Prologue

1994…

June coughed and groaned as she held her stomach, feeling twice as sick from this flu and her morning sickness. She had been ordered to be on bed rest from her doctor until her flu cleared up. Neither she nor the baby was in any danger at the time as everything looked normal on the ultrasound and the other tests.

Her husband was being as helpful as usual with making sure she was comfortable in her illness. She kept him on his toes with her random demands for the strangest food combinations when her cravings kicked in, but they were surprisingly deliciously. Although her husband would often react in disgust when she insisted as much and offered him some, which he always turned down.

They had moved for the job opportunities to Jasper, and the charm of a small town certainly didn't hurt. But she'd always heard whispers that the previous owners kept moving out…strange, but they were just rumours.

June coughed again, and wanted this flu to pass as quickly as possible. Who gets the flu in a desert anyway?

1998…

June looked down into Jack's pleading eyes as he asked her for the third time not to let him go to pre-school. "We've gone over this, honey. I promise you'll have fun, you'll make lots of friends…"

"I don't wanna!" Jack shouted, the light of the kitchen flickering violently. "I want daddy!"

June kept calm, even though the reminder stabbed her like a knife to the chest. It had been only two months since her husband had one night just up and left, with nothing but a note explaining why. He couldn't handle her constantly being ill, and the added stress of taking care of Jack was a strain on his work. "Please," she said softly and gently ran her fingers through her son's hair, "do this, for me?"

Jack looked into his mother's sad eyes, and stopped as he didn't want her to look like that. The lights had immediately stopped flickering. "Okay mommy."

June hugged Jack and patted him on the back. "Now finish up your supper…and Jack, I promise things will be fine."

2000…

June had always been worried about Jack and how his moods affected the things around them. She had taken him to the doctors to see if there was anything wrong, but everything had come back completely normal. She kept quiet though about what was exactly going on, there was no need to draw attention to it, as the mechanical failures were sparse and few if he got upset or stressed.

Jack had a good control over his moods, good enough for her to bring up these startling revelations to him. He hadn't liked the thought that there was something weird about him, and had a taken a while for him to even set foot into a lit room, but he'd learned to accept it. He did seem relieved to know why things kept happening afterwards, and that it wasn't just a jinx or anything of the like. He stilled got annoyed when it had taken several tries for him to even be able to own a cellphone without it short-circuiting, even by accident.

June suspected that perhaps there was something else going on, and had wondered if her previous bouts of random illnesses were in any way connected. Though while hers had abruptly stopped after several years, Jack had been like that since he was an infant and it hadn't gone away yet.

Still, June hoped for Jack's sake it went away, she didn't want to break her promise to him after all.

Chapter 1

2010…

When Jack walked on his way home, he felt like collapsing from sheer shock alone. Giant robots, giant fighting robots; it was like something out a science fiction movie. And it had been real! Jack had even pinched himself to make sure he'd actually seen what he'd seen. He could still feel his blood pumping in his ears and he leaned against the lamppost beside him to try and calm down.

He felt something like a static shock when his hand connected with the post and he had jump back when the bulb shattered. He checked himself over to make sure that he didn't get on the glass on him and berated himself momentarily about he got around any kind of machinery when flustered or anxious. And a lamppost still counted apparently.

Jack rolled his eyes and kept on walking while he continued to try and calm himself down. He needed something normal and he'd even eat the tofu dinner his mother would try to feed him for dinner. He took another deep breath to calm himself down, but he saw sparks run along the ground and into the other streetlamps and the glass exploded. Jack winced and looked around cautiously to see if anyone else was around to see that.

Jack hurried his pace down the sidewalk, but when he turned the corner, he caught sight of something that had been seared into his mind. It was the sight of a purple and black car that had transformed into one of the giant robots that tried to kill him and the other robots with lighter colors. He turned on his heel and walked back the way he came and to find another way home. He glanced back to see to his horror that the car was driving silently down the same road as he was. He hurried his pace and tried to keep himself calm.

The dark-haired boy saw the sparks flee along the ground from his feet once more and this time sparked around the few cars parked at the side of the roads and their alarm systems went off. Jack took off immediately, fear coursing through him and when he glanced back, he saw the black car gaining speed on him and Jack tried to run faster, taking a sudden turn into a narrow alley and then between the houses on the other side.

When he reached the street on the opposite side, he leaned on his knees and panted heavily, trying to catch his breath. Why did he have to leave his bike at work? He sighed in relief when he saw that the there was no car on any side of the street and walked down the street to try and find another way home. He turned the corner cautiously and was glad that he could see no black car, so he continued on walking.

Jack heard a sudden screech and he whirled around, but he had no time to react as the black car transformed and snatched him off the ground. He felt a light shock and the robot nearly dropped him too, but with how high up he was, Jack didn't want to fall to his death, so he gripped at the hand and barely took notice of the sparks shooting from his hands onto the robot's.

The robot pressed a finger to his head. "I have the human that was with the Autobot Arcee." The voice the robot used was male, and Jack couldn't hear a response, so he waited with baited breath for what was going to happen next. "Affirmative." The robot said abruptly and tossed Jack into the air.

Jack shouted at the sudden weightlessness, but it quickly turned into panic when he realized he was about to splat. He shut his eyes as he felt himself fall, but what he hit was soft under him and he felt something strap tightly around his chest and he let out a soft grunt. His gaze darted around the interior of the car and he tried to claw the seatbelt off of him, but the seat jerk forward and his head was bashed against the steering wheel. The teen groaned as he was sat back upright and he slumped down, momentarily dazed.

He felt his head spin, but even with that, he could still feel the robot car under him drive away. He shook his head and grabbed the steering wheel to try and get the car to turn back and stepped on the breaks, and for a moment he felt something falter with the robot and continued in his effort to get out. The seat suddenly slid back so his foot was too out of reach, and the seat went back, so he was no longer holding the steering wheel. Jack's head spun again and he squinted at the wave of nausea, his hands going back fort the belt around him, though his efforts were in vain and his panic rose considerable as he grew more desperate. "Let me go!" he shouted and sparks erupted from his fingertips with each scratch to the belt.

Jack felt his throat constrict as the car stopped so suddenly, and he tugged at the belt, but the menacing voice made him freeze.

"Shut up, or you'll be dead before we get back."

Jack carefully weighed his severely limited options; he could continue, and die, or he could be compliant, and hopefully make it out alive. 'I don't wanna die.' He thought to himself and stopped trying to get the belt off him and kept his gaze steadfastly focused on the ceiling.

The robot said nothing as he continued on driving, the bumpy road telling Jack that they were driving over the gravel of the desert now.

The teen attempted to keep himself calm, but every time the car would go over a bump, he felt panic rise and fall. If he hadn't tried to impress Sierra he wouldn't have gotten into this mess. He thought if he was ever going to see his mother, she had always been so protective of him, always worrying about him. It would suck for him to die, but he didn't know how she'd react. 'No, don't think about it.' Jack thought as he pushed away the possibility that he might actually die in this situation.

A situation he'd never once believed could have happened.

Jack stopped himself in time as he was about to ask what was going to happen to him, but he didn't want to find out. It couldn't be good anyway. Jack craned his neck to look out the window as best as he could, but the expanse of desert didn't give him a clue as to where he was, and he didn't know how to control these little bursts that had made him a walking techbane when he was upset or stressed. His
eyes widened as he realized he still had his cell phone in his pocket, and maybe he could call the cops, at least to let someone would know he was missing.

'Please don't be busted too.' Jack thought as he reached into his pocket and pulled his phone out, nearly letting out a sigh of relief that it wasn't broken. He quickly dialed for the cops, but the phone flew from his hand when the robot made a sharp swerve and Jack saw it land on the other side of the backseat. He reached out as far as he could, only to have him firmly rooted in the seat as the belt tightened to an almost crushing degree.

Jack worried for a moment if the robot was aware of what he had been holding, but when he looked up, he saw through the windshield a giant ship and his dread grew as they got steadily closer to it. When the robot drove up the plank, the door opened and the belt retracted from him, letting Jack get out of the car, but as he ran for the plank, it started to close before his eyes and he banged on the steel in frustration. He heard the sound of transformation, and a loud crunch indicating his phone was no more. Next came the heavy footsteps, and he struggled against the hands that lifted him off the ground. One hand merely secured both his arms to his sides to stop his struggles.

Jack was too tired to feel panicked anymore, and the robot walked out of the room they had come in and down a dimly lit purple hall. 'Is everything purple?' he thought but didn't ask. He kept his head down to make himself appear smaller when they passed other black and purple robots who, though having the same blank face as the one carrying him, didn't seem all that happy to see a human with the way they tensed up.

The robot carrying him paused just short of a steel door, and the grip Jack felt around him tightened and he morbidly thought that just a little tighter and he'd be paste, but the grip loosened and the robot walked forward, the door sliding open to reveal a mostly empty room, the only thing present being the chains suspended in the air.

Jack was sure his face had paled as the robot, with surprising gentleness, pulled one of his arms up from his side and hooked it onto one of the chains before doing the same with his other. The robot seemed to shift as though he wanted to leave, but paused and raised a hand toward Jack, who flinched back, only for the robot to stop suddenly as the sounds of approaching footsteps were heard outside the room.

The door slid open and another robot walked in, this one silver and actually having a face with a pair of red eyes. The silver robot ignored the one that had captured Jack. "Where is the Autobot base?" The silver robot asked with a male voice.

Jack blinked at the question, but there was that word again; 'Autobot,' what did it even mean anyway? He'd heard that black and purple robot call the motorcycle one, was she the reason he was in this mess? "I don't know what you're talking about." He answered honestly.

This was apparently not the answer the silver robot wanted to hear. "Oh, really now?" he asked with a touch of sarcasm before he scowled. "I have ways of making you talk, human." He spat and as if seeing the robot standing off to the side for the first time, his next words were menacing. "Bring the prod."

Sneering, Starscream took the energon prod away from the Vehicon and it stood back over at the side. He turned his attention back to the human and held the prod up. "Last chance, human; tell me what I want to know, or suffer."

The human stared back, that infuriating look of false innocence on his face. "I don't know what you're talking about!" he repeated.

Starscream's sneer deepened. "Then you say pay the price for your silence." He hissed before he jabbed at the human, who flinched back, though there was no other reaction; no screaming, no pleading, nothing. Starscream frowned and stuck the human again, but there was still no response. He examined the prod briefly before he abruptly turned and struck it at the Vehicon, who reacted as he expected. "Well isn't this…interesting." Starscream mused darkly as he looked back at the human, who seemed to have gotten over his fear from the way he was being glared at. "Don't think your safe, human; you will tell me the location of the Autobot base." He said and used a sharp edge of the prod to nick at the human's visible skin and the red fluid leaked onto the edge. This should be sufficient enough to tell him what he wants to know.

Starscream stalked out of the holding cell, his optics narrowing at the blood on the prod. This was the right one, and energon was supposed to react negatively to organics, so what went wrong? The prod worked, so it must have been that wretched human's fault! Well, it wouldn't last for long, once he figured out what made the human so resistant to the energon shock.

The seeker made his way to the lab, and instead of passing it off to one of the lesser mechs to examine the sample, he decided to do the examination himself. He wanted to get this problem fixed as soon as possible, and he didn't want one of those drones to make a mistake. He walked over to one of the microscopes, but before he set a drip on one of the slides, he noticed how the blood was reacting to the energon when he scanned it experimentally.

It had apparently affected the organic, but just not in the way he'd expected it to. The blood was…absorbing the energon.

"Impossible." Starscream muttered and quickly put the sample under the microscope, but there it was for him to see. The blood still seemed organic, but the energon had merged with it, and when he scanned the blood once more for something other than simple experimentation, the second go had him reeling back.

It was faint, as this was just a sample, but the blood still gave off readings that were like that of the Allspark, but how was this possible?

Starscream narrowed his optics. "The human must know something. Organic or no, one does not simply stay near such a relic without noticing something." He said to himself. "And I will be getting the information out of him." he added before he grinned maliciously. "And to think, I will be the one to get the elusive Allspark…" he trailed off and rubbed his chin thoughtfully, though a scowl stretched across his faceplate the next moment. "For such a prize, the situation will require…finesse."

"Hey," Jack called out to the robot that was standing to the side, which had seemed to recover from the shock of being poked. It made him realize that the silver robot had wanted that to happen to him, and he was grateful that he hadn't felt anything, "can you come over here?"

The robot surprised him by walking over, even though he made no move to touch him. "What is it?"

"Can you pull my collar up to my neck, since I can't exactly stop the bleeding?" Jack asked and wriggled his wrists.

The robot tilted it's head before he nodded and lifted the collar of the teen's shirt to hold it against the cut. "You really should have just told him, he might just take it easy on you. You would only be left to starve anyway."

Jack glowered at the robot. "How is that better than being poked at with a stick?"

"...the stick hurts." The robot retorted and Jack blinked. "The energon prod was intended to hurt you, and Starscream turned it on me when it wouldn't work on you."

Jack filed the name away as the black and purple robot was clearly talking about the other one. "Then why didn't it work?"

"It...truly is strange." The robot admitted.

They lapsed into silence, and Jack had the unnerving feeling that the robot was staring at him, but then again he was holding his cut, so it was just logically.

The door slid open, and the silver robot, who Jack could now put a name too, walked in, his expression blank. He walked up to them and his optics narrowed at the robot. "What are you still doing here?" he questioned before he shook his head and looked past the robot at Jack. "Are you ready to talk now?"

"I don't know anything!" Jack shot back. How many times was he going to have to repeat that until he was believed?

Starscream's face shifted to one of realization. "You really don't? Are you certain?"

Jack could have sighed with relief if he didn't feel so frustrated. "Yes! I don't know what these 'Autobots' are with how that one got me into this mess, I hope I never do know anything about them!"

"Then it appears as if I have made a grievous mistake," Starscream said repentantly and then black and purple robot looked at him, but Starscream either didn't notice, or ignored him, "as our sworn enemies, the Autobots are known to be rather persuasive."

Jack furrowed his brow, and wriggled his wrists. "Then will you let me go?"

"Of course," Starscream replied and looked at the robot in front of Jack with a stern glare, "take him down, and escort him back to his domicile."

The black and purple robot nodded and took a hold of Jack with one hand, while he used the other to take the restraints off of Jack. He looked over at Starscream when he was done. "Further orders, sir?"

"Remain with the human, the Autobots might very well show." He replied.

"What?" Jack asked abruptly. "Why would they do that?"

Starscream didn't reply as he gave a significant glance to the other robot, a dark underlining in his gaze that Jack didn't quite understand, but the robot seemed to as he nodded before Starscream walked off.

Jack held his shirt up to the cut as the black and purple robot walked out of the room, though the grip on him was not crushingly tight as it had been before. He hoped that since Starscream believed him finally, that there was no reason to hurt him, right? 'Well,' Jack thought and glanced at the robot holding him, 'at least I get to leave.'

June pulled her car into the driveway, her brow furrowed though upon seeing the black and purple car in the garage, she started to get worried. She took out her cell phone and dialed her son's number. "Jack, where are you?"

"I'm in the house, why?" Jack asked confused.

"There's another car in the garage, do you have anything to do with this?" June asked.

There was a pause on the other end. "Oh! Yeah, I gotta…uh, bought a car." Jack replied sheepishly.

June frowned as she replied. "Jack, what on earth made you do that? You only have a learner's permit!"

"I know mom, but I thought it could be good practice." Jack said and his voice turned sincere. "I really didn't plan on this, it just sort of happened. I wouldn't have bought it without a reason."

June blinked and she was suddenly worried. "Jack, did something happen? Did you get upset or angry? Is that why you got the car?"

"I…I didn't mean for anything to happen, I was checking the car out, and it just happened when I saw the originally price." Jack said frustrated and the signal turned to static for a moment before Jack calmed down enough to talk. "The owners just thought it broke, so I said I'd pay them half and they let me keep the car."

"Jack, that wasn't very nice of you." June replied sternly.

"I couldn't tell them the truth; they'd think I was crazy or something." Jack replied tiredly.

June had to concede on that point, her hope that this strange phenomenon would have just stopped like her illnesses had. "Alright, but you are not allowed to drive that car, you hear me young man?"

"Yes, mom." Jack replied relieved.

June hung up her phone and exited her car. She walked into the garage, her hands on her hips as she inspected the vehicle her son had gotten himself. She had to admit it was an impressive looking car, but then again, that didn't mean it was safe just because it looked nice. She sighed, shaking her head. "I'm going to regret this." She said to herself before she continued on into the house.

Taking one last look at the car, June pursed her lips and walked through the door.