Today, the only ones who were currently in the Autobot base were Willow, Bulkhead and Ratchet as everyone else was busy with their own things. While Ratchet was busy working at the main console, Willow and Bulkhead were watching a roller derby match on the hangout platform's TV as the team in red managed to score enough points to win, causing them both to cheer happily.
"Yes! They're the winners!" Willow stated in cheerfulness.
"Nice!" Bulkhead remarked.
"Give it up for today's winners, the Red Wheelers!" The announcer stated enthusiastically, which Ratchet heard from his position.
"Would you mind lowering the volume?" Ratchet asked, slightly annoyed.
"Hey, Ratch, check out the roller derby game Willow took me to, last week." Bulkhead said.
"I even managed to get a few pictures on my Scroll." Willow added, pulling out her magical device.
"Two teams of humans tackling each other around a large circle while wearing wheels on their feat?" Ratchet questioned. "I have no idea why humans would call that entertainment."
"It's just like Flyer Derby, which is much better in my opinion." Willow commented.
"Yeah!" Bulkhead said in agreement.
"You could be helping Optimus in the field, right now." Ratchet told the muscular Wrecker.
"Aw, he doesn't my help to search for some ancient educational thing-a-ma-bob." Bulkhead replied.
"The 'thing-a-ma-bob' to which you refer happens to be a Cybertronian Data Cylinder." Ratchet answered before pressing on the main console, causing the TV channel to switch to a schematic of the cylinder.
"Hey!" Willow exclaimed annoyingly as Bulkhead groaned.
"And there is no telling what vast intelligence it may hold. During the Golden Age, dozens of these cylinders were created, each containing the sum total of Cybertronian knowledge of any given subject. Stellar cartography, medicine, ancient mythology." Ratchet explained as he displayed a few more cylinders on the main console. "When the war broke out, the cylinders were hidden throughout the galaxies to keep them as far as possible from Decepticon reach. Detecting one signal here on Earth is the opportunity of a-"
"Ugh! TMI, Ratchet." Willow said with a groan, earning a confused expression from the Autobot medic. "Luz says it's short for 'Too much information' a few days ago."
"Switch it back, I wanna see the hoedown showdown!" Bulkhead stated.
But just then, Ratchet started getting a call from Optimus and he answered it before hearing some fighting noises on the other side.
"Ratchet, Decepticon ambush!" Optimus stated. "The cylinder is at risk! We require backup!"
Hearing this got Bulkhead filled with enthusiasm as he stood up to get mission ready.
"Backup's what I'm built for." Bulkhead said as he crushed his fists together and rushed towards the activated Ground Bridge.
"Go show those Cons what you're made of, Bulk!" Willow called out encouragingly.
Once Bulkhead had made it into the Ground Bridge, Ratchet walked up to Willow.
"I have an important mission for you too, Willow." Ratchet told her.
"Really? What is it?" Willow asked before Ratchet suddenly handed her a mop, causing the Plant witch girl to groan in disappointment.
She took the mop and began cleaning up the hangout platform with it while Ratchet returned to the main console. But when Willow saw that the Ground Bridge was still open, she came up with an idea she wasn't totally okay with.
"Okay, I'm thinking about doing something that Gus normal does. But still, it's better than just moping an entire room built to contain alien robots." Willow whispered to herself.
Having made up her mind, Willow dropped the mop and she ran straight down the ladder before going into the Ground Bridge.
With willow
She soon arrived on the other side of the Ground Bridge, but was shocked to find herself in the middle of a battle between the Autobots and Decepticons. Optimus was battling Knock Out, Arcee was fighting Breakdown,drift,Wheeljack was clashing his swords with Wildrider,skyfire,Cliffjumper was busy avoiding some hammer swings from Brawl, and Bumblebee,blurr,hot rod,Bulkhead and Jazz were taking on some Vehicons.
"Okay, maybe I did make a mistake." Willow muttered worriedly.
Just then, Bulkhead uppercutted the Vehicon he was battling and he began stumbling back towards Willow's position, causing the Plant witch girl to immediately run out of the way and take cover behind a boulder. Willow peaked her head out to see Optimus was still battling Knock Out, only for him to then grab the Decepticon doctor and then punch him away.
"Autobots, stand your ground!" Optimus ordered. "The artefact must not fall into enemy hands!"
"We're doing our best, Optimus!" Wheeljack called out, avoiding some blade attacks from Wildrider before kicking him away.
Willow looked ahead to see a mechanical cylinder laying near where she was, obviously meaning it was the Data Cylinder that Ratchet was talking about. After knocking down Breakdown, Arcee began rushing over to the cylinder to grab it first. But then, Knock Out tackled her away and he immediately transformed into his vehicle mode, driving towards the cylinder before transforming again.
"Come to papa." Knock Out said with a smirk, preparing to grab the Data Cylinder.
But before he could, the Decepticon doctor was bashed away by Bulkhead.
"Run to mommy." Bulkhead quipped, only for Breakdown to attack him from behind and grab his head before holding him up.
"Say uncle! SAY IT!" Breakdown ordered.
Brawl suddenly managed to grab Cliffjumper and smashed him into the ground before rushing towards the cylinder.
"It's all mine, now!" Brawl laughed.
Seeing that the brutish Decepticon was gonna grab the cylinder, Willow summoned some vines from underneath his left foot than made him trip up and land on his face while missing the cylinder in the process.
"For a really big brute, he sure is a clumsy Con." Jazz joked with a smile while holding back a Vehicon.
Willow saw that all the Cybertronians were busy fighting each other so she quickly rushed towards the Data Cylinder and got behind it before bringing out her Scroll. She was fortunate that Ratchet was able to make modifications to the base's communication system so that it would be compatible with the Hexside Squad's Scrolls.
"Ratchet, are you there?!" Willow asked hopefully.
"Willow?" Ratchet questioned, sounding quite surprised. "This is an emergency channel. We need to keep it open for the Auto… Wait, where are you?"
"I'm with the thing-a-ma-bob, of course!" Willow stated.
"Thing-a-ma… The Data Cylinder?" Ratchet asked with a shocked tone.
"Yes!" Willow called out. "Can you try Bridging it out of here?"
"I'll reactivate arrival coordinates." Ratchet informed.
Willow heard the Ground Bridge appear somewhere and she looked over the cylinder to see it was far away from her position.
"Uh, do you think you could try moving it closer?!" Willow questioned in annoyance.
"Supply coordinates." Ratchet said.
"Uh, fifty yards?" Willow guessed.
"Precise coordinates!" Ratchet stated before Willow yelped in shock by a shot that nearly hit her.
Knowing that she didn't have any other options, Willow attempted to push the Data Cylinder towards the Ground Bridge, but it didn't even budge. The Plant witch girl stopped her pushing attempt and she quickly stepped a few feet back from the cylinder.
"Here goes!" Willow said determinedly before charging at the cylinder for a rough tackle.
But when she made contact, Willow ended up bouncing off the cylinder and it suddenly started to make a weird sound. The red optic device ontop began glowing and some parts of it opened up.
"Wow." Willow gasped in surprise.
The Autobots noticed the red glow that was coming from the cylinder and they turned towards it, including Bulkhead as he was busy fighting Breakdown before laying eyes on his Witch friend.
"Willow?" Bulkhead questioned with a surprised expression.
Willow began shielding her eyes a bit from the red glow as Bulkhead immediately shoved Breakdown away and rushed towards her.
"No!" Bulkhead called out, until Breakdown knocked him down from behind.
The dark-green Wrecker landed right in front of the Data Cylinder and a red beam was shot out of the optic and straight into Bulkhead's forehead. Once the beam had faded away, Bulkhead's optics went out as he groaned weakly.
"Bulk!" Willow said worriedly as she rushed up to her Autobot Guardian.
But then, Knock Out picked up the Data Cylinder and Willow nervously backed away.
"You really took one for the team, Bulkhead. My team." Knock Out said with a smirk.
"Thanks for letting us grab this new gift, Autobots!" Wildrider called out mockingly as another Ground Bridge appeared.
Knock Out, Breakdown, Wildrider and Brawl ran into the Ground Bridge with the Data Cylinder and it closed up while the remaining Vehicons transformed into their air vehicle forms and flew away.
"Well, that sucked." Cliffjumper muttered.
The other Autobots rushed up to Bulkhead as he had recovered and stood back up.
"Bulkhead! Are you…" Optimus began asking.
"I'm fine. Didn't even smart." Bulkhead reassured, making Willow smile in relief.
back at the base
Once Bulkhead and Willow had returned to the base, Ratchet was doing an examination of the dark-green Wrecker to make sure he was okay.
"I helped lose that thing, I wanna help find it. I need to get back in the field with Optimus." Bulkhead said as he tried to stand up, only for Ratchet to stop him.
"Dat dat, you're under my watch now. Optimus' orders." Ratchet told him before going back to the computer. "And running a full scan of your neural net would be a wiser use of your time."
"Come on, Doc. There's nothing up there to scan." Bulkhead scoffed as he tore off a cable connected to his head.
"He seems okay to me, Ratchet." Willow agreed, causing the Autobot medic to groan in defeat.
"Well, if you insist of making yourself useful, you can help Willow tidy up." Ratchet said as he held the mop in his hand again, handing it to Bulkhead.
"Really? He acts like he owns the place whenever Optimus is gone." Willow muttered in complaint.
"Hehehehe, that's Ratchet. No vector squared, alright." Bulkhead replied while twirling the mop in his fingers.
"Wait, what?" Willow asked, a little surprised by what he just said.
"Hey, have we got any paint around here?" Bulkhead questioned.
"You wanna do some art? I like that idea." Willow said.
Meanwhile on the Nemesis,
Knock Out, Breakdown, Wildrider and Brawl were presenting the Data Cylinder to Megatron. But their leader wasn't very happy by what they told him.
"What do you mean it's empty?" Megatron asked with an annoyed scowl.
"We mean that there's nothing in it." Brawl answered.
"Knock Out and I searched the entire inside of this thing, but we couldn't find anything that was extremely useful." Wildrider said.
"Lord Megatron, these cylinders are not unlike batteries. The data is stored within them as a form of energy." Knock Out explained as the cylinder's schematics appeared on the computer. "It scanned fully charged, that's how we located it to begin with. But now…"
The Decepticon doctor pressed on the cylinder and it's top optic opened up, only to spew up nothing but sparks and smoke.
"Dead battery." Breakdown finished.
"Did you drop it, you big oath?" Megatron questioned rhetorically.
"No, master. I wasn't gonna touch the thing after it put the zap on Bulkhead." Breakdown answered.
"Wait, do you think…" Wildrider asked, starting to realise what happened to the data.
"I know. And I must find out what that vessel contained." Megatron said. "When it comes to the secrets of the ancients, knowledge can be power."
Back at the base
Willow approached Ratchet as he was busy with the computers.
"Seriously, Ratchet. You need to see what Bulk's painting, right now." Willow told him.
"Yes. I'm sure one hasn't truly lived until one is beheld Bulkhead's take on 'still life with lug nuts'." Ratchet said sarcastically as he followed Willow to the other side of the base.
"See? It's some of the weirdest art I've ever looked at." Willow admitted, pointing at Bulkhead as he was mumbling some weird words.
"The differential of 1/3 cubed is RDRR." Bulkhead said, painting a strange symbol on the wall.
"That is not art. It's science." Ratchet whispered in amazement.
later
After Ratchet had called the other Autobots back to base, Bulkhead was seen laying on a medical table as some weird energy patterns were shown to be inside his brain on a screen.
"This hotspot you see here, it's information. Data. Living energy." Ratchet explained.
"Wait, this data stuff is actually alive and it's living inside Bulkhead's brain?" Willow asked in disbelief.
"Chill, Willow. The data's only inhabiting a fraction of my brain." Bulkhead assured. "Infinitesimal by standard neural net densities. Wait, how do I know all that?"
"Based on what we witnessed during our skirmish, the living data must have been programmed to eject when it sensed unauthorised access." Optimus theorised.
"A security measure." Ratchet added.
"It would have jettisoned heavenward, lost to the stars." Optimus said.
"Except Bulk's fat engine block got in the way." Wheeljack quipped with a chuckle, patting his fellow Wrecker on the shoulder.
"Every Con there made a grab for it. But the cylinder doesn't go off until Willow touches it?" Arcee asked.
"The cylinders originated from Cybertron's Golden Age, predating the Autobot-Decepticon division." Ratchet explained.
"So it wouldn't consider any native of Cybertron to be a threat." Optimus added.
"Only alien life forms, such as Humans or Witches." Ratchet said, referring to Willow.
"But, what do the symbols that Bulkhead painted mean?" Bumblebee questioned.
"Are we staring at genius or gibberish?" Arcee asked while gesturing to a nearby symbol.
"Maybe both?" Cliffjumper quipped.
"I do not wish to falsely rally anyone's hopes, but these equations appear to be the formula for a Synthetic Energon." Ratchet proclaimed.
"Alright! This is amazing!" Bumblebee cheered.
"We hit the motherload?" Jazz asked with a big smile.
"Willow, do you understand what the means?" Bulkhead asked excitedly.
"…Not exactly." Willow admitted.
"Energon provides our fuel, our ammo, our life force. With the natural stuff in such short supply here on Earth, this could solve a whole lot of problems." Bulkhead explained.
"Such as providing us with the edge we need to turn the tide of this war." Optimus commented.
"Or handing us the key to revitalising Cybertron." Ratchet said with a pleased smile.
"We got the goods, and all Megatron got was an empty bucket." Arcee remarked.
"That's what I call a serious win." Wheeljack added.
"How often do I get to use my noggin to save the day?" Bulkhead asked jokingly.
Later
Bulkhead later seen dipping his mop into a bucket of white paint before he started drawing some more symbols in a metal panel in front of him while muttering some equation stuff.
"Are you nearly done?" Willow asked, feeling a bit bored right now.
"I've gotta admit, it's weird seeing Bulk in brainiac mode." Wheeljack commented as he and the other Bots watched nearby.
"It's definitely something I won't get used to." Bumblebee admitted.
"Took the words right outta my mouth, Bee." Hot rod said in agreement.
Arcee walked towards Bulkhead and grabbed the metal panel before dragging it away with Cliffjumper's help.
"Okay, this is a good time for break." Willow told her Autobot Guardian. "How about we go for a drive in the mountains?"
Unfortunately, Bulkhead went back to painting symbols and muttering science words, causing Willow to groan in disappointment.
"We've got another round for you to log, Ratchet." Cliffjumper said as he and Arcee placed the metal panel next to some other ones.
But Ratchet wasn't paying any attention as he and Optimus were busy checking out something important.
"This is Bulkhead's neural net as you saw it earlier." Ratchet said before pressing on the computer's button. "This scan was recorded just minutes ago."
The image of Bulkhead's mind began showing the data spreading all across the inside of his head.
"It is as I feared. The data seems to be actively and aggressively rewriting Bulkhead's neural net." Ratchet explained worriedly. "I had hoped he was purging the data, but he seems to be merely transcribing it as it…"
"Consumes his mind." Optimus finished.
"From all indications, by the time Bulkhead completes the formula, his own thoughts, his memories… could be wiped clean." Ratchet said as the other Bots overheard him.
"But if we stop him, goodbye Synthetic Energon." Arcee reminded.
"You assume we possess a means of stopping him. I don't exactly have instant access to the wisdom of the ancients." Ratchet admitted.
"I will not allow another one of our own to be sacrificed, no matter the cost." Optimus declared.
"So, how do we get Bulk back to his old self?" Wheeljack asked.
"If the living data transmitted itself from the cylinder, perhaps we could somehow coax it back inside." Ratchet suggested.
"How are we supposed to get it back from the Decepticons?" Arcee questioned.
"Megatron will bring it to us." Optimus answered.
later.
When Optimus and the other Autobots left the base, Bulkhead was continuing to paint the symbol formula for the Synthetic Energon. Willow then walked onto the platform with a tablet in her hands as Bulkhead muttered something that involved the word amplified.
"I'll show you amplified." Willow said, switching the tablet on and going on a music app.
"Proving Perceptor's Paradox is nothing of the kind." Bulkhead said to himself.
When Willow placed the volume on maximum, she played a rock and roll song on the tablet that was loud enough for Bulkhead to drop the mop and clench his head in pain.
"What is that?!" Bulkhead questioned.
"Rock and roll. It's your favourite type of music." Willow reminded.
"I'm trying to concentrate." Bulkhead said firmly.
"Ugh! You're starting to sound like Ratchet, now." Willow said in complaint.
"Who?" Bulkhead asked, showing a confused expression.
Willow became worried when she heard this and quickly made her way towards Ratchet, who was walking at a monitor.
"Ratchet, I think Bulk's starting to lose his mind." Willow told him as Ratchet stayed silent in response, causing her to realise something. "You… already knew."
"Willow, we didn't want to frighten you. But rest assured, Optimus has a plan." Ratchet assured.
"Optimus isn't Bulkhead's doctor." Willow replied. "I just need to know, once Bulkhead's finished writing down that formula, he'll go back to being himself, right?"
Ratchet didn't say anything, causing Willow to become even more concerned as she closes her eyes.
on the nemesis
Megatron was standing on the bridge of the Nemesis before Knock Out, Breakdown, Wildrider and Brawl approached him.
"Lord Megatron, we've detected a familiar energy profile." Knock Out informed.
"The data?" Megatron asked.
"Bulkhead must have left the shielded radius of their base." Knock Out said. "Breakdown, Wildrider, Brawl and I will-"
"Fail me, again?" Megatron interrupted, not taking any chances this time.
with megatron
The Decepticon leader and a squadron of Vehicons soon arrived at a stone canyon in the middle of the night and they transformed, landing straight into the hole. But what they found wasn't Bulkhead.
"Optimus. You're certainly not the Autobot I expected to find here." Megatron said to his life-long foe. "But let me guess, you rigged a transponder to mimic the frequency of the data I seek."
"Megatron, I have a proposal." Optimus told him as the other Autobots stood by him.
The Vehicons aimed their weapons at Team Prime, only for Megatron to have them stand down.
"I'm… listening." Megatron said.
"Surrender the cylinder and I will return it to you fully charged." Optimus offered.
"This trinket, right here?" Megatron questioned, revealing the cylinder in his hand. "And pray tell, what trifles did it hold that you are so anxious to give away?"
"Accept my terms and you will find out." Optimus replied as both leaders stared each other down for a bit.
Meanwhile
Willow was trying to get Bulkhead to remember who he is.
"Do you remember when Seaspray fired his last torpedo into the primary heat exchanger?" Willow asked.
"Who?" Bulkhead questioned.
"Seaspray! You're best friend." Willow replied as she showed him the photo she took when the aquatic Wrecker came to visit on her Scroll. "Besides me and Wheeljack, of course."
Bulkhead only lowered his head and continued to paint more symbols.
"Do you even know who I am?" Willow asked with a depressed expression.
"Of course. You're…" Bulkhead said, only for him to pause for a couple of second and then go back to painting more symbols while muttering the equations.
All Willow could do was lower her head in sadness as Bulkhead was finished painting the next symbol, allowing Ratchet to grab it.
"Keep them coming, Bulkhead." Ratchet said before leaving.
Willow watched the Autobot medic leave before an idea came into her mind. She approached a nearby keyboard and typed on it before the Ground Bridge turned on. The Plant witch girl then snatched the mop from Bulkhead and rushed towards the Ground Bridge with it.
"Follow me if you wanna finish that formula, Bulk." Willow said.
With team prime.
"Do you accept my proposal?" Optimus asked as the Autobots and Decepticons continued to stare each other off.
Megatron was about to answer, but then he started getting a call on his com-link.
"Lord Megatron." Knock Out called.
"Give me a moment." Megatron said before he walked away to hear Knock Out's call.
"Did you find what you were looking for?" Knock Out asked.
"It's complicated." Megatron answered.
"Well, Breakdown, Wildrider, Brawl and I may have located the bogey, fully charged." Knock Out told him.
"Proceed." Megatron instructed interestingly.
"Just one hitch. We don't have the cylinder." Knock Out admitted.
"Then bring me the head of Bulkhead." Megatron ordered with a menacing scowl.
meanwhile
Willow and Bulkhead were seen inside the arena of an outdoor roller derby game as the dark-green Wrecker was still painting some equation symbols.
"Look, you really like roller derby. Remember when you drove me all the way here to see my first match when I missed playing Flyer Derby with my friends back at the Boiling Isles?" Willow asked hopefully.
"Mass times the fusion rate square is constant." Bulkhead muttered while still painting.
"Isn't any of this ringing a bell?" Willow questioned.
"Bell curve? No no no, that wouldn't factor in." Bulkhead said, shaking his head.
"How about a quick race around base with my staff? Telling each other about what we used to do in our previous lives? Playing pranks on polly when she's sleeping on couch ?" Willow asked with a smile, desperate to get her friend back to his senses. "Wouldn't all of that be great?"
Bulkhead didn't reply as he kept on painting the symbols.
"Okay, forget about the past. Starting now, we can make some new memories." Willow told him.
But once again, Bulkhead ignored her and muttered more scientific words while painting the equations on the wall. Willow gained a look of sadness as she felt like Bulkhead would never be the same Autobot she got to meet all those days ago.
"Bulkhead, I know somewhere inside of you will always remember me. And I just want you to know… I'll never forget you." Willow said softly as she approached her Autobot Guardian and hugged his foot.
"Boo hoo! I'm shedding lubricant!" Wildrider's voice called out mockingly as Willow turned to see him, Knock Out, Breakdown and Brawl standing on a nearby edge of the stage.
"Follow me right now, or these guys are going to… steal the formula!" Willow called out to Bulkhead, finally getting his attention.
"My equations!" Bulkhead exclaimed.
He and Willow began to run their way towards the stadium exit.
"Come on, come on!" Willow called out before she summoned two large vines and tossed two nearby parked cars at the Decepticons.
"Incoming!" Brawl stated before he fired two missiles from his tank cannon, making both cars explode.
"Not like Bulkhead to run from a fight." Breakdown admitted before he and his comrades jumped down from their position.
"I'm afraid our friend has had a little too much to think." Knock Out said before he contacted Megatron. "Lord Megatron, we're good."
meanwhile
Megatron nodded in response before he turned his attention back to the Autobots.
"Optimus, upon carful consideration, if you want the cylinder, you'll have to take it." Megatron sneered, allowing the Vehicons to fire their blasters at them.
Optimus, Arcee, Bumblebee,drift,blurr,hot rod,skyfire,Cliffjumper, Wheeljack and Jazz brought out their blasters and began firing at their enemies.
Meanwhile At the same time.
Knock Out, Breakdown, Wildrider and Brawl followed Willow and Bulkhead into a parking lot, where they saw a bunch of trucks and vans in the area.
"I can't tell which is the real Bulkhead." Brawl muttered.
"Okay then, fun and games." Knock Out said before they all started searching the area. "Come out, come out, wherever you are."
"What's wrong, witch? Too scared to face us?" Wildrider questioned tauntingly, pulling out one of his wrist blades.
Willow hid behind Bulkhead as her Autobot Guardian was currently in his vehicle mode. She tried calling Ratchet on her Scroll, but it was not working for some reason.
"Come on, why won't it work?" Willow asked quietly.
"Good thing Soundwave modified this jammer to mess up any magic signals." Wildrider told his allies while holding a device in his hand. "I guess him getting his tailpipe kicked by those tiny fleshlings was a good thing. The experience really taught him a lot."
"Too true." Breakdown agreed with a chuckle, flipping a truck upside to see if Willow was underneath.
"That's really not good." Willow whispered after hearing them.
"If the trisector of the polygon is an integral of the subset." Bulkhead muttered.
"Shh! Just stay here and don't move. I'm going to see if I can get far enough to call for help." Willow told him before walking off.
The Plant witch girl moved between the trucks, but quickly came to a halt when she saw Knock Out approaching her position. Knock Out bent down and looked under two trucks, but couldn't see Willow and stood back up.
"Find anything?" Wildrider asked, approaching the Decepticon doctor.
"Nope." Knock Out answered before they both walked away.
Willow was seen hanging underneath one of the trucks and she jumped down before running ahead to find another hiding spot. Breakdown was busy smashing the front of trucks with his sledgehammer and he spotted a brown van, kneeling down to it.
"Bulkhead! Is that you?" Breakdown asked as he tapped on the front window before smashing it.
Brawl threw away two trucks and he saw that Willow wasn't underneath them, causing him to growl in frustration. But when Willow began running past him from behind, the brutish Decepticon turned around and spotted her before giving chase.
"Hehe. Where do you think you're going, little insect?" Brawl asked maliciously.
Willow immediately ducked under a van and Brawl tossed it away, only to see that the Plant witch girl was gone.
"Brawl, forget the witch." Wildrider told him. "Our real target is Bulkhead."
"Wildrider's right. Besides, games are more fun to play…" Knock Out said before pulling out a scanner and activating a tracker system on it. "When you're winning."
Meanwhile
As Knock Out began following the signal, Willow stopped under one of the vans and she attempted to call Ratchet on her Scroll, only for it to still not work. Knock Out kept on following the scanner's detection signal before he stopped in front of Bulkhead, getting a strong reading.
"I think I'm warm." Knock Out said before Bulkhead suddenly transformed.
"EM3 divided by the square root of the propulsion factor equals." Bulkhead said, drawing a symbol on Knock Out's chest and leaving the Decepticon doctor with a horrified look.
"You… painted my paint job!" Knock Out shouted in anger. "Prepare for surgery!"
Breakdown suddenly charged up to Bulkhead and punched him in the face before Wildrider leaped up and kicked him to the ground. Willow ran out of her hiding spot to see Knock Out moving Bulkhead's head upwards before shifting his hand into a buzz saw blade.
"Heads, you lose." Knock Out said with a smirk, bringing the saw blade to Bulkhead's neck.
"NOOO!" Willow called out.
Meanwhile
Optimus and the other Autobots managed to shoot down the last Vehicons, leaving Megatron alone.
"Well in that case, no one gets it." Megatron said before he crushed the cylinder with his bare hand and dropped it.
The Decepticon leader then transformed and flew away as Optimus looked on.
"Well, this sucked." Jazz sighed in defeat.
"Optimus, Bulkhead and Willow have abandoned base." Ratchet informed on the com-link. "I have their Ground Bridge coordinates."
"Bridge us back, immediately." Optimus ordered.
with Willow
Willow watched in fear as Knock Out moved his buzz saw blade closer to Bulkhead's neck before she steeled her resolve and summoned some vines around her hand, forming a thorny fist with them.
"Stay away from him!" Willow called out before charging at the Decepticons.
However, Knock Out simply moved his foot away and Willow ended up missing before accidentally crashing into Bulkhead's head. This caused a familiar noise to be heard and Bulkhead's eyes opened up, revealing a red glow before they shot out two red energy beams.
"Not again!" Breakdown exclaimed.
"Get down!" Wildrider ordered before he and the other three Cons ducked.
"I did it again?" Willow asked herself.
The red beams soon faded away and Willow approached Bulkhead, who didn't show any signs of being alive.
"Bulkhead?" Willow asked with a worried expression.
Knock Out scanned Bulkhead's mind with the scanner device and saw the results.
"Well?" Brawl questioned.
"Dead battery." Knock Out answered begrudgingly. "Megatron will peel our paint for losing that data."
"So we're gonna have to peel you." Breakdown told Willow with a glare.
Knock Out brought out his buzz saw blade and Wildrider activated his wrist blades, making Willow back away as they prepared to finish her off. But then, a familiar green light appeared behind them and the Cons turned around to see Optimus, Arcee, Bumblebee, Cliffjumper, Wheeljack and Jazz rushing out of their Ground Bridge.
"Or peel out of here." Knock Out said, not wanting to get damaged anymore.
"Fine. We'll get them next time." Brawl muttered before he and his comrades bashed through a wall, transforming and driving away.
Once their enemies were gone, the Autobots turned around to see Willow crying on a motionless Bulkhead's shoulder.
"Bulkhead…" Willow sobbed as the Bots approached them, with Wheeljack having a sad look on his face for seeing his partner's condition.
Back at the base
The Autobots and Willow arrived back at base, where Bulkhead was laying down on a medical table while Ratchet checked his vitals.
"The data has been fully expelled. But Bulkhead remains completely unresponsive." Ratchet said.
"Because the energy took Bulkhead's mind with it. Heavenward, lost to the stars." Willow replied with a sob, remembering Optimus' words from before. "It's my fault that you'll never know the rest of the formula. And it's my fault Bulkhead's gone forever."
"Willow, your quick thinking prevented the formula from falling into Decepticon hands." Optimus reassured.
"If anyone would have backed that play, it's Bulkhead." Arcee added.
"He's always been doing the big risks. That's one of the things I like about him." Wheeljack sighed in depression.
"It's simply too early to know the extent of his condition. Something as simple as a familiar sight, or smell, perhaps even a sound could trigger Bulkhead's awakening." Ratchet explained.
"Like what?" Cliffjumper asked.
After hearing this, Willow remembered something that Bulkhead really enjoyed and it might be the key to waking him up. She got the tablet from earlier and switched to the rock and roll music that Bullhead liked before turning up the volume to maximum. The Plant witch girl then played the music and it sounded off throughout the base before she soon switched it off. Everyone saw that Bulkhead was still not awake and this caused Willow to lower her head, but then the dark-green Wrecker began to open his eyes and groan a bit.
"Bulkhead?" Willow asked, lifting her head up once she heard him.
Once Bulkhead's eyes were fully open, he sat right up and made guitar noises to mimic the music he heard.
"I love that song!" Bulkhead remarked before he spotted his Witch friend. "Willow."
Willow smiled in happiness when Bulkhead said her name, happy to have her Autobot Guardian back to his old self.