Forever A Team: Transformers Animated

Chapter XII

As soon as they got back to the base, they found that Sari had gone back home, leaving the five of them to themselves. Ratchet was currently working on repairing Bulkhead who got the majority of the injuries as they fought off those two decepticons that he still found himself wondering as to why they had left on their own and given up the fight. Something was clearly off, yet he had no idea what was going on. Optimus simply watched as Ratchet worked on Bulkhead as he continued to think over the events that had happened in the past several hours.

"Oh, my aching chassis." Bulkhead groaned.

"You're lucky you're still online after facing those decepticons." Ratchet replied.

"I think one of them has a screw loose." Bumblebee commented.

"Just one?" Prowl asked as Optimus sat there listening to everything going on and thinking over what happened in the process as best as he could.

"Crazy or not, we still can't risk them getting their servos on the allspark." Ratchet spoke up.

"And we can't endanger any more innocent lives. We'll have to repair our ships and move the allspark off this planet." He replied.

"We can't just pick up and go. How will we break the news to Sari?" Bulkhead asked.

"She's a big girl, she'll understand." Bumblebee commented.

"What about Julie? It seemed pretty clear that her mission was to help us." Prowl spoke up.

"Speaking of Julie, where the heck was she?" Bumblebee replied. "Surely she could have helped us figure out something about those cons, or helped us fight them off."

Optimus was dreading the moment that they realized that she had disappeared.

"Last we knew, Prime was with her." Ratchet replied. "You didn't hurt her, did you?" He asked as he looked at him. He shook his head in mere response as he sighed. "I took her out of the base for a drive, but she ended up telling me she wanted to be alone, so I left her." He replied. "She made it very clear she didn't want us controlling her choice here in our world."

"You mean, you simply left her alone?" Ratchet cried out.

"What if the Decepticons find her? They could be after her just as they were after the allspark." Bumblebee replied.

"I am sure that she is fine out wherever she is." Optimus replied, avoiding bringing up the fact that he had also kissed her in the process.

"I don't care if that Prime ordered us to take care of her or not. So help me if she comes back upset or injured, or if she doesn't even come back at all..." Ratchet started to cry out, before he ended up mumbling something that he was unable to even pick up. "Bumblebee, I want you to go and get Sari so we can break the news to her about us leaving. We will need her help in order to succeed in fixing our ship."

"NOOOOO!" Sari cried in front of them as they looked down at her.

"I think she's taking it well." Bumblebee mumbled next to him as Optimus looked down at her. "Sari, please try to understand. We don't have a choice."

"It's only a matter of time before even more decepticons follow us here." Prowl agreed.

"So!" Sari replied.

"Grow up kid. The only way for to protect your planet and the allspark, is to go." Ratchet exclaimed as he looked down at her and turned away.

"We're running out of time, Sari. Ratchet can't fix our ship without you and your key." Optimus spoke up.

"You want me to spend the next ten megacycles alone, on a space ship, at the bottom of Lake Erie, with this protoform?" Ratchet cried out as he crouched down over Sari.