Author's Note: Chapter two! School has started. Expect updates every two months, though if I get a chance it will be sooner. Sorry, but I didn't have any free time over summer, much less with classes! Rrr! Enjoy!

Disclaimer: Love Transformers. Don't own it. (sigh) Same for Transformers: Animated. Can't wait for season three. (sigh) Wingshadow is mine, however, and this plot!

Chapter 2

"Ratchet?" Optimus called, walking quickly through the abandoned warehouse that served as their base. He paused in the doorway where Bumblebee and Sari were playing the racing game again. "Have either of you seen Ratchet?" It had been two days since the mysterious meteoroid had hit, and to say the medic had not been himself would be an understatement.

"No," the two chorused in unison, eyes and optics not leaving the screen. Optimus continued down the hallway, towards the living quarters.

"Ratchet?" he called again, knocking on the old medic's door.

"He's not here."

Prime turned to see Prowl poised in the doorway to the monitor control room.

"Well then where is he?" Optimus snapped, more than slightly annoyed. He immediately regretted the harshness of the question. "Sorry, Prowl," he started, but the ninja-bot waved it away.

"He left early this morning. I believe he was heading to the ship."

"Thanks, Prowl," Optimus said, and raised a hand to his audio receptor to try to contact Ratchet. "Ratchet?" Static was all that met him. "Let me know if you hear from him," Optimus called over his shoulder to Prowl, headed for the door.

XXXXX

Ratchet had indeed headed to the ship that morning, hoping for some comfort and relief from the questions that plagued his processor, working diligently on a reprogramming sequence to distract himself. The mystery of the femme's sudden and seemingly random appearance was enough to put him on edge; he had discovered the hard way that nothing good happened when she was around. But her being here, chased by her faction, and not blasting him—it made him even more suspicious. Had he misjudged her the last time? Had he…underestimated her? Was there a chance that the femme had done what she had because she truly had cared about him, not just to save her own plating?

Unfortunately, the reassuring bulk of Omega Supreme, a brave Autobot and old friend who had given up his spark star cycles ago, did little to belie his worries. Ratchet reached out and pressed a key, powering down the terminal. As he was about to close his optics and lean back to rest tiredly in his chair, however, a glint of red across the room caught his attention, and the medic jumped in surprise, throwing himself out of the chair with a thud! He quickly pulled himself up the console, glaring over it and into unmoving crimson orbs watching him out of a still face he had failed to notice before. He sputtered for several seconds before closing his mouth components and simply staring as he slowly sat back down in his chair. Neither spoke for another cycle, and Ratchet purposely ignored the buzz of an incoming transmission.

"It's been a long time, Ratchet," the intruder finally said, coming forward. She was exactly as he remembered: tall, slim, and lithe, but he knew that she was far stronger than the appearance her frame radiated. The Decepticon reprogramming had given her greater size than most femme, as well as greater firepower. She, as were all Decepticons, was a fighter, designed specifically to kill. But there was one small difference between this current image and the ancient one in his memories: what had remained of the underlying soft innocence of her youth that the Decepticons had not immediately stripped away was long gone. All that was left was a tough, experienced, battle scarred seeker. And from the looks of her plating, she had seen quite a lot of action since he had last laid optics on her.

He narrowed his optics. "What do you want, you backstabbing double-crosser?"

A hint of sadness gleamed in the depths of her optics. "I apologize for that. I did what I had to."

"Yeah, yeah, I know," he said in a mocking tone. "To cover your own aft and all that other blah. Spare me the details."

It was now hurt that was reflected back at him. "You don't understand!" she cried, covering the rest of the distance between them and setting her clawed hands on the console. "Yes, you're right: I did what I had to to defend my position. But if I had simply walked away, they would have made short work of you. They thought I had offlined you, so they didn't bother to check! I did what I had to to save your miserable life!"

Ratchet met her glare with a stoic one. The femme's face twisted in frustration and she slammed both fists into the console before whirling away from him. Tension mounted for a cycle, then she visibly forced herself to relax.

"Regardless of the situation when we last parted, and regardless of how much it dents my pride," she started, causing him to sit up straighter, "I came here with a very specific mission in mind." She turned back to face him, optics full of determination. "I need your help."

XXXXX

Optimus stopped beside the Ark not twenty cycles after leaving their base. He transformed, walking towards the hatch. "Ratchet?" he called, getting no answer, though he expected none. He was beginning to worry about the cankerous veteran. It wasn't like Ratchet to ignore transmission beacons and run off without telling him. Shrugging, he entered the ship.

He stopped in the control room first and found nothing. He slowly headed to the back, searching each room carefully, finding nothing out of place. He paused halfway through his examination as a low warble reached his audio-receptors. Voices? Yes, most certainly voices, two of them, one definitely Ratchet's drawl, the other female. Silently, a hand reaching for his axe, the Autobot leader followed the sound to the medical bay and paused outside the door, listening intently.

"—why I came to you. With the lies Hook's telling, not a single Decepticon would even consider listening to me. I'm branded as a traitor."

"And you think I can help you with this?"

"You know as well as I that any other Autobot would have shot me before I could so much as transform! Ratchet, I came to you because you are the only mech in the universe I can trust! Even if you are one of the Autoscum."

"It might help your case some if you stop insulting me."

"Sorry. You're right, as usual, and ow! That hurt, slag it!"

"Good. Stay still! What exactly did you do to yourself anyway? Fight the entire Decepticon army?"

"In a way, yes."

"I was being facetious!"

"I know."

"By the Spark, femme, it's a hard enough time figuring out where all these pieces fit without you moving and griping at me!"

Optimus rounded the corner slowly, confused. His optics widened in shock and disbelief. Ratchet was studiously bent over, welding carefully. His patient had her faceplate turned away, optics narrow, wincing slightly. She would have been as tall as Sentinel standing up, perhaps a little taller, and was slim but very well armed with what must have been dozens of battle upgrades. A pair of wings slanted down from her shoulders, a purple insignia emblazoned on them.

She spotted him then, leaning back slightly, suspicious, optics widening, unsure if he posed any threat. "Ratchet…"

Her tone made him look up, and the medic followed the line of her optics behind him to meet Optimus'. For a moment, the three simply stared in shock, tension mounting. Then Ratchet pasted a cheery smile on his face.

"There you are, Prime!" he said, striding across the room with his arms spread wide open, draping one over his leader's shoulder. "Could I have a word with you?" he asked innocently, pulling Optimus away from the doorway, into the hall, reaching behind him to shut and lock the door.

"I think you had better have more than a word for me, Ratchet," was the last thing Wingshadow heard before the door blocked their voices. The click of the lock initiating made her narrow her optics, but she forced her tight servos to relax. She had come this far; she had to trust Ratchet.

The terminal beside the exam table caught her attention, and she rose to her feet, stepping over to it carefully. She reached out with one claw, activating the console. The words ACCESS DENIED. INPUT CODE. flashed across the screen, glowing bright green letters. She shrugged indifferently and flipped the power switch, then booted it up again, hacking the password before the lock could initiate. Another moment and she was sorting through the ship's data banks, scanning quickly, trying to discern how many Autobots were currently stationed on this planet and why.

There were currently eight Autobots on the planet, which was called Earth: Ratchet was a medic, of course; Optimus Prime, the mech in the hallway, was their leader; a Cyber-ninja-bot named Prowl; the leading space bridge expert by the name of Bulkhead; and a speedy little bot named Bumblebee. An interesting combination, she mused, drawing up the ship's log. Here a security program asked her for her name and rank, which she overrode easily. The list scrolled down, and she clicked on the first one. Their mission had been repairing space bridges, apparently, until accidentally discovering the All-Spark. This caused her optics ridges to rise. They had fled before a ship the ship's computer had identified as the Nemesis. The data continued, reporting that they had entered a space bridge and the Nemesis had been supposed destroyed in the explosion. The next words kindled a hope in her that had long been extinguished.

Since then, the report continued, the Autobots had landed on Earth, battling Megatron, who had boarded their ship. He had been knocked out on the landing, however, and the five had spent the last 50 solar cycles in stasis lock. The only other thing worthy of note was that an Elite Guard ship had landed three Earth orbital cycles ago, the crew consisting of Ultra Magnus, Jazz and Sentinel Prime.

Isn't that convenient? She thought, flipping the power switch off and on again, deleting her trail. She had not heard about any of them except Ultra Magnus, of course, but that mattered little.

XXXXX

Optimus barely contained his anger until the door hissed shut. "Just what is a Decepticon doing aboard Omega Supreme!?" he shouted, making Ratchet step backwards, hands held out in front of him defensively.

"I can explain, Prime—"

"Oh, you'll be explaining alright! To Ultra Magnus!"

"No! Optimus, you can't blow her cover yet!"

"Why not?"

"Because she has information we need! Just listen to me for a cycle!"

Optimus crossed his arms, optics narrow. "This had better be good."

"First off, I didn't know she was on board when I came here this morning. I've had a lot on my CPU and was just working on a diagnostic, and I looked up and there she was! Then she told me she needed my help." He paused. "We do need to tell Magnus about that. She has uncovered a plot to completely wipe out both the Autobots and Decepticons."

"How?"

"We haven't gotten that far in our conversation yet!"

Optimus relaxed, and Ratchet was relieved to see the anger slowly draining from his frame. "Why did she come to you?"

Ratchet stammered. "I…We met during the war…once…in battle…" he stopped. "It's a long story."

"She doesn't seem to like you. I heard the name she called you."

"Oh, she's far from being happy about being here, but the orchestrator of this plan, Hook or something or other, knows that she knows and is hunting for her or something. They're Decepticons! It slags my processor to try to understand it."

"I'd like to talk to her."

Ratchet nodded and unlocked the door. Wingshadow was sitting where they left her, and turned to face them when they answered, her optics flicking from Ratchet to Optimus. Optimus glanced at Ratchet, who waved him to go ahead.

"I am Optimus Prime, leader of the Autobots here on Earth. Ratchet informs me you need our help. Would you care to elaborate,…?" he left the sentence hanging for her to provide her name.

"Wingshadow," the seeker filled, "and no."

Optimus' hopeful, polite face fell, and he blinked.

"Oh, for Spark's sake, Wingshadow!" Ratchet cried. "You want me to help you? Well Optimus here can do a lot more than I can, and I can't do anything without him knowing anyway!"

The Decepticon leveled a glare on him and rose to her full height, towering over Optimus. "Just how badly to you want to help?"

He took a step backwards. "It depends on how serious the situation is."

The glare swung back to Ratchet. "You didn't tell him!?"

"You haven't told me!" the medic retaliated, stepping towards her, ignoring the blunt fact that he was looking up.

The femme allowed her shoulders to relax and locked optics with Optimus' again. "I do not take kindly to those who betray me," she said, speaking to them both. "Only those you trust are to know about me. And when all is said and done, I am guaranteed safe passage off-planet, or away from wherever we are. Do you agree to those terms?"

Optimus exchanged a glance with Ratchet. "Yes," he said.