Boulder wished his afternoon nap had been more restful.

It had taken him some time just to get back into sleep mode once he was settled in his room, and then... images began to form. Flashes of memory, reliving the afternoon over and over.

Cody's cries, Heatwave's wounds... Chase's desperate final call.

I have him! He's safe with me!...

Chase's voice had been quick, as if he had been trying to get the message out before he couldn't anymore... before something cut them off.

Boulder's optics flew open and he sat up. Chase's lack of contact... Perhaps it hadn't been because he was afraid of calling for them... It was because he couldn't.

Chase and Cody's disappearance... the Sodorians' appearance, they seemed almost simultaneous with one another... and the bots had been pulled out of their own world before, by other anomalies than Charisma.

Boulder's optics closed again, his hands and pedes folding together into a meditative position. Sleep wouldn't yield answers... but maybe The Mists would.

He reached out, trying to imagine the place between places... and mists between worlds... and then his optics opened again as sound hit his audio receptors... the loud, thunderous voices of many, many anomalies speaking all at once. The Mists surrounded him like a dense fog, but as it moved and twisted, he could make out individual anomalies all around him- at least a dozen of them. And all of them seemed to be in argument.

Boulder was still learning how to understand and translate their language, but the flashes of red and gold told him that they were angry.

"Charisma?" He called out, searching for the anomaly he knew best, even if it wasn't very well at all. If she was here, then she was too busy fighting with the others to see or notice him... but something else did.

Boulder felt it before he saw it, but then the flicker of movement caught his attention, and he focused on it to see a slithering, black shape making its way through the crowd. It appeared to be made of pure darkness, fragmented and broken, with glowing white eyes and a mouth full of teeth. Pieces of it would fall away, reforming on the end to make a draconic creature with two clawed hands that gripped at the 'gowns' of the nearby Anomalies.

It hissed and appeared to be searching for something... and then its eyes locked on Boulder, and its hisses grew louder.

"Oh scrap-"
Boulder was running before it even began to chase him. Its shriek rang out in his audio receptors as he ran, echoing in the world of endless fog and sparkles. Boulder had never been the fastest rescue bot, but as Blades had once said... Fear was a great motivator.

Still, it was gaining, whatever it was, and Boulder had no idea what to do about it. There wasn't any soil for him to use against it, and he didn't even know if could be affected by solid matter. As he ran and dodged anomalies all around him, he noticed something... he was getting larger. Every time he passed an anomaly, his helm reached a little higher on their forms. How could that be? Was it a mindset thing? Were the anomalies just slowly getting shorter as he got deeper into The Mists?

Something grabbing his leg and knocking him back down halted his thoughts, and he yelped as he hit the ground and then was dragged backward. 

He twisted around to look as the creature's hands gripped his left ankle and tried to pull him towards its mouth. His right leg wound back and then kicked hard. It made contact with the creature's jaw, and it shrieked in pain, releasing the bulldozer's ankle and reeling back. It shook its head hard, and then snarled as Boulder got back up to his pedes.

"O-Okay, I can hit you just as easy as you can hit me...!" He hissed, putting his hands up in a fighting position. "Stay back!"

The creature shrieked and then came towards him again at incredible speed, and though Boulder planted another hit to its muzzle, it plowed him right over, knocking him down to the ground again. He grunted as its arms held him down, its many teeth preparing to snap around his neck... and then there was a flash of light and the creature shrieked in pain again before disappearing.

Boulder!
Boulder winced as he felt a pair of arms come up behind him and help him sit up, and then he looked up to Charisma as she bent down over him. Darling, what happened? are you hurt? Let me look at you-

"I-I'm okay, Charisma...!" Boulder stammered, his spark still pounding in his chest. The warmth of her embrace helped his panic a little, but still he felt himself shaking. "I-I was looking for you, actually."

Yes, I'm sure you were... I am so sorry, my darling...
Charisma helped him up to his pedes again, her hands on his shoulders as he now stood almost at her waist, rather than being small enough to sit in her palms. I have been quite busy the past few days.

"Charisma, it's about Chase and Cody. We can't find them."

I know, my darling... I am looking for them too... They've been taken.

"Taken? By who?"

Still trying to figure it out. But I need you to trust me on this, okay? She leaned forward and planted a light kiss on his helm that sent shivers through his form, The Fragment Wastes are no place for a young mosaic who doesn't know how to fight them.

"Fragment? Was that what that thing was?"

Charisma nodded, giving a sigh. Not... Not all surviving lights stay lit... some become corrupted, absorbing the darkness... They wander the Mists, feeding off of the energies of worlds to keep themselves together... if that one had gotten to your energy... It didn't, that's what's important.

Boulder shuddered again, rubbing his arms as he could still feel the eerie feeling it had given him. "But Chase and Cody-"

I will find them and tell you as soon as I do. I promise... Narrowing it down as we speak.

Boulder sighed, "And... The Sodorians?"

Hmm?

"The nine new mosaics that popped up in our world? Do you know where they came from?"

Charisma looked puzzled for a moment, and then her brows furrowed. No... But I have a feeling that they are the key to finding out where your brothers are...

"You didn't know about them."

She shook her head, Been busy, like I said... Keep an eye on them. I will come and talk to you on the surface when I have something, okay?

"Wait, you mean like you'll come down into-"
Boulder was suddenly falling again, gone from his mother's grasp and sitting up on his berth with a gasp. His spark was still pounding, his helm swirling with questions... but one big question had just been answered.

Chase and Cody were no longer in their reality.

Boulder rubbed his neck, and then looked at the time. It was already almost 5 PM. The Sodorians would have been at the training center for the better part of four hours now.

"Ergh... Better go check on them..." He mumbled, and then tell the Burnses the news...

Boulder opened the door to his room, making his way out into the front room just in time to hear the groundbridge activate. He turned and saw the Sodorians step back out, some of them quite dirty and shaking dust out of their joints. "What in Cybertron happened to you?"

"Ask them..." Cranky grumbled, pointing to James and Blurr as they exited last and looking rather sheepish.

"Uh huh...?" Boulder crossed his arms, "Get some racing action in, did we?"

"Hey, I decided to make it be on foot so it would be fair." Blurr defended, "We were just running laps, that's all! And then a little weight lifting, and... well... things got outta hand."

"Didn't realize how competitive some of us are..." Emily mumbled, "Nothing broken, but it might take a little longer for that grass to grow back."

Boulder raised a brow, and Blurr waved it off. "It's all good... Can I talk to you for a second, Boulder?"

Boulder shrugged and then he and Blurr walked around the corner as they heard Salvage offering to help clean the dirty Sodorians off. "Okay Blurr, shoot."

"Something's weird with these guys."

"In what way are you referring?"

"Dude, they just kept going from one thing to another without resting. Like, I've never seen bots so eager to do whatever they could to avoid standing still for more than a few seconds."

"Blurr, I told you, they're not familiar with the concept of being awake and not working in some way. They'd wake up, they'd refuel, be given their instructions for the day, and then go off and haul freight and people all day all over their island until they were done and then went right to sleep. There was no vegging, and if they did stop moving for a bit, it was usually part of a job and they were just waiting for someone else to finish theirs in order for them to move on."

"That's just whack. How could you do that to someone? They were slaves!"

"They were freight engines, Blurr. It was all they knew, and they enjoyed it because they didn't know any different."

"So what are they going to do when they go back home and they do know different?"

Boulder didn't have an answer for that, mostly because he wasn't sure it was his decision to make. Sigma Seventeen were here because their world was destroyed, but this world was almost identical to the one they left.

It was not so for the Sodorians- they could still go home to the world they came from, which was similar in some respects, but very different in others. They had friends back home that they were forced to leave without being able to say goodbye, they had people who counted on them every single day. It wouldn't be fair to make them stay, but would it also be unfair to send them back to a world where they lacked the amount of choice and freedom that they had here?

Not to mention they were mosaics now- would their new selves affect their lives there more than just having abilities they could call on at convenient times? It might raise questions that could put them in danger, especially since they couldn't explain how it had happened- Sigma Seventeen had the advantage of knowledge of advanced technology and quantum theories, and even they didn't fully understand the physics and mechanics of their new status.

Ultimately though, the decision to either go or stay would have to be up to them. It was only right that they choose their own future.

"I don't know yet... We'll figure it out when we get there."

"Okay... Any news from Blades?"

"No, but I've got news from someone else. I need to talk to the Burnses for a few minutes, can you watch them for just a little bit longer?"

Blurr shrugged, "I guess... But I wanna hear about this later."

"You will, but they're first..."