It was different without Sky. Usually, I would wait for her to arrive and go to Starbucks for coffee and breakfast. It was a great way to start my day and often got me in a better spirit, but now that she's gone, I feel different. Bored, and boredom makes me mean. I'm pretty much aware of it, but I couldn't help myself to hurt others to make them feel how I was feeling every single day. That intense pain running through my systems could no longer be ignored. Sky made sure I had a little bit of human food and gasoline to soothe it, but now she's gone... I could barely even sleep from the pain. I begged for Energon, something I had sworn never to do, but the humans declined the request, and everyone ignored it.
As long as Prime isn't back, I can't do anything other than accept the pain. Ratchet tried to talk to them, but he could not get it done; I appreciated the effort, despite the pointlessness.

Sky couldn't call very frequently either. She's on the other side of the country, searching for that psychopath while I was sitting here, waiting for her to contact me. I was lying in bed, waiting, but I wasn't sure if she would. She hadn't called me the other day either. I was almost about to go to sleep when my phone went off. 'Sky? I'm so happy to talk to you.' I sat up. 'Hey, Sunstreaker...' there was something off I'm her voice. 'Something wrong?'

'I'm going to send you something, and I would like you to look at it.' There was silence. The soft vibration of my phone told me she had sent me something. I sat up and looked at the image she showed me, putting her on speaker. 'What am I looking at?' It was chaos in the photo. Many fires and broken cars seem to be in the parking lot.

'I'm not allowed to talk to you about this... but I don't think a bomb went off here...' I stared at the photo. It was hard to tell from one photo what had happened. 'Well... it could be... there's a lot of damage and fire...' I trailed off. 'I found evidence that it might have been something else. Are you still willing to come?'

'They don't let me go, Sky. You know I tried.'

'I know... but I think this is about your brother.'
'What?!'
'I have surveillance cameras. It was a silver Chevrolet stingray 2009. On one of the other cameras, which only lasted a blurry 3 seconds, was a transforming Cybertronian. It looked similar to the photo I have seen of Sideswipe, but I only can tell for sure. If that's true, then your brother is here on the west coast.' I slid out of bed. 'Are you for real?'

'Why would I be making jokes about it, Sunstreaker?'

'I have a patrol tonight, I will use it to escape, but I first need to cut out that chip. I'll be there as soon as possible.'
'Be careful,' she warned. 'I will...' I disconnected the call and dressed up. I hurried at my pace to the medbay. Ratchet was wrapping up some work. 'I need your help one more time.' He perched his head up. 'Sky just called me... she believes my brother is on the west coast and asked me to identify him. I need to leave, but I don't have enough Energon to make the journey.'

'How sure is she?'

'Pretty sure. She said she recognized him from a photo.'
'You can take my portion. It will be enough to make the journey, but I'm not sure if it'll be enough to make it back.' I shook my head. 'That's fine, maybe I'll stay,' I mocked, but there was a curtain truth behind it. Ratchet eyed me. 'Promise me you won't make stupid decisions and try to stay under the radar.' I nodded rapidly. 'Yeah, totally. I'm not going to screw this one up.'

'You know where I treat the Autobots... you can find the Energon there.' I sucked in a breath. 'Thank you.' My holoform fizzled out, and I transformed.
The chip the humans wanted me to have doesn't have to be destroyed. It doesn't give an exact location, only a general one. They might think I'm still at the base somewhere if I hide it well.

I strode into the medbay and found the Engergon Ratchet had been talking about. It was an instant relief. The pain in my systems faded. The pumping of my spark increased again, instantly making me feel better but mostly relieved. As I finished, I went through Ratchet's equipment closet and found some sort of knife. It was sharp enough to cut through my protoform, but I didn't particularly appreciate ruining my protoform; it was scarred sufficiently.

I took off my chest plating and moved my servo over the delicate, smooth metal until I found it by pressing. I pressed the knife on my chest, where my collarbone would've been if I was human, and started cutting. Engergon started seeping out, covering my servos. With two digits, I searched through the gash until I found it and pulled out. It wasn't too big, not much bigger than the tip of my digit, but not amazingly designed either. The only reason I knew where it was located was because of the pain it was causing me. Ratchet treated me for infection several times. I looked at the little thing. Humans designed it, so of course, it caused me harm.
I hid it underneath one of the cabinets and cleaned up the gash before making myself ready to leave.

Prowl seemed surprised when I showed up seven minutes early. 'Where is Optimus?' He shook his helmet. 'The answer is still no, Sunstreaker,' he grumbled. 'I am asking where my commander is. I tried to call him, but he's not answering his comm calls.' He shook his helmet. 'Jazz and Prime will be back around Friday; that's all I know, okay?' He pushed me aside. I watched him walk off. I rolled my optics and looked around one more time before I transformed and drove off.