HEYYYYYYYYYY! LOOK GUYS! AN UPDATE!

Please note: I do not own Transformers. I do, however, have my own OC's which I have inserted into the story. My OC's include Reese Shields and Chase Sanders. Electra belongs to my sister.

Destination: Cybertron

This chapter corresponds to the episode "Orion Pax Part 3"

Reese and Jack both held their heads tenderly as they stepped through the portal. Space Bridging had been a little more intense than they had anticipated.

"I think I'm going to be sick," Jack muttered, holding his stomach.

"I don't think you want to get sick in your suit. You wouldn't be able to get away from it," Reese grimaced at the thought.

"No kidding," Jack grimaced as well, doing his best to keep his stomach from revolting.

Once the initial dizziness of the jump subsided, Reese and Jack were able to properly survey their surroundings. Cybertron was cold, desolate. The ground was littered with rusting buildings and the stains of spilt energon. It was heart wrenching.

Arcee vented sadly, visibly distraught by the scene before her. She shook her helm sadly, bowing it slightly in reverence of her fallen Autobot brethren.

"You okay, Cee?" Jack asked, lightly putting a hand against the femme's leg.

"This isn't how I wanted you to see my home…" Her voice shook a little, coolant falling from her optics.

"I… I'm sorry," Jack looked crestfallen. This reaction from Arcee had just sapped any excitement of being on another planet from the two teens.

"In the fog of war, its hard to see beyond the next leg of the mission, or the next punch in the fight. We did everything to save Cybertron, but when the fog finally lifted, there wasn't much left to save." Arcee shook the coolant from her optics, clearing her vision.

"Don't give up hope, Arcee. Perhaps there is hope yet for Cybertron," Reese said as comfortingly as possible, but regardless, her words felt hollow, empty.

"Perhaps…" Arcee vented again.

"Arcee, Jack, Reese, do you read me?" Ratchet's voice came in over the comm link in the teen's suits.

"Roger, we're on Cybertron," Jack confirmed.

"Alright you three, just keep the sightseeing to a minimum, you hear?" This time it was Bulkhead who spoke.

"Indeed, we don't know if your journey is five klicks, or five thousand." Ratchet took back control of the link.

"Understood, we're out," Arcee acknowledged, then she turned to Reese and Jack.

"Okay, Ratchet said the keys would guide us, but I don't see how," Jack looked down dubiously at the key in his hand. He waved it around, and it began to glow.

"Whoa! I think that answers your question," Reese's eyes widened. She held her key out in the same direction as Jack's and it too began to glow. "I say we go that way."

"I mean, it's all we have to go on, so, might as well," Jack agreed.

"Alright then, less talking, more driving," Arcee transformed in front of the two. "C'mon, hop on."

Jack and Reese climbed on, Jack holding onto the handlebars, and Reese holding onto Jack. In her other hand, Reese held the keys out in the direction they were glowing.

Then, with a quick rev of the engine, they were off.

The ride was pretty uneventful. It was a lot of nothing. They had pulled onto one of the main highways on Cybertron, so it was pretty much a straight shot.

Reese quickly became bored of staring at the glowing keys, and instead decided to take in her surroundings. If everything hadn't been so sad and rusted, the view would have been breathtaking.

The buildings that lined the road were still very impressive, despite being old and half destroyed. Reese could only imagine what they looked like before the war.

Out past the main buildings lining the road, there was a vast expanse of metal land. Several futuristic cityscapes dotted the horizon. It was incredible, seeing the buildings rising from the rubble. Unfortunately, fallen soldiers lay scattered around, their bodies rusting along the road, marring the view. Reese shook her head a little, trying not to think about the sight. So much death; so much destruction. It reminded her of the fallen soldiers at the spacebridge depot. Even if they had been Decepticons, surely, they didn't deserve to die, Right? Optimus had fought so hard to end this war, but, as a result, many lives were lost, and the planet was left in ruins. Reese felt tears prick her eyes as she felt just a glimpse of the overwhelming pain the autobots must feel. She could understand why Arcee had shed tears upon seeing her world like this.

"Hey you two, I think we are getting close," Arcee interrupted Reese's thoughts. Reese looked down at the keys in her hand; they were glowing brighter than ever. They emitted a soft metallic hum, vibrating ever so slightly in her hand.

"Do you know where we are?" Reese asked the motorcycle.

"Looks like we are coming up on the City of Kaon," Arcee replied.

"Wait, The Kaon? Like, Decepticon capital, Kaon?" Reese sounded a little worried. She had read about Kaon on the many datapads she had borrowed from Ratchet. The stories she read had not been very pleasant.

"Yep," Arcee deadpanned.

"Lovely," Jack muttered under his breath. He didn't sound thrilled by the news, either.

They drove for a few more minutes before Arcee pulled to an abrupt stop. They were right in front of a gate, probably the entrance to Kaon. It was massive, and formidable, filling Reese and Jack with a sense of dread.

The two teens hopped off and Arcee transformed. "We're on foot from here. We wouldn't want engine noise to attract the wrong kind of attention."

"You mean like cons?" Jack asked, a little apprehensively.

"I thought you said no one else was living here on Cybertron now that it was dead," Reese glanced around nervously, suddenly afraid that hidden eyes might be staring her down.

"Vermin," Arcee grunted, readying her blasters, just in case.

"What kind of vermin?" Reese shuddered as thoughts of giant robotic spiders and rats filled her mind.

"The kind you don't want to mess with. If we're lucky, and quiet, we might be able to evade them. Let's just move quickly," Arcee took point, leading the two teens onto the bridge that led into Kaon.

They followed the glow and hum of the key, trying to be as stealthy as possible. Reese felt the hair on the back of her neck stand on edge a couple times, like she was being watched, but she chalked it up to paranoia. Arcee wasn't panicking, so neither would she.

Eventually, they made their way into what looked like the city's center. The entrance to the center had a giant statue of Megatron on top of it. Reese shuddered at the sight of him.

The keys were glowing brighter than they ever had, vibrating strongly in Reese and Jack's hands. The hum coming from them was very loud now, making Reese wince a little. What if it attracted unwanted attention? She stuffed the key in her suit pocket, hoping to muffle the hum a little.

To everyone's surprise, the ground began to tremble violently, stone and metal crashing down from the walls around them. Reese and Jack held onto Arcee's legs, trying to steady themselves, watching as the ground in the center of the square split open, and a large structure emerged from beneath the city.

The sound of metal screeching against metal met the group's ears, making them wince. So much for being stealthy. Anyone within a mile radius probably knew of their location.

Reese and Jack walked up to the massive structure, holding their keys out towards it. The keys glowed brightly, and then blue lights began glowing on the structure, the door to it opening up as they got close.

"Vector Sigma is down here?" Jack asked dubiously. "Why would it be located under the Decepticon capital?"

"Kaon didn't always belong to the Decepticons," Arcee seemed to pick up on Jack's confusion. "Megatron took it as their capital. Apparently, without realizing what lay just beneath their feet."

"Well, let's get going then," Reese hastily made her way towards the entrance, but stopped as small debris came falling from above. She looked up to find a bug like being perched atop the structure. It gave her what looked like a sickening smile, followed by an ear-piercing shriek. "WHAT IS THAT!?" Reese screamed, stumbling back a couple steps.

"Get Back!" Arcee yelled, diving in front of the kids as the creature jumped towards them.

Reese's legs went into motion immediately, propelling her as quickly as possible away from the insect-like enemy. Jack was right on her heels.

They looked back to see the creature shriek again and dive into Arcee, sending her flying into the wall. She collapsed to the ground, temporarily dazed.

"Arcee!" Jack called out, reaching out towards her. Unfortunately, this attracted the attention of the creature. It saw the glowing key in Jack's hand and let out another painful shriek as it barreled towards them.

"Time to go," Reese grabbed Jack's arm and dragged him along as she ran towards the entrance to Vector Sigma. The last thing she wanted was to end up as some robot bug's lunch.

The creature had almost caught up to them when several blasts hit its flank. Arcee was back on her feet and ready for some revenge.

The creature turned and chased after Arcee, apparently deeming her much more of a threat than the kids.

With the creature distracted, Reese and Jack took up running again. Jack pressed the comm button on his suit as he ran. "Guys! We're being attacked by some kind of bot beetle thing!"

"An insecticon!" Ratchet said with disgust, from the other side.

"A what?" June asked worriedly. Looked like their communication link was a three-way call.

"Insecticons were a hybrid species engineered during the war. A few were left in stasis, placed as sentries on Cybertron, should the 'enemy' return," Ratchet explained.

"Jack, Honey, are you okay? Are you hurt? Please tell me you're not hurt," June sounded frantic on the other side.

"So far so good," Jack replied breathlessly, still being dragged along behind Reese.

"Jack! Reese! Get into the tunnel!" Arcee called out from the battle.

"Without you?" Jack pulled Reese to a stop, turning back to look at his guardian in disbelief.

"He can't go in without Arcee! She's his guide!" June sounded panicked, clearly not on board with the plan.

"No, Nurse Darby, Arcee is their backup; the keys are their guide." Ratchet corrected.

"I SAID GO!" Arcee yelled again, trying to keep the insecticon from crushing her.

"Listen to her, Jack. You've made it this far. Optimus is counting on you," June's voice came in clear over the link. She sounded different this time. More determined.

Jack looked worriedly between Reese and Arcee, the former of whom was trying to pull him along again.

"I can't just leave her…" He muttered, sounding very torn.

"Jack, this is what she came along for. It's up to us to get the matrix. I'm sure she will be okay," Reese placed a firm hand on Jack's shoulder, looking him directly in the eye.

"Okay, let's go," Jack looked away, still sounding distraught.

"You got it," Reese nodded, dragging Jack along again. They ran up to the entrance of the tunnel, not even stopping as they passed over its threshold. Once past the entrance, the door to the tunnel closed, cutting off the teens' view of the fight. The last thing they saw was Arcee getting tackled by the insecticon.

"We gotta keep moving, Jack," Reese broke the silence shakily, activating her suit's flashlight so they could see where they were going. The door had blocked out any incoming light, leaving them in total darkness.

The glow from the keys also provided them with a decent amount of light, giving them the slightest glimmer of hope in the dark situation. The two followed the tunnel, deeper and deeper into the planet.

They walked in silence for a while, the only sound to be heard being the incessant hum from the keys. On a couple of occasions, Reese thought she heard the sound of tiny feet scurrying along behind them, but when she flashed her light around, her search always came up empty. Jack picked up a rusty metal pipe, brandishing it like a weapon, just in case.

Deeper and deeper they went, until they finally came to another metal door. It too, glowed brightly and opened as it sensed the keys in Reese and Jack's hands.

The two walked forwards, gasping at the giant room ahead of them. A bridge, lined with glowing lights, led to a large round platform in the center of the room. And ominous blue glow emanated from the vast expanse below the platform. Reese made sure to stay close to the center of the bridge, knowing a fall from that height would mean certain death.

The two teens walked to the center of the circle platform, watching in awe as some kind of mechanism, imbedded in the floor, began to glow.

"Well, how do we connect the keys to this thing? I don't see a slot to insert them at," Reese wondered aloud, looking down at the mechanism curiously.

"Well, I suppose we just place them in the center and let it do its thing," Jack shrugged his shoulders, placing his key down on the floor. Reese followed his lead, placing her key right beside his.

To both of their surprise, the keys glowed brightly and began to intertwine together, forming one key. The key then grew, as if by magic, until it fit the indent in the middle of the platform.

The platform began to retract towards the bridge, causing both Reese and Jack to stumble. They jumped back onto the bridge as the mechanism began to rise up from the floor. Once it was standing fully upright, the floor in the middle of the platform, where the mechanism had just retracted from, began to open, and a giant blue orb lifted into the air. It glowed so brightly that Reese and Jack had to look away until their eyes could adjust. The orb had rings of metal that swirled around it, carrying its energy towards the mechanism. As the energy interacted with it, the mechanism began to pulse with a blue light, the light traveling inwards towards the key.

Reese and Jack stared in awe, completely transfixed by the process. It was incredible. The most incredible thing either of them had ever seen.

"commencing download, I think," Jack informed over the comm link.

The two watched for a while, growing slightly impatient as the process showed no signs of slowing.

"This sure is taking a while," Jack mumbled.

"Of course it is. We are talking about the collective wisdom of the Primes," Ratchet scoffed, having anticipated the process being a long one.

"Well, hopefully it won't take too long, I'm starting to get hungry," Reese rubbed her stomach as it let out a loud growl. Unfortunately, a much louder sound drowned out the growl of her stomach. The sound of hundreds of tiny footsteps echoing along the walls.

Reese and Jack whipped around, looking back towards the entrance of the room. Both of their hearts stopped as they spotted hundreds of tiny creatures crawling through the entrance, their large purple eyes trained on the glowing mechanism.

"Uh, Jack, what are those?"

"Scraplets," Jack replied, holding his pipe out in front of him protectively.

The scraplets, having realized they had been noticed, all turned in unison, opening their mouths wide and displaying their many rows of rotating teeth. They leapt off the wall, gathering into a giant flying cloud as they headed right for Vector Sigma!

"WHAAAAA!" Reese ducked out of the way, covering her head as they came flying past her.

"Why did it have to be scraplets? Anything but scraplets," Reese could hear Bulkhead groan from the other side of the comm link.

"WHAT ARE SCRAPLETS?" She screamed over the roar of the vermin munching away on the mechanism.

"Their Cybertronian pests that eat metal. We have to stop them from attacking Vector Sigma!" Jack explained, hacking away at as many scraplets as he could.

"THEY EAT METAL!?" Reese shrieked, running her hands down the glass shield of her space helmet.

"Yea, and if we don't stop them, they will completely devour our only hope of getting Optimus back," Jack grimaced as one of the scraplets, that he had just knocked off the mechanism, was flung into the side of his helmet.

"Oh my gosh, oh my GOSH!" Reese frantically wheezed over and over again, unsure of how to help. She didn't exactly have a weapon like Jack did. She gasped again as the light from Vector Sigma began to dim, struggling under the barrage of tiny attackers. "Jack! What are we going to do?"

"I don't know! We need to find some kind of metal to distract them with!"

"Preferably, living metal. Scraplets are attracted to the metal that comprises living Cybertronians." Ratchet added.

"living metal, huh?" Reese mumbled, a spark of an idea flashing through her mind. It wasn't a pleasant idea, but it was an idea, nonetheless.

"You got something?" Jack looked over at her, having heard her comment.

"Maybe… but you aren't going to like it." Reese muttered as she checked the seal around the wrists of her space suit. Once she was sufficiently sure that no air could get into the rest of her suit, she pulled her gloves off, exposing the cybernetic implants that covered her hands.

"Reese, what are you doing? Put your gloves back on!" Jack screamed, frantically grabbing the gloves that Reese had discarded to the wayside.

"You said they eat living metal, right? Well, the metal in my cybernetic implants is about the only living metal in here, other than Vector Sigma," Reese explained.

"Reese, don't be foolish. You can't recklessly put yourself into harms way!" Ratchet called frantically over the comm link.

"I'm not being reckless, Ratchet. I'm being resourceful. The options are the Big V, or me, and I'm willing to make that sacrifice, for Optimus," Reese said quietly, trying not to second guess her decision. She grabbed one of the scraplets with her exposed hand, waving it around in the air to get the attention of the other pests.

The hive mind of the scraplets immediately changed focus from Vector Sigma to Reese, as they zeroed in on the cybernetic implants fused to her body. They all lifted into the air once more, flying in a swarm towards her.

She took off running as fast as she could, leading the metal eating vermin away from Vector Sigma, which had resumed the uploading process at full speed, now that it was no longer under attack.

She stumbled beneath the weight of the scraplets, screaming as they gnawed away at her exposed hands. She curled into a ball around her hands, trying to protect them from the scraplets. The scraplets buzzed angrily now that they couldn't get to her hands and began gnawing into the fabric of her suit, seeming to have sensed that more metal lay beneath it. She could hear her precious oxygen hissing as it escaped through the many puncture holes that now riddled her suit.

She closed her eyes, accepting that she probably wouldn't survive for very long without oxygen. The barrage began to let up ever so slightly, but she kept her eyes closed, figuring that they were getting ready for a bigger attack of some kind. But the attack never came. The scraplets continued to let up until eventually she was left lying on the floor, alone.

She opened her eyes a sliver, quickly shutting them again when she saw the damage the scraplets had done to her hands. Energon leaked from the bite marks that had been left behind. Layers of metal had been stripped away in certain areas, leaving nasty gashes. It was an ugly sight, to be sure.

She hissed as the pain intensified and bit her lip hard enough to draw energon. She hadn't really noticed how much they hurt until she saw the absolute carnage that was left behind by the scraplets' feast.

"Reese! Reese, talk to me!" Jack was suddenly by her side, shaking her shoulder. "Oh my gosh! Your hands!" he reeled back, unsure of what to do.

"Did… did the key…"

"Yea, it's all filled and ready to go. Don't worry, we will get you out of here. Get you back to Earth," Jack focused on looking into her face, rather than at her mangled hands.

"No time… my suit is losing oxygen too quickly. I won't make it back." Reese sighed sadly. So far, the toxic atmosphere hadn't been able to get into her helmet, but it was only a matter of time before her oxygen ran out.

"I can patch up the holes. Share some of my Oxygen with you. You will make it back. You have to." Jack was frantically trying to plug as many of the holes in Reese's suit as he could, but he didn't have anything on him to seal them with.

"No Jack, you don't have enough Oxygen to make it back if you share with me. Besides, there is no time. Go, find Arcee. Get Optimus back," Reese smiled sadly, watching as the meter on her Oxygen tank hit empty. She opened the seal to her helmet, allowing Cybertron's toxic atmosphere to fill her lungs. She coughed and sputtered, the corrosive air burning as she breathed it in.

"Reese! No!" Jack was shaking her again, tears collecting on the inside of his space helmet. "You can't die! You just can't!"

Reese continued to cough and hack, wheezing and gasping. Surprisingly, though, after what felt like an eternity, her breathing came back to normal, albeit a little labored.

"Reese? You're not dead?"

Reese struggled to sit up, the room spinning a little. She was alive, somehow, but definitely worse for wear. "Apparently, it's not my time to go just yet."

"How? How are you still alive?"

"Maybe it's because I'm a techno-orgnaic?" Reese winced as she struggled to her feet. Jack grabbed her arm, helping lift her up. He draped one of her arms over his shoulder, helping carry her weight as they made it back to the chamber entrance. "By the way, how did you get rid of the scraplets?"

"That insecticon followed us into the tunnel. So, I grabbed one of the scraplets and threw it at him. They immediately changed targets, and all went to munching away on him. He, and they, fell off the platform, lost in the abyss below," Jack explained.

"Welp, that's one way to do it, I suppose," Reese grimaced at the thought. She couldn't help but feel at least the slightest bit empathetic for the insecticon.

"Here are your gloves. Maybe you should try putting them back on to protect your hands as much as possible," Jack handed Reese her gloves.

"Maybe you're right," Reese sighed, gingerly taking the gloves. Her hands stung with each movement of her fingers. She wondered if they would even be able to fully recover from the damage. She tried to slip the gloves on but couldn't seem to get her hands to cooperate.

"Here, let me help you," Jack took the gloves, placing them on Reese's hands for her. She winced as they were slid on, the pressure from them aggravating the wounds further. "You gonna be okay?"

"Yea… I think so… but we should probably hurry before I lose too much energon."

"Got it, let's make it back to the entrance. Hopefully, Arcee is okay," Jack looked at the tunnel a little nervously. He was probably worried at what he would find when they made it back outside.

They didn't have to wonder, though, as the sound of an engine met their ears. They watched as Arcee came barreling through the tunnel as fast as she could, skidding to a stop in front of them and transforming back into her robot form.

"What happened to the insecticon?"

"He became scraplet lunch," Jack explained, shuddering a little at the memory.

"Are you guys okay?" Arcee quickly scanned the teens over, her optics widening as she took in the state of Reese's space suit. "Reese, what happened?"

"Uh… It's a bit of a long story. I'm fine, don't worry. Let's just focus on getting back to the others," Reese sighed, not wanting to worry Arcee with the details.

"Are you sure you're okay? Your suit is full of holes. Won't you run out of air?" Arcee looked at Reese skeptically. She also noticed that energon was beginning to seep through and stain the fingers of Reese's gloves. "You're hurt!"

"I already ran out of oxygen, but it looks like I can breathe the atmosphere here, so I'm okay. Let's just get going, I can explain the rest later," Reese winced.

Arcee squinted suspiciously into Reese's eyes, knowing there was more to the story, but decided not to press any further. Instead, she transformed back into her motorcycle form, instructing the two teens to climb on.

Jack looked at Reese nervously, wondering if she would be able to ride the cycle without the use of her hands. He knew that they didn't have time to waste, but she was in pretty bad condtiont.

Reese gingerly climbed on, trying to use her hands as little as possible. She draped her arms over Jack's shoulders so that she wouldn't fall off. He held onto the handlebars with one hand, and used the other to hold onto her arms, providing a little extra security to keep her from falling off.

The ride back went much more quickly than before. Arcee knew exactly where to go, and sped the whole way there, making it back in record time. The space bridge was still open, but Reese couldn't help but feel a slight sense of foreboding. She didn't know what else to call it, other than a gut feeling, but something felt… wrong.

"Ratchet, we are ready to come back. Is everything still good on your end?" Arcee asked over the comm link, apparently having gotten the same foreboding feeling. No answer came, which only heightened everyone's nerves. "Reese, Jack, get off, I'm going to transform. Something's wrong. Ratchet should have responded."

Jack and Reese slid off Arcee, stepping back as she transformed, readying her blasters.

"You don't think the decepticons got wise to our plan, do you?" Reese looked up at Arcee nervously.

"I don't know… But we can't be too careful. I'm going to go through and make sure everything is okay. You two wait a moment before following me," Arcee ordered as she transformed back into her motorcycle form and raced through the portal.

"How long do you think we should wait?" Jack looked nervously from Reese to the open portal.

"I don't know… at least a minute or two, right?" Reese shrugged her shoulders.

"Do you think you will be okay if there is a fight on the other side? You're injured enough as it is."

"I'm sure I'll be fine…"

"Will you? You're looking a little pale. You have probably lost a lot of energon already. Your gloves are completely saturated in the stuff."

"Well, I can't get medical attention until we get through, so I don't see any point in waiting around," Reese huffed.

"I suppose you're right… Well, how about we go through on the count of three?"

"Sounds good to me."

"Alright… One… Two… Three-" Jack counted down, running forward on the count of three. Reese followed along behind, trying her best to keep close to him.

Reese hissed as she stepped through the portal. The jump had been less intense the second time around, but the vibrations aggravated the wounds on her hands. She clutched them close to her chest, breathing deeply to try and ease the pain.

Jack gave her a concerned glance, but she merely nodded at him, letting him know she was otherwise okay. They both looked up and saw a confused Orion Pax looking down at them. Guess he hadn't expected two kids to come running through the portal.

Jack held the matrix infused key up towards Orion, creating even more confusion for the bot. His optics widened as he recognized what the key meant.

"Are you certain I am worthy of such an honor?" Orion eyed the key dubiously.

"You don't even know," Reese nodded, her eyes watering a little. Just seeing Optimus again made her heart leap for joy.

Jack held the key up towards Orion, his eyes widening as a beam of light shot out of the key and right into Orion's spark. Orion then knelt, closing the distance between himself and the key. It was such a regal moment, watching Orion be endowed with the Matrix of Leadership.

Unfortunately, the moment came to an abrupt end as Megatron came running towards the Prime, sword raised.

"Optimus! Look out!" Reese screamed, but she had no reason to worry. The transfer completed just in time for Optimus to catch Megatron's sword mid-swing, his battle mask activating.

"Megatron, this ends here!" Optimus boomed, his voice no longer lacking the confidence that Orion's had. He swung his clenched servo, clocking Megatron in the jaw with a painful uppercut that sent the warlord flying. He continued to punch Megatron, never giving the decepticon a chance to recover between blows. With one last powerful uppercut, he sent Megatron crashing into the wall of the cave, temporarily incapacitating the warlord. Then, he turned to Ratchet. "Ratchet, how did we arrive here?"

"It's a long story, old friend," Ratchet practically laughed, unable to contain his joy.

"Ratchet, we are reading five life signs down there. Is Prime with you?" Fowler asked over the comm link.

"Prime, Jack and Reese! We are all back, safe and sound!" Arcee replied.

"Good to hear! I will send a ground bridge to your location."

The ground bridge opened and, one after another, the team retreated back to base. Optimus protected the bridge until all but Reese had made it through. She had collapsed to her knees, struggling to keep the world from spinning.

Optimus gently scooped her up into his massive servo before he jumped through the portal, shooting one final blast at Megatron as the portal closed behind him.

On the other side, the Autobots came through to find their human friends jumping up and down ecstatically. Each bot ran to their respective charge, except for Ratchet and Optimus. Ratchet merely sighed happily as he turned and watched Optimus walk in.

Reese had removed her helmet at this point, resting her forehead against one of Optimus' giant digits. Then, without warning, she wrapped the digit she was resting her head against in a tight hug, letting her tears stream down it.

Optimus seemed a little taken aback at first, but then a small smile pulled at the corners of his mouth. "I see that my time away from the rest of you has been trying. Honestly, there are many things that I still do not understand or remember." He said to the team. He then turned back to Reese and looked down at her with gentle and kind optics. "But, I see my absence has been even harder for you, Reese."

"I… I thought you were gone forever… You promised… You…" Reese fell forward, her world closing in around her. "You promised you would come back. When you didn't… it felt exactly like when I lost my parents. That sickening feeling of knowing that someone you love was never coming back." Reese sobbed openly now. As embarrassing as it was to have such an emotional breakdown in front of Optimus, it also felt really good to let the emotions out. She gave Optimus' digit another tight squeeze, but hissed as it put pressure on her hands. She pulled them back quickly, cradling them tenderly in her lap.

"Reese? Are you alright?" Ratchet stepped forward, his voice filled with concern.

"No, she's not. The scraplets gnawed up her hands really bad. I think she has lost a lot of energon too," Jack spoke up on Reese's behalf, seeing how she couldn't exactly respond in her current state.

"I told you not to do anything foolish!" Ratchet sputtered.

Reese just sighed heavily. She had figured Ratchet would be angry about her little stunt.

"Well, let me take a look at them," Ratchet huffed.

"I can't get my gloves off…"

"Optimus, go ahead and set her down on the medical berth so I can see what I can do," Ratchet waved Optimus over to the med bay.

Optimus gently placed Reese so that she was sitting on the medical berth, cradling her hands in her lap.

"Here, let me help you get those gloves off," June rushed over. She gently pulled on the fingers of the gloves, trying to slide them off without further aggravating the wounds. As they slid off Reese's hands, the energon that had pooled inside them came spilling out, getting all over the medical berth and Reese's suit. "Good heavens!"

"They probably look worse than they are. That's my hope, anyways," Reese mumbled, trying not to look at the open wounds on her hands. She appreciated that June had stepped forward to help, though. It really showed that the nurse was making an effort to change.

"Alright, lets have a look at those hands, shall we?" Ratchet had activated his holoform and walked over.

Reese gently lifted up her hands, letting them rest in the palms of Ratchet's gloved hands. She winced as she took in the damage. They looked bad.

"Those scraplets did a number on you. I don't know how much of this I can repair…" Ratchet trailed off, as he continued to inspect the damage.

"You mean, you can't fix them?" Reese looked at him worriedly. If he couldn't fix her hands, would that mean she would lose the use of them?

"I will do what I can, but my medical tools aren't exactly made to work on techno-organics," Ratchet vented. "Don't give up all hope, though. I will repair what I can, and the rest should heal up on its own. It will just take a while. A few weeks, at least."

"Will… Will I still be able to use them?"

"Yes, you're lucky. The scraplets did a lot of damage, but it doesnt look irreversible. If they had had more time, they likely would have gnawed your hands clean off."

Reese shuddered at the thought, grateful for Jack's quick thinking.

"Alright, do what you have to," Reese sighed.

"I will get everything set up, you just sit there and try to relax," Ratchet turned to prepare what he needed to make the repairs.

Reese sat, head lowered, feeling dizzy from the loss of energon.

"Reese? I apologize that you had to suffer such an injury for my sake," Optimus knelt down beside the medical berth. "Thank you, for going to such lengths to bring me back."

"I couldn't just let the scraplets destroy Vector Sigma. We might not have been able to get you back, otherwise. It was a sacrifice I was willing to make to bring you home, to help you keep your promise."

"Alright, I'm ready. Now, all of you, get. I won't be able to get any work done if you're all breathing down the back of my neck." Ratchet came back, shooing everyone out of the room.

Reluctantly, everyone filed out, leaving the medic to do his work.

Everyone gave a bittersweet sigh as they entered back into the main room. Things weren't the most ideal, but they also could have gone much worse. Reese was going to be okay, and finally, the team had their leader back. For that, the autobots couldn't have been happier.

YAY! We are finally done with Orion Pax part 3! WOOT WOOT HOORAY!

Next stop: Operation Bumblebee!

Thanks so much for reading. I hope you enjoyed the chapter. Please leave a review letting me know what you thought. I love reading your reviews :)

Well, that's all I have to say, so as always, have an awesome blessed day! - Lucy