The Shadowbolts all came into the training room and watched as Sunset and Optimus oversaw the recruits. Many different Autobots of all shapes and sizes were practicing their weapon accuracy, hand to hand combat, and surviving an assault course with their partner. They all observed each of the bots one at a time before they looked up to Sunset, who in turn, gazed down at the five of them.

“Hi, Sunset!” they all said in unison, smiling and waving at her.

“Hey, girls.” Sunset leapt off of the platform and landed before them. “You’re feeling pretty chipper today. Something good come in the mail?”

“Nope! We’ve just come out of the most incredible treatment we’ve ever had!” Sour Sweet clasped her hands together. “I feel so fuzzy and warm inside…”

“You should totally try it out, Sunset!” Lemon Zest’s smile got even bigger. “Wheeljack found a way to fix us up and now we’re super-duper good now. No more little fights over the silliest of things.”

“Good. It’s nice to know that you five are turning over some new leaves.” Sunset tousled the hairs of each and every one of them. “But what are you doing here, exactly? I thought you all weren’t interested in watching the others train.”

“That was the old us, Sunset.” Indigo walked up to her and patted her on the shoulder. “Now, we’re gonna try our hardest not to slack off, get in trouble, or do anything rash. Plus, I wanna see the bots’ new moves.”

“Well, I could use an extra set of eyes to see if there are any bots falling behind.” Sunset heard an explosion. “For god’s sake, Strongarm and Tracks! Why can’t you two get along?!”

“Sorry, Sunset! She just got in my way!” said Tracks, trying to climb out of the cluttered mess they had both made.

“You mean my way!” Strongarm snapped.

Sunset just groaned and shook her head. “You know if this was a real life situation and if Optimus and I were both held hostage right now… we would be dead.”

“Just try it again, you two.” Optimus folded his arms. “And remember. Work WITH your dysfunctions. What one bot lacks, the other can make up for.”

“How did Wasp and Road Rage do on this course?” Sunny asked.

“Those two got along perfectly, and they made it in record time.” Sunset replied, sighing. “Heck, we had to install a leaderboard just because of it.” Sunset pointed over to it, showing pairs of bots in a list ranking, with Wasp and Road Rage at the top.

“She’s gotten good, hasn’t she?” Sour asked, pointing to Road Rage’s score. “Hey, I bet if me and Smallfoot do it, we’d get a great time!”

“But Smallfoot’s already experienced, isn’t she?” Sunset asked.

“I meant for me too. I still need to practice y’know.” Sour replied. “Don’t wanna feel like I’m soft now that I’ve been cleaned up.”

“Anyway, I need to get back to overseeing the rest of the training.” Sunset walked up to a ladder and climbed her way up to the top. “You’re welcome to stay and help out if you want. Maybe see how some of the newer bots are getting along on the firing range?”

“We’d love to!” Indigo beamed. “C’mon, girls!”

They gleefully skipped over to the firing range, narrowly avoiding some debris that Strongarm and Tracks ended up making as they tried getting through another part of their course. The five bolts came up to a row of booths, with bots standing in each and every one, armed with blasters and other such cybertronian firearms. A few examples were Hot Shot, Trailbreaker, Pipes, and Arcee.

“Hey, everyone!” Lemon smiled. “How’s it going?”

“Hey, girls! Nice to see ya.” Hot Shot turned to the girls and gave Lemon a big hi-five. “Just in time, too. I’m about to thrash Arcee’s record on this thing…”

“Easy, Hot Shot. I still have a few tricks up my sleeve.” Arcee said, closing one eye as she focused her arm cannon down the range. The blast penetrated one target and struck the one behind it as well. “Like that one.” She blew the smoke coming off her barrel. “Top that, Armada-boy…”

Hot Shot huffed. “I’ll show you, Team Prime girl…”

“Hey, it doesn’t matter if you served in the Armada, the first war, or even the newer battles,” said Sugarcoat. “You’re all still Autobots. Brothers and sisters in arms. Don’t ever forget that.” She smiled.

Arcee and Hot Shot blinked for a moment.

“Since when did Sugarcoat give advice that was… nice?” Hot Shot asked.

“Since Wheeljack gave us that lovely little treatment back in his lab.” Sunny Flare nodded. “He’s such a sweetheart, isn’t he?”

“Uh…” Hot Shot said. “I’m a little creeped out right now.”

“Hey, uh, buddy? You’re gonna run out of time.” Jolt, Hot Shot’s Mini-Con, pointed out the time on the wall. Sure enough, it was ticking down fast, and Hot Shot was nowhere near beating Arcee’s score.

“Oh, scrap! C’mon, little buddy!” He took up Jolt and put his on his back, causing the Mini-Con to merge onto his body. “Let’s kick this into overdrive!”

“Just focus, buddy, you can beat that time.” Indigo called out.

Once Jolt transferred his power to Hot Shot, he was firing bullets one after another at rapid speed. Targets barely even materialized before he shot right in the bullseye. He was closing in fast on Arcee’s score, and she was trying as hard as she could to cement her win.

“Come on, Hot Shot! You got this!” Indigo cheered.

“Nearly there…” Hot Shot continued firing more and more shots, shooting a large cluster of targets in just under a second. It was almost as if he was fighting an army, but in truth, he was just standing still and shooting his blaster, albeit much faster than before. “We can do this, little guy…”

“C’mon, c’mon, c’mon…” Arcee desperately tried to get a better score, but Hot Shot was mere hundreds behind her. It was only a matter of time before he overtook her.

“You go, girl!” Lemon cheered.

Finally, the klaxon blared loudly, and the targets vanished. When both Bots looked at the scores, they were identical. It had ended in a draw, and Hot Shot had matched Arcee by the skin of his teeth.

“We… we tied.” said Hot Shot as Jolt jumped off of his back. “Man, that was pretty close, huh?”

“Yeah. You can say that again.” Arcee looked at her gun. It was almost like a cigarette coming out of her arm. “My blaster’s practically on fire.”

The Shadowbolts all cheered for both Arcee and Hot Shot, who both came out of the booths and shook each other’s hands, giving themselves grins of their own.

“You’re a pretty good shot, huh?” said Hot Shot.

“You too,” replied Arcee. “But doesn’t using a Mini-Con tire you out once you break the link?”

“Well… it used to, but I’ve gotten so used to Jolt here that I barely feel like stopping.” He picked Jolt up and patted his little head. “We’ve been through so much together. From all the Cons, to Megatron, even had to fight Tidal Wave together. Now that was a battle for the ages…”

“You fought Tidal Wave? Now that’s impressive.” Arcee's mouth hung open.

“Who’s Tidal Wave?” asked Sugarcoat.

“He’s probably the biggest, baddest, most destructive Decepticon ever!” Hot Shot threw his arms out. “He’s so huge, he makes Devastator, Menasor, and even Predaking look tiny!”

“If you’re wondering about his vehicle mode, Tidal Wave is an aircraft carrier when he’s not a Decepticon,” Jolt added.

“And you got to fight him…” Indigo sat down and crossed her legs. “Do you think you could tell us the story? It sounds great!”

“Maybe another time, Indigo, I’ve got some work to do. But I hope to see you girls later.” Hot Shot winked before leaving. “See ya round, girls.” He drove off in vehicle mode.

“Bye, Hot Shot!” the girls all chimed together.

Pipes and Trailbreaker just stood in awkward silence as they looked at the happy girls.

“...What just happened?” Pipes asked.

Meanwhile, in the blackened world, Toxic Sugarcoat was scrawling notes on the ground while the other Toxibolts just stood there in silence, watching as she worked. There were echoes that rang out through the void, with even the tiniest of foot taps reverbating through the air.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, Sugarcoat! How long is it gonna take?!” Toxic Sour shouted. “I’ve got a lot of things to say to my emotional bitch of a girlfriend!”

“Just give me some time, alright?! It’s a pretty complex formula I’m working on here!” Sugarcoat lurched back at her. “Just shut up and sit down. Don’t think I don’t know how to kick your ass from here to Timbuktu!”

“Why can’t we just smash the place up?” Toxic Indigo asked. “Aren’t we just in some kinda weird test-tubey thing? There’s gotta be something we can smash…”

“It’s not that easy, Indigo.” Toxic Sugarcoat continued working. “Wherever we are, it doesn’t seem like something that can just be punched or kicked into pieces. That Wheeljack is a crafty little devil. He’ll probably have this whole place under lock and key by now…”

“So, we’re trapped in here forever,” said Toxic Sunny Flare. “That’s just great! Goodbye, college! Goodbye, marriage! Goodbye, whatever remained of a normal life!”

“Sunny, stop being such a whiny little bitch and let me work!” Toxic Sugar snarled. “You might be a negative Sunny Flare, but that doesn’t mean you can be as irritating as her.”

Sunny just sat there in silence, almost bumping into Toxic Lemon, who was still drowned in her own little world of music.

“Carry the two, calculate the velocity of ooze and pinpoint the latitude and splatter graph of where it’ll land…” Toxic Sugarcoat mumbled to herself. “Identify the square root of this negative mass…”

Toxic Sour Sweet only groaned some more. “I can’t stand it anymore! I’ve got talk to that bitch!”

“Why are you so mad anyway?” Toxic Sunny Flare asked.

“Ugh! I’ve been patient for so long, and I want to take things to the next level, but that emotional piece of shit isn’t showing me any sign she even wants to... “ Sour just whispered in Sunny’s ear, making her cringe in disgust.

“Why did you tell me that!? I didn’t want to know that!”

“My point is, that bitch is going down!”

“Now, if my calculations are correct, then that means that…” Toxic Sugarcoat picked up a lump of her ooze and hurled it straight up towards something that resembled an eclipse. Her throw was so powerful that the gunge splatted right on the ceiling and burned through the lock. “We’ve got ourselves a way out of this shithole…”

“Finally!” Toxic Indigo yelled.

“There’s one more thing I need to do, make sure that we can all make the travel.” Toxic Sugarcoat reached down and grabbed massive balls of the black toxin, rubbing them all over her back. She did the same with the other girls as well.

The mass mutated on each of the girls’ backs into a pair of black wings. Two for each of them. Each individual feather was laden with the gunk, and even it dripped as the girls fluttered them in the black darkness. Now, they could all fly, and had a way to get out of Wheeljack’s trap.

“Now, let’s get out of here!” Toxic Sugarcoat shot off the ground and darted to the open hole. “Are you gonna follow me, or stay here in the pits with the rest of your miserable lives?!”

“Oh, we’re coming!” Toxic Sour dashed through the air right behind Toxic Sugarcoat. Close behind her were the other bolts. Toxic Lemon was almost completely left behind, if not for Toxic Indigo picking her up and slinging her across her back

The goo in the vial burst out of the lid, filling the energon safe up with the black mass. Wheeljack was so busy working on his next device that he didn’t see the ink-like substance leaking out of his safe. As soon as he turned his head back to the vault, it burst open, coating the floor in the black mess.

“Whoa!” Wheeljack jumped backwards. “What the heck happened?!”

The Toxibolts all rose from the black swamp of slime, causing the flood of ink to retract and reform their bodies. The mess was all cleaned up from the floor, but in its’ place, were five blackened, seething, and dripping humans.

“Uh… who are you five?”

“We’re the last thing you’ll ever see.” Toxic Sugarcoat crossed her arms. “Prepare to die, you piece of scrap!” And she rushed towards Wheeljack, kicking him in the face. It was such a strong attack, that he smashed into the wall, leaving a massive dent.

Wheeljack slid down on the ground, and his optics shut down as he went into stasis, knocked out.

“Say goodnight, you old mess…” Toxic Sugarcoat spread her ooze all over his body, drenching him in the black liquid. He eventually rose from the floor, but his eyes were all red, and his Autobot symbol had been transformed into that of a black ink mark that was neither Autobot or Decepticon. It instead showed a black flame with shadows bursting out in all directions.

“Optimus Prime is going to pay for all the times he rejected my inventions…” Toxic Wheeljack cracked his fingers. “I’ll make him suffer so much, he’ll be begging for Megatron to put him out of his misery!”

“Oh YEAH!!!” Toxic Sour roared, pounding her chest like an ape.

“Thought you could run from us, you stupid other halves?” Toxic Sugarcoat watched Toxic Wheeljack drive off out of the lab, towards the training room. “Think again. You’ve held us back for far too long. It’s time we finally let loose and have some fun for once…”

Back in the training room, the Shadowbolts and Sunset all watched the recruits gather up, for it was time for Optimus Prime to make an announcement.

“Everyone, I want to congratulate you all on doing another good job on the training course. I see you all are getting stronger every day. Keep up the good work, and you will be great Autobots, should Starscream and his army return.” Optimus said.

“But I think you’ve all still got a lot of work to do,” added Sunset Shimmer. “You’re all showing great progress now, but the Decepticons will be getting better too. So for now, just work harder and harder every single day, and I’m sure that you’ll be able to mop ‘em all up in no time.”

Everyone let out agreeing nods.

“You are all dismissed.” Optimus said before leaving.

Each of the bots filed out one after another, but Strongarm and Tracks were the last ones. They both tried to leave together, but they couldn’t fit through the doors and just ended up trying to shove each other out of the way.

“Hey. What’s going on?” Indigo asked, leaping off the platform towards Strongarm and Tracks.

“Can’t you two go one at a time?” Lemon asked. “Smallfoot and Hound learned that the hard way.”

“I refuse to let some girl leave before I, Tracks.” He puffed out his chest. “Now, move out of the way, Strongarm!”

“No way, bud!” Strongarm retorted. “You’ve still got a lot to learn and I’ve been doing this longer than you! Check your privileges!”

Sunset sighed. “Not again… Five minutes, can we go five minutes without those two fighting?”

“Don’t you get involved in this, Sunset Shimmer,” Tracks said. “It’s bad enough I have to deal with this girl. Don’t make me get angry with you too…”

“Both of you, that’s enough.” Sugarcoat sternly said. “Now, come on over here, let's sort this out.”

“Why are you even fighting anyway?” Sour tilted her head. “Aren’t you supposed to be Autobots?”

“Someone seems to forget that we’ve only been here for six months!” Strongarm snapped.

“Yeah, but you’re just like we were. You’re just letting yourself get angry over the tiniest little things,” Indigo said. “Just calm down, take a few steps back, and try and think what is it about yourselves that the other side can’t stand, then try your hardest to just not show that part.”

“You shouldn’t let in-fighting destroy yourselves.” Sugarcoat nodded. “You’re the Autobots, not the Decepticons. Anger’s just gonna make you do worse and worse. Just try and breathe, think about what makes you happy, and work on that. It’s better to fight the enemy than to fight yourselves.”

Strongarm and Tracks both stopped for a moment and they carefully pulled themselves out of the door, taking deep breaths. As they looked each other in the eye, it seemed like what Sugarcoat was saying was true. They both had the Autobot symbol on their bodies, but they were arguing with themselves rather than working as a joint unit.

“United we stand, divided we fall,” Sugarcoat added. “Win together, or lose alone. That’s what the Autobots are about, isn’t it?”

Sunset blinked and she gave a smirk. “When did you get so wise all of a sudden?”

“Well, it’s like we said.” Sour smiled. “Wheeljack did this little experiment on us and made us all super-nice. You should try it out too, Sunset. Those cognative toxins are pretty bad for you.”

“We’d take you to the lab, but just look at the time.” Indigo looked down at her phone. “It’s almost time for class again. We’d better get going, girls. Don’t want Cadence to give us a bad mark for being tardy.”

“Let's go!” Sour said, opening up a mini-groundbridge.

“Bye, everyone!” the Shadowbolts all chimed before running through the portal with giddy grins on their faces.

Sunset, Strongarm and Tracks all tilted their heads in confusion.

“You know… this kind of scares me.” Strongarm commented.

Just as the portal closed, an alarm blared out throughout the base.

“INTRUDER ALERT! INTRUDER ALERT!” Teletraan-1 declared. “UNKNOWN BLACK ORGANISMS HAVE INVADED THE BASE! INITIATING FULL DEFENSE MATRIX!”

“Scrap! Get going guys!” Sunset said as she ran through the doors.

But before any of them could get out, Optimus Prime was hit by a car that drove his body into a wall. Toxic Wheeljack jumped out of vehicle mode and stood atop Optimus, ready to finish him off.

“Optimus!” Sunset cried out.

“You’re dead, old man!” Toxic Wheeljack was about to punch Optimus in the face, but Optimus kicked him in the chest, knocking him to the floor.

“What the… Wheeljack?!” Sunset watched in horror as the blackened scientist rose to his goopy feet and glared at Optimus with seething red eyes. “Are the Shadowbots back? Is this what this is?”

“No, but I suppose your guess isn’t that bad.” Toxic Sugarcoat said from behind her. “But it’s still far from the truth and you’re an idiot for guessing it.”

Sunset gulped. “S-Sugarcoat? What happened to you!? Wait, why did you come back?”

“Don’t get me mixed up with that ooey-gooey other half.” Toxic Sugarcoat cracked her neck. “All those sunshine and smiles as she tries using honesty to help others out. Pah! She’s weak. And once I’m done here, I’m gonna find that goody-two-shoes Sugarcoat and leave her to rot in that toxic hell! Then, we’ll do the same with all of your pathetic friends until there’s nothing but toxicity in this wretched world!”

Toxic Indigo Zap stepped over and she glared down at Sunset who looked panicked.

“What do we do with her?” Toxic Indigo asked. “Lock her in the brig?”

“You’ll do nothing!”

A bunch of other Autobots stood by the door and pointed their blasters at the Toxibolts.

“GAH!” Toxic Wheeljack just charged at Optimus and tried to punch him, but he turned into vehicle mode and struck right back. “Just give in to the ooze, you old fart! Become evil like we are, and let your true fighter out!” His hand morphed into a demonic sword. “Or we’ll just have to leave you to bleed, rotting your energon from the inside out!”

Everyone opened fire and wasted no time in turning the Toxibolts into a gooey mess. The five toxic teens just made snake-like hisses and disappeared into the goo, draining themselves down through the nearest drain. Once they were gone, the Autobots all opened fire on Wheeljack, who also became a black puddle and vanished down the grates and into the sewers below.

“Seal the drains up!” Optimus shouted. “Don’t let them get anywhere near the base ever again!”

“Does that include—”

“Yes, Grimlock, that includes the toilets as well.” Optimus groaned as he felt the pain catch up to him. “We can’t allow those… things to come back. Who knows what could happen?”

“The Shadowbolts just left, though. We saw the groundbridge and everything.” Sunset watched the black goo continue to slip down the grates. “And then Wheeljack turns into this black monster and attacked Optimus. Something’s not right here... I’d better get the other Rainbooms. We might need our new powers if we’re gonna stop these things.”

“Are you alright, Optimus?” asked Grimlock as the other bots came in to assess their leader’s wounds. “Me Grimlock thinks that you took a serious beatdown…”

“I’ll be fine, Grimlock,” Optimus tried standing up, but he groaned in agony as he just limped across the room. “Just get Red Alert to patch me up and I should be fine. In the meantime, you’d all better seal up the drains. The black creatures could come in through any tap, shower, or even toilet. And we don’t want another attack like this.”

“Teletraan-1. How many drains are there here in Autobot HQ?” Sunset asked.

“There are ove—BLLZZZ, ERGG…“ His voice cut in and out of reality, being replaced by static. “Apologies. My syste—noranaw=e0fk3wirn02—were damaged by those beinoae;n03q0832NOUN—when they burst out of Wheeljack’s lab. Initiating systematic reboot. I will be back online in a few hours.”

“What have you unleashed, Wheeljack?” Sunset asked as the bots all darted out of the training room.

Author's Note

Things are about to get worse...