Chapter Text
“Renowned scientist Shockwave consigned to empurata for the crime of harboring and training up outliers.”
It was in all the news broadcasts. The Senate made sure Shockwave’s crime and punishment were known. It was notable, if only because Shockwave was both forged and rather high-profile.
Soundwave thought little of it. The empurata of yet another ‘criminal’ was no longer surprising, even one so prominent as the scientist Shockwave.
There was no word in the broadcasts on the fate of the outliers. Shockwave dropped off the face of the planet not long after the Senate stopped parading him around.
That was the end of it for several months. A blip on the radar, another atrocity of the Senate. Soundwave didn’t bother investigating the scientist’s fate. He was just one more casualty of the system.
Shockwave stood now before Megatron.
Well, to say he stood would be inaccurate– the guards on either side of him served to prop him up more than restrain him.
The Pit’s grainy view-screens had not done his new image justice. Gone were the sleek lines of a flier, the flashy paint job, the calculating gaze and cold grace that Soundwave remembered from Shockwave's public appearances over the years.
The mech before Megatron had no immediately discernible altmode. A single yellow optic, color bleached pale, stared out from the pit of an empurata head. Pincer servos hung at his sides. Purple paint flaked off his frame.
In short, the once-upperclass scientist looked like complete and utter slag.
“So,” Megatron drawled. “What brings a servant of the Senate to my door?”
The light of the late noon sun, made sickly yellow by a filter of smog, shone through broken windows high above.
Shockwave lifted his head. Soundwave glimpsed a ring of grey weld marks around his neck.
“You need a scientist of my calibre,” Shockwave said. “I need a patron.” His voice was as flat as it had been on the broadcasts.
Megatron’s optics narrowed. “What could you possibly offer that I want?” His digits twitched at his side, a signal.
“I have experience in weapons development and frame modification,” Shockwave replied. “I can improve your gladiators– and your rebellion.”
Soundwave let his mind unfurl. The thoughts of those around him rang out: the grumbling of the two guards, the steady burn of Megatron’s resolve, the hum of the Pit beyond this warehouse-turned-audience chamber. He tuned them out. There was only one mind he wished to hear.
He reached out, skimming the surface of Shockwave’s mind. Where in others there would be turmoil, a churning sea of emotion and thoughts, Soundwave found only silence. The surface of these waters lay flat and still.
“I have mecha who know these things,” Megatron said. “We’ve long known how to repair and upgrade ourselves in the Pit.”
Soundwave’s first instinct was to recoil. He had never seen such a mind as this. But he remained, ghosting over the still waters, listening to the silence.
“Your mecha do not have the knowledge that I have.” Despite his wretched state, hanging from the hands of the guards who flanked him, Shockwave was unbothered. He was not, at least on the surface, anything at all. “I can develop new weapons and augments better than any you would find on the black market.”
It had to be shadowplay. The Senate had done more to this mech than take his hands and face. Soundwave felt a flash of revulsion. Whether he felt this towards the Senate or Shockwave, he couldn’t quite tell.
“What would you ask in exchange for your services?”
“Fuel, lodging, protection. Resources to continue my work.”
But no shadowplay had ever done this to a mech: silenced his thoughts completely.
There was still a mind somewhere down there, deep below the surface of the waters. Soundwave could sense the steady hum of its machinery. He itched to dive in and investigate, but any further reconnaissance would be detected.
“What would would that be?” Megatron asked.
Shockwave replied, “I have many projects.”
There was nothing more to glean from that vast, dark ocean. Soundwave withdrew with an inaudible sigh.
It was a relief to leave the unnatural silence behind, though the clamor of the Pit was hardly better. Soundwave closed his audials to foreign thoughts, rendered himself alone within the sanctuary of his own mind.
Megatron chuckled, a rough sound that emanated from his chest. “Keep your secrets, Shockwave. Your medical and scientific expertise will pay your way here in the Pit.” He looked Shockwave over with a critical optic. “I expect you’ll do much to furnish our rebellion.”
Shockwave bowed his head. “I will do my best.”
Megatron smiled. His sharp incisors glinted. “I look forward to seeing what you can do for me.”
At the wave of Megatron’s hand, the two guards released Shockwave. Another wave sent them from the room. Megatron turned his head.
“Soundwave.”
Soundwave stepped forward from his shadowed corner. Megatron nodded to the purple mech standing alone before them.
"Show our new medic where he'll be working and fueling, then find a room for him to sleep in. Return to me when you're done." Megatron paused, glancing over Shockwave's battered frame once again. "And put some energon in him. He looks more brittle than a dead crystal."
With that, Megatron departed, leaving Soundwave and Shockwave alone.
Silence fell. Dust motes glittered in the light coming through the broken windows.
Soundwave regarded Shockwave warily. Shockwave stared back at him.
Shockwave really did look like slag. There was a slight sway to his stance without the two guards to prop him up. He was covered in dents and untreated weld scars. The paleness of his optic indicated a lack of energon, while the frailty of his frame and the flaking paint implied a period of prolonged starvation.
He looked as though a gust of wind would blow him over. Whatever life Shockwave had been living since he dropped off the grid, it hadn't been an easy one.
"Follow me," Soundwave said at last. He stepped around Shockwave and made his way to the door, which opened before him. He heard the thud of footsteps following behind.
Soundwave led Shockwave through the maze of halls, passing by other mecha on their way to one task or another. Soundwave's reputation granted them a wide berth, though Shockwave's appearance earned a few sideways glances.
The Pit was once a factory perched over the massive smelting pit which now served as the arena. The place had been heavily retrofitted: tiers of balconies and viewing stands erected around the old smelting pit, the factory's many machinery-filled rooms and basements converted into training rooms, living quarters, medical bays, and other necessities.
The Pit's time as a factory lay centuries ago, of course, long before Soundwave was scooped up by the old ringmaster. Despite the passage of the years, the Pit still smelled of soot and burning slag.
The primary medical bay, positioned near the entrance to the arena, was rarely empty of patients– there was always some mech coming in from a vicious spar or an argument-turned-brawl. Come nightfall it would be full of gladiators fresh from the arena.
The Pit had three medics, though only two of them were present when the double doors creaked open.
Hook, the de facto chief medic, looked up from where he was elbow deep in the innards of some unfortunate, unconscious mech.
"Soundwave." Hook scowled. "Why are you here?" His helm tilted. "And who's that?"
Soundwave ignored him, stepping aside to permit Shockwave full view of the medbay. “This is the primary medical bay. Your duties: repair and maintenance of Pit occupants, repair of fighters following Pit fights."
“You want him working here?” Hook pulled his hand out of his patient. "The slag he will! He couldn't even hold a dent stylus with those oversized forceps." He emphasized his point with a wave of his hand, sending an arc of energon droplets across the room.
Soundwave levelled his stare on Hook. "Megatron has ordered that Shockwave operate in a medical capacity."
"Shockwave? The scientist?" Knock Out looked up from his own patient with interest.
Shockwave said nothing, his yellow gaze panning across the room. It was well-lit, which only highlighted its dreary state– the scuffed walls and floors and dented medical berths. Thanks to Hook's standards, however, it was quite clean.
Hook's upper lip curled into a sneer. "Well, if Megatron orders it." He turned back to his patient. "Just don't blame me if fighters end up dead because he can't tie up a torn energon line."
Soundwave turned to Shockwave. “Come.” He stepped out into the hallway.
The mess hall once contained huge, lumbering machines that processed the smelting pit's output. All the machinery was gone now. The memory of them remained in screws and fasteners jutting out here and there from the floor, walls, and ceiling. Mismatched tables and cobbled benches filled the room, while a row of battered ration dispensers lined the far wall.
A few of the mecha within glanced up when Soundwave and Shockwave entered but soon went back to their conversations.
“This is the mess hall,” Soundwave said. "Pit occupants are permitted one ration cube per day, excluding particular circumstances."
Shockwave spoke to Soundwave for the first time. "What circumstances?"
"Victorious fighters are permitted extra rations."
In years past Soundwave gave those extra rations to Ravage and the birds, as well as Rumble and Frenzy after they joined him. Now, with Megatron as leader of the Pit, Soundwave's companions were provided fuel enough that Soundwave did not need the extra rations. He kept them in reserve for bribing other Pit occupants.
"I see."
Soundwave glanced at Shockwave from behind his visor. That yellow optic panned over the room. Shockwave said nothing more.
Soundwave crossed to the ration dispensers and retrieved a cube. Storing the cube in subspace, he turned to Shockwave. “Come.”
Most of the Pit's occupants lived in a series of basements repurposed into barracks. The highest ranking gladiators enjoyed private quarters and amenities, while the medics, few and vital, were also given private rooms.
Soundwave led Shockwave to one of the private rooms he knew to be empty, unlocking the door with the master-code to which he was privy.
The door opened to reveal a small room. The lightstrip flickered when Soundwave pinged it online. The berth was dusty and stained with what appeared to be old energon. There were no other furnishings.
"Current door code: 298957," Soundwave informed Shockwave. "Washracks are at the end of the hall." From his subspace, he withdrew the ration he took from the mess. He held it out to Shockwave. "Drink."
Shockwave took the cube with a trembling servo and pierced the seal with the tip of his other claw. A slender proboscis slipped from below his optic, dipping into the cube. The color slowly returned to Shockwave's optic as he drank. The trembling of his servos steadied.
It was tempting to dive into his mind, get answers here and now. But Megatron had requested that Soundwave report back, and Soundwave would not disobey.
There would be time enough to investigate Shockwave's aberrations later. He wasn't going anywhere.
When Shockwave finished drinking, the proboscis retreated into his neck. He banished the cube to subspace and lifted his head, staring at Soundwave unblinking.
“Rest here,” Soundwave said. With that he turned and walked away, leaving Shockwave standing in the doorway to his new room.
As he rounded the corner Soundwave felt the weight of a familiar gaze. “Ravage,” he said. He heard a creak overhead before four nimble paws landed on his shoulders. Soundwave barely paused in his stride.
“What’s his deal?” Ravage remarked, settling across the span of Soundwave’s shoulders. “He’s the coldest fish I’ve ever seen– and he smells wrong.”
“Always with the ‘nose knows’.” Rumble’s teasing barb was laced with naked curiosity as he hurried out from his own hiding place to match Soundwave’s pace.
“Careful or I’ll bite yours off,” Ravage retorted, tail lashing across Soundwave’s face.
Soundwave batted it away. “Where is Megatron?”
Rumble was quick to reply. “In the second training room.”
“Want me to keep an optic on the new guy?” Ravage asked.
“Affirmative.” Soundwave reached back, nudging his knuckles against Ravage’s cheek. Ravage nipped at his digits before sliding like oil from Soundwave’s back.
“What’s his deal, boss?” Rumble echoed Ravage’s earlier words.
“Shadowplay.”
That brought Rumble up short. “Slag,” he breathed.
“I must report to Megatron.” Soundwave looked down at his companion. “You and your brother research Shockwave’s activities since the Senate took him. Be careful.”
Rumble flashed a grin, wry and irreverent. “We’re always careful, boss.”
Soundwave reached out to cuff Rumble’s helm. Rumble ducked under the blow with a laugh and ran away, vanishing into the Pit’s maze of corridors.
There was no one in the second training room except Megatron, hacking away at a battered training bot with a long knife.
"Soundwave," Megatron said. He made one last vicious slash upon the training bot. It collapsed with a warble. Megatron let out a gust of air from his vents, relaxing from his stance and turning towards Soundwave.
"Shockwave has fueled," Soundwave reported. “He is in his quarters."
"I see." Megatron nodded to the rack of weapons against the wall. "Spar with me while we talk."
Soundwave went to the rack and, after a moment of consideration, selected a vibro-bladed staff. Megatron grunted and took up a wide sword that had been set aside on a bench. Soundwave stalked to the center of the room and settled facing Megatron. A flick of his digits activated the vibro-blades. Energy crackled down the length of the staff.
They assessed one another– Soundwave with the staff in one hand, standing tall, Megatron with the sword in his right hand and the knife in his left, stance wide and low.
Megatron acted first, closing the distance with a dash and a swing of his sword. Soundwave dodged the attack easily, slashing at Megatron with his bladed staff.
They danced around one another. Strike, dodge, guard. Testing the other's reflexes.
"So," Megatron said, "what is your assessment of our new ally?" His sword came swinging down on Soundwave's head.
Soundwave sidestepped the blow, darting out of range. "He has no surface thoughts.”
Megatron raised a brow. "You mean to say you cannot read him?" He closed the distance again, sword angled for an upward sweep. Soundwave blocked the blow and twisted away from the dagger striking low from Megatron's left hand.
“Affirmative.” Soundwave knocked the dagger away and countered with a blow of his own. "Shockwave was shadowplayed. Extent unknown."
Megatron blocked Soundwave's blow with the hilt of his sword. A wry smile twisted on his lips. "The Senate stoops ever lower." He slashed between them with the knife, forcing Soundwave to fall back. "But I do not need your gifts to know that Shockwave will serve as benefits him."
“If the Senate would do this to one, they may do it to others.” Soundwave sprang back towards Megatron, the blades of his staff hissing through the air.
“Know thine enemy.”
Megatron reared back, narrowly avoiding a vibroblade to the face. Soundwave pressed the advantage while Megatron was off balance. Their conversation fell away for several tense seconds.
At last Megatron said, “Do not act yet. Let him settle in. Perhaps this silence is due to his trials, and is only temporary.”
Soundwave shook his head. It went so much deeper than that.
“Do it anyway.” Righteous anger flashed in Megatron’s optics. “We shall be better allies than his former masters.”
"Perhaps the Senate is using him to infiltrate us."
A strange absence of surface thoughts might not be the only change the Senate wrought within Shockwave. Shadowplay could do many things. Alter personalities, yes, but it could also create sleeper agents.
“They think us little more than discontents, rolling in the mud.” The blade of Megatron’s sword struck the end of the staff. A shower of sparks scorched their plating. “And even so, if they have any sense, they will not activate him right away. We have time.”
Soundwave hummed in acknowledgment. "Will you assign him further duties?" He brought the staff up between them in a sharp slash, forcing Megatron to fall back.
"Get someone to set up an R&D lab for him," Megatron replied. "He'll work the medbay with the other medics during the fights, but he'll be researching and developing upgrades with the rest of his time."
Shockwave's knowledge would be wasted in the medbay alone. "Acknowledged."
With that they put their full attention to the fight. It dragged on, though not half so long as that first time they'd clashed in the arena. This encounter also did not leave them quite so injured, though energon sprayed in the air on occasion.
They drew back and then clashed once more, the hilt of Megatron's sword stayed by the bar of Soundwave's staff. Again came the dagger from the side, but Soundwave twisted away before it could pierce him. A kick while Megatron was unbalanced sent the offending blade skittering across the floor.
After that it didn't take long for their fight to conclude– a stalemate yet again. The tip of a sword at Soundwave's gut and the edge of a blade at Megatron's neck. Their ventilation fans hummed loud in the sudden silence, working to cool their overheated frames.
Soundwave lifted the blade from Megatron's neck. Megatron withdrew the sword angled between them. They stepped back, lowering their weapons.
"I assume you will be watching Shockwave closely," said Megatron.
"Affirmative."
Megatron hummed thoughtfully. He turned away, walking towards the weapon rack and setting the sword upon it. The knife he retrieved from the ground and tucked into a panel in his arm.
"I trust your judgment in this matter. Do as you will." Megatron crossed the room to Soundwave and clapped a hand on his shoulder. He smiled, fierce and sharp. "I'm glad to have you by my side, Soundwave."
Soundwave only needed to flick out with the edge of his mind to taste the truth of Megatron's thoughts. He smiled back. "Likewise."
Shockwave was adjusting well to life in the Pit. Though Soundwave only saw Shockwave during his own visits to the medbay –always brief and rarely treated by Shockwave– Ravage and the birds reported that he went about earning his keep with ruthless efficiency.
Shockwave worked in the medbay most nights alongside the other medics, repairing the fighters who'd ended up injured in the night's bouts. His servos caused some dexterity issues early on but he appeared to have adapted for the most part– enough to perform what work Hook permitted of him.
When he was not patching up gladiators he was developing augments and upgrades for the fighters who commissioned them. So far he'd been letting Megatron hold onto the payment for those upgrades. Megatron, too, had laid several tasks on Shockwave's table. None of the weapons Megatron requested had reached a prototype state, though schematics were impressive, according to Ravage.
Shockwave's physical condition was also improving. Soundwave could only assume that he had been truly starving following his disappearance for the Pit's lowgrade rations to restore him so quickly.
Rumble and Frenzy traced Shockwave’s activities in the weeks after the Senate cut him loose. They found that he had boarded a cargo ship bound for Kaon, with stops at Polyhex and Altihex along the way. The ship landed in Kaon without Shockwave, and the trail went cold until he reappeared at Kaon’s southern docks some months later disembarking a smuggler’s ship out of Polyhex.
Whatever went on during those months remained a mystery.
The condition of Shockwave’s mind did not improve. Soundwave brushed against him now and then during his visits to the medbay. At no point did he detect any change in the placid waters of Shockwave’s mind, no hint that anything but silence reigned supreme.
It was two months after Shockwave's arrival in the Pit that Soundwave chose to act. He sustained a minor injury from a spar and, rather than going to the medbay, made his way to Shockwave's lab to press upon the scientist for repairs instead.
The lab was once a spare medical bay, fallen into disuse in favor of rooms closer to the arena and the training rooms. The door hissed open on Soundwave's approach.
He glanced about, taking in the space. Metal, wires, and half-assembled machinery littered the various ramshackle workbenches, all arranged into a particular sense of order. A sterile scent hung in the air, scrubbed metal and disinfectant.
Shockwave looked up when Soundwave entered, straightening from the terminal he stooped over. "Soundwave," he said. "What brings you here?"
"I need repairs." Soundwave gestured to his injury; a long gash across the metal of his chestplate. Energon ran in thick rivulets down his front. Unsightly, but not nearly enough to be fatal.
Shockwave's optic tilted down, then back up. "I see." He gestured to a medical berth, sat near one of the workbenches. "Sit there."
Soundwave made his way to the berth. It had been scoured clean recently. He hoisted himself onto it. The thin berthpad crumpled beneath his weight.
There came a ping from Laserbeak, lurking in a ventilation shaft just above, and then another from Frenzy, loitering in a nearby hallway.
Shockwave approached with a rattling cart of medical equipment. "Sit up straight and hold still," he said.
With slow but sure servos, Shockwave clamped the torn energon lines shut. It took more time than one of the other medics would have achieved, but he was at least precise. Soundwave stopped receiving alerts on his energon loss.
Shockwave cleaned the energon out of the wound and peered into it. "You were not cut beyond the first layer of plating," he said. "I will solder your energon lines and apply a patch over the injury. Your self-repair will take care of the rest."
Soundwave nodded. "Acceptable."
Shockwave turned to his cart, retrieving the relevant equipment. As Shockwave set to work Soundwave let himself unfurl, reaching out across the distance between them.
Shockwave's mind was as still and silent as always. Soundwave hovered over the still waters, straining to see what lay beneath. No whisper came from those waters, no ripples came to the surface, though he could sense the stirring of Shockwave's mind far, far below.
Shockwave repaired him with a steady efficiency. Silence reigned, both within and without, broken only by the hum of their frames, the clinking of Shockwave's tools, and the whirring of the ventilation system overhead.
When the surface of Shockwave's mind became too unsettling to linger on, Soundwave turned his attention to Shockwave's physical appearance.
Shockwave's state was much improved since last Soundwave observed him in detail. His optic glowed a solid yellow, his paint no longer flaked away, and his plating sat flush to the curves of his frame rather than hanging brittle over malnourished struts.
He didn't appear to have tended to the dents he'd had during that audience with Megatron. And there were still, Soundwave saw, the unsanded weld scars. The one Soundwave had first noticed, wrapped around Shockwave's neck, was thick and prominent, but there were others– at his hips and thighs, his shoulders and wrists. Two long lines ran up either side of Shockwave's spine when he turned away to retrieve another tool.
A complete reformatting, that's what those scars indicated.
How did it not hurt? Any scar of Soundwave's left without further treatment always ached, a strut-deep pain that lingered until his frame finally assimilated the repair. Shockwave clearly hadn't assimilated the welds, no doubt due to his months of malnutrition, but there was no hint of pain to be found in his mind. There was nothing at all.
Shockwave finished sealing the patch across the gash in Soundwave's chest. It was an ugly, gunmetal grey, but Soundwave had been more patch than plating too many times to care for aesthetics.
"The patch should assimilate within a week," Shockwave said. The soldering iron in his servo turned off with a click. "Inform myself or one of the other medics if this does not occur."
"Acknowledged."
Soundwave stood from the berth. Shockwave said nothing more, picking up the spare patch material he'd left on the berth.
Soundwave sent a ping to Frenzy. The doors to the lab locked with a distinct clunk. Shockwave began to turn towards them. Soundwave seized him by the forearms. That blank yellow optic swung towards Soundwave.
Soundwave took a brief, bolstering breath and plunged into the cold waters of Shockwave's mind.
He found long rows of memories, neatly arranged, extended into the depths. Had Soundwave entered Shockwave's mind via hardline interface all before him would have been protected by firewalls. To Soundwave it was all free to view, every unblinking memory. Even a mnemosurgeon would not have such free reign of another's mind.
The stillness of the surface did not extend here. Shockwave's mind hummed with activity. With every passing second another speck of light was added to the walls of memories, each moment rich with data, all catalogued and marked and noted as Shockwave struggled to free himself from Soundwave's grip.
Despite the activity found here beneath the waters, Soundwave heard no thoughts. The memories built upon one another in silence.
Soundwave passed down between the rising banks of memories. Each one winked at him in passing, offering glimpses of the data contained within. He spied flickers of Shockwave’s time in the Pit, his audience with Megatron. The memories had no markers signifying emotional significance, only timestamps.
Soundwave continued downward, skimming along the rows and rows of twinkling lights. He glimpsed Shockwave’s long journey to Kaon, his time as a shunned empurata in Iacon, the weeks he spent under the Senate’s glaring stage lights and blinking cameras.
Soundwave almost missed it when he passed it by. An irregularity in the wall of neatly ordered data.
Soundwave looked closer and found a stretch of memories pushed to the back of the shelves. They did not budge when he tried to pull them into view but remained stubbornly in place, walled off from the rest of Shockwave’s databanks.
He tried opening the memories directly preceding this section. The speck of light bloomed beneath his touch, bringing sight and sound and color.
“Strap him down.”
“You don’t want him sedated?”
“No, I want him to feel it happening. Do you hear me, Shockwave? I want you to feel every last second of this.”
The memory cut off abruptly moments later. But what Soundwave felt in those brief seconds was fear. It lay thick on the hours before that breaking point.
The next accessible memories, lying just past the hidden section, were blank. Shockwave sat up on the operating table and looked down at his new servos and felt nothing.
What exactly had the Senate done to Shockwave? Soundwave saw no evidence that Shockwave's memories were tampered with. This concealed section was a product of Shockwave’s own processor, not the cutting of a mnemosurgeon.
The answers to Soundwave's questions lay within that darkened stretch of memory, but to pull any harder would almost certainly do damage.
There was still deeper to go.
Soundwave dove down, down… past the rows and rows and rows of memories. It was an eternity in a moment, a lifetime passed by in a fraction of a second. He broke through the furthest reaches of Shockwave's memory to the layers beneath.
There he found programming, protocols, lines of code– and finally, finally, the quiet murmur of Shockwave's thoughts.
An outlier, Shockwave was thinking. Able to remotely initiate one-sided hardline-adjacent interface.
His many processes hummed and whirred and clicked, the turning of countless gears. He'd stopped struggling at some point. What struggles he'd made had borne no fruit– a recently-starving mech of the science caste had no chance of resisting a gladiator of Soundwave's calibre.
Not one of my students, Shockwave thought. There was a flash from the memory centers above, a string of faces that Soundwave didn't recognize.
Shockwave felt nothing for the faces he remembered. He felt nothing at all.
He is looking for something.
Shockwave's thoughts were empty. No color suffused them, no hot red anger at the intrusion or white-blue fear.
Not even here, within his own mind, did Shockwave feel anything. Not even pain, though Soundwave glimpsed signals and warnings which indicated that the damage to Shockwave’s frame was registered by his sensors.
There were still no marks of mnemosurgery. No cuts or incisions in Shockwave's programs and processes, no stray lines of foreign code that might one day come together to force Shockwave into action, or awaken him to some other purpose.
There was one place left to check, beneath the machinery and clicking gears.
Soundwave dove down to the multilayered core of Shockwave's mind. The layers tightened against him, but Soundwave slipped through with ease into the humming center of Shockwave's entire being. Here lay the centers which governed personality and temperament, which ensured that even if a mech forgot all he knew he would still be essentially the same person.
And here lay the cause of Shockwave's strange, disturbing emptiness. Soundwave found it hanging limp in the cold waters, shunted aside by the rest of the core's processes, a haggard ship left to rot: Shockwave's emotion centers. Or rather, the shattered remains of them.
They had been butchered. Torn from their moorings in his core and broken into disconnected pieces. Every now and then one of the fragments twitched and flickered, stimulated by the activity in the layers above, a dead creature shocked by a prod.
This was the only sign of mnemosurgery in Shockwave's mind. No modified memories, no insidious code. Just the tattered remnants of his emotion centers.
Horror spoiled in Soundwave’s tank, thickened in his throat, so potent that it spilled out from his careful barriers and into the cold waters. What have they done to you?
He would not wish this on his worst enemy. To be not only altered, but utterly unmade.
Shockwave did not reply. That yellow optic stared up at Soundwave. Empty, blank.
Soundwave stared back.
Without emotion there was no loyalty. This mech would never serve the Cause as Soundwave did. He served only his own interests. If those should ever cease to align with the Cause, he would not hesitate to raze it to get what he wanted.
One day, Soundwave thought, he would kill this mech.
Horror turned to hate, tipping over that thin line between fear and anger.
Soundwave reached out and touched those splintered pieces of code. He pushed and prodded, coiling to see all angles of this terrible thing. He was not gentle. Neither Shockwave's mind nor his body flinched at the contact. He only stared, utterly silent.
Soundwave pressed against the fragments, feeling along their jagged edges. He nudged at the pieces, pulling them into proximity. Nothing happened. Though the fragments twitched and spasmed, aborted attempts at signals, they could not communicate with one another or the higher processor.
Soundwave extended, draping over the ruined emotion centers, pressing them together. He could taste the places where they should have connected– see where the lights should be flickering, the colors blooming.
There was only silence.
For a moment, the fear and anger became pity. Shockwave was irrevocably changed. So shattered that he could not even care about his brokenness.
Then something beneath Soundwave's touch lit up and there was pain.
pain pain pain painpainpainpainpain
The cold, still waters erupted into a churning whirlpool. Shockwave was screaming, staticked and raw. Soundwave barely heard it over the pain. He felt a scream rise up in his own throat and swallowed it down.
it hurts it hurts what have they done to me it hurts
The waters raged and roiled, pain pain pain. A redness came, hot and boiling, churning the waters further.
damn them what (it hurts) have they done to me (it hurts!) damn them damn them damn them
Soundwave tore himself away. Released the fragments of Shockwave's emotion centers and retreated to the surface. The moment he let go all writhing ceased. The coldness returned.
"What did you do?" Shockwave asked in a hoarse voice. His body trembled.
The surface of his mind was silent no longer. Ripples stirred the waters, bringing from the depths a low anger, muted and dull, a fraction of that previous intense fury. The soft whisper of Shockwave's thoughts drifted to the surface, his questions and analysations and clinical notations.
And still there was pain, a burning ache that sat heavy on Soundwave's tongue when he tasted it.
Soundwave did not respond. His head reeled.
"If you will not answer," Shockwave said, "then release me and allow me to return to my work."
Soundwave realized he was still gripping Shockwave's forearms. He'd dented the plating. Soundwave didn't let go.
Shockwave hypothesized as to the reason and said, "I do not intend to retaliate at this time."
Shockwave was calculated beyond measure, patient and willing to wait before acting. Soundwave knew this now, an immutable truth.
Soundwave released Shockwave's arms. Shockwave bent to pick up the soldering iron and patch material he'd dropped. The overhead lights cast the dents on his arms in sharp relief.
Soundwave coiled back within himself, blocking out the murmur of Shockwave's thoughts. Shockwave said nothing more. He began to organize the tools on his medical cart.
Soundwave turned and walked away. Every step steadied him.
The doors unlocked with a thunk when Soundwave approached, opening to permit his exit. As he stepped through he heard a clatter. He looked back.
Shockwave had collapsed. The medical cart was overturned beside him, instruments scattered across the floor. He hunched there on the ground, a lump of shuddering metal. The scars framing his spine glinted silver against the purple of his paint.
Soundwave turned and left. His pedes took him down the hall.
A weight settled on Soundwave's shoulder as Laserbeak reached him. The rhythmic pounding of footsteps announced Frenzy's arrival.
"Boss!" Frenzy cried once he caught up. "What the slag was that!?"
"What happened in there?" Laserbeak's question was less impassioned, but his claws pricked at the wires in the junction of Soundwave's shoulder.
Soundwave sighed. He felt suddenly weary. "I'm not sure."
His companions asked no more of him. The air prickled with their curiosity and worry. Soundwave continued towards his quarters on autopilot, lost in thoughts belonging only to himself.
The echoes of Shockwave's pent-up suffering still rattled in Soundwave's struts, etched into the casing of his processor.