Chapter Text
“And you believe you can convince Starscream and his Seekers to abandon Megatron’s cause,” Sentinel intones with bright, shrewd optics narrowed.
“Indeed, I do!” Jetfire has no indoor voice, but it is oddly charming, the way he heroically bellows seemingly at all times. “Starscream is sorely misunderstood and he simply misunderstands! In his Spark, he is a good and loving mech, with only the noblest of intentions!”
“Dunno about that,” Bumblebee mutters darkly.
Windblade does not shush him. She is inclined to doubt, herself.
“Allow me to intervene and speak some sense into my dear old friend! He will listen to me!”
“Hmm. That would be… a lot less messy than my plans.”
“I come to you, Councillor, as Windblade and Bumblebee both reassure me that you fight the good fight! As allies, let us spare Cybertron of the atrocities of war! The first step is confronting Starscream, so that my Seekers may be spared!”
“We may have, uh, oversimplified things a little,” Bumblebee interjects with a sidelong look at Windblade, who nods a little guiltily at that. “But he wants to help. Give him a shot, yeah?”
“Allow me to save Starscream and the Seekers!” Jetfire slams his fist to his big bosom, solemn. “It is my duty! Then you may contend with this foul Megatron character!”
Sentinel’s chin shifts as he grinds his jaw thoughtfully for several seconds. “Alright, then. We’ll try things your way, but be quick about it, mm?”
“I shall rescue my brood forthwith!”
“Yes, quite. Those Functionists are baying for blood and I have to keep them satisfied.”
“Baying for my love’s blood?! Heaven forbid! His Energon is my Energon, all Seekers are as one! This cannot be! Any Seeker’s death is my own!”
“We are not executing anyone, for any reason,” Orion reminds Sentinel with a deep, tired sigh. “As I have said before. Please do not panic, Jetfire. However, if you could convince Starscream to withdraw his Seekers, it would disempower Megatron considerably, so he may do less harm.”
“Like it or not, those Functionists want Megatron and Starscream strung up almost as badly as I do and they’re pushing me to do something drastic.” Sentinel lays a large servo on Jetfire’s pauldron, squeezing. “You really don’t have much time, before drastic action must be taken to save my face and end this farcical uprising so order can be restored. Don’t fail me.”
“Ohh, my darling Star, whatever have you done, whatever have you gotten yourself into! I feel faint!” Jetfire swoons into Windblade’s arms.
Sentinel quirks an optic ridge. “Oh-kay.”
“Primus, the Energon is so much better here.”
“Meh, it’s alright.” Thrust pops a goodie in his intake, immediately chewing it to bits before reaching for the accompanying liquid ration to wash those bits down.
“You wouldn’t believe the stuff Shockwave sent us down in the Pits,” Slipstream mutters, contemplating her own laden tray. “This weird synthetic blend, day in, day out, always the same, no matter how often we asked for a change. I tried to be grateful, but seriously, disgusting stuff. You guys have it good up here.”
“Well, you’re back, so you’ll have it good, too.”
“Yeah, I guess.”
“Hello, darlings. How are we this morning?”
Nova Storm actually squees. “Empress!”
Skywarp chirps, offering a wink as her hello.
Thundercracker cringes and Thrust flushes uncomfortably, the mechs wilting.
“Slip, Slip, Slip, look!” Nova Storm grabs Slipstream by the chin and forces her to look up at Empress, who seems rather amused by this. “She’s a real gladiator! Like Megatron! She signed my datapad, just like he did! So cool!”
Slipstream smiles shyly within Nova Storm’s grip, waving up at Empress. “Hi, again.”
“Wait, you’ve met?”
“The Captain and I bumped into each other last night.”
“Oh.”
Empress gracefully sits among the Seekers, so much bigger than they are, relishing in their worship and fear alike.
Nova Storm releases Slipstream, turning instead to grasp Empress’ enormous servo. “Isn’t she just magnificent, Slip?”
Skywarp rolls her optics as if this is all very dumb, but she smiles coquettishly all the same.
Slipstream chuckles airily. She is about to reply, when someone prods her in the pauldron to get her attention.
“Mom, my tummy hurts,” Nacelle mumbles, holding his belly with a wince.
“Mom?” Empress echoes.
“Well, no, not really, but she fills the role, pretty much,” Thundercracker supplies.
“It hurts real bad.”
“Oh, no.” Slipstream frowns softly with concern, rising from her seat to attend to the younger Seeker properly. “Did you consume your ration too quickly, little one? That can sometimes cause a tummy ache. You must moderate yourself.”
“I dunno. Wasn’t really hungry, anyway.”
“Does it hurt often, your tummy?”
“Sometimes. Not every day, but some days.”
“Does it hurt if I push here?”
“Ow.”
“And here?”
“Ow!”
“Mm. Have you been otherwise unwell?”
“No, I’ve been fine. Just the tummy ache.”
“Maybe ulcerations, or it could just be irritable tank syndrome.”
“He got that existential dread,” Thundercracker interjects helpfully. “Y’know, the tank disease.”
“That sounds scary. Mom.” Nacelle’s young optics widen. “Am I gonna die?”
“No, Nacelle, you’re not gonna die of a tummy ache,” Slipstream says gently as she lays her palm over Nacelle’s firm, flat abdominal plating, rubbing soothingly with his helm tucked against her neck for comfort. “That’s not quite correct, Thunder, but thank you for your contribution. We’ll talk about existential dread later. Probably should’ve had that conversation a while ago.”
“Do I gotta see a medic?”
“I’ll check the medkit first. As a standard, we should have dissoluble–”
“Eeew!” Seekers exclaim in a squawking cadence as Nacelle suddenly ejects his morning ration all over Slipstream’s chassis with a horrendous wet wretch, her expression twisting with maternal discomfort.
“…You did not just do that.”
“…Eugh. I did.”
Decepticons curl their dermas with disgust, picking up their trays and moving to the tables farthest away, others outright leaving the mess hall entirely, appetites gone.
Nova Storm grimaces her sympathy, Thundercracker looks apologetic and Thrust is just glad that did not happen to him, because that scrap is nasty, just so gross.
“Sorry, mom.”
“That’s quite alright.” No, it is not alright, not at all. Slipstream wants to scream, but she reigns it in with a shaky sigh and a gaze upcast to the heavens as filth drips from her frame. “It’s not your fault, Nacelle.” She strokes his pauldrons as he sniffles wetly against her.
“Hey, I feel better, now.”
“That’s great. Just great.”
Skywarp rises to take over in assisting the pale but improved Nacelle, nodding to Slipstream, thus dismissing her to go clean herself up.
Empress’ expression is a thoughtful one, as if she is contemplating the vomit that drips from the edges of Slipstream’s muscular breastplate.
“Poor Slip,” Thundercracker mumbles. “She’s always having a bad time. Like me.”
After exhausting the supplies available within the mess hall, Slipstream makes quite the first impression of herself by loping to the shower block with lingering traces of sick smeared over her shell, burning her olfactory sensors and souring her already bittersweet emotional constitution. She keeps apologising to people she lurches past, as if her existence is something she should be sorry for, more so than the sorry state she is currently in. She sequestrates a sink to herself within the wash racks, trying to clean herself without offending the other Decepticons, who do not take kindly to people covered in traces of vomit.
“Captain.”
Again, that soothing sensation washes over her, just on the cusp of crying again. She only realises now that Empress followed. “I’m so sorry you have to see me like this.”
“Why are you apologising to me? You’ve done nothing to offend.”
“I… I don’t know. It’s just not very flattering, I guess.”
“Ah, flattery. I know that vice quite well. You know, flattery does have its place, it serves its purpose.”
Decepticons are awed by Empress, who lingers closely behind Slipstream, mopping at herself in the sink.
“You may call this flattery, but…” The huge femme leans in, so her chin almost comes to rest on the Seeker’s pauldron, their face plates reflected side-by-side within the holomirror mounted above the sink. “There’s something very attractive about a femme who leads by compassion and not cruelty.”
Slipstream looks into Empress’ optics from within their shared reflection, quietly astounded.
“Maybe that’s because I’d like to be such a femme myself, someday, but all I know is toil and violence. I’d need someone to teach me, reign me in.” That deep voice resonates throughout heavy sheets of battle-scarred armour, gunmetal grey. “Nobody ever taught me to be gentle and considerate of anyone else’s feelings but my own. My mentor only taught me to serve myself. Your mentor must be very proud of you, serving others at your own detriment, dear. Even a brute like me can see honour in you.”
Slipstream looks down at her breast, partially cleaned. She is sure vomit got into the gaps of her armour. She may need to take a shower, so she can rinse properly. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“Saying nice things about me.”
“You’re very welcome, my dear.”
“I, uh, never really had a mentor. Jetfire was the closest thing to it, but I did most of the raising.”
“Oh? That must’ve been very hard on you.”
“Yeah. And he left while we were so young, so Starscream was a mess for a while and I had to pick up the pieces of our little family.”
“Family,” Empress echoes deeply, softly. “Strange, I would’ve called Seekers a clan, based on the way Starscream leads by his example. But you call your own… family. I think that just proves my point, really.”
“He’s not all bad. He loves us, in his own way.”
“His love isn’t really of much use to anyone, though, is it?”
The Captain cringes, thinking deeply about that, until a brush along her spinal seam reminds her that she has a great big hunk of femme pressed gently into her from behind.
“Will you be alright, dear?”
“Yes, thank you, I’ll be just fine.
The gladiator smiles warmly and finally withdraws, stepping gracefully back.
Slipstream suddenly whips around and throws herself against the bigger Empress without a second thought, hugging her tight.
“Oh!”
Some onlooking Decepticons meandering about in the shared shower block wonder where this is gonna go.
The Seeker sighs as large palms caress her pauldrons very gently, her cheek pressed to the gladiator’s rumbling chassis.
“Now we shall both need a shower, I think.”
“Scrap! I forgot!” Slipstream peels herself off of Empress with a grimace, attempting to wipe traces of vomit off of her shell. “I’m so, so, so sorry!”
“It’s quite alright.” The gladiator quite enjoys having those servos on her. “I’ve bathed in the viscera of my enemies.”
“Ah, right, of course you have.”
“Shall we?”
The Captain flushes, glances at the availability within the showers. “You should go first.”
“I was rather thinking we should share.”
“Whaaa–”
“We can squeeze in.” Giggling, Empress saunters ahead, the expanse of her hip joints beckoning with each swing like a friendly wave. “If you want to.”
“Yes,” Slipstream croaks. That strange aura of relaxation may do wonders for her social anxiety, but it does nothing to cull her generally quite neglected libido.
“Come along, then.”
She trots after the bigger femme, wings perked adorably.
Empress smiles demurely at others who ogle her. “Hello, ladies.”
There is a chorus of flirtatious giggles from the femmes, whilst the mechs finish up quickly to depart.
“How do you do that?”
“Do what?”
“That,” the Captain repeats, nodding to the femmes.
“Oh, I’m not sure what you mean.” The gladiator flexes impressively as she reaches for the solvent, showing off.
“Fine, then. Keep your secrets.”
“Don’t you prefer that I maintain my enigma?”
Slipstream thinks of Shadow Striker fondly and says, “Femmes do love a good mystery.”
Empress beams, then turns her broad back strut as she douses herself with dry solvent and then activates the hot oil shower, thus agitating the solvent to lather. “I know we only just met, but I have trouble reaching back there, dear, would you mind scrubbing my back for me?” Her rail shifts aside, exposing the rugged planes of armour.
The Captain can be forgiven for her moment of hesitation, since she has never been intimate with one quite as large as the gladiator, servos hovering over so much femme. “Oh, wow, um.”
“I’ll do it!” volunteers an eager femme, taking advantage of that pause.
“No, let me!” interjects another, elbowing her soapy companion aside. “I have such soft servos! She’ll scratch you up! I would know!”
“Glitch! Some friend you are!”
“Call it friendly competition if it makes you feel better!”
They laugh, clearly very close, very fond of each other. As if showering together was not suggestive enough.
“Captain?”
Slipstream finally picks a spot to start with, ignoring all the other jeers offering lewder services, and she proceeds to give Empress the best massage of her entire life.
“Oh, Captain. Ohhh.”
“Not too hard?”
“Not hard enough.”
“Alright, then. Tell me if I’m hurting you.”
The gladiator manages a jerky nod, slumped against the metallic tiled wall, at the Seeker’s mercy.
“Damn. Hey, can I have a turn next?” a femme asks, actually being quite serious.
“You slag,” answers another. “Leave the flier be.”
“Dude! I was just asking!”
“It’s weird.”
“Why!”
“You and your flier fetish, that’s why.”
“Heeey! It’s hardly a fetish! That thing I had with Thrust was a one-time thing only! And it was, like, two weeks tops!”
“It was a month. You wouldn’t shuddup the whole time about how hot his flying frame is, like how his wings bounced when you hit it from the back. You cried when he dumped you.”
“Whatever! Sheesh, you date one Seeker and all of a sudden every other grounder glitch in the base thinks it’s a fetish!”
Empress suddenly moans, shuddering under the servos that attend to her soapy back strut.
“Okay, scrap that. I want a turn, too.”
“Maybe I do have a flier fetish. She’s kinda hunky. And the wingspan on her, mm…”
With the vomit rinsed under the downpour of hot oil and the sweet fragrance of solvent heavy in the air and both servos full of gorgeous femme with other attractive femmes offering compliments for such good service, Slipstream finds it in herself to smile. Nice.
“That wily old glitch locked me out.”
The armoury is secured. This would not prove a problem to a certified Decepticon, if the door could be unlocked by anyone except Shadow Striker. However, she has made the executive decision to override security protocols so that only her credentials are acceptable for entry.
“Open, dammit! Ow!” Flamewar snarls, zapping herself on the Energon-laced forcefield that prevents her from tampering with these security measures. She knows she could hack her way past them, if not for the forcefield. “Let me in!”
The door does not acknowledge spoken commands.
She grabs the bars, laced with defensive Energon, hurting herself as she attempts to rattle open the door by force. “Let me iiin!”
The door bloops a negative.
She eventually collapses from an overcharge of Energon. She is unconscious for some minutes. When she revives, she can smell singed rubber.
“What do you think Megatron plans to do with him?” Thunderblast drawls lazily, skipping out on work to hang out with the guard.
“I dunno,” Demolishor intones with a burly shrug. “Hopefully not something too terrible. I trust him with my life, but I dunno how to feel about all the carnage. Is that really what Decepticons should stand for? Executions, torture and desecration of corpses?”
“I don’t care about all that, so long as I still have a world to take over, with him at my side, on a short leash, eating Energon goodies out my palm.”
“You’re kinda weird, and in a really scary way. No offence.”
“You’d just better maintain my favour, sweetie.”
“Brrr! I hope so!”
Five-of-Twelve thus begins to pray out loud, the prisoner alone in his cell.
“Primus, that’s annoying.”
“Yeah, he can go at it for a while. Hey!” Demolishor slams his huge fist on the door. “Shuddup in there!”
“Yeah!” Thunderblast caws. “Keep those prayers in your thoughts, like polite people do!”
Shadow Striker is forced to contend with the nightmare that is Decepticon administration, since Slipstream is no longer here to do all the datawork. How these little things pile up into something truly significant, when someone is so sorely missed.
Suddenly, Flamewar slams her palms atop the desk, leaning in to bare her fangs very close to her commanding officer’s face plate. In turn, she shoves her helm through the hard-light holographic monitor projected from the desk. It tingles her brain module and feels cool on her cheeks.
“Ooh. Jumpscare.” The old mercenary thus pauses her typing, narrowing her singular optic, scope following scrolling data readouts that are interrupted by the curve of the bike’s handsome cheek. “Rude.”
“Gimme access to my armoury. Now.”
“No.”
“Why not.”
“Don’t be stupid. You know damn well why not.”
“I wanna play dumb right now. Say it, boss bot.”
“You could hurt yourself.”
“Kill myself, you mean.”
Shadow Striker flinches.
“Isn’t that my right?”
“I’m not facilitating it.”
Flamewar licks her fangs, rumbling.
“You need to get over her and get back to work.”
“I can’t work without my workplace.”
“I’ll attend to the armoury. You’ll be kept busy elsewhere, earning your keep less dangerously.”
“Frag you.”
The mercenary sighs, summoning whatever goodness still dwells within her tired old Spark. “Flamewar, I miss her too. We all do.”
“Nobody misses her like I do. We were gonna get married.”
“No, you weren’t.”
The bike recoils, yanking herself out of the monitor which reconstructs itself without the obstruction of her helm. “How dare you!”
Shadow Striker reaches for the hologram, carefully grasping it by the edge, coaxing it to shut itself down with a dismissive gesture.
“I would’ve settled down for her!” Flamewar exclaims with great emotion and an edge of insanity, an edge to her character that is usually very appealing on her, but not so much when she really loses it. “I would’ve raised her kids with her!”
“She would make a good mentor. I’m not too sure you would, but that’s sweet of you to say.”
“Ah, but we’ll never know now, will we! A whole chapter in my future is just gone, boss bot, and my happy ending was in that story! My future happiness left me when she did! And you let her go!”
“I put in a formal appeal, arguing against the transfer, insisting it be overruled, with all the reasons why she should stay listed neatly and succinctly for review. I submitted my appeal three times actually, with changes here and there in wording and argument. Do you know how tedious those documents are to produce and then submit through the right channels?”
“So you did some datawork for once, so what! She’s still gone!”
“I yelled at Scream for over and hour, got a little heated, threatened to harm him, and in turn I almost got pulled into another disciplinary hearing. I told Megatron he was making a mistake, I almost begged him to reconsider. Hear me? I came this close to begging.”
“Even Megatron didn’t listen to you.”
“Hey, I’m just some guy, right? And Slipstream is a Seeker, so I really don’t own her. It was always… temporary, turns out. Liar. Scream just fears what I could turn her into, if I could just break that codependency and give her some independence, give her a life of her own.”
“She was mine! Starscream can suck a fat one and die!”
“Uh-huh.”
“Call Megatron right now, lemme tell him so!”
“If the big mech himself won’t concede to me, your boss bot, do you really think he’ll bend over for you?”
“I gotta try!”
“You’ll just embarrass yourself. And me, by proxy.”
The little bike trembles all over, engine roaring like she intends to transform and race around the cramped, cluttered office in a tight little circle. Knowing her, she just might do that.
“Calm down.”
“It’s so hard.”
The mercenary pushes back her chair with a scrape, sighing.
“It’s so hard,” Flamewar repeats, pawing at her weeping optics, slicing lines into the synthetic flesh of her face that weep too, “for me to make friends!”
“Stop that.”
“Easy to fall in love, easy to grow attached, easy to lose everyone I’ve ever wanted! Loss, boss bot! It’s all I know!”
“Come here.”
“So, like, for a long time, I was a loner! I refused to let people in! I never let myself care about anybody, because it’s so hard to make friends, but easy to be alone!”
“Come.” Shadow Striker pats her lap. “Sit.”
The bike peers between wet claws. “Uppies?” she croaks.
“Uppies,” the mercenary grunts, deadpan.
Flamewar considers this for a moment, then huffs. “I’m still ticked off at you.”
“That’s fine. I’m mad at you, too.”
“You better be comfy.”
Shadow Striker manages a tired smile at that. “I’m told I’m very comfy.”
The bike snorts, then moves behind the desk, sitting her aft on the mercenary’s lap and flopping back against her, nuzzling moodily into her neck as big, strong arms envelop.
“There. Is that any better?”
“Ugh. Yeah.”
“Am I comfy?”
“So comfy.”
“Good.”
“Glitch.”
“You know, I’m reconsidering Starscream.”
“About time. Guy sounds like an afthole.”
“Yeah, well, I thought I could ignore all that. I’ve caught glimpses of him and he’s just so beautiful. And he’s got so much rank, oooh! I love a powerful mech!”
“Pretty on the outside, maybe. Way he treats his Seekers, though? Ugly on the inside, abusing his rank. Poor Slipstream, she’s got it rough, going back to him. She was better off with us.”
“Sugar glider’s gonna be okay. She’s soft, but strong.” Thunderblast pauses momentarily, then turns to Demolishor with a pretty frown. “Think she misses us?”
“Of course she misses us. We miss her.”
“It was only a few months we spent together, trapped down here, but…”
“…Yeah. We got tight, all of us.”
“It just doesn’t feel right without her. And if my darling future hubby Megatron can just whisk any of us away like that, I gotta wonder, who’s next?”
“That’s not something I wanna think about.”
“Slippy would kiss it better.”
Shadow Striker rolls her optic. “After I put the gross sealant on, you tell me that.”
Flamewar huffs, her wounded face plate attended to, after her claws rendered weeping lines. “Slippy wouldn’t let that stop her.”
“I’m not Slippy.”
“Clearly.”
“You know you need to let her go. You will get over her eventually, but if you drag this out, it’ll be harder to move on. Besides, she’s not dead. We’re Decepticons, we’re bound to leave this slaghole someday and bump into her again, eventually.”
“I just want my Slippy, boss bot.”
The old mercenary heaves a great sigh, then leans in and kisses the bike’s wounded cheek, grimacing against the stink and taste of sealant.
“Thanks, boss bot. That helps a little bit.”
“Bleugh. Damn well better. That stuff’s nasty as frag.”
Flamewar giggle-snorts as Shadow Striker moves to kiss the other cheek with much grumbling and disdain.
“Absolutely vile. Yuck.”
“But you’re helping make me feel better. That makes the grossness worth it, right?”
“Sure, whatever.”
“Boss bot! You’re so mean.”
“Look, you demanded a kiss, I gave you two kisses. How’s that mean?” The mercenary ruffles the bike’s helm, smirking down at her. “Give a femme a complex.”
They still have a long way to go.
“Whew! That, my dear, was delightful.”
“Mmhm.”
“Strong, silent type you are, hiding a real kinky monster within that stoic exterior. Compromising your self-righteousness, ’cause my goods are just too hard to resist! Who woulda thunk it, all I had to do was flutter my shutters and bam!”
Roulette puffs out a cloud of cy-gar smoke, slumped against a wall, spike heavily slung and valve oozing lazily, sweat shimmering over her handsome frame. “You don’t need to talk.”
Swindle grins at the floor, suspended by his bound wrist and ankle joints with his aft up and thighs spread, spattered with her tansfluid and lubricant. “Aren’t you glad I got away last time? I think this is way more fun, especially since you’re gonna let me go free after you’re done using me, just so you can follow my trail and catch me again for another round! Riiight?”
She says nothing, just smoking her cy-gar.
“You’re, uh, making me a little nervous, here.”
“Do that thing I like and I’ll consider it.”
“Which thing, handsome? I did a lotta things, and you liked them all. Be more specific.”
“That thing.”
“Ohhh, I getcha. You know, you’re a great communicator. You really know how to sell.”
She does hate herself, but he is one attractive bastard.
“What was he like, before?” Windblade hears herself ask, finding herself alone with Jetfire as she shows him about the Council chambers, introducing him to the various amenities and staff.
“Oh, he was adorable!”
“Seriously.”
“Yes! My beloved Star, always so sensitive, so anxious to be liked, trying so hard to impress everyone!”
“Okay, that sorta tracks. He likes praise.”
“He had the fire of ambition within him from the very first day I brought him home! He was not as cuddly as the others, true, but he was very affectionate in other ways! He took it upon himself to follow me wherever I went, learning from my example, asking such deep questions about love and life and our place within everything! Such intelligence, so much creativity, scientific enquiry tempered by a soulful contemplation into the vast reach of the unknown! He was my scholar, my poet! Not a soldier, no, far from it!”
“Wow. He must’ve really admired you, then, to let you see such sides of him.”
“He did, yes! I knew he was destined for great things, but I felt it would be best to disband the Seekers, so we would never again be utilised as weapons! After all, the Senate all but abandoned us, ceasing the means of our production! It seemed like destiny, that our chapter would close, with so few surviving Seekers left to see the dawn of a new Cybertron!”
“But Starscream convinced you not to disband the Seekers. He begged you to let him lead. And then you left.”
“Do you imagine me a villain?”
“No, but I think you fragged up.”
“I know he has frightened you, I realise he has frightened so many people! But I assure you, Windblade, Star is a good person, deep within!”
“Real deep, maybe. I’ll take your word for it.”
“Allow me to prove it to you! I can still reach him, and when he is returned to his senses, I will ensure he atones for his wrongdoing!”
“I think you’re in for quite the shock, Jetfire.”
“Do the others know?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t they say anything?”
“I told them not to tell you.”
“Why would you instruct anyone to keep this from me?”
“I wanted to tell you myself, so I may maintain control. Consider yourself duly informed. Now, we must plot, and quickly.”
Slipstream needs to sit down all of a sudden.
Starscream indicates the chair before his desk, already seated himself.
The Captain drops into it with a shaky gasp, gripping the lower half of her face plate as she stares at him past the clutter and the discord of his untidy office.
“Take a moment to compose yourself,” the Commander rasps quietly, shadows swallowing his bright, burning optics. “I certainly did.”
And for some time, nothing is said.
“You don’t look very happy he’s back, Sir.”
“How perceptive, darling.”
“You think he’ll reclaim his Seekers, don’t you.”
“It’s his right to challenge me for leadership, if he perceives I’ve failed him.”
“And do you believe you’ve failed him?”
“Don’t you dare get me started, femme.”
“You did make a promise, Sir, when you convinced him to promote you, just before he left us.”
“I recall that, no need to remind me.”
“And part of you knows we’ll choose him, over you.”
Starscream sucks in air sharply, showing pretty dentas.
“We were happier when he led us.”
“You really are insubordinate, speaking to me this way. Windblade truly has ruined you.”
“Good news, I guess. She dumped me, Sir. We’re done.”
“Wonderful! Then you will learn to obey and behave, as you once did. You will remember your place.”
“Like I have a choice.”
“You don’t.”
Slipstream sighs quietly. “What’re we gonna do about him, Sir?”
“Convince him to ally with us, before those fools of the Functionist Council seduce him with their notions of right and wrong. You know what Jetfire’s like.” Starscream dramatically throws an arm across his forehelm, sighing dreamily. “Always has to be the hero, that beautiful beast of a mech! And after abandoning us to pursue his own sense of belonging in this universe, or whatever it was he was searching for. He returns to me, posing a threat to my rightful place in this universe! It is exquisite! It is excruciating!”
“The war really damaged him, Sir. It’ll damage us all, if you don’t stop it.”
“For the greater good, I will make sacrifices.”
“Sacrificing us.”
“I do what I wish with my Seekers. And in turn, your sacrifices shall pave the way for a future in which Seekers rule the skies in the multitudes and grounders never again abuse us for their own ends. Such a beautiful dream, soon to be reality.”
“Okay, and what is Megatron doing with us, exactly, if not abusing us for his own ends?”
“Silence!” Starscream suddenly shrieks. “Bad Seeker! Bad, bad girl!”
Slipstream instinctively drops her helm, lowering her wings, pathetic. She is, after all, still nothing more than a Seeker.
“How dare you! Very naughty! But you can make it up to me.”
She adorably looks up whilst keeping her helm down.
“You are the closest thing to a mentor I have ever known. Not him. But you, yes.” The Commander props his elbows on his messy desk and rests his chin atop his joined servos. “It’s why I extend such mercies to you, after your treachery. It’s why I forgive your disrespectful talk. I know you love me. And I suspect you love me more than he does. I suspect you love our Seekers more than he ever did.”
The Captain winces. “Star, I do love you, more than I can ever hope to quantify, but I’m not so sure about–”
“You will lovingly help me convince Jetfire to join forces with Megatron, without surrendering my seat as second-in-command of the Decepticons and Commander of the Seekers. He will be easily persuaded if the both of us back each other up and demonstrate that Decepticons are the rightful heirs of the future.”
“Oh, scrap me.”