Chapter 4

Now he knew who it was the Sunstorm reminded him of and all it took of all of that 'I'm better than the rest of you' speech to make it jump to the forefront.

"Starscream! That's it isn't it. Your related to Starscream."

Sunstorm paused as he secured Will to the makeshift examination table. Sunstorm pulled the belts a little too tight next. "You're what…siblings right or is it you just got some of his spare parts." That earned Will pain as Sunstorm's micro cables descended from his hand and plunged into his torso, arms, and legs.

An intense light was pulsing along the lines and disappearing into William's body. He arched upon the table as spasms of pain raked up and down his body. Fire danced on every nerve ending. He would have screamed if able to. He would have to have moved his muscles in his chest and right now that seemed impossible.

Slowly the pain was receding, and Will felt hot. Yes, he was getting hot, and sweat was beginning to condense upon his brow and soak his clothes. He looked over at Sunstorm and noticed the red tinge to the lines leading from the mech's body into his own. He felt especially hot where the cables entered.

"What..are…you….doing?" It was all Will could get out. He felt so awful at the moment.

Sunstorm didn't respond to him verbally. He took another cable that was drawn from his chest and laid it over Will. Then with his free hand he turned Will's head to have greater access to his spinal cord at the base and entrance to his brain. Sunstorm attached the cord linking his central core to Will's.

Will was in sensory overload. He didn't know what he was seeing, hearing, or feeling. His skin was on fire, and he felt every movement of air upon his exposed skin. It was stranger, new, and painful, oh so very painful. Will's eyes rolled into the back of his head as this new cord began pulsing faster.

Soon Will slipped into oblivion as Sunstorm continue to monitor him and adjust not only the data he was sending but also the microscopic nanobots that were going to redesign and replace certain components of Will's physical make-up to Sunstorm's specification.

Sunstorm had the knowledge vested in him from Vector Sigma; he had been granted the knowledge from Vector Sigma on the process used to reform biological matter into techno-matter. Vector Sigma had shared much, so much at first that it had overloaded his own processors. They had all turned against him when he was just trying to help his own race.

Time in space had allowed him to adjust and now he was ready, ready to use that knowledge as he saw fit. This time it would be different. This time he had a new plan.

At the holding area…

Ironhide scanned the area with a view of the charred remains. He detected them before they got to the gate. Prowl and Cliffjumper were flanking out on either side looking for anything that could have done this. Ironhide approached one of the bodies and scanned it.

The bone structure identified it as human, male and in its late thirties. A melted dog tag sat in the middle of its chest. The story was similar to all the others he scanned. His processors whirled and whined as he looked for his charge. He was hoping to not find him among his men.

Epps and Cliffjumper were searching the holding facility when they made the grizzly discovery of the two scientists. They didn't look real; it was like some bad Halloween corpses thrown over the debris, but Epps and Cliffjumper knew better after seeing the bodies outside. Epps search more of the area as Cliffjumper kept lookout.

Ironhide had secured the perimeter and Prowl had searched all adjacent buildings without finding anything out of the ordinary in those buildings.

"Ironhide, we have accounted for all but one member of this detail…Lennox." Prowl hated having to inform his friend of this fact, but it was fact and nothing was going to make it any easier to hear.

"We found this," Epps held up Will's jacket and military issued shirt. "Looks like it went to war with a cup of coffee and lost. At some point he had time to change." Cliffjumper came forward. "I scanned the interior and detected some weird energon reading. I'm not sure what to make of it."

Ironhide looked at the scans deep in thought. 'This looks familiar' Ironhide pondered at the data screen. Then Ironhide let out a string of phrases in Cybertronian that Epps couldn't follow.

"What's he saying," Epps wanted to know. Cliffjumper leaned forward, "Use your imagination and you've got it. Other than that, I won't even begin to translate that." Prowl nodded as Epps looked over at him.

Ironhide was still throwing out strings of Cybertronian that Epps imagined would make a sailor blush profusely. Ironhide suddenly straighten up and turned to face them. "We'll wait for the human forces to arrive and secure this sight. Then we need to head back to base immediately. Things are about to get bad, really bad.

"What do you mean?" Epps was curious now.

Ironhide growled out, "I've seen this energy output before. It's the signature of a very messed up bot. Even his own keep their distance from him. He was supposed to be off-lined a long time ago. Like I was saying if it's him, we and this planet are in for a world of hurt."

Epps was getting agitated now. "Well, how bad can he be?"

Ironhide growled, "He makes Starscream seem sane." Epps raised his eyebrows, "I take it that's something."

"For Starscream to be sane, yeah, he is really bad," Cliffjumper replied.

Back at the base…

When Ironhide's team had returned, he went straight to Optimus Prime to report all they had found and give him his suspicions about who he thought had abducted Will Lennox.

"It's him. That crazy, lunatic of a decepticon is back Optimus, and he has Will with him. We have got to find Will before it's too late. The crazy son of a garbage scowl somehow survived, and he's back to wreck havoc on all of us again."

Optimus Prime allowed Ironhide to finish his tirade before speaking. "Are you sure about the readings?" "Oh yeah," Ironhide stated matter-of-factly, "I had Ratchet run the data against what we had stored in our data base. It was a match for the base energy with a new strand from that last encounter."

Optimus nodded his head. He remembered that encounter. "So, Sunstorm has returned." Not too soon after the initial meeting with Ironhide, Optimus Prime called a meeting with the heads of the departments at the base to relate what they discovered and suspected.

"We believe that the Cybertronian known as Sunstorm was revived at the holding facility and eliminated the humans he perceived as a threat. He has unique abilities and weapon resources that make him a formidable opponent.

He can utilize light and heat to his advantage. You can see the effects of how he can use those in the pictures taken of Lennox's men upon the ground. He is also mentally unstable for a Cybertronian due to a computer bank of excessive knowledge being downloading into his brain. He couldn't handle it, and he went insane. It took the joint efforts of both Decepticons and Autobots to defeat him last time. I can only hope that he will not want to stay on this planet and will move on."

"You mean to tell me that this one bot is that powerful?" One of the generals leaned forward after reading the reports and listening to Optimus.

"I'm saying that I do not wish humans to engage him. The consequences would be to great on your end. You would not stand a chance against him. Your defensive policy assures me that there will be more human causalities before this is over. I would request the acknowledgement that I plan to engage in offensive measures to address Sunstorm and whatever he is up to."

Another general replied, "You want our permission to go after him then?"

"No sir,..." Optimus leveled his gaze at the Generals in question, "... I did not request nor need your permission to handle this…situation. I merely want you aware that you are in danger and had you disclosed the nature of the ALL space debris you had recovered, this might have been avoided."

With that Optimus Prime nodded once to those he regularly saw at the base and left to coordinate with his own mechs.

Thank you for the reviews! I'll try to update again tomorrow! If you didn't realize Sunstorm is a mech from cannon as well as Victor Sigma.