Hey everyone! :) I'm back with a new chapter! (obviously)

Now, my dear friend Bee4ever has found something that could be slightly confusing in the future chapters: When following Dark of the Moon, you will find that the Autobots' base is in Washington D.C. and in my story, the base is in Chicago. So everything goes around Chicago, everyone is in the same city. It's easier to keep track of things (for both you and I), so I hope this will clear things up if anyone gets confused!

Let's carry on with the story then, and remember, Dark of the Moon has started!

He was gone.

Gone at the wake of dawn.

With no way of knowing if he would come back.

I couldn't sleep last night. But I couldn't face him either.

It was like nostalgia, not letting me sleep, but not letting me watch him go either. I was caught in the middle.

I was sitting up in my bed. The window to my left showed me the Sun's rise, along with its rays penetrating the skies. They lighted the room as I brought my knees to my chest.

I cast a look at Ironhide. His holoform was sleeping, as I took in the details the Ratchet made sure were there. His work wasn't unnoticed. He spent so much time making the holoforms the best they could possibly get, and now, he had perfected them. Everything humans had, now the holoforms had. How, I did not know, but I was glad it was that way.

The noises outside my room told me that the soldiers were slowly starting to wake up, and that military life started early, even though I wasn't technically a part of the military.

The room to my left was occupied by Nicole, while the room opposite to mine was Mikaela's and the one opposite to Nicole's was Leo's. Sarah's room was the first one on the left, while Annabelle had chosen the first one on the right.

But I couldn't think of that at this moment. The thoughts of my uncle going away to Ukraine weren't particularly pleasant ones. Optimus and Ratchet had gone along with him. I guess it was up to Jazz and Ironhide to keep everyone else under control, those two being the wisest and oldest of the Autobots present.

I got dressed into my regular clothes, careful not to wake up Ironhide with the clothes rustling.

I went out of the room, closing the door quietly and going down the hallway and down the stairs, my hands folded across my chest.

I was still new to this place, and how couldn't I be, we all just arrived yesterday, so I was looking around the base. The only thing I found were the forms of Autobots resting in one part of the Main Room, other than the soldiers doing their daily duties in front of large TVs and computer screens.

I already missed home. The cozy, comfortable and warm home. Not this cold facility, with everything being so formal and no room for mistakes. Everyone was minding their own business, including me, although I had no idea what my business here was. Roaming around was probably the only good I would do today.

My morning sickness decided to come again. I put a hand over my mouth as I ran back into my room, this time not caring that the door abruptly opened and was left that way. I opened the bathroom door and arrived just in time to purge my stomach contents again.

Hide was by my side in an instant, picking up my hair and holding my forehead.

I felt disgusted, weak, and like I was going to have another mood swing.

But as I stopped emptying my stomach the wrong way, I could still feel my body shaking as Ironhide used the toilet paper to gently wipe my lips.

This time, he knew better than to say anything. I guess I was in the silent kind of mood. He got up and about 10 seconds later came back with an unopened bottle of pure mountain water. He opened it for me and gave it to me. I stared at it for a while, still dizzy from my vomiting.

I took the bottle of water and drank some of it, getting rid of the horrid aftertaste in my mouth.

"Thanks." I managed to say after I had contained myself. "Why am I vomiting all the time?"

"It's just been twice, and I'm sure it's too early to tell." He said with a smile. I felt like he was keeping something good away from me and I wanted to know what.

"What's too early to tell?"

"Why you have been purging your stomach contents for two days in a row."

"What do you think could be the reason?"

"No idea." He shrugged, but I knew him better than that.

"Come on, don't play that game with me." I guess my mood was a happy one. God, I can be so complicated to myself, I wonder what Ironhide thinks of me, or how he even puts up with me.

"I'm not playing any game." He said. "Why don't you go and find something to eat?"

"I just vomited." I said. "Isn't it kind of obvious that I might vomit again if I eat?"

"No. Not really. Your stomach needs food."

"And just where am I supposed to get some? I have no idea where things are at this base."

"Do you want me to walk along with you?"

"That would be nice." I admitted. "Help me get up?" I offered my hands to him. He slowly lifted me up as both of us walked side by side out of the room. He showed me some new corridors on the second floor. The corridors were filled with various rooms, most of them were some filled with weapon parts, if not weapons themselves.

We went down the emergency stairs, even though there was no emergency, he was just showing me another way down. We walked across the Main Room, getting to the other side of the facility rather quickly. "These doors here," he said, walking towards the first and largest door on the corridor, "are to the kitchen. Here is where you'll find something to eat."

"And where are you guys going to…?" I was searching for the correct word, but 'eat' just didn't cover it.

"Refuel? To us it doesn't really matter, we can refuel anywhere."

"But don't you guys have something like a kitchen where you can take the energon?"

"We can carry our energon rations with us, we have special compartments for this."

Too complicated. "Okay, got it." I simply said as I walked into the kitchen, looking at the counter where meals were displayed. They weren't much, but they did look tasty. They were the sort of 'made in 5 minutes' meals.

"You think you can manage around here?" he said, looking at the soldiers who were discreetly looking at us.

"I think I'm good." I smiled, my self-esteem pumping up. I had to restrain myself from giving him a goodbye kiss. Not everyone should know of mine and Hide's relationship.

He seemed to understand my dilemma and lack of 'action' so he just patted me on the shoulder, just as he would do to a comrade, without much emotion. It almost made me laugh, but I contained myself once more and walked to the counter, taking a plate of roast beef and mashed potatoes. For a military base, they certainly had good food here.

I sat on a table a little further away from the soldiers. I didn't want to eat with all of them watching me taking a bite.

I saw someone sit beside me, surprised to see it was Sideswipe. "Hey Sides."

"What's up?"

"I'm trying to eat here." I stated the obvious, taking a bite of my dish.

"Well, I have a problem."

I looked at him. If he had a problem, he certainly would have solved it by now. So going to me meant the problem wasn't big. I kept on eating. "And what's the problem?"

He made himself comfortable by swinging an arm around me. "You see, I don't think the soldiers understand much about our holoforms and alts."

"And that's a problem how?" and what did I have to do with it?

"I'd just like you to… help out." There was a catch to this. I could hear it in his voice, see it in his smirk, and just feel it in the atmosphere. At this moment, whatever I said, he would interpret it as to aid himself.

"No." I said. "I don't have the time to do such things and besides, even if-"

"Good, see those soldiers over there?" he motioned with his hand that was swung across my shoulders. "They could be good practice."

"I said no, Sides." I softly said, finishing up my lunch. Or whatever this had been.

"Then who am I supposed to ask for help?"

"Nicole." I shrugged.

"But I like you more." I almost choked. "Besides, her energon-energy things scare the frag out of me. It's fragging freaky."

"So you like me more because I'm less freaky. I'm bound to tell her that." I said, swallowing my last bite.

"No, no, no, no, no," he hurriedly said. "If you dare tell her, my aft is fried and not in the kinky way I like it!"

I didn't even want to imagine that scene, otherwise I would have puked all over the place.

So I sighed. There was no escaping this, or him. "If I help you out with this, then you owe me one."

"Yes, Princess!" he hugged me, without even caring that the soldiers were probably looking at us strangely. "Okay, so here's the deal…"

XxXxXxXxX

After much arguing and plotting, Sideswipe and I had finally come to a decision. He wanted the soldiers to know who he was, holoform, alt and robot mode and I had to aid him in this somehow, but it had to be done the right way.

He and I walked side by side to his alt mode which was parked in Bay 37, which was the Weapons Assessment Bay, but nobody was doing anything at that post now, so it was like his personal little area.

There was a huge propeller in front of his alt. I wondered what good that would do.

"So what now?" I asked as I walked up to his alt, crossing my arms and leaning on it. "I'm not going to do anything dirty, I know your mind, Sides."

"Pshhh, dirty." He rolled his eyes, but he and I perfectly knew he wanted something kinky. "Look, to attract their attention, first you have to rev the engine. These humans are most probably petrolheads."

"And what makes you think they are petrolheads?" I gave him a disdainful look. "They could know absolutely nothing about cars."

"Sure, but they can't refuse the sweet sound of my V8 engine." He said proudly.

"To be honest," I found myself talking, "I like the sound of Sunstreaker's alt more."

"Good idea, I'll call him in."

What?

After a second, I responded. "What?"

"Yeah, we'll make a revving battle."

"You can't do that inside a base."

"Watch us."

I could hear the thundering footsteps of a certain yellow robot.

Sunstreaker was walking proudly across the base, loving the admiring looks the soldiers were giving him. He walked up to us and began the transformation sequence, prolonging it so that the attention would be all on him, as if it already wasn't.

He transformed into the stunning yellow Lamborghini Aventador, which caused the soldiers to gape at him. If he could smirk from his alt, he must have been smirking with all he had. Showoff.

"You called me, brother." He said, summoning up his holoform.

"How about we show these humans what a revving battle looks like." Sides challenged.

"Let's put in Dino here as well. Maybe Bee can help in this, too." Sunny replied.

It was odd that Dino's bay was called Bay 23, even if it was just beside Sideswipe's, which was Bay 37. Dino 'woke up' as I heard him start up the Ferrari engine. The soldiers were gossiping in the back, reminding me of high school girls.

I could see Bee rolling in here too, as he parked near the three Autobots, shutting off his engine. "Your turn, Sides." I said as he started up the V8 engine. It grumbled deeply.

Bee started up his engine effortlessly, as it grumbled deeper than Sideswipe's. It could have sounded deeper because of the different exhaust tone.

And for the grand finale, Sunstreaker started up the humongous Italian V12 engine which wanted to be revved to the limit.

The soldiers slightly wooed at Sunstreaker. He won before any of them started the battle.

Dino started first, lovely notes of the 4.5 liter V8 engine flew freely around the base, only to be shut down by Bee's deep and throaty engine.

Sideswipe intervened with his more powerful engine, only to be roughly cut off by Sunstreaker's high pitched rev.

"Louder!" I wooed, raising my hands up and so did the soldiers behind us.

"Yeah, come on!" a guy from behind came up front, yelling for more. He was soon accompanied by his whole squad, who were certainly enjoying their time watching the four Autobots revving it out.

The cars revved and revved, as deep and high pitched tones filled the base and each of the humans' bodies with tingles and pleasant sensations and chills. It was amazing, these sounds.

The first one to fall out of the competition was Bee. Even though he sounded good, he just wasn't a good enough match for the Ferrari, Lamborghini and Corvette engines.

He moved out, doing a small wheelspin and rolling out of the base.

The trio was left now. The Ferrari and Corvette engine battled it, as the soldiers quickly dubbed it 'The Battle of the V8s'. So some of them did know cars after all. Sides was right. Up to a point.

But the high pitched note of the Ferrari engine was nothing to match the Corvette's LS7 engine, it was way better, and because it 'screamed' better, Sides was out of the game.

Sideswipe's engine died out, silently admitting defeat, as the two of the Italian cars almost seemed to glare at each other, their aggressive alts choosing the right moment to unleash their full power. The 458 and the Aventador looked like they were going to pounce at each other.

Their engines were humming, ready to get down and dirty.

Sunstreaker wasn't known for waiting. He started with a small rev, slowly increasing it.

Dino follow suit, but gave a more powerful one.

"It's four exhausts against three, Dino. Odds are in my favor." Sunstreaker smirked from his holoform. "I have more power, bigger and louder engine, not to mention more cylinders… I'm also faster, better looking, have a custom paint job…"

The soldiers started rolling their eyes at his talk, but came closer to the car and me. I felt like I was surrounded by them, but I didn't feel unpleasant.

"No one cares, Sunny." I rolled my eyes too as I heard snickers behind me. I heard some of them mention something about me, but I couldn't hear it straight because the hardcore rev the Sunstreaker made happen, it was aggressive, loud and deadly by all means, as a flame erupted from his exhausts, a good thing in his situation, since he could control the flame amount. It was a warning sign and I knew it. I guess I had embarrassed him. "Sorry." I moved away, fighting the urge to curse him.

As I was moving away backwards, I had tripped on a soldiers foot, but luckily, the said soldier had caught me before I could fall on my back.

"Oh God, I'm sorry." I smiled embarrassingly.

He grinned charmingly at me, as the soldiers behind him wooed for him, making those annoying 'woo' noises that people in elementary and high school did when someone had a crush. "No problem." He let me go as I walked away to where the other Autobots were parked. "She's good. Wonder if she's single…" Some of them said as I got out of their sights as quickly as possible, without having to run away.

"All arriving Autobots, in tar, training and debriefing in 15 minutes." A voice coming from the Command Center, which I had absolutely no access to, said, as I saw Optimus leading the way of Autobots. He wasn't carrying his trailer with him this time. I presumed he left it elsewhere.

I moved to Ironhide's bay, Bay 12 and waited for him there. He was right behind Optimus and as Optimus went into his bay, I noticed the row of Autobots entering the base. Bee came back and behind him, there were Ratchet, Que and the other set of twins, Skids and Mudflap, although they have changed their alt modes since the last time I had saw them. They had the same alt mode Skids had four years ago, although both alts were now black with green and red details to help separate the twins from one another by color.

Behind all of them, came the sisters, Arcee, Chromia and Elita One, each of them going to their own bays. My uncle arrived riding in Ratchet. As Ratchet parked in his own bay, Will got out of the green Hummer and I waited for him just outside Ratchet's parking spot.

Will got out and gave me a hug. "Thank God, you're alright." I said, holding him tight.

"US agencies say they have been monitoring the blast, but if in fact this was a covert military strike, no nation has yet…"

And just in that moment, as the TV was speaking, I had noticed a blonde business woman approaching me and my uncle. "Stay here, I'll handle her." Will said before going away, and I could hear some of the conversation they had.

"CIA's up my ass on this mystery raid on the Middle East, so it's time to come clean, was the unit involved?"

"Um… I'm not sure, ma'am." My uncle answered. I saw Bumblebee already going into training mode, seeing him transform and train with the soldiers on how to decapitate a Decepticon with a kill shot.

I walked to Ironhide and his bay, as he too had transformed. He was talking about weapons with Que, who seemed to be enjoying himself making them.

"This gun is my perfect invention, Ironhide!" Que said enthusiastically, only to have his hopes brought down by Hide's uninterested answer.

"Right."

"Killjoy." I said as he looked down at me. He snorted in return.

I hadn't seen him in his alt mode in quite a while, and I certainly enjoyed the view.

"Ah good, they're here! My name's Que, I do hope you have answers for him, I've never seen him so upset."

"Optimus, you remember Charlotte Mearing, the Director of National Intelligence?"

So the blonde business woman's name was Charlotte Mearing. Dino and Bee were behind Optimus in their true forms, as most of the Autobots here were. "He's in a bad mood. He's not talking to anybody today."Dino said, moving his arms around only for me to gaze on his massive swords on his forearms.

"What is this, the silent treatment?" she looked at the Autobots disdainfully.

"We've seen that and this is not that." I was slightly surprised when Ironhide had spoke.

"Definitely not!" Que added.

"This is worse. Prime, make something of yourself!" Optimus started transforming, being hit on the roof of his alt by Ironhide's fist, he knew he couldn't ignore the humans anymore. I did wonder why he hadn't transformed as well, when all other Autobots had. "He's pissed."

For the first ever, I had seen Optimus with wings. A winged Optimus. He looked way bulkier than before now.

His transformation landed strongly on the ground, causing the ground to shake and his air vents to huff air from them. He was standing in front of a metal counter, on which a weird, spherical object. "You lied to us. Everything humans know of our planet, we were told and all been shared, so why was this found in human possession?" he said, irritation clear in his voice, pointing to the round object on the metal counter.

"We were in the dark on this also. It was Director Only clearance at Sector 7 until now. The bag." She turned to her assistant, who was carrying more bags than a woman ever should and yet she still managed to look classy.

"Which one?" She said in an embarrassing whisper, which we all could hear in the silent base, struggling to find the right bag her boss was looking for and not have any objects fall on the ground at the same time.

"Hermes Berkin green ostrich." She annoyingly raised her voice. "My God." She took out a file from her green ostrich bag. "This is a secret few men know, and few still remain alive. Allow me to please introduce to you, two of NASA's founding mission directors and astronaut, Doctor Buzz Aldrin, one of the first two men to step foot on the moon." She turned to Buzz Alrdrin, "Sir, Optimus Prime."

I watched at all of this from a distance, putting a hand to Ironhide's foot, just to have some sort of support in all of this formal madness. I wondered what I was doing here and where the others were.

"From a fellow space traveler, it's a true honor."

"The honor is mine."

Somehow Charlotte had appeared on the upper deck, close to some TV screens. "Our entire space race of the 1960s, it appears, was in response to an event."

"Our astronauts investigated a crashed alien ship." A bald man with glasses in a light gray suit spoke up. I had no idea who he was. Then again, I didn't know anyone here I didn't know 4 years ago. "No survivors on board."

I turned my head towards Optimus. He remained emotionless. But it had to be hard on him, to lose his entire planet, his entire race…

Buzz spoke up, "We were sworn to secrecy by our Commander in Chief."

"A total of 35 people knew the real plan at NASA." The bald guy finished.

There was a thin man, his face almost drained. He was wearing a black suit and continued talking where the bald man had stopped. "Soviets managed to land unmanned probes, somehow they must have picked up that fuel ride."

"We believed the Russian deduced that the ride was a fissionable fuel assembly, believing they had it mastered and tried to harness it at Chernobyl." Charlotte spoke from up above.

"We have had six missions in all, took hundreds of photos, samples… We locked them away forever." The bald guy continued. I wondered how all of these people were talking differently and yet, making sense at the same time. For a second, I wondered if they had rehearsed this. "And the Moon program was shut down."

I felt sudden movement from Ironhide. He walked a small step away from me, going closer to Optimus. My hand fell down from his gloss black plating as I stood in my place. "Where did you search the crash vault?" Ironhide asked.

A deadly silence met his question. None of the humans knew where it was searched. Or maybe they would have kept it a secret.

Optimus broke the silence with his voice, yet it sounded softer than usual. Perhaps of the pain it burdened. "The ship's name was the Ark. I watched it escape Cybertron myself." he walked closer to Mearing. "It was carrying an Autobot technology which would have won us the War… and its Captain."

"Who was its Captain?" Charlotte asked, leaning her forearms on the rail, comfortably talking with Optimus.

"The great Sentinel Prime, the technology's inventor. He was Commander of the Autobots before me. It's imperative that I find it, before the Decepticons learn of its location. Our Autobot spacecraft has the ability to get there, and you must pray it's in time." he fave her a stern look.

Another silence prevailed as Charlotte looked at her phone. "You have clearance to travel to the Moon." She said.

"Understood. Ratchet, you will assist me. I may need your medical knowledge."Optimus said, turning to Ratchet. Ratchet nodded in approval.

"You are to leave whenever you want." Charlotte said, putting her phone away and going down the stairs.

"Ratchet, we set up in one hour." Optimus commanded, going somewhere along with Ratchet.

Mearing left with her assistant, and they were shown the way out with the help of some soldiers. I walked towards Ironhide. "What was that all about? You never told me about the Ark."

"You never asked." He shrugged, summoning his holoform in front of me.

"Don't play that game with me, I know it all too well." I narrowed my eyes, feeling a little angry.

"Mel, don't get mad at me, but now I have to test Que's weapon, now that we have Decepticon activity, I have to be prepared."

Whatever little anger I had in me had disappeared. "Of course, love." I said in a lower voice and repressed my habit of kissing him goodbye. "Just don't lose a part of your body."

He snorted, "I'm too good to do that." he winked as his holoform disappeared and his true form went away with Que to a different part of the base.

I was again left alone, standing like a statue, with no way of going anywhere. But not because I couldn't move, I could move perfectly, but because I had no place to go to.

And my savior cam in the form of Nicole, who was also bored. "Wanna go out and discover the town?" she asked.

"Oh yes." I answered. "Don't we need someone to watch over us?"

"I think Jazz is free." She said.

"Let's find him." I grinned as she and I walked side by side, roaming he base.

As you may have noticed, this chapter is longer than the usual ones are. Okay, it's the longest chapter I've written yet, I admit, but cutting it in two just didn't seem right. It does have around 5.000 words.

I decided to put in the first part of DOTM here, which includes Will and two certain 'Bots going to Ukraine and returning with the engine part of the Ark… Well, I'll just be repeating what you already read, so that would be all for now. :D But I did make some alterations to the real movie, but since this is fan fiction, I'm allowed to do as I please. Each of us writers are.

I know that I made some mistakes in here, quoting-wise, because I don't have subtitles for my Transformers movies, and I write just by listening to what they are saying, and I don't pick up or understand clearly every word of it, unfortunately. So if you could tell me what are the correct sentences, I would be happy to listen to you.

I noticed that my updates are getting more and more frequent. I'm somehow not having any writer's block, which is amazing by the way, and I think it's because I have the DOTM movie guidelines for me, so that makes the writing process a little easier. But it doesn't make the things to come easier, too. :/

If some of you would actually like to know how an Aventador V12 engine (aka Sunstreaker's alt mode) sounds like, I suggest you go to YouTube and search 'Aventador Rev Battle'. A yellow and orange Aventador will appear, I think it's Shmee150's video actually. Now THAT'S a sound everyone should hear in their life. I managed to hear it once, and damn, I was speechless. These Aventadors are amazing! :D

As always my dear favers and followers, review! :)