Nick woke slowly, as if he had been deeply asleep. He felt slightly strange, detached from the world, floating in a vast ocean. His body flowed with the gentle waves, almost flying. He tried to recall how he had come to be here, what had happened, but there was nothing at all. It didn't even alarm him that much. It was a nice feeling to be so at ease, to feel so peaceful. After a while he felt someone with him. It was a presence, strong but gentle, holding him, guiding him. He felt his lungs expand as he drew a deep breath and his eyes opened.

Nick blinked, still not knowing where he was. He lay flat on his back, looking up at a gray, metal ceiling. Dimmed artificial light cast over him. The presence was still there, still strong and gentle, but probing more now.

//Karr?//

He didn't know where he knew the name from, but with the name memories came. Mission City. The attack. Giant robots. Injuries. Karr changing shape. His implant… the implant starting to hurt… everything… everything a blur…

//I am here// Karr's deep voice sounded in his head.

Nick turned sleepily, almost lazily, toward his partner's presence and was surprised by the image he saw in his mind. It was as if Karr was physically present. He couldn't really grasp the image, but it was there. Nick felt like in a virtual reality where his partner had taken shape, where the robot had shed its shell and turned into something more... more... warm, real, just there. He experimentally reached out and his virtual fingers encountered a substance. Soft... flexible... and then gone.

So weird. Not like their past encounters through the link. Not just an inky black mass of cool warmth. Not just a presence without a shape. This had been Karr. The new Karr. The altered version.

Someone talked to him, outside the link, and he tried to concentrate on the voice. It sounded a little familiar and he blinked, trying to focus.

A huge face loomed over him, but Nick couldn't muster the energy to be shocked.

Ratchet.

He knew this one. An Autobot. One of the aliens.

"Nick MacKenzie?" Ratchet tried again.

"Yes?"

"How do you feel?"

"Fine."

And he did. Strange, but fine. So aware and yet so different. It was as if his whole body had been changed, as if he felt every impulse, every sensation, much sharper than before.

Ratchet was scanning him and Nick let him. He turned to Karr again.

//What happened to me?//

Karr rumbled uneasily. //The Allspark affected the neuro implant. It changed it, expanded it, gave it… life.//

Nick frowned. //Life?//

//It grew//

Now Nick felt the same unease. //Grew how?//

//It possessed your whole body// was the quiet, level answer.

Nick felt the shock settle in despite the former feeling of relaxation. Something beeped somewhere and Ratchet straightened with what sounded an expletive in a foreign language.

"Mr. MacKenzie? Please calm down."

Nick sat up, feeling slightly dizzy. "What happened to me?" he demanded.

Those alien blue optics met intense cold blue, human eyes. "I'm afraid that I'm not sure," the medic answered. "You and your partner were touched by the Allspark and while it affected Karr more directly, giving him transforming abilities – among other things – your implant reacted differently.

"How differently?" Nick asked, voice colder now.

"Our metal skin is no ordinary metal, Mr. MacKenzie. It is a molecular structure not unlike your own skin, able to grow and repair itself from damage, even large damage if given time. The Allspark endowed the implant with this ability. It's no longer just metal encased by your flesh. It has grown along your own nervous system, into your muscles and bones, without triggering your natural defense systems. It altered your body."

Nick felt something cold and hard settle inside him at the words. Panic and fear warred with fury and desperation, and finally there was absolute terror. He had encountered a lot in his life, early on from his childhood to now. He had been raised to be an emotionless killer, he had been bonded to another cold mind by the name of KARR, and he had broken through all of it, coming out more human than anyone had ever intended. The government assassin had gone freelance.

But this… this was so much more than his still very human mind could handle.

"How long was I out?"

"Twenty-four of your hours."

Nick blinked, taking stock, then stared at Ratchet – hard. "You want to tell me all that happened in twenty-four hours?"

"Yes."

Hell…

He felt Karr's presence increase, surround him like a soothing blanket. His partner was here. Karr was still there and linked.

//I'd never leave you// the dark voice whispered.

"How am I altered?" Nick heard himself ask.

"I'm not sure. I'm afraid you will find out along the way."

Nick's hands clenched around the edge of the mattress. Yes, he felt different. More alive. More aware. So much more… everything.

"Where's Karr?"

"Your partner has parked himself outside in the hangar and hasn't moved since," Ratchet informed him. "You are free to go and see him, Mr. MacKenzie, after I ran a complete check. You're not a prisoner, only a patient."

Sometimes there was no difference between those, Nick thought darkly, but he slid off the bed. His knees felt like jelly, but he locked them, refusing to show weakness. Not that a giant robot equipped with all kinds of medical scanners couldn't tell how bad off he was. Still, years of conditioning didn't leave him now.

"Take it easy," Ratchet advised. "Your body has gone through a lot."

He had noticed that too. And it wasn't new to him either. Nick closed his eyes and tried to ignore the headache, the weakness, the general exhaustion.

//Don't// Karr's dark voice could be heard and he looked up.

A black prow had nosed into the med bay area and Ratchet gave it a scowl. "I told you to wait outside. Either transform or park your chassis beyond those doors."

Karr didn't look pleased as he morphed into bipedal mode, but Nick only smiled. It was good to see his partner.

"Now, if you please…" Ratchet could be heard, an edge to his normally more gentle voice.

//Let him check you// Karr added.

//Any ideas?//

//No. My medical scans are inferior to his. He is specialized// Karr didn't sound too thrilled about that.

//Specialized in not knowing what happened// Nick muttered darkly.

Ratchet gave him a curious look, probably well aware of their communication, though not the words. Then he started to run Nick through a complex program of scans and requests.

+++++

"Sounds like a cyborg," Sam remarked when Bumblebee told him about what Ratchet had found in their guest. "Half man, half machine."

"Nick is not a machine," his friend contradicted. "The implant isn't mechanical. It's the electronics that grew, if I understood Ratchet correctly."

Sam shrugged. He and Bumblebee had driven to the old look-out, a place he chose to come sometimes to spend some time thinking. Mostly right after the battle. It was a nice spot, something remote but not too far away, and once in a while he had seen a car parked there, probably with a couple making out. That was when he had driven past. Today he was alone, but with Bumblebee, as always.

"What's it do?" Sam asked.

"No one knows."

"And Karr?"

"Peaceful so far. He is adapting, like Nick."

Sam stuffed his hands in his pockets, gazing out over the dusky landscape below. "I wonder what it's like, to have something like Karr talking to you in your head."

Bumblebee tilted his head.

"I mean, it sounded horrible when he told you. And now it's grown and taken over parts of his body."

He shivered, thinking back on the moment he had stumbled and crashed to the ground with the Allspark bouncing onto the pavement. Sam hadn't given it too much thought, just started to run again, for his life, for everyone's lives.

"Bee? Do you think the Allspark might influence normal people as well?"

"Like you?" came the gentle tease. "Sam, there is nothing of the Allspark's radiation inside you. I checked before."

"You did?"

"Yes. I'm your guardian. I care for you. You were already covered in our radiation, a radiation quite harmless for humans, I might add. You're in no danger of morphing."

"Oh. Okay." Sam felt relief swamp through him. "Thanks, Bee. For caring."

"I always cared, Sam."

It gave him a warm feeling and he smiled at the much larger Autobot. Bumblebee had no mouth, but his optics were brightening now and a soft song trickled through the radio.

Sam laughed.

A drop of water hit him in the face and he looked up, noting the dark clouds coming in. The forecast had been for rain and there it was, in thick clouds that promised torrential downpours.

"I think we better go," he sighed.

Bumblebee transformed and he hopped inside. By the time they were back on the road it was raining and getting stronger. Sam leaned back and let the sound of fat rain drops hitting the car's skin lull him into a sense of utter security. The radio came on, soft music playing, and he smiled.

+++++

The headache Nick had woken up with didn't really abate. It sometimes grew less, but it was always there, like a bad tooth ache, pulsing. He blamed the injuries, but they didn't get better. For twenty-four hours, Nick fought against the ever-rising ache, then it had developed into a migraine and he was almost completely out for the following hours. Ratchet turned down the light that hurt his sensitive eyes and gave him a pain relief that managed to kick his thought processes back into order. Still, the headaches came and went with almost regular clarity.

Sometime throughout the afternoon the next day it grew better. Another pain killer was given and Nick felt muscles relax as he was pain free for the first time in days.

Sitting outside, watching the sun set in a murky sky that promised a torrent of rain soon, accompanied by heavy winds that were already blowing in a milder version over the still hot ground, Nick let his mind drift. He had found that relaxation exercises worked best, especially when he let himself fall away from everything.

//Am I hurting you?//

//No// Nick answered, smiling at the inky darkness close by. //It's not you. But it felt like you… in the beginning of it all//

Karr regarded the origin of the pain and sent confusion.

//I don't know// Nick confessed. //Maybe the implant has to adjust to my awake mind. It's better now//

Whatever was the trigger, it wasn't coming in through the normal channels of the implant. Then again, the implant had transformed just like Karr had.

Heavy footsteps let the earth vibrate beneath him and Nick drew himself out of his relaxed place, gazing up at the massive form of Optimus Prime. Nick had a healthy dose of respect for the giant mechanoid and it wasn't just because of their size difference. The few times they had talked, and they were truly few, he had looked into the ancient optics, had seen an even older pain, and he knew that this being had seen more than Nick could claim he ever would. It was like a dark aura around him, weighing him down. He was the leader of a desperate race, one at war with another faction of themselves, and he had no way back home – a home that was dying, maybe already dead.

"May I sit with you?" the Autobot leader asked.

Nick shrugged, pushing his glasses firmly back up his nose. "It's a free country."

That got him a chuckle and Optimus lowered himself down. "I wanted to apologize, Nick MacKenzie."

"What for?"

"The Allspark changed you and your partner. It was never our intention to hurt any of the humans, to be the cause of their death, and in your case, become a hybrid of Cybertronian technology. Autobots respect sentient life. We would have done everything in our power to steer this war and all its pain away from your young world."

Nick smiled wryly. "First of all, you guys saved the whole planet from destruction, and my race from extinction. Yes, people died. In my profession, I accept the loss of human life, even my own, and that of close friends. I was Death for a while."

Blue optics regarded him steadily. "I am aware of that."

"Good hackers."

"Your systems are easily broken when the right access is taken."

Nick smirked. "Tell me about it." He shrugged. "As for Karr and me, this is just one more change in our lives. Ask any of my past associates and they would swear every oath I've never been close to human. Karr was a machine to begin with."

"We destroyed our own world, Nick," Optimus told him seriously. "To see such destruction wrought here, people suffering because of our foolishness, pains me."

"Karr and I are still alive and kicking. Aside from the lingering headache."

There was a noise that was almost like an electronic sigh. "Your kind is very resilient and resourceful, Nick. Sam Witwicky saved my life, risked is own to keep the Allspark safe. He is a trusted friend. He is young, even for your kind, but he has shown an incredible greatness that I can't comprehend. You survive against great odds and you evolve."

"It's a knack."

The blue optics glowed with a brief smile.

"This is not a burden you bear, Prime," Nick added, meeting those optics unflinchingly.

"I bear many."

Yes, he did. Too many. And he always would. Death was a fact of life, in both their lives, and they had killed to survive as well. Alien lives were so similar to humans, Nick mused darkly.

"May I ask you another question?"

Nick shrugged.

"What do you know of Barricade?"

"Who or what is Barricade?" Nick wanted to know, sending the same question to Karr.

//From the files we hacked, I take it he means the Decepticon who was following us//

//Ah hell//

Optimus slightly tilted his head. "We discovered a Decepticon nearby, unresponsive, buried under debris from a recent building collapse. His designation is Barricade. He is one of two Decepticons still believed on your planet."

"And the other?"

"A drone called Scorponok."

"And you captured this Barricade guy?"

"We found him."

Nick rose, dusting off his pants. "Show me," he only said.

Optimus' features were unreadable, then he nodded, getting to his feet and the impressive height of twenty-eight feet, and accompanied Nick inside.