Autobot Base:
Knock Out gingerly got up from the berth, much to his former mentor's displeasure.
"Sit back down," Ratchet said firmly.
The red medic shook his head mockingly, but did as he was told. "Figure it out yet?"
"Huh?"
"What happened," Knock Out tried to punch Ratchet in the shoulder playfully, but fell short due to not being fully recovered.
"Don't strain that arm," The older medic growled. "I just fixed it. Anyway, I've got a few theories on the event."
Knock Out rolled his optics, staring up at the ceiling. "I'm listening."
"First of all, it may have been a simple equipment malfunction," Ratchet frowned when he replayed the scene over in his mind. It hadn't seemed like a malfunction. "From another point of view, it is quite possible that you slipped into permanent stasis lock, but something brought you back. Perhaps the stabilizing equ-"
"Stabilizing equipment?" Shrieked the racer, his red optics widening in shock. "Ratchet, I'm sure I didn't need it. Besides, you know what that does!"
"Inhibits some abilities, especially those in sync with an alternate mode."
"E-exactly!" Knock Out stammered, his voice rising indignantly.
"It saved your life," Ratchet snapped, restraining himself from hitting the younger 'bot over the head with a wrench.
"I didn't want to be saved," the reply was so faint Ratchet could've imagined it.
"Why not?"
Knock Out glanced at him in surprise. "I just didn't want to."
"There has to be something more than that," Ratchet pressed.
Knock Out closed his optics, wincing as if he'd been injured again. "When I left that note, I didn't realize just what Breakdown would do when he saw it. But now-" he looked up sharply, a renewed understanding gleaming far beneath the pain in his crimson optics "-but now I understand. It was the ultimate betrayal, us having been … partners… for quite some time. Even though he was a Decepticon, and I an Autobot, I still felt some kind of friendship toward him. Nothing much, though. I grew to like his unrelenting personality, and single-mindedness about destroying Bulkhead. It was amusing, to say the least. Just like what drives Bulkhead to get even with Breakdown every chance he gets. Reminded me of the way things were on Cybertron, before the war. At the time, I thought nothing of leaving the note – it was my final challenge to Breakdown, just to see if he was half as dumb as I suspected – but now I know what Breakdown felt when he read the message. I had betrayed him."
"Knock Out, you couldn't have betrayed him," Ratchet smiled faintly. The younger 'bots were always so sensitive. "You were never on his side."
"But for a time-" The red medic sighed. "Never mind, I should have known you wouldn't understand."
Ratchet shook his head. "I'll go make sure no one else is badly injured."
"You didn't do that earlier?"
"I was too busy trying to repair you," the head medic responded.
"Oh."
Knock Out busied himself while Ratchet was gone by thoroughly exploring the Autobot – No, just the base. He corrected himself. He really needed to stop thinking of himself as a Decepticon. The façade was no longer necessary. Megatron probably knew, and he was sure Soundwave was the reason the Decepticons knew in the first place.
He had almost finished when he heard heavy footsteps behind him.
"Enjoying your tour?" The voice belonged to Bulkhead.
"Mildly," Knock Out turned in the direction of the sound, unable to keep the venom he'd carefully developed toward the Autobots out of his voice. Another thing he'd thought up to avoid detection. Then something occurred to him. If he'd heard no fighting when he woke… "What happened to Breakdown?"
Bulkhead tossed a chunk of black metal at him. "Dead."
Knock Out realized what it was the moment he looked at it. Breakdown's eye patch. When he spoke again, the venom wasn't all an act. This time it was real. "I guess you finally won, Bulkhead."
"Wasn't me," the Wrecker replied, oblivious to the barb in the medic's statement. "Didn't have the chance."
"I always thought you would be the one to offline him."
"Wish I had," Bulkhead pounded his fists together; the metallic clang echoed in the hallway. "The 'con had it coming. You mess with one of us, you get all of us."
Knock Out just shrugged in reply. He was lost in thought. After a bit of talking with no reply, Bulkhead finally got the idea.
If Bulkhead didn't do it, then who did?
He shuddered as it all came rushing back to him.
He was somewhere… but just where, he couldn't tell. It felt like he was trapped somewhere between reality and someplace much, much darker. He tried to call out, but the words were lost in the harsh ring of the enclosed space. Suddenly a burning pain gripped him like a vise, and he felt his vision starting to go black.
After what felt like an eternity, the blackness lifted, and he was able to see again. But there was nothing to see – it was pitch-dark, the only light from a faint beam too far away to be anything much. He could see, but not see. There was nothing but darkness, yet there seemed to be light somewhere far away. There was burning pin, but it felt muted, as though it should have been worse.
The pain was unbearable. Even though his optics were functioning again, the agony that gripped him still remained. It grew worse by the second, until he knew he could last no longer. Just another minute, he told himself. Just another minute and it'll be over.
But even that short minute seemed to last forever.
Finally, the pain was gone. Nothing remained but blissful peace. There was nothing left to come.
And right now, nothing seemed like the best thing in the world.
He was about to drift off into an eternity of emptiness and relief when a loud voice interrupted him.
"Ah," it boomed. "A trade? Very well then. Your choice is made, and I will send him back. But be warned, he will not remember what you did…"
Even as the memory came to a close, he felt it slipping from his grasp, drifting off into bleak oblivion, and dissolving before his optics.
He should know who offered to – what was it again? – but couldn't remember. And the booming voice, he should recognize – wait, what did it say again?
A faint burning sensation came to him, but it was nothing like… what was he trying to remember?
Blackness ate away at the edge of his vision, nothing compared to the darkness of before… wait, what happened before?
He shook off the echoes of the … event, he decided to call it – whatever it was.
As Knock Out turned Breakdown's eye patch in his hand, he couldn't help but feel there was something he was supposed to remember.