Chapter 13

A Doctors Pain

Ravage's return to the Decepticons was interesting to say the least…

Naturally the mech teenager was shocked when he first laid his optics on the two massive Predacons that currently inhabited the Nemesis. But just like with everything else life had thrown at him and his Carrier, the shock quickly wore off and he adapted to life on board the warship and he swiftly settled into the position of one of Megatron's soldiers. And things went relatively well… until the day that Soundwave found his eldest child passed out in his beast mode in the middle of one of the Nemesis's hallways and he was being poked by Weaver and the two human girls. Suddenly fearing that his son had once again succumbed to the mind-destroying virus, Soundwave rushed over to Ravages' side only to find, much to his surprise, that the young mech was snoring peacefully. And a quick scan revealed that his energy levels had plummeted for some unknown reason… of course after a moment of calming himself, Soundwave then began to inspect the physical state of the hallway he was in and he noticed the large amount of claw marks upon the walls and the floor. And he figured out the reason behind this little mystery when he noticed the laser-pointer in Orb Weavers servos. Suddenly aware that Soundwave had figured out what had happened Weaver quickly tossed the laser-pointer to Freefall and stated that it was her idea… which got an angry 'tattle-tale!' from the human girl.

Not that it did her any good, both received a light swat on their heads for nearly giving him a spark attack…

Soundwave didn't swat Moony simply due to the fact that she more than likely had not masterminded this situation…

…and because she had taken the opportunity to curl up and take a nap next to the passed out Ravage, obviously she had been lulled to sleep by his soft purring…

Nonetheless, in spite of that incident Ravage had found that he rather liked Moonrise and Freefall and he got along decently enough with Orb Weaver. Both being techno-organic's it was somewhat interesting to meet another even if they were of different breeds. In some ways spending time with those three reminded him of happier times with his younger brothers and Laserbeak… Speaking of which; upon discovering his sister had been changed into a healthy sparkling, Ravage immediately offered to watch her so Songbird didn't have too; after all he had watched her back when she had really been born back on Cybertron. Song was perfectly fine with this, but she did point out that she'd be happy to give the young mech a break whenever he needed it. This allowed the gryphonformer to spend a bit more of her time with her daughters and Predaking…

As well as begin working on another issue…

While it was not uncommon for the Predacon femme to walk past the MedBay as she wandered through the warships hallways, she always made the effort to pass it as quickly as possible due to the stench of death and rust that hung in the air like an unholy fog. But right now Songbird was standing just outside the MedBay's entranceway… since as fate would have it, on this day she found herself needing to speak with the ill-tempered medic. As she slowly walked inside, she found the stagnant air to be almost oppressive. Inwardly Song wondered how come no one else had complained about this before… but then again she remembered that a Predacon's senses were far more acute than that of the average Cybertronian so it was unlikely that it bothered anyone as much as it did her.

"Hello?" Song called as she cautiously made her way further into the dark and foreboding room. But after a moment of not hearing any response Songbird continued inside, still looking for Knockout. Of course it was hard to concentrate looking for someone with that horrible odor in the air… and as Song continued quietly wandering around the MedBay she came across a door that apparently led to a small side room. Just as she was about to walk past without giving it another thought, something stopped her dead in her tracks… Namely the realization that the horrible stench that haunted the MedBay was so strong in this area that its source was undoubtedly located right behind this said door. 'Oh, I just know that I'm going to regret this…' She thought coldly to herself as she walked up to this door and paused for only a moment in order to brace herself… before going into this room.

Songbird found more or less what she had expected to find…

The rusting corpse of a long dead mech…

Even though she had suspected there to be a body in here, it didn't dampen the feelings of horror and utter revolt that coursed through her system like an electric shock. From what Songbird could tell the dead individual had been a very large and imposing creature in life, although his color scheme was nearly impossible to determine at this point due to the rust that completely covered the body. But if she had to guess she'd say he used to be dark blue… There were noticeable jagged seams that covered the front of the large chassis indicating that it had been ripped apart, possibly dissected, several times… and then put back together again. It was an eerie sight that was only made far worse by the smell. Song backed up clasping her servo around her mouth as she fought back the growing feeling that she was going to purge her tanks… Just as she managed to back out and close the door as shrill and angry voice split through the rancid air like a rusty blade.

"What are you doing in here?!" Knockout snarled, seeing that the female Predacon had wandered into his MedBay while he had been out. Apparently he really couldn't leave his post for even five minutes without someone needing him for one fragging reason or another! But Knockout paused when he noticed that Songbird had been backing out of that room. Horror and anger washed over him like a tidal wave and his red ringed optics seemed to come alive with immeasurable hate! "Get out!"

"Why are you keeping a corpse in there?" Songbird asked while completely ignoring Knockouts angry demand for her to leave. "Does anyone else know about this? Somehow I don't think that Megatron does…"

"That is none of your concern!" The red Aston Martin snapped wrathfully as he pulled out his saw blade with the intentions of threatening Songbird. Although she cast it a half-interested glance before refocusing her attention on the medic himself, not afraid or intimidated in the slightest. "And for your information No One Cares! Now get out of here and leave me alone!" Song did not move nor did she say a word for what to Knockout seemed like an eternity. But when she finally spoke her voice was soft and gentle… the likes of which he had not heard in a long, long time…

"…it must be hard." She said, successfully getting Knockout's anger to dissipate for just a few moments as he looked at her in confusion.

"What?"

"No one caring… it must be hard." Songbird continued only now she moved away from the door she had just exited and casually leaned against a wall, giving Knockout some space as he continued to eye her warily. "I'm just going to take a guess here; the dead mech in the other room was someone important to you. He'd have to be, why else would you still be keeping his body?" Knockout glared at her, but a deep sorrow and misery began to creep its way into his optics. Song took notice of this and decided that if she did not continue this conversation he'd never tell her anything… and she needed to talk to him. "Who was he?"

"My mate." He muttered in a voice that was barely audible. "He was my bondmate…"

"What was his name?"

"…Breakdown…" Knockout paused after he said this name, a name that had not left his lips in so long. There were no words that could possibly describe the sorrow he had been living in for the past several years. His loss, his loneliness… wounds that still burned just as fiercely as if they had been inflicted upon him only yesterday. No… He didn't want to talk about this especially not to one of the Predacons! "This is none of your business! Leave me alone!" Song did not flinch from his words as she still remembered what she had seen in the card reading several months ago… That and she also knew Knockout needed to address this swirling storm of misery that was brewing within his spark, if he didn't… he would never heal. It appalled her to think that he had been living with this sort of pain for a long time without any help; whether it was because no one saw someone who was hurting or they deliberately turned away and didn't help them… She realized they were in a war, but sorrow could often be compared to a septic wound. If not treated it will only fester until there is no saving the individual. Song just couldn't sit back and let this happen, so she kept talking to him… Something that others should have done a long time ago.

"What happened to him?"

Knockout chuckled coldly at this and shook his head. "Dissected alive by humans, killed by that pitspawn Airachnid… who is the mother of that brat Orb Weaver you've taken in, and to top it all off his body is stolen and desecrated by the same fragging human who carved him open in the first place! That… that little slime fused himself to my mate's body! But when I got the chance I ripped him out piece by slagging piece!" As he raged knockout remembered everything he had done to Silas once he had gotten his servos on him. He remembered how he had opened Breakdowns chassis, exposing what was left of the human and he slowly and carefully with surgical precision, removed every inch of skin from the human's body with a rusty blade before slowly repeating the process with the next layer of tissue… dissecting him in the same way he had dissected his mate. The human endured this torture for three days before Knockouts rage peaked and he cleaved opened his rib cage and ripped his lungs out of his chest. This brought the doctor only the slightest bit of peace, but it was short-lived because in the end… Breakdown was still gone. The medic suddenly shook his head as these painful memories began to tear at his spark, threatening to drive him mad with this seemingly infinite grief and he glared angrily at the gryphonformer. "What does any of this matter to you anyway?!"

"Call it curiosity." Song said with a slight shrug. "I always wondered why you act the way you act and over time I figured that something must have happened to make you so cold… But now that I know, I cannot possibly begin to fathom what you're going through. I've never had a mate, so I can't imagine the pain of losing one." Silence resumed after these words. Knockout glared at Songbird and if looks were capable of killing, Song would have been struck dead over a thousand times courtesy of various sharp weapons… "And what's worse… is that I have a terrible feeling that there is more to this story than you are saying right now…" Song watched as something flashed across the red medic's face, a look of fear? Perhaps horror? Whatever it was Songbird knew that she had definitely struck a nerve.

"What do you think you are, a therapist or something?" Knockout grunted as he began eyeing the tall femme with even more anger.

"No… believe it or not I just want to help. And from my experience talking about your troubles tends to make them lighter… easier to carry. Perhaps if you tell me what's weighing on you, you will feel better. I swear to you that anything tell me will not be repeated."

"Like I give a frag if you repeat anything! None of it matters anymore!" He snapped lethally, feeling so much wrath and ire burning inside of his spark that it gave him the feeling that he was going to explode! But there was something else too… All of the grief and misery he had been silently suffering with for all these years was steadily rising to the surface. And although he tried to deny it Knockout wanted to tell someone what was bothering him, to tell someone how he felt! The urge to bury his emotions was steadily being over powered by the need to get this off of his spark… He remained totally silent while he waged war deep within himself until finally the desire to be heard won out and he closed his optics and did not open them again.

"…after Breakdown was off-lined I discovered I was carrying." The words came out as little more than a whisper but to Songbird they held a horrible strength to them. To Knockout just saying this out loud felt like a blow from his deceased mates hammer straight to his spark chamber. "But… I never thought that I would actually get to hold them! I've carried before, over six times, but always miscarried. My gestation chamber is weak, defective… But Breakdown always wanted sparklings. He wanted a big family so I tried... but it always ended in disaster. Finally we just agreed to wait until the war was over to try again, of course every now and again I would find myself sparked up but I never told Breakdown about these times because as usual it would only end in a miscarriage." Each word came straight from his spark which at this point in time was raw and bleeding. Behind his shuttered optics coolant tears began to well and then steadily cascade down his cheeks like twin waterfalls. "But this time was different. For reasons I can't even begin to understand I somehow carried to term this time! I was able to hide it from everyone because I didn't swell much. One night I went into labor and delivered them… twins… I fragging carried twins! A little mech and femme…"

"What happened to them?" She asked quietly almost afraid of what Knockout was going to say. But the medic just shook his head, lost in his memories for a few moments.

"I kept them hidden for five days while I tried to figure out what I should do… But one night my daughter wouldn't go to sleep. And her crying caught Shockwave's attention and he found out… He saw a golden opportunity to deal a blow to the Autobot's… So he took my sparklings from me and strapped them to a bomb! I fought him, I fought him with everything I had! But the fragger nearly killed me… and in the end he didn't give me the luxury of death! And my sparklings… they were blown into oblivion!" Blinding rage coursed through him as he opened his optics and leered at Songbird. "So now you know what's bothering me glitch! Now will you finally leave me alone?!"

"Why didn't you tell anyone about this? And… why have you stayed here for that matter?" She asked calmly but at this Knockout just threw his servos in the air in a defeated manner. She was never going to leave him in peace!

"What would've been the point?! No one else knew… Megatron, Starscream no one else knew that I had sparklings! Shockwave never revealed that he had used them as bait and even if I revealed it what good would it do?! Megatron wouldn't have done anything! Shockwave is his precious scientist while I'm just the medic! The reason I've stayed here is because I don't have anywhere else to go! And because… I'm waiting… waiting for a time when I can rip Shockwave's spark out!" He raged turning his back to Songbird and wiping the coolant tears from his optics knowing all too well that while venting his problems now actually did make him feel better, the grim facts of reality were still staring him in the face. Nothing could change the past… he was still all alone.

Of course Songbird had a remedy to that…

"Your sparklings are not dead…" No sooner had the words come out of her mouth did Knockout immediately tense up and whip around to face the Predacon, his optics blazing! She was mocking him! But before he could begin to scream at her Song continued. "The little femme is blue and white in color with gold optics, while her brother's red like you and shares your ringed optics only in gold." With every word the Aston Martin's optics grew wider and wider and no sooner had the last word left her mouth did he bolt for the door like Unicron himself was after his spark. But anticipating this Song quickly transformed into her gryphon beast mode and forced him to the ground, carefully pinning him under her claws.

"Let me go! I have to-…I have to get them!" He stuttered as he writhed beneath Songbirds sharp talons. His mind was reeling so fast from this revelation that to be honest it hadn't fully processed it. His spark was in charge of his movements now, not his processor… the spark of a parent who had been torn from his children and now that there was a glimmer of hope that they were still alive! And he was not about to leave them with the Autobots for a moment longer!

"You do not know where they are." Song explained shifting her claws but not letting him up. "I can find them… there is not a scent in the world that I cannot track. You will stay here and I will bring your sparklings to you." Knockout stopped his struggling and looked up at the femme almost not believing what she had just said.

"Why… why are you doing this?" He asked and now content that he wasn't going to try and run off and do something stupid Songbird let him up. "What are you going to gain?"

"Because… I am going to be leaving in a few days." She explained as a small smile beginning to appear on her features. "I finally located an area that would be acceptable home for myself and my daughters. It may not be in land of midnight sun and northern lights, but… my time here hasn't been so bad. I have made some new friends and I certainly hope that the feeling is mutual. But if I'm going to be leaving, I want to leave the individuals on this ship hopefully in better condition than when I first arrived here. And even though we've never really gotten along I can certainly understand why now… So to sum it up, I just want to help you. I'm not gaining anything."

"…thank you…" To Knockout the words didn't seem enough to properly express just how grateful he felt for the Predacon's actions, but they were the only words he could think of. And Songbird accepted them before turning and quietly striding out of the MedBay before she abruptly stopped and turned to look back at the doctor.

"After I retrieve them I'll meet you in your private quarters. Simply due to the fact that no sparkling should be in this room when a dead body is in an adjoining room. And for that matter you should consider letting your dead mate rest in peace… You shouldn't need a corpse to remember him by."

"Easier said than done…" Knockout muttered looking away in what Song perceived to be a bit of embarrassment. Still she just shook her head.

"I see… but would he wanted to keep mourning for him? Or would he want you to go on with your life… Death leaves a heartache that nothing can heal, but love is a memory no one can steal. It would be wise of you to remember that."

And with those words Songbird turned and left the med Bay and proceeded towards the flight deck…

She had some tracking to do…

"I can't believe it," Weaver grumbled coldly. "I think I've read just about every data pad on board this entire warship!" The techno-organic femme and her two human cohorts were walking down one of The Nemesis's hallways. It was midafternoon and there wasn't much for any of them to really do at the moment. So the trio were pretty much just walking and talking. While Orb Weaver did enjoy being with Moony and Freefall her inner nerd was always on the lookout for new reading material and the fact that there didn't seem to be anything that she hadn't read was a bit frustrating.

"I just wish there was something else to do." Freefall muttered as she put her hands behind her head and gave the older girl a questioning look. "You think we could play with Ravage using the laser-pointer again?"

"No," was the quick and straightforward answer. "Do you really want to piss off Soundwave again?"

"Of course I don't. But I thought that Ravage kind of enjoyed it… Don't you think Moony?" There was no response which caused Freefall and Weaver to stop in their tracks as they realized Moonrise was nowhere to be seen. "Moony?"

"I found something!" The five year olds voice called from a ways back down the hallway. Following the sound it was revealed that Moonrise had slipped into one of the rooms that had been left open. Doubling back to find Moony as soon as they looked into this room Weaver froze. This was undoubtedly the Decepticon's vault, the one room Megatron himself had specifically instructed her to stay out of! So while Freefall zipped right in to go after her sister, Orb Weaver stood nervously in the doorway. But when Freefall saw exactly what it was that had captured Moony's attention, she too began to call for Weaver to come inside.

"Seriously Weaver, you got to see this!" Freefall said, her tone of voice nothing short of freaked out. Swallowing nervously Orb Weaver cautiously entered the vault and walked up to what appeared to be some sort of stasis pod… But when she looked inside her spark nearly burst out of her chest in utter terror.

"M-M-M-Mom?!" She squeaked as she looked through the glass and realized that it was indeed her carrier. The same femme that had in fact it seemingly abandoned her so long ago… Airachnid… There she was frozen in stasis, with a look of fear present on her features. An emotion that many would believe was alien to her.

"That's your mama?" Moonrise said looking at Weaver completely surprised. "Why isn't she moving?"

"Who cares Moony, if it's Weaver's mother then we've gotta bust her out of this thing!" Freefall growled hefting her spear and preparing to stab the glass that held the stasis pod. Of course before she could do that the sound of approaching footsteps caught Weaver's attention and in a single swift movement she grabbed up both human girls, and hid behind the pod. Clamping a hand over Freefall's mouth and making a single quiet 'Shhhh' to them. Everything was silent for a few moments until someone entered the still open vault and began moving around. Very carefully Weaver peaked over to see who had just come in only to see that it was Shockwave. He was apparently taking what appeared to be several tools as well as data pads from a container in the back of the room and he was putting them in his subspace. After this was done he closed the container and walked out of the vault, the door quickly closing behind him. Weaver let out an audible sigh and released her grip on the two young humans.

"What was that for?!" Freefall demanded angrily.

"I'm not supposed to be in here remember?" She growled looking over to where shockwave had just been and she noticed something, apparently the scientist had dropped one of the data pads and had failed to notice it. So Weaver walked over and picked it up, figuring that she would at least get something new to read. "Let's get out of here."

"What about your mom Weaver? Aren't we going to save her?" Freefall asked a little surprised at Weaver's urge to leave without helping her.

"My mom isn't exactly a good person guys; I think it's safer for all of us if we just leave her here for now…" She explained as best she could. It wasn't that she didn't love her mother, because in spite of everything Airachnid had done some part of Weaver did still care about her… they were family after all… But Songbird Moony, Freefall and Predaking had become like family to her as well. And just knowing her mother… well… She just knew that it wouldn't be pretty...

So very quietly Weaver poked her head out of the vault room and when she was sure it was clear, she and her two companions jumped out and raced down the hall a ways until they were far enough away from the vault that no one would suspect that they had ever been in there. It was then that Weaver pulled out that data pad and began reading it.

What she read stopped her cold…

"Weaver… are you okay?" Mooney questioned, finding that the way Orb Weaver had just gone rigid to be somewhat unnerving. But Weaver's eyes just proceeded to get larger and larger as she continued to read the information on that pad. After a few more seconds her head snapped up and she grabbed up both Moonrise and Freefall and began racing down the hallway, knowing that she had to do something!

Because Songbird and Predaking were in terrible danger!

Thank you all for everyone who is reviewed so far! I want to apologize right now if I made Knockout seem a little OOC but in my defense I'm not really sure how he would behave under severe emotional trauma so I took some liberties with this ^^; all right then, as always please remember to Read and Review! Remember that reviews equal quicker updates!_^