He's walking down main street, the sun beaming warmly down on his face. It's an utterly average day. He's just finished his shift at the library, and his brother's linked, Arial, is walking with him, trying to convince him to come out tonight. There's a new bar, she promises, you'll love it, she swears, it's so-

He never finds out what it 'so' is, because the street explodes.

Even now- vorns later-no matter how many times he hears it from others or watches the video stream, his memory is still in fragments.

The mech sprawled out in front of him, his dark optics staring at nothing.

The femme snapped in two, her silver frame splattered in sticky blue

A scrap of a disposable pad floating to the ground, a cry for equality ripped to shreds.

He gets up, somehow. He aches, and half of his face is open and bleeding from where shrapnel caught it. He checks over Arial who-though dazed-is unharmed, somehow.

He turns and sees the Enforcers. A solid line of silver and blue, their frames so shiny they are almost blinding in the sunlight, standing still as a mountain. Now and then someone will stagger over and flash an ID, and they will be ushered away by one, even as another seamlessly takes their place. The wall remains unbroken. Not one breaks ranks to move towards the wounded. They simply stare. There is no help coming from them.

He knows that if he gathered himself enough to limp towards them, he and Arial would simply need to flash their IDs, and they would be sheltered and aided

And then he looks to the injured, the dying, the dead. The ones wailing for help, the ones wailing in pain, the ones who are not wailing at all.

And he stumbles towards them.

With what resources can be scrounged from locals running to help, he divides volunteers and sends them to work. He bandages wounds. He puts out fires. He sits with the dying and holds their servo as they slip away into The Well.

Every now and then someone will look at him and double take, their optics bright and mouths slack. He's not sure what they see, if they see anything at all or if it's just shock hitting them, but he whispers kind words to the injured and gentle orders to those helping.

Each of them nod, still appearing awestruck, and do as they are asked.

He is finally reunited with Arial much later, when the wounded and dead have been whisked to medical and what remains is clean up. The media had shown up half a joorafter the blast, and then their numbers doubled, then tripled, then swelled into the screaming crowd that's standing here now. They can't get past the line of Enforcers who, as he looks at them for the first time since he stood up, now look uneasy. The media still tries to push past them, frantic, holovid recorders flashing and snapping incessantly.

He has a vivid thought at how strange it is. There have been attacks like this before, some even worse. And the media had been all over it of course, but nowhere near the frenzy they are in now.

He turns to Arial to remark on how strange it is and she gasps, one hand flying to her mouth, the other over her spark.

Orion, she chokes, oh primus bless.

She's staring at his cheekplate, the one ripped raw. It only now occurs to him it hasn't hurt in joors. He turns and finds his reflection in one of the windows that survived the blast. His frame is dented, covered in dirt and Energon. He steps closer, and he sees it.

He lifts his servo and touches his cheekplate. He rubs it. It does not rub off.

He drops his servo and turns back to Arial, finally facing the media head on.

That's the image they splash on every stream everywhere on every screen.

Him, standing on a pile of rubble that's still smouldering, surrounded by mechs and femmes and neutrals staring up at him in awe.

And the prime glyph burned into his cheek.

The hanger buzzed with activity as bots and humans paced through their daily tasks. There's a rhythm in their movements; they almost dance as they cross the room. A cybertronian moved to speak to another, their optics on the datapads in their serovs even as they sidestepped the human carrying a PADD over to a holo. Another weaved around their pede as they jotted notes on the clipboard in their hand. A holo swerved around another's desk, scooping up a sparkling as another cybertrononian steps over both of them.

To those in the know, it looks like a wonderful blend of races, moving together in harmony. It speaks of the level of comfort they have with each other, of a shared future.

To those on the outside…it kinda looks like the humans are all batshit insane to be walking around with their heads buried in books around giant alien robots and oh my god please look up you are going to get squished.

The agent hovering at the door shared the second opinion.

He glanced again at the clipboard in his hand, and then around the room. His unease around the mix of humans and aliens was obvious in every part in him; in the way he shifted on his feet; in the way his eyes darted from human to holo, as if he was trying to figure out which one was the alien; and in the way he eyed the looming cybertronians with unbridled fear.

Mikaela had to fight to keep her eyes from rolling, and not for the first time, several cybertronians eyed her and the rangers with appreciation. They had all heard of how they had been introduced to their war, and it the ease in which they had taken it was admirable at least, and attractive to many.

This agent had been on the base for months, and yet he still looked like he expected to be stepped on any second. The agent glanced at his clipboard again, more to psych himself up than actually check the information, and then forced himself to clear his throat.

"Uh. I. Have a…package? I guess?" He flushed in embarrassment as several heads turned to stare at him. 'Is calling it a car offensive to them?' "A request was fulfilled and it's waiting outside if they um. Want to uh. Sign."

"What is it?" Will called from where he was waist deep in the internal wirings of Ironhide's canon, his chosen's holo sitting beside him and holding him steady by his beltloops while flicking through a datapad.

"It's a car?" Seeing the looks exchanged, he forced himself to keep talking. If he kept talking, they wouldn't shoot him, right? "But not like the usual ones. It's a beat-up piece of crap."

Barricade and Fig shared a glance, then the spy shrugged and called "who ordered it?"

'Sideswipe, maybe?' he wondered. 'He has started to really get into human classics…'

"Um, it's a… Samuel wit…wick…y?" the agent sounded out, the odd feeling that he had forgotten something tugging in the back of his mind.

When no one came forward to claim the package or left to get Samuel, he looked up and was faced with a tableau. Bar the whirling of cooling fans and distant shouts from soldiers moving outside, not a sound could be heard in the hanger. Every human, holo and cybertronian seemed to be holding their breath and intake. No one dared look at the two blondes staring at their laptops, the brunette frozen by her notes, or the dark haired holo at the desk in the corner.

It felt like hours passed before Miles stood up. His laptop snapping shut, and his footsteps across the hanger floor echoed and bounced off the vaulted ceiling.

"I-"

His voice cracked, and he squeezed his eyes shut for a moment before clearing his throat and starting again.

"I'll sign for it."

His signature was messier than usual as his hand shook. The agent pulled the clipboard back as quickly as he could without appearing rude and hurried out of there, shouting out an affirmative to the agent waiting in the tow truck by the cybertronian entrance.

Those in the hanger watched numbly as the tow-truck swung around and backed in, and a car that did seem to earn the name 'piece of crap' was quickly unloaded and placed in an unused corner by the doors. The agents hurried back out of the hanger as soon as they could, as if they had wolves nipping at their heels.

The hanger's eyes were on the crippled Dodge Spirit, more rusted orange than royal blue. There was nothing alien about it, no cybertronian life signs echoing out from the silent wreck. In fact, the most extraordinary thing about the car was that the doors hadn't fallen off from the years of rust nibbling away.

"I remember that car." Mikaela's voice broke the silence, and suddenly no one could look each other in the eye. "It was in your garage, wasn't it?"

Miles nodded. "It was Ron and…his pet project." He murmured, his hand gently rested on the hood. "They found it in some scrapyard and he…he thought it looked sad."

His laugh was wet. In the corner, someone exhaled shakily. No one had the courage to look over.

"Ron promised he would teach him how to fix it up. When I went over on weekends, we used to sit there for hours, passing him screwdrivers and bolts. And when we…got back, he always tried to…continue. But he uh. He never really got further than sitting on the hood. I guess it…it just hurt. It hurt too much."

Bumblebee leaned into Miles' side, intertwining their fingers gently. Miles squeezed his hand in a silent thank you.

"He paid someone to keep it when we moved on base. Didn't want it taking up room. And then after. After Egypt..." Miles shrugged. "He said he wanted to try again. He'd been bitchin' about how the brass were putting up a fight, how they wanted to take it apart and put it back together before they'd let it on base, and how they told him they could just get him a new one. He didn't want a new one. He wanted the one he worked on with his dad."

"And now it's here. And he-he's-" Miles cut short, staring at a rust spot until the orange and blue blurred together.

"It will be here for him." Ironhide rumbled, not lifting his eyes from the car. "When we bring him home."

The chair in the corner overturned with a crash, and the door that lead to the holos' and humans' apartments slammed shut. Arial waited only a moment before pressing a kiss against Dew's helm and hurried after the devastated Prime.

There's something in their energon

It's messy, written by a man running out of time. A hurried, final scrawl, desperate to give as much information as possible in the precious seconds he had left.

Ratchet removed his glasses and closed his eyes, rubbing at his forehead. Elsewhere on the page, nanites was underlined, and in the margins, there are cybertronian equations scribbled.

There are still gaps in the picture; disjointed sentences and calculations that must have come to him in visions or dreams drift aimlessly in the idea Sam was pulling together. They float, isolated like the stars in the sky, just waiting for someone to draw connections and create constellations.
But at the moment they are nothing, just little pinpricks of possibility.

The scans of Decepticon and Autobot energon samples reveal that they are identical. If there was something in their energon that was turning them against their brothers, and causing the Autobots to hesitate when attacking one enemy but jumping to fight another, then surely something would show up? Some oddity, some peculiarity that surely should be obvious. If this difference as enough to quite literally make brother kill brother, then surely there should be a giant glowing neon arrow, and perhaps a few nanites jumping up and down with colourful banners shouting 'Here it is! This is what is making your friends want to kill you!'

And yet, nothing.

No matter how many times Ratchet studied and experimented over the last four months, no sign of this mysterious thing in the Decepticons' energon which would turn them into blood thirsty monsters had ever appeared.

He leaned back in the desk chair and absently pushed his foot off the ground and let himself spin. Sam's lab spun around him, the clinical white walls and dark computer monitors flashing in a black-white-black-white blur. When the chair finally slowed to a stop, he was left staring at the photograph framed on Sam's desk.

Orion holds Terra and Quickfire in the palm of his servo, his optics bright as the two look up at him, awestruck as he tells them a story of their home world. In the frame there is a skinny strip of photos tucked-Orion and Sam in a photobooth: grinning at the camera; sticking out their tongues; Sam kissing Orion's cheek.

They were caught in a moment of peace. A brief interlude from the war.

They both looked so young, and so utterly happy.

Ratchet turned the frame face-down.

Blood dripped from his nose. That wasn't any cause for concern, or any sort of shock. His nose was now more likely to bleed than not. True, it had been a few hours since the last shock of fire cracked from its tip to the back of his skull, and the blood had slowed and congealed hours ago. Still, a little nosebleed was hardly high on his list of worries.

The stabbing in his chest every time he took a breath? The feeling like he couldn't hold his breath, or inhale anything but short shallow gasps? Yes, that was much higher on the list. Knowing his luck, he had pierced a lung. Again.

At the very least a few ribs were broken, maybe even splintered. It at least had bought him a little bit of peace. Some people would argue that an hour alone in severe pain, was no better than an hour surrounded by people causing you moderate pain. Those people had never been tortured. It's much easier to deal with pain alone. At least then you can flinch.

He rolled his head to the side and groaned as something pulled taunt and split. Yes, that's exactly what he needed. Another open wound for dirt or-

The door slammed open, and for a moment all he could see was shocking, agonising white. And then the water hit him with a slap, and he smelled the vinegar just as every open wound screamed in unison.

His back bowed as he arched, and as hard as he tried, he could not keep the scream behind his clenched teeth.

Two shadows stood, silhouettes against the light. The one on the right laughed. The one on the left said nothing, but their head turned slightly, and their feet shuffled. Their shoulders were slouched inwards and they were turned towards the other, looking to them for guidance. They were a new hire, or at least new to this job.

He felt a momentary pang of disappointment. The other shadow had been replaced. They had been...kind. Well. Kinder. They had given him actual water to drink and held the cup to his lips. The other would throw it around him and he'd have to try and chase the droplets running down his face and arms with his tongue, much their amusement. And that was when they were being nice. Sometimes they'd offer him a glass, only for it to be filled with salt water. After a particularly useless interrogation, when his nose had been smashed to pulp, they had offered a glass filled with bleach. When he tried to turn away, they held him still and forced it down his throat. It took days to recover, and the smell of chlorine still caused him to gag.

The two shadows straightened to attention, and they quickly left their post as two more entered the room. The dim lights above his head spluttered before they finally flickered on and began their persistent buzz. As usual, his vision returned in splotches, but he didn't need it to know who was standing in front of him.

His looked between them. His uncle's suit was impeccable as usual, with not a perfectly combed hair out of place.

But something was off. He shifted just a touch more than usual. His eyes flicked down, and his wrist twisted a little in response. Strangely, he seemed...impatient, almost.

For an average person, impatience was expected. For Tom Banachek, it was very unsettling. Things happened exactly how and exactly when he wanted them to. For him to visibly appear ruffled suggested something strange had happened.

His theory was bolstered the second Tom opened his mouth. Usually, he started off honey smooth, as if every single day was a new day, and this could be the interrogation where he broke. That smoothness would wear away as the session went on, until he was clipped and cold as he left.

Today, he seemed to have skipped right to the end.

He didn't bother with platitudes. Didn't even try bargaining. He just lunged for the jugular.

"The NBE base; the NBEs' numbers; and everything you know about them."

It was the three questions they had asked him when they first dragged him into a cell and tied his wrists to the ceiling. It would be the three questions they would ask before he died. In the beginning, he had raged back, and called them every colourful word in the dictionary. Later, he had snarked, telling them the Autobots were all driving around in Mini Coopers and that they were allergic to the colour green.

Now, he simply stared. There was a spot on the door opposite him, a tiny chip that showed the brown wood under the red paint.

His head snapped to the side before he even realised Fault Line had hit him. He barely had time to turn his head back when the Elite lashed out again, and again and again until there's blood in his eyes, his mouth, his nose, and he's choking, drowning in red and copper.

The strikes to his face were followed by jabs to his chest that pushed the breath from his lungs, over and over and over and finally whatever stubbornness that held his ribs together snapped and splintered. For a moment, he went limp.

The dark is warm. The dark is safe. Feelings and images and noises come in disjointed flashes. He hears children laugh. A pair of hands cup his cheeks. A man chuckles. A pair of lips kiss his forehead. 'Persevere' a woman whispers.

And then he's just lost in the black. He feels the edge of his consciousness and reaches out, even as it slips out of his hands like water. He has to fight against the dark current hauling him back, the awareness consciousness brings just out of reach as he strains towards it.

He comes back.

The only sound in the room were his cracking inhales, his rasping exhales, and Tom's foot tapping. He is so very impatient today.

He finally managed to lift his head again. He can only squint out of his eye now. Tom and Fault Line are reduced to two tall blurs; two smudges of charcoal wrapped in their dark cloaks.

He doesn't know what Tom seen in his gaze, but the Director nodded.

He will not break today.

"Move him", he barked at Fault Line, and he turned on his heel and stormed out.

He took a breath and held it as Fault line unsheathed his dagger with one hand, and grabbed the waistband of the filthy sweatpants he's dressed in with the other.

A bitter little voice in the back of his head snarled at the sight of the dagger. The weapon he used to protect and fight, now turned on him. It twisted his gut, and the first chance he had he was putting it through Jason's throat.

Fault Line yanked the sweatpants off and grabbed his knee, uncaring of his pained grunt. He wrenched it outwards, the bone grinding painfully in its socket, and eyed the inside of his thigh critically; the skin had gradually toughened there after so much abuse.

Then, the Elite shrugged, and the dagger sliced down. The artery was nearly severed, and blood exploded outwards, soaking Fault Line's legs and the floor in half a second. A second later and the pain knocked him back into the dark.

Fault Line waited as the blood drained out of his thigh, rushing across the floor. He stood like a child on the shore, watching the waves curl and crash, and the sea rushing up the beach. The crimson waves echoed it, racing outward, crashing and lapping against his shoes.

After another minute, he reached out and touched the hanging man's skin. Cold, clammy, and the pulse fluttering like a captured bird who had just slammed into a window. He removed what looked like a marble from his pocket, and with casual indifference, flicked it onto the gruesome wound. The marble stuck, sunk, and shot out a substance that looked eerily similar to a spiderweb. The bleeding from the wound ceased almost instantly, and by the time the last drop had ran down his leg and splashed into the stagnate pool below him, he was stable enough for travel.

They'd move him, drop him in medical, give the doctors there a few days to patch him up enough so he doesn't shatter and leak messily when they ask him a question, and then get right back to where they left off.

He tapped his PADD and moments later two of his people were in the room, walking through the blood with blank faces and practised movement. They uncuffed him from where he hanged and carried him out of his home of the last three weeks.

Fault line surveyed the cell, and finally decided on the nice blank wall directly opposite the door. Then he bent, dipped his fingers in the copper paint at his feet, and began to write.