Author's Note: Hey there! Last chapter I'm loading before traveling to Minneapolis! Things start to pick up a bit in this one, so I hope the change is welcome. :) Each chapter will have a quote from this point on, usually from one of the characters in that chapter, though the quote itself isn't necessarily present.

Disclaimer: I don't own anything but the plot and OCs! (Yes, Blackjack is mine, in all his villainous glory.)

Chapter Five

"Life is a gift worth suspicion. No god would give us something so precious for free." -Blackjack

"Normal speech."

Inner personal thoughts.

"Comm chatter."

:Bond Speech:

Astrosecond: 2 seconds

Klik: approximately five minutes

Joor: half an hour

Breem: nearing one hour

Cycle: meanings vary; most often half a solar cycle

Mega-cycle: one human day

Solar cycle: one Cybertronian day

Vorn: approximately two months

Orn: five years

Mega-vorn: nine years

Mega-orn: twenty years

Somewhere beneath the ruins of Praxus...

It was dark. Shadows licked along vague, indistinct shapes, dripping from the corners of a high ceiling. Jagged, gaping holes in the walls swam with ebony murk, leading to dark tunnels and caved in passages. The chamber was in ruins; rust dusted the floor, colorless in the blackness. Cracks bit into corners and slithered through heavy metal support beams, nipping at the bolts that held the structures together.

It was sturdy enough for Blackjack's purposes. He had never had any trouble seeing in the dark.

Beneath the dark mech's weight, trapped between his heavy blue thighs, a black and purple form writhed. The floor under them both was slick with energon; the bright liquid bubbled from the imprisoned mech's torn throat, chassis, and back, trickling in heavy streams from his slim waist, which was ripped open, exposing sensitive internals to the open air. Scattered to either side were the remains of a majestic pair of glossy wings, battered and speckled with blue droplets. Scarlet optics fluttered weakly, the light within them dulled by pain. Smooth silver lips trembled, coated wetly with the mech's fluids.

Blackjack watched the display impassively, holding the shuddering servos firmly against the slick floor, lowering his helm closer to his victim's exhausted faceplate's in order for the wounded mech to hear him clearly.

"Are you ready to speak?" He asked quietly, hissing past his facemask.

Red optics flickered brighter, casting a wavering glow over Blackjack's angular chassis, and the plump mouth bared sharp denta in a defiant snarl. It vanished, transformed into a shrieking wail of agony as Blackjack's third servo slipped with deceptive care into the mech's middle, stroking bleeding tubes and brushing up gently against the mech's opened fuel tank. The mutilated mech writhed, bucking his chassis, frantically trying to flee from Blackjack's questing digits. The raw internals twitched and guttered grotesquely.

The sadist let a cold, fanged smile creep over his features, eyeing his shuddering victim's wet insides with dark amusement. The claws of two of his servos slipped out of sight beneath scarred chassis armor, soon becoming visible again through the glass of a golden cockpit as they fondled a silver spark chamber.

"I need to know," Blackjack purred, bending low above the other's chassis and pressing his helm lovingly against his victim's, lips brushing an audial. "Where my twins have gone."

The seeker stiffened at his intimate touch, optics shuttering tightly, lips clamping shut in dreading expectation. A trickle of lubricant fell from his optic corner, sliding between their touching cheeks. Blackjack allowed himself another smile.

"Skywarp…" He hissed, clenching his servos tighter, chuckling as the wingless seeker gasped. "No one will find you here. I have no doubt they are experiencing…troubles of their own; my twins are volatile creatures, and the scrambling packs I installed in their processors cannot be helping matters. They may have even killed your friends by now, all because you wouldn't let me save them..."

Skywarp's intakes hissed out a high sound, as close to a sob as the seeker's brave facade would allow. There was an audible gulp, and Blackjack almost heard the cogs in the seeker's processors turning.

"I've never seen your brats before in my life." The words were wheezed from between clenched fangs; an obvious play for time. Blackjack smiled against the mech's audial, and ripped an energon line loose.

If he thought the seeker had been wailing before, he was wrong. Long, agonized keens ripped free from Skywarp's mouth, unfortunately quite close to Blackjack's audial. They shrieked through the air, unbelievably loud in the stillness; eerie agony ringing within the depths of featureless darkness.

Blackjack cursed as the body beneath him convulsed; the seeker was smaller without the added mass of his wings, but the size his race bestowed on him was still formidable compared to Blackjack's. There was a good reason it took all four of the sadist's arms and both his sturdy legs to hold the wounded mech down.

"How does it feel," He hissed vindictively between the flier's convulsions, servos denting metal wrists and shoulders. "To be alone and powerless? To lay in the dark after so many cycles of surviving the worst that life could throw at you, too damaged to flee, and know that there is nothing to do but die? To not have the agonizing opportunity to bid farewell to your loved ones?"

The convulsions had lessened as he spoke. The seeker was now only faintly shuddering, ragged ventilations hissing against overheated internals. The energy coating both their frames steamed and sizzled unpleasantly.

Blackjack swiftly readjusted his hold so that he could move one arm freely. His newly freed servo crept up the seeker's side, into transformation seems and over neck cables in a mockery of a lover's embrace, until it finally stroked ins slow, smooth brushes over the mech's trembling optic shutters.

"But you know what, Skywarp?" He rasped, mesmerized by the sight of his dark claw against the seeker's unblemished optic lid. "At least it is a simple death. Think of it: there is nothing left for you but deactivation at my hand. Also," He continued reasonably, "No one who cares or respects you will see you beg for your life; only I will see that."

The silver lips were trembling, though he could tell the seeker was doing his best to still them. There was lubricant trickling from Skywarp's optics; hot tears that sent shivers of delight up Blackjack's spinal struts.

Blackjack had never understood that; the mannerisms mechs from earth carried back with them were so foreign to him. He hadn't bothered asking Skywarp what "brats" had meant; the word obviously referred to his twins. The seeker had displayed so many alien characteristics during his agony. It was disgusting.

Blackjack pushed aside his revulsion, and bent low once again to deliver his final message.

"My master wants his property back, seeker, and I want my legacy. Tell me where they are."

At the Decepticon Base...

The bauble was moving. Back and forth, the two end balls clicked, knocking against the three middle balls and sending momentum through to continue their movement. The balls were suspended by silver strings on a slender rack; a human design created according to Cybertronian specs. It was a gift from Soundwave at the beginning of the peacetime conferences with Optimus Prime, and Megatron still hadn't figured out the purpose behind it. Perhaps it was meant to symbolize the two leaders' difficulties in communicating through lackeys? Megatron was one end ball, and Optimus the other, and they…No, he still didn't understand.

With a sigh, he slumped further in his seat, eyeing the knickknack atop his desk with a baleful eye, and cursing the injections Hook had given him. His repair nanites, over many vorns of combat, had become less than efficient. They required specialized boosters to do their job properly. The only side-effect was that his judgment, cognitive operations, and overall intelligence was impaired for the duration of the boosters' "stay" in his systems. Optimus had laughed when he heard, and said something stupid about Megatron being "high".

Speaking of the Prime, a deeply pitched yelp caught his attention. The Prime was seated on Megatron's plainly furnished berth, probably unaware that he was in the Decepticon leader's personal quarters rather than his office. If he had known, he would probably be blushing, despite the context of the situation. Prime was like that; incredibly proper and hyper-aware of others' privacy, particularly the ways in which he had breached that privacy. Starscream would have lounged on the berth as if he owned it, full knowing it was no office couch. Starscream would smirk at him, daring Megatron to be the first to insinuate that something was amiss, so that Starscream could be the first to be "scandalized" that Megatron had such dirty things on his processors.

Megatron blinked, ran that sentence through his filters, and was honestly surprised when it came back as completely sensible and logical.

Another yelp reminded him of the reason he'd turned his helm in the direction of his berth in the first place, and he turned his attention back again just in time to see Hook applying another weld to the Prime's neck cables. The medic was grumbling and muttering under his breath, optics narrowed in irritation, plating ruffled and unsettled in the presence of both faction leaders. The Prime was all but pressing his chassis to his knees on the berth, hunching to allow the medic access to his throat. He looked extremely uncomfortable.

Megatron smirked, fingering his own patches and a couple of new gouges in his armor. Who would have thought the upstart prisoners could escape the cell and launch an attack? He hadn't, and, judging by his squawk, neither had Prime.

Who would have thought that such "talented" intruders could go down so fast, either? He certainly had. By the carefully controlled and intentionally single sucker punch he had delivered to the red twin's face, so had Prime.

The doors irised open, snapping his stuttering thought processes like a thread, and the very seeker he had been recently considering sauntered in.

Except, he didn't saunter. Usually Starscream had a definitively feminine strut, hips swaying, each move graceful. Despite his distinctly masculine method of attack on and off the battlefield, this delicate bearing gave him a reputation of being "femmish", weak, and sultry. Megatron did not share this opinion, having been persuaded by various attempted assassinations that Starscream was indeed very male and very much confident in that fact. This was one of the reasons that only Megatron and Starscream (plus the air commander's trine mates when they were present) were the ones to laugh when an insult regarding the seeker's masculinity was made.

Starscream's entrance was without his customary vanity. It was stiff and short, as though he were forcing himself to approach an execution squad. Sky-blue servos hung against slim hips, clenched so tightly Megatron could hear the joints creaking from his seat. He almost didn't recognize Starscream's dark faceplates, so twisted was the seeker's expression.

In the time it took for Starscream to reach his desk, Megatron had determined the look to be a grimace.

They both stared at one another, waiting; Megatron, because he'd rather not set off the emotional bomb his Second in Command had apparently become, and Starscream, because…well, Megatron didn't know (one never knew with his Second), but he wished the seeker would reconsider and just speak his mind.

Finally, Optimus' voice broke the silence. "Oh. Hello, Starscream." Autobot manners save the day again, or so the Decepticon saying would go when Megatron proclaimed it their new faction motto that evening. But seriously, that had been quite well timed.

The seeker's reply was less pleasing, mostly because he didn't address it to the Prime. Clawed digits dug into Megatron's desk as the seeker lunged down, planting his servos against the heavy steel surface and leaning far too far forward. "We need to talk." He rasped, directly into Megatron's face. The Decepticon Leader in question raised an optic ridge at the invasion of his space.

"Oh?"

"Yes."

Refusing to be the mech who backed away (and so receiving a blast of hot intakes from the seeker's famously overheating vents), Megatron cast a furtive glance in Optimus' direction. The Prime looked puzzled, but far from suspicious. Still, to retreat into privacy when Starscream had already so foolishly presented such a dramatic need for conversation… "Speak." He ordered decisively, finding the seeker's scarlet gaze and holding it firmly. He immediately felt an instinctive urge to crawl beneath his desk in order to escape the glare he received, but mega-orns of practice enabled him to dismiss the reaction with ease, despite the boosters coursing through his systems.

"We need to talk...alone." The seeker corrected through gritted denta. If that wasn't blatant, Megatron didn't know what was. Was the seeker trying to incite Autobot suspicions?

The lord of the Decepticons glared sourly at his Second.

"Fine." He eventually bit out. But, just as Megatron turned to politely ask him to vacate the premises, he discovered the Prime was already moving. "Prime-" The Decepticon lord began, but the Optimus waved a dismissive servo that clearly said: Don't worry about it. Strange, how he could interpret the movements of his one-time enemy so easily nowadays.

"I'll be waiting outside." Came a calm and unperturbed voice from behind the Prime's face-mask. The leader of the Autobots removed himself with good grace from the office, Hook trailing behind his retreating form like a mother hen whose chick had hatched too early.

Megatron shuddered, wondering when and where he had started using such disturbing earth analogies.

Starscream was giving him a strange look that vaguely resembled his habitual smirk. It was so weakened and strangely nervous, however, that Megatron had trouble recognizing it.

He watched his Second for a few moments, analyzing the seeker's twitchy wings and trembling digits. Starscream was either quite frightened or quite embarrassed. Maybe both. Maybe neither.

"Alright." Megatron began warily. "What is it?"

Starscream fidgeted, and Megatron frowned at the incredibly uncharacteristic action. The seeker looked from left to right, behind himself, and behind Megatron (he had to stand on his pede-tips to do so) and finally settled on the berth with a resigned air. A blue servo whipped out and snagged the edge of the frame, noisily dragging the heavy contraption until it rested directly in front of the gladiator's desk. Once the piece of furniture was properly angled (which took several more moments to accomplish due to a certain seeker's picky nature) Starscream seated himself cross-legged upon it.

Megatron had seen him assume such a position only when seeking comfort during long hours of Strategies and Tactics, as Megatron had begun referring to the Decepticon Officer "get-together" evenings during the war. It looked incredibly painful, but whenever anyone had pointed that fact out, Starscream had nearly bitten their head off. Literally, in some "granted-there-had-been-high-grade-involved" cases, though his relatively small fangs hadn't managed to gnaw far.

Still, Megatron quirked an optic ridge at the sight as a whole, wondering briefly and without seriousness if his seeker had well and truly cracked.

Wait. His? Since when had he called Starscream-

"I have a confession."

Attention: snagged. Disbelief: heavy.

"Do tell." Megatron drawled. "You rarely have one until after you've done something stupid, so why don't you start with your mistake and work up from there, hm?"

Starscream didn't reply; only hung his helm lower, cocked slightly to the side, as if…but surely not…

Megatron eyed the cringing position; the lowered wings, the crooked helm, fidgeting servos, flicking optics. He sat up straighter in his chair, and steepled his digits.

"Starscream." He couldn't have banished the smirk from his mouth if he had used a grinder. "What has you so shamed? It's a nice look for you."

The seeker's sudden fury at the insult briefly restored normality to the situation.

"I'm not ashamed!" Totally was. "I'm…worried." Well, that too. After the "ashamed" bit. The seeker's rage vanished before Megatron's eyes like margarine applied to a red-hot skillet; still present, but almost invisible; liquidated into a simmering pool.

Decided to placate for the sake of getting answers sometime before his recharge cycle, Megatron spoke honestly. "You have nothing to worry about if you are honest with me." It was true. Mostly. When he wasn't pissed off by Starscream's attitude or inexplicable lack of intelligence at key moments of a battle. But he wasn't any of those right now. Just high on drugs, as Skywarp would say. Hook's concoctions were splendid for boosting one's repair nanites, but they played pit with a mech's thought processes. Made him all…goofy.

"Right." The seeker said flatly, his high voice a disbelieving drawl. "Well then, I suppose if I told you that from the moment I enter the Decepticons, I haven't been completely honest with anyone but Thundercracker - that I have been playing a part during most of our conversations and the entirety of the war - that, in short, you never knew me…you wouldn't mind." Acidic, but still with a note of nervousness.

Megatron frowned. Mind? Why would he mind? Starscream had always been lying to him at one point or another. Why would the fact that the seeker had been lying in other ways concern him?

Wait…something wasn't functioning right in his processors. A program was being reported as delayed. That couldn't be right; his reaction time was always impressive, if not perfect.

"Hm." He grunted, distracted by his internal malfunctions. More warnings were popping up; warnings he hadn't seen in so long he barely knew what they meant. "Probably not…give me a moment." He interrupted himself. Was he…glitching? Surely not. But what else could possibly make him display the chaotic beginnings of a heavy crash? He was clueless. That Autobot, Prowl, crashed. The infamous Red Alert crashed. Pit, Soundwave had crashed, once. Megatron had never-

His joints locked, limbs spasming, and his vision flickered out. The last thing he heard was a nearly hysterical "Frag it to the pit!" But he didn't know who it was; his processors were haywire, designating his knickknacks as Optimus Prime and firmly asserting that his berth was his flagship, The Nemesis.

His audials and optics were out, vocalizer fizzling and tickling with what he could only assume was static, since he couldn't hear. Hot digits were clenching beneath armor plating, apparently trying to keep his balance for him. He could have told whoever it was that the attempt was hopeless; his frame was heavy and strong, capable of ripping off any helpful mech's arms with a spasmodic jerk of his servos. When he fell from his chair to the floor, he carried the mystery mech with him. A heavy chassis collided with his own, and something gave, clinking in light, pinging sensations over his plating.

Megatron tried to speak, though he didn't know what he would say.

Then, with a sudden, painful jerk, he fell offline.

At The Ark...

Jazz leapt over a fallen table, kicking up sparks as he scuttled and scrambled gracelessly beneath a plush, Autobot sized sofa they had imported from Earth.

"Primus-smelt-it-Ratchet-it-wasn't-meh!" The saboteur wailed in a flurry of garbled Cybertronian, cringing at the sound of heavy pede-falls nearing his place of refuge.

"Come out of there, you pit-spawn!" The medic's snarl grated above a revving, furious engine. Jazz scooted more firmly into the underside of the sofa, stabbing his sharp digits into soft, plush fabric the color of mayonnaise. It clashed horribly with the bright orange walls of The Ark, but no one cared because the cushions were truly sinful; like clouds of warm breath a bot could simply fall into after a trying day of patrols and politics. It was Jazz's favorite couch, and he felt bad for stabbing it, but sometimes sacrifices had to be made.

"Ah ain't lettin' you pick meh apart for a prank Ah can't take credit for!" The silver mech howled, lowering his helm and poking his nose just barely beyond his protection, ascertaining the medic's position. That turned out to be a mistake.

Ratchet's cherry-colored digits snagged his nose in a cruel grip, threatening to wrench the protrusion off if Jazz didn't follow willingly and immediately. Cursing, flailing, and generally trying to make the experience as unpleasant as possible for his captor, Jazz allowed himself to be hauled from beneath the sofa.

"Ya got 'im?" Ironhide had entered the rec room, standing with massive black arms folded over his broad, shiny chassis. Jazz gave him the finger. "None o' that, now." The Weapon's specialist chided with a shit-eating grin. "You ready ta fess up, kid?"

"Man, Ah am at least three fourths yer age."

"Whatever ya say, kid."

"Enough." Ratchet growled, stomping past Ironhide's larger form and yanking Jazz behind him. "Time for a check-up."

"Ah'm innocent!"

"Shut up."

Mirage watched the scene apathetically. Jazz's howls of rage and promises of revenge were almost entirely without weight; he could see the saboteur's grin break out over his silvery features every couple seconds or so. The leader of the Autobot's Special Ops task force was far more adept at hiding his real emotions than most mechs realized. Jazz was loving every second of Ratchet's "abduction". That was ninety-five percent of the reason why Mirage didn't intervene.

The remaining five percent sat on his lap, having somehow managed to discover his hiding place among the rafters, scale the slick rec room walls, and claim the spot as his. If Mirage had lent a helping servo or two, no bot would ever know…unless Jazz had caught a glimpse. Then every bot would know.

Bumblebee chirred happily, completely absorbed in his inspection of Mirage's chassis armor. It felt a little odd, having small, silver digits running over his transformation seems and swiping excitedly over his spark's shielding, but Mirage hadn't made a move to halt the sparkling's explorations. So few bots bothered to approach him, let alone touch him, that such honestly curious and fascinated attention was quite welcome. Mirage hid his smirk as Bumblebee let out a frustrated bweep, and looked down.

The sparkling was glaring at his chest armor, servos planted between stubby silver legs, one on each of Mirage's thighs. Apparently, something was not operating according to the little one's expectations. Obviously, this meant that adult intervention was required.

An expectant, vivid blue gaze speared Mirage's own, optics wide with supplication.

The spy shifted uncomfortably beneath that gaze, not expecting such feeling in the deep, solemn orbs. Expressive faceplates trembled in a tight-lipped beg, and Mirage sighed, knowing he had lost.

"What?" He whispered, carefully scanning the area for passersby.

Bumblebee turned a suddenly scowling face to the noble's chest plates, rapping them with a disapproving knuckle.

Mirage frowned, confused. What on earth…? "What do you want?" He asked, barely breathing the words. Gears was passing by beneath them, grumbling something about bad weather and aged joints.

Bumblebee gave him a look that clearly stated the sparkling's less than glowing opinion of the spy's intelligence. Then silver digits pointed inward to a tiny, gleaming chassis, and Bumblebee's chestplates split open, revealing a brightly glowing, very bare spark.

Mirage gaped for a moment before recovering. "B-Bumblebee!" The noble shrieked, appalled. He waffled between slamming the chestplates closed and covering his optics, servos twitching indecisively mid-air. "Close yourself this instant!" He snarled, settling on verbal reprimand.

The lights flickered suddenly, illuminating Bumblebee's startled and somewhat hurt expression. Mirage glanced around at the Ark's strangely glitching systems, surprise outweighing his embarrassment. Vents blasted and hissed to a silent wheeze intermittently; the lights flashed and guttered into darkness, brief spasms of light bursting from them. Mirage frowned, honestly confused. It was a sign that peacetime had taken its toll on his battle awareness that he didn't think to look down.

There was a chuckle from beneath them, and the lights went out entirely. The voice was certainly not Gears, nor any other Cybertronian Mirage could recall having the displeasure of hearing. Cold, harsh bursts of grinding, sliding metal grated into the air, like jagged blades drawn against one another. The noble froze out of habit, servos instinctively jerking the sparkling to his chassis and wrapping round him protectively. Mirage's stealth generator engaged with a brief hum as the rasping laughter sounded again, this time a mocking echo of its previous amusement. It stopped, and Mirage, strained to see through the darkness to the source, scanners sweeping the area with fine-tuned precision.

"I would hazard a guess," Purred sibilant words from beneath them, "That he likes sparks. How interesting…" The lights flickered again, revealing a disturbing scene to spy and sparkling alike.

Gears' prone form lay in a heap of tangled limbs at the feet of a shadow. At least, that was what Mirage thought it was, at first. Then a slit of a mouth opened, exposing white fangs, and black, flat chrome glowed dully beneath the flickering rec room lights in a vaguely Cybertronian outline. The voice continued with a hiss. "But this little one is not the sparkling I am looking for, Lord Mirage - not even one of them." Yellow optics shuttered open, glowing like twin flames, filled with cold calculation; dark humor twisted the pale mouth, and the dark lips opened again.

"Have you seen my twins?"

At the Decepticon Base...

"Starscream."

"What is it, Thundercracker?! Can't you see I'm busy hauling this huge-aft aft to Hook!? Stupid fool glitched."

Thundercracker ignored Megatron's slumped and supremely undignified sprawl on the floor; he moved swiftly to his trine-leader's side, and caught the mech by one shoulder. Starscream jerked around, irritation sparking from scarlet optics, mouth already opening to release a withering barrage of verbal abuse for the contact. Thundercracker dut him off with a look.

"Where's Skywarp?" The blue seeker demanded.

Starscream's expression confirmed his fears.

Author's Note: Well, we had a drugged Megatron, a not quite murderous yet Sadist, and a scandalized Mirage. I had a bit of fun with this chapter... 3:)

If anyone is interested, there's a picture of Blackjack on my Deviantart account. Just search for "AshesInWhiteHands" on the Deviantart search engine, look for "OC: Blackjack", and you should find it.

Hope you enjoyed! Please review! I have very little idea whether or not people actually like this story, and if there's honestly little interest in it, I might have to redesign the plot and figure out what's wrong with it, which would result in very few updates and probably a lot of confusion. Please tell me your opinion, even if it's that the story stinks. Thanks! Until next time.