A/N: For all of those who followed this throughout the years. I write this for those faithful readers I left with unfinished business.

There is a story in need of an ending.

To you, dear readers, I owe you so much.

At long last…on with the plot.

Chapter 33

Arcee woke to the sound of voices.

The first voice filled her spark with an ache so fierce, it caused her to shudder in despair. That voice—the voice that woke her—was filled with the velvet underside of thunder. It was filled with the solidity of mountains, and resounded with a familiarity that froze the very Energon in her spark chamber.

Optimus.

He was here! Wherever here was…

But it was the second voice that kept her from ducking out of her hiding place behind a wide panel of consoles. This voice was rougher, as though filled with broken bits of gravel, it rasped the very edges of the air and had an unwelcome dry bite to it.

Knockout.

"Here, My Lord Commander." Knockout ushered the larger mech into the room, or so Arcee assumed. For fear of being discovered, she didn't dare risk trying to look out from behind her hiding place. She felt the vibrations of their steps, heard the sigh of servos as Knockout helped the other lay down on the examination table.

"You still have damage that needs to be attended to," Knockout continued and Arcee shuttered her optics closed at the thought of him being wounded. He needed Ratchet, not Knockout.

"Quite a close call you had there," Knockout spoke as though he didn't completely expect a response from the bot that lay before him. He was nervous, Arcee realized. He was afraid of the mech he treated, "Thank Primus—or, I guess, we should thank Unicron, huh?"

Arcee's Energon rolled at the thought that somehow, Unicron had been invoked. Nameless fears began to nip and gnaw at her spark, leaving her raw and aching. Please…she whispered to Primus, please let whatever Megatron did to you be reversable…

"M-my, Lord Commander, it will be easier to treat you, if I place you in stasis for a short time." She was surprised at how timid, how cowed Knockout sounded.

"If that is what must be done, Doctor." Orion rumbled.

There was a pause, a metallic rasp as Knockout retrieved the necessary equipment accompanied by a series of soft, almost melodic beeps. Another stretch of silence and then Arcee heard Knockout ex-vent in relief; she assumed that to mean the Decepticon medic had indeed put Orion into a repair induced stasis. But just as he began to work, Knockout let out a cry of dismay as the comm line rattled under the demand of Megatron's voice.

"Knockout!" The Lord of the Decepticons snapped and the medic rushed to the console to respond.

"Yes, My Lord!"

"To the bridge, immediately!"

"But, My Lord, I have—"

"Now!"

Before the red mech could stammer an answer, there was the sharp static buzz as the line was cut. With a huff, Knockout moved quickly about the small med bay, making adjustments, putting away tools—or so Arcee assumed—before he headed toward the door.

"Can't please everyone…" the Decepticon grumbled just as the door hissed shut behind him.

Left alone at last, with nothing and no one as a barrier between her and her once-friend, Arcee found herself unable to move. Her joints seized, whether from fear of what she may see, or from the pain of her own injuries, she couldn't rightly tell. But Arcee was no coward, so it was that she willed her servos to move as she stood and crept from her hiding place.

One, two, three steps carried her away from the consoles and toward the examination table that held…that held…

With a cry, she fell to her knees, her frame shuddered, drowning in the sight of the impossible.

She turned away, bringing her arms up before her optics as if to block out the vision that was now burned into her very processor. A vision of black panels trimmed in purple…

"Primus…" she breathed, "Oh Primus...no…"

Because he was her friend, her Prime, Arcee staggered to her peds, crossing what felt like the distance between Earth and Cybertron itself to reach the side of the examination table. He lay unmoving before her, and looking down at him then, his optics darkened in stasis, there was no defense against the totality of the damage Megatron had wrought.

"Did he succeed, Optimus?" Arcee asked him, her hands reaching forward to rest lightly upon his arm, "Did he finally take you from us?" Her voice waivered as she stood there, silently bleeding from this, the greatest injury that Megatron could ever have deal to them, to her.

"How, Optimus?" She whispered, "How did he convince you to change, to deny everything you are?" That was when she saw it. Not just the yawning tear across his chest, but the glint of something within; a purple glimmer, something that glittered with malcontent.

A shard of Dark Energon.

Anger rose within her, making her slender frame tremble under the ferocity of the emotion. It raged through her, gave her focus, gave her purpose and clarity. "How dare you Megatron! I'll tear out your spark with my bare hands for this!" She snarled. The travesty rocked her to the core; to taint a Prime with Dark Engeron, with the very essence of the un-maker, the destroyer…what monstrosity was this, what treachery?

Decided, she reached forward, her hands seeking out, and locking onto the unholy shard. "No…" she growled, "No, Megatron…I won't let you take him from us!" She yanked then, in a jagged motion pulling it free, the force of her momentum knocking her back several paces. Ex-venting she looked down at the purple shard clutched in her hands in shock, her processor still struggling with the gravity and depth of Megatron's transgression. With a cry she flung it to the ground, grinding it into dust beneath her peds.

It was then that a new sound registered in her audio receptors. She turned just in time to watch the great frame, stained in midnight and purple, shudder from the sudden loss of Dark Energon. His optics flared to life once more, as he struggled to rise from the table.

Arcee took a step forward, wanting to reach out to him, to help him, but she found herself pinned under the weight of his gaze.

Those optics, saturated with the fire of Dark Energon rose to meet hers. His crushing gaze locked on to her without familiarity, without recognition. His optics rolled over her frame, taking in one crucial detail—the silver emblem glinting deceivingly from the delicate wing-like panel on her back.

His optics narrowed as he rose to his full intimidating height, his voice, painful in its familiarity, rumbled in damnation, "Autobot."

Arcee staggered backwards, her processor a whirl, unable to voice any plea or protest, she could only watch in horror as he advanced. In her spark she knew that this was her end, and somewhere within, a tendril of peace unfurled in the darkest corner of her processor: at least it would be Optimus sending her to become one with the Allspark. But as soon as the thought had formed, revulsion filled her anew.

No. This wasn't how it was supposed to end. No.

She couldn't let the memory of the last Prime become stained by the slaughter of the very bots he once led from the ashes of a dying world. If there was a chance, any chance, any flicker of hope that Optimus would one day be restored…and if he found out he had extinguished Arcee's spark it would devastate him. She could never do that to him, could never allow him to bear the responsibility for her termination. It was enough to enable her to move.

With a heavy spark, Arcee turned then, turned and ran away from her Prime, her leader, her friend.

Away.

She had to get…

Away.

Stumbling out of the lab, on and on, she pushed her beleaguered frame as she struggled to out run the pain, the grief and the harsh reality her world had become. Optimus…the last hope Cybertron had, the last hope the Autobots so desperately clung to, their shield in the storm of the war…was gone. All gone, all turned to ash in the inferno that was Megatron. Arcee gasped as the revelation at last crested over her: the line of the Primes had ended, Optimus was dead. And in his place, Megatron had somehow resurrected a monster.

Faltering, Arcee hit the floor hard, skidding and scraping her battered frame yet again. They only had each other now, just the four of them to stand together against the howling tempest that raged, clamoring for their destruction. It wouldn't be enough, she knew. They were so few, against so many… worst of all, they had lost their guiding light.

It wasn't enough.

But it would have to be.

Slowly, Arcee tried to pick herself up. She couldn't give in, couldn't give up. Not yet. They had to keep fighting, for themselves, for all those who had made the ultimate sacrifice.

For the memory of the last Prime. In honor of her oldest friend.

It was then that she realized she wasn't being followed. Shaking from Energon withdrawals, she lay there in the gloom as a notion blossomed and then bloomed with terrifying clarity in her mind. Horror gripping her spark as she wondered…could she have been wrong? Had Optimus been struggling to recognize her rather than attack her? She hardly dared to hope…

The clatter of approaching footsteps, the shout of troops alerted her to the fact that she wasn't safe. Her time had run out. With a moan of pain, Arcee pushed herself up, managing to stagger into another room. This one was occupied only by a lone vehicon trooper monitoring a handful of consoles.

With a well-placed shot from her blaster, he hit the floor, his spark extinguished before he even realized she was there. Locking the door behind her, Arcee stumbled over to the computer, summoning up the Decepticon warship's current coordinates.

Feeling wrung out, Arcee at long last contacted the Autobot base…her base, her home.

"Ratchet…" Her voice rasped with disuse, "I need a bridge…"