Far off in the distant North, deep within the Arctic Circle, two lone bots trudged on through the wasteland of snow and ice. Breakdown and Skyquake had been on the hunt for a Cybertronian energy signature for a while now, as a recent storm that had passed through the area must have revealed it.

"Any idea how much further we are from it?" Breakdown asked, keeping a watchful eye on the horizon. He had been on lookout for either Autobots, who no doubt would be able to pick up the same signal that they were tracking, or humans. Soundwave had already scanned ahead, ensuring the two that there were no human outposts in this sector, however he was well aware that human expeditions traverse the icecap regularly enough to be cautious about it.

"Should only be on the other side of this ridge" Skyquake said, pulling out his handheld scanner to double-check.

As they were cresting the top of the icy hill they were on, and began their decent down into a small valley of jagged protrusions, that Skyquake, still lost in checking over his scanner, didn't see that he had stepped onto a sheet of particularly slippery ice, and fell flat on his face as he slid down the bumpy hillside, crashing into and shattering some of the weaker ice formations on his way down, coming to a stop as he slammed into a particularly sturdy one.

Breakdown had been quick, yet ever cautious to follow after him, maneuvering his way down the hill as to not end up in the same way Skyquake had, having learned his lesson from the last time he didn't watch his step. Reaching where his fellow Decepticon had fallen, he helped to get them back on their own two pedes, Skyquake making sure he was on stable ground before making his next move.

It was only then did either of them realise that the scanner had been going off, signifying that they had found what they were after. Skyquake pulled out his large claymore-like sword, and with a greater deal of precision than what he was used to, cut away some of the ice from the formation that he had the displeasure of slamming into, revealing a metal surface underneath.

"Well well well, look what we have here." Breakdown said, using his hammer to bash away the tough ice covering the metal object. After a while, they had taken off enough of the ice to see that it was some sort of cylindrical cargo canister.

"Ok, you grab it from that side, and let's see if we can't get this thing outta here on our own." Breakdown said. They both stood on either side of the pod, digging their hands into the icy embankment to get a good grip under it.

"On the count of 'three', we lift." said Breakdown.

"One… Two… Three!" The two mechs put all their might into holding up the pod, however, it proved to be too heavy for the two of them alone, and the frosted metal made it difficult to get a good grip on it. Not wanting to risk any injury to themselves, they dropped it back down, a small cloud of snow erupting from the impact.

Breakdown pulled out a long-rang communicator, much better suited for dealing with interference from the weather, and called in for a groundbridge.

"Yeah, Soundwave, we found it. Gonna need a bridge, and another heavy-lifter to help get the thing out of here."

. . . . .

With the help of Hook, and his much more powerful crane, they were finally able to get the capsule back through the ground bridge, so that it could be further examined. Back at the base, the weather conditions weren't as bad as the Arctic's, but to the other extreme, as a mid-summer heatwave was currently in affect, and everybody onboard the Nemesis was feeling the heat.

Well, almost everybody, at least, as Breakdown and Skyquake were currently defrosting whilst getting checked over by Knockout in the medbay.

"Luckily you bridged back in time, you two might have been permanently damaged had you been stuck out there long enough," Knockout said, more than a little annoyed that his medbay was slowly filling up.

"I appreciate your concern doctor," Skyquake said, sitting himself upright on his medical berth, "but I can assure you, we're fine. Nothing but a little bit of frost in the joints."

"A little frost in the joints? You wont think its so 'little' when you start to seize up. Thats why im taking you two out of commission for a while to have a proper defrosting procedure. You especially Breakdown."

"If you say so, Knock." Breakdown said, still lying down on his berth. Well aware of his mate's temperament when it came to medical procedure, he knew it would be best to not get in his way.

Knockout sighed, as he gathered up the chemicals needed to whip up a batch of defrosting solvent to scrub his patients with. Having never been to many places with such cold and snowy regions, he had never needed to use such a mixture, so it took him a while of scanning over multiple medical guides to find the correct formula.

"Honestly, I don't know why you even agreed to go on that mission," Knockout said, as he began to coat Breakdown in a waxy gel that would help to fully defrost him, "You know us Velocitronians are not adapted to cold climates."

"Wait, what do you mean by that?" Skyquake asked, not knowing much of the Cybertronian colony worlds himself.

"Velocitron is a mostly dry, rocky planet. Most of the weather and native lifeforms are at the poles, but for such a barren place, you'd be surprised how often a weather system pushes a storm out across the rest of the planet." Knockout said.

"So, have you learned anything about this Arctic find of ours?" Megatron asked from across the medbay, where he was looking over the pod, now slowly starting to melt, a puddle forming around its base.

"Probably won't be able to open the thing without breaking it," Hook said, examining it himself. "At least until it fully thaws out, that is. But my scans show that whatever is inside, there's a whole lot of them."

"Then perhaps it would be best to not waste time while we wait for it to thaw. I shall send out another search party to see if they can track down anything else in the area," Megatron continued.

But before Megatron could get on comms to find out who was available to head back out into the field, he was being pushed back away from the pod by Hook, a look of grave concern upon his faceplates. "OK everyone, stand clear of this thing," he said.

"Ahhh frag, where's the clean room on this ship again? You know what, bad idea, I'll dump it outside the ship," Hook said hurriedly.

"What's gotten into your processor?" Skyquake said, in awe of the crane's newfound sense of urgency.

Hook glared indignantly to those in the medbay, then remembered that he hadn't even pointed it out yet. "What's gotten into me? That's what." he said, as he quickly paced over to the semi-frosted pod, and pointed to a very brightly colored hazmat symbol, the words "DANGER: SCRAPLETS" written in Cybertronian next to it.

The now deathly silent room suddenly felt as though it had dropped 20 degrees.

"Dear Primus…" Knockout said, agasp.

"Only just noticed it myself, must of been hidden under the ice. And look," he continued, tapping on the container's hatch, "the glass is broken. We gotta get these things outta here, now!"

Using his powerful crane, Hook quickly got a hold of the pod, however struggling due to this being more than a one-bot job, and hurried out of the medbay, screaming to anyone that he saw to clear the way.

. . . . .

Walking down the halls of the Nemesis towards the medbay, where Megatron had asked them to meet with him, Barricade and Airachnid were having a nice chat about the recent going-ons of their rag-tag group of heroes, and Airachnid had just been talking about the certain someone she ran into her first night guarding Jack.

"No way." Barricade said, in a joking manner.

"Yes way, 'Cade. Jack really is June's kid." Airachnid said, almost disbelieving it herself a little.

"Ha ha, isn't it funny how the universe works like that sometimes. And you say you talked with her? How's she doing after all these years?"

"Well… she talked to me, but I just stayed in my alt-mode and said nothing."

"So then, does Jack know he's a second generation 'con kid?"

Airachnid gave a laugh at this, "You know that's a silly name to call our charges. And no, he doesn't know. Not yet at least." she said, as they continued walking on.

Before Airachnid could continue, they heard yelling coming from the direction they were heading. Sure enough, rounding the corner at speed, Hook was in his alternate mode with the large pod that had been found in the Arctic.

"Move it or lose it!" he yelled, as he zoomed right past the two warriors, both of them managing to get out of the way before they were run down by the seemingly crazed medic. Barricade just stared as he watched him keep on driving, until he was out of sight.

. . . . .

Outside, the rest of the constructicons were gathered due to Hook's hasty comm message, telling them to, "Dig the deepest frag-off hole you can, and far away from everything," and they were certainly not enjoying themselves. The hot midday desert sun beat down on them as they continued to dig, now reaching about the three meter mark on the short notice they had.

That was when Mixmaster looked up, and saw Hook running towards them, a strange metal cylinder still dripping with melted ice dangling from his crane boom, and he showed no sign of slowing down.

"How deep is that hole?" Hook yelled out, still halfway between them and the ship itself.

"Three meters, three and a half maybe." Scavenger yelled back from his big excavator alt-mode, as he dumped another bucket full of dirt into Long Haul's dump truck form.

"Need it deeper need it now!" Hook shouted again, as he finally reached where the rest of his team was digging.

"What's the matter, eh? That a casket with some bot who had Cybonic Plague or somethin'?" Long Haul asked.

"Nope. Worse, much slagging worse. It's Primus forsaken Scraplets."

The impromptu construction site fell dead, only the sound of the last ice chunks falling off and splatting onto the ground pierced the silence.

Without a word, they all sprang back to life, as Scavenger and Scrapper sped up their digging double-time. Mixmaster transformed into his cement mixer, now understanding why he was asked out to a dig site, and started whipping up some of the toughest quick-drying cement he could. The minutes felt like hours, slowly ticking away with greater intensity. Eventually, Hook began to feel something stirring in the pod. Then more movement, and the sound of buzzing.

"Guys… you'd better be-"

"And we are, 7 meters deep in record time. Drop the fragger in." Scrapper cried.

No sooner than the words were spoken, Hook stood over the pit, and released his hold on the capsule, watching as it fell down with a heavy thud.

And with the pod in the hole, Mixmaster backed up to it, and quickly poured in the cement, exactly enough to fill it to the top, completely sealing the scraplets in their tomb.

With the job done, the Constructicons gave out a collective sigh of relief, now knowing that there was no chance of the tiny monsters escaping without any metal to chew through.

"Well then," Hook said, as he sat himself on the dusty ground, "I'd better comm. Megatron, let him know that the situation has been taken care of."

Darkness. That was all he could see, nothing but inky black nothingness. He tried to open his optics, but he was just too drained of energy to do so.

'Where… am I?" he thought to himself, lost within the recesses of his own processor.

Slowly, he began to move, the internal warmth of his spark still the only thing he could feel.

Then he heard it. The faint clicking of metallic limbs, scuttering around close by.

That was when something else took over, as if he was possessed by his millions of years worth of instincts, Skywarp felt a great surge of energy within him, and like lightning he lurched up from his berth, looking around for where that dreaded creature was.

Then he saw the scraplet, mouth wide open, eating through the berth he was laid on. Skywarp, in an act of desperation, leaped off of his berth, hovering in mid-air a few feet off the ground, and raised both arms and let loses a great many null-ray blasts upon the infernal creature. When he was done, the scraplet was long dead, nothing left of it, and the medical berth was in ruins.

Suddenly, bursting in from the main room of the medbay, was Knockout and Megatron.

"What in the Pit is going on in-" was all that Knockout could muster before he laid eyes upon the seeker levitating before him, in shock that Skywarp was of all things glowing, as if his frame had miraculously grown many more bio-lights, but no, that wasn't the case.

Skywarp had a look of embarrassment on his face. "Uhh, sorry about the berth, Doc." he said bashfully, as he descended to land. However, once he did reach the floor, he felt as though he was still flying, as if most of his weight had left his frame.

It was Megatron who stepped towards him first, ever so cautious about this strange phenomena. He reached out to grab a hold of part Skywarp's arm that was affected by the strange purple glow, but found that his hand went right through him. What proved even stranger, was that when Megatron tried to touch a part of Skywarp's chest, it was solid, yes, but his hand still phased into the seeker a little ways.

Skywarp, still confused by such strange events, wasn't sure what to make of the situation. "Oh… oh Pit, that's not good I'm guessing," he said.

A bright flash erupted in the sky over the Earth's moon, as a small bot-sized pod appeared, and began its descent to the surface. Had it not been for the low gravity, the impact from falling such a distance would have surely damaged the teleportation pod greatly.

But Brainstorm wasn't all too focused on that. He instantly remembered the similar arrival he had back in Iacon.

"Ah scrap, not again…"

A/N: Gee, you'd think they would label a container of all-consuming scrap demons.