Under Fire

Burning Bridges

After Knock Out didn't come back for some hours the team split up to look for him.

But couldn't find their friend. And were now worried it wasn't like Knock Out to just vanish for this long.

Starscream tried to call him on his com-link but Knock Out didn't answer. And Ratchet couldn't get a fix on his signal which meant he was either out of rang or it was being shielded somehow.

There was one more possibility but none of them wanted to think about it.
_

Meanwhile Shockwave had been looking through Knock Out's processor and had all the information he wanted about the Autobots.

He had also learned somethings about the red medic that Knock Out didn't want anyone to know about him.

Like that he was abused and left for dead as a sparkling by his Sire who killed his Carrier when she tried to protect him. But fortunately a medic had found him when they discovered his carrier's body.

And the medic took him to the hospital and fixed him up then found him a good home. That had actually been his reason for becoming a medic because of the one who saved him.

He and his family had been visiting Cybertron from Velocitron so the medic had even made sure the ones who adopted him were from Velocitron so he could go back to his own planet.

Shockwave looked at some more of his memories then decided to start experamenting on him.

Shockwave gave him a serum he had been working on that would cause whatever happened to a bot inside their processor would affect their body as if it was really happening to them.

Then Shockwave used the patch to tamper with Knock Out's processor and make the red medic think he was being attacked by an insecticon that was beating the scrap out of him.

Knock Out was trying desperately to struggle as the insecticon held him by the neck cables but just wasn't strong enough as he could feel it tighten it's grip.

"No!" "Please stop!" He choked. As he jerked around on the berth if he hadn't been strapped down on it he would have fallen off. Knock Out was still in power down with his optics closed but his body was still responding to what was happening to him in his mind.

Shockwave watched as Knock Out coughed up energon as he continued to squirm against his restraints.

Then Shockwave changed it so Knock Out thought he was being attacked by scraplets instead.

So far Shockwave was pleased with how well the serum was working. Then he noticed Knock Out's spark rate continued increase he was having a spark attack.

So Shockwave gave him some circuit boosters to sedate him. And Knock Out became still.

"I would perform some shadow play on you but I doubt you will survive." Shockwave said to the unconscious sports car. "So doing a mind rip and saving whatever useful information you have would be logical."

Then Shockwave started preparing to do the procedure.
_

Meanwhile Megatron, Arachnid and Ratchet were looking around near the Sea of Rust when they head arguing and found Starscream and Battlecry had run into each other while trying to help find Knock Out.

They had been trying to keep those two apart because everytime they were together they fought.

"Hey Starscream!" Battlecry yelled as he was looking at the others and he turned around only for her to punch him square in the faceplates.

"She punched me can you believe it she actually punched me!" Starscream told the others. Then he bonked one of his digits right into the middle her forehead.

Which she responded to by shoving him.

"Hey don't you shove me!" Starscream shouted at her.

"You wanna go brig it!" Battlecry shot back.

"Break it up you two." Ratchet told them. "Your behaving like sparklings."

"You two fight more then siblings." Arachnid chimed in. Making both seekers cringe.

And Megatron had to fight back laughter as the seekers tried to tackle each other but he held them apart to stop them from scraping one another until they both got tired neither one being strong enough to push past him.

Then Ratchet noticed the cave and called it to their attention Arachnid and Battlecry went in first while Ratchet, Megatron and Starscream hung back a bit and called the rest of the team in who came through a ground bridge so they could back them up if they got in trouble.

Arachnid made it to the back of the cave first and saw Shockwave getting ready to do a mind rip on Knock Out.

He was just about to press the button to start the process when she stopped him by catching his servos with her webs he fired a blast at her right before her webs stopped him but she was able to dodge it.

"I see the webs I gave you are still working well." Shockwave said when he saw Arachnid.

"You!" "Your the reason I'm the monster I am!" Arachnid cried in pure ferry as she attacked him. "You did this to me made me do horrible things!"

"I only changed you personally the decisions you made afterwards were yours alone." Shockwave told her.

"I'll make you pay for what you did to my processor!" Arachnid bellowed as she webbed him to the wall. Then started to kill him with her leg claws.

"Arachnid stop!" Yelled Arcee who had just gotten there with the rest of the team.

"Why do you care I killed your partner, I killed Knock Out's partner I'm a monster and he's the one who made me!" Arachnid practically screamed.

"I've learned that revenge dosen't solve anything and everyone can change and deserves a second chance we can't change the past but we can control the present and try to do better in the future." Said Arcee but while she was speaking to Arachnid she was also looking at Starscream telling them she forgave them both.

"Arachnid it's true that your actions in the past were your own we all make bad choices I should know." Megatron told her. "But the choice you make now is your own too make sure it's the right one."

Arachnid still had her leg claw raised in the air and let it linger for a minute before she withdrew it deciding she didn't want anymore energon on her servos.

Then Bumblebee and Bulkhead went to take Shockwave to the base to put him in a holding cell. But Shockwave managed to get one of his servos free and fired a blast at Arcee but Starscream pulled her out of the way at the last second.

Then Bulkhead and Bumblebee got him under control and took him to base and put him in his cell.

"Thanks." Arcee told Starscream.

"Anytime." He replied.

Then they all turned their attention to Knock Out who Ratchet got to work treating right away.

"We need to get him to the medbay." Ratchet said. "Knock Out needs medical attention."

"He's not the only one!" Cried Starscream as he pointed out Battlecry who was laying on the ground having been shot by the blast Arachnid dodged earlier and they could see that she'd hit her helm when she hit the ground.

"Call First Aid and Red Alert I'll need help to treat them both." Ratchet told them. And Optimus called First Aid while Megatron called Red Alert. And both said they'd meet them at the base.

Starscream carried Battlecry while Bulkhead carried Knock Out as they rushed their friends to the medbay just hoping they'd both pulled through.

To Be Continued.

Well that it for this chapter. Another cliffhanger for you guys. Hope this chapter turned out ok it was hard to come up with and I hope I had enough dialog in it that's the hardest part to come up with for me. I'll try to update soon in the meantime feel free to send feedback.