Disclaimer: I do not own Transformers. Just the plot and OCs.

Thanks again, wonderful readers.

Chapter 41

"What do you mean Mercy's sparkling?" Ironhide's question fell on deft audios as the pair of hunter snarled at the room, at each other, at their damn manager they were both going to stab multiple times with a rusty knife before Outrider gathered himself up and stalked out of the conference room. With a twist and a jump Smokescreen went after him.

They were both a little to unsure of what they were capable of at the moment and frankly, Rider just wanted to start walking and not stop until he found War and busted his knuckles against his chin. They weren't going to get far though. They hardly made it down the hall before Ironhide and Prowl caught up with them. Both mechs still too weary to let them out of their sight, and both of them suddenly very afraid of what the pit they were talking about. Which was probably why most all that conference room chased after them as well. Only Grimlock staying behind with a recharging mechling in his claws.

He wasn't going anywhere, and no bot was going to make him.

Ironhide's hand closed around Outrider's shoulder at the junction of a four way cross in the hall, snapping him around in a whirl only to stumble back by the growl that shoved him away.

"I mean just what I said!" Rider snarled, shoving his brother another foot or two back. Processor rolling, sparkling twisting. His insides felt like they were twisting into a sickening knot as he stood there in the middle of the hall panting hard, trying to shake away the tears that wanted to leak from his optics.

He was not going to cry.

No.

He wasn't.

Mercy would just call him a sparkling for crying over her. She wouldn't want him to.

Smokescreen was muttering things that didn't make any sense as the tri colored mech paced in a tight circle in the hall with his wings hiked up so high behind him they were near vertical. Prowl didn't even try to touch him. Those tightening fingers holding onto his sword hilts didn't look at the moment like they cared who they buried the dangerous blades into.

Prowl wasn't about to push his luck. They were still somewhat thin ice at the moment and he had no wish to start another reason for Smokescreen to be wary of him touching him again.

Then all of a sudden that muttering turned into sense. "Didn't even tell us!"

Well, mostly sense.

Sort of.

"WHY THE FRAG WOULDN'T THEY TELL US!?"

"She had a Primus damn sparkling!" Outrider threw his hands in the air over his head, weapons systems whirling and heating unsure what to do with themselves in his boiling anger and mounting grief. "A sparkling! All this time! And we didn't even know!"

"They didn't TELL US!" Smokescreen whipped out a blade and slammed it so hard into the wall in front of him the thick metal cracked and splintered under the force of the hit. Buckling inward and sending fractures veining out in a radius around it. Breathing hard Smokey stood there glaring at it only to flinch away when Prowl dared reached for him this time.

He didn't want to be touched.

He didn't want to be comforted.

He wanted to fraggin' kill something!

"They didn't . . . tell us . . . wouldn't even tell us how she died . . . didn't even tell us when she did . . . how could they not tell us she had a fraggin' sparkling!?"

It left the command staff of the Autobot faction glancing around at each other with wide optics as Hide and Prowl attempted to talk their raging little brothers back down.

"Okay," Roddy huffed tiredly, fingers rubbing at his closed optics. "I'm confused. Can we start over at the beginning and go again?"

Outrider sort of wanted to punch him in the nose, but that might have been because he was still brewing and the last thing he wanted to be doing was sit at a table retelling the last arch of his life.

Again.

What was so complicated about this anyway?

Wardrums had a little sister.

His little sister was Mercy.

They knew Mercy—she'd actually cared for some Primus damn reason about the two of them—but neither Rider nor Smokey knew how she died because Dust wouldn't tell them and War couldn't talk about her.

And finally, the little mechling that had this whole faction wrapped around his tiny fingers and could play them all like harps had her optics. Her optics.

There was no mistaking it.

Those were her optics.

And the two of them were damn fools for not seeing it before.

That was pretty much it, what was so hard to get?

"What other way can I fraggin' say it?" Outrider sighed, head in his hands as he stared down at the table. "Wardrums' little sister was Mercy, and Mercy was your mechling's carrier."

He tried to pretend that he didn't see Hide and Mia flinch.

"Those optics are hers." Smokescreen sighed, nervously rolling his fingers against the table in the wish for a cy-gar, but Prowl had a hand wrapped around his upper arm and slow warm pulses were seeping through a bond he had no idea when had even opened again as the elder Praxian just about held him in his lap again at the table.

So he didn't reach for it.

He didn't want to reach for it. He didn't want Prowl to see him need it. Not again. Not after what just went down between them.

But Primus help him he needed it.

If Outrider could do without a drink or his hands with his fingers shaking slightly for his knife though then Smokescreen could do without his cy-gars. That was what he was hoping for at least.

"But you can't just know that!" Roddy threw his hands up over his head, bright optics sparkling with something that looked far too much like fear. His spark hammering in his chest and his weapons systems fighting for control of his frame no matter how many times he cleared away the ping to engage them. If it wasn't for the towering form of the blue, red, and white mech seated hardly a breath away from him with his huge hand resting against Hot Rod's chair arm he really might have bolted from the room himself, but Magnus was there and his field pushed firmly with reassurance into his uneasy one.

It wasn't a surprising thing. Not really. Magnus had seemed to always be there. Not that he couldn't remember a time in which he hadn't had the massive mech there beside him to help hold him up, but he didn't want to.

Roddy was not a fool.

He knew very well just how much he needed Magnus. Though sometimes he wondered if Magnus knew that it was more to Roddy then him just leaning on a mech that understood the world and was a whole lot more levelheaded then he was. He kind of figured he didn't.

"You didn't know her." Outrider muttered without looking up.

"Yeah well neither did we." The growl that bubbled up out of Sunstreaker vibrated the cubes of energon sitting untouched on the table.

It was safe to say neither twin was all that happy at the moment.

Most of the crew was sort of in shock, but that didn't mean they weren't gonna find out what was going on right now.

"There is a lot we didn't know apparently." Sideswipe grumbled, optics fixed on the table. "How the frag he hid that he had a sister though I've got no idea. Why he would hide it I have no idea. We lived with them for damn sake! How did he hide a sister!?"

"She was small." Smokescreen snorted a sad sound. "Would explain a lot about your little mechling too wouldn't it?"

"Bumblebee small because he was premature." Ratchet said in a low tone drawing both the hunter's startled optics.

"He's what?" Rider blinked.

"Premature." Ironhide's uneasy optics held his brother. "Bee is premature."

Rider and Smokescreen just stared at him.

Hammer snorted. "Yeah. That's about what I did."

The hunters glanced at him and then snapped at the same time.

"Premature sparks don't live!"

"And that's what I did." Quickfire sighed.

"I don't know how it worked." Ratchet admitted quietly. "Trickster would never tell us the whole story."

"Trickster?" Smokescreen flicked his wings. "Who the pit is Trickster."

"Ha!" Sideswipe threw a finger forward in a point and a shout that had Aid, Jazz, and Jolt almost jumping away from him it was so out of the blue. "Something we know that you don't!"

"Oh Sides." Arcee whispered under her breath.

"What!?" He snapped toward the femme. "I'm getting fed up with this! We knew that bastard! They raised us for frag's sake! And he didn't tell us he had a fraggin' sister!"

"He didn't tell you because he didn't tell anybot." Smokescreen told him, flicking a doorwing again and gaining both the brothers' focus. "We only found out because we walked in at the wrong time. We came back early from a screwed hunt. She was still there with Dust. That's the only reason we found out. We only got to know her because Mercy wanted to know who Dust was trying to save this time. War hid her from everything. He was trying to protect her."

"Didn't work out for him though." Rider sighed, optics low and spark cold. "That bastard Emperor still got a hold of her. Looks like he did a whole lot more than just steal her away for a while."

"I can't believe you're telling me this." Jazz held his audio horns and glared through his dark visor. "You knew his carrier. That glitch sent you here to take back a youngling he doesn't even know because it was his sister's he didn't even bother to try and save!? If he wants Bee were the frag was he when he was dying in a fallen city!? He can't just decided he wants Bee back! He can't have him! He's ours!"

"Enough Jazz," Optimus' baritone rumbled. "No bot is taking Bumblebee."

"Honestly," Outrider straightened up in his chair, letting his gaze lock with that of the high commander. "I don't really think he wants him back per say."

"It's not really War's style." Smokey added. "Sure he saves mechs, but it's only the mechs built to take the world as he calls it. Even I don't fit that. He only bothered with me because of Dustoff. Or at least that's what I've always figured. It makes sense that the same could be said for Elita, Mia, and Cee. You said it was only ever Dust right?"

"Yes." Elita nodded. "We never saw anybot like what you all are describing."

"See Dust does try sometimes. He fails more often than not though and it just gets him hurt and that's why War makes him not do it so often, but he does every once in a while. Your youngling though—" Smokescreen shook his head, looking to the chair that had housed the massive ancient and the mechling until they returned and the beast mech took the mechling away with a wave of Optimus' hand. "He's never going to stand a chance. Not in the life War makes. There is no way War would have anything to do with him. Mercy's sparkling or not—maybe for that reason more than anything else—he wouldn't want him in that arena or anywhere near any of it."

"Part of me doesn't get it." Rider shook his head. "It goes against everything War is to want a youngling like Bee. He's little, he's sweet, he's innocent, he's never going to be big enough to stand toe to toe in a fraggin' arena. The only thing it could be is that he's Mercy's and he wants the bounty off his head before somebot kills him and War can make that happen. If anybot can it's War. But he doesn't want to keep him, Hide, if he wanted to keep him he'd come and got him himself."

"He wouldn't have gotten anywhere near him." Jazz growled under his breath.

Smokescreen huffed a bitter laugh. "Yeah right. A fraggin' army couldn't stop Wardrums when he wants something."

"They are an army." Rider muttered.

He was ignored.

"He's Wardrums he's a fraggin' shuttle former! He's as old as dirt itself!" Smokescreen shrugged. "He's not only huge, but he's . . . well mean. Add in the whole Last Knight of Cybertron thing and it's just like trying to move a mountain. There is only one mech on this whole Primus damn planet that can stand against him and that's the Ring Emperor."

"Did you just say Knight of Cybertron?" Magnus hissed from across the table.

"Yes." Rider nodded.

"The Knights went extinct." Roddy's optics widened.

"So did the ancients but there was one sitting in here a klick ago holding your mechling so I'm not so sure how much I'd bet on that." Smokescreen lifted an optic ridge.

Optimus just stared at them.

"I think you're all missing a very important factor here." Bluestreak spoke up from his place down the table.

"What's that?" Wheeljack glanced at him.

"What the frag are we gonna do now?"

"I swear." Smokescreen said. "This is nowhere near as complicated as you're trying to make it."

"I disagree." Prowl snorted without looking up from his typing on the huge digital map laid out before him.

"Which is why we're still standing here and not halfway back home by now."

"That pit hole is not your home." Jazz half growled, arms crossed and claws drumming against his biceps.

"And what, this place is?" Smokey lifted an optic ridge toward him. The grey Praxian standing on Prowl's other side shifted slightly seeming wary to speak up in front of him let alone look at him.

Smokescreen fought not to roll his optics.

He didn't hate the mech. He felt better now. He wasn't even angry—well not at anybot here at least—the youngling needed to calm down. They had plans to make. Not that Smokey was all that big on following other bots plans.

He had a plan.

It was a very nice plan.

It consisted of walking back home and punching his manger in the mouth.

Plenty of merit there if you ask him.

Prowl, however, did not seem to think so and neither did any of the others which was why half an orn later Rider was down in a shooting range with Ironhide and some others while Smokey was up here still trying to convince Prowl that no plan was going to work here. It just wasn't.

They had one option, and that was bring the mechling to Wardrums to end this bounty. They all knew that. Which was why he didn't understand what was taking it so damn long to sink in.

"I s-s-s-s-u-uppose." Bluestreak offered softly. "If you w-a-wanted it to be. Nobot here wants you to leave."

"Is that so?" Smokescreen flicked a doorwing. "Because you can't even talk to me without tripping over your own tongue."

"Smokescreen." Prowl scolded coldly, glancing up from his typing before returning to it.

"What?" Smokey shrugged. "He is. He sounds like a broken record."

"I'm sorry." Bluestreak whispered with his optics low and wings sagging.

Suddenly, Smokescreen felt bad. Which was weird in and of itself.

"Stop apologizing." The tri colored hunter huffed out. "I didn't mean anything by it just . . . look I'm not very good at this okay? I'm trying. I'm just a glitch, often a mean one, so just . . . ignore me okay?"

"You're not a glitch." Bluestreak lifted his soft optics. "You shouldn't say that."

Smokescreen snorted. "You don't even know me."

"I know a lot more then you might think."

"Youngling," Smokescreen straightened up and crossed his arms at the mech who was at the very least a handful of vorns younger than him. "I ain't that mechling in Prowl's stories. Not anymore. And thinking that I am isn't going to get you anywhere."

"You're wrong." Prowl's low pitch drew both the younger Praxian's gazes to him. "And the sooner you figure that out, Smokey, the better you'll feel."

"Look we sort fixed things." Smokescreen snapped. "Or at least we started and I don't want to hurt anybot right now—that isn't Wardrums—so we're doing better than when we got here, but honestly I just really want a cy-gar and I really want to end this stupid field trip. I want to know what the frag is going on in my life, because I don't know anymore. I want this hunt over with."

"And what are you going to do when you get this hunt over with?" Jazz asked him.

To that Smokey stood there for a moment, looking down at Prowl's planning map before he shrugged.

"I always sort of hated this job anyway. I was kinda thinking about enlisting, if we can get the bombs out of me and Rider's sparks that is. And you know, if War doesn't kill me after I punch him in the mouth."

If anybot had bothered to ask Bee—which none of them had by the way—he would say that it had been a really weird three orns. For one Rider and Smokey were no longer in their berthroom, and while Bumblebee was thrilled on being allow out of the berthroom he wasn't so big on the shuffling around that was going on once again.

Everybot was busy doing something. Something they didn't want to tell him about.

That in and of itself wasn't that new of a concept in his world, but the sparkling sitting patrol made up of the Dinobots at almost all breems of the orn and night.

That was new.

By no means was he complaining—pit no Swoop and Scorn were fun—but it was safe to say he once again had no clue what was going on and that had never been a feeling he has liked. He's a mechling, he is not clueless.

He knew very well what he saw when Swoop pranced by the medical bay with Bee on his shoulder and he caught a glimpse of Rider and Smokey sitting on one of Ratchet's tables as the medic worked about them. Ratchet was trying to fix something with them. He might not know what, but he did know that.

Just like when he saw Prowl, Magnus, Optimus, Roddy, and Elita all bent round a digital map and datapads scattered around them.

They were planning something. He might not know what, but he did know that.

Just like when Hide, Rider, and Hammer blew up one of the shooting ranges with one of Jacky's knew guns.

They were testing some new guns for something. He might not know what, but he did know that!

So why couldn't somebot just pause for a moment and explain to him what was going on? Because the Dinobots didn't know—he got the feeling Grimy did, but Grimy wouldn't tell him—and were busy keeping him busy so they were no help in talking to.

Bee didn't like being left out of the loop. He wanted to know what was going on. He just had no idea how to find out what was going on. That was the problem.

The problem had him perched in the middle of a Dinobot size table, with a Dinobot size cube of energon, and a very long straw with two pups curled about him glaring at the door waiting for either Mia or Hide to come pick him up for berth. He intended that this time they were going to get a piece of his little mind.

Until his little plan got blown out of the water when Grimlock leaned against the table and rumbled out in his powerful voice that could vibrate the very air.

"Itty Bitty?"

Tiny yellow head perking up he turned to stare up at the red visor of the massive beast mech. "Huh?"

"Itty Bitty think would like to stay night with us Dinobots?"

Say what now?

Scout and Echo popped their heads up.

Bee wasn't allowed to stay the night with the Dinobots. He'd never been allowed to recharge over with them—he was pretty sure that was because either Ratchet or Hide thought they were going to accidentally crush him or something—ever. He always had to go back to his berthroom sooner or later. That or go to Optimus' and Elita's. Or Arcee's and Ratchet's. Every now and again Blue, or Jazz, or the twins.

Come to think of it though, this was the longest stretch of time he'd ever been with the Dinobots. Maybe Hide was staring to trust that the huge bots weren't going to break him and that they could be trusted. Because they could. He knew very well that they could.

That however, did not stop the little mechling from blinking up at that thick visor with big baby blue optics swimming in confusion as he muttered another soft. "Huh?"

This seemed to amuse Grimlock for the King let out a small snort as he rested his arms down against the table letting a smile grace his thick lips.

"Stay here night with Dinobots. Him Hide and her Mia said could. They come down get you for breakfast in morning. If that something you Itty Bitty want to do."

"Really?" Bee's antennas flickered as a smile crawled up on his lips.

"Really." Grimlock nodded.

"Okay!" He chirped happily, all growing annoyance of once again not knowing what was going on flowing out as quickly as they had gathered. The easily cheerful youngling had never been very good at staying mad anyway.

"He's where?" Outrider asked, hand running over his chest as he sat heavily in Ironhide's room. He had figured Ratchet's looking around wouldn't feel good, but he hadn't really planned on it hurting this much. The medic had eventually given up when he became afraid he was doing both Smokey and Rider more harm than good.

Outrider could have told him he wouldn't be able to get the bombs out. In fact he did, many times, but Ratchet was not satisfied until he saw for himself just what was ticking away, wired and welded in to the outsides of both the hunters' spark chambers. It was pretty safe to say the medic hadn't been all that pleased about it, but it was clear now there was nothing he could do.

The only option they had was the one they knew all along. It was back to The Rings, or death. For more than just the two hunters.

Since Rider wasn't all that big of a fan of dying anytime soon the plan Prowl was scheming had gotten thrown into overdrive.

They were leaving at dawn.

Rider wasn't sure why that knowledge had left him feeling so empty inside. Smokey had already told the others what they had silently started considering between them. The option of—should they make it out of all this alive—coming back here . . . to their family.

He couldn't pinpoint the reason leaving just to plan on coming back was making his tanks so queasy.

"With the Dinobots." Chromia answered him as she placed a cube of energon in his hand and perched up on the table beside him while Ironhide sat down to his left in a chair. "No bot in any manner of speaking is making it past all of them."

"I didn't figure you'd say they could make it past you." Rider smirked as much as he could through the scowl the pain in his chest was putting on his lips. "Also wouldn't have figured you would let him go tonight with what happens in the morning."

"He doesn't need to hear all this." Ironhide sighed. "It will just upset him. Seeing you like this wouldn't help either. He likes you. He'd worry. It's better to let the Dinobots keep watch for a night while we make sure you are up to what you say you are."

"Don't doubt me, Hide." Cobalt blue optics narrowed over to his brother. "I'm capable of a lot more then you want to think about."

"I know, Rider." Ironhide gazed back at him with a sadness in his optics that Outrider had to look away from.

"Let it go on record that I don't like this plan." Chromia huffed out, chin rested in her palm as she slouched on the tabletop.

Rider gave a breathy chuckle as he continued to rub at his chest as if that would sooth the ache under his plating. "I didn't figure you would, but it will be alright, Mia."

"I don't think you two can't pull this off, I'm just worried about what can go wrong. He's just a mechling, Rider. He's little, and his breakable, and he won't understand what we're doing." She worried her bottom lip as she stared down at her knees.

Letting his head rest back against the chair he shifted uneasily. "You bots are the ones that don't want to tell him what we know."

"How exactly do you want me to tell him you know a carrier he can't remember?" Ironhide ground out with pained optics. "He spent almost four orns without speaking or eating when he came here, when he figured out she wasn't coming back. He doesn't remember her, but that doesn't mean he doesn't hurt in the place she use to be. I don't know how he'll handle it."

"You can't possibly know if you don't tell him, Hide." Rider told him quietly. "And when we get the Rings, when we get to War or when he finally answers his damn comm he isn't going to not say anything. He looks just like her, Hide, and I know War. I know how much he loved Mercy. I know what he did trying to save her. I know what he was like after she died. He probably thought Bee died with her, but now he's got this nephew out there with his little sister's optics, and her colors, and no fraggin' idea who or what he is."

Taking a breath Rider stared down at his own hands resting in his lap, glancing up his arms to all the marks that lie underneath.

"War and Dust gave everything they had trying to protect Mercy from the place they couldn't escape from. And they failed. War has never forgiven himself for that. I don't think he ever will. I don't know the whole story. I don't know how somebot as strong as he is, as old as he is, that knows as much as he does ended up a slave in a Ring when I know for a fact he could kill each and every single bot in any of them. Only the Emperor stands in his way, and after what that bastard did to Mercy I don't see how anything would have stopped War from killing him. But he doesn't. He won't fight him. He doesn't even try. He gets under his hide, sure, he pisses him off, he saves the few him and Dust can, he makes all the trouble he possibly can, but he will not stop him. And he would never tell us why. Well I intend of finding out this time. He's going to fraggin' well tell me why he didn't bother to tell us Mercy was carrying—that she had a sparkling. She was my friend, Hide. The only friend either of us had for a very, very long time. I'm going to find out what happened, and I'm going to get those fraggin' hunters to leave her sparkling alone. Even if it kills me."

"This isn't going to work." Prowl huffed, doorwings high and tight behind his back as he stared down at the map Smokescreen had finally stopped typing at.

"You don't know that." Smokey snorted.

"Oh but I do." The black and white Praxian almost growled as he snatched up the control pad and started rewriting. "This is suicide you can't do this!"

"It's not suicide. And I can do it." Smokescreen pulled the stylus he'd been chewing on the end of from between his lips and twirling it around his fingers. He needed something to keep busy with and Prowl seemed to like this more than his cy-gars. For now he could live with it.

"Smokescreen." Prowl drew out his name in a warning tone—but really how many times had he heard that tone in his life, it didn't faze him, not in the slightest—as his optic ridges drew together over his optics.

"Don't treat me like a youngling, Prowler." He smiled as he stuck the stylus back between his lips and chewed on it for a moment. "We both know there is no other way this is going to work. Don't pretend that it's not facts. Now are we gonna keep arguing about what we both know you can't think your way out of?"

"He's right, Prowler." Jazz sighed from his seat around the table where Bluestreak sat leaning against his shoulder. "Only him and Rider stand any chance of getting in and we all know it. Any other way is just going to get bots killed."

"Thank you." Smokey nodded, but his words were slurred a little bit around his chewing distraction. He was ignoring the sad way in which the younger grey Praxian was watching him try and keep himself busy in the middle of all this.

He didn't need the mechling's pity.

He was accepting him. He expected to be accepted back.

Things were never that easy though.

Simple, yes.

But never easy.

"Is this going to work?" Sideswipe's smooth voice lifted Ratchet's optics from the medical kits he was putting together. It was probably too late in the evening to be doing this. He should probably be in his berth with his arms wrapped around his mate because in the morning he was getting up and leaving here without her. In the morning Magnus was taking his ship, Roddy was taking his, and Elita was taking theirs and they were hitting the upper atmosphere. To wait for the end game of Prowl's and Smokey's little scheme.

Ratchet wasn't thrilled with it.

He wasn't thrilled with leaving Arcee here.

He wasn't thrilled with the party splitting halfway there.

He wasn't thrilled with letting Rider and Smokey go the rest of the way alone with Bumblebee.

And he sure as pit wasn't thrilled with still taking him to this Wardrums.

He had been out voted though, and in the end it wouldn't have mattered. Optimus' word was final and Optimus wanted it done this way. For now all Ratchet could do was say he would trust his best friend's instincts and pack way more medical supplies then they should ever need.

Because they were probably going to need them.

Arcee, seated across the work bench from him helping, spoke up before he did even if her soft optics didn't lift from her task of sorting sedatives.

"I think it will work."

"But Mirage doesn't even think it will work." Sides huffed. The red frontliner sat with his brother at the end of the work bench from them with his arms crossed on the cold table top and his chin resting atop them. Sunstreaker was leaned back in a chair beside him, his own arms crossed but his were more of a clear display of how much the golden brother didn't want to agree to all of this than anything else.

"Mirage does not know near as much about that place as Rider and Smokey do." Ratchet put in, turning his optics back to his task. "Together we can pull this off."

"Destroy the Rings and the Emperor all without getting Half Pint killed?" Sunstreaker growled low in his chest. "I don't see this working out as peachy keen as Optimus seems to think it's going to."

"Sunstreaker." Ratchet warned.

"Don't you 'Sunstreaker' me." The golden frontliner hissed. "This is stupid! No. Scratch that. This is worse than stupid. This is suicide! And worse than that it's probably gonna kill Bumblebee!"

"Just because you do not wish to go back to that place does not mean you are not capable, Sunstreaker." Arcee's calm voice cut off the frontliner's tirade before he had a real chance to get going. The calm, clipped words leaving him to duck his head and lean back in his chair. Those soft optics had hardened by the time the femme medic lifted them from her work and set them on the elder twin. "And do not for a nano play at pretending that any of us aren't very much aware how thin a line we are walking. We don't have any other choices, Sunstreaker. You know that. It's why you are so mad."

"I don't want to go back." Sideswipe whispered, optics not lifting from his stare down the table. "I don't want to be there again. I don't want . . . . War and Dust were a long time ago. A whole other lifetime. We left it that way, left them there, and we became this. Back in that place Ratchet. We . . . we won't be this."

"Sideswipe," Ratchet sighed, laying down his tools and staring down at the younger twin. "I hate myself for saying this, but a little of what you were might be something we very well need by the end of this."

"This isn't going to work."

Trickster flatted his pointed, flexible audios against his head and ignored his grumbling older brother.

"You know this isn't going to work." Impulse had never really been one to be ignored though.

Still, Trick gave it a damn good run.

"You have already screwed all this up and you know it!" Long grey claws latched hold of his arm digging into the dark black plating and spun him around letting cold blue meet hot red as each set of narrow optics clashed. Trickster was having none of it though. Ripping himself out of Impulse's grip he staggered away and marched back to his cliff edge.

He'd been brooding just fine on his own, thanks very much, he didn't need any of Pulse's help.

"Trickster," Impulse snarled as he stalked up behind him. Only the sudden clenching of long black claws around the hilt of the sword Trick had already stabbed into the rock face beside him stopped the larger Guild member from latching hold of him again.

"Just stop it, Pulse." Trickster's tone was cold, hollow, and tired. The sound of it made Impulse go quiet fast enough that his flight engines sputtered with the shut off. All of a sudden the elder Guild mech was wary.

Wary of Trickster.

Of the other side of his balance.

That . . . that had never happened before.

He found he was quickly regretting the things he had just said.

Swallowing stiffly Impulse gathered himself up and walked the last few steps to his brother where he stood overlooking the steaming expanse of the Smelt out before them.

"Trickster?" He said a bit softer, slower, easier though he did not dare to reach out and touch the tense plating of the almost vibrating mech beside him as Trickster clung to his Center. The sword humming dangerously with the energy Trick was trying to bleed off. It made Impulse's finger itch for the axe strapped across his back.

Trickster did not answer though.

His engines just thundered with his temper as his secondary vents struggled to expel the angry heat that was building in his systems.

"I did what I was told to do." Trickster ground out through clench teeth as his narrow optics fixed on the bubbling river of molten lava and slag. It was that for put his sword through his brother's chest.

Glaring seemed like the better option.

For the most part.

"I know, Trickster." Impulse admitted. The even tone of his voice more a forced sound than anything else. He himself was still angry, but the anger rolling off his brother made him realize that taking it out on Trickster wouldn't solve their growing problem.

Damn.

Where was Evermore when he needed her? He needed a good smack upside the head for not noticing Trickster was this angry.

"I told him because I had to tell him!" Trickster hissed. "Because War and Dust know more than any other bot still alive. They know! Besides, he had a right to know."

"I know that, Trickster."

"They're almost as old as we are for pit sake. They remember. They were there. And all these vorns he has played his part well. He's done as he was meant too. And he didn't try and screw it all up when Mercy died anyway. He could have ended it all. He could have just killed the mechling when he found out about him, but he didn't. He's letting things play out. Even if I told him how it would end."

"Yes," Impulse nodded slowly. "But we both know what he's doing now is not part of the plan."

"Stopping the bounty has to be done."

"War should have nothing to do with it. The mechling isn't old enough yet. He's not meant to know Wardrums yet."

"Knowing War he won't. He doesn't want anything to do with him anyway. We can work with that for now. He won't kill Mercy's sparkling. If he was going to he'd have done it already, or he'd just let the hunters fight over him until either Lockdown gets a hold of him or he dies."

"You are forgetting War's nature, brother." Impulse sighed. "He is not the last Knight because he is forgiving. The mechling is too young to know that side of his heritage yet."

"It is what our Master wants." Trickster sighed. "We don't have any other choice."

"That is beginning to piss me off."

Well, at least that was something they could agree on while they watched this next disaster grow into existence while there was nothing they could do to stop it.

This one I fought with, but it worked out about like I wanted it to. Hope you guys like it, because the gang is about to get back into trouble.

Rider and Smokey can't stay out of trouble even if they tried.

Looking forward to seeing what you all thought.

-Jaycee