Alright, so I've been staring at this for weeks ever since I put up chapter one and I can't take it anymore. I'm sorry if there are any mistakes and I hope you like it anyway. The next chapter didn't drive me bonkers as much so it should be up faster.

Right! So the AU-ness was hopefully pretty obvious in the first chapter. Pretty much this story is a giant 'what if'. As in, 'what if Elita, Optimus, and Sentinel didn't go to Archa-7 when they were younger?' What if instead, Elita and Optimus bonded and had a sparkling before Sentinel led a team to the organic planet with Elita-1 and a femme named Glyph (who is canon, just not widely used as far as I can tell)?

And the answer to these intriguing questions continues in chapter two! Thank you for your patience and hits! And especially thank you to Sarahdoll165 and KHGiggle for your reviews! It's always exciting to hear one of my stories has potential. Or at least, it's always nice to know I wasn't the only one who thought it did... ;3

...

Fractured

2. Archa-7

Half the night passed before it was safe to go near the house. Leo fell asleep against Moonracer's shoulder as the adults around him talked about his mother, trying to keep her close to them in some small way.

Little did they know, Elita-1 thought where she sat, one shadow out of a million that night, and watched them through her own windows.

Eventually, after Optimus had reassured their friends numerous times that he would be fine and would see them at some time tomorrow, Moonracer carefully peeled Leo off her neck and handed him over to his father so the little mech could be put to bed.

Elita waited another half cycle before daring to approach the house. It took her that long just to convince herself to go. After all, it had been dark when her bond mate had seen her, he hadn't been able to see most of the damage. Most of the…alterations. What if they disgusted him like they disgusted her? Or worse, what if Leo saw her? Would he even recognize her as his mother?

She was just about to turn around and leave when the back door suddenly swung open, revealing Optimus standing on the other side. He looked worried.

He released an anxious vent of air when he saw that she was still standing in the dark. "I checked the front door and you weren't there," he said, by way of explanation, "so I figured you must have come around back." He stepped aside and waved her in.

For a nanoklik, Elita didn't move. This was it, she thought in joint-freezing fear, one step inside and he wouldn't be able to unsee her.

But he was watching her with such concerned optics. "Elita?" He asked softly as he stepped closer. "What's wrong? Are you hurt?"

Elita crossed her arms over her chassis and shook her head but couldn't find the words to speak. Slowly, she stepped inside the house that they'd shared since they'd bonded. They'd seen lots of changes in this house. Optimus' promotion to the elite guard team under Ultra Magnus himself. Elita's transfer to the exploratory team led by their old academy friend Sentinel Prime. Heck, she was ninety percent sure their son had been conceived in this house, on that little spot of floor behind the couch. He had certainly grown up here, playing and laughing in these little rooms and halls.

"Sweet Primus Elita-" Optimus breathed when he finally saw her in the revealing light of the hallway.

Elita couldn't bring herself to watch his face as he looked at her, so she stood there, just listening to the silence after those first three words as she kept her optics - all four of them now - glued to the sharp servos that weren't hers.

She thought she could feel his optics as he looked at her and tried to absorb what he was seeing; that this was not the same femme he had known for most of his life. His Elita wasn't some half Cybertronian, half organic freak with four spindly legs appearing out of her back or four optics, two on each side of her now black head, or organic fangs peeking over the edges of her lips. Even her paint job had changed, black and purple replacing her natural yellow and turquoise.

Elita crossed her arms over her middle and hugged herself. Why had she let him see her like this?

He lifted a hand to her altered face and she shied away, squeezing her four diamond shaped optics closed. "Don't." She said quietly.

She felt rather then saw him draw back. But then much to her surprise, she felt his digits under her chin as he tilted her head up so that she could meet his optics.

"Elita," he said softly, "Elita look at me."

Carefully, she opened her altered optics.

He was watching her with optics that were no more or less worried about her than before. But, she noted with no small amount of relief, that he didn't look afraid or revolted by her new techno-organic shell.

"It's going to be alright," he told her, "we're going to fix this."

A half sob, half laugh escaped her mouth. "How?"

She saw the cloud come over his optics as he thought as quickly as he could, but it was hopeless. She already knew that. But she also knew that her Optimus would never accept that as an answer.

"I don't know," he admitted with obvious pain. But then his optics cleared and he gave her a gentle shake. "But we're going to find a way."

He put his hands on either side of her face, not shying away from her new eyes and organic tissue. "Just," he tried to sound calm, "tell me what happened."

As much as her new frame sickened her, Elita lifted a clawed servo to hold onto Optimus', not wanting him to let go of her quite yet.

A small, sad, moan drifting out of the door behind her mate reminded Elita that they weren't alone in the house. Rising on her stabilizing servos, she looked over Optimus' shoulder at the cracked open door.

That strange thumping began again in the area where her spark should rightly be even though it had quieted some after Optimus had gone back inside earlier.

"How is he?" She asked quietly.

Optimus vented a long sigh. "Distraught." He told her, turning to look at his son's bedroom door. Elita noticed that he didn't let go of her hands which comforted her some. "He thinks you're dead 'Lita." He said in an even quieter voice.

Elita looked over at Optimus and saw the question in his optics. Why lie to Leo? Didn't he deserve to know that his mother wasn't dead? That there had been some big, stupid mistake instead?

Elita looked down at her self. Her mutated, half organic, self.

"I don't want him to see me like this." She whispered before looking back up at Optimus. "I-I don't even know if I am myself anymore." She whispered, afraid.

The fear he saw in her four optics made his spark ache. Carefully, mindful of the strange modifications that had taken over her head, he leaned his forehead against hers. "I recognized you," he reminded her, "and Leo would too. You're still you Elita." He murmured, believing it unquestioningly.

Elita still wasn't sure about that, but until some proof appeared that she wasn't really her anymore…well she'd just have to muddle through on the assumption that she was still herself.

"Come on," Optimus mumbled, not moving away quite yet, "you can explain everything in our room. That way we can let Leo rest. Unless you want to wake him up with the good news that his femme creator's only a few feet away from him now?" He raised his optic ridges hopefully to go along with the question.

But that same spark clenching fear appeared in her chest and made the thumping worse. Elita shook her head. "No," she whispered, "not right now. Not until we know something more about what's going on."

Optimus sighed, but didn't argue any further. Just took her hand and led her towards the back of the house to the room they shared.

She was a little surprised that it hadn't really changed. Sure, it was a little messier, a little dimmer without the light coming through the window, but it usually ended up like that whenever she was assigned an off world planetary exploration trip.

"Do you need anything?" Optimus asked as he closed the door behind him, leaving it open only a crack in case Leo woke up in the night. "When's the last time you refueled?" He asked, finally noticing the dirt coating her legs and the other travel stains on her discolored frame.

Elita glanced at the dirt, distantly noting that it must have come all the way from Archa-7 with her, and then shook her head. "I'm fine." She told him as she rubbed her servos together nervously and, carefully, sat down on the edge of the recharge berth big enough for both of them.

Watching her, as if he could still hardly believe that this wasn't some kind of dream, Optimus sat down next to her and automatically placed one hand behind her shoulder.

A distressed laugh threatened to escape Elita's mouth, but she swallowed it down. She had noticed early on in their relationship that he did that to try and convey comfort when she was upset. The familiar gesture at once put her at ease and made this ten times harder then she had expected.

"Can you tell me what happened?" Optimus asked softly a moment later when she didn't speak.

Elita nodded to tell him it wasn't a classified issue. "We," she started hesitantly, "we landed on the planet with no problems. The charts said it was called Archa-7. It was immediately obvious that it was an organic planet. There was dust and rocks everywhere along with this peculiar crystalline structure that hung in webs between the canyon walls. It was very pretty, especially when the sunlight caught it." She added, almost absentmindedly before continuing on.

"Sentinel said that we were there to investigate the rumors about Decepticon energon stockpiles stored there during the last Great War," she told him, "apparently they had a ship full of the stuff and it either crashed there due to some circumstance we don't know about or they hid it there on purpose."

"Then why didn't they ever go back for it?" Optimus asked.

Elita nodded vaguely. "Yes, that's what I was wondering. There are still Decepticon stragglers out there. Why don't they retrieve the energon? But," she shook her head, "but that's not really the point right now. The point is, we knew the 'cons hid energon on deserted planets and there were rumors that there was a store there."

She sucked in a deep, cooling cycle of air. "So we investigated." She said, optics focused on the wall in front of her. "Glyph's readings quickly led us underground. There were," she spread her arms to demonstrated, "these huge tunnels down there that all looked like they'd been bored out by some simple machine or tool. It must have taken ages." She murmured softly.

Optimus waited a moment as her thoughts wandered back to the strange planet Archa-7.

Soon her optics, all four of them, narrowed with memory. "But we found out pretty quick that we weren't the only ones down there." She said, voice hard.

Optimus frowned. "The natives?" He asked.

Elita nodded sharply, once. "Glyph's readouts led us through the maze of tunnels, but we didn't leave any physical markers to show us the way out."

"You thought you wouldn't need them." Optimus guessed.

Elita nodded again. "After awhile we came across this huge cavern. I mean it could fit the council hall five times over easily," she told him, looking at him briefly before the memories consumed her vision again. "And there it was," she said, sounding somewhere between impressed and surprised.

"What?" Optimus asked after a moment.

Elita gestured with a servo again. "The ship." She told him simply. "That dang, blasted, Primus forsaken ship. And the rumors were true, it was loaded with energon. I swear it was sitting in piles eight long and five high at least." Elita marveled.

But then her optics drained of all amazement. "And there were these oval sphere things on them. They were all over the ground and the energon, laying in little clusters surrounded by that same crystalline web stuff we had seen outside.

"Only these were fresher, suppler, they hadn't had time to crystallize yet. I touched some of the stuff to see what it was and it stuck to my servo like bonding agent. I tried to fling it off but it just gummed up the joints in my digits. It took Glyph and Sentinel's help to finally get the stuff off of me." She told him.

"What did it look like?" Optimus asked, optic ridges drawing together in thought.

Elita shot him an anxious look, and then slowly raised her far arm off of the recharge berth. Before Optimus could ask what she was doing, a glob of wet, whitish string span out of her palm and stuck to the wall with a splat.

Optimus jerked back slightly, startled. All the while Elita's optics never left his face.

"It looked like that." She whispered.

For a moment it looked like Optimus would say something. His jaw fell open, he stared with wide optics at the muddied white string clinging to his bedroom wall, and he sucked in air through his vents.

But then he closed his mouth and carefully took hold of his love's hand, almost as if he was afraid he would break it. He ran wary digits over her palm, feeling for whatever opening had spat out the sticky thread. But when he didn't find anything, he gripped her hand in his and looked up at her.

She could see he was struggling with this new information, but he asked anyway, "What happened next?"

Elita thought about cutting off the narrative there. True, he hadn't thrown her out of the house or anything, but if he had that kind of trouble with the web, what would he say when she finally told him what had happened to her?

She tried not to think about it as she lowered her head and continued talking. "Glyph and I took samples of the webbing and some broken bits of the oval pods while Sentinel inspected the energon piles. He told us they were unstable, hardly useable, but that we should probably bring back one or two for Perceptor to study anyway, along with one of those oval things so we could find out what they were.

"Glyph didn't think it was a good idea. She told us she was picking up life readings from inside the little things. Maybe not very strong or advanced ones, but still, life signs all the same. She was afraid that messing with them would either damage them or anger whatever creature was within them."

Elita slowly swung her head back and forth with a grim smile on her face, showing off more of her new fangs. "But you know Sentinel. He just couldn't comprehend that there was something out there that could give him trouble."

She vented a sharp, soft laugh, but Optimus noticed the morose overtones in her low voice.

"So he chose an oval for sampling." Elita eventually told him. "And as soon as he picked that thing up, a monstrous clicking sprung up all around us."

A small click appeared from seemingly nowhere, and it took Optimus a minute to realize it had come from Elita. He wasn't sure if she had meant to make the sound or if it had been an unconscious thing, but it was still unsettling. Vocal processors weren't supposed to make that sort of sound.

"It echoed all throughout that huge cavern until I thought it would vibrate my processor to pieces," she continued on in a soft voice, unaware of Optimus' thoughts, "We had grouped together as soon as it had started, but it took the spiders a couple of kliks to get close enough for us to see them, much less get within Glyph's scanner range."

"What's a spy-der?" Optimus asked.

Elita rubbed at the back of her left hand with her empty right one. "The natives Glyph told you about." She answered softly, not meeting his gaze now. "They were immense, but only rose to about half my height. They had eight legs, two body segments including their head, and," she tapped a digit below her new optics, "eight optics all around. They scuttled about on the ground, but with all those legs they could move awfully fast."

She shivered slightly, like she was cold even though the room was fairly warm. She rubbed at her arms, but it didn't seem to help. Optimus wrapped an arm around her shoulders.

"They were everywhere," she went on, voice barely above a whisper now as she looked at something far away, "not just on the floor, but on the walls, the ceiling. They must have had," she tried to think, "I dunno, some kind of natural adhesive on their servos because they could cling to every surface in that cavern."

"They surrounded you." Optimus guessed.

Elita laughed sharply. "We were always surrounded. We just didn't know it until then." She told him bitterly.

She stared off into space another klik, but then shook her head and rubbed at the side of her face, almost poking herself in one of her new optics in the process.

"They weren't too happy with any of us, but they were focused most on Sentinel. With the way they were watching him and all that hissing and clicking Glyph figured we were in some sort of nesting ground-"

Understanding lit up Optimus' optics as a piece of the puzzle fell into place. "And the ovals housed their young."

Elita nodded, glad with all the interruptions. It was almost impossible for her to spit these words out in the first place. And the more Optimus put things together himself, then the quicker this narrative would end.

"They went after Sentinel first of course since he still had the offspring, but when Glyph and I tried to help him, they turned on us too. They weren't exactly technologically advanced," she said, "but their pincers were strong enough to pierce armor. The first one went right through Glyph's shin guard like it was made of tinfoil."

Optimus nodded. He had seen that wound when she'd come with Ultra Magnus to give him the news about Elita.

"She went down. For a moment I couldn't see her over the spiders clamoring over her, but I could hear her screaming. I downloaded Sentinel's ability and managed to fling one off of Glyph. I hauled her to her feet and Sentinel ordered us back to the ship. Said he'd be right behind us, so I got an arm under Glyph and started to hack our way through the spiders back the way we'd come. Once we made it to the cavern exit, they thinned out and Glyph and I were able to get back to the ship."

She sighed, bracing herself. "Unfortunately the inhabitants of Archa-7 had gotten there first and the pilots were dead. The spiders had trashed the main ship to get at them, but the exploration pod was still in tact. I got Glyph fixed up as best I could and into the ship. The last I saw of her she was trying to raise Cybertron command on the ship's communication for help."

Optimus narrowed his optics in thought. "Longarm never reported getting any emergency communications. Something must have happened to the signal -"

"I know!" Elita shouted, shooting to her feet with her arms held stiffly at her sides. "For heaven's sake Optimus I know!"

Optimus drew back, surprised by the raging vehemence in his spark mate's voice. He could count on one servo how many times he'd seen Elita this furious and this only made magic number two. The first time this had happened she had nearly taken Leo's teacher's head off for insinuating that her son wasn't progressing at the 'normal level' like most other younglings in his class because he'd been sparked by co-creators rather then coming from the Well of AllSparks like almost every other bot online.

Now that had been a parent-teacher conference to remember.

And this looked like it might even be a more spectacular demonstration as the darkly colored femme stood there shaking as all her anger suddenly boiled over. Even her blue optics were starting to turn red near the bottom.

Optimus sat very still, not sure what to do. Across from him, Elita did the same, trying to shove down her sudden fury.

"It's not fair," she growled in her processor, "this isn't me! I don't deserve this!" It was all she could do not to scream.

Before the sound could escape from her mouth though, a very different sound slipped through the crack in the door.

"…mama…."

The small word was followed by an equally small whine. Leo's little voice came again, more desperate then the first, before Optimus and Elita could as much as look at each other.

"Mama?"

Optimus looked over at Elita. He gestured towards the cracked open door. "'Lita aren't you-?" He started to ask.

But Elita was already backing away. She shook her head, but it was nothing compared to how badly the rest of her was shaking. She wrapped her arms around her middle to try and keep herself together. Her four, spider-like limbs unconsciously did the same.

"But-" Optimus tried again, reaching out a hand towards her.

"No," Elita said in a small voice, "I-I can't. Not like this." She looked down at herself, and then looked away, unable to stand the sight of her mutated frame.

Frustrated, Optimus leaned forward without realizing it. "But he's our Leo." He tried again, wishing not for the first time that she wasn't so dang stubborn all the time. But then, he supposed in the back of his mind, that if she wasn't, she really wouldn't have been the same Elita he knew and loved.

"Mama!" Her young son started crying in his sleep.

That blasted thumping reappeared in her throat and Elita froze. Would Leo even recognize her if he saw her like this?

She couldn't remember how to move before Optimus vented a frustrated sigh and spun out of the room. A nagging sense of guilt joined the stupid thumping as she listened to him stalk down the hall to their mechling's room.

"Leo?" She heard him whisper to their youngling. "Leo, buddy, wake up. It's just a nightmare." He told him. Elita didn't have to see her boys to know that Optimus was gently shaking the child awake.

There was a start and then a whimper and she knew Leo was opening his optics to see Optimus sitting next to him.

"Daddy?" Leo asked, voice soft and scared. "Where's Mama? She was here wasn't she?"

Elita heard Optimus' disheartened sigh and she hugged herself tighter. He had always been so adamant about telling the truth. It was one of the things she could always count on from him; his honesty. She had used to think that there was nothing in the universe that could convince him to lie. Nothing at all.

But it turned out she was the one bot alive that he would lie for.

This new truth did nothing to make her feel better.

"I," Optimus said slowly to his three year old. "I think you were dreaming Leo," he said carefully, managing to stay away from an all out falsehood.

"But I heard her!" Leo protested.

"I know Leo," Optimus said. There was a shuffling sound as he scooted over and pulled the little bot onto his lap. "I know. I hear her too."

Elita squeezed her optics shut. She was being a slagging coward and she knew it. But her fear was real. And how could she expect them to still love her when she couldn't even stand herself?

With a shudder, she sank back onto the berth and tried to keep herself from shaking to pieces on the floor.

She was still sitting there, hunched over slightly, four optics gazing unseeingly at the floor, when she heard Optimus return some time later, after Leo had fallen back into a fitful recharge. The room dimmed briefly as he stepped through the door, his broad shoulders cutting off the light from the hallway for a moment.

Only Elita didn't see the light return as he came and sat next to her on the berth again. She was back in that blasted cavern, the only light coming from the flickering glow of the unstable energon cubes. The light cast a sickly pink glow over the bulbous bodies of the spiders, making them appear even more grotesque.

She was skidding through the cavern's large entrance, one arm already transformed into her service weapon, the other held ready incase her download powers suddenly became useful.

The spiders were everywhere, on every surface like she had told Optimus. Hoards of beady, red optics leered at her from the pink tinged blackness, making her spark shudder. They were hideous, ugly even by organic standards. Primus how she hated them…

The energon light flickered as the hoard turned on her. She heard a masculine scream from the middle of the cavern blackness that sent a spasm of fear shooting to her very core. She tried to help him, but then the hoard turned towards her. Almost immediately, their hairy bodies blocked out the light entirely. She felt herself shriek as she fought back, but there were too many. One leg gave out from under her because of the combined weight of the spiders on top of her, and the other was quick to follow. She was covered by a mound of hissing, biting things. She tried to find something to help her, anything she could download, but something must have glitched because as soon as she activated her power a burning spread fast as lightening up her circuits.

And after that…nothing.

"Sentinel fell." She said softly, knowing Optimus could still hear her. "I fell. The spiders took me down with their venom. On instinct I tried my downloading power, but it didn't work on the organics. I remember blacking out. I thought I was a goner," she huffed a sad laugh, "and then, when I woke up," she looked down at her black, claw like servos, turning them over slowly, sadly, to stare at her black palms, "I wished that I had."

Thick, blue digits wrapped around hers, interrupting her dejected staring. She looked up into the familiar optics of her mate.

"I'm glad you did." He said simply. "I'm…more relieved then I can put into words. We got the news an orn ago that you were…just gone," he said with a rough voice, optics lowering for a moment.

"It was the longest orn of my existence." He told her softly. "I could hardly drag myself out of recharge every day. Outside it was like nothing else had changed," he said sharply, "but going on orbit after orbit without you…it was unbearable.

"And Leo," he added after a brief pause to get his voice back under control, "Hearing that you were gone nearly broke his spark. He cried for days. He panics whenever I leave the room. I can't make you tell him, and I won't do it for you," he said quickly, frowning slightly now, "but 'Lita…" he trailed off for a space of time before looking up at her again, pinning her with strong optics, "Elita he needs you. And no matter what happened to you, no matter how this infection has altered your frame, you're still our Elita, and we love you, more then anything."

Elita stared silently at her servos held tightly in his. Her own self loathing kept her from believing him entirely. How could they love her when she had turned into this…half organic freak?

"We'll figure this out." Optimus told her, briefly tightening his grip on her servos. "We'll find someone that can help find out why this happened, how to reverse it if that's what you want."

"Of course that's what I want!" Elita cried, optics widening as she looked up at him again. "You think I want to stay like this forever?!"

Optimus watched her silently. And then slowly placed a kiss on one blackened palm. "No matter what happens, just know that we still love you. That I love you, no matter what."

He leaned up to kiss her forehead again, but Elita moved and caught his mouth with hers at the last moment.

They stayed that way a long moment, unable and unwilling to pull apart so soon after believing for so long that they would never see each other again.

Even after they separated some time later, Optimus leaned his forehead against hers. They were still another long handful of cycles.

"You should get some rest." Optimus eventually murmured, still not pulling away quite yet. "You've been traveling for awhile now. You're probably exhausted. We can sort things out in the morning."

Elita nodded. She was tired. She'd hardly closed her optics since she'd patched up the main ship and put in the course for Cybertron. But she made sure to pull Optimus onto the bed after her as she scooted over.

"You're not in any better shape." She told him at the questioning look in his blue optics.

They settled down on the flat surface, systems quieting down in preparation for sleep. But it wasn't until Optimus wrapped an arm around her and Elita found the familiar spaces between his armor that they managed to shutter their optics and actually find some rest.