"Careful, guys," Ironhide cautioned. "We don't know what's down there. Could be a Decepticon trap."

Sideswipe and Sunstreaker groaned audibly while Prowl and Jazz just looked at each other. Ironhide had been unusually paranoid since Teletran-1 had picked up on some unusual energy readings in the Mojave Desert. His words were grating on their audios. There would be no living with him until he'd been proven wrong.

"We are aware of this, Ironhide," Prowl stated calmly as the five of them prepared to climb down. "All precautions will be taken."

"Yeah," Sunstreaker quipped. "Stop acting like Red Alert."

Ironhide scowled as Sideswipe jabbed at his brother. The jab jarred their lines and sent the twins tumbling into the crater. Jazz quickly followed to keep the two from doing too much damage to each other as Prowl looked at Ironhide. His scowl had turned into a deepened frown as he gazed in the direction they had come from.

"Something wrong, Ironhide?"

"Which way did we come, Prowl?'

Prowl blinked.

"What?"

"Which way did we come?"

"The direction you're looking in . . ."

"Where are our tire tracks then? And, for that matter, shouldn't there be scorch marks or something from a crater this big?"

Prowl sighed to himself then started to point out where their tracks were when he stopped. Their tracks had vanished and there were no scorch marks on the ground where there should have been. The angle of the crater suggested that. The two seconds looked at each other.

"I don't like this . . ."

"Neither do I, Ironhide. I'll call them back up here . . ."

The ground gave way underneath them at that moment and sent them tumbling to the crater. Rocks and dust flew around as they went but Prowl noticed that their descent left no trail. Alarm klaxons rang in his mind then he felt his air intakes hitch as he and Ironhide hit the ground. Two sets of arms immediately hefted him to his feet. Glancing to his right, he saw Jazz helping Ironhide to his feet.

"Are you guys all right?" Jazz inquired.

"Yeah . . ." Ironhide hesitated. Prowl nodded. He started to say that they were leaving when something glinting the sunlight caught his optic. Out of habit, he looked at it and he barely noticed as the others did the same. In a flash of white light and a stabbing pain in his forehead, Prowl blanked out.

888888888

"Excellent work, Starscream. Any idea as to what they were looking for?"

Prowl opened his optics and shook off his grogginess just in time to hear Megatron and Starscream talking. His head ached.

"None, Megatron. They were just lying on the ground," Starscream explained. "There wasn't even anything of significance to explain why they were here in the first place. Prime's probably got a glitch in his diodes."

"They were just lying there?"

"All four of them," Starscream nodded. They weren't looking at him so Prowl ventured a look around. Starscream had to be wrong. How could they miss a crater sixty feet deep?

'We may not even be in the desert anymore,' Prowl told himself as he gingerly propped himself up. Yet, somehow, he didn't think that was the case.

Sand greeted his optics. The sky above had become pitch black, save for the stars and the moon. Emptiness filled him where the tides of shock and anger should have been. Prowl's gaze traveled from the desert to the sky, the pain in his forehead momentarily forgotten. He saw the answer in the sky, in the moon itself but knew not how to name it.

Eventually, Prowl averted his gaze from the sky and looked for his colleagues. Starscream had said four. He had to be mistaken. There were five of them.

Jazz rested next to him, and Sunstreaker and Sideswipe were across from them. Out of the four of them, only he remained relatively free to move around. Ironhide was nowhere in sight.

"Just these four?"

"Just these four," Starscream affirmed, as if they somehow had heard Prowl's thoughts, curbing his concern and panic.

'They don't know about Ironhide,' Prowl thought with a small amount of relief. 'Good. Maybe he's found his way back to base. Primus willing, he's on his on way back.'

The clouds moved in at that point, covering the moon. Prowl never noticed it as the pain in his forehead went from a dull ache to a piercing, stabbing blossom of pure agony. He groaned and passed out, gaining his captors attention.

888888888

"Get them back to base," Megatron ordered after he had inspected the Autobot tactician. He wanted to be sure that the Autobot was off-line. An icy feeling had developed in his processor and he wanted to leave the area as quickly as possible. He had noticed there were no tire tracks approaching the scene or leaving. There were no tracks of any kind and that unsettled him greatly. "And scour the area. Find out why they were here and make sure there are no more coming."

For once his orders were carried out quickly and without question.

888888888

"Stop that!"

Optimus glanced up just in time to see Ratchet reach over and snatch Ironhide's hands into his own. The older Mech's hands were clasped together and his fingers intertwined. Ratchet had lowered them once more and now tried to pry Ironhide's hands apart. Optimus shook his head. He knew it would be a futile effort on Ratchet's part. Ironhide had been like that since they had discovered him in a ravine six hundred miles away from the Mojave Desert. His hands had been clasped together and he'd been rubbing his forehead, as if he had some kind of irritant lodged there. What worried Prime the most were Ironhide's optics – they were tinged pink around the edges – and the fact that the older warrior spoke in an ancient dialect no one had heard before. They had hoped that Ironhide would snap out of it and be able to tell them what had happened to Jazz, Prowl, Sunstreaker, and Sideswipe, but, so far, he hadn't.

'Wonder if Perceptor's had any luck in finding a translation for it,' he wondered idly as he watched the medic wrestle with his best friend.

"You could help me out a little," Ratchet snapped, disrupting his train of thought. "He is a tad bit stronger than I am, you know."

Optimus shot Ratchet a sharp look but dismissed the medic's waspish tone. He did have a right to be ornery. Three days of Ironhide's unusual behaviour would drive anyone crazy. He moved away from the console and proceeded to help Ratchet in prying the older Mech's hands apart. As he did so, his mind went over the events of the last five days.

Something had impacted on the Earth. Prime knew as much. Whatever had hit immediately gave off unusual energy readings, and he had sent Ironhide and Prowl with a small reconnaissance team to assess the situation. He had not been ready to send out scientists and justifiably so. After the investigation team had reached the site, the team simply vanished and the readings were gone. They had found Ironhide in the ravine two days after that but by mistake only. Teletran had picked up an unusual energy reading in that location, mistaking Ironhide as the source.

'In the same location as Ironhide . . . the same exact location as Ironhide. Teletran didn't even recognize him at first. So odd,' he thought idly as he felt Ironhide's hands finally give way.

"That's it!" Ratchet declared huffily. "I'm restraining him!"

"Won't that agitate him even more?" Prime asked, not really liking the idea.

"I'd rather have him be agitated than trying to wear a hole in the center of his head," the medic retorted angrily. "It doesn't help that I still don't know what's wrong with him. Our equipment still refuses to work around him, and I'm not about to open his cranial module to find out, either!"

Optimus blinked at Ratchet's little tirade. Their equipment was still not working?

"I thought," he began.

"We ran diagnostics on the scanners and fixed the problems?" Ratchet cut him off. "We did. They're working on everyone else but Ironhide. It's like he isn't even here. Physically here and I know that's a bunch of bull."

Optimus frowned behind his mask then glanced at his best friend. Something bothered the older Mech. He could always tell by the scrunched look around his optics and Ironhide's optics were squeezing just ever so slightly.

"Tried. Every time he's around, however, Ironhide starts that gibberish up again, only it's more agitated than when Perceptor's not around. We're getting nowhere fast, Prime . . ."

Something about the way Ratchet trailed off caught his attention fast. It had a hint of something. Frustration, defeat, hopelessness . . . Prime wasn't sure which. He gazed at Ratchet for an explanation. Ratchet caught it.

"He's gone for five days without getting anything into his systems, Optimus," he murmured. "Every attempt to put him into the recharge chambers fails. He thrashes about so wildly I'm afraid that someone's going to get hurt. Every I.V. attempt fails. Pouring a small energon cube down his throat fails. It keeps up, he isn't going to live much longer, especially with the non-stop fidgeting he's doing."

Optimus just stared. Nothing registered, not even what Ratchet had just said. The only thing that he kept thinking was Ironhide was dying? How could it be?

"Find out why he keeps rubbing his forehead, Ratchet."

"I can't . . ."

"Excuse me . . ."

They turned to see Perceptor and Blaster standing in the door, grim expressions on their faces. Prime had a sinking feeling he wasn't going to like what they were going to say, but he had to hear it anyway.

'I hate being leader sometimes,' he thought darkly as he said, "What is it, Perceptor?"

"We've located Prowl, Jazz, Sunstreaker, and Sideswipe . . ."

"You have? How?"

"The same way we located Ironhide," Blaster said. "They're giving off the same weird energy reading he is."

"Is?"

Both Mechs nodded.

"Where are they? And how . . .?"

"They must have somehow absorbed the energy from the crash site, though their individual readings are no where as strong as Ironhide's," Perceptor offered. "And locating them wasn't easy. We finally had to have Teletran ignore the readings Ironhide's giving off. I'd have to run some tests on Ironhide, though, to be certain."

"If you can, you mean," Ratchet interjected.

"Well, yes," Perceptor nodded. "As for their location . . ."

"The Decepticons have them," Blaster finished.

If it had been possible, Prime would have blanched at Blaster's proclamation. Instead, he focused his attention. He had to. Four of his own were being detained by the enemy and being used for Primus only knew. He was not about to leave them to the "tender" mercies of the Decepticons any longer than necessary.

"Blaster, organize a strike force. We're going after them. Anything else, Perceptor?"

"Yes . . ."

Prime didn't like the way the scientist hesitated.

"What is it, Perceptor?"

"I've managed to translate parts of the dialect Ironhide's been speaking . . ."

"And?" he prompted. Perceptor shifted slightly and rubbed his hands together nervously.

"He's calling out for help . . . and for the death of his enemies . . . us."

"What!"

Ironhide howled at that moment and bolted forward, his optics burning a ghastly white-ish pink. Chills shimmied through Optimus at the unusual colour of his friend's optics but nothing scared him more than the shape they were becoming before his own optics. The shape of a crescent moon.