That’s the third time today I’ve had to pick my way over something dead in the hall.

Bluestreak looked down at the oozing remains of what had probably been a Decepticon, nudged it lightly with the end of his foot. Metal scraped against metal, and the thick scent of internal fuel made him grumble a little under his breath and take a huge, fastidious step over the carcass.

"Don’t touch that!" someone screeched.

Without thinking, just responding, his rifle was in his hand, and he nearly spun right there and put a shot through the figure emerging from his quarters.

Bluestreak put his foot down and stepped completely over before he responded.

"What? Touch what? This heap of refuse you so happily tossed into the hall? Ratchet, this is like the fourth time you’ve thrown one of your playthings out where I have to cross to get back to my quarters. I’m tired of having where I have to go and recharge reeking of rust and something that crawled back out of the smelting pits. And this thing..." he rambled, poking at the dead, stiff hand with the tip of his rifle, a look of utter disgust flashing across his face as it made a scraping noise along the floor. "I don’t care what you do, personally. You want to drain off someone’s fuel, mix it in with weapons cleaner and make him re-process it, you do that. I just care that you kill Decepticons. The more you kill the less likely they are to destroy anyone else’s life."

A shudder ran through him, and he saw Ratchet’s blue optics seemingly narrow, and then the medic smiled, a smile that made the fuel freeze up in Bluestreak’s lines.

"I could rebuild you, you know," Ratchet whispered, his voice sliding down to almost a low, seductive note. He took a step forward, holding out his hands in a gesture that was supposed to make him look harmless. "You love to destroy the Decepticons. Look what they did to your home. If you had all the power you needed. . . ."

Another step, and he moved to where he could almost touch the gunner, reaching out to attempt to put his hand on the younger mechanism’s shoulder. Bluestreak looked down, at those grey fingers smeared with old fuel, and something inside him - that primitive survival instinct, perhaps, made him snarl, and raise his rifle.

"Get away from me," he hissed, optics flaring until they were almost blue-white with disgust. "You just back off, you psychotic hack-job, I heard what you do in there and I see it in the hallway about once a week. I’m not even letting you close to me with that scalpel of yours."

Ratchet shrugged, laughed a little. "Coward. I could make you do things you’ve never done before."

The sharpshooter backed up, rifle clenched in his hand, the door panels on his shoulders quivering with revulsion. "You just keep away from me," he warned, his voice rising a little in pitch as he backed off down the hall, step by careful step, rifle out in front of him.

Ratchet laughed softly. "You know, there will be a time, when you come back to me . . . they all do, you know . . . you and everyone else on this little forsaken and wretched planet. And when you do . . . you’ll be begging me to fix you, and then I can show you upgrades that you never dreamed of . . ."

He trailed off and knelt next to the corpse in the hall, and Bluestreak saw the grey fingers reach into the twisted open chest cavity. Something rose up in his mouth, bitter coolant perhaps, as Ratchet smiled and yanked.

Bluestreak backed slowly down the hall, gun clutched in his hands, trying to ignore the chuckle that drifted down to his audio sensors. He must be over energized again . . . he’s got to be. Prime catches him like that again and he’ll beat him until they need a medic for the medic. Optimus Prime says it’s a disgrace for a warrior to show a weakness.

He stiffened, abruptly, his fingers tightening on the weapon in his hands.

Am I doing just that? Showing a weakness by backing off? I hope no one saw me . . . I mean, all it would take was for someone to tell Lord Prime and then I would be probably marched out to tell them my weakness. Our glorious leader says that it builds a better warrior to stand on the dias to and admit our fears while our companions laugh at our foolishness. Teaches us to not to let it show. A snarl graced the corners of his face, his expression hard, his rifle coming up like an extension of his thoughts. You ever do that again, medic, and I’ll blow your head off and leave you in the hallway. Next time. . . .

A pattering noise off to his left made him spin and his finger tightened on the trigger. The shadow looked up at him, and then gave a low, mewling noise.

"MetalliCat," he said, looking down at the winged animal as it slunk by, belly to the ground.

The cat looked up at him, wrinkled her metallic muzzle and hissed once, the green optics whirling with madness. He frowned slightly and took a step back from her as she growled low in her chest.

It’s just not my night. Everything managed to be in this little hall on the way to my quarters. First the rip-saw doctor and now the insane song-crooning cat. He started to lift his leg reflexively, to give her a kick and then he stopped. No point in taking my frustrations out on someone else who doesn’t really deserve it.

He sighed, gun dropping down a little as he rubbed his temple with his free hand.

"Go on, kitty. Ratchet’s working down that hall . . . and he might be interested in robo-vivisection, so I’d recommend you stay clear."

The strut-winged animal growled again, then cocked her head slightly, ears flattening a little.

"Sea of holes..." she murmured.

Oh, here she goes again on that sicko Earth band. What are they, the Beatles? Those humans were wacked, evil, drug strung out little flesh creatures. I mean, I heard once that you could have freebased the lot of them if you put them near open flame. And then when their drummer got wasted and bit the head off of some living animal on stage . . . what a whack job. He and Bumblebee would’ve loved each other.

"Go on, Cat. Take a hike, okay?"

She raised her muzzle a little, claws leaving deep rents on the wall as she casually turned and scratched down it. Bluestreak winced at the shrieking sound as little curls of twisted metal shredded under her talons. The cat’s ears swivelled back to him, and her tail flicked, rasping along the metallic floor as she dropped down off the wall and stretched casually, her rump higher than her shoulders, wings outspread.

Then her pale green eyes glowed up at him, and her raspy, singsong voice echoed around the corridor. The chilling lyrics flowed from her like an icy wind, an undertone of a growl, the haunting echo of a cat’s scream on a long, lonely moonless night.

"He’s as blind as he can be, just sees what he wants to see. . . ."

Bluestreak looked down at her, shuddered.

"What is it with me today and insane mechanisms? Look, just leave me alone and get out of here. Go talk to Ratchet. I saw him holding something you might think was a snack."

Sinuously, she slunk forward instead, her body twining around his legs, almost tripping him, all cat. Metal rasped against metal, and it took all of his control not to kick her away from him as the touch of her body against his legs wracked his chassis with an urge to recoil.

"Cat, knock it off. Don’t touch me. You know I hate it. Come on, I know you are just...um, a little messed up, and I really don’t want to blow the head off of something insane, but I swear by the Matrix-"

The cat leapt back from him, hissing, snarling, and his rifle swung around as she rolled in the corridor, blindly striking out with taloned fore paws, screaming. At first he was too stunned to do anything but jump back from her, the rifle instantly trained on the cat rolling on the floor, paws flailing at everything and nothing. Oh, great...nice job, Bluestreak, had to bring up the Matrix around her, didn’t you, idiot. Great.

A memory hit him then, of hearing that horrible noise, the scream of a thousand souls cornered with no escape, of all the power of the Matrix, the hush that had come over the base as they all stopped and stared at one another, all of them fervently glad it hadn’t been one of them who had dared to question their leader. Bluestreak stood there, shaking, a faint coil of fear rising in him, licking into his mind like a fire barely banked as the other scream out powered the revolting resonance of the Matrix, the scream of one soul struggling to keep her sanity, failing. . . .

The screams. . . .

No, no, no. . . .

He fought back the memory, shoved it down into himself, and threw out a hand.

"Stop it! Stop it, Cat! Now!!"

MetalliCat rolled to her feet, mewling, and he looked down. "I’m sorry. I am. But don’t touch me again. It just sets me . . . off. And that’s not your fault, but mine, I know. But I hate it, so don’t touch me. I hate being touched, you know that . . ." he trailed off, looked down at the metal winged puma crouched in the hall. She glanced back up at him, and shook herself, rattling her wings and stretching as if nothing had happened at all.

Then softly, sweetly, another tune rose from her, a snatched, broken lyric as she looked up to him, an odd haze in her green optics. "Choice is made for you . . . my friend. . . .  Truths to you are as lies to me . . ." she trailed off and sighed, softly, and then she turned and with a flick of her tail, vanished into the darkness.

Bluestreak stood there, and then a faint look of confusion crossed his face that slowly turned into disgust.

"Stupid Cat," he muttered to himself as he hurried toward his room. "Dangit, I’m going to ask someone if I can transfer quarters out of the psychotic section and up into the slightly deranged one. Preferably as soon as possible. . . ."

The lights in the security wing were as dim as always. At first someone casually striding though might think it was because there was something to hide here, but the longer that you stayed you realized it was because things were . . . hidden. Shadows pooled like oil on the metal flooring, and there was the faint scurry of some little earth mammal somewhere in the distance, scratching out a meager existence in what the human slaves ate. The scratching noise pattered off, hesitated, and then there was a flicker of blue light, a shattered squeal and the sweet carrion odor of burnt fur wafted down the corridor.

"You heard me the first time," the female voice murmured.

The black and white mechanism smiled a little, took a few steps forward toward the slender black Autobot femme leaning casually against the wall.

A deep, thick chuckle escaped him as he looked down at her, and took that extra step forward and leaned on the wall also, reaching over to run a finger down the metal of the corridor, every motion somehow sensual and yet nonchalant at the same time.

"Ah, Nightwind. I did hear you the first time. I think your exact words were, ‘What brings you snooping around?’ to which I replied, ‘Well, I needed to talk to someone in Intelligence, and that would be you.’"

A slow, lazy smile turned up the corner of his mouth and his back door panel twitched a little as he leaned closer to her, the icy color of his blue optics turning a little warmer now, the blue of a clear fall sky. Nightwind made a noise in the depths of her chest, almost a cross between a cough and a chuckle, and her own azure optics gleamed almost sapphire in response to his words.

"Whatever, Prowl. I don’t quite buy the concept that you’re slumming down here looking for an intelligence report."

Prowl shifted, his door panels swinging out a little, drawing attention somehow to him even more, the shadows gleaming down over the brilliant, cold white of his chest. They slid past his Autobot symbol that sat there like a splash of fresh blood, down to his lean waist, across his spotless chassis and metal like dark, caressing touches. He tilted his head slightly, lifting his chin a little as he looked down at her.

"Intelligence? I never said you were without that, Nightwind. Sanity, perhaps, but never intelligence."

Nightwind laughed lightly. "Why, Prowl. How nice of you to see that."

"Sanity is rather overrated, isn’t it? It’s far more . . . tactically to your advantage if you always keep people thinking you’re willing to do anything since you don’t really stick to a set of rules." Again, his door panels twitched again, the symbol on the door gleaming gold with the badge of the Military Earth Squad, the famous slogan ‘To Serve and Obey,’ written in black, graceful script below. "Isn’t that right?"

She smiled, a quick flash of amusement in her sapphire optics. "Of course. But according to you, you’re always right," she told him.

A slow smile lifted the corners of his mouth. "Well, of course I am, but it’s nice to have that thought confirmed by someone else who’s good at their job."

"I am very good at my job," she responded quickly. "So why are you slumming, Prowl? One would think you were forgetting about your . . . how shall I say this . . . recreational pursuits and putting work ahead of your own agendas."

"My own agendas? Nightwind. For shame, I have no agendas other than to serve Lord Prime in the destruction of the Decepticons." "Really? How . . . noble."

Prowl chuckled again, the sound rolling up from low in his chest as he stopped leaning on the wall and moved a little bit until he was in front of her, a casual saunter that was rather like a tomcat pacing along the street on the scent of a late night tryst.

"Noble. What makes you think I don’t support our leader’s noble cause of survival for our race, dear Nightwind?" A faint, thoughtful look passed across his features, and he brought his hand up to rub across the metal of his chin. "I support our leader to my utmost abilities. I’ve been there for him since he rose from the pits of the Combat Arena to spread his message throughout our little burned out wreckage of a planet. We were made to take what we need to keep that spark of existence flaring within us. The Autobots are the best and brightest of what Cybertron has to offer and I - and Lord Prime will not let us falter in our cause."

Nightwind’s gleaming optics met his own. "Nor should you falter."

The silence hung there, the stillness of anticipation flickering between the two Autobots as they watched one another, the second-in-command’s door panels swinging out another fraction of an inch as he looked down at the matte black femme in front of him. . . .

"Sir?"

Both Nightwind and Prowl jumped back a little, Prowl’s hand reaching for his rifle, Nightwind simply stepping back into the shadows and reaching for her own pistol.

Prowl turned slowly, a cold, angry fire in his optics as he flared out his door panels.

Bluestreak backpedaled, holding up his hands, an instant gesture of appeasement.

Looking at the two of them, Nightwind had to admit, was like looking into a reflection in a pool of moving water. Prowl was slightly taller than Bluestreak, and while the second in command wore his self confidence like a military uniform, Bluestreak crouched in his cloak of constant unease.

I remember when they brought him in. . . .

He’d dug himself out of the ruins of his city. Rumor has it that he survived in a pocket down in the rubble, that it took him a week to claw his way to the surface, that the only thing that kept him from being crushed was someone else’s rusting corpse, Nightwind thought. Determination he has . . . dangerous thing if it’s not channeled into the proper areas. . . .

Bluestreak made a noise similar to a human clearing his throat. "Sir. I’m sorry sir, I didn’t mean to catch you off guard, but according to Cliffjumper, you’re the final voice in where we’re quartered and I really need to request to move."

"Why don’t you submit it on disk like an intelligent creature would?" Prowl intoned quietly. There was something more unsettling in the second in command’s calmness, Bluestreak decided, then if Prowl had just hauled off and shot him.

A slight chuckle echoed that statement, and then the Autobot sharpshooter watched Nightwind reappear out of the shadows.

Oh . . . crud. I didn’t know she was there. He felt himself go on the defensive, the nervous energy making his weight shift from foot to foot, rocking back a little. Just exactly what I need, her down here with him. She knows everything that goes on in here, and I know she’ll use it to whatever advantage it will give her over the rest of us. ...Careful what you say, Bluestreak, or you know you’ll end up screaming apologies to someone for whatever insult they take

"Why, Bluestreak . . . whatever is wrong with your quarters? Don’t tell me Ratchet left his toys in the hall again," she murmured, shaking her head. "I have suggested over and over again that he be polite enough to pick them up after he was done playing with them."

Bluestreak nodded, encouraged somehow by this minute bit of agreement. "Yeah. I mean, Sir, I’m just sick of it. My whole room stinks like a smelting pit," he complained, the words starting to tumble out of him, his voice modulator rising and falling with each hurried sentence. "I mean, every time I go down to rest, I have to step over Ratchet’s latest corpse, avoid Wheeljack’s newest ‘experimental’ weapon, then listen through the walls all night to Autobots beating each other to scrap. Would you believe that I went down the night before and had to chase that little thief Bumblebee and his pet human out of my quarters? I still can’t find my other power pack for my rifle." The silver-grey Autobot shook his head and continued. Sometime during the conversation, he’d pulled his rifle off of his shoulder and now was turning it over and over in his hands, fingers stroking nervously along the stock. He looked up at Prowl, an irate look flashing in his optics. "I know those little creeps took it and Bumblebee was probably hiding behind the Ark and using it to overenergize. He’s gonna blow his neurals one day doing that, you know, not that it would be a great loss-"

Prowl threw up a hand, effectively stopping the other Autobot’s rambling.

"Bluestreak. Shut up. And stop playing with your rifle. It’s a good way to get yourself killed."

Bluestreak straightened up and snapped his gun back over his shoulder, looking Prowl with a rather sullen expression that he attempted to hide and failed miserably.

"Yes, sir."

Nightwind took a step out to stand next to Prowl, looking the silver-grey Autobot up and down for a long moment.

"Do you find it distracts you from your duties, where you’re stationed?"

Bluestreak shifted his weight uneasily. "I can’t concentrate, if that’s what you’re asking." Prowl snorted, a noise of derision that echoed through the corridor.

"Well, I hardly see that being the fault of your quarters. That seems to be a personality fault, not a personnel one."

Bluestreak clenched his fist, his face darkening, the tension causing his own door panels to shift out, flaring slightly from behind his shoulders, the silver-grey catching the dim light.

"Enough," Prowl warned him softly, his voice deceptively quiet and calm. "You’re good at what you do, Bluestreak. Don’t fool yourself into thinking you’re that good."

Bluestreak’s left hand trembled slightly as his optics met Prowl’s, and then Nightwind saw the silver Autobot look aside, his pale blue optics riveted on the floor.

"If you are both done with this amusing show of masculinity - which I’m rather enjoying greatly, so don’t stop on my account - I would like to point out that his request makes sense." Nightwind told them.

Both males looked over at her, and Prowl’s optics seemed to narrow a little while Bluestreak inclined his head and looked at her as if she’d suddenly spoken in some long lost bizarre dialect.

"Really . . ." Prowl observed dryly as he turned his head to look at her.

"Really?" Bluestreak wondered.

"Yes. Really. If it’s hard for you to concentrate, then no doubt it affects your . . . abilities. Have Jazz find you new quarters, preferably up a level from the refuse pit downstairs. If that of course is all right with you, Prowl?"

He shrugged. "If you find it prudent, who am I to doubt you?"

Nightwind chuckled a little. "Ah, you should never doubt me."

Bluestreak just stood there, looking at them both, uncertainty crossing his features, then a faint, small smile flicked across his face, surprisingly open.

"T-Thank you. Thank you both."

"Go now," Prowl suggested. "Before I change my mind and move you in with Gears."

Bluestreak winced. "I’ll go right up and talk to Jazz."

"What, Gears too cheery for you, Bluestreak?" Nightwind teased.

"Something like that . . ." he replied, saluting just as footsteps approached them. All three of them looked up to see the blocky green form walking towards them, his head moving from side to side slowly, the ominous rasp of his intakes pushing the air past his olfactory sensors.

"Hey Hound. How’s it going?" Bluestreak asked.

Silence.

"I’ll take that to mean ‘not bad’," Bluestreak offered again with a faint smile.

Hound snorted, his ice blue optics looking through, not at, the silver-grey Autobot. He took another long sniff, and then his lip curled slightly to expose gleaming mouth plates as he turned his head slightly and looked away from Bluestreak, his gaze coming to rest on Nightwind and Prowl.

The scarred tracker looked at them, slowly, inclining his head a fraction, his shoulders dipping. Nightwind had that distinct feeling that Hound was sizing them all up like all predators did, waiting for someone to make the first move that showed that they were prey and not predators themselves.

Bluestreak transferred his weight from foot to foot, uneasily.

Hound’s head snapped around, his frosty gaze coming to rest on Bluestreak.

Bluestreak held up his hands again slightly.

"Sorry, Hound. Didn’t mean to startle you, okay? I just was leaving, anyway. Know what? They switched my quarters upstairs. No more picking my way over the dead corpses on the way to recharge." Bluestreak chuckled a little, shrugging his shoulders. The tracker still watched him, impassively, coldly, and Bluestreak shifted again, feeling uncomfortable for a moment.

Well, forget it. I’m not treating Hound like some sort of animal just because he’s mute. He just took a bad pounding in the name of the Decepticon cause and then when he came back on line - a slight shudder wracked Bluestreak. He wouldn’t let them fix his face. Rumor had it that he used his mouthplates to rip through someone’s throat getting out of med bay . . . but that’s all most of it is around here. Rumors. Half the time I don’t know what’s right. Lord Prime says it keeps us . . . alert. His hands trembled slightly, and he started to reach for his gun and then stopped. Quickly, he glanced at the others, hoped no one there noticed the glitch. Then he shook his head, the words coming quickly from him as he attempted to regain himself.

"I guess today must be my lucky day. Tell you what, you want, you come up with me to the main room when I’m done moving, Hound. I’ll buy you a drink, even. To celebrate."

Hound actually drew back, tension rattling his frame, and for a brief moment, there was the faintest spark of reason perhaps in his distant pale optics. Slowly, the scarred tracker regarded Bluestreak, his head inclining, the slashes across his face looking like the shadows of tree branches under the moon.

Bluestreak grinned a little.

Hound’s optics flared and his hand clenched into a fist next to his side. Then, a look of pure derision crossed his face, and he spun on his foot, shoving past Nightwind and Prowl into the darkness of the corridor beyond.

Bluestreak sighed, and shrugged. "Guess he just isn’t interested in being social. Well . . . thanks again. I won’t let you down, sir."

Prowl nodded. "Good."

The sharpshooter turned and walked back down the hall, vanishing from sight around a corner. A moment later Nightwind turned to Prowl.

"A hundred credits of energon."

"What?" he asked, looking back at her abruptly.

"A hundred credits," she told him again, with a slight laugh that caused her wings to lift a little.

"For?"

"A bet."

"About?" he prompted, looking back at her.

"Hound is going to kill him one of these days."

"Hmm. Not much of a bet," Prowl replied, thoughtfully rubbing a finger across his chin. "If I am going to bet credits, I want to optimize my return, not throw it away."

Nightwind chuckled, and then she shook her head and gazed down the hall. "He’s . . . interesting."

"Who? Bluestreak?" Prowl asked, then a faint noise escaped his chest. "Interesting? Nightwind, please don’t tell me your impeccable tastes have gone downhill recently. Were you there at that battle by Portland?"

"The one at that human research lab? Yes, but only for the initial fly by to see if the Decepticons were lingering around and to map the area out for the best approach."

"Then you missed Bluestreak’s . . . episode," he told her. "It was rather entertaining, in a way. I don’t know if anyone else but me really saw it. But you wouldn’t be interested in hearing about it, would you?"

She looked at him. "I suppose it would cost me," she asked. "What do you want, Prowl?"

He waved a hand. "We can work out those details later. So, do you want the story or not?"

Nightwind looked thoughtful, and Prowl crossed his arms, waiting patiently as ever.

"You want to know, don’t you. Information is as essential to you as refueling . . ." he murmured. She sighed, finally, shrugged, her sleek shoulders rising and falling.

"Tell me if you want. Otherwise, I’ll say this conversation is over and head to do my part in making sure the Autobots conquer the last packets of resistance that this planet has to offer."

Prowl leaned forward, smiled.

"Ah, I couldn’t let myself lose your beautiful company. So I suppose I’ll just tell you for free."

"For free? I don’t accept charity even if it’s information."

"Call it a gift."

"And I certainly know better than to accept a gift from you."

Prowl actually laughed, then. "As the humans say, come here, little girl, want some candy?"

"Not unless I run it through a scanner first," she admonished.

He merely chuckled. "Suit yourself . . . but let's just say you’d probably enjoy the candy I could give you. Hmm. . . .  Well, I’ll tell you anyway. I like the fact that it somehow makes you indebted to me in this little game of give and take."

Nightwind settled against the wall. "In your opinion, perhaps."

"Mmm. That is what’s important, of course." He leaned back against the wall, his door panel nearly touching the edge of her shoulder. "Anyway, as luck would have it, it was myself and Bluestreak who ended up being off to the side of the initial wave, after Prime rammed the front corner and went through the building. As Grapple had predicted, it just needed to be hit on that corner to cause a collapse."

"I thought we weren’t going to collapse the place?"

"Optimus’s orders. They put in a distress call to the Decepticons for help." Prowl’s handsome visage twisted into a sudden sneer of derision. "Idiot organics, you think they would learn. Even the Autobots understand the idea of cause and effect. Humans aren’t half as intelligent as the Autobots make them out to be. It’s simple really - they call for help, and the Decepticons come . . . then we level the place, maximum damage and casualties," Prowl remarked, shaking his head. "Hmm. Very small brains, I suppose. But that’s neither here nor there. As I was saying, Optimus slammed through that corner, then punched out the other side at the opposite support rail, dropping the building."

"Immediately?"

Prowl nodded. "Pretty close to immediately. I ordered Bluestreak to go in and sweep the rubble and dispatch survivors."

"He wouldn’t?"

"No, he did like a good little soldier. Then, as I watched, he moved up a little slope, and his foot slid between some chunks of concrete. I watched him then, he seemed to jerk, then locked up, and the fool started to struggle instead of doing the logical thing and twisting back the way he’d come." Prowl shook his head at the memory, another faint look of contempt gleaming in his optics.

"I watched him completely lose his head then, and he dropped his rifle, clawing at his ankle, screaming. He dug at the concrete so hard that he tore off his fingertips on his right hand, I think." The black and white Autobot chuckled. "Although highly entertaining, it was not something one wants to see in an Autobot warrior."

"How long was he like that?"

"Screaming? Or pinned?"

"Both."

Prowl rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "Perhaps half a human hour or more, and I thought he’d break his main linkage, or at the worst, draw Prime’s attention to him . . . and myself. So I finally had to go up and get him out of it before he could disgrace the Autobots further. Funny thing, I kicked him out, and he rolled to the side, picked up his gun, and he couldn’t even remember he’d been making such an utter idiot of himself. I think he . . . reroutes when it happens to him, blocks it out of his mind."

Nightwind nodded slightly. "I suspected as much."

"It makes him a horrible liability at times," Prowl told her with a slow smile. "One of these days he’s going to draw attention to himself . . . and he’ll be deactivated. Just like he should have been when the damned city dropped on him . . . isn’t that so, Nightwind? Shame how the best of Prime’s plans always seem to end up with . . . loose ends. Now, we of course, know how not to let that happen. Loose ends have a way of turning on you, as you know."

"I know that very well," she laughed, as he leaned over and let the edge of his door panel brush against her wing, just the slightest of touches before he backed off and smiled at her.

"We shall, of course, talk about payment later. I’m sure you can come up with something we’ll mutually benefit from," he told her, sharply turning on the edge of his foot and striding off down the hall until he was swallowed by the shadows.

"Attack!!"

"Decepticons incoming! Prepare to engage!"

Bluestreak held his rifle, watching as the sunlight glinted off of the wings of the incoming jets.

Above him, he could see the triad swing and bank off, the dark shapes of Skywarp and Thundercracker flanking the silver shimmer of Starscream.

Hold your fire. . . .

Watch them, count every rivet on their underbelly, hold until you can feel the air being split by their wings, stay . . . steady now. . . .

The jets roamed through the sky, coming around, the warm, deep tenor of Skywarp’s engines singing a counterpoint to Thundercracker’s deep bass rumble.

The Autobot held his rifle, his metal cheek pressed to the stock of his weapon as he sighted down the barrel, his cold azure optics revealing nothing but sheer, terrible determination.

Starscream’s engines burst into blue fire as he started to pull away from the other two, his own distinctive sound echoing over the terrain, singing like a siren to Bluestreak’s audios. The Autobot’s mouth tightened in a grim line, index finger coming to slip lightly over the trigger of the weapon.

Come closer. . . .

Come to me. . . .

Starscream turned, sliding through the air like a silver snake, his underbelly exposed. . . .

Bluestreak fired.

The lightning struck the jet right under his cockpit and Starscream howled loud enough to be heard over the sound of his engines, as the blue streaks of energy shot from wingtip to nosecone. Black smoke poured from the jet’s cockpit, and the Decepticons scattered as Starscream transformed, his chest a ruin of wires, his hands struggling to cover the gaping hole as he started to tumble from the sky. Instantly, Thundercracker transformed and dove to grab Starscream, trying to desperately catch him as Bluestreak calmly swung the rifle around and flicked his thumb back across a tiny metal tab. It clicked into place as he fired again, this time a projectile bursting from the barrel and slicing through the air. Thundercracker turned, his face registering shock just seconds before the projectile slammed into his throat, up out the top of his helmet, and exploded, forcing shrapnel out of his ruby optics just an instant before they turned grey.

Bluestreak allowed a faint smile to cross his face. Interesting. His foot-thrusters are still firing . . . proves they are robo-chickens after all, eh. One left. . . .

He spun, smoothly, just as the air wavered behind him, shimmered, and Skywarp solidified, wings outspread like an avenging black angel. He took one step, went to raise his weapons. . . .

"Predictable." Bluestreak scoffed. His thumb flicked over the tiny switch again, and he grinned.

"Say bye bye, Skywarp."

The electricity arched between them, and Skywarp screamed, his body jittering in place, his form going intangible in places as he was overloaded, his systems shorting out as they came on line, off line . . . and he fell to his knees, smoke pouring from every joint.

The Decepticon jet held out his hand, fingers outspread and the look in his red optics one of sheer plea. His fingers began to tremble as he coughed, "Spare . . . me. . . ."

Bluestreak flipped the switch.

"No."

The projectile lifted Skywarp off of his feet, as it drilled home square between his optics. Bluestreak laughed, kicking the still kneeling body onto the ground.
 

The jets screaming in, the city falling, as he stood there, the package he so carefully carried smashed on the walkway between the feet of the Autobot he had given it to. Bluestreak had turned his head, seen the first tower start to crumble . . . and there was that sense of shock and disbelief . . . he’d turn away, and turn back, and it would still be standing. . . .  Then the whole ground just . . . buckled under his feet, and the Autobot across from him looked at him, his expression wide with shock.

"They . . . they did it. . . .  I can’t believe what . . . a fool I was. . . ."

Decepticon flyers streaked over, shouting evacuation orders . . . but it was all numb in Bluestreak’s mind, and he stood, his weight shifting precariously as he rocked from foot to foot, the walkway shaking, the city shattering and falling and the smells rising now to assault his sensors, a cold odor of ozone and burnt wiring.

"Run!!"

He needed no urging, he turned and fled, the Autobot right behind him as his feet pounded over the walkway.

"I can’t believe they did it. This whole city’s gonna blow!!"

Bluestreak whirled, "The city’s gonna blow? What? But . . . they can’t blow up a whole city. . . ."

He wanted to stop then, but under his feet, the vibrations thrummed up like the beat of a death knell, and even if his mind wanted to stop and take a second look, hoping that he would rub his optics and it would all be gone, that everything would be back to normal. His body was smarter, charging blindly forward in self preservation, forgetting in his blind panic that he had a faster form as he slid down the collapsing bridge, barely dodging bodies as they tumbled past him into the abyss below.

Bluestreak jumped, threw himself forward towards the edge of the platform, rolled and heard the bridge collapse with a crashing boom, and then some explosion lit up the entire horizon, turning his silver blue sheen the color of molten steel, the flames reflecting off of his finish. He turned his head to see the city starting to crumble, towers collapsing, the red glow of the destruction starting to overtake the pale glow of the city lights. Smoke billowed, black and thick as he turned and just froze, staring back. The Autobot in front of him turned for a fraction of a moment, and yelled at him, bright blue optics almost grey with shock.

"Move! Move! Don’t just stand there, you idiot! Do you want to die?"

"N-No . . ." he heard himself stutter as something crashed into the void where the walkway used to be, a gleaming silver spire. He swore he could hear mechanisms screaming as they rode it down into the inferno, and somehow that prodded him into flight again, his arms and legs swinging as he ran after the Autobot.

Something whooshed past him, and he felt a jarring pain in his back as he was thrown hard onto his chest. His fingers grasped for purchase as the passage he was in slid, shifted, sending him tumbling. The Autobot in front of him looked up, a twisted snarl on his face as the loud sound of engines whirled back for another pass. A power post suddenly fell where he’d been standing a second ago - had the flyer not hit him, he would have been dead.

"Get out of there! The place is unstable..." the flyer screamed. "You don’t understand, they rigged-"

The Autobot shrieked, suddenly opened fire, bolts splashing in the crimson lit sky as the Decepticon whirled and the floor seemed to open underneath him. . . .
 

"Bluestreak!!"

He jerked back to awareness just as the blow caught him under the edge of his hood. He grunted as he was lifted up and tossed to land about ten meters away, and his rifle flew from his fingers to skitter across the metal floor. He looked up, felt something trickle down his chin, and he reached up to wipe it away as the bitterness blossomed in his mouth.

"You idiot!"

He cringed, almost instinctively, rolled as the second kick caught him behind the door and caused a noise like a dying teakettle escape his vocals.

"What? What?" he asked, forcing himself onto his feet.

"You got us both killed in this Scenario," Trailbreaker growled, aiming a punch that Bluestreak staggered back from, "I don’t even know why I bother working with you at all. This happens every time. Now, personally, I don’t care if the Decepticons use you for a target, but I’m not going down with you. You just locked up again, you worthless little piece of rust."

"I didn’t lock up. I shot them like I was supposed to. Killed them all," Bluestreak muttered, wiping fuel from his mouth.

"Yeah, you killed them, and then the Decepticons came and saw you on your knees giving thanks for your mighty display of target shooting and drilled you in the back, and then came and stomped the circuitry out of me."

"Sorry about that," Bluestreak muttered, his door panels twitching in a half shrug.

"You’re sorry? Sorry does me no good if I’m dead, you little. . . ."

Trailbreaker’s words trailed off into a string of curses, and he suddenly lunged again, catching Bluestreak right in the mid-section. There was the sound of metal slamming on metal, a choking noise echoing from Bluestreak as pain flared up into his main receptors.

Trailbreaker backed off a step as the silver Autobot coughed, spitting something out of his mouth. He leaned on the wall, and almost looked like a retching human for a moment, his arms folded over his mid section. Then he braced his hand against the wall, his head hanging a little, his door panels flaring out behind him as he tried to keep his footing.

A low snort escaped Trailbreaker as he stepped forward and jabbed a finger into Bluestreak’s chest plate, a smile curling across his mouth as Bluestreak’s fingers slipped on the wall.

"Listen to me, you little slaghead. I'm tired of filing complaints about you. Next time you endanger me like that, I deal with you myself."

"It was just a sim. Not the real thing."

"And it’s not going to be the real thing if I can help it." Trailbreaker growled. Bluestreak’s optics seemed to narrow, and then he slapped Trailbreaker’s hand away from his chest.

"Don't touch me."

Trailbreaker laughed, and watched as Bluestreak grew more and more uneasy. The Defensive Strategist hovered close, deliberately invading the Sniper’s personal space, watching as the smaller silver Autobot began to shake slightly, his fingers twitching as if he held his weapon.

"I'll touch you if I want, boy."

Trailbreaker’s finger jabbed Bluestreak again, right over his left headlight. Bluestreak felt a moment of sheer loathing. It's no wonder everyone on base hates him. Including Prowl, which is probably why he ignores everything Trailbreaker tells him. I just wish he’d quit . . . touching me.

Reacting, not even realizing it, the sniper slapped the other Autobot’s hand back again as he managed to withdraw a few feet. The boxy, black Autobot stepped forward again.

"You reading my frequency, you little freak?"

Bluestreak lifted his head slowly, looked directly into the indigo visor.

"Get . . . away . . . from me," he snarled, his door panels quivering with anger. "I shot them. I did my job. I followed the scenario perfectly. It's not my fault you can't watch your back after I wiped out all three of their fliers. Better than you could ever do. Ever. You're nothing but a grunt."

Trailbreaker’s mouth curled in a cruel smile, that recalled a thousand schoolyard bullies.

"A grunt? As opposed to a twitchy little gunner, I'd prefer being a grunt any time." He stepped forward again, not letting Bluestreak regain the distance he needed to get comfortable. The silver sniper made a low noise in his chest and looked from side to side, seeking to escape.

"Look, let’s just call it a day. Maybe we need a break. . . ."

"What're you afraid of? I'm just a grunt, after all. You can take out three Seekers in flight, can't deal with someone one meter in front of you?"

Bluestreak’s optics suddenly filled with an odd, brittle look, and he curled his lip back from his mouthplates like a cornered dog.

"Back off."

Instantly, Trailbreaker laughed, and then his right fist shot out, backhanding Bluestreak across his face, hard. It impacted with such force that it nearly spun the silver Autobot off of his feet.

"Make me, Blue boy."

Bluestreak hit the wall, hard, and leaned there, his fingertips clawing at the cool metal, dazed. He began to shake so badly that Trailbreaker could hear every servo rattle. Slowly, he looks at the ground, then his hand went to his face. His mouth opened and closed, the look in his optics unfathomable as he almost slipped onto his knees.

Trailbreaker smirked.

"Thought so."

He strode forward, grabbed Bluestreak by the shoulder, hoisted him up.

"You think you're better than me just because you take out three Decepticons in a simulator exercise?" He smacked Bluestreak again, nothing damaging, but painful and humiliating as possible, this openhanded cuff that sent a wave of fresh fuel spattering into Bluestreak’s mouth. "It's grunts like me that keep them from coming right up on you like this. . . ."

Smack.

His fist stuck again, this time the knuckle ripping across the lift of Bluestreak’s cheek.

"Getting in your face. . . ."

Smack.

Again that deliberate, brutal hit.

"And beating the coolant out of you in close quarters. . . ."

Bluestreak had gone completely rigid, his optics almost a pale sky blue. The fuel pooled at the corner of his mouth, dripped slowly across his chin and down his chestplate, and Trailbreaker watched the sniper begin to rock slowly back and forth.

Heh. What a complete waste of chassis.

Trailbreaker opened his other hand, dropped him back against the wall, starting to flick the spatters of fuel off of his hands.

Bluestreak sat there, huddled, and then he lifted his head, a flat, dead look passing over his features. The sound of his mouthplates grinding made it almost sound like he was growling as the cut across his cheek suddenly split open, and a multicolored gleam of energon trickled down. He reached his grey fingers up slowly to wipe it off. . . .

Trailbreaker never saw him move, but suddenly Bluestreak was across the floor, his hands grasping the stock of his rifle, rolling back to his feet. He just stood there for a moment, the weapon clutched in his hand . . . and the barrel pointing straight at the center of Trailbreaker’s head. The black Autobot looked back, confused by this turn of events. Even though Trailbreaker wasn’t the fastest Autobot in the Ark, sudden understanding creased his face as his expression went from a sneer, to surprise and anger, and then it gave way to fear. . . .

Bluestreak tilted his head, almost like he didn’t see him, and then he just smiled a little, this lopsided, quirky grin.

Trailbreaker was a little slow, not stupid. Instantly, the red shimmer of his force field surrounded him, flickering to life as he started to back towards the door.

The sniper’s gun never wavered, just hung there in his hand like it was suspended on invisible wires from the ceiling. A little thread of thought came curling through Bluestreak’s main processor, a detached, almost logical internal monologue. He started to speak, softly, his words flowing together like water.

"How long will it last - the force field, I mean. I've heard it takes a lot of power, and I don't know how much it can draw off you before you start to collapse. What do you think? A minute, two . . . no? And you can't fire at me while it's up and it's pulling power from your weapons systems . . . I can be patient. I can be patient. . . ."

Bluestreak rocked a little back on his heels, then forward, bracing himself smoothly, his left hand coming up to brace the rifle gently, his fingers caressing over the metal.

Trailbreaker realized abruptly this was not where he wanted to be. At all. Quickly, he transformed, and with a squeal of tires, he made a beeline for the exit.

Bluestreak’s voice drifted after him. "Why are you leaving?" the sniper asked, sounding confused. "I thought you wanted to work this out, and I found the solution - one of us dies. Problem solved. You don’t have to report me because you’ll be gracing Perceptor’s autopsy table. . . ."

His finger drifted to the trigger and fired a shot directly to the back of the force field. It bounced off, as Trailbreaker rushed through the door and around the corner, out of sight. The sounds of metal colliding into metal echoed back to Bluestreak’s audio receptor, along with someone’s furious shrieking. The silver Autobot cocked his head slightly, still rocking.

"Well, I guess that means he ran into Sideswipe or something," Bluestreak murmured, still rocking back and forth, his door panels shuddering with each pass of his fuel pump. The fuel from the corner of his mouth was starting to dry, a multicolored shimmer left like a snail’s slow passage. "I think that’s okay, because then he’ll get his main pump smashed out of him. It’s interesting . . . do you know we can survive for a while like that . . . main pump smashed? It takes a while for the energon to stop supplying your main relays, your mind dies way after your body doesn’t know it’s supposed to quit. . . ."
 

"How much?"

"A hundred credits..."

Bluestreak grinned just a little. "That’s an awful lot just to run a package across town."

The Autobot shrugged, smiled and shook his head. "Hey, it’s not my resources I’m squandering. Optimus Prime himself needs this to get to Ricochet, and I’m concerned that if I take it to him, there might be some of those Decepticon "freedom fighters" wanting to jump me and take it, and I’m not in the mood to tell Prime I let it fall into the enemy’s hands. It’s not important, really, but Prime doesn’t need the stress of the data being lost along with everything else he has to deal with. . . ."

The Autobot looked up at Bluestreak’s slight gaze of impatience, and laughed a little.

"Yeah yeah . . . I know you’re not really concerned with the war, you Neut, you. Figured that you would be the one to take this over the fastest and be able to deal with any Decepticons that try to take it from you. You’re a heck of a shot. Saw you at that targeting contest over in Iacon one time. Keep practicing, you’ll be amazing. . . ." The Autobot shook his head after a moment. "But, someday the war’s gonna land in your lap and I hope you pick the right side."

Bluestreak laughed, reaching out to take the package, a small, flat silver box.

"Well, those little faces are ugly, you know. Why ruin my looks now? Besides, I can’t see how it would land in my lap. I just try to stay out of the way of politics, make a little money, and keep my processors clean," he said.

"Oh it will one of these days. You know that the Decepticons just want to keep us from surviving, right? They made some impassioned speech over the interplanet coms last week, did you hear it?"

"What, the "Freedom for All," speech?"

"Nah, the one on how us Autobots are attempting to take over Cybertron and that Prime’s some evil warlord bent on dominating all sentient beings. I mean, come on now, that’s just stupid. This planet’s a mess. We’re low on resources, and we need to start expanding our horizons. We don’t start exploring and harvesting other planets, we’re all gonna be rusted out hulks in a couple of thousand cycles. Plus the Decepticons seem to think that if we just ask nice, some other sentient world will help us in the spirit of togetherness. Now isn’t that just one of the dumbest things you’ve ever heard? I mean, it sounds all good on datapad, but Megatron needs to wake up and process the real world, and someone needs to explain to that idiot that it’s not survival of the nicest. . . ."

Bluestreak held up a hand, shaking his head. "Whoa there. I don’t need to hear the condensed version, either. Tell you what, I’ll run this over there for you, okay?" The silver Transformer stretched a little, shaking the rest mode out of his legs and arms and inclined his head with a cheerful, open grin that made him look terribly young.

"Thanks, you’re fantastic."

"Nah, I just want the credits," Bluestreak laughed as the Autobot put the box in his hand. He opened a side panel, tucked the item inside, and gave a little mock salute. "Have it over to him fast. What’s his name, and what’s he look like?"

"His name’s Ricochet, like I said. Pretty skinny, green base coat. He’s one of Optimus’s main guards. He’ll be waiting at The Bridgeway, and just tell him that I sent you, okay, and then give him the datapad. Prime says he’s supposed to read it the minute he gets it, it’s rather important."

"Yeah, sure. I gotcha. Read it right away," Bluestreak repeated with a bob of his head. "I can tell him that, no problem."

"Don’t forget."

"I won’t. But I’ll get going, the faster that I get it there . . . the faster I get back and get paid."

"I’ll see you soon, then," the Autobot laughed. "And say hi to Ricochet for me."

"Can do." Bluestreak replied, doing a casual half flip in the air, feeling the sheer thrill of his body shifting around him, his arms and legs and body folding until a sleek hovercar rested lightly on its cushion of air. Then his engines revved and he sped off towards The Bridgeway.

I think I’ll catch that new vid when I get back. I heard it’s pretty decent . . . it had everything . . . femmes, ships . . . guns. . . .
 

"Two minutes to clear the sim room . . . all operations will be shut down for routine maintenance."

Bluestreak lifted his head, shook himself like a dog shaking off water, his doors rattling, and popped his rifle into his shoulder holster as he strode out of the room. Sideswipe looked up, his hands curled around Trailbreaker’s neck guard as he straddled the Defensive Strategist. Sideswipe glanced down at Trailbreaker, then back up at Bluestreak.

"Where you going, Blue?"

Bluestreak turned his head slightly, his blue optics so pale they were almost white, a fragile smile on his mouth.

"I think . . . I’m going to go watch a movie."

"A movie, huh? Well, tell you what, I got the coolest one recently. Traded it for a few energon chips. I think it’s called Maximum Overdrive. Cars that ran over and squished humans . . . pretty decent really, considering it was humans that made it. Shows that they realize they were on the bottom of the natural order of things, right?" The red Autobot looked up, and suddenly frowned for a moment. "Hey, who hit you in the face?"

Bluestreak’s hand went up to his cheek, and he looked down at his fingertips. He’d forgotten all about the rip, but just touching it caused him to wince. A faint shimmer of energon goo slicked across his fingertips and he ended up wiping it on his leg.

"Guess it was . . . a training exercise," he demurred, his optics shifting slowly back into a deeper blue as he shifted his rifle back over his shoulder and locked it into place. "Next time, I guess I’ll remember to mount my shoulder cannons . . . but they block my view sometimes, and, well, you know how it goes. I’ve been trying to keep them for when I need them on a long range assignment. Otherwise, it seems like an awful waste of ammo. . . ."

His voice trailed off as he managed to realize he was rambling. Embarrassed, he attempted to grin and look back down the hall, fidgeting nervously from foot to foot.

"Yeah, well," Sideswipe replied as shook his head and looked down. "Trailbreaker, were you picking on poor Bluestreak again? Well, guess that means that I need to teach you a little lesson about not throwing your weight around. Tell you what, we’re going to have a little talk.

"See, Blue here, he’s a good shot. A damn good shot, and I kind of like having him around simply because he’s capable of taking out incoming Decepticons at a distance, which means that there are less of them to take potshots at us poor dumb grunts, right?"

Trailbreaker mumbled something and pushed at the red Autobot weakly. Sideswipe grinned and gave a little chortle as he lifted his arm up, his hand retracting as the pile driver slid smoothly into place.

"No-" Trailbreaker stuttered, recognition coloring his optic visor a pale shade of blue.

"Go on, Blue," Sideswipe encouraged. "I’m sure Trailbreaker and I can work on this little attitude adjustment ourselves, don’t you, ‘Breaker?"

Bluestreak nodded, not needing any further incentive to leave the scene.

And they say I don’t know how to keep my mouth shut. . . .

The siren blaring through the base woke Bluestreak from his shutdown cycle, and caused him to sit bolt upright, his rifle clutched in his hands, his door panels quivering out behind him.

It took him a moment to realize it wasn’t a siren . . . it was his own screams that had caused him to come back on line. He shuddered, tried to regain his composure, attempting to forget the memories that seemed to escape as he rested, forcing them back into the farthest recesses of his mind. A moment passed, and he got to his feet and reached for the small energon dispenser on the table and brought it to his mouth. He gulped frantically, and then started coughing as the surges hit his system in quick, sharp bursts.

Settling back down on the bunk, he rested his head in his hands for a moment.

I wish it would stop. . . .

"Yeah, I know I do," he said out loud. "But it doesn’t, Bluestreak, so live with it. Get a grip on yourself."

Get a grip on myself?

"Yeah, get a grip on yourself."

You’re talking to yourself again.

"Well, it’s the only conversation I can keep up with lately."

Yeah, well, okay, fair enough.

"Shouldn’t you be defending me?"

Nah, you’re talking to yourself. You’re short a few circuit boards. No one defends anyone around here anyway why should your own internal voice be the one to start?

He sighed, and leaned back slowly in the darkness, still tasting the sharpness of the lingering energon traces in his mouth, brought his hand up to rub the rising pain between his optics. You know it’s going to be a bad day when your internal monologue starts getting uppity. He shifted his body again, staring at the broad expanse of the metal ceiling above him, and then he shivered, tried to look away to focus on the table next to his berth, anything to take away that feeling that he was in danger of being crushed by the sheer weight of the rock above him.

It’s just the Ark. It’s not what you think it is. It’s not that tower . . . it’s not the city. Just the Ark . . . over my head. Don’t think of the mountain above. Don’t think about it. Stop it. Calm down. Why now? Why so bad lately . . . why. . . .

The alarms tore through the base, and his rifle fell into place in his hands as he threw himself out of the room, all thoughts of the weight of the mountain above gone as he raced into the corridor. Dashing out into the hall, he nearly collided elbows with Sideswipe, who grinned over at him, raised a fist in a good natured parody of a strike, and instead just pretended to flick a finger against Bluestreak’s shoulder, careful not to actually touch the silver Autobot. Bluestreak managed to grin back and feigned to swing his rifle over, and Sideswipe just chuckled and lifted his hands in mock fear.

"What’s going on?" Bluestreak asked.

Sideswipe laughed a little. "Some excuse to pound the living circuitry out of a Decepticon, that’s all I care about."

Bluestreak nodded. "About time. . . ."

Yeah, 'cause the less you have to think about anything else, the better off you are. Now look, time to go out there and blow a few ‘Cons from here to oblivion. Then . . .the little nagging voice told him, then you can go and rest for a bit. No dreaming. Just the fact that there are less of ‘em around to destroy someone else’s city, that always works . . . for a while.

He rode the lift down, leaning as far back in the corner as he was able to, trying to ignore the feelings of claustrophobia that always seemed to bother him in close quarters like this, and then stepped with Sideswipe out into the main room where Teltran One flashed a pale green warning. The color cast everyone with a sickly glow, like they’d been suddenly dipped in some seafoam luminescence. Bluestreak actually shuddered when he saw Gears step out from behind Beachcomber, his white expanse of face twisted permanently into his horrible, leering smile. The green made it seem even worse than it usually did, shadowing the areas under his optics so he almost looked like a human skull.

I am so glad I am so careful never to end up in the med-bay, Bluestreak told himself.

Another flicker of motion caught his optics this time. Bumblebee was standing with his arms crossed, his "pet" human Spike leaning back to back with him like two gangsters out of a cheap movie. The human’s leather jacket was covered with all sorts of metal bits, and glued to the upturned collar were bits of red glass. At a casual glance from most they might have seemed rather artistic and rather pretty when they caught the light, but Bluestreak knew optic slivers when he saw them. There was one of the glass bits rammed through the human’s right earlobe as well, and for some reason it made Bluestreak even more uncomfortable. He knew it was only when you looked closer did you end up really noticing the glazed look in the human’s eyes, the faint tremors of his hands.

Sideswipe glanced over and noticed Bluestreak looking at the human. The red mechanism chuckled,

"That is your processor . . . that’s your processor on drugs . . . any questions?"

"I think that about sums it up, thanks," Bluestreak agreed quietly.

He was shifting uneasily from foot to foot as a hush came over the room. Abruptly, the waiting Autobots eased back until they were against the far wall of the room, opening a corridor that was like a carpet unfolding before royalty.

Lord Prime. . . .

Bluestreak watched the Autobot leader come into the main room, striding slowly, head and shoulders above the rest of the assembled. He was massive, solid across the chestplate, and carrying his rifle loosely in his hand. Bluestreak didn’t even think for a fraction of a second that the Autobot leader was even remotely concerned about anything as the giant mechanism walked deliberately across the floor and came to stand in front of the viewscreen. The greenish glow backlit him coldly from behind as he lifted one hand for silence.

Not one word escaped a single mechanism standing there as they regarded him.

"As you all know, the alarms have sounded. The Decepticons think they have managed to deceive me into thinking that I didn’t know about their plans. They have taken upon their foolish selves to attack our secondary storage facility for their own gain. And as you all know . . . any attack on anything I control means instant, swift retaliation. We need to teach them another lesson, one that they never seem to learn."

He inclined his head, his cold blue optics slowly lighting on one Autobot after another, each of them turning their gaze somewhere else as he passed over them. The only one who held his chin up to meet that terrible gaze was Prowl. He turned slightly, the green aura flickering along the edges of his white areas

"If I may offer a suggestion, Lord Prime?"

"You may always offer," the Autobot leader said in an offhanded, rather polite way.

"Did you sacrifice a warehouse just so we could teach them a lesson? That seems . . . rather wasteful."

Prime glanced over, and half of the room flattened themselves tighter against the walls.

"Well, perhaps if you didn’t use so much energon servicing your . . . partners, you wouldn’t fear a little tactical waste."

Prowl stiffened, and Bluestreak unwisely chose that uncomfortable moment to look up from the floor. Prowl’s optics met his for the briefest of moments, and then the other Autobot’s mouth curled up in a faint little smile. Bluestreak looked immediately down, wishing he hadn’t drawn any attention to himself.

Prime continued as if he hadn’t been interrupted.

"Autobots, transform . . . and destroy our enemies."

The semi folded down on its wheels, the huge gun splitting apart into two smaller weapons that clamped onto the doors with a sharp, magnetic click. The pairs of massive tires spun, the Autobot leader roaring out into the rain slicked night, his headlights reflecting coldly against the blacktop of the highway. Behind him, Prowl’s lights began to flash as he slipped around his commander’s trailer and took the lead of the convoy. Bluestreak felt his body settle down into that familiar sense of a vehicle and let out a tiny, inaudible sigh. It was comforting, somehow, even if his tires did rest on ground and not that cushion of air he’d been used to for a long, long time. Sideswipe’s engine growled softly, and as the red Lamborghini surged forward, the silver Datsun did the same and followed the multicolored ribbon of cars out of the Ark.

Driving along, Bluestreak listened to the splash of rain against his windshield, feeling the cold drops spatter against his metal skin. It was one thing he hadn’t really thought about before, but he found himself liking more and more as the Autobots stayed on Earth. On his home planet, he’d never really found much to enjoy with rain. Well, that’s because it was mostly acid rain. Not just water . . . and there’s so much water on this world . . . it’s just fascinating. There’s something about water . . . it never is the same one moment to the next. Always changing . . . always alive, somehow.

A clump of mud thrown up by Skids in front of him struck his hood with a solid thud and slopped into his windshield wipers, smearing across the transparent metal.

Ew. . . .

Okay, I take what I said back now. Water’s a pain in the rotators. Hey . . . he did that on purpose . . . he’s not even staying on the blacktop . . . what’s that all about, anyway?

"Did you hit it, Skids?" someone asked over their communications channel.

"The deer? Nah, missed that furry squishy. Couple of feet more and I would have had him."

"Oh that’s smart, bounce a deer off your hood," Windcharger called out.

"Ten points if you hit it and it runs off. Twenty if it’s dead before it hits the ditch. Thirty if you angle it right and bounce it over your hood and flip it off the back so the tailgater behind you hits it."

"Ever actually gotten thirty points?"

"With a deer? Nah. They move fast . . . sometimes you can hit one if it freezes in your headlights, but I actually did my best thirty pointer on a human. Light doesn’t seem to freeze them, though. I guess they have better than animal instincts."

"They hold together when you hit them like that? Dang, I would have thought they’d just explode, the little blood sacks," Windcharger whistled, amazed.

"Depends on how you hit them, really."

"Honestly, he’s right," Sideswipe remarked, interjecting himself into the conversation.

"About the trajectory thing?"

"Nah, about the fact that the humans aren’t much above these baseline animals. I mean, at least the animals have the sense to get out of the way when they hear an engine coming. The humans just stand there and think they’re invincible. Did you catch that one standing in front of Warpath and waving his white flag?"

"For about a second before Warpath ran him over."

"That’s my point. What intelligent being stands there and goes ‘oh, my, a large tank, I think I’ll stand in front of it and hope it avoids me?’" Sideswipe wondered.

"I don’t think it has to do with intelligence," Bluestreak found himself saying slowly.

"That’s because they don’t have any," Windcharger guffawed, making both Skids and Sideswipe laugh.

"No, that’s not the reason . . . I just think that they’re defending their territory." He trailed off as another burst of laughter came from the other Autobots he was driving with.

"Defending their territory? Bluestreak, that’s the dumbest thing I ever heard of. Even those little noisy things- what are they called, Skids?"

"Which things, Windcharger?"

"The little ones that stand there and bark at us. . . ."

Skids thought for a second. "I think the human word for them is ‘comehere’s, but I’ve heard them also referred to as dogs.’"

"Yeah, those things, the dog things. They have the sense to run when you shoot at them. The humans picked up their little projectile weapons and tried to chase us away with their planes and their tanks and their little guns. You’d think they’d just get smart and give up, but then again, even after all this time the Decepticons haven’t either. Maybe they’re actually humans in big armored suits, right?" Another round of laughter echoed at that statement.

"Maybe," Bluestreak replied quietly, not interested in being the subject of another round of joking at his expense. "Or maybe they just don’t like the fact that we came in and totally changed their way of life. They used to be the dominant species on the planet. Now they run underground the moment they hear an engine. I think it’s rather that they have a choice . . . fight or become obsolete. And nothing becomes obsolete without a struggle. It’s against everything in a living thing’s program."

"Oooh, Little Boy Blue’s getting philosophical," Windcharger laughed.

"I hate that nickname, Windcharger. I’ll take it from Jazz, but not from anyone else. Especially not from someone who’s making snide comments at the expense of my intelligence."

"You’ve got intelligence? You?"

Bluestreak let out a low sigh. "Ha ha. You ought to go find a stage."

"Think so?"

Sideswipe chuckled. "Bluestreak, how many times do I have to remind you that sarcasm is lost on Windcharger. He’s got the brains of a human himself."

"Hey-" Windcharger began, his engine revving higher as Sideswipe just laughed and sidled back over towards Bluestreak. The other Autobots laughed a little at Windcharger, and then settled back into following the convoy towards their destination.

"Autobots. Surround and destroy."

Bluestreak took up his rifle at the command, staring down onto the warehouse, the stock pressed against his shoulder as he sighted down the targeting scope. It lit up, feeding information across the screen so fast that he was just instinctively processing it, adjusting for the wind, the rain, the darkness, the distance . . . every scrap that he would need as he waited for the command to attack.

The Decepticons were edgy, he observed, seeing them outlined in the greenish glow from the scope. Their body language spoke it all, the tension in their hands and the way they kept looking around, scanning. He knew they wouldn’t notice the Autobots until they were literally on top of them. Blaster had an uncanny knack for scrambling most detection systems . . . when he wasn’t struggling with the rest of Team Omega over who was going to pound the other two into the repair bay.

The rifle felt light in his hands as he drew the scope across the two Decepticons waiting outside.

Look at them. . . .

His finger tightened imperceptibly on the trigger, his blue optics becoming focused until he saw nothing else but the lift of a shoulder, the twitch of an arm. . . .

Haven’t the faintest clue what’s coming. . . .

Just like. . . .

No no . . . not now not. . . .

Stop it . . . stop it, stop. . . .
 

They called it The Bridgeway, a long gleaming delicate span of metal that connected his home city to the rest of Cybertron. Bluestreak did as he had done all of his life, stopped on The Bridgeway and looked down as far as he could. Below him was soft darkness, the buildings below lit up with a thousand pinpoints as the inhabitants within them moved through their lives. It had always awed him, somehow . . . that just looking down there gave him a glimpse of a moment frozen in someone’s life. He looked up past the lights to see the faint spattering of cold stars above and then back down into the depths of the canyon below, leaned his hand on the coolness of the rail. Then he lightly tapped his fingers lightly along the metal, listening to the bridge sing softly with resonance.

He turned his head slightly to look back into his home city, the shining spires rising like silver swords into the sky. A faint sense of pride and admiration rose as it always did . . . he’d always found his home to be the most beautiful city on Cybertron no matter what others argued. Iacon was noble and austere, Tarn was solid and dependable . . . and Vos had that sense of wanting to leave the ground for the air where it more likely belonged.

However, where he called home was back over The Bridgeway. Bluestreak always had told himself that someday he’d even perhaps reside in one of the spires . . . even though they were reserved for mechanisms with a lot more credit than he’d ever had. It didn’t stop him from dreaming about it, and for every job he did, he tucked away half of those credits . . . no matter how small an amount, and didn’t touch one bit of it. He even kept a holopic tucked away in one of his side panels. It was of the view back into the city from where he was standing now - and it served as a reminder that even when it got tough . . . he was one day closer to achieving his goals.

He finally tore his gaze away from the view and looked down the roadway. It wasn’t long before he found who he thought he was looking for and hurried up to him, standing there and fidgeting slightly until the slender green Autobot looked up and noticed him.

"Ricochet?" Bluestreak asked politely.

"Who wants to know?"

"Well, I was supposed to say hi from some Autobot who was looking for a quick way to get this to you. I’m fast, I’m low on credits, and I ended up saying I’d take the job. He gave me a description of you, though."

Ricochet looked up, blue optics gleaming. "He did? Well, what else did he give you?"

Bluestreak looked over the edge of The Bridgeway for a moment.

"Just this," he said, reaching into a storage panel on his hip. The Autobot visibly tensed, his hand reaching for the gun strapped over his back.

"Um...it’s just a box," Bluestreak stammered, as he slowly drew out the item, holding it out in an upturned palm. Ricochet’s optics seemed to narrow suspiciously for a moment, and Bluestreak almost wondered if he was going to have to defend himself. He took a step back slightly, his back panels flaring out to betray his nervousness. Make a note to yourself. A job like this isn’t a hundred credits . . . it’s a lot more than that. Maybe I can have a little talk with the other Autobot about rate increases due to the ‘I don’t want to get shot in the head fee’ . . . this guy’s jumpier than a Decepticon wandering into Iacon with a proton bomb in his back spoiler.

"Supposedly, it’s a datapad from Optimus Prime. All I know is I got paid to deliver it, that’s all."

"You don’t know what’s on it? What kind of messenger are you?" Ricochet asked.

"Well, I’d say I’m an honest one, not reading things meant for other mechanisms."

Ricochet looked at him, frowned.

Oh give me a break. It was a joke, a joke . . . no wonder I stay out of this faction nonsense. I think those little faces drain your sense of humor.

Bluestreak found himself sighing. "No. It’s just a datapad, and he told me to tell you to read it right away. Something about it being very important."

"He said it was important? Or that he said Optimus Prime said it was important?"

Sigh. . . .

"He said that Optimus Prime said it was important, honestly. That you were supposed to read it right after I gave it to you."

Ricochet took the box, turned it over in his fingers, and then a slow smile lifted the corners of his mouth. His optics gleamed almost blue-white with anticipation, and then he chuckled as he lifted out the datapad and held it lightly in his cupped palm. He ran a finger over the readout screen, lightly, and then seemed to suddenly gain an aura of satisfaction as he looked back up at the silver transformer.

"If this is what I think it is, I’ll even tip you."

Bluestreak grinned. "Well, let’s hope, simply cause I’d like a decent recharge tonight."

Ricochet’s fingers flicked over the switch, the data pad humming as the screen started to glow to life. His smile became even more pronounced, and then he chuckled.

"Well, well, a promotion . . . Prime, I think you’re finally seeing things my way. . . ."

Well, there goes any chance of that tip. Unless I need one on how to become the leader of a up and coming force. Nah. Well, I think this is my cue to get out of here. Hmm. If I hurry, I can track him down and get my credits before it gets much later.

He turned, took a step and then the bridge trembled. It wasn’t a big thing . . . just a faint motion of the span that rocked it slightly, the faintest of pushes. He frowned a little, looking around. That’s odd. I’ve never felt it do that before. . . .

Ricochet was screaming something as he twisted back his arm and threw the datapad over the side of the bridge. It gleamed there, a soft purple dot against the city backdrop, and then it met with the forces of gravity and spiraled downward into the darkness. Bluestreak looked up, and then he felt the bridge lurch again. He was forced to grab onto the rail as the span shifted a good three meters, nearly throwing him on his face.

"What is it?" he yelled at Ricochet as another spasm shook the bridge, dropping him to his knees. Below him, the scattered starlike lights of the buildings went suddenly black, and then this odd, greenish glow started to fill the darkened chasm.

"That . . . he did it. I can’t believe they did this. . . ."

"Believe what? What are you. . . ."

He heard the shockwave then, the low rumbling bass boom that seemed to roll through his framework as the city seemed to buck in place. His astounded mind couldn’t comprehend what happened next as he tried to pull himself up to his feet. In numb horror, he watched the first spire lean . . . and break off, falling like a knife point down into the unprotected city. A plume of smoke and debris shot up, and then the next spire rocked and came plummeting down . . . smashing across the other buildings with a blaze of red light.

A whoosh of engines passed overhead, and he heard The Bridgeway groan as if it had suffered a mortal wound. He looked up, saw the flier make another pass, the Decepticon symbol emblazoned on its wings.

"Get off the bridge!" it ordered, a slightly raspy note to its voice, accented with stress. "The structure is unstable! It will collapse!"

Bluestreak’s hand went to his gun, trying to tear the rifle out of the magnetic clasps that held it behind his shoulder, and then The Bridgeway tilted slightly, sending him rolling a few feet across the span. The only thing left in his mind then was survival. His rifle was forgotten, his ability to transform a long dim memory, and all he had left to him was to scramble back up to his hands and knees, denting his fingers as he clawed himself up to a standing position and began to run, slipping and sliding as the span warped and danced underneath him. The smell of burning drifted over him as he bolted forward, a sharp electrical and mechanical smell, his silver color turning a gritty grey with ash and oily residue.

He barely cleared the edge of The Bridgeway, leaping desperately for the toll platform, and then he just found himself frozen, looking back on the carnage as the city seemed to collapse in on itself. He felt himself shaking, felt the sinking sense that what he was seeing was something that just couldn’t be occurring. It was simply not possible to destroy an entire city . . . not possible. . . .

A moment later, he felt the strike somewhere on his left side, and he was thrown back to land heavily against a nearby toll booth. Bluestreak sprawled there, dazed, energon spattering along the corner of his mouth. He managed to look up in time to see the flier bank and turn back towards the city, the two purple symbols of the Decepticon faction burning a permanent loop into his memory banks. With that sight rose a wave of bitter hate, foaming up from his internal workings as the Decepticon was silhouetted against the shattered skyline.

I’ll kill him. . . .

I’ll kill them. . . .

What madness possesses them that they can destroy . . . a city. . . .

His finger tightened on the trigger and then there was the satisfaction of the first shot lifting the Decepticon below him clean off his feet just as his associate looked over at him. The shock registered on the Decepticon’s face and he leapt instantly to catch his friend from hitting the ground.

Bluestreak calmly chambered another round, and waited one pass of his energon pump, just long enough to let the Decepticon realize he was the walking dead. The transformer looked up, disbelief and terror etched across his face, and the silver Autobot gunner savored it, processed it and then squeezed the trigger. The Decepticon fell, landing on the body of his friend, his leg kicking out once in reflex. Bluestreak shook his head, once, and then rocked back as the Autobots began to swarm the storage faculty, multicolored fire streaking through the rain slicked night. He could feel the water dripping off of his door panels . . . slithering coldly down his back, and he brought up a hand to wipe his optics, brought his hand back and looked at his fingers.

Water. . . .

Fuel. . . .
 

Bluestreak came back on line with a shuddering groan, feeling a weight on him, pinning him down. He choked, coughed, spit out a mouthful of energon, and then realized his vision was fuzzy, almost as if he was looking through a liquid. He struggled, managed to free his left arm, ignoring the pain and the pressure and tried to wipe off his optics.

"Oh . . . my . . ." he managed to stutter. Above him, Ricochet lay, his chest smashed open, his body pinned between two huge metal slabs. It was with horror that Bluestreak realized two things; the first that Ricochet’s main pump was crushed and that’s what was leaking on to his face, the sweet smell of processed energon somehow even overwhelming the reek of destruction, and secondly, the only thing that was keeping him from being crushed to deactivation was Ricochet’s body and the way he had fallen above him when the platform collapsed.

He struggled a bit, felt the debris shift, and something jammed hard into his side, making him actually cry out. The noise didn’t go far, the tons of material above him somehow bounced it back, muffled it, and made it faint to his own audio receptors.

"I’m trapped," he heard himself say, his voice cracking, rising and falling oddly. "I’m trapped and they won’t find me . . . I’m going to die. I know this. I know it’s probably going to happen . . . I know it . . . how are they ever going to find me here? I’m trapped under a dead Autobot and a city. . . ."

Ricochet’s optics gleamed.

"Not . . . dead yet. . . ."

Bluestreak stared up at him, wiped his optics again.

"Ricochet? But . . . yourchest . . . your pump. . . ."

The Autobot laughed softly, a long thread of energon drooling out of the corner of his mouth and spattering somewhere on Bluestreak’s chest.

"Can . . . live a long time on . . . a smashed pump, Neutral. You’ve been shut down for the . . . last two . . . cycles. I thought . . . you were dead myself."

"We’ve got to get out of here," Bluestreak heard himself saying. "If we can . . . dig our way up . . . there’s got to be someone up there to help . . . they can’t have destroyed the whole . . ." he trailed off as Ricochet made a gibbering noise.

"Neutral. They took down the whole city . . . just to get rid of one threat. Nothing got out of there alive . . . because I sure won’t . . . and you can’t get out. One threat to their power . . . one threat to their cause . . . and they blew up a city . . . they killed everyone in it. Beautifully . . . masterminded . . . if I say so myself . . . and I was one of the best . . ." he coughed, his optics dimming slowly.

"Decepticons," Bluestreak snarled, flatly.

"What. . . ?"

"I know why . . . the Autobots . . . stop them now. He was right. I can’t stay neutral . . . I can’t. If I get out of here, I swear . . . I’ll hunt them down . . . every last one . . . and. . . ."

"Decepticons? They are fools . . . not to see . . . what is coming. . . ."

Bluestreak struggled, fingertips clawing as he dragged himself forward a fraction.

"They blew up an entire city . . . the whole city. . . ."

"Yes . . . remember that."

He looked up in time to see Ricochet twitch, cough.

"Remember that. Best . . . advice can give you. . . .   There. That’s my tip. . . ."

The Autobot coughed, spasms racking his frame, and then Bluestreak knew he was dead and that he was alone. Struggling . . . he fought the debris for what felt like days before he realized it wasn’t going to give him any leverage to dig his way out to either side. Terror filled him . . . he was going to die down here, not from the trauma but from the fact that he would run out of energy, the slow, lingering painful death of de-energization. He started to claw frantically through his storage panels, hoping that he might find one last energon chip that he had tucked away for a quick recharge when he didn’t have time to rest.

Something cold and hard slipped across his fingers, and he pulled it out, ran his fingers over it.

The cube nestled in his hand, and at his touch, it started to give off a faint silver glow. He stared at it, dumbly, for a moment unsure what it was.

Then the spires of the city came to life inside the holocube, the golden span of The Bridgeway as delicate as ever, the stars above reflected below somehow by the life of the city itself. A tiny noise escaped him, a half moan torn from his vocals as the holocube brightened and shimmered and pulled his mind back from that horrible path it was starting to slip down. The despair returned as resolve . . . and then burned with hate. He tenderly tucked the little cube back into his side panel, let the darkness return.

Slowly, his fingers reached up, and then he clawed at Ricochet’s body, feeling the pieces rain down around him as he dug slowly towards the surface, inch by inch, meter by meter . . . an eternity of debris and the odors of burning with tinge of something else to it . . . processed energon, perhaps, a sweet smell that he ignored, knowing full well where it came from.

Bluestreak broke the surface with a shrieking howl, pulling his body from the shattered, wounded ground, and stood, door panels flaring behind him, exhaustion and loss of fuel making him rock slightly as he looked into the faces of two Autobots standing nearby with a look of utter awe.

"By the Matrix . . ." one began, but the other silenced him.

Bluestreak opened his hand, and showed them the red symbol he clutched between his fingers. It still bore traces of green around the edges as he slammed it onto his chest. The ragged edge of the sigil effectively pinned it to his silver metal, and he stood there, his ice blue optics cold with hate as he slowly took in the ruins.

"Autobot Bluestreak reporting for duty," he said slowly, spitting out a mouthful of fuel.
 

Duty to kill them all. . . .

Pain exploded in his right shoulder, and he screamed, shaken abruptly from his memories, spinning automatically to try and get away.

Hound pulled back the knife and snarled at him, bringing the edge of the blade up to his mouth. Bluestreak watched in numb horror.

"What the-"

The green Autobot snarled, lowering his shoulders, and lifted the knife again, his scarred face twisting with pure, animal aggression. He brought the knife down at Bluestreak again in a slashing arc, the distant flames reflecting like blood on the blade. Bluestreak somehow managed to bring up his rifle to fend off the strike before it hit his face. The knife bit deep into the stock of the weapon as the two of them struggled there, pushing and straining against each other like two massive metallic bucks in rut, their legs slipping in the mud and the rain, throwing up huge gouts of soil to spatter against their framework.

Hound slashed down, opening a long, shallow wound across the gunner’s midsection just as Bluestreak suddenly reversed his grip on the rifle and used it like a club, smashing into Hound’s jaw, sending him staggering back. Bluestreak reversed his grip instantly, bringing the rifle up to his shoulder. Hound snorted and began to stalk around him in a circle, a slow deliberate motion.

"What’s gotten into you, Hound?" Bluestreak heard himself saying as he turned in place to keep his sights on the green Autobot. "I don’t want to shoot you . . . but so help me I will. . . ."

"Hound. Stand down."

Bluestreak turned at the voice, his circuits growing cold. The massive figure stood there, backlit by the fires burning behind him.

"Lord . . . Prime."

Hound backed off a few meters, brought up his blade to his mouth again as he crouched there.

"Very good. You remember who I am."

Bluestreak nodded, a look of confusion passing across his face. "Of course, Lord Prime. I know who you are." He felt his door panels begin to rattle at the sudden chills that were racking his framework.

"Then you also should remember that when I give an order I want it followed."

"I was supposed to shoot them," Bluestreak said softly, lowering his head. "I did that..."

"You were supposed to shoot them when I gave the signal. You shot ahead of that, and nearly cost me the element of surprise." Prime rumbled, taking a step forward. "That is normally cause for deactivation. You know that, sniper."

Bluestreak stood there, his door panels rattling, his gun forgotten as he looked up at his leader.

"Yes . . . sir. I do. . . ."

Prime rubbed his hand across his faceplate, looked down at the silver Autobot, and then he shook his head, slowly.

"Your talent outshines this mistake. This once. And you will go into Perceptor within six earth hours of returning to base and have him fix that annoying glitch of yours before it kills someone. Namely, I think, you. Do you understand?"

Bluestreak felt himself nodding as he stammered, "yes, Lord Prime. I understand."

"You always do. You’re a good soldier," Prime replied. "Hound. Come. There is still some clean up to do."

Hound let out a growl that sounded suspiciously like a chuckle and rose, following the massive Autobot leader, a terrible smile on his mouth as he glanced once more over his shoulder at Bluestreak.

Bluestreak almost snapped up his rifle and shot Hound in the back. Sheer force of will kept him from doing it . . . either that or the utter realization that Lord Prime would probably blow his head off. One didn’t fire a weapon anywhere around the Autobot leader’s back and expect to get away with it.

He stood there in the rain, trembling, his head down, utterly defeated.

I blew it. It finally caught up to me and now it wins. It wasn’t a city that will kill me . . . it’s my memories of it that will. I’ve got to fight it off . . . I’ve got to keep them from taking over and costing me my only chance at salvation. When they’re all dead . . . that’s when I can let it win . . . that’s when I can accept whatever fate hands out. . . .

A strangled moan escaped him, and he pawed at the side of his head as if he could shake the memory out.

"Bluestreak . . . easy."

He turned then, dully to see another Autobot standing there, his white areas lit up with the red flames like he’d just stepped out of the pits of human hell himself.

"Prowl?"

The second in command walked up slowly, that casual saunter that brought him next to the gunner’s side after just a few strides. He glanced down at the burning storage facility, looked back at Bluestreak, and then back at the form of Lord Prime walking towards the devastation, Hound pacing at his heels like a cur dog. There was the faintest gleam of disgust in his optics that faded when his gaze met Bluestreak’s again.

"Interesting, isn’t it?" Prowl asked softly. "How your life can change in a few moments of time and be put onto a path that you never expected?"

Bluestreak looked over, inclined his head slightly.

"I guess," he said with a shiver.

"I mean, even the simplest of objects can change history."

Confused, leaking, and exhausted, Bluestreak shrugged.

"Sir, I’ve been told to go to medical. I should probably return to base, sir. I can’t really do much more here."

Prowl looked him up and down for a moment, then he knelt down in the mud, a puzzled expression on his face.

"Hmm. This must have dropped while you were . . . wrestling," he said, reaching over to hand it to Bluestreak with a shrug.

Bluestreak looked down and a puzzled expression went across his face.

"This is an old datapad . . . it’s not mine, sorry." He started to hand it back to Prowl, and then stopped, the pad clutched in his hand.

"It’s not? Well, it’s not anything I recognize of Hound’s either. How . . . interesting."

Slowly, the silver Autobot ran his finger over the cracked face of the pad, and it hummed to life at his touch, a soft, faint violet shining through the rain and the dark. With a burst of static, the picture came into focus, and Bluestreak inclined his head, his face devoid of all expression.

The pad began to relay the message.

"As you know, Ricochet . . . we have always been the best of allies . . . you were one of my most trusted advisors when the Autobots rose up to show Cybertron what path it should take. You always have understood, better than most, what power is, and how you must hold it. Consider this your promotion to my commanding officers. Congratulate yourself, it is much deserved.

But I have a slight . . . concern. You have become . . . ambitious. That is a good quality in a leader, but a poor one in his commanding officers. Therefore, you have outlived your usefulness. This is your final order. Start running. You won’t get out alive. . . ."

The charge in the datapad flickered once, then died.

Bluestreak’s weapon was suddenly in his hands, and his cheek pressed against the stock of the rifle. His sights targeted the back of the Autobot leader, right between the shoulders as the rain poured down, obscuring his vision until it was almost completely blurred.

Then he turned his head, to see Prowl standing there.

"A simple object . . . changes everything." the strategist said quietly.

Bluestreak’s finger tightened on the trigger, his thumb clicking over the tiny catch that transferred the explosive round into the chamber of the rifle. His hands were steady, his optics this odd hazy shade of blue that dimmed and brightened.

Then he seemed to shake himself, his door panels rattling as he lifted his head.

"I’m . . . not . . . doing anyone else’s dirty work for them," he said slowly. "Move, Prowl, and leave me alone. Or I swear on what’s left of my eternal spark that I’ll blow your head off. I’m done being used."

Prowl looked at him, and then a faint chuckle escaped the black and white Autobot.

"Bluestreak . . . I think you now understand you’ve been used for a very long time."

Prowl turned and walked slowly away, his back exposed. He didn’t have to wait long for the shriek of horrified realization that rose above the sound of the pounding rain.

"You’re back . . . early. . . ."

Bumblebee looked up from where he was going through the desk. Bluestreak stood there in the open doorway, leaning hard on the frame as he looked down at the little horned Autobot. His pet human, Spike, sat on the edge of Bluestreak’s recharger, swinging his legs as he hummed a little song to himself.

"Back early?" Bluestreak said, his voice breaking slightly. Even Spike looked up at the tone in the silver Autobot’s voice, and flinched just a little, looking from his master to the other robot with a slight furrow of concern.

Bluestreak’s door panels drooped as he looked around the room as if he really didn’t see his surroundings. He wiped his hand slowly across his mid-section. His fingers came back dry, for which he was glad. It made things much easier, he supposed.

"Yeah . . . from the battle," Bumblebee questioned. "You took a few hits, looks like. They send you back for repairs. . . ?"

Bluestreak’s laughter echoed as he suddenly lunged for the other Autobot, grabbing Bumblebee by his throat guard and shaking him like a yellow, metallic rat as he lifted him clean off of the ground. Spike leapt off of the bunk, pounding at Bluestreak’s leg, but Bluestreak ignored the human to shake Bumblebee harder until the smaller Autobot’s side panels opened, spilling out a bunch of assorted items across his floor. Bluestreak flung Bumblebee aside and knelt down, searching through the mess until he found what he was looking for.

"This . . ." he said, holding up the power pack, "is mine."

"Um, yeah . . . it is. Wonder how that got there?" Bumblebee started to say.

Bluestreak sighed, looked over, and punched Bumblebee as hard as he could in the face. The yellow transformer collapsed into a metallic heap and the human looked up at Bluestreak, and for a moment, perhaps there was the faintest smile on his face as the silver transformer stepped over his unconscious master. Slowly, they looked at each other, fragile human to massive machine, and then Bluestreak brought his rifle up and pointed it at his own chest. Spike’s eyes seemed to widen as the gun went off in a crackle of energy and the smell of burning enamel filled the room.

The silver Autobot staggered, then caught himself, and slowly looked down at his chest where the low power blast had burned his sigil to unrecognizable bits. Then he shrugged, wiping off the charring with the palm of his hand. Inclining his head, he looked down once more and then stepped disdainfully over Bumblebee and left the room.

Bluestreak casually walked out the front of the Ark and looked up at the sky where it was starting to shift from the darkness of the night into the cool violet of morning. Then, he transformed, sat there for a second, and then drove away down the road. Not once did he think where he was heading, just that he wasn’t returning.