Darkness rising

Darkness

At the Autobot base, Ratchet was rushing to stabilise everyone's injuries. By far, Arcee, Bumblebee and Optimus had the least amount of injuries, only needing to have some dents and minor injuries repaired, which were done soon. Bulkhead was more severely injured. Ratchet had to do a lot of work to repair the damages and get his arms and legs functioning again. Finally, Tailgate was the most injured. Ratchet had to put him in a forced stasis lock before he could operate on him. 

(Some time later)

The operation on Tailgate was done. Ratchet had reattached his severed limbs and repaired his other fatal injuries. Arcee had been sitting beside him ever since the operation was done, refusing to go before Tailgate woke up. In the meantime Optimus, Bumblebee and Bulkhead had debriefed the others on the outcome of their mission. 

"Wait a minute, you want to say that Airachnid and some minicon did all that to you?" Ratchet said.

"To sum up everything, yes." Bulkhead gruffly replied as he tried to move his left arm, which was still aching.

"What's a minicon?" Miko asked.

"Minicons were a special species of Cybertronians Miko. They were around the size of a human and it's said that a minicon can enhance the physical capabilities of a Cybertronian. Their small size made them extremely good spies and some of them proved themselves to be rather fearsome warriors." Ultra magnus explained, upon hearing her question.

"But minicons almost went extinct during the war on Cybertron! And even more so, it doesn't make sense why would a minicon help a human organisation like MECH?" Ratchet said.

"I don't know. But one thing for sure, Darkstriker isn't an enemy we should be taking lightly. And now with him working alongside MECH, we have to be more careful." Optimus said.

"Prime!" 

The sudden loud voice made Raf jump back and gained the attention of the Autobots. Agent Fowler stepped out of the elevator and was holding some sort of file in his right hand. He walked over to the railing and as the Autobot leader stepped forward.

"Agent Fowler, I am truly sorry for not being able to stop MECH." Optimus said.

"There's nothing we can do about that now Prime. But I've brought something that you might find interesting." Agent Fowler said as he held up the file he was holding.

(Meanwhile with Arcee)

Arcee was sitting beside Tailgate. The blue and white mech was currently in a stasis lock. Arcee was staring at him, the person she once called her partner. Tailgate was one of her oldest friends. The recent events may have caused a turmoil to their friendship, but it didn't mean that she wanted Tailgate to go through harm's way.

Suddenly Tailgate stirred in his stasis and his optics began to flash and then he woke up. Tailgate groaned as he felt the pain in different places on his body. He tried to get up, but Arcee pushed him back on the berth.

"Stay down. You need to rest." She told him.

Tailgate was initially shocked to find Arcee sitting beside his berth.

"Arcee?" Tailgate faintly whispered. Just loud enough for the said femme to hear. 

"Yeah, it's me." Arcee told him.

"Wha-What are you doing here?" Tailgate asked before wincing in pain.

"Just, watching over you." Arcee said, looking away from the blue and white bot.

After a few moments of silence, Tailgate tried to say something. "Arcee…" he barely managed to say, before Arcee cut him off.

"Look Tailgate, I know we've been through some rough times." Arcee said before sighing and then continued "But I could never bring myself to completely hate you. Even though I can never bring myself to forgive you for what you've done, I don't want you to suffer a terrible fate."

"I…… I understand." Tailgate replied after a moment of silence.

Arcee gave him a weak small smile as she got up. 

"Rest well, Tailgate. You will need it." She said before walking out of the medical chamber.

When she reached the command centre, she found all the team members gathered around the computer. This got Arcee curious and she went over to them to see what's going on. The first person to notice her was Ratchet.

"Arcee, we were just going to call you to come here." Ratchet told her.

"Why? What happened?" Arcee asked.

"Agent Fowler has brought us some security footage that he retrieved from that military base where MECH attacked. He said that there is something in the footage that might spark our interest." Optimus said this time.

"What could possibly be in there that would spark our interest?" Ironhide questioned.

"That's what we are going to find out." Ratchet said before instructing Raf to play the footage.

Raf pressed some buttons on his laptop, which was connected to the Autobot computer, and a screen appeared on the computer screen showing a video. 

The video showed two helicopters, one of which the Autobots recognised as Airachnid and the other was just a regular Blackhawk helicopter used to carry military personnel, landed in the camp and mere moments later MECH soldiers came out of the Blackhawk and began attacking the military personnel present at the camp, followed by Darkstriker who dashed at the military personnel in an incredible speed.

The footage then changed to show another clip. This time it was from an aerial view. The video showed Darkstriker taking down multiple military personnel all by himself before the MECH soldiers came and assisted him. 

Ratchet immediately had Raf replay that part of the video when he noticed something. Raf did so and at Ratchet's command he paused the video at a certain mark. 

The Autobots looked at the scene currently being displayed in shock. The scene showed Darkstriker standing with his helmet removed, revealing his human head. The most noticeable features of him were his raven hair and pale skin. The lower half of his face was covered with a mask or face plate, concealing his identity. 

"By the allspark…." Bulkhead gasped "...Darkstriker is a human." 

Bumblebee frantically beeped out, questioning how a human could do what Darkstriker was capable of doing.

"I-I don't know Bumblebee. But I am sure it has something to do with his involvement with MECH." Ratchet said as he let the information sink in.

"Who can this guy be?" Raf questioned.

"We have no idea. But I suppose he is some guy working for MECH." Agent Fowler replied to Raf's question.

"That seems like the most logical answer at the moment." Miko added.

"It doesn't matter who that guy is. What matters right now is that MECH has turned into a bigger threat than before." Arcee suddenly said.

Optimus now stepped up and said,"I agree with Arcee. Autobots, it might be our hardest moments right now, as we have a new threat to fight against." 

The Autobots couldn't help but agree to the statement their leader made. It truly was a dark period for them. One they were not sure if they could go through as easily as they did before.

AUTHOR'S NOTE:- Hey guys. Commander Alfa here. Hope you enjoyed the chapter. 

I am really sorry for not updating the stories for a while. I had been goin through some personal problems. But now I am back and you can expect a more regular update from me. Thanks for bearing with me guys.

That's all. Hope you have a good day or night or whatever time of day it is at your place.

Bye guys. See ya in the next chapter. Alfa out. Peace.