ONE EARTH WEEK LATER…

Tomato had been living on the Elite Guard ship for one week now, and he still didn't feel like he was at home. He was online, but not really living. He didn't feel like getting out of bed, but the other Autobots urged him to, making him interact with the others. Deep down, Tomato knew they meant well, but they didn't know how he really felt. They couldn't bring themselves to understand that all he really wanted was to go back to the Nemesis.

One morning, Tomato was sitting on his bed, staring up at the ceiling, because that was all he wanted to do. He heard a small knock on his door and Red Alert came in, carrying oilcake.

"I brought you some oilcake, Tomato." Red Alert sat down on the side of the bed. "When you were younger you used to love it."

"Do you have fizzy energon?" asked Tomato, wishing to taste a drop of home.

"No," Red Alert replied with emphasis. "Fizzy energon is VERY bad for you."

"I don't care," replied Tomato. "I told you, I don't want to be here."

"Oh, sure you do," Red Alert said. "Megatron didn't have any oilcake on his ship, did he?"

"No, but he had fizzy energon, normal energon, and dark energon," Tomato replied.

"Not dark energon!" yelled Red Alert. "How much did you drink?!"

"I didn't drink that much," Tomato told him. "I didn't really like it. It was a little strong…but the others drank it all the time."

"Well, we don't have it here, because it is like the very blood of Unicron," said Red Alert. "We will never hurt you like Megatron has."

"Megatron was good to me," Tomato protested, anger welling up inside of him again.

Red Alert shook his head and sighed. "Look, Tomato…maybe it will be better if you talk about it."

"What's there to talk about?" Tomato asked. "Do you want to hear about how he turned me from a weakling to a warrior? About he taught me to be strong and smart and fast? How he gave me my weapons and my Decepticon insignia when I deserved it?"

"That's not how sparklings should be treated," Red Alert told Tomato. "When was he kind to you?"

"It's called tough love," Tomato told him. "Megatron never tortured me, ever…and he was my father."

"Your father wasn't Megatron," Red Alert insisted. "I knew your father. He and I were very close friends. You can't imagine how devastated I was when I found out he was offline. Don't you care that Megatron killed your real father?"

"I hardly knew him," Tomato replied. "Megatron was the one who raised me and made a Decepticon out of me. Besides, my father was a scout, so he would have told you where our base was, and we would have lost this stupid war."

Tears streamed down Tomato's faceplates, no matter how hard he tried to hold them back. Of course it wasn't a good thing his father had been killed, but he didn't want to be taken away from Megatron and the others, either. It was horrible how he had been yanked away from everything he held dear to his spark.

"Please just leave me alone," Tomato whispered, burying his faceplates in his pillow. "None of you ever will ever understand."

"Are you sure?" asked Red Alert, but when Tomato didn't answer, he just said, "Okay then," and left the room.

THE NEXT SOLAR CYCLE…

It was about afternoon, and Tomato was lying in his bed again, not talking to anybody, when he heard Ultra Magnus yelling for all the Autobots to report to the main monitor room.

"Everyone!" he was hollering. "Enemy contact!"

Out of habit, Tomato reached into where his sheath used to be and prepared to pull out his sword, then remembered his sword wasn't there any more. His gun was gone, too. When the Autobots had taken them away, he had protested, but there had been nothing he could do.

When he heard the cry "Enemy Sighting", though, Tomato did what he had been trained to do and forgot about anything that was holding him back. He ran to the main monitor room and looked around until he located the place where the Autobots had dumped his weapons. As quickly as he could, he reattached the gun and grabbed the sword as fast as he could. Looking down at his chestplate, he tore the Autobot sticker right off to reveal the Decepticon stamp of which he was incredibly proud.

"Decepticon Warrior Tomato reporting for duty, my liege," he whispered.

Tomato looked up at the screen of the main monitor room, where there was a projector image of Megatron speaking. (He was still back at the base, of course, but he was contacting the Elite Guard like this through his com. link.)

"What do you want from us, Megatron?" asked Ultra Magnus.

"Do not fear us, Autobots," Megatron answered, expressionless. "I have called to offer you a deal."

"Elaborate," said Ultra Magnus.

"We have what you are looking for," Megatron told him. "If you were to pay us a price for it, we will give you the AllSpark fragments we have found."

Tomato stared at his leader, mouth wide open. Had Megatron blown a diode? Why was he giving up the AllSpark fragments they had? How badly did he need what he was asking for in return?

"We could really use those AllSpark fragments," someone said quietly.

"So be it," Ultra Magnus told Megatron firmly, then turned to the team. "All able-bodied troopers, come with me. The rest of you stay back and guard the base."

"Aye sir!" Ironhide shouted, and all the Autobots who were going went outside. Tomato followed them.

"Why do you want to come along?" asked Ultra Magnus.

"I, um, I've just been thinking," Tomato lied, thinking quickly. "You guys were right. Megatron is horrible. I think I should fight him with you, for I seek revenge."

In truth, the only reason Tomato was coming along was because he wanted to stop Megatron from giving the AllSpark away before it was too late. In no way did he think Megatron was horrible, and he would be fighting against the Elite Guard, not with them.

"Well, okay," Ultra Magnus told him, sounding surprised—so surprised, in fact, that he didn't notice how Tomato had gathered his weapons and ripped off his Autobot sticker.

All the Autobots transformed and headed to the Decepticon base. Since Tomato had become able to fly during his training, Autobot programming or no, he flew to the base at a slow pace as the Autobots drove. Sure, it was still a little scary to fly, but he remembered Starscream's advice—he should be cautious, not fearful.

After Tomato had flown for awhile, and the Autobots had driven, the Nemesis was finally in sight. Tomato wanted to land on the ground and run right back into base, but he knew better.

When everybody had arrived and turned to robot mode, Ultra Magnus called, "Come out, Megatron! We've decided this deal sounds very good for us Autobots."

"Oh, yes," said Megatron, coming out of the base and pointing his gun right at the troopers. "It sounds very good for me, too."

Before anybody (including Tomato) knew what was happening, Megatron blasted his cannon at Ultra Magnus, smashing him into a pile of rocks by Tomato's obstacle course. The others ran toward Megatron, on the attack, but Megatron, undaunted, managed to hold back their attacks. That was when he turned his head…and noticed Tomato.

"Tomato!" he hollered. "Come on!"

"Decepticon Warrior Tomato, reporting for duty, sir!" yelled Tomato, whipping out his sword and charging headlong into battle.

There were several Autobots he had to fight past, but Tomato used his martial arts skills to take them down, sometimes with the help of his sword or gun. Megatron had been right after all—his weapons could be his best friends during battle.

"What do you think you're doing, Tomato?!" asked Ultra Magnus. "I thought you were on our side!"

"Like scrap I am!" Tomato shouted, knowing his leader would be proud. "I am a Decepticon, through and through!"

Before the Elite Guard could say anything back, Tomato ran off, doing his best to take down any enemy who blocked his way. That's when he heard a shriek from behind him. Instinctively, he ran towards the sound, and he couldn't believe what he saw.

It was an Autobot femme, albeit one he'd never seen before. She was a beautiful dark-blue, a little smaller than Tomato, and probably around his age, too. Unfortunately, she was also breathless with pain—and that's when Tomato noticed her entire leg had been shot off, the shattered remains scattered all over the ground.

"My leg!" she cried, clutching the socket where her leg had previously been attached. "Help!"

"W-What?" asked Tomato, his spark suddenly pounding furiously as the femme opened her optics for a minute in surprise. Her optics were beautiful, too; even though they were tearing up with her pain, their bright blue seemed as if it had been taken from the sky itself. Her paint job was the deep blue of the ocean, as flawless as the rest of her perfect body. Tomato's mouth opened involuntarily and he even dropped his sword.

It wasn't entirely unexpected that Tomato would feel like time had stopped upon meeting this exquisite young Autobot femme—except for Blackarachnia, he had never actually encounteredthe other half of the Cybertronian race before. And besides, Blackarachnia didn't really count.

This 'bot, on the other hand, was downright ravishing, even with one of her legs shattered to pieces. The femme stared up at Tomato from her place on the ground. Tomato knew he wanted to help, but he didn't know how.

"Help…" the femme whispered.

Tomato was still kind of in shock, but he snapped out of it when he looked at the raw energon flowing steadily out of the femme's leg. Since he knew she needed help, he walked over to her.

"Please, have mercy," she pleaded. "I can't have any more of my body parts broken."

"What are you talking about?" asked Tomato, but then he looked down at the Deception insignia on his chestplate, the gun on his arm, and his sword on the ground. He picked it up and put it back in its sheath. The femme still looked terrified of him.

It was so strange. Tomato knew he wanted to help this femme, but he didn't quite understand the feeling of how fast his spark beat when he looked at her, or why he suddenly felt nervous and even scared. It was similar to the feeling he got when attempting to fly…except he wasn't flying.

And what help could he be, anyway? Obviously her leg needed to be fixed, but he didn't know the first thing about doctoring. All he knew was that she was in trouble, and that she didn't trust him not to hurt her.

"Please don't hurt me, Deception," the femme repeated sadly. "I'm much too damaged already."

"Relax," Tomato told her, kneeling next to her on the ground and lifting her head. "I'm not going to hurt you."