Shadowstreaker's quarters—I cannot be certain," Prowl replied.

"Where is the Specialist right now?" Asked Ultra Magnus.

"He should still be in his quarters," Arcee said. "I locked the door when I left."

"Then let us not delay in helping Shadowstreaker any longer," Optimus said. He started down the hallway, and everyone else followed.

They arrived at Shadow's door moments later. Arcee stepped ahead to unlock it, but it opened automatically for her. She had to keep herself from gasping.

The room was destroyed. The shelves on the right side of the room were torn apart, souvenirs scattered everywhere along with the shelving. Lighting fixtures on that side of the room had been pulled from their housings, leaving it dark. Remnants of the Cortical psychic patches she had seen earlier were all over the room—some intact, others shattered. The one Shadow' had been working on when Arcee saw him was still there, broken and reformed. The workbench itself looked like it had been punched repeatedly.

"Does da Shadowster' always keep his room like 'dis?" Jazz asked. "'Cause Ah think he might need a talkin' to 'bout an invitin' atmosphere."

Arcee knew the saboteur was joking, but she treated the question seriously. "No, he doesn't. It looked nothing like this when I left."

The bond she shared with Ironhide grew angry, in turn affecting the bonds they both shared with Elita and Chromia; Chromia was affected far more heavily. "Then the kid must be running around with his Protocol on again."

The blue and pink femme sent disapproval to Ironhide for his tone, but didn't refute what he said. Shadow' was nowhere to be seen, his quarters destroyed; she agreed he wasn't in his right CPU. Technically.

Optimus stepped into the room, examining the damage closely, faceplate blank. Arcee's experienced optics saw the troubled look the Prime was hiding.

"What are your orders, Prime?" Prowl asked.

"Place the base on lock down. No one enters or leaves until we find Shadowstreaker." Optimus picked up a Cortical patch that had been ripped in half, the metal sheared in two. "Where are the children?"

"We had Bulkhead take them on a drive, keep them off base," Elita said.

"Good. Something tells me they should not be here. What of the wounded?"

"They watched the footage with us. Moonracer is watching over them."

"And the others?"

"Unaware of Shadowstreaker's status. We wanted to alert you and Ultra Magnus first."

Magnus frowned at the use of his name without his rank attached; Optimus nodded. "Understandable, but unnecessary. Prowl, inform everyone else on base, and stay in the ops center to operate the space bridge. But leave our patrols in the dark—they have enough to worry about."

"What about the rest of us, Prime?" Jetfire asked, stepping aside to let Prowl by him to carry out Optimus' order.

The Prime looked at Jetfire seriously. "Find him."

I shifted through storage containers rapidly, tossing things aside without really looking at them or even thinking. My servos moved of their own accord. I didn't know what I was searching for at any given point—I only knew I had to look for it. When I found it, I placed it in a sub-space pocket and moved to search for something else. What was I even grabbing?

"You don't need to think about that."

I shouldn't think about it.

"Keep searching."

I kept searching, rummaging through the contents of another storage container before moving to another and tearing off its lid to see inside. Did I have to do that?

"Yes."

Of course I did. I had to see inside every container. The fastest way to go through them all was to not waste time opening them properly. How ridiculous of me to even think of doing it another way!

I seemed to find whatever it was I was searching for, sub-spacing it and moving to another container. I went to break it open, but paused, adjusting to my environment.

Something clicked in my helm, and through the rock, metal, and composites that made up the walls, ceiling, and floor, I somehow started listening to far-off areas of the base. I heard fifteen pairs of pedes hitting the floor. Some above me, and some below me. Each pair had a different sound and pace to them to them—none supported the same weight. One pair was walking back and forth in the med-bay.

Two pairs of them were in the hallway outside the door, moving to the storage hanger I was standing in. Their voices were muffled, unclear. I didn't know who they were. Something about that made me unhappy, but it didn't matter. No matter who they were, maybe they'd help me search for the… Things I'm looking for!

"You don't need their help."

I don't need them to help.

"You need to go to Storage Hanger Beta-4."

I turned to walk out the door, hearing snapping back into focus. It felt weird.

"Not yet."

I stopped. But then I started moving again, heading back into the mess of storage containers, pedes and servos no longer under my own control. The voice warning me that I should be worried reappeared. It was more urgent this time. Louder. It said I needed to stop pretending.

Once again, the voice was crushed. "Now to meet the first customers of the day."

Jazz led Springer down the hallway, blue optics scanning every angle from beneath his visor.

After Optimus gave the order, everyone who'd gone to the med-bay with concerns about Shadowstreaker had split up into pairs to search for the Triple-Changer. The formation of each pair went quickly, and wasn't organized. As a result, Jazz and Springer had been placed together. The saboteur hadn't worked with Springer much, but he had seen how much the green Triple-Changer had matured as of late. He would watch Jazz's backplates; Jazz trusted him to.

That being said, Jazz only trusted Springer because he'd peeked into the mech's file once or twice—to make sure it was all filed correctly, of course—and read evaluations from Springer's old commanders. Evidence of the green Triple-Changer's old behavior colored every review, but they all said Springer was more than reliable when it mattered.

The saboteur had a bad feeling he was going to see if that was really true.

"Where do we start?" Jazz asked, looking at the doors to the storage hangers that lined both sides of the hallway ahead.

Springer pointed at a door to their left. "That one."

"Why 'dat one?"

"It's the one silver door here."

Jazz shrugged at the weak reasoning and stepped up to the panel next to the door Springer pointed to. He entered the combination to unlock the door, and it slid open. The room beyond was empty.

"'Da color silver an' ya don' get along, do ya?" Jazz drawled.

Springer crossed his servos, look in his optics telling the saboteur the larger mech was purposefully ignoring what Jazz said. "Let's just keep looking, alright?"

"Touchy, touchy. A'ight. What' ya next pick?"

The larger mech walked across the hallway and started entering another combination into another door panel. "This one."

The new door opened. Like the first, it was empty.

"Do ya wanna go for best three-outta-five?"

The index digit on Springer's right servo twitched. An unconscious movement on Springer's part Jazz noticed only occurred when the green Triple-Changer was getting annoyed. Good; Jazz wouldn't be doing his job if other 'Bots were never annoyed with him.

Springer went to the door right next to the one he just opened. The room was, again, empty. Jazz found that impressive; this was one of their most used storage areas on the base. The odds of finding three consecutive empty hangers was very small.

"Wow. Ya sure know how ta pick'em, don' ya, Springs?"

Springer huffed, now genuinely annoyed. "I don't see you trying to pick a door."

"Ah' been tryin' ta be polite. Ya know—give 'da average bot a chance ta shine."

"Then consider this me not wanting to shine. You choose."

Jazz looked up and down the hallway, optics shifting from door to door. They all looked identical, leading to identical rooms. Shadowster' could have been in any one of them. Or, in turn, he might have been on the other side of the base. But something was demanding Jazz go to the storage hanger four down from Springer's original pick. He followed that suggestion without questioning it. Very seldom did he ever think twice when he felt his instincts tell him something.

But he was a little curious why this time his instincts felt like a large, gentle servo pushing him toward the door; usually, his instincts only told him to look at something more closely. They had never felt like they were pushing him before. It was… Odd.

They reached the storage hanger Jazz's instincts were telling him to go. He went to unlock it, but the door opened automatically. The room beyond was trashed. Containers were torn to pieces, contents strewn about the floor. The hanging lights in the room were damaged. Flickering or out completely. It appeared the room was empty other than the containers and the items around the floor.

Jazz's instincts told him otherwise.

"Check your corners and stay on your pedes." Jazz's order came quickly and smoothly, within moments of the door opening for them. He had dropped his drawl completely as he stepped inside.

"Got it," Springer said from behind, staring at Jazz incredulously as he followed.

The saboteur ignored the larger mech's shock. Springer knew Jazz only dropped his fake accent when he was serious. And things had indeed just turned serious. Jazz felt something was inside the room. Something dark. Otherworldly. Disturbed. Twisted. Pained. Something that didn't belong.

Something that was sending a shiver down Jazz's spine.

He and Springer made their way through the room. They found nothing in the first rows of containers, besides more parts that had been ripped out of storage. Why was he doing that? What was the Shadowster' looking for, and why was he destroying so many containers to find it? Jazz's CPU was telling him there was a pattern in the seemingly random destruction, but he couldn't see it. Not now. He was too focused on watching his backplates along with Springer's.

A faint groan of metal came from somewhere up ahead. Jazz held his servo up to halt Springer, and the saboteur listened closely to pinpoint the sound. For a moment, there was nothing. Then he heard it again. It came from the right side of the room, behind one of the rows that had only a few containers destroyed.

"To the right and three rows forward, Springer. It might be Shadowstreaker," Jazz said to Springer through a comm-link.

"Should we go ahead and check, or call for the others?"

"Both." Jazz switched to the universal communications channel made for everyone involved in searching for the Shadowster'. "Jazz here. Springer and I might have found Shadowstreaker in Storage Hanger Echo-3."

Static greeted him.

The feeling of there being something wrong about the situation intensified, cooling Jazz's spine. He shook it off. "I can't raise anyone else."

"What? How?"

"Focus," Jazz said calmly. "Move up."

They did. Jazz went first, Springer behind him. The saboteur had them hugging the sides of the containers, moving slowly so they didn't make any sound. When they came to the row Jazz where heard the noise, he stopped at the end of a container, and Springer came up next to him. Then Jazz looked around the edge of the container, down the row and toward the origin of the sound.

A small, crudely-built scale was sitting directly between the rows of containers on either side of it. It was unevenly balanced. A set of magnets were at the heavy end, one attached to the scale itself and the other attached to the floor. They were facing each other with the same charge, causing the scale to tip upward whenever the heavy end went down to the floor. A faint groan of metal sounded from the scale whenever the heavy end was level with the light end.

This was a trap.

He felt movement from behind he and Springer. Slow. Quiet. Purposeful. Menacing. "Down!" He yelled, and threw himself away from the container and dove to the floor.

Springer took a moment to react, but nonetheless followed the saboteur's example. He was too late.

A large, heavy-duty metal pipe—meant for repairs to the energon power lines—struck Springer in the chestplates. He was sent flying from the blow, crashing back through the container he and Jazz had been against, and through several other containers beyond. He didn't even have time to cry out before he vanished.

Jazz rolled with his dive and came up on his pedes in a defensive stance. Shadowstreaker was in front of him, holding the metal pipe easily. But at the same time, it wasn't Shadowstreaker—it didn't seem like him. The much larger mech's posture was different, less disciplined. His optics were crimson as they had been in the footage Jazz watched. And as the saboteur looked into those normally royal cobalt optics, he felt like he was seeing a glimpse of darkness itself.

The pipe came swinging toward Jazz. He slid backward, out of the makeshift weapon's reach. The pipe came again, and the saboteur dodged again. Again and again he dodged, letting himself feel where he should go, instead of trying to plan his defense. Planning ahead of time could leave a fighter vulnerable if their intent was read by their opponent. Jazz preferred being wild. Unpredictable. It made him a harder target to read and track.

But that also meant he could see when he was being tracked. Shadowstreaker's optics were on him at all time. Following him. Never losing sight of him. The Triple-Changer's attacks had a pattern to them—a purpose. Like they were an experiment. Shadowstreaker knew where he was going before Jazz himself did; he just wanted to test Jazz's reaction time.

The saboteur had to shake things up.

Jazz dodged to the side as the pipe crashed down to the floor where he had been standing a moment ago. As Shadowstreaker pulled the pipe up, Jazz jumped on top of it and used the extra boost from Shadowstreaker's movement to send him upward. He grabbed onto a container on top of a row and quickly pulled himself up on top of the container, out of Shadowstreaker's sight and up above the lights.

From down below, a distorted chuckle echoed up to Jazz. It seemed to chill the room. "You live up to your reputation, saboteur."

Jazz rolled off the container he was on and landed softly on another just below, frowning deeply at the Triple-Changer's words. That voice… It didn't sound like it belonged. It carried the same qualities as Shadowstreaker's voice, but it sounded like it had been jumbled up. It was like someone else had used his voice as a template, and joined the template with something else. That, coupled with Shadowstreaker's words, made Jazz quickly realize Arcee had been right.

This wasn't the Shadowster'. This was someone else entirely.

A loud clang reached Jazz's audio receptors. The pipe had been dropped to the floor. "I must commend you on your exit strategy; it was unorthodox, but effective. You avoided harm, and—most importantly—you retreated to a place you know well: the dark."

The saboteur's optics narrowed behind his visor as he jumped between the rows of containers, deliberately making enough noise to echo around the room, disguising his true location. What was this mech saying?

"Darkness has been a good friend to you, hasn't it? It follows you. To planets, wars, assignments, this little rock. It's been a constant companion, wherever you go. You even embrace it, in some places. Like at Kalis, the Core, Velocitron, and oh so many more."

Jazz unconsciously stiffened at the mention of previous battles before he forced himself to focus. He didn't like talking about his time in Spec Ops, about the things he had done in his countless missions. For some mechs and femmes, talking about their time during and after the war was a way for them to cope with their actions in battle and the loss of friends. And it worked for them, digging up their secrets and leaving them in the open.

It didn't work for Jazz. He knew there were some things that should stay buried, never again to see the light. His exploits in Spec Ops were among those that should be forgotten.

So how was it that this mech—this pretender—knew anything about them?

The room seemed to vibrate as the pretender hummed, voice coming from off to Jazz's right and down at the floor. "No denial? Interesting. I thought you would want to at least try to lighten up your actions, make them seem justified. Seems you know it's impossible to do that."

Jazz didn't even have to try to keep himself from answering as he jumped to another row of containers. Sometimes, wars needed people willing to do bad things for good reasons. He was one of them.

"Tell me, how many throats have you slit?"

Many.

"How many interviews have you conducted in your time?"

A few.

"How does it feel, knowing you're just like the so-called monsters you fight? Knowing you're worse than they are?"

Jazz stopped making so much noise, continuing on to his intended destination as silently as he could. What was the pretender on about, now? Was he trying to make Jazz feel guilty? Not a good chance of that; Jazz had known he'd pay for his actions a long time ago. Every interrogation he led, every sword through the backplates, every assassination—they would catch up to him at some point. But he made peace with that. Each questionable action he committed saved another Autobot from having to do the same thing. He could face his eventual judgement with a clear helm, knowing that.

"Still you offer no defense," the pretender went on, sounds of his pedes hitting the floor telling Jazz he was moving around the room. "How disappointing. I was hoping for some form of entertainment, before I moved on to bigger and better things."

Jazz ignored the pretender's taunts and twisted voice. He came to a stop on the containers and looked down below him. The pretender controlling Shadowstreaker was there, walking slowly, scanning his surroundings. He hadn't spotted Jazz.

From this height, the saboteur would be able to incapacitate the pretender by landing on Shadowstreaker's helm. It would hurt—both on Jazz's end and the Shadowster's later on—but it was the most effective method Jazz could use. A prolonged fight would go in the pretender's favor due to Shadowstreaker's armor, and all other ways Jazz could end a battle quickly would result in either Shadowstreaker's offlining or a long stay in stasis lock. Neither option was acceptable.

Jazz waited patiently as the pretender walked forward, closer and closer to where Jazz wanted him. Not yet, the saboteur kept telling himself. Not yet. You have one shot—only take it when it's perfect.

The pretender stepped right into the target zone. Jazz jumped, elbow-joint held out below him.

For several micro-klicks, the saboteur fell straight down, gaining momentum rapidly. In his CPU, he was falling in slow motion, planning out everything about his attack. He'd hit the pretender in the helm with tremendous force, elbow-joint first to amplify the blow. The rest of his frame would follow, bringing them both down hard. If the pretender was somehow still able to form coherent thought after that, several kicks to the helm wou—

The next thing the saboteur knew he was tumbling along the floor, helm ringing, chestplates numb with pain.

Jazz had been played.

He slammed into something solid enough to stop his journey, and fell to the floor. His world was spinning, but he was still able to check his chestplates and helm. Neither were leaking. That was good; meant the pain and dizziness would pass. He slowly got up on his knee-joints and servos, moving as quickly as he could without further disorienting himself. He struggled to figure out how the pretender knew where Jazz had been, and how he struck so fast and hard. Jazz hadn't even seen him move.

The pretender stalked toward Jazz casually, crimson optics shining with a disturbed glee. "Aerial attack. Used commonly, by mechs of your size; it provides use of greater strength than could otherwise be produced. Very effective against most targets. Unless the target was expecting it. Which I was. Want to know why?"

Jazz shook his helm to clear his CPU, slowly getting up to his pedes.

"Because no matter how random a man is in a fight, no matter how much he tries to avoid patterns, he always falls into one. You change your fighting style rapidly and seamlessly, never using a style twice against the same opponent. A wise and slippery method of fighting, but just as predictable as staying with one style—you fall into a pattern by trying to not fall into a pattern. Your pattern is as easy to read as an open book."

"Ya wanna signed copy? Ah do give fans autographs in da form of busted limbs," The saboteur quipped, adopting his drawl as he took an unsteady step backward. The container behind him gave him a clear path up to the top of a row of containers. If he could just stall long enough to jump…

But no—his helm was spinning too much, his pedes unsteady already. He wouldn't be doing anything more than a slow walk until his helm cleared completely. The pretender had hit him too hard.

The pretender chuckled, the distorted sound echoing in Jazz's helm. He picked up the pipe from where he had dropped it before, and kept walking toward Jazz until he was standing right before the saboteur. "Always trying to find a way out, aren't you? So elusive." He swung the pipe experimentally, a twisted smile on a faceplate that didn't belong with the look. Then he rested the pipe on the side of Jazz's helm, holding it there. "Even in the face of death."

The pretender pulled the pipe back, and swung. The metal created a deep hum as it sliced through the air, homing in on Jazz's helm.

Then a flash of green and black slammed into the pretender's side, throwing the pipe out of his grasp and preventing it from reaching Jazz.

Springer was back up.

The two mechs crashed to the floor, Springer throwing the pretender off him and getting to his pedes first. He went on the offensive immediately, raining blows down on the larger mech as fast and as hard as he could. Left. Right. Kick. Punch. His movements were a blur to Jazz's spinning CPU.

But Jazz also saw the danger in Springer's form. The urgency. His armor was cracked where the pretender had struck him with the pipe, and he was favoring his right pede over his left. He was putting all his effort and hopes on his string of combos; he couldn't afford to draw out the fight.

After a particularly long and unanswered combo, Springer rushed forward and jumped, using both pedes to kick the pretender in the chestplates. He went flying back, smashing through a storage container. Jazz lost sight of him in the dark of the container.

"Come on, snap out of it, mech!" Springer yelled, returning to his pedes and keeping a stance that was between defensive and at ease, making no move to enter the container. "We're not your enemies! We're not a threat! We're your friends here, Shadowstreaker!"

Jazz realized Springer hadn't heard the pretender speak. He still thought the mech he had just fought was Shadowstreaker struggling with something affecting his Protocol, or something similar. That wasn't good.

Before Jazz could call out a warning, Shadowstreaker's pitch black form had rushed back out of the container and had a servo wrapped tightly around Springer's throat, lifting the smaller mech up to his faceplate. "Shadowstreaker's not here anymore," he snarled, and lifted Springer higher.

The pretender threw Springer away from him, and right into Jazz.

Jazz went numb as soon as Springer hit him, stunned by the larger mech's mass landing on him. His vision blacked out for a moment, and it took a micro-klick for him to confirm he still had his servos and pedes. As far as he could tell, Springer was going through something similar.

The pretender walked toward Jazz and Springer, expression bored, Jazz thought. He looked up at the row of containers near all three of them, and started to walk away from Jazz and Springer. "Why don't you two take a little nap, hmm?"

As soon as he was clear of the containers, the pretender's servo lit up with the same green light Jazz saw in the camera footage. An ominous crack came from the containers, and the entire row started to tip toward Jazz and Springer. They tipped further and further, and fell.

The containers impacted. Then Jazz's world went dark.

Why did they attack me? Why? Why? Why? What did I do?

The mound of containers burying Springer and Jazz had stopped shifting. I waited for them to dig themselves out, but they never appeared. The containers remained in place. Motionless. Silent. It was deafening in its own way.

What have I done?

"You defended yourself from attack," the mech next to me said, distorted voice carrying no emotion.

Why did they attack me?

"It doesn't matter."

Why? Why?

"You shouldn't care—they didn't care about you."

Why?

"Stop thinking about it."

What did I do? What have I done? What did I do?

"Fight him."

I paused at the sudden voice, missing what the mech next to me said at the same moment. The voice was nearly identical to mine, but it also carried a regal quality that commanded respect and authority just by being there. It sounded like it was only in my helm.

What?

Everything around me changed. The hanger and the mech next to me faded away, as if they had been fog on a spring morning. Darkness surrounded me on all sides, hiding me, sheltering me. I was standing on a floor of black metal lined with dark circuitry. The circuitry made the metal appear to be broken into square panels, each three square meters in area. There were groupings of metal cubes floating over the floor that looked similar to the panels. They were almost too dark to see, only the light from the floor giving them away. They seemed—no, felt—wrong.

"Fight him."

I blinked and turned. There was a light in the distance, so bright it was like staring into Sol a thousand times over after seeing darkness for vorns and vorns. It seemed to be shaped like a person with a roughly humanoid shape.

"Fight back," the light said, regal voice projecting as if it was standing next to me, even at this distance. "Don't let him win."

I blinked again, tilting my helm unconsciously. Who was this? Whoever it was, it felt nice to listen to him speak. He sounded inspiring.

"Fight. Regain yourse—"

The darkness intensified, blotting out the light as it had never been there in the first place. A shape so black it made everything around me seem white appeared next to me. A servo like the concept of the cold grabbed my own servo and led me into the darkness.

The world snapped back into focus. The containers were back, the lights were back. I was standing in the storage hanger again.

Where had I gone?

The mech pulled me around so I was staring into his crimson optics. "Stop thinking."

Why?

The mech's optics flashed, and something else entered those two crimson orbs. Something darker and colder than the dead space between stars. It seemed to form inside the mech's own optics, staring at me with an infinite number of eyes. Each one felt ancient and powerful beyond measure. They made me terrified. "Stop. Thinking. Forget."

I didn't dare question him.

The look disappeared. He let go of me and pointed to the floor. "Grab that energon line."

I grabbed the line. It wasn't like the power lines. This one was smaller, compact. Meant to be used in field repairs for injured soldiers.

The mech smiled, a twisted sight, with that look in his optics. "Get to Beta-4."

I walked toward the door, forcing thought from my CPU. I couldn't let myself think—the look would come back. I didn't want the look to come back.

"You're fine."

Fine.

Fine…

"Light breaks, Good shakes

When the Night Awakes.

"So don't fret, don't bite

For the Darkness will take you Home tonight."

Moonracer paced.

She didn't want to be pacing—it wasn't something she typically did—but she couldn't help herself. Her trigger digit was itchy, aching for the collapsed Titan on her backplates. Constantly she was running calculations for a multitude of things, muzzle velocity of various firearms chief among them. Something was urging her to move. Not in particular direction or speed, just move. Move at all time.

Moonracer didn't like it. She liked order to her thoughts, a scientific approach to her actions. But her CPU racing too quickly to form coherent thoughts, and her constant pacing was a nervous habit from her younger cycles. For Primus' sake, she was no longer some nerve-wracked femmling! She was older now, more mature. Experienced in the long journey called Life. What was making her act this way?

'You're beginning to unnerve them.' The words from her other half snapped her from her thoughtless silence. He was sending her comfort through their bond, and looking meaningfully at Bumblebee and Flareup, who she just now noticed were looking at her in worry.

The sharpshooter and medic forced herself to stop pacing, and gave the two younger bots a smile. They didn't notice it was forced, and relaxed. Moonracer turned her backplates to the med-bay's other two occupants, making it seem like she was checking Ratchet's wounds, and said back, 'You know why I am restless.'

'You don't know why you're restless.'

'Exactly!'

Her sparkmate huffed through their bond, shifting on his medical berth uncomfortably. Her scrambled, thoughtless need to move was affecting him. 'Well, you're not going to accomplish anything by wearing a hole in my—'

'Our—'

'Floor,' Ratchet finished, silently telling her through the bond that he agreed with her in viewing it as their med-bay, not his—the words had been instinctive. 'Find something to keep your processor occupied.'

'I've tried. All I can do is focus on feeling the need to move.'

'I know.'

'I hate things like this.'

'I know.'

'There's no order to them.'

'I know.'

'Then why suggest doing something else?'

'Because pacing and thinking about nothing clearly isn't helping you.'

Moonracer sighed quietly, aware her mate was right. She stepped away from his berth and made her way to the med-bay computer to monitor the others; it would also reassure Bumblebee and Flareup to see her do something other than pace.

She checked the progress of everyone on patrol. Minimal so far—no requests for a space bridge. Not uncommon, but… She felt like something wasn't quite right about that. She didn't know what was behind her feeling. Only that it seemed like her long-departed sire was gently telling her to check something.

Moonracer shook her helm, and the feeling disappeared. She brought up a program that let her see, in real time, the movement—or lack thereof, in Grimlock's case—of every active Autobot on the base. She and Ratchet very seldom used the program to preserve privacy, but with Shadowstreaker missing and clearly not well, she felt its use was warranted. Moonracer just wished she could have made it easier for everyone else and just told the others where Shadowstreaker was. The program only worked because of the tracking devices in active Autobots—Shadowstreaker had been placed into inactive duty, turning the tracker off. The tracker had to be manually reactivated to go online again.

She noted the location of her fellow Autobots, comparing it to standard patrol patterns. Accounting for the passage of time since she last checked everyone's location, all was in order.

The warm whisper didn't agree.

It told her something was wrong, not as it should be. That it was right in front of her, and she couldn't see it. No one in the med-bay could. But that she needed to see it. Find it. Somehow.

Clamping down on the odd voice in the back of her helm before it bothered her sparkmate as much as it was her, Moonracer dismissed the program in a rush, accidentally hitting one of the keys Ratchet had bound as a shortcut to his readings of the Delphic. She went to exit the one program on the computer she loathed—her mate had spent far too much time on it—but stopped.

One of the monitors, specifically the part of the program monitoring the Delphic's link with Shadowstreaker—which usually was in a steady, almost rhythmic line, like a sparkbeat monitor—had turned to a solid bar.

She looked at her sparkmate. 'Love, is this normal of the Delphic?'

He started at the question, shocked she had even mentioned the enigmatic energy source. 'Is what normal?'

'These readings. Th—' Moonracer cut herself off as she looked back at the screen. The bar had turned back into it's normal, steady line. She felt confusion for half a micro-klick, before she just barely caught something out of the corner of her optic.

A miniscule spark of green light arcing from the keyboard.

It was then, after seeing that spark of light, that Moonracer saw what the feeling of warm whispers wanted her to see.

Moonracer quickly opened a communications channel. "Optimus—I need you back in the med-bay. We have another problem."

The channel was static.

A multi-lensed, crimson optic appeared on the screen, staring right at Moonracer. Her alarm was great enough to gain worry from Ratchet, and a look from Bumblebee and Flareup.

Before she could explain even through her bond with Ratchet, the computer shut down, the lights overloading from a power surge. The door locked, the metal bar slamming into place with a metallic snap.

Moonracer no longer had to explain what had alarmed her; it was obvious to everyone, now.

There was something in the system.

And it had just turned the med-bay into a cage.

Can't think. Look will come back.

I sub-spaced something from the container I broke open. I didn't know what it was; I didn't look at it. I only knew it was longer and heavier than my own servo.

Can't think. Look will come back.

A rack of equipment was sent crashing to the floor, pulled from the wall by servos I didn't command. Two more items were sub-spaced.

Can't think. Look will come back.

I ripped the the door of another container off, staring down at dozens of ingots of raw Cybertronian metal. I sub-spaced all of them without checking which Cybertronian metal they were specifically, then moved to another container.

Can't think. Look will come back.

"Fight him."

My important musings were broken by the interruption, nearly making me drop the contents of the container. The voice sounded… Familiar. Serious, yet not scolding. Like a determined friend. Wh—

The back of a numbingly cold servo hit me over the side of the faceplate hard enough to turn me sideways. "Focus."

I went back to going through the container, ignoring the cold spot on the side of my faceplate. Can't think. Look will come back.

The mech's helm suddenly snapped toward the door. "Hmm. Now, who's this?"

I stopped searching the container, frame not under my control. I listened to my surroundings, hearing everything from everything. Three mechs were walking in the hallway outside. They paused on the other side of the door, then moved down the hallway. I listened as they spoke, hearing each word clearly.

The mech chuckled lowly, sound redoubling in his throat. "It was only a matter of time before the Old Man made an appearance. Stupid old idiot."

I started walking to the door, not controlling my actions. Look will come back.

The strange song returned.

"Light breaks, Good shakes

When the Night Awakes.

"So don't fret, don't bite

For the Darkness will take you Home tonight.

"Hmm, hmm

Hmmm, hmmm."

"Why are we doing this, again?"

"Because it's our job to look out for our fellow Autobots."

"Yeah, so why are we wasting time on a pretender?"

Smokescreen bounced lightly on his heels at Air Raid—the Air Raid! The one who infiltrated Kaon by himself!—and Jetfire's—the actual Jetfire! The same Jetfire who never once got shot down by the Decepticons!—conversation, a nervous habit of his. He wasn't sure how he felt about Air Raid's hostility to Shadowstreaker. He talked about the Triple-Changer as if he was a traitor who had personally offlined hundreds of Autobots and sold out hundreds more to the Decepticons. That didn't sound like the Shadowstreaker Smokescreen knew.

But how well had Smokescreen known Shadowstreaker in the first place? He hadn't spent a lot of time with the Triple-Changer before he was taken, but Smokescreen talked to him enough to know something had changed in Shadowstreaker while he was away. Something was darker, more serious. That, along with how stoically Shadowstreaker informed everyone he'd caused an entire ship to be destroyed, made Smokescreen make every effort to avoid speaking to the mech.

But why? Why did the Triple-Changer's actions make Smokescreen so angry? What made him want to ignore Shadowstreaker's existence? It wasn't what the other mech actually did; Smokescreen had spoken with mechs who had purposefully offlined thousands and even tens of thousands. And it wasn't as if he'd ordered the ship be destroyed; the Triple-Changer had been held captive. Was it that Smokescreen thought people like Shadowstreaker—descendants of the Primes, or the son of two of the Thirteen, in Shadowstreaker's case—should just be… Better? Better at everything, including finding ways to save people? Smokescreen didn't know.

Jetfire rounded on Air Raid, staring intensely into the other seeker's optics. "Are you saying it's pointless to search for a troubled fellow Autobot?"

Air Raid crossed his servos, shrugging. "It is when the bot we're looking for isn't a true Autobot."

"Since when were you the one who determined a true Autobot from a Decepticon wearing our insignia?"

"Since I didn't destroy an entire ship full of Autobots."

Jetfire shook his helm and started walking down the hallway again. "Still acting like a youngling whenever something important comes up. You're so quick to judge everyone around you, but you never let your own actions be placed under a spotlight. Convenient for you."

The other seeker scoffed. "Yeah? And you're different. I mean, when Silverbolt and I got here, I shrugged it off; maybe you'd finally hit the cranky stage of life in your old age. But I'm done shrugging it off. Primus, what happened to you, junker? Back in the cycle, you'd be the first one to call out a bad 'Bot when you saw one and have them thrown in the brig or interrogated. Now you're defending the bad ones? Treating them like they have honor? You've changed."

Jetfire's wings twitched. "I'm not the only one."

Air Raid said nothing to that.

Smokescreen kept following the other two mechs, unsure if he should make a comment on their argument. Then he heard a door behind them slide open, and he looked back where they came from. Jetfire and Air Raid did the same.

Shadowstreaker was in the middle of stepping out of a storage hanger they had past, optics burning crimson. Smokescreen stiffened at the sight of those optics. He heard from the others that Shadowstreaker had some sort of rare protocol that changed his optic color and turned him into a mindless machine when Arcee was in danger. Smokescreen briefly thought he was seeing that protocol in person, but then he saw the intelligence in those optics. The anger. The sheer darkness. He realized what he was seeing in Shadowstreaker's optics wasn't coming from whatever protocol he had—nothing about what Smokescreen saw in them was mindless.

Jetfire stepped forward so he was at the head of their little group, faceplate set stoically. "Shadowstreaker." The words almost sounded like a question, as if he was testing a theory. Smokescreen had seen the same thing Jetfire saw! Awesome! He was, like, well on his way to being as badaft as Jetfire was!

… His admiration for famous warriors was getting in the way of his priorities, wasn't it?

"Try again. Maybe you'll get it right the second time," Shadowstreaker said in a distorted voice, and immediately Smokescreen knew something was wrong. That wasn't Shadowstreaker talking.

Jetfire's optics narrowed. "Who are you?"

"I've been called a lot of things by a lot of people over the years, but I prefer Cold. It matches my sunny disposition."

"What did you do to Shadowstreaker?"

Cold just smiled.

The way Jetfire's optics darkened made Smokescreen feel he was seeing a part of the ancient seeker that few witnessed; Smokescreen also saw out of the corner of his optic that Air Raid seemed just as surprised as he was. "Whatever you did, you're going to pay for it."

"I doubt that very much, grandpa. You're not much of a thre—"

Jetfire's fist connected with Cold's jaw, the seeker's lightning-fast move accelerated by the rockets on his pedes. The impact created a loud clang.

Cold was sent crashing to the floor further down the hallway, a good sixty meters from where he had been standing. He skidded along his backplates until—in one smooth motion—he rolled backwards and jumped up, sliding to a stop in an upright position, looking like he had never fallen down in the first place.

"You were saying?" Jetfire asked.

Cold rolled Shadowstreaker's helm, stretching neck cables audibly. Smokescreen found it intimidating. "That tickled."

Suddenly Cold was standing where Jetfire had been, and the seeker was the one crashing backward, his own trick used against him. "That probably didn't."

Training took over after that. As Jetfire tumbled back, Smokescreen rushed forward, Air Raid just ahead and to his right. He knew Air Raid would hit high since he was a seeker, so Smokescreen aimed low. He would hit one of Cold's pedes, and hopefully knock him off balance so Air Raid's attack would be more effective. After that, Smokescreen didn't know what he should do—he trusted his training would tell him.

He watched Cold fall into an unfamiliar stance as Smokescreen and Air Raid rapidly approached. In an optic blink, Cold disrupted Air Raid's high attack and landed two solid punches on the other mech's chestplates before spinning and tossing the seeker to the floor back near Jetfire.

Smokescreen came closer to succeeding in his attack than Air Raid—his strike actually landed. But Cold leaned into the blow, the size and weight of Shadowstreaker's chassis negating its effectiveness. Smokescreen quickly attempted to back up after his failed attack, but Cold was using Shadowstreaker's frame with frightening precision and speed. Smokescreen wasn't fast enough to avoid the pede that took his own out from under him, or escape the servos that grabbed him and threw him into Jetfire just as the older mech was rising from the floor. They both tumbled again, and stopped near each other.

Slow to recover, Smokescreen checked himself over for injuries. He found he only had a couple dents in his armor, though they felt worse than they should. He'd be fine.

A slow beat of metal hitting metal drew Smokescreen's attention. The former Elite Guard cadet looked up to see Cold was the source of the sound. He was clapping, optics holding a mocking look in them.

"A good effort, I must say, but predictable, as always. Firstly, you seekers like to use your speed to your advantage, yet seem to always try attacking from above when in hand-to-hand; simple anticipation turns your natural advantage into a weakness. And you, wheelie—you're just stupid. You need to account for an opponent's mass when you're trying to throw them off balance. If you don't, you fail. Everyone knows that. Well, except you, it seems. You groundies aren't very smart, are you? That is what you wheeled ones are called by the seekers, isn't it? Groundie? Or is it ground-ers? I suppose it doesn't matter. Either way, you Cybertronians are strange."

Jetfire and Air Raid had both risen as Cold spoke, and Smokescreen finally joined them in standing as he fell silent. The younger mech's helm was ringing with confusion and questions. Who was this impostor controlling Shadowstreaker? Where did he come from? Why did he refer to Cybertronians like they were alien to him? Nothing about him made sense.

"And you need to leave," Jetfire said.

"'Leave'? As in leave leave this accursed place? Yes, you're right. I do need to do that at some point. In fact, I think I'll do that, now." Cold turned and started walking down the hallway, not even giving any of them a second glance.

"No, leave as in leave Shadowstreaker's frame and have a fiery offlining." The ancient seeker's voice had adopted a hard edge to it.

"Oh, I know what you meant." Cold stopped and turned again. "I just find it amusing that some part of you actually thinks you can do anything about me."

Jetfire deployed his Missile Rifle, and Smokescreen jumped in surprise. "I can think of one thing I can do," the ancient seeker said lowly and darkly.

Smokescreen couldn't decide who he was more scared of—Cold or this side of Jetfire. It seemed like Air Raid was thinking the same thing, since Smokescreen saw him take half a step away from the other seeker.

"Oh. Shiny." Cold tilted Shadowstreaker's helm to the side and back, one optic ridge raised. A picture of arrogance. "So you think killing me is going to help? You kill me, you kill your friend. No one wants that. Or rather, some people don't want that. The others? They don't care." He smiled, then looked behind him and called, "Isn't that right, gladiators?"

From further down the hallway, the red and yellow forms of Sideswipe and Sunstreaker appeared from two gaps between two different doors and the sides of the hallway. The faceplates of both twins were cautious as they slowly advanced toward Cold. How had Cold even heard them?

"Now, don't tell me. You're Gladiator-One, and you're Gladiator-Two. Or are you Gladiator-One, and you're Gladiator-Two? You Cybertronians all look the same." Cold asked, distorted voice carrying something akin to humor. It didn't sound right.

The twins just scowled at Cold.

"Twins?" Jetfire asked in greeting.

"Finished our route. Turned back after the dead end. Heard a rumble down this hallway. Came to investigate. Found you," Sunstreaker summarized.

"Yes, yes. And you thought you were being stealthy. I know." Cold looked back at Jetfire. "Where were we? Ah yes—you were trying to be noble. Which you were failing at, by the way. That happens when you threaten to kill someone else."

"I never said I'd offline you," Jetfire said. "But I'm willing to bet what you've done to Shadowstreaker can be reversed if we can keep you still long enough. You won't stay in one place willingly, and you've shown you have no qualms about fighting. The only way you're going to stop is if you're disabled. Otherwise, you stay in control of Shadowstreaker. I'm sure the youngling will take recovering in the med-bay over having you stick around." He fell silent, then added in a harsher tone, "Twins."

The twins glanced at each other for a moment, silently communicating. Then they deployed their swords and took up combat stances, waiting, pacing. Like fighting animals waiting for their cage to open, Smokescreen decided, deploying one of his own weapons at the insistence of Jetfire; Air Raid did the same.

Cold looked between the two groups of Autobots, smiled, and crossed Shadowstreaker's servos. Then he laughed. A sick, twisted, disturbing laugh that seemed to bring Cold's namesake to the hallway. "You just have no idea what you're dealing with, do you?" One of Shadowstreaker's servos flashed with deep emerald light, a bolt of the same light hitting the floor.

The light spread out like a drop of water in a still lake, expanding out away from Cold in a circular wave that traveled throughout the floor and even up the walls and the ceiling well above them all.

When the light reached Smokescreen, he suddenly couldn't grip the floor with his pedes. Each time he moved one, it slipped out from under him and he almost fell. It was like trying to walk on ice covered in some kind of oil.

Then he started floating. Literally. Right off the floor and into the air, slowly going up and up. This was not okay! Smokescreen was a grounder, not a seeker! He didn't like this! He liked it even less with Cold being the one responsible for it. Who was he? What was he? And how could he do this through Shadowstreaker's frame?!

A quick check told Smokescreen the twins were experiencing the same thing he was, flaring around in a poor attempt to gain control of their movements; however, Jetfire and Air Raid had broken free of the phenomenon by using their jets. They looked on in shock and mute amazement, too stunned to form words.

Cold laughed again. "Even after the countless number of centi-vorns gifted to your kind to learn, you Cybertronians still can't grasp the fact your kind are playthings. Your lives are worthless. Pointless. You are used for mere entertainment by your betters. You were built to die. You are, all of you, nothing."

"Then this shouldn't hurt much then, fragger!" Sunstreaker shouted furiously, drawing Smokescreen's attention to him just before the older twin threw one of his swords down at Cold, throwing himself into an unending cycle of spinning in the air in the process.

The weapon was perfectly balanced and maintained very well. It flipped several times on its journey down to its target, edges shining in the light. It hit Cold in the shoulder-joint—Shadowstreaker's bad one. The one injured on a mission before Smokescreen came to Earth. The sword found a gap in Shadowstreaker's heavy layers of armor, piercing through the shoulder-joint and hitting the armor on the other side.

Cold snarled and looked upward in a glare that Smokescreen could feel from across the hallway, without it even being sent his way. It felt dark.

For the first time since Smokescreen had known him, Sunstreaker looked afraid.

A sword from Sideswipe brought the look to an end. Cold—with the first sword still in his shoulder-joint—moved and deflected the blade away so it buried itself into the floor instead of in his other shoulder-joint. He growled after he dodged.

Jetfire and Air Raid were broken from their shock by the first attack by Sunstreaker. By the time Sideswipe threw his sword, they were aiming their own weapons. They opened fire as soon as they had the shots they wanted, raining weapons fire down on Cold—Air Raid with the Neutron Assault Rifle he'd kept since his initial training, and Jetfire with his Missile Rifle. Smokescreen joined with his standard servo-blaster—Paraion weapons would cause too much damage. He aimed as far from Cold's critical areas as possible, as Jetfire and Air Raid did.

Cold struggled under the storm of energy bullets and scaled down missiles, being hit constantly by one or the other. The twins threw their remaining swords. They both missed, but only just; Cold avoided them by mere inches. And he was slowing down, wounds taking their toll on him. It looked like Jetfire's plan was working.

But then two bolts of emerald light shot out from Cold's servo as he nearly collapsed to the floor, striking Jetfire and Air Raid in the chestplates. They went from firing, to completely still, optics dark. They fell out of the air, limp, and crashed to the floor. Neither of them moved.

Panic and concern swept over Smokescreen, and he stopped firing his own weapon. He looked down at the unmoving frames of Jetfire and Air Raid for a sign they were alright, but he was given nothing. What happened to them?

Cold stood up fully from his near collapse. Numerous dents and wounds covered the chassis he controlled, but his posture gave no indication of pain. He ripped the sword from his shoulder-joint, tearing out bits of both armor and internal components. He didn't seem to care. Then he looked up.

That look Smokescreen felt was now being focused on him. Cold's optics stared directly into Smokescreen's, and the white and blue mech swore the crimson optics he was transfixed on had adopted a multi-lense that broke apart countless times.

It made Smokescreen petrified.

Both of Cold's servos started sparking with emerald light, arcing rapidly. Like little pieces of lightning. He stood below and between where Smokescreen and the twins floated. The twins were to his right, and Smokescreen was to his left. With a particularly distorted and twisted voice, he said one word, "Break."

Smokescreen and the twins flew away in different directions, tumbling and moving incredibly fast. Too fast. Impossibly fast. The hallway was not long. He was going to hi—

He knew no more.

Green light bad. Green light wrong. Green light destroys. What have I done?

"They had it coming."

Green light destroys. What have I done?

The mech next to me gave a distorted sigh. "Must I repeat myself? I said they had it coming, especially the Old Man. He was the worst."

What have I done?

"Hey, are you deaf or just plain stupid? They had it coming."

I looked down at my servos, the source of the light. The tools used to destroy. What am I?

The mech stepped in front of me. "Look at me."

"Fight him."

I raised my helm to look at the mech, but instead I found myself staring at an infinite expanse of darkness that felt… Familiar. Everything was. The metal floor was familiar, the cubes of metal were familiar, and the circuitry was familiar. When had I been here before?

"Fight him."

Suddenly, I realized someone made out of light was standing in front of me, lighting up everything around us with his presence. The light at its source was blinding, but it also allowed me to see the cubes formed with other cubes to create great structures, countless kilometers wide and tall. They all seemed to be darkened, hampered by frost that covered their surfaces.

How had I not seen him before now?

"Don't give in. Think. Rationalize. Fight. Win." With each word he spoke, the circuitry brightened, frost on the cubes fell off in flakes, and the light surrounding him became less blinding.

As the light receded, the appearance of the speaker became clear. He was a tall, broad mech—taller and broader than I was, with a battlemask over his faceplate. His thick armor was white as snow, and his optics were gold. Parts of the armor on his shoulder-joints, backplates, and servos floated in the air, moving in tune with him without being in physical contact with the rest of his frame. Golden runes in the language of the Primes—Primic—ran over his armor and his battlemask.

Looking at him, and hearing him speak, was refreshing. It felt like he had the power to motivate anyone to do anything, no matter how impossible it seemed. Even then, he made me want to think again, do more than obey.

My motivation to think went away when the space around us shook. The metal ground shifted, shaking as if it were in the middle of an earthquake. Darkness creeped in against the light of the mech in front of me, darkening the circuitry, recreating the frost that fell from the cubes. And in the distance, an ominous rumbles thundered through the air. Like a giant hitting a great wall again and again.

Look will come back…

The Mech of Light looked in the direction of the rumbling, and calmly raised a servo. A bolt of white light appeared from his servo, stopping and spreading outward and back over us in a dome. It blocked out the rumbling and the Darkness, keeping them at bay. The frost on the cubes within the dome melted instantly, circuitry beginning to glow faintly. It felt warm and safe inside the dome.

The Mech of Light looked back at me. "Face your sins. Own them. Stop this. Stop him."

His words inspired me to let myself think, just a little bit. The circuitry around us became alive with bright blue light, cubes moving in every direction at once. "H—h—how…?" I managed to ask, barely able to get the word out. My voice sounded incredibly weak and small in comparison to the Mech of Light's regality.

His optics became filled with determination, and it encouraged me just by seeing his confidence. "You are to be the Xel'Tor. Act like one."

It was then that the Darkness outside formed into a servo and shattered the dome. The circuitry went dark like the night, cubes freezing in place, frost covering everything. The Mech of Light was overwhelmed in an instant, engulfed by the Darkness, Light vanishing from my sight.

The servo made from Darkness grabbed me, then pulled me away.

I was back in the hallway, falling to the floor heavily where I was thrown. Had I ever left?

The mech grabbed me and roughly pulled me up to my pedes. He looked unhappy. "Stop thinking. Forget everything."

I hesitated, staring at him. Why should I do what he tells me? All he's been doing is cause destruction.

The mech growled, a frightening sound. The look in his optics came back, but something deep within me resisted its horrifying depths. "Forget."

I struggled, fighting an internal battle on two different fronts for two different reasons. One to fight, the other to obey. Both tempted me, and both repulsed me. I could make no decision.

Then something pushed me more toward the will to fight, and it gained a permanent, narrow lead over the desire to obey.

"I… Don't want to," I said as firmly as I could manage. It was barely above a whisper.

The mech rolled his optics and growled again, this time from extreme annoyance. Then before I could say anything else, he grabbed me by the front of my armor and threw me against the wall hard enough to smash the stone it was made of.

I tried to pry myself from the wall, but the mech was upon me before I could even move my servos. He punched me in the chestplates, further burying me into the wall and breaking the first layer of my armor. He moved in close and grabbed both sides of my helm, pinning me to the broken wall by my helm. His servos made it feel like my processor was freezing.

"Forget."

My only response was to kick him in the tank. All I succeeded in doing was numbing my own pede.

A scowl appeared on the mech's faceplate, look in his optics intensifying. "You are so pathetic," he said with contempt.

Then he started to squeeze.

I had to bite back a scream of agony as I felt the armor of my helm start bending and cracking, sounds not seeming right because of how cold his servos were. I brought my own servos up to the inside of his to push his servos off my helm, but they did nothing to hamper him—he didn't even seem to notice.

The mech leaned forward so his faceplate was inches from mine, optics closer and more terrifying than they'd ever been before. "I've grown so tired of you."

The squeezing increased. I fought back with all I was, but nothing I did made a difference. But I couldn't stop. I ha—

There was a snap of metal.

Then nothing.

Cold rolled Shadowstreaker's—no, his—shoulders. He brought a hand up and curled his fingers, flexing them experimentally. Then he took in a deep breath and slowly released it, the air rumbling in his throat.

"Hmm. Not bad," he said. This body was durable and strong, but it lacked the agility Cold preferred. The wounds it carried were also proving to be a little bothersome, not repairing themselves as fast as Cold wished they would. Seemed standard overclocking gave Cybertronians only moderate improvements.

No matter. It would serve its purpose.

Cold used the various systems he controlled in this base to check on the other Cybertronians.

The med-bay was still dark and locked, but the female was attempting to hook the computer to an energy cell she had on hand. Cold rerouted power to the computer from different systems, overloading the computer and foiling her attempt to circumvent his localized blackout.

Cold searched for the others. The Berserker was still hiding in his room, unconcerned with the goings on outside his door, having ignored the leader's attempt to recruit him for the search. Another was manning their transport system, as he'd been ordered. The other six were separated. Two were down in the Cybertronians' training level, and the last four had crossed paths in their search patterns, moving down hallways that were outside the patrol routes of both pairs. They were moving in Cold's direction.

This was going very well.

"Like Moths to a flame," he said. Just as he'd wanted, the remaining Cybertronians on this level had been at the base's farthest reaches when he'd disposed the main group. The battle was a complication, since the noise it made was now attracting the other four to him, but it was of little concern; his plan was intact. He had wanted to recover a few more objects before making his escape, but he technically had what he needed for the basics—and he could cannibalize what remaining items he wanted when the time came. He truly needed only one more item for everything to be perfect.

Next stop, the Medics' room.

Cold walked in the direction opposite of the four Cybertronians who were approaching, singing to himself.

"Light breaks, Good shakes

When the Night Awakes.

"So don't fret, don't bite

For the Darkness will take you Home tonight.

"Hmm, hmm

Hmmm, hmmm.

"Ashes, ashes,

We all fall dead."

Optimus made his way down the hallway, Ultra Magnus, Ironhide, and Arcee at his sides. They'd met up a short time ago, and it was then that they all heard weapons fire from the quadrant of Jetfire's team and the twins. He had attempted to raise them on the universal communications channel, but he'd received only static. Now they were investigating both the weapons fire and the silent communications.

He had a strong feeling that anything they found would keep them from something they needed to do. Something bigger. More vital.

The Prime didn't know where he was receiving the sense of urgency, but he knew it first appeared when he saw the state of Shadowstreaker's quarters. At the time, he thought the feeling to be normal, as he cared greatly for all his soldiers—even the ones that hated him, like Grimlock. But the feeling had grown stronger and stronger since then, at times feeling like a servo that was trying to pull him in directions outside his search pattern.

He had ignored when it did that.

But even though he did not listen to it entirely, Optimus could not dismiss the way the feeling of urgency would double in intensity when he did not do as it said. It was as if the feeling of urgency had a CPU of its own, and it was disappointed he was not listening to its guidance. Like how his sire had felt when a young Optimus—then Orion—refused to pay attention.

The Prime didn't like ignoring the feeling he had, but as Prime, he could not afford to always listen to his feelings unless the Matrix approved. And this cycle, the Matrix was oddly silent. Why did it not give him insight to their situation?

They continued down the hallway, turning several times in the large expanse of passages inside the base. According to Optimus' estimation, they were near the origin of the gunfire. Three more turns, and they would be at their destination.

A warning from the guilt told him to stop and go another direction.

Optimus ignored the feeling and continued leading his group. They rounded one of the turns. Two more.

The feeling of urgency intensified, but was again ignored. Barely; it was stronger than it had been at any point since its appearance. Optimus and his Autobots neared the second to last turn.

That was when the urgency increased for a second time, and this time Optimus could not ignore it or stop it or hamper it in any way. It would be listened to.

He came to a sudden stop just before the turn, the feeling so powerful it overwhelmed every sense he had besides the feel of the Matrix. He stumbled to the side of the hallway, placing a servo against it and using it to keep himself upright. He couldn't hear or see anything, and he could barely form a thought. The only thing that was coming in clear to him was the sense they were in the wrong place. That they needed to be somewhere else.

The feeling lessened, and Optimus regained his senses. The Matrix gave him a feeling of approval; it was the first time since that morning Optimus felt anything from it. Why was it choosing to be active only after Optimus was forced to listen to the sense of urgency? Was it all a test?

Ultra Magnus stepped up next to him, frowning slightly. "Sir, are you well?" He asked, and Optimus could see the question written on the faceplates of Ironhide and Arcee. Ironhide looked more concerned than Arcee did. Optimus suspected she was saving most of her concern for another mech.

"I'm fine," Optimus said, standing up straight again. He did not take another step in the direction they had been going, and both the sense of urgency and the Matrix sent him approval. "But we need to leave."

The frown on Magnus' faceplate deepened. "May I ask why, sir?"

"We're not where we should be."

The other three Autobots shared a look between them. Then Ironhide asked, "Well, then where should we be?"

"I… Do not know."

"Too obvious. Too out in the open. Too far off the ground. Too impractical." Cold tore a hole in the nearby desk, the common metal providing little resistance. "And no hidden compartment in the desk. Typical."

The last necessary item on his list was proving to be harder to find than expected. He had torn numerous objects apart in his search—furniture, lights, the base of the bed, personal items. None of them contained what he was looking for. If he was not in control of the base's systems, he would have assumed his prize was hidden in the only other location his prize was kept. But he was in control of the systems, and he knew it had to be here. Somewhere.

Cold stepped away from the desk and used his control of the base systems to scan the room as much as he could. But the only systems that were active in the private rooms of these Cybertronians were power lines, and there was only so much he could discover from those. His scan gave him no leads. His objective might have been in the room, but wherever it was stored was either running off its own power supply, or had no power in the first place. He couldn't locate it as he had the other items he needed

He growled in annoyance and kicked at a piece of debris he had created during his search. It flew across the room in a blur, propelled by the strength of an overclocked foot. This resulted in it being at waist-level when it connected with the opposite wall… And passed through it. A crash came from that direction, and the debris came tumbling back out in several pieces. The wall rippled each time the fragments touched it.

Cold's attention was drawn immediately to the wall, and he crossed the room with a grin on his face. A hologram. How cliché.

He reached the wall and put a hand through the hologram. After a short time spent searching the cavity beyond, his fingers brushed up against a small switch. He flipped it, and the hologram deactivated, revealing a square storage area that was five feet wide and twice as tall and deep. A collection of items were contained within, but there was only one object that Cold cared about.

And it was floating in the middle of the hidden storage area, producing nearly blinding light from its nigh-indestructible, glowing crystalline shell.

Cold's smile grew. "So that's where you've been hiding." He reached in and pulled the power source out from its hiding place. It felt uncomfortably warm in his hands, but Cold didn't care. He had one of Emitters—the White, to be exact. He had all he needed.

He placed the Emitter in one of the strange storage portals Cybertronians had installed in their bodies, and started to walk out of the room.

A table in the corner caught his eye before he stepped through the door. It was large, roughly thirty feet long and half as wide. It made simply, created from a single thick, dense panel of metal. Gravity repulsors kept it off the floor, floating it in place about three feet in the air. It appeared to be a project made by one of this room's inhabitants, a test of experimental technology.

Cold placed a foot on the table and pushed down, testing its ability to maintain altitude. The table lowered by mere inches. He could work with it.

He Summoned, touching the table with a hand sparking with light. He knew everything about the table the moment he touched it, including how to operate its gravity repulsors. Cold took his foot off the table and told it to move out into the hallway; its basic control system complied, and it floated out the door. Cold followed it out.

"Got anything?" Elita called to her sister, standing out in the middle of the shooting range. Her location made her feel like a fool, but a bot that didn't want to be found could hide anywhere, including behind targets on a range.

A feeling of mild annoyance was sent her way through their bond, and Chromia's helm appeared from the top of the climbing wall. "What do you think?"

"That you would have told me if you had."

"Exactly right. So why bother with the question?"

"Protocol."

Her sister rolled her optics, emotions in their bond mirroring the gesture. She made her way down the climbing wall, then made her way over to Elita. "Always protocol with you, isn't it?"

"Good leaders need to have good rules."

"True." Chromia glanced around the Safe. "We've checked everything down here, and not a thing. Should we check the combat simulator?"

Elita knew without sharing a sibling bond with her sister that Chromia was really asking whether they could leave—she felt they were getting nowhere down here. Elita agreed. As she started making her way back to the elevator, she said, "We'll check a few storage hangers, then touch base with everyone else."

"They'd have told us if they found him," said Chromia.

Elita stepped into the elevator and pressed the button for the surface level. "They would have, but it doesn't hurt to check in."

Chromia shrugged, and they both fell silent.

The older sister was comfortable with the silence for a short time, but something told her they were in danger. That something was wrong. She felt they shouldn't be on the elevator right now. She always trusted her feelings, but was always wary of acting on them. Nevertheless, she followed part of what her feeling told her to do. "Actually, scratch that—go head and touch base with everyone."

Chromia raised an optic ridge, but complied. "Chromia, here. How's the search going?"

She received static as a response.

Blinking in confusion and concern she immediately buried, Chromia looked at Elita. "I can't raise anyone."

Elita knew this already, due to being part of the communications channel Chromia patched in to. She tried getting through anyway, and was met with the same result as her sister. They both shared a look.

Were they being jammed?

Cold trailed the floating table down the hallway, making his way to his final destination at a steady, moderate pace. He knew the four Cybertronians who had been approaching his position earlier had not moved for a long time, halted by their leader. The others were not pleased, but they obeyed their commander—the Prime, Cold realized. Since they were still a ways off, maybe he could make another trip to a storage hanger. It would be easier t—

He detected the elevator next to him activate.

Cold focused on the elevator, extracting every bit of information he desired. The Cybertronians down in the training level were now approaching the surface, their search of that area complete. Cold accessed the elevator control panel and listened to their dialogue.

He scowled when he positively identified them as two of the three sisters on the base. The elder two, to be precise—Orphan-One and Orphan-Two, he designated them. He didn't care what their real names were. The only thing that mattered was they would be a problem, if they reached him.

Cold let himself seeth until the elevator was within a hundred feet of the level he stood on. Summoning again, he manipulated the elevator and stopped its ascent, right where he wanted it to be.

He didn't tolerate problems.

The elevator came to a stop, brakes grinding audibly.

Elita and Chromia stumbled slightly as the elevator halted. Elita tried getting the elevator to move again, but when she pressed the button, her only reward was a green spark from the panel.

"That wasn't a malfunction, was it?" Chromia asked, optics narrowed. The emotions from her end of the bond matched the look on her faceplate.

"I don't know," Elita said. Even though she didn't agree verbally, internally she was thinking the same thing. The elevator didn't just stop working; it was made too soundly to have serious problems. And then there was the way she felt like they were being watched from all directions. Like the walls themselves were spies.

It gave her a bad feeling.

Cold reversed the polarity of the command given to it by one of the Orphans, and rerouted power to increase the power in its motors. Then he sent the elevator down.

It rocketed downward as if sucked into a blackhole.

"Ashes, ashes

We all fall dead."

Elita was almost thrown up to the roof as the elevator suddenly rocketed downward, reaching speeds far beyond safe in a very short amount of time. What was happening? What was making the elevator fall like this?

No. Not fall, she realized—pushed. To speeds where a sudden stop would cause the elevator to fall in on itself, and perhaps collapse the entire shaft down on them. That could potentially mean thousands of metric tons of debris.

Someone was trying to offline Elita and her sister. And it was a pretty damn good attempt.

It was then that Elita felt sorrow. Not for herself, but for Optimus and Arcee. She was one of Optimus closest friends and advisers—had they not been commanders, they would be so much more. And Arcee… Her Little 'Cee. Her and Chromia's sparkling sister. There were things Elita had never said for Arcee's benefit, but there were others Elita and Chromia should have shared with her when she was old enough.

The whole truth about their creators chief among them.

Elita looked over at her sister, and she saw the hard-to-see signs that Chromia was communicating with her mate through their bond. "What are you telling him?"

The smaller femme smiled grimly. "Just that I love him. That I love him with everything I have."

The elevator impacted.

And then there was only darkness.

Complete, oppressing, oily darkness.

Arcee felt her spark get stabbed. Once. Twice. Three times. One for each of her bonds. It was unlike any pain she had experienced before.

Ironhide collapsed and came to rest next to her, convulsing. She turned away as Magnus scrambled to his side, yelling something to her brother-in-bond, but she couldn't make it out. She barely heard the rumble from the opposite side of the base. Barely felt the entire base shake. She could even barely think.

Optimus approached and leaned down so he was at her level. She could see that he was speaking to her, but she couldn't make out any of the words. So much pain…

Dimly, Arcee knew what she was feeling and what was causing it. And it would never go away; it would keep crippling her unless she did something about it.

Reluctantly, Arcee slammed figurative doors on all her bonds. The pain went away instantly, but it left her feeling cold and empty. Alone. She almost preferred the pain.

"—hat is wrong?" Optimus' voice cleared, and she could hear the concern hidden in his words. "Are you alright, Arcee?"

"I'm…" She definitely wasn't good—not after what she felt. But she couldn't think about that, now. She had to focus. No matter how much she wanted to stop everything. "I'm functional."

Optimus looked behind her at Ultra Magnus and Ironhide, but Arcee refused to look. She couldn't—it would shatter her focus. "What happened?" The Prime asked.

Arcee couldn't get herself to speak of it. "We need to go," she said instead, walls in place to keep her voice emotionless. She saw the look in Optimus' optics. The very normal worry and desire to know what was wrong. He knew it had involved her siblings, and it made him anxious.

The look vanished as the Prime side of him took over. "I have felt I made us wait too long to move. But, we cannot move unless we have a destination."

"The ops center." Arcee said the words without thinking, blocking out Ultra Magnus' continued shouting at Ironhide. Part of her wanted to say, 'The elevator,' but the location she had given felt right. She didn't know why it did, or what compelled her to say it.

"Are you certain?"

"Very."

"Then we go." Optimus stood to his full height and looked behind her again. She felt he was looking at Magnus. "Take care of him."

"Yes, Prime." Magnus sounded distracted. Arcee wasn't sure she found that a good sign or a bad one.

Optimus turned back to Arcee. "Come," he said, then turned and ran down the hallway.

She followed immediately, ignoring the way Magnus' shouts became more urgent.

Cold approached the transport room, moving at a more clipped pace than he'd have preferred. Simultaneously, he was watching two of the group of four Cybertronians making their way toward him at a rapid rate. He needed to work fast—he was running low on time.

He rounded a corner, then quickly made his way down the final leg of hallway to the transport room. The Cybertronian was still manning the teleportation system, face devoid of emotion. Cold recognized him as the Murderer—this group's SIC.

The Murderer turned away from the computer as Cold entered the room. His mechanical eyes analyzed him for less than a second. "You are not Shadowstreaker."

Cold smiled and clapped once, genuinely impressed by the Murderer's speedy analysis. "Congratulations—you're the first person to realize that straight away. Do you want what's behind Door Number 1, or a simple cash prize? Neither? Ah, I know what you want: to hide your sins behind logic. I'm afraid we don't carry anything to help you with that delusion."

The Murderer gave no indication to what he thought of the taunt, and Cold's respect for the mech went up at that moment; it was not easy to keep things from him. The Murderer stepped away from the computer and out into the middle of the room. He appeared to be in a normal pose, but Cold could see it was a rouse. All species had rarer, more brutal forms of hand-to-hand combat that had stances made for luring in opponents. Cybertronians were no different.

"Who are you?" Asked the Murderer.

Cold chuckled, the sound echoing around the room. "Oh, how I wish you and I could have a longer chat about that. But unfortunately, I don't have the time for it." He Summoned, and the table flew toward the Murderer.

It seemed the Murderer anticipated the move. He ducked down, letting the table fly over him and hit the back wall. He returned to a standing position, and brought one of his Rifles to bear.

But then Cold propelled himself forward, using the trick the Old Man had inadvertently shown him, and kneed the Murderer with all his strength. It landed just as the Murderer was preparing to fire. Right into his chin.

The Murderer's head snapped backward. He remained standing for a moment, then fell. He didn't move after that.

Cold scoffed, unimpressed. "Weakling." He used his control of the base to activate the Cybertronians' teleporter, lighting the room green. Then he scrambled the computer's data, making sure it never recorded even part of the real coordinates he set the teleporter to open.

Summoning again and raising his hand, Cold regained control of the floating table. He told it to right itself—it had fallen at an angle and had no system to keep it level—and had it float over to him. It stopped directly in front of him.

Now to go to work.

He unloaded various objects from the strange pockets of the body he controlled: metal ingots; tools; some small weapons; energy cells; explosive material. Many things. When he was done, the table was covered in a pile of items he'd collected, their weight making the table float only inches above the floor.

Cold stared at the pile for a moment, considering whether he should add one more item. He decided that he should.

Summoning, Cold made his hand glow with emerald light, each bolt arcing. Then he held his hand out, and drove it into his own chest. The light on his hand let him tear through the armor and form-fitting semi armor with ease. He grabbed onto a part inside, then tore out, creating a large hole in his chest cavity. He didn't feel any pain from it, nor did he even know what he had taken out.

He transferred the light to his other hand, then Infused some of it into the part he held. Green light started to arc over it.

Satisfied, Cold dropped the part on top of the pile, then commanded the table to move through the portal in front of him. It disappeared shortly after.

Part one was complete.

He checked in on the Prime and the other Cybertronian. They were approaching quickly. He had to work fast.

Cold closed the portal, changed the coordinates, and commanded it to reopen. At the same time, he opened each of the strange pockets in his body at once, dumping the contents to the floor. The items were the same as the ones he loaded onto the table—save for the Emitter—but they were greater in volume.

Cold Summoned again. But this time he held nothing back, didn't keep the light from traveling to other areas of his body. He virtually glowed in that room. He checked in on the two Cybertronians again.

It was now or never.

He focused all the light into his fingertips, and shot it down into the pile in front of him.

Optimus and Arcee could hear the space bridge at full power before they neared the ops center at almost a full sprint. They could feel it vibrating the floor. They saw its light flooding the room.

But nothing gave them an indication of what they were about to see.

They entered the ops center, sliding to a halt. The computer was running itself, opening and closing programs without anyone operating it. Prowl was prone on the floor, unmoving.

And at the space bridge entrance, a crimson-opticed Shadowstreaker was melting metal into liquid.

His servos were glowing with light, focusing it down into metal in front of him, heedless of the wounds that riddled his chassis. The metal in front of him—items made of various alloys and raw ores—was melting and fusing into a single, black metal in molten form. But it wasn't molten; no heat came from it. It was just becoming liquid. As if the act of smelting had never been a necessary part of forging.

The black liquid oozed its way away from Shadowstreaker, forming into a giant pool as dark as the void. In the middle of it, the Delphic floated easily.

As he watched, Optimus felt the urgency guiding him increase to a level far beyond where it had been before.

Along with it, there was a trace of fear. Not of Shadowstreaker—for he realized he and Arcee were not looking at Shadowstreaker himself—but of something else.

The last of the metals turned into liquid and joined with the black. Then in an intense flare, the green light left Shadowstreaker's digits, bonding with the black fluid. His optics stopped being crimson, but they didn't return to their normal color, either.

They were dark. Powerless.

His frame slowly collapsed, frozen in its pose, and landed heavily on the floor. He showed no sign of life.

Arcee wanted to cry out when she saw that, both from horror and from feeling her already-fragile emotional state break. But she found she couldn't; she felt nothing but numbness.

The remaining liquid pooled in with the rest, light arcing and flickering rapidly.

Then, it started to rise.

It started first as a small disturbance in the pool of black. Then it grew into a series of drops that were going the wrong direction, falling up instead of down. The drops turned into trickles, the trickles to part of the pool seemingly being affected by a wave. It kept rising and soon the liquid had taken up the shape of a towering, massive, formless being of liquid that kept shifting and falling down, only to rise back up.

When the last of the liquid joined with the formless being, the liquid solidified.

The liquid became black armor. Seamless, shineless. Thick. It was jagged at every point that was possible without hampering movement, and sides of his helm were adorned by red Primic runes that were reversed. The armor belonged to a mech who stood more than ten feet over Optimus, and had a powerful build. His chassis had no wings or wheels. It didn't even seem to be intended to transform in general.

The mech held his servos out to his sides, flexing his digits and forming fists. His optics opened; they were crimson in color and multi-lensed. He laughed, and the lights flickered at the distorted sound. "Oh, how it feels so good to be free…"

Optimus stiffened at the voice. It sounded so… Wrong. Corrupted. He could find no other term for it. Every instinct he had was telling him he had to stop this mech—that Optimus had to be sure he never took one step outside the base.

He pulled the Omni Saber from his backplates. Like with the Star Saber, he felt every fiber of his very being be enhanced simply by holding the Ancient blade. But unlike the Star Saber, it didn't feel quite right. He felt it was not intended for his use, but for another, and he was using it without permission. It felt odd.

However it felt, he could—and would—use it. He brought the Omni Saber out in front of him, the blade crackling with dark red, celestial power. It would destroy anything Optimus desired.

The mech turned his helm to Optimus, multi-lensed optics like two pools of darkness. Only the Matrix in Optimus' chestplates kept him from flinching. "Let me just stop you right there."

Green light shot out from the mech's servos, and suddenly Optimus found he was frozen. No matter what he did, he couldn't make himself move at all. Even his optics were frozen in place, staring at the mech.

Beside him, Arcee went through the same thing. But she was stuck looking at the unmoving form of her courted, still feeling nothing. She longed to feel anything besides just the numbness.

"You are the Prime, aren't you?" The mech asked, slowly walking toward the unmoving Autobots. "I give you credit for the team you have assembled on this tiny little world. They are loyal, skilled, powerful fighters. Truly a force to be reckoned with."

As expected, Optimus said nothing in response.

"Not one for compliments?" The mech mocked. "I suppose I can understand why. Taking credit for things you don't do is a pretty terrible thing. And you do like to sit on your ass, really."

Optimus could only listen.

"After all, while you were running around, old Cold here picked your team apart like they weren't even there," Cold said, looking down at Optimus like his frozen state was a scientific curiosity. "Kinda like how you are normally. I mean, you weren't the one who trained them, or went on all the missions they're famous for, or came swooping in when they needed it most. You just tell them to go die for you. Again, and again, and again, and again. They're breaking, bleeding, and burning in your name all the time, and have been for so long. Tell me, how many times did you have a chance to end the war by killing your brother? And how many times did you try to change his mind, or just… Let him go? Had to be hundreds. Probably thousands, actually. Always thought Primes were supposed to be willing sacrifice for the good of their people."

The Prime was like a statue.

"Now, let me tell you what I mean by that. I've heard of these old Primes—they were around way back in the day—and they were incredibly powerful. Everyone revered them for their wisdom and leadership. Well, until one of them decided he wanted to be the supreme dictator of the planet, and convinced most of the population that he was in the right. Then opinions were kinda mixed. Anyway, these Primes had to fight the rogue one. Even kill him, just to stop the war. Isn't that incredible?"

No response.

"What I find so great about that, is the other Primes didn't even hesitate before going after him. They just did it. Stopped their war before it claimed trillions of lives. Very inspiring. And selfless." Cold leaned forward, so he was staring into Optimus' optics. "You've never been like that, and you never will be."

The Prime couldn't even blink.

Cold looked away from Optimus' faceplate, focusing on the Omni Saber held in the Prime's servo. His optics lit up greedily. "Oh. Is that a Shard?" He reached out.

Then took the Omni Saber from Optimus' frozen servo. It did not crumble to dust as it should have when a non-Prime touched it.

Cold held the Omni Saber appraisingly, inspecting it. He swung it experimentally, but frowned, dissatisfied. His servo sparked with light, then the Omni Saber shifted and moved. Like a Cybertronian shifting mass to transform, only a dozen times more complex. It extended out and broadened, coming to be almost as long as the Star Saber was. Its overall appearance remained the same, despite changing in size.

Once it was finished changing, Cold swung it again. This time, he smiled. "This is a very nice Shard. I think I'll keep it. You don't mind, right?"

He paused, as if waiting for an answer. When none came as expected, he smiled again. "Somehow I knew you wouldn't mind." He stepped away from Optimus, heading toward the open space bridge.

But then he stopped, catching sight of Arcee. "Ah. So you're Orphan-Three." He gave her a quick look up and down. "You're probably considered a pretty little thing among your kind, aren't you? I admit that I think I understand why that would be."

Arcee wasn't even listening to him, CPU as focused on the frame of her courted as much as her optics were.

Cold stepped closer and leaned down so he was at her audio receptor. Then he whispered softly, "How does it feel? Losing everyone you care about? And to start losing them so early in life. With your own parents, too."

Arcee's reverie was broken by Cold's words. She focused on every word he just said, and any words that may have come after. What was he saying about her creators? She knew they were offline. Why the conspiratorial whispers?

Somehow, Cold saw her change in attention. He laughed at something, long and hard and genuinely. He sobered himself eventually, making a show of wiping at his optics, as if cleaning imaginary tears. "I'm sorry; I should have more control of myself. But it's just so… Funny. You have no clue what I'm talking about. All this time, and you still don't know about them. You should probably get on that, read up on the topic. I recommend asking your sisters about it. Oh, wait. I forgot." He laughed again, the distorted sound filled with a sadistic glee.

Arcee felt anger well up within her. Consuming, fiery, pained anger. He dared…

Cold returned to his full height, resuming towering over her. "Well, as positively enlightening as this conversation has been, I must be off. I have places to be. Fareterribly." He turned and started walking toward the space bridge.

Something deep down in Arcee snapped. All the times she'd failed. All the people she'd lost. All the hurt she'd experienced in her life. It was all too much. She felt that consuming anger pour over her conscious thought, smothering it like it had never been there before. The anger took control of her, driving her, motivating her. Breaking her. She wasn't going to have her pain thrown in her faceplate one more time.

Her servo twitched.

Cold came to a stop.

Arcee made a fist, then one of her entire servos became free. A sound like shattering glass filled the room.

Cold turned to her then; and in his multi-lensed optics, Arcee could see shock in them. Real shock, just a little. Barely noticeable in such a minute quantity, but there.

Arcee's other servo came free shortly after. Then she could turn her helm. One by one, each part of her frame became free; and each time a part started moving, it sounded like glass was shattering. Her entire chassis was soon free, and she fell to a knee-joint, feeling weak, strained. Like she had fought a hundred battles in a row without recharge.

The shock in Cold's optics vanished, and he tilted his helm to the side and back. "Oh, aren't you a feisty one. Admirable trait, but foolish. Mostly because you aren't planning ahead of time. I mean, what's next? Are you going to start slapping me?"

Instead of dignifying him with words, Arcee screamed and jumped to her pedes, servo-blades deployed by the time she was up. She rushed forward—a small, blue and pink blur across the floor—jumped up, and sliced Cold across the faceplate. She followed her first cut with another at the neck, blade cutting into the armor there.

She kicked off his chestplates before he could react, flipping through the air and landing back on her pedes. Arcee rushed him again before he could do anything, and cut at his tank and pede, and sent another swipe at his side. She jumped back in preparation for the downward cut she knew he'd throw, anger driving her to plan five steps ahead.

But then the swing never came.

Her anger waned, and she paused. Cold was still standing in the same place, not reacting. None of the wounds she thought she'd given him were visible.

Cold raised an optic ridge, tilting his helm further. "I'm sorry, but was that supposed to hurt me?" Light appeared on his servo, and he waved it dismissively.

Arcee was sent flying across the room like she had grown jets. She collided with the wall far behind and above the workstation, and the rock caved against her. She created a hole in the wall where she shattered the stone, then was buried by rock above her that became unstable. The rock didn't move at all once it finished filling the hole.

Cold waited to see if there would be movement at any point after that, but there wasn't. He chuckled once. "Crazy bitch." He turned away and moved to the space bridge again, but stopped dead in his tracks at the obstacle in front of him.

Shadowstreaker was standing up. He paid no attention to the wounds to his frame, and his optics were shining gold.

And in his servo, there was a ball of white light.

"No." The word came from Shadowstreaker, but it wasn't his voice that spoke it. He aimed the light at Cold.

Cold urgently raised the Shard he had taken. But he knew he didn't react in time, hadn't seen it fast enough. He had been too slow.

The ball of light hit Cold in the chestplates, turning most of them into white ashes instantly. A massive, gaping hole was left in Cold's chestplates that went through him completely, allowing the Delphic to float free of his frame.

Cold collapsed to his knee-joints then, dropping the Omni Saber next to him. He could feel himself losing power rapidly, his frame shutting down without its power source—the Delphic. He hadn't even been able to use its power. But he had been so close. It was agonizing to fail when he had been feet from winning.

Cold raised his helm to gaze at Shadowstreaker, as the Triple-Changer prepared to fire another ball of light. Then he roared. Not in anger or rage, or even pain. But in pure, black hatred. The lights in the room burst from his roar.

The second ball hit Cold in the faceplate, cutting off his roar and vaporizing his helm. His powerless frame fell the rest of the way to the floor.

After Cold finally fell, the space bridge deactivated, computer rebooting. Optimus was released in the same moment, but he did not stay upright. He collapsed as well, optics darkened, and didn't move.

Shadowstreaker didn't even look in the Prime's direction. He lowered his servo to his side, then his optics returned to being totally powerless. He tilted backward slowly, and landed squarely on his backplates. His fall left the ops center in darkness.

Nothing happened for several micro-klicks, then the computer came alive again as it finished rebooting. Then Bulkhead contacted base. "Hey, Bulkhead here. Can I come back with the kids? They're getting pretty bored with the drive. Raf and Jack also don't appreciate off-roading much. I think they might puke soon. Hehe."

No one answered the green Wrecker's statement.

He waited for a response for longer than necessary, then tried again, "Hello? Anyone going to say something? Kinda waiting on an answer, here."

There was nothing.

"... Hello…?"

The ops center was dark. All was still. All was silent.

Like a grave.

... I got nothing.

Some things in this chapter were intentionally made to appear as bad as possible. I put emphasis on appear. I will say nothing else.

One last thing, the song featured in this chapter was one I made myself. It is not from a band or group or singer; just me. And as such, I intend to keep it. So do not use it without my permission. (I kinda need to say this).

This chapter's credit song is "Sub Pub Music - What Have We Become" Now, I realize I posted this chapter months ago and kept the original song in place up until now (it is late October, for reference), but after re-listening to the song I gave, I decided to retract it. I honestly designed and came up with the ending of this chapter by listening to the song I am listing now, and the other was a last-minute decision. I like both, but I decided to put this one in so anyone who reads this now will have the originally intended song for reference. And in case you wish to compare it to the original credit song I posted, the track was Fieldwork - This Is Not The End.

Now, I must be off to write my novel. I will be back. In the meantime, please take the time to leave a review to send a PM to me. The more feedback I am given, the better I know where I need to improve.

Thank you all for reading, and I hope you are having a wonderful day/night. And also, you're awesome.

See you soon.