Chapter One

Foothills of Manganese Mountains

"This is it. This is how I am going to be remembered by."

A tall red, black and white mech thought as he ran into the foothills of Manganese Mountains. A very known mountain range that many if not all inhabitants of Cybertron knew where the deadliest. If not then certainly the early snow seasons would get one caught off guard and certainly unprotected from the harsh winds with no place to seek shelter if one was lost in a storm.

"Make this easier on yourself Brave!" A victorious voice none other than Megatron's could be heard a few kilk away from where the tall handsome brave currently stood.

"I will not let you have this poor defenceless sparkling, Megatron!" The Brave snarls back at the Tyrant.

"Foolish." The gun metal mech spoke as they came face to face before one another. Megatron held a deadly grin, the other back against the mountain side with the foothills of the mountains on either side of him. The only way out was blocked by the Tyrant. "Tell me, young one. What has Optimus Prime been teaching you?"

Green optics narrow at his question. The response was laughable if not gloryest to be honest with himself. Megatron laughs at the glare that was directed at him. "Honorable death, he's taught you, well than." It was a small movement of Megatron's right arm with blad out that caught the well trained optics of the mech standing before himself to react. A arm came up to block the blade from striking the poor helpless sparkling in Kings other arm. A painful cry leaves King as the arm holding up against the blade was giving away into his armor. His armor may not be suitable for physical contact with the blade like Megatron's but the knew the had to guard this poor sparkling from being turned into a killer much like Megatron.

"Foolish to think that you can take me."

"I'm not foolish, Megatron. I'm doing what is right." King snarls throwing his weight into the hold the has to get away from the larger mech the was fighting. "I protect those that can not!" King adds as he drawled his own sword keeping the other at bay with a vast distance.

"Prime has been too soft on you brave."

King growls as he took his sword and made the first move of fending off the Tyrant. Megatron steps back taken aback by the display of his sword skills. But that didn't seem to face Megatron as the was an ex-gladiator had seen many if not every kind of swordsmanship skill in the arenas of being a gladiator. Megatron barked out a laugh at the sight of the Brave fending him off. It seemed that the warlord would have a excellent time playing mind tricks with his enemy.

With the Tyrant laughing at him, King wasn't sure what was going on, to say the truth. All he knew was the sparkling he held was something Megatron wanted, and clearly so did himself, but who was going to be left standing after this fight? Would it be Megatron or himself left standing or worse, would it be him lying on the ground still trying to put up a fight against Megatron before the other sniffed out his last dying breath.

No, that wasn't going to be the case, not if King could hold out a few more klik until Optimus comes. Optimus did say that Megatron was a force that was to be reckoned with, that King didn't believe, until now. Someone had to notice that he hadn't returned to Headquarters. Surely his team would be alerting Optimus about him not being at base yet. Bishop would surely be the on to say anything about their leader not showing up,right?

A sharp burning pain came tearing through the side of King abdomen making the brave come out of this thoughts. "Gah" Knight cries out his sword dropping to the ground before his peds.

Megatron grins watching the wound the had created ooze energon "In pain Brave?" The question was said with snarkiness, no remorse or sympathy for what the other was feeling for pain.

The sparkling in King arm was let go as he lands on his knees feeling his strength being bleed out of him though the deep dash across his white abdomen.

"I won't." The Brave Leader started to speak, arm over the wound to help stop the bleeding, or to at least subside it until he got into contact with the Autobots. "I won't let you walk away from this."

"You're wrong, Brave. I will get away with this, who is the wiser to think that you gotten nearly lost in theses mountains and offlied by a mechanical." Megatron lifted his blade up and was going to slam his arm down into the chest of King, but the other was wise, and not as combat skilled as the Tyrant, nor had nearly the same amount of experience as the other. The Brave had grabbed his sword while he had the other gloating about his victory, by than the gunmetal colored mech was struck by King's sword being impaled straight thought his chest. It was a guess as to where Megatron's spark lays hidden behind his armor. For King it was an unexpected, and unlucky guess that cost him to be in the same boat as the Tyrant.

Megatron looked down than brought him rwby red optics to look into Kings shock, of not in plain horror. "You aim to kill a mech, you aim for their spark!" Megatron bellows at King, the arm that held the blade was reached upwards violently up King's already bleeding abdomen. By now King knew he had lost, if not he at least went down putting up a fight and that his fellow brothers would remember him. With his mind reeling King didn't notice the blade being forcefully removed from his frame, all he felt was the pain and the hard ground meeting up with his helm as he lands forcefully to the mountain ground. Green color optics where dim as King watched helpless on the ground as Meagan stalked his way towards the sparkling he once held. Crys of high pitched whails left the dark blue and seafoam green sparkling.

"Autobots approaching." A slim looking mech with a mask stated to his lord. Megatron was a few feet away from sparkling, and having to make an retreat so suddenly and without the sparkling. King watched as they left leaving him to pounder in his sorrow, and pain. The sparkling was out of reach of his grasp and the sound of rumbling engines off in the distance was a relief. King's optics slowly lost their color, his frame was losing too much blood to keep himself awake any longer, it was best to save it if a wild nitrotiger or whatever wild life was natíve in the Manganese mountain range.

How true that was to King as the orn sun slowly fades away in the side of the mountain. Fog was fast approaching to valley King was stranded in. It was thick as it rolls covering everything in its path with a light covering of drizzles of acid drops on the plants, trees and in this case both King and the sparkling who's whaling subsided to soft hardly heard whimpering of someone to hold it. A shadow of a mechanical slowly descends upon the two as it had heard the loud cry of a youngling lost. If anything it meant that if Carrier was offlined or it was lost,all the better for easy picking when it came to hunting. Hunting in the Manganese Mountains was harsh, only those who fought to survive were the ones that ruled the mountain range and that included a nitrotiger who just so happened to hear the cry of young.

Slowly inching closer and careful to make sure that the cries were not a trap from hunters, the nitrotiger field of vision cleared. Allowing the femme nitrotiger to gaze upon the hoarded scene before her very optics. Taking a closer inspection the nitrotiger walked up the larger frame of a mech who she knew was on his last dying breath before going to the well of Primus. The frame had taken it beating, who ever once possessed the frame would be welcomed by Primus with open arms.

Moving away from the mech's frame the white nitrotiger covers ground before herself and the sparkling to be standing right above the sparkling. She was shocked to see such a young sparkling be torn away from it's Sire so soon, much less have witnessed the gruesome fight with whatever it was that the sparklings Sire was so brutally wounded.

"Take." King spoke spooking the nitrotiger into crouching down an lashed out it's large paw that was armed with deadly claws. "Take him. Please." The Brave Police leader voice rasped as King used the last of his energy to speak to the wild nitrotiger. King watched as the defensive stance of the nitrotiger changed to a more relaxed posture and it's icy blue optics losing its heat to a more softened look to them. What was also a shocker to King was the fact that the wild nitrotiger could understand what was being asked of it.

King had a weak smile before he finally felt his frame shutting down. One by one systems shutting down to be running at minimum function. Said nitrotiger stood where it was for a few klik before it decided to transform now knowing that the older mech was in the early stages for emergency stasis, and systems running on their lowest settings. The white with black tiger knelt down beside the sparkling smiling to the dark blue and seafoam green as she gently stroke the cheek of the sparkling. Disregarded by the femme mechanical was the fact that King had made one last attempt to see what was going on around him.

What he saw was stunning to him, if not the most spark dropping sight that is if King even had a spark. He saw a femme kelt down in front of the sparkling named Ace and as he studied the femme small amount of characteristics of a nitrotiger could be spotted on the femme. For instance, the helm of the femme held more feminine structure as the top and bottom portion of the nitrotigers jaw made up her helm, from there the helm of the form of the nitrotiger optics stood out as they were dark, yet held the same icy blue tone to them as they did in the mechanical optics of said femme. The ears, they had King stumped for a few seconds before he realized that the white dots on the back side of the ear where there for the young to follow their Carrier in the dark. Trailing down the backside of the femme nitrotiger that King said to take the sparkling could see the tail of the mechanical flicking the very end of her tail.

"Ace." King spoke once more watching the femme nitrotiger give an unsettling look towards him before it was gone. "King." The mech moves his large black servo to his wounds.

Having the mech speaking to her caused the femme to freeze. She ponder on if she should risk the chance of speaking with this mech, but the chances out weighted to the fact that he was hurt and the sparkling was needing someone to care for it.

"Lighting." She said giving him a look of certainty. "You're in need of rest. He'll be taken good care of with myself to guide him. Two mechs are approaching, I must leave" Lighting said in very fluently in English to King as she knew he would understand her words rather than speaking to him in Cyberglyphics that she was sure he wouldn't understand.

King nods and finally shuts down completely in stasis. The last thing he saw was Ace, and a very loud noise that sounded like a cross between a grunt and woof.

"Arrrwoof!" Lighting made the noise knowing that one if not two approaching Autobots would surely know where to come looking. Again the femme nitrotiger does it again, before she finally hears the words 'over here!' in the distance. It was time for the big nitrotiger to make her leave. She did not want to be near or pinned down by Autobots, even though both sides deemed it unethical to pouch any form of mechanical, that is why they set aside the mountain range of Manganese for wild mechanicals to see safety.

Snatching the young sparkling named Ace by his scruff with her teeth the femme nitrotiger makes the long and trenches descend down the small cliff like hill that she had stumbled the two just only a few kilks ago. By the time Lighting reached the bottom of the valley she could easily make out voices, and see what was happening, even though a mech could not see though the acid mist didn't mean that mechanical like herself couldn't. She sees a small silver mech catching up with a much smaller younger yellow colored mech who was waiting for the other.

"It looks bad." Bumblebee spoke looking doesn't look down at King as Jazz scanned the area for any wild mechanicals near the area.

"Ratch's on his way, we need to keep him stable enough that he doesn't completely shut down in stasis. "Jazz goes over to the other side, helping Bumblebee roll King to his back.

"You don't think a wild mechanical would do this?"

"No, I don't. But I did notice tracks of a wild nitrotiger leading up to this unfoucanite mech. Whatever this mech had something wanted it and they wanted it no matter what."

"What in Primus name did you two drag me clear out." Ratchet started in one his ranting when his trained medical optics caught sight of Kings from. "Primus! Why didn't you two get me sooner! I am going to need to take him back to base. I cannot work on his wounds out here."

"Very well Ratchet, we'll help carry the mech to the ship." Bumblebee chipped in.

"Alert Prime of this. I have a feeling that this is just a part of something larger."