Ironhide let out a frustrated vent at the scene playing out in front of him. How hard was it to get one Dinobot inside of a fragging rocket? Very hard apparently.

"Me Grimlock don't want to go inside! Me Grimlock want to fight!" He was standing firm on the loading ramp with his arms crossed in refusal, his red eyes glaring at everyone who had tried to convince him the fight was on the other end of the trip.

"You have to get on the rocket to get to the fight you glitch!" The weapons specialist finally lost his limited patience.

"Me Grimlock don't like you yelling. Maybe me Grimlock bite you again. You still taste like energon?"

Sideswipe snickered at that one as Ironhide flatly looked up at the large Bot. "Get on the rocket!"

Grimlock's glare deepened as he stared Hide down, but someone else was getting impatient with waiting for the Dinobot leader. Scorn came up and squarely kicked Grimlock in the aft to get him moving.

"Snackbot say fight up there, we go up there! Scorn tired of listening to Grimlock whine like sparkling."

Grimlock promptly turned and punched his fellow Dinobot. "Me Grimlock do what me Grimlock want!"

"Slug shut Grimlock up!" The third Dinobot grumbled before he turned into his triceratops form and rammed into Grimlock, then lifted his head. The result of that being he carried the wildly protesting leader into the patiently waiting Omega Supreme.

Strafe and Bumblebee shared an amused look at that before they followed Scorn up the ramp.

"Primus help us all." Ironhide muttered as he made his way inside.

Optimus was the last one to enter once he had everyone he needed inside and not long after Omega began to shake as he fought against the pull of gravity to lift himself and his cargo off of the ground. The Dinobot bickering continued even as they were lifted high into the air, much to Ironhide's frustration. Did he really have to come along for this one?

One look ahead of him as they cleared the atmosphere clearly gave him answer. Yes, he did. Unicron had already drawn so much closer and Ironhide could only stare at what he was seeing. He also began to wonder if this mission was no more than a suicide attempt. Even his towering confidence had trouble sticking around as they closed in on their adversary.

The only thing that silenced his doubt, somewhat, was the calm, composed stance of Prime as he patiently waited for their ride to get them close enough. Ironhide wished he could say he felt the same as his leader did, but he didn't.

.

.

The heralds stood in front of Leo, their faces twisted with evil glee at the fact that they took out every one Leo cared about in one strike. They expected this to be the blow that would give them an edge over this already disadvantaged turtle. They watched Leo as he stood there with his eyes closed, waiting for the pain of his loss to become clear. Anticipating to relish in his grief before they put the now worthless champion out of his misery.

Kyle was standing behind Leo with a stunned and grief stricken Will and Epps, his face clearly showing the effects of the building's collapse as he stared at the ruins. This was what they were hoping to see on the turtle. This was not what they were going to get.

When Leo finally opened his eyes they lit up the night around him they were glowing so bright. Those eyes raised to look at the heralds, completely unafraid. Anger was in his features, that same anger that had fueled him every time someone struck out against his family, but it was so much more potent now.

Will was the first one to feel it and snapped himself out of his shock enough to begin to pull Epps and Kyle as far away as he could.

That glow grew to surround the rest of Leo as he spoke. "You were warned. That was the only one that was going to be given to you. You should have listened to it."

This wasn't what the heralds expected to hear, nor see. So many times before had this worked in their favor that they could not comprehend why it didn't this time.

"Does he not care for them?" Famine asked. "Why does this not phase him?"

"On the contrary." Leo replied, his glow growing brighter. "I care for them very much. But you assumed I'm the only one that does, that was your biggest mistake."

"What?" Pestilence didn't understand and it was painfully obvious. The blue glowing turtle just smiled slightly at him, a smile tinged with pity of all things.

Leo didn't answer verbally, but someone else did. There was a loud roar from behind him before the top of the debris pile suddenly was scattered off with a powerful blow from within. That power being from purple tinted wings as the earth dragon flung the remains off of him. Donnie straightened fully then, easily towering over the building remains and revealed the numerous individuals that he had shielded, even as Mikey and Raph came walking out to join Leo, their eyes also brightly glowing. Donnie cleared a path through the rubble for the humans under his protection to escape the unstable pile before he calmly leapt out and landed behind his not yet transformed brothers.

"Four?" Death's black eyes grew wide. "There are four of them?"

"How can this be?" Famine could not wrap his head around what he was seeing as he stared at Donnie. "How can the power be split among four of them? And then be given the most powerful spirits of all... The dragon..."

"It does not matter!" War bellowed. "One, or four, the champion will still fall!"

"Our turn." Raph snarled.

"Indeed." Leo agreed calmly.

That blue glow brightened now tinged with red and orange as his brothers joined him and when it finally dimmed, there were now four dragons facing off against the heralds.

War roared his own anger and led the charge, fully intending to run down the blue banded dragon in front of him.

But the dragons weren't going to make it so easy, that became clear just as soon as a tail came whipping around and slammed into War and his mount, sending both to the ground and taking out numerous trees from the forest around the base in the process. Leo's head was high after that blow. His wings lightly flared, he stood staring the leader down as steam escaped from his nostrils as they flared in anger and determination.

"Very well beast!" War came to his feet, a large battleaxe now in his hands. "Come and face your doom!"

Leo did just that without hesitation, leading his own charge with his own roar.

And the orb in the sky grew slowly bigger as their master drew ever nearer.

.

.

Ty himself didn't have time to look on as the dragons engaged. He was busy helping his mother and aunts try and get everyone out of the immediate danger area. Which given the sizes of what was out there was going to be a very large area indeed.

"Down!" Blaster suddenly hollared over the commotion.

All of them had trained intensely in various ways and they let their battle instincts kick in and hit the ground on their stomachs, hands covering heads as a blast of dark energy hit his Uncle Mikey's dragon form, sending the large dragon into the ground. That in return resulted in boulders and trees flying everywhere. Before the last of the debris fell, a roar of defiance came from the dragon and he rolled back to his feet and charged the female bot that got a hit in on him.

"Move! Now!" Ratchet snapped.

"Daddy!" Ari cried, concern covering her delicate face as she watched with extreme worry.

"Go Ari!" Adam grabbed her hand and began to drag her along. "There's nothing we can do to help him!"

"So...the little female is your spawn is it?" The female grinned nastily. "Let me show you the reason I am called Death foolish dragon."

Another blast came, this time straight for Ari and Adam. But it never hit. Using a strong gust of wind the dragon of air pushed them out of the way and the blast hit the now empty ground where the teen and her partner had been only moments before. Then he swung that neck around and loosed his orange dragon fire to connect with the next blast as he shifted his body around to place himself between this opponent and his daughter. The two streams connected and held firm as both struggled to gain the upper hand on the other.

Ty grabbed Ari's other hand and joined his pull with Adam's to get her back onto her feet. "Come on cousin! We need to move! Our presence is only distracting them!"

They got her moving just as the streams themselves couldn't hold their own power and exploded, sending Death flying off of her mount and Uncle Mikey rolling, narrowly missing the now running group as he rolled across their path behind them.

"Jesus fucking christ!" Aunt Cris screamed. "It's like some fucked up version of Clash of the Titans out here!"

"Go Mom!" Thane pushed her with his good arm to keep her moving even faster, only to pull her back again as one of the heralds toppled, mount and all, into their path. Uncle Donnie furiously followed him, landing on him with his claws digging into the armour.

"There's nowhere to go!"

"Over here!" Dante called, his hand firmly held Emily's as she stared wide eyed around her. Blaster was with him, hurriedly ushering the other humans to follow Ratchet. The Med Bot was trying to guide them a path to safety around the struggling behemoths.

The mount's legs thrashed violently as it struggled to fight off the dragon holding it and it's rider down, kicking up all kinds of debris as it's clawed feet struggled to find a hold. Thane and Aunt Cris weren't the only ones struggling to find some kind of cover from that deadly rain. It was Ari and Ty now desperately trying to guide the human in their trio to safety as they pushed him back and forth between them as they themselves tried to get out of harm's way.

But there was a large boulder not even their quick reflexes were able to get past as it came rolling towards them. It suddenly disappeared as Uncle Raph's mighty forepaw calmly slapped the fuck out of it and sent it to his own opponent. Then that large redbanded head looked at them and gave a low impatient growl.

"We're trying Uncle!" Ty snapped back at him. "We don't want to be in the middle of this shit any more than you want us in it!"

The fire dragon didn't have time to worry about that anymore, his body being tackled by the fourth horseman. Ty suddenly found his feet not wanting to hold him up through the tremors that collision caused.

"Go, go, go, go, go, go!" Ari was yelling as she led the retreat now.

"We're going, we're going!" Adam answered as they finally made it to Dante.

Ty was right behind them as Dante turned and led them further into the woods and farther away from the battling bodies. Still the ground shook as they retreated, making a quick flight impossible as they all continuously stumbled long.

"Ty! What do we do?!" Cindy's eyes full of fright as she turned to him.

He wanted nothing more than to hold her and calm her, but he couldn't. "We keep moving. It's all we can do. The farther we get from them, the more they can focus on what needs to be done." Ty turned with Cindy to close the gap and follow the others before he stopped in shock and quickly pushed her behind him.

Jeff smiled as he tilted his head. "Did you miss me?" He began to close in. "I missed you. Missed beating the life out of you anyway. Now I'm going to finish the job...and Daddy is too busy to save your ass this time."