Author's note: This story actually takes place during the beginning of "Slivers of Resistance."

Water trickled slowly past his face, ice cold. Once again, he attempted to get up, and a painful hiss escaped his vocalizer like the groaning breath of some wounded and dying beast. Mud oozed between the fingers of his left hand, the stones resting under the curve of his silver cheek, rasping against the metal every time he turned his head to survey how low he had finally fallen.

Brambles, the winding dance of blackberries, the thorns were a thousand talons reaching out to tear his cloak from him. Even the vegetation wanted to rend his shroud, expose him to the elements of this world. Sunstreaker attempted to lever himself up again, feeling his leg twist between the two massive trunks, his right arm pinned in mid transformation. Face down, foot caught and held, his golden form stained with mud and organic debris, he snarled to himself in frustration and exhaustion. He had ripped up gouts of earth in his fury, and as the water trickled by him, the small, clear stream turned into a discolored, fouled wash.

Days.

Each grey morning had faded to wet, cold afternoon, then passed into the dark, lonely black of a clouded evening, and through it, he had struggled like some animal caught in a trap. The mud clinging to the rocks and trees gave clear evidence of his fight for freedom, thrown afar with his thrashing , reddish globs that resembled old, dried blood.

Nights.

He made no noise but the repetitive grind of his transformation attempting to engage. It echoed through the ravine like the sound of teeth on bone; scraping, leeching the energy from him as the seconds ticked by, stretched into fragile minutes and into long, terrible hours. Once, he found himself lurking on the edge of shut down, but then he fought himself back from the welcoming darkness. No, he was the darkness. He was all those seconds and minutes between death and life, the tip of a knife as it punctured plating, the taste of the fuel lapped from a still pounding pump.

The branches stretched above him, clawed hands of twig. He felt like they were trying to call down the sky on him, force him into the dirt and mud; they would apply pressure to his chest until he choked and thrashed again, his pallid blue optics gleaming from under the sodden folds of his black hood. Sunstreaker twisted his head back and forth, his mouth full of mud and grit, and then he spat it from him with a howl that echoed around the ravine; a sound of fury and anger and loss that rolled up from his massive golden chest plate and saturated the air as much as the acrid smell of his own emissions.

A faint rustle slipped though that echo, a sound that didn't come from the wind or the small animals that were afraid to approach. After all these eons, it was like a pistol shot, the sound of metal against stone. Small and insignificant to anyone not listening for it, but he'd been expecting it, waiting for it, dreading it. Sunstreaker's vocalization cut off instantly, snapped back into his systems and he flattened into the mud with a low, shuddering moan.

They had found him.

He somehow expected it sooner than this, and here he was, stuck, one arm partially transformed and useless, half melded into his side, his ankle caught between two thick, close set tree trunks. It was humiliating, and of all the things wrong with this situation - even knowing he was about to be sent back to the Ark - he only wished that he was at least standing on his feet to face them. They would have feared him, then, and he could have watched their laughter fade under the force of his blows before he was brought down, his cloak ripped from his body, used to taunt a pack of vicious wolves. He could imagine it. He had imagined it, for days, the shrieking laughter of Cliffjumper, waving a tatter of cape before Brawn, and the others screaming in delight as they watched. Above him Prime loomed, cold azure optics filled with the flicker of that entity inside of him, the Matrix ready to accept him into eternal torture.

Sunstreaker jerked his head up as much as he was able, levered himself up on his good arm.

He jerked his head up as much as he was able, levered himself up on his good arm.

Trotting silently out of the darkness, angular shimmers of blue slipped out of the sodden pine trees; then in mid-stride, they hesitated, came to a fitful stop. A soft rattle shivered through its framework, then it slunk closer to peer over the edge of the ravine; thoughtfully, it pulled the breeze past its intakes, as if it couldn't quite believe what it was picturing, painted in scent.

Sunstreaker grunted, struggled to pull his leg out of the trees again, attempting to free himself, wrenching back and forth, torn metal sawing at the trunks.

The optics came to the edge, looked down, and he heard the whisper of air again as something drew another breath.

"Who's there?" he challenged the shadows. "Show yourself!!" He jerked back and forth, attempting to wrest himself free again, his damaged transformation circuits filling the muddy ravine with the crunching scrape of metal on metal.

A low, soft growl.

Something crouched there, optics gleaming a deep, terrible cobalt as they took in the situation. Slowly, the gaze turned back and forth. A sliver of moon shattered the clouds, gave him a glimpse of worn grey and scuffed black, a ribbon of silver lightning drawn down on the lean chest plate. No faction symbol marred the metal there, not a splash of bloody red or a touch of soothing lavender; and then he knew what had found him here, tracked the smell of his anguish and suffering to this remote and lonely gash in the earth.

Sunstreaker answered with a deep growl of his own, the sound grating in his chest. This, he was not afraid of. This was merely annoyance, barely a scavenger; a turbo fox coming to nose at the leavings after the bigger beasts had done the hard work of killing.

"You..."

Challenge answered. He was not dead yet.

"Come to laugh? Don't...you dare laugh at me."

No response, just the faint, low, sniffing noise as it seemed to pick out every drop of fuel, every torn line and rendered metal skin. Lightly, it - no, she, for that's what it was, Bluestreak's pet femme - jumped the edge of the ravine, picking a careful path partially down the crumbling sides of the wash to study him. Halfway down, she crouched on her haunches again, apparently waiting for him to give up and never move again as his wounds slowly dripped life back into the horrible organic soup below him.

Then, the growl came again, and in it, words managed to claw their way out past into clipped, rough speech.

"Thought might be dead," Dart said slowly. "Thought wrong. Mistake."

"Come to...correct the mistake, then?"

"Heh. Not think so. Think, already going there. But... had to stop, see."

He struggled again, sunk back to the torn and muddied ground. "And watch, and laugh, and judge," he hissed. "Why not? It's not like I'm not used to it..."

A faint snort of air echoed softly from rock to rock as she looked down at him, spreading her fingertips for balance as she peered down. "No, no. Watch, yes, admit. Watch dangerous things...know they go, less dangerous place after. But not...laugh at death. Never. Am not stupid."

Sunstreaker chuckled, the sound bitter and cold. "After everything I did... you won't even laugh. Or judge, or hate. How very Decepticon of you."

Abruptly, the slanted optics gleamed in the darkness, burning as blue and as cold as a clear winter sky. "Not Decepticon," she told him, and he heard the swallowed growl of warning, there. That in itself meant nothing to him, her warning. But it was something in her scent that gave him pause, a faint wash of fear. Not of him...but of the Decepticons themselves, and that left him confused, that anything would dread anything those cowards could offer. "Not. Not ever Decepticon."

"No?" he asked, turning his head.

"No," she responded, her voice oddly flat, but then she shook herself. Across her narrow shoulders, her spoiler rattled, as if she shuddered off a memory. "But death not something laugh at. Defy. Deny. Not laugh. Know death...odd."

"What's odd?" he found himself asking her.

"Never thought see Death...ask for itself."

"What is that supposed to mean?" he snapped, his dripping hood falling over one optic. "Come down here," he suddenly wheedled softly, his voice changing to all smoke and honey, coaxing her softly as he crooked a fingertip, beckoning to her. It was a voice he'd used a thousand times long ago, the promise of affection, a caress of words that more often than not had led to a femme's fingers stroking down his plating as she followed him back to his expansive home with instant, unrestrained eagerness. "It's so much nicer to talk face to face, don't you think, instead of me shouting up at you like this?"

Dart canted her head, looked down at him with unmistakable bemusement.

"Heh. No. Think just fine here, really."

Sunstreaker managed to twist his head, clenching earth in one fist, wishing he could find a rock to throw at her. He could imagine it slamming into her jaw, sending her tumbling head over heels to land beside him so he could grab her; while she was howled out her fear, he'd snap her neck, rip her own weapon out of her arm and vivisect her with it, spilling cable and wire and fuel into a mechanical gut pile.

His internal workings tightened. He could admit he was ravenous, and he remembered things from their last encounter; a nuzzle along her pale grey throat, brushing his nose back and forth, intakes shuddering in delight as her fuel pump ran high and pattering with unspoken terror. Then, the swift cut, and his mouth fastening hard, sealing over the damage to suck sharply at the wound. The taste of the half-processed fuel pulled from her body had been bitter on his lips; as a connoisseur, he found her flavor tinny and cheap, as befitting a scavenger.

As she twitched, the golden mech had to strive not to bite down, to lock his jaws around her throat and tear it out; let her gurgle out her final moments on earth through a gaping hole. However, it would have been over too quickly, and not given him the reaction he wanted from the silver mech. No, he had drank deep of that foul taste, watched her companion react with horror and utter frustration. That was what drove him farther, to disdainfully lift his head up enough to stare at the silver mech, then turn his attentions back on the thing dangling from his grasp; to sniff and lightly nip at the tiny rip in her plating. Her swallowed yelps of terror had meant nothing; oh, they were enjoyable, of course, as was her thrashing and twisting in his grip, trying to fling herself out of his hands, but....

Truly, it had been Bluestreak's helplessness Sunstreaker had savored. Every damned drop of it, as the lean femme's fuel dribbled down his throat and clotted at the corners of his lips.

This time, though, there was no one here for him to prove his utter control of the situation to. So, he could merely bring her down, bite and tear and slash until her main pump was exposed. Then he would slit it open and feed on her, toss her away, empty and drained. Trash.

She growled, softly, drew herself back.

"Well," he hissed, his voice rough. "Do it, then."

"Do?"

He settled back into the muddied water, pulled his cloak tighter around him with his good arm, as if he could cocoon himself into the drenched fabric and the world around him would fade back into his memories.

"Kill me," he laughed, and she drew back a little at the depth of the vehemence in his voice, looking nervously around as if she expected him to suddenly be able to teleport behind her. "If I don't die here of energon depletion, I'll die when they catch me again, and I do not want to give Lord Prime one shred of me to gloat over, damn him." His fingers clenched and unclenched, and he turned his head slowly from side to side like a blind cobra, his hood flaring out a little, lifted by a sudden flare-up of wind.

She just watched him for a long moment, her optics shining a pale, shattered blue as she slowly drew his scent in, then let it drift back out past her sensors.

"Don't you want it?" he asked her, glaring up.

"Want what?" she questioned, crouching back down again.

Sunstreaker couldn't believe it. Oh, the irony. Here he was, ready to die, and he got her, an idiot who had to think about it? No wonder Lord Prime had made a mockery of the Decepticon forces... that was it, right there.

He laughed, a broken sound. "To... kill...me." he explained carefully to her, word by word, his optics going dim as he choked again, spat up a mouthful of coolant and mud.

Dart inclined her head."Why?"

"I told you why!"

She shifted, made a grinding noise of frustration. "Is not asking tell why. Is asking... why think want... kill you?"

"What are you talking about, you little fool?"

A low, deep growl rumbled up from her again.

"Am not fool. Is not getting closer, notice?"

"Fine, not a fool, just a coward. Do what you should do. Kill an enemy who would kill you if he could stand up. Because if I could stand up, I'd take you apart, bit by blasted bit."

Dart let out a soft huff of air. "Can not stand up though. Difference."

"So you won't kill a defenseless enemy? How noble."

She shrugged. "No no... not noble. Honestly... not think you defenseless. But not question. Ask again. Why want," she said quietly, her hand coming up to slowly point at her chest "...kill you? Not have reason kill you."

"No reason?" he snorted, craning his head to look at her. "I tried to kill you and you...well, whatever Bluestreak is to you."

"Did try. Not do, though."

"I had my priorities. If the humans hadn't... interfered, you would be dead."

"Heh. Humans smart, yes. But... why not?" she pressed him. "Could have."

He glared up at her. "I'm starting to wish I had, at any rate."

Dart actually gave a short bark of a laugh. "Think better next time, then? Next time, run lots faster. See, am not stupid."

"There won't be a next time. One way or another. Whether you do it or they do."

She snapped her head up, sniffed warily, and looked around as if she expected the Autobot army to come suddenly tramping over the edge of the ravine.

"You can understand that, can't you?"

She nodded. "Yes. Understand. But think not reason wants die."

"You think you know my reasons? Oh really," he sneered. "Do tell."

She shrugged, her lean shoulders rose and fell slightly. "Is hurt. Autobots did this. Smell it. Is funny. Hurt own, all time. Maybe why everyone leave," she offered, with a small bark of a laugh. "Soon, all Autobots hide woods. War over."

His jaw worked silently, not sure if she was laughing at him, at all of the Autobots, or excluding him.

"Having fun?" he finally said, scorn dripping from his voice..

"Is funny think about."

"I'm sure it is to you. Look...if you won't do it, then get the traitor here. He'll do it."

Dart stiffened. "Is not traitor. Scraps get tired of, yes?"

Sunstreaker heard her step forward, sliding down just out of range, gauging the distance between them. He could tell she wasn't getting any closer.

"Scraps," he snarled, bristling as he thought of a thousand images, of energon being held out to him as if he were a dog, of lives being thrown before him as though he were some monster that required satiation, of love offered only in exchange for riches. Bitter, face down, he muttered, "Give the freak enough that he remains useful to us..."

Her sharp audio receptors caught his words, and the dark, lean femme canted her head, then dipped her chin in what could have been a nod.

"Yes. Understand that."

"You would," he spat, then softened slightly, face averted. "Why else would you leave the Decepticons? You're obviously not the type to leave just because they're losing. You stay with that -- with Bluestreak, anyway."

"Decepticons lose," she replied with a shrug, ignoring his first question as if it had never been spoken. The second she answered with the air of quiet finality of someone who had thought long and hard on this subject and never found any other answer, even if they had wished it. "Not able fight like Autobots, in the end. One battle because enjoys. Other battle for survival. Live, die. Is choice."

"If that's the one thing left to me, then I'm damn well choosing."

"Is always choice, say."

Sunstreaker looked down, the edge of the cloak falling in front of his pale optics.

The courier edged a step closer, sniffing lightly.

"Is hurt bad."

He tossed his head back. "What gave it away? The fluids pooling under me or the fact that I'm lying face down in this abysmal muck?"

The courier shook her head. "Not body. Voice."

"What is it about me that everyone finds so fascinating that they want to psychoanalyze me to figure out how they can use me?"

"Used enough, think. Like self. Know how is."

He looked up, unsure, and the sodden cloak fell over one optic.

"What do you think you know?

Dart moved a step closer, still giving that air of something ready to bolt; a beast drawn to the light of a fire, but wary of the dangerous spear, knife edge ready to be cast out from within in that ring of warmth.

"Is no place run left, think."

The mech slid that idea around his mind, tried to fathom it, and then he knew with cold clarity what she was trying to say.

"No. I have no place," he snarled at her. More quietly, he added almost to himself, "No place left."

"Yes," she said, quietly, and he realized she could hear him. Her audios were tuned like her olfactory sensors, able to catch a nuance of scent and sound. "Is always same. Not know...if things like you...come, all time."

She whined, softly, and lingered there, hovering like a jackal waiting for a lion to die, her optics slanted and feral in the darkness. He hung his head, that grinding noise from his tortured transformation circuits stopping, the cloak plastered to him so that every angle of his body showed in sharp relief, a squared off shoulder, the sleek and yet massive chest, tapered hips...the things that had won him the adoration of fans now nothing more than something left to rust in the gutters of this organic world.

"Is too valuable for them lose, would think. Is... good at job, no?"

He watched her creep closer, circle him cautiously, just out of range of his grasp.

"Not anymore. I've defied them."

A quick nod. "Defy. Understood that."

"I defy Prime himself. One last moment of fame."

The courier shook her head, and offered up a chuckle, the solid silver sweep of her ponytail nearly brushing the rim of her neck guard. "Not think like being famous for defy. Live in holes. Be chased lots. Not fun."

Sunstreaker's dry laugh expelled itself out of him as he tugged again on his trapped leg. "That's the beauty of it. I'll defy Prime my way. I would even deprive him of the satisfaction of killing me himself."

Dart shook her head slightly.

"Do it. Kill me."

The femme growled, stepped forward smoothly, the tip of her blade extending past her fingertips. Again, she fidgeted just out of range, his extended fingertips merely six inches from her foot. Then she crouched slowly, gave a soft, oddly delicate whine. "Could do."

"But you won't," he stated, flatly.

"No."

"Get out, then."

His stillness broken, he screamed and lunged forward, his face twisted into a ragged, terrible snarl. The noise of linkages snapping in his trapped leg echoed like pistol shots around the ravine. Dart scrambled backwards from him in a abrupt, frantic bound, getting some distance between them before she again sank back down onto her haunches, barely touching down with her fingertips for balance.

"You're a coward," he frothed, coolant bubbling at the corners of his mouth as he pounded his fist into the water, gobbets of ooze from the stream bottom splattering around him with wet, heavy thumps. "You're a blasted coward. Oh yes, I should have killed you, ripped you into bits, scattered you all over the landscape, cut you into ribbons for the humans to nail up over their holes."

Dart inclined her head, watching him writhe with annoying, patient calm, and he screamed again, twisting back and forth, his back arching as he sent sheets of filthy water rising on either side of him; shattered wings made of organic debris, a fallen angel in the slop of reality.

"Killed you slowly!" he hissed, mud drooling across his chin. "I would have made you beg like the cur you are!"

She flinched, drew back, her hand in front of her chest. Slowly, her lip curled, exposing the barest edge of mouthplate, silent warning. Or was it fear? Fear, he decided - something backed into a corner, eyes rolling, searching desperately for escape routes. He enjoyed fear.

Yes...

"Little dog, where's your master? Oh, that's right, as much of a whining coward as you! Hiding. Crawling on his belly. You heard him beg me when I was beating him, didn't you?"

Offended pride gritted through her words. "Did... not... beg."

"Oh, he sounded like it to me. Begging. Pleading. Whimpering. Coward. He must have been taking lessons from you, don't you think?"

The growl ground out from her lean chest, a low, vicious sound that told him he'd touched a nerve. Sunstreaker laughed, a high pitched, wordless rise and fall of sound before he spoke again, driving the knife of his message into her soul; twisting it like he would any dagger, carving it back and forth, seeking to maim, to tear, to goad her into doing what he wanted so the pain would stop.

"Just like me, then," he taunted, scorn lashing from every word. "A monster on a leash, at your master's beck and call. What a good little beast you are. Come here," he coaxed. "What? You won't come to me? Oh, here, I'm doing it wrong, aren't I?"

He lifted his head, and whistled, a lilting mocking trill.

Dart howled, her slanted optics flaring a crystalline, brittle blue, and surged forward. He saw her shake with barely restrained fury, heard her plating rattle as she held herself mere inches from his reach. "Would kill you," she shrieked, her voice cracking and shattering then settling back into her ragged, canine growl. Would kill you dead right here, now! Would hurt you like you hurt him, hurt me!"

"Then do it!" he demanded. "Dammit! Do it!"

She lunged forward, snarling, her optics locked onto the shadowed hollow of his throat.

The rush of motion stopped as suddenly as it began, and Dart dug her heels into the wet earth, sliding back as if she'd struck an invisible barricade.

Sunstreaker had lifted his head, and he'd bared his silver throat ever so slightly... and she just stopped.

"No. Is too close..."

"What's too close? Damn you, you worthless thing, step a little closer and I'll make it all fair, I'll show you what to do. But then you'll be dead, and I won't get what I want. I wish you were blasted easier to teach."

"Red..." he heard her mutter softly as she moved away, crouched down again.

He snarled, his optics going so pale as to be nearly white as his sodden cloak snapped back, water droplets flinging to strike her metal chest plate with sudden, sharp pings. "You won't kill me...because of him!!"

Wrenching forward, he dug his fingers into the earth as if through sheer force of will, he would rip himself finally free from this prison of organic pillars.

"You won't kill me, so you condemn me instead to them!"

She let a long sigh of air pass her intakes, and lowered her head. Her constant, rumbling growl died away, left silence between them, a pause for breath.

"Know... how is, scraps. Only give scraps to... beasts."

He said nothing for a long moment, and the water stilled under him, the mud washing through and the stream running like a clear, pure ribbon of silver as it stole some of the grime from him and returned it to the earth.

"If you won't do it... then go."

Slowly, she raised her head. "Is what want? Die alone, here, then. Not think... last longer. Think self, want die? Thought did, once. Then... realized death not what wanted."

"Kill me or go... just don't stand there and watch."

She rose smoothly to her feet, standing upright fully, shifting her weight back and forth on the tips of her toes.

"Don't laugh at me," he warned her.

"Not laughing at," she told him quietly. "Laugh at self, honest." Slowly, she paced back and forth, just out of range, studying where he was caught, sniffing, drawing in all the scents and the scene.

Sunstreaker wrenched forward again, frustrated..and she looked at him, gave a small, almost concerned smile. "Stop. Is enough."

He stopped, going stock still...the sodden cloak dripping into his optics, and he wiped them with the back of his hand, wondering if he had actually seen that expression...wondering...was it meant for...

Then he heard the rasp of her blade. He looked up in time to see it leave her wrist, the delicate, slender weapon extending past her fingertips as she shifted her weight. He saw it, and his body tightened in response to the offer of death. Now that it was proposed...

Sunstreaker did not want it.

He pulled himself up on one knee, one arm underneath him, crouching, bracing himself, tossing his cloak out of his optics. Saturated with water and mud, the fabric slid back to pool around his shoulders, leaving him brutally and finally exposed. The corners of his lips twisted into a sardonic snarl, his fist clenching.

Dart lowered her shoulders, took one step, two, and then flung herself forward, a grey and sable blur, charging flat out, knife extended. He lunged at her, but his fingers merely furrowed behind her in the mud as she sidestepped him in mid stride. Sunstreaker thought he heard more than felt the terrible rasp of the edge slamming home; strangely, it didn't hurt like he had always remembered, and he wondered how long it would be until...

The courier skidded, spun, shot back past him, and he dimly heard the strike again, the deep, metallic thunk. Then she was standing a few meters in front of him, crouched down again in the ravine. She shook her head once, made a low, soft noise in her chest.

Something gave.

Reflexively, he wrenched, and he heard a crack, and then...release.

The tree folded down to the side of him, the branches cushioning the fall into a silent whisper of leaves. Instantly, instinctually, he turned over, throwing himself aside until his back was pressed against the wall of the ravine, clutching his battered knee joint as his jammed shoulder popped free, gave him the use of both hands as his arm was able to transform.

He looked up, slowly.

Dart's gaze met his from across the divide, then shifted slowly away, looking at the ground. He brought up one hand, grabbed his hood, and pulled it back over his head. Inside the dark shadows from the cloak, blue optics gleamed inscrutable, somewhere between furious and utter confusion.

"You should...go," he told her, finally.

She nodded, edging a few steps away as he dragged himself forward, his fingers clenching and unclenching. Then, she turned and scrambled quickly up to the top of the ravine. He looked around, and forced his way slowly up the other side, hand over hand, methodically, and at the top, he sniffed the wind, saw her on the other side doing the same.

The question rose from him. Unbidden.

"Why?" he muttered.

She turned, slanted cobalt optics glancing across the gap between them, and he realized she'd heard him again. He thought for a moment she might answer.

Instead, she merely turned and bounded off into the darkness, grey and black metal swallowed by the waterlogged pines.

It would be so easy to track her back to wherever they'd holed up this time... Bluestreak shrieking in fear as Sunstreaker tore his fuel pump from his chest...

No.

He ached, hurt, and he needed to leave before the Autobots tracked him down. And he had no desire to be back in the bottom of that ravine for any reason whatsoever, period. Quietly, he pulled his ragged cloak around him and took one stride, two, and silently allowed the shadows to welcome him once again.