Welcome back to Young Wrecker!

I was surprised that people still cared about this story, but I'm more than happy to continue writing it :) Hope you enjoy!

Fair warning: this episode contains a few references to G1 and the comics (specifically, a certain major character makes an appearance).

Chapter Eight: In the Prescence of Power

Several Orns Ago . . . Halo's POV . . .

It hurt just to think back to that time.

I couldn't place how many days, weeks, or months it had been. All of it was just a painful, dizzy blur.

They didn't let me outside. Only from the cell, to the lab, then back to the cell for the Decepticon guards to take turns punching, kicking, and laughing at me. I credit them for why I have such a high pain tolerance for a two-wheeler.

Things were no different that day as I walked down the long winding halls of the Decepticon hideout. I couldn't tell you where it was located. I'd never been beyond those few walls.

My sight was already gone. The only thing I could see was pure darkness. The guards had put a bandage around my eyes. Probably so they didn't have to face the realities of the cause they were supporting. But maybe I'm giving them too much credit. They probably just thought it looked gross.

The guards chuckled louder than usual this time.

"What's so funny?" I demanded weakly, still tired from lack of sleep.

"We know what he's planning today." The taller seeker said in a sing-song voice. "And you probably won't survive it."

I grumbled, wondering what would be next. The walk to the lab was the worst part. The anticipation of pain was the only thing on my mind.

We got to the operating room. But it was set up differently.

Shockwave was over at his computer, writing up some kind of data. I could hear the sound of of a second voice. A femme's. She sounded sharp and commanding. There was a pause. I heard footsteps as she moved towards me.

"Oh, you are devious, Shockwave." She mused. I could hear the sadism in her voice. "Experimenting on younglings. Where did you find this one?"

The one-eyed monster didn't bother glancing back at me. "We found her in the Sea of Rust, Airachnid. She was looking for some Wrecker."

Bulkhead.

I wondered silently if he'd ever come back from Earth. It'd been months. I thought he or Wheeljack would've found me by now. So much for family.

The guards did their usual routing of ensuring I was tied down to the medical berth. The first time they did it, I was scared. Now, I was just...numb.

I'd come to a dark and nihilistic realisation.

I was going to die in here.

I was never going to see Bulk or Wheeljack again.

I was never going to be a great warrior like they were.

Taking a deep breath, I just waited for the next part. The other worst part.

But it never came. Before Shockwave could do anything, the sounds of a loud crash came from outside in the hallway.

A third guard came running into the room.

"Commander Shockwave!" He uttered through heavy breaths. "The base is under attack by Autobots!"

For the first time in months, I jolted up a bit. I didn't want to get my hopes up though. There's no telling if they'd be able to find me. Or if they'd even win the fight.

The scientist's emotionless demeanour didn't shift. "Gather any and all research you can. And leave the test subjects. Most of them will die before the Autobots can find them."

"What about her?" One of the other guards said. I assumed their were gesturing to me.

Shockwave continued to stride towards the exit. "Leave her. With her damage, I'd doubt the Autobots would want her for their cause. And even if they did, what damage could she possibly do?""

What damage could she possibly do?

My shoulders dropped as those words rang out in my head. The sound of gunfire and violence outside was drowned out by the realisation I had. What could I do now?

I heard them all leave as the door swung open, then slammed shut again.

But I still didn't dare move.

What if the Autobots lost? What if it was a test?

I stayed frozen like that for what felt like an hour.

My small frame jolted again as I heard the door open and the cocking of a gun. I started to breathe quickly, hoping it was the right side.

"Holy scrap..." A mech's voice uttered under his breath. "Holy scrap! We got a kid over here!"

His footsteps approached quickly as he undid the restraints on the medical berth. I felt myself shaking as he picked me up in both of his arms. I didn't know what to say or do. It was just this overwhelming feeling of relief. But it didn't take away my distrust that something would go wrong.

He wasted no time in running through the base, presumably back to his friends. I just held on tight and tried to stop myself from crying.

The mech must've noticed my shaking.

"I know this is scary." He began. "But your safe now. Our squadron has run most of the Decepticons out of Akalai."

Akalai.

All this time I was worried and scared to leave.

All this time...

And I was only the next city over from the Wreckers' base.

Did they even try to come looking for me?

I couldn't hold it in anymore. I was tired, beaten, bruised, weak, and in pain. Tears started streaming from my optics. It burned. The wounds from my optics being removed were still fresh, and the tears were only stinging them more.

"Hey, hey, it's alright." The mech frantically tried to calm me down, stopping in the middle of a hallway. "What's your name?"

I sniffed. "H-Halo..."

"Well, Halo, I'm Tailgate." He comforted. "Me and my partner got sent here to help other 'bots like you. And I promise, we'll get you home. Where does your family live?"

That was a good question.

For orns, I'd been told by the Wreckers that they were my family. That they wanted to protect me and I was one of them. But they hadn't even tried to find me.

I'd seen Wheeljack track down missing 'bots with no more than a trace of energon and their last known location. I'd seen Impactor blow up a whole building because the 'Cons inside had killed his pet Scraplet.

To the Wreckers, I wasn't worth finding. To Shockwave, I was worthless altogether.

His words just kept echoing in my mind.

What damage could she possibly do?

It was no longer an insult to me. It was a challenge. I was going to make him regret what he did to me. I was going to prove to the Wreckers that I shouldn't have just been left behind.

I was going to make anyone who dared to ask "What damage could she possibly do" regret ever daring me to show them.

"I don't have a family." I lied. "They were killed orns ago."

Present Day . . . No One's POV . . .

"It has become evident that the information I translated for Megatron was incredibly dangerous in his hands." Optimus addressed the team as they stood in the main room. "But while hope is limited, it is not entirely lost." He gestured to the screen. "On here, we have a completed set of at least four coordinates. I will work to translate more, however in the meantime, we need to act quickly."

"Optimus," Ratchet began. "How are we to know which relics could be dangerous to the holder?"

Optimus sighed, solemnly shaking his head. "Unfortunately, there is no way for us to know until we recover them. If your relic poses a danger to yourself, contact base and we will proceed from there."

He started listing off the missions and who was assigned them.

Bee and Arcee were heading to New York. Optimus himself was heading to the Arctic. And as for Ratchet...

"WHEELJACK?!" Halo and Ratchet yelled simultaneously.

Ratchet whined. "You know I don't like that loose cannon!"

"He hasn't contacted me in months, but 'suddenly' he's available?!" Halo complained through gritted teeth.

"Ratchet." Optimus sighed. "You will have to put your own judgements of Wheeljack aside. While he is rogue, at best, he is also very good at what he does." He turned to the irritated gold femme. "As for you, Halo. I'm aware there's been some tension between you, Wheeljack and Bulkhead lately. To that, I have no better advice than to focus on the task at hand. We can't afford to lose time."

Halo knew he was right. She hated that he was right.

Since her encounter with Airachnid, she'd been reminded of what she suffered at the servos of Shockwave. She'd also been reminded of how no one from the Wreckers came to save her. And that made the question resurface: Why?

Why did they leave her there?

Maybe she'd finally bring herself to ask Wheeljack that question.

She sighed. "Fine. I'll be civil with him."

Optimus shook his head. "You won't need to. You're on a separate mission."

"Oh, come ooon!" She grumbled.

"Hey, it won't be so bad," Bumblebee reassured her, placing a servo on her shoulder. "Maybe he'll finally come back to base."

The scout was very much aware of the situation between Wheeljack and Halo. She'd been reluctant to talk about it, but over the past few months, they'd been spending a lot of time together.

Halo took a deep breath and sighed. "You're right. Sorry for yelling."

Optimus blinked. "Uhm...Thank you for the apology."

"When did you start being reasonable?" Arcee joked.

"Hey, I'm always reasonable!" Halo retorted.

Bee glanced at her again, smiling softly.

Again, the gold femme let out a deep breath. "Y'know, you can't keep using you're 'logic' and 'reason' on me."

"I can and I will." Bee chirped, feigning innocence.

Arcee rolled her optics, grabbing Bee's shoulder and dragging him to the ground bridge. "Alright, smooth operator. Time to go."

Halo waved subtly as the scout left, chuckling to herself.

Bulkhead glanced over at Halo. She still hadn't been speaking to him since the news about Dreadwing came out. He wondered if it was even worth trying to talk to her right now. At least this time, she wasn't leaving immediately when she saw him in the room. He counted that as improvement.

"Uh, Haley?" He spoke up nervously, shuffling over to her. "Any chance you're ready to talk yet?"

Halo wished she had Bumblebee there to stop her from saying something she'd regret. But alas, she didn't.

"I'll talk to you again when my parents miraculously come back from the dead." She snapped, folding her arms.

Bulk tried to reason with her. "Haley, come on. You know I never would've killed Duros if we knew it'd hurt your carrier. Jyn was a good person."

The gold femme's shoulders dropped slightly. She half-turned to face Bulkhead.

"Bulkhead, don't you get it?" She began. "I can't trust you anymore. You've been lying to me since you 'found' me." She shook her head. "I loved you so much, Bulk. But I...I don't know if I can now."

The green Wrecker's eyes widened. His eyebrows furrowed sadly as he stared at the floor. Of course, he knew this could be the outcome. But it felt much worse than he could ever imagine to actually hear those words. To hear her say she wasn't sure if she could still love him the way she used to...It hurt.

He'd been shot, betrayed, punched, blown up. But this was a new kind of pain for him. It was something he didn't know how to heal.

"I'm...sorry, Haley." He managed to utter.

Halo didn't want to guess how upset he must've looked. Before saying it, she thought she could just leave it at that. It was honesty, after all. But realising how badly it hurt him...she wanted to take it back.

"Bulkhead..." She began softly. "I didn't mean-"

"Halo Jyn." Ratchet interrupted them.

They both turned their heads back towards the main computer.

"It's your turn to go through the ground bridge." He informed her, seemingly oblivious to the heartfelt conversation that he'd just interrupted. "The coordinates have been sent to your internal GPS system."

The gold Wrecker hesitated to leave. She still had so much to say. She had a lot she wanted to take back...

But Optimus was right. If the Decepticons got to the weapons before they did, it could mean the odds being even worse for the Autobots than they already were.

Halo turned to Bulk sympathetically.

"Can we talk when I get back?" She asked hopefully.

The Wrecker nodded slowly, but didn't speak again.

Reluctantly, she strode through the ground bridge. She arrived on the other side, a rainforest type of area. According to the notes from Ratchet, it was a place known as the 'Amazon'. Halo guessed that he didn't mean the "next day delivery" kind.

The gold femme sighed as the bridge closed behind her.

"Welp. At least I get to be alone for the next couple hours."

She transformed into her golden-silver bike mode, driving swiftly but cautiously through the tall grass and hanging vines.

Behind her, the leaves shuffled. Through the darkness of the trees, a pair of glowing yellow optics appeared. Halo was too far up ahead to hear the creaking of metal and the scraping of rust.

"Well..." A deep, raspy voice mused. "After all these years, we finally have company, brother."

Bulkhead wondered how Halo must've been doing as he drove across the grainy mountain terrain. He wondered what she wanted to say to him when she got back. Above anything, he wondered what on Earth or Cybertron he needed to do to earn her forgiveness. Was it even possible?

But he didn't have time to think too much about that right now. He had a load of toxic energon in the backseat that he really needed to get rid of.

He already felt his vision growing blurry. His energy was starting to deplete. It was that dreary kind of feeling that you wake up with after a bad night of sleep.

Hearing the unsettling roars of the Insecticons growing closer and closer to him, he was only faced with one choice:

Drive fast. Drive far.

Halo had tracked the signal all the through the thick undergrowth, dodging several wild animals along her way. The signal was starting to scramble as she dove deeper into the rainforest.

Sighing, she transformed back, lightly tapping her helm to refocus her internal GPS.

"C'mon, this is not the time..." She grumbled.

She froze at hearing a rustling in the leaves. Spinning around, she turned to try and pinpoint the source of the rustling. She listened and waited.

Nothing.

The rustling had stopped.

The Wrecker shrugged it off.

Probably just another Earth animal, She reasoned.

She turned back to the forest, carrying on up the inclining ground on foot.

Again, the yellow optics appeared through the trees, followed by the familiar sounds of rust and shaking metal.

This time, Halo was within earshot.

She spun around, aiming her bow and arrow at whoever was following her.

"Show yourself." She ordered.

From behind the thickness of trees, the figure that had been trailing her stood up, growing to their full height.

It was a mech. Taller than Optimus. Taller than even Megatron. The highlights of his mostly dark-grey frame might've once been a fiery red, or orange. But was now mostly faded, the edges of his armour covered in a bluish-green rust. His armour was broken, like it hadn't been maintained properly in millennia.

"You're quite short." He wondered aloud, his voice raspy and breaking. "Are you done growing yet, child?"

Halo was offended, but kept her bow raised. "Are you a Decepticon?"

"A what?" He furrowed his eyebrows.

This time, Halo's bow lowered very slightly. What did he mean by that? Every Cybertronian in the universe had heard of the war and their resulting sides. She shook herself out of her distraction and raised her bow again.

"Is this a trick?" She demanded.

"My days of tricks and treachery are far past me now, little one," He groaned, beginning to walk past her.

He remained at a distance far enough that she didn't shoot. In fact, she lowered her bow. Remounting the bow on her back, she began following him.

"Wait up!" She called, struggling to keep up with the towering mech. "You're Cybertronian. How have you not heard of the war?"

The mech once again groaned. "Oh Primus. You younglings started another war?"

"Well, I didn't." She defended. "I wasn't even born when it began."

"Then why fight it?" He countered.

She paused. No one had really asked her that before. It was just expected to fight in the Great War.

She shrugged. "To protect my friends."

The mech scoffed. "Friends are temporary. Solitude is inevitable."

"Look, not that I don't appreciate the wisdom, but I need to go. Optimus sent me on an important mission."

"What kind of mission?"

She hesitated to tell him. But he seemed harmless. Just an old mech who was too out of touch to recognise the war that had plagued them all for millennia.

"I'm recovering a relic. One forged by Solus Prime." She admitted.

That sentence caused the mech to freeze in place. His shoulders dropped. His eyes glanced at the floor.

"Solus..."

Halo tilted her helm. "Do you...know where it is?"

The rusted mech shook his helm. "I swore to myself that I'd never let such a weapon fall into the wrong hands."

"Well, Optimus isn't the 'Wrong Hands'." She reassured. "I trust him."

He scoffed. "TRUST?!"

Stomping further up the hill, he moved at a much faster pace than Halo expected from the old-timer.

"Trust, little one...is an imbalanced concept." He grumbled. "It takes years, sometimes centuries to build. And it takes seconds to break." He turned back to her, glaring. "One misfire. One moment of pure, unthinkable idiocity! And it is GONE!"

He got down onto one knee, leaning one arm on his knee as he pointed the other at Halo Jyn. She could smell the refined energon on his breath. It mixed with the smell of metal to create an odd scent that made her uncomfortable. Still she didn't falter.

"Do you understand?" He whispered.

The gold femme shifted her pedes awkwardly. "I-I don't do much trusting nowadays."

The mech tilted his helm. "Why?"

She shrugged half-heartedly. "Well...it's a long story."

"I have nothing but time, child. Speak. Perhaps if you do, I'll decide how worthy you are of the relic you seek. However, you are to speak honestly."

Halo inhaled deeply. "Well...you don't know about the war, so I guess we'll start there..."

An Hour Later . . .

"And after that..." Halo finished her story. "I just don't know if I can trust Bulkhead again, y'know?"

By now, the two had moved from the forest to the abandoned wreckage of a Cybertronian ship that he was using as a home. It was ancient. Even from before Cybertron's golden age, before the war. She wished she could've examined it better. As a youngling, she'd only ever seen blueprints for ships this old.

"I don't know." The Wrecker shrugged, turning to her new vent buddy. "Am I supposed to trust him?"

"Of course not," The mech added immediately, taking a break from his cube of refined energon. "There is no 'supposed to' or 'have to'. You have free will."

She sighed. "And I used it to tell him I wasn't sure if I could ever love him the same way again." She held her helm in her hands "I was so sure things would go back to normal after I reunited with him. It was the only thing that got me through all that torment with Shockwave."

"Oh right, him." The mech mused, tilting his head. "Tell me more about what that time was like for you."

"Well, I can't remember how long it must've been-"

"Nonono, I meant your mindset." He corrected. "What would you have done to get out of there, if you'd had a fraction of the power I possessed?"

There was a pause.

The tall mech glanced down to the short femme beside him.

"I would've killed them all." She muttered. "Except for Shockwave. Him, I would've made suffer. For as long and as harshly as he made me suffer. Maybe even more."

She wasn't lying. He could see he wasn't lying. He could feel the ire in her voice and the hatred anytime the name 'Shockwave' came out of her mouth.

"Your honesty is appreciated." He nodded, standing up. "But in no way will I give such a powerful weapon to someone who would use it for such selfish reasons. You are a child. A toddler. You cannot be trusted with a relic forged by one of the Primes."

Annoyed, the gold femme stood up with them. "I thought that 'Trust was an imbalanced concept'?"

"But a concept nonetheless. Power corrupts. By the time you realise how far it's dragged you, someone you love is lying on the floor. Dead."

Halo tilted her helm as the cogs turned in her helm (literally). Suddenly, everything was making sense.

The relic long-forgotten.

A seemingly ancient Cybertronian vessel.

And a rogue Cybertronian who didn't know anything about the war, but recognised the name 'Solus Prime'.

"The relic you're protecting..." She began solemnly. "Is is...the Requiem Blaster?"

She was thrown back by a sudden force hitting her, throwing her into the ship's wall. Stumbling, she regained her balance. Before she could move, she felt the all too familiar feeling of a gun barrel pressed against her chassis.

The mech's demeanour darkened. His eyes had shifted to a darker shade of yellow. His previously hidden strength was now clear as he held the blaster to her spark.

"Listen to me, youngling." His voice grew deeper as he snarled at her. "You will leave this place. You will forget you ever met me. You will tell no one of this meeting. Understand?"

Halo felt her spark beating louder and faster.

This feeling...it was too close to the one she felt with Airachnid.

She didn't know if it was because she'd been remembering Shockwave, or what happened with the spider-Con, or that she'd just reached her breaking point with Bulkhead. But this time, Bumblebee wasn't around to calm her down. Her servos balled into fists. For the first time in orns, she felt her optics well up.

The tears began to stream down her face, falling out from underneath her visor. She tried to hide it, but the ancient mech's optics softened.

"Why are you crying?" He asked gently.

She violently shook her head. "I'm not! It's just...when's the break? When's halftime? When do we finally get to rest from all this fraggin' trauma?!" She sighed, leaning her head back against the wall. "I know you want to be forgotten, Megatronus Prime. I know you want to protect others by keeping the Requiem Blaster safe after what happened with Solus Prime. And I know you loved her."

"What is your point, child?" He demanded, raising his voice yet again.

Neither her crying nor her heavy breathing had stopped.

"You asked me what I would do with your power if I was still in that captured state. I'm asking you what you would give to save her from yourself, if you could."

Halo felt the blaster start shaking. She heard his breathing grow shallow as he tried to maintain his composure, but it was no use. Hundreds of thousands of years of solitude and guilt had finally overwhelmed him. The Prime lowered the Requiem Blaster and sank to the floor on one knee. His eyes welled with energon tears as he let go of the Blaster.

The gold femme still shook with fear. After all, he was still unpredictable. But she stepped forward, slowly reaching out. She placed a hand on his shoulder.

"I won't try convincing you to give me the Blaster." She reassured him. "Just...please don't let the Decepticons use it to hurt my friends."

He half-cried, half-chuckled. "It's funny...hearing all these stories you've told of an impatient, vengeful Wrecker whose only goal is destruction. Yet I see compassion in her." Megatronus glanced up at her through watery optics. "Tell me, do you have a love of your own?"

A light blue tint blushed across Halo's face. "W-Well, maybe. We haven't figured that out just yet..."

The Prime half-smiled, then looking down at the Blaster. "The one who forged this weapon is the last one I killed with it. I've become the Fallen. And am content to serve my eternity as such. But you, and your 'Autobots' may still yet be saved."

Halo stepped back slightly in surprise as the towering bot held out the Requiem Blaster to her. It was only a few metres shorter than she was.

"I...don't get it." She began. "I thought you couldn't trust me."

He shook his head. "I didn't expect perfection when I passed down this mantle. I expected blunt honesty. I'd say you've earned that much." He again looked at her through serious optics. "Once embedded with your unique Cybertronian code, this weapon will work only for you. However, I have one condition."

The gold femme sceptically tilted her helm. "What condition?"

"When you find Shockwave," He leaned in close, almost hissing the next part. "You use this weapon to end that son of a glitch. If you're feeling up to it after, come back with refined energon and tell me. I've always wondered if the taste of refined has changed over the orns."

Halo smiled. "I think I can agree to those terms."

With that verbal contract Megatronus returned her smile in kind. He chanted something in ancient Cybertronian dialect under his breath, and the blaster's handle began to glow. Halo didn't realise.

"...That's your cue to grab the Blaster, little one." Megatronus chimed in.

"Oh! Right, my bad."

She awkwardly reached out, grabbing the handle of the Requiem Blaster. She felt the Blaster shift and transform around her servo, getting lighter as she held onto it. After only a few seconds, Megatronus let go of the Blaster and stepped back.

"It is done." He said solemnly, beginning to stumble to the back of the ship. "The blaster has your code in it and can only be activated by you. Now I suggest you get going."

She nodded. "O-Okay, but...do you have any advice for using it?"

He paused, half-turning his helm back to her. "I'll tell you what Solus Prime told me: "Think before you shoot, but keep your finger on the trigger."

An austere atmosphere hung in the air of the base. No one spoke. No one dared to try.

Halo was the only one who hadn't returned yet, but Ratchet didn't have time to worry about her. He was already concerned with the patient lying in the medical bay. Arcee, Bumblebee and Optimus remained in the main room, waiting for there other team member to regain consciousness. Jack and Rafael were currently in the kids' hangout spot, comforting Miko as she lay face-down on the couch, burying her face into a pillow.

At that moment, Ratchet recieved an alert from Halo Jyn. She was ready to return to base.

The usual routine of activating the Ground Bridge felt so much more serious than it needed to be. The portal hummed to life, and the short figure of the gold femme cheerfully jogged through, the Requiem Blaster mounted on her back.

"Guess who accomplished a mission without using violence!" She excitedly announced.

Silence.

Optimus and Ratchet glanced at each other.

She quickly caught on to the feeling of the room. It almost felt like grief.

"What?" She asked.

"Halo Jyn..." Optimus began. "There was a complication with Bulkhead's mission."

Her spark might as well have stopped. She'd heard those words so many times, only with different names. But never did she expect to hear them with Bulkhead's.

"Is he alive?" She asked, almost too scared to hear the answer.

"He's alive," Ratchet added. "However...it remains to be seen if he'll wake up."

The next question is one every Wrecker asked. One Optimus knew he shouldn't answer at the risk of endangering Halo and the entire base.

Halo's servos balled into fists.

"Who did it?"

End of chapter!

Thanks for tuning back in! It's been a while and I can't promise when the next update will be, but I will say that I'm very proud of this chapter.

What do you guys think of the inclusion of Megatronus? Should he come back into it?

Also, should Halo revert to her old ways of vengeance in the next chapter?

And should Bee and Halo get moving with this mutual crush?

Ahhh, I have so many questions!

Again, thank you for tuning in, and please comment! It always brightens my day to see what people think of the chapters!

'Til All Are One

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