Warning: I'm terrible at Australian pronunciation, so if anyone knows the pronunciation, please message me. Enjoy Chapter 3.

I never saw Sideswipe and Mirage ever again after that chaos back at NEST...and for three years, I had been around with Drift and Bumblebee, having our road trips, meeting new friends that still support the bots, and small Autobot reunions. We had bumped into the two Wreckers, Hound and Crosshairs and they want to tag along with us on our trip...still no sign of my best friends and no sign of that asshole, Savoy and the Cemetery Wind team. Things were very peaceful for me and the bots as we remained hidden...until he came and started the major hunt...

~Toni Evans

Transformers Age of Extinction: A Bond That Never Severed

Chapter 3: The Hunt Begins

Three years later...

In a cold misty day in a grass field, there were several massive black vehicles parked and the man who announced that massacre plan three years back was there outside in front of the vehicles like he was meeting someone. Behind him in one of the cars, the CW commander stared out at the man watching in silence and in his thought of this sort of "meeting", he thought that this was a terrible idea, but the man decided to let this unknown being speak face to face with him. For a few minutes, a huge noise was heard in the sky, and the man glanced up seeing a huge ship slowly descending. The ship look more like a Cybertronian ship and it look a bit like it was made with old metal. The whole Cemetery Wind team came out of their cars staring up at the ship that is almost close to the ground. As it hit the ground, the ships engine was turned off and the grass field got quiet. Savoy approached up a little and stopped next to the man.

"Sir," the commander spoke staring at the ship. "You sure you want to cooperate with an alien that is the same race as those Autobots?"

The man glanced over at Savoy with a calm look on his face.

"If he said that he only work alone...and is a bounty hunter, then I would like to cooperate with him. He can be able to help us on tracking down the Autobots, and he is searching for the Autobot leader, Optimus Prime. And lastly, he has something we must retrieve."

A thud was felt and Savoy and the man looked back at where the ship is at and a dark figure slowly approaching to the CIA black ops team. He was a cybertronian like the Autobots and Decepticons. His armor was mostly black, silver, and a pitch of gray. He stared at the humans with his bright green optics showing no emotion at all. The black ops soldiers had their rifles out but the CW Commander gave the signal to stand down and the man began to approach to the unknown cybertronian. Then they both stopped face to face, and the bounty hunter's optics narrowed.

"Are you the human, Harold Attinger?" The mech spoke. "Head of this CIA?"

Attinger nodded once. "That is correct. Are you the bounty hunter name Lockdown?"

"Affirmative." Lockdown nodded back. "On our recent contact when my men and I were in the atmosphere, you said that Optimus Prime is here in this planet. Correct?"

"Before I answer, are you willing to make this deal on catching Prime...and then giving us the seed?"

Lockdown huffed having his arms crossed. "You humans are more interested with the seed and what it does. Let us recap: we create an alliance on finding Prime. And once we capture him, you will have what you wanted..."

The Head of the CIA nodded and waited patiently for Lockdown's answer. The bounty hunter nodded.

"Let the hunt begin."

In a quiet morning in Detroit, Michigan, the familiar Bugatti was speeding down an empty street that led to an abandoned warehouse. As he made it passed the entrance Drift transformed into his robot form and glanced around slowly.

"Took ya long enough." an Australian-like voice was heard on the right side of the Autobot samurai as he turned to the direction seeing an Autobot paratrooper, Crosshairs approaching to him.

Drift vented lightly as he taken out the remaining energon he had found during his scouting patrol.

"I'll take that amber fluid!" The green corvette exclaimed snatching the energon away from Drift and the blue mech glared at Crosshairs in slight anger.

"You better make sure there's still enough energon for the rest of us." The samurai warned the paratrooper.

"Yeah yeah," Crosshairs rolled his optics taking a quarter of energon into his system. "There, I done it, mate. Ya happy?"

Drift didn't answer looking away from Crosshairs shaking his helm before walking over to the entrance of the warehouse. He suddenly stopped and looked back at the green mech.

"Is Toni back from her little hunt?" He asked.

"Yeah, she's back awlright." Crosshairs spoke in annoyance. "She's in the repair room crafting anotha weapon."

"With the cybertanium she found back in Chicago?" The samurai asked.

"Yeah, I dunno why, but that's on her." Crosshairs slowly approached to Drift tossing the container back to him before walking off. "Not my business."

"I believe I know why..."

In a room on the second floor where the Autobots are able to see her, Toni was crafting a cybertanium weapon carefully and caution. She was wearing a pair of goggles, her hair was in a ponytail, she was wearing some gloves to be on the safe side, and her NEST jacket was wrapped across her waist. The girl was using the tools that were left all around the building and they were real handy as she was working well on the blades. As Toni was focusing on the very tip, she heard a voice next to her and looked over to the left.

"Toni is everything-?"

It was Drift that came to her and spoke though when he was asking her if she was alright, he suddenly glanced down at her craft work. He was interested of a human doing cybertronian craftwork and he believe where the former lieutenant had it from. The samurai nodded once.

"Quite interesting on your craftsmanship, Toni-chan." he said.

"Thank you, Drift." She said placing her tools down and picked up the cybertanium blade examining it. "Wheeljack had taught me how to be in use of cybertronian craft. He taught me and the other troops when we were on standby one night… It's a shame that he was killed in battle in Chicago."

"I understand of your loss." The Autobot replied in a slight disappointed tone having his helm down a bit.

"Well that era has been done and we need to resolve this strange era on the government trying to end you and the other Autobots." Toni continued on her work sharping the blade carefully before carving it into her own designs. "They already got two of the wreckers and I don't know how is that even possible."

"They must have increased the firepower to end us easily. Your kind had hunted us for three years so far." Drift glanced up at her and watched the girl almost finishing the weapon then made a concerned look on his faceplate. "I would like to know why are you crafting those blades."

The girl paused her carving before setting her tool down again and looked back at the blue Bugatti. She sighed shaking her head approaching to her.

"Remember I said that I had the same dream about those unknown Decepticons?" Toni asked as the samurai nodded and calmly listened. "Last night was different…the first one is when they keep arriving to Earth searching for something and now this one, they were approaching to me and they were going to take me.."

"Hmm, that seems odd," Drift had his helm down thinking.

"You have any idea what that means?" Toni wondered. "You know a bit of messages in human dreams, right?"

"Partially, my friend." the blue mech corrected the girl. "Hmm…I understood of the arrival. It will be another intrusion someday. And you being taken away by the unknown Decepticons…I believe that the day is-."

When Drift was about tell Toni the real message of her dream, Crosshairs suddenly came in quickly and closed garage door suddenly. The samurai and the girl glanced over at him as he quietly came to him.

"Ay," Crosshairs spoke in a serious tone as he looked all around. "I'm picking up some bogies close by."

"Decepticons?" Drift turned to the paratrooper in slight shock as Toni made a shocked face.

"No, not even Autobots." The green mech shook his helm. "Their spark signals are unknown."

"Unknown signals….."

The samurai glanced down a bit and was thinking back on his mission with Optimus going on an investigation mission remembering bumping into a certain old friend of his along with his troops, and their life signals were unknown. His optics suddenly narrowed as he clenched his servos and Toni noticed the expression on Drift's face.

"Drift, what is it?" the former NEST soldier asked.

"Mercenaries." he finally spoke as Crosshairs glanced at Drift.

"Mercenaries?" the green Corvette Stingray made a weird look on his faceplate. "Those same assholes that came at you and Prime out of the blue back at that bloody moon?"

"I am not sure, but we will find out once they come closer. Crosshairs, we will give them the element of surprise after I contact Bumblebee and Hound."

"I'll stay hidden too and ready my rifle." said Toni as she put on her NEST jacket and have her rifle on her back along with her unfinished cybertanium blades.

"Yeah? Well ya better be caution with this one, mate." Crosshairs said to Toni.

"We'll see about that, smartass…" the girl mumbled before heading over to her hiding place going down the stairs

"I'm sorreh, what was that!?"

"Nothing, Crosshairs."

Several minutes later, the warehouse was now quiet, and the three survivors were in their spots to surprise the visitors. Toni was under a stack of steel platforms peaking in the hole to see anything out there. Then suddenly, the girl felt something shaking nearby causing her to shake a little. She was showing no fear of this fight but Toni was a little afraid what her end would be like. It is quite a mystery to her, but now she quickly dropped that thought and focused on the plan she and the two wreckers had created. All of the sudden, something blast through the garage doors and Toni saw it flew across the building. The soldier peaked back at the entrance seeing two unknown robots surveying around then saw two more outside of the warehouse and was about to enter as well. Toni took a silent deep breath before grabbing her rifle not ready to come out and aim at them. The strangers proceeded on coming all the way across the building surveying the area. Toni looked on the far left of her place seeing Drift in his hiding area and looked at a shadowy area where Crosshairs was at before quietly coming out of her hiding place staying stealthy going behind other hiding places where the enemies can't see them. The girl slowly came in front aiming her rifle at one of their legs carefully as she was searching for the area to hit. As she found something, Toni opened fired at the very back of one of the mercenaries' knee-joint as he fell and she fired at the other's knee joint before falling.

The Autobots saw their signal and the blue Bugatti sped out of his hiding place ramming at the injured ones. The other two mercenaries were about to fire at the samurai, but the green corvette surprised them as he transformed into robot mode firing at them with his dual blaster pistols as they were hit on the helm and chassis before falling. Toni ran out of her hiding place and looked all around at the four enemies, three offline and one was about to go out. The mercenary tried to move away but the Autobot paratrooper had his pede on the mech's chassis and Drift had his sword on his faceplate. The mercenary snarled at the two Autobots.

"What?" said the enemy. "Y-You expect me t-to talk?"

"No ya mangy bastard!" Crosshairs replied pointed his blaster pistol at the mech. "I ratha let ya be a squeala instead of a talka."

"You must think back, stranger…" said Drift. "There is only three of us…and one of you."

"Three?" The mercenary coughed. "I-I only see tw-."

"He counted me, pal." Toni spoke approaching to the enemy.

The mech looked over at her and chuckled. "That shrimp? S-She's an Autobot soldier? Ha, seriously?"

"Shrimp!?" Toni made an aggressive look on her face as she have her blade out and stabbed the mech's wrist as he yelled slightly in pain.

Crosshairs chuckled as he watched the girl hardly pulling out the sword. "Ohh, ya shouldn't piss off this shrimp here. This shrimp is as deadly as a bloody bity."

"Shut the hell up, Crosshairs." The girl glared up at the paratrooper still trying to pull out the sword.

After Toni got her blade out for a minute, Drift lifted the mercenary's helm up with his blade glaring.

"Now, I must ask…" the samurai spoke to the mech. "Who sent you here?"

"O-O-Okay, I'll talk. Just low your damn weapons already."

"We'll set them down until you answer!" the former NEST soldier snapped.

"…I-It's L-."

As the mercenary was going to answer, a surprise blast hit the mech's helm as the three survivors stumbled back fast and suddenly begin to hear a roaring engine outside. The three quickly ran out seeing the current black and gray Lamborghini sped off away. Drift and Crosshairs were not picking up that unknown vehicle's signal at all.

"I'm gonna say it." Crosshairs shaking his helm in anger putting his guns away. "I'm really gonna say it, mates."

"Dammit, just say it already." Toni said to the green paratrooper.

"What the bloody hell was that all about!?" Crosshairs snapped kicking the pile of rusted metal. "All of that crazy intrusion was a bunch of bullshit!"

"It couldn't have been the one I was thinking of." said Drift placing his swords away. "The mercenaries are more different from before.

"We are not safe here then…." Toni spoke in a low tone shaking her head as the two Wreckers looked at her.

She was right. They were not safe in the warehouse anymore, and now they have to wait for Bumblebee and Hound to return and tell them about this problem. Toni, Drift and Crosshairs may know that there are cybertronian mercenaries that came to Earth, but they don't know that they were the prey in this hunt that just began and who is leading them.