Chapter Text
The sounds of thunder rang out around the imposing tower known as Darkmount, but there was not a cloud in the sky over Cybertron. Instead, the unrelenting roar of metal clashing against metal came from within the tower. Starscream, former acting leader, and, now, former second in command to the Decepticons was being treated like no more than a child’s plaything. Being tossed against walls and onto the floor for the mere amusement of how gravity caused his spindly limbs to bounce slightly slower than his helm against the hard surfaces. Darksteel and Skylynx roared with glee as they began tossing the Seeker back and forth between their maws, turning to a demented game of catch once the novelty of gravity had worn off. But the constant, shrill screams coming from their new toy? That never got old.
Darksteel caught Starscream in his jaws from an especially great height and violently shook his head in victory, nearly causing Starscream to purge onto himself. Energon dripped from his body as if he had taken a shower in it, covered in ever-growing lacerations caused by the blade-like teeth of the Predacons. Despite his spinning vision, Starscream managed to cry out to Predaking, the largest of the Predacons, who watched from what was meant to be Starscream’s throne with a bored expression, cheekplate resting on a clenched servo.
“My liege, please! You said you were here to settle scores, is this not enough!? Can I do nothing to get you to reconsider!?”
Predaking straightened in his seat, his unamused expression weighing heavy on his brow ridge. “No, you cannot. And no, this is not enough, because you still speak.”
Predaking stood and began to approach the three with a commanding stride, echoing like a sparkbeat across the room. While Starscream’s gaze was elsewhere, Darksteel adjusted the Seeker in his maw until he held onto him only by his elbow joints, and Skylynx immediately took the Seeker’s legs into his own. The two began taking small, deliberate steps backwards, away from each other, while Starscream’s chassis remained in the middle. Stretching, stretching, stretching the mech’s body until it began to creak, threatening to pop at the seams. Starscream let out a loud shriek that was slowly strangled out of him until he could only gasp.
Predaking was at Starscream’s side, now, and he held up a servo, which stopped Darksteel and Skylynx from stretching him any further, letting him linger on the very edge of his internals exploding out of his body. Energon leaked from his intake and steadily dripped onto the floor. Predaking leaned down, looming over the former Decepticon with enough contempt to kill any other mech, but not enough for Starscream.
“There...An improvement, already. But your torment is far from over, Starscream.” The designation left his intake like a purge. “You are a liar, a scoundrel, and a coward. And for that, you deserve a coward’s death. And it will be my pleasure to grant it to you.”
Predaking stood tall and snapped his digits, and his brethren begrudgingly released Starscream, allowing him to clatter to the floor once again. Starscream coughed, more energon spraying from his intake, but before he could hope to steady himself, Predaking transformed and threw himself onto Starscream. Without a single, merciful moment for Starscream to anticipate what could possibly be in store for him next, the Predacon used his claws to pierce into his optics.
The glass spheres shattered beneath the claws as though they were merely Christmas ornaments. Starscream wailed with all the strength he had left. It barely sounded like his own voice anymore, it was almost a roar. A miserable, fearful, anguished roar that caused the temperature of the air to drop. A nauseating rainbow of colors and static covered his vision for only a few miliseconds. And then, blackness. He felt the claws in his optic sockets flex, then they abruptly pulled downwards, across his face plate, leaving a trail of deep gashes from his sockets to his mandible.
Starscream convulsed on the floor for what felt like several minutes. Predaking transformed again, taking the Seeker by the throat and lifting him from the ground, then spoke to the mutilated mech with a low, venomous growl.
“You will die in darkness, alone, and gripped by fear.”
The Predacon began walking. To where, Starscream wasn’t sure, at least not until he felt the cool night wind against his wings. Predaking was holding him over the edge of Dark Mount. Starscream lifted his servos and dug his sharp digits into Predaking’s wrist joint, but was too weak to break past his thick armor.
“Ple...ease…” Starscream croaked.
“And yet it still begs for mercy...You pathetic creature.” Predaking tightened his grip and extended his arm, holding Starscream further over the edge. “This display of weakness will not earn mercy from me, as it did with your former master. Farewell, Starscream, King of Nothing.”
Predaking released his grip, and the drop in Starscream’s tank announced his fall even sooner than the sound of wind screaming past his audials. He couldn’t transform, he was too weak. But what good would that do him now, when the world had become so dark? He could feel the ground approaching with cruel speed. Instinct took over, and Starscream used what remained of his strength to activate his thruster and slow his descent. It was impossible to tell how effective it was , he couldn’t even tell which way was up anymore, but he would soon find out, one way or another.
And sadly, it was not enough to completely cushion his fall. Starscream’s pedes hit the ground, that answered where ‘up’ was, and the rest of his frame followed. A sharp pain ripped through his chassis like a blaster shot, which transformed into a vibrating numbness, and then, finally an indescribable ache that pulsed which each beat of his slowing spark. The dust of the ground caressed Starscream’s cheekplate with all the gentleness of sandpaper. Cold, and scathing against the claw marks on his face plate. Each particle that entered his seeping wounds felt like pure acid. The pain was unlike anything he’d ever felt before, worsened by his lack of vision, which only amplified his remaining receptors to compensate for the loss.
Starscream coughed, painting the ground with a thin mist of energon. But he did not scream. He did not move…Even if he could, what would be the point of trying? He knew that only the vast, empty expanse of Cybertron would be waiting for him. The Autobots were still nearby the Nemesis...Even with their bleeding sparks, they likely wouldn’t even bother to rescue Starscream if they stumbled upon him. With the war over, he had nothing more to offer as leverage. With only a few words, Megatron had stripped him of everything: his title, his power, and his purpose. And now, he would die with nothing.
Starscream, King of Nothing.
What felt like hours passed, and Starscream wished he hadn’t tried to slow his fall. It would have been better to die quickly by hitting the ground than to lie here, in agony, waiting for the end. He briefly wondered whether or not Predaking expected him to do such a foolish thing, then he realized that it really didn’t matter. But he had the misguided hope that one of the Predacons would come down from their tower to look at their handiwork one last time, if only to put him out of his misery...or, at the very least, to not be left alone. Even to die beside his murderer would be better than to be left alone. To know that someone witnessed him, and that his death would have meant something. That his existence mattered.
Another minute passed...maybe. Starscream had no optic lids to shut anymore, but he could feel everything begin to get further away. Yet, somehow, he could swear he felt a presence beside him, now. It made no sound, it didn’t touch him, and yet, he could feel it, somewhere nearby. It washed up beside him like a sheet in the wind, graceful and unfeeling. Perhaps it was only a delusion his processor had created to comfort him in his final moments, but, even so, he welcomed the spirit. But just as quickly as it came, the spirit left, and was replaced by the whirring, electrical sound of...a ground bridge?
Starscream’s chassis sputtered back to life after sitting dormant for what felt like days. He lifted his helm, seeing nothing, but he could feel the energy of the ground bridge on his tortured faceplate, mere inches away. Was this another trick of his mind? Or had Primus actually answered his prayers for once? Regardless, there was only one thing to do, and it would be the hardest thing Starscream had ever done. He dug his digits into the ground, and began to crawl.
All was quiet on the wreckage of the Nemesis. After Optimus Prime had made his greatest sacrifice, the Autobots pressed on through their grief to continue their quest to restore Cybertron. Ratchet was currently in the control room, sputtering and grumbling over the state of their computer systems. Ever since the Nemesis crashed, the ship’s computer kept malfunctioning; opening doors, flickering the lights, turning on the comm system, and worst of all opening-
A green portal flashed into existence to Ratchet’s right and he groaned. “Another slagging groundbridge! For Primus’ sake!” Ratchet stomped over to the ground bridge’s control panel and began investigating, but nothing jumped out as being amiss. Smokescreen, who was currently picking up datapads that had been tossed by the Nemesis’ crash landing, sighed and walked over to Ratchet.
“Before you accuse me of doing it, no, Ratchet, I’m not messing with the ground bridge to pull a fast one on you. That’s like, kid stuff.”
“Then why, in the name of the Allspark, is it continuing to open groundbridges at completely random intervals!”
“Beats me! If I was doing it, you would be able to tell from my comedic timing. Uh, maybe it’s just a short circuit or some kind of...automated…” Smokescreen turned to look at the groundbridge and narrowed his optics, seeing a small figure begin to take shape.
“Automated!?’ Oh, puh-lease. If it were automated, not only would that be a massive waste of energy, but it would also be completely reckless on the Decepticons’ part. And we would be able to see the same coordinates pop up each time! Bah, this whole ship needs a complete reboot.”
Smokescreen approached the groundbridge and stood in front of it, waiting to see who, or what, would appear on the other side. He placed the datapads down and transformed his dominant arm into a blaster. The figure grew brighter as it approached, until finally, it took shape. At first, the mech was nearly unrecognizable from the state of his face, but once Smokescreen dampened his surprise long enough to see the full picture, he gasped.
Ratchet threw up his hands and walked to the main control to shut off the groundbridge. “That’s it, I can’t find anything. I’m closing this down.” Ratchet’s servo landed heavily onto the keypad, which emitted a shrill, monotonous ‘beep.’
“Ratchet, wait!” Smokescreen cried, but not quickly enough. Without a second thought, he dove into the groundbridge and grabbed the injured mech by his servos, then dove back out just as the portal shut, nearly severing his pedes clean off. The sequence of events happened so quickly that Ratchet’s surprised yelp seemed delayed. “Smokescreen, are you alright, what was the meaning of-!?”
Ratchet’s words were crushed by the atmosphere he stepped into. Smokescreen was on his knees, holding a mangled, nearly-unrecognizable Starscream. Energon soaked his chassis to the point that it looked like a top coat of paint. His wings were bent, one could even say frayed from the abuse he’d endured behind that groundbridge. And yet, by some miracle, small puffs of steam were escaping his intake. He was alive.
Smokescreen looked up at Ratchet with terrified optics, his helm shaking slowly as if trying to deny what he was seeing. Ratchet looked into those young, frightened optics, and found the strength to steel himself.
“Get him into the med bay, now.”
By the time he was in Smokescreen’s arms, Starscream couldn’t feel anything at all. Every touch against his frame, even the ones that reached down to his lacerated protoform, felt like nothing more than ocean waves below the surface of the water. Everything even sounded as if he were adrift at sea, nothing but muffled voices and the whooshes of movement. But, over time, things became more detailed. Thumping turned to pedfalls, multiple sets of them, and the voices began to take shape.
“Primus, I think I might faint! I don’t think it’s even possible to buff out something that deep!” Said a particularly familiar voice, that, for some reason, made Starscream feel a bit of anger. Why must this voice be the first he hears?
“Really, that is what you’re worried about!?” Said another voice, one he couldn’t say he’s heard much of. At least, not until recently.
“Hey, give me a break, I’m trying to cope, here!”
“Quiet! Bulkhead, any luck finding a spare optic?” A gruff, more aged voice cut through the commotion with authority.
“No, I’ve been looking everywhere, but all the ones we’ve got are broken!”
“No thanks to you, I hope!”
“Hey, watch where you point that wrench, Ratchet, I’m trying to help!”
Wait, those names, these voices...Starscream knew where he was! He opened his optics to confirm, but, nothing happened. He felt movement in his helm, but no light graced his vision. He tried again, and again, searching for something, anything. But at that he found was inky, unending blackness. The memory of his encounter with Predaking cut through the sedatives like a knife.
Starscream suddenly let out a guttural shriek that forced the entire room into silence.
“MY OPTICS! MY OPTICS! I’M BLIND! I-I’M BLIND!”
Starscream thrashed his helm back and forth, searching in vain for the lights and colors that hid from him. As he attempted to flee from this horrifying reality, he found that his arms were restrained, but his pedes remained free. He kicked and screamed, then, suddenly, his heel strut collided with something that emitted a sharp shout of surprise, revealing that there were even more bots in this room than he had initially heard.
“Augh! Are you tryin’ to make me your twin!?”
“Jackie, help me get his legs!” Bulkhead shouted.
“Knockout, sedate him! Now!” Ratchet commanded.
Starscream felt familiar servos press firmly into his left arm as a set of much larger servos secured his legs to the medical berth, but he continued to try and fight, completely overcome with panicked delirium. His processor craved escape that it could never obtain.
“No! Please, please! Don’t do this! I’ll do anything you want, just don’t hurt me! Don’t hurt me, PLEASE!”
Starscream felt a sharp pinch in his arm, and after a mere second, his glossa became so heavy that it weighed down his entire helm. He tried to keep it upright, but his spinal strut failed him. His helm crashed backwards into the medical berth. A servo rested on the crest of his helm, followed by a weary sigh from his once trusted medic.
“Sorry, Screamer...”
Starscream was back beneath the waves once again, only this time, the warmth of the water had been completely lost. He was cold, with an unpleasant, numb tingling pulsating through his frame and resting on the tips of his digits. The sedatives did nothing to dull his fear, only his senses. He floated in a gruesome cocktail of grief, terror, and anger. Anger, that normally came to his rescue in such times to help him push past his fears. Anger, that fueled him to go on, despite everything he had been through and would go through again. Anger, that had become...weak. There was no kindling to add to his fire anymore; there no revenge to plot and no karmic justice to anticipate. Predaking had settled his score, Megatron was gone, and Starscream was blind.
Voices reached his audials, but they were muffled beneath the water. Was he even awake? He felt that horrid, numb static pulsing through him, but nothing more. He couldn’t even feel the berth beneath him or the restraints around his joints. He could be floating, for all he knew, and he hated not knowing whether this was his own nightmare, or the one that waited for him in the waking world.
Starscream swallowed, and his glossa felt as though it would slide down his throat like a thick, disgusting slab of cold, organic meat. The primal part of his processor told him to cry out for help towards the voices he heard, and he obliged it. But his attempt to say ‘help’ came out more like a wheeze that only ceased to increase in pitch when he pursed his lips around it. The voices continued...They got quieter.
‘Don’t leave me.’
Silence.
‘Help me.’
The silence had already greeted him once; it knew it was here to stay.
‘Help me!’
His final cry echoed out into nothingness, but this time, there was an answer. It echoed back, like the sound of whales, at first, but it grew clearer, and clearer, until he felt a pair of servos harshly shaking his shoulder pauldrons. Reality closed around him as through the air lock of his processor had been breached, and Starscream gasped as sound, glorious sound, graced his audials once again. Medical equipment beeped, air flowed through vents overhead, flooring creaked, and Knockout shrieked.
“Starscream! Wake up!”
Ratchet slapped Knockouts servos away and Starscream flopped back onto his berth, where he took deep, shaking intakes. “That’s enough, Knockout! In fact, none of that would have been preferable!”
Starscream felt Ratchet’s digits inspecting his throat cabling with careful diligence.
“You could have caused further damage to his hexa-lateral scapula if you shook him any harder.”
“Sorry, but I couldn’t take those noises he was making anymore! He sounded like a Zombiecon!” Knockout proceeded to imitate what he had heard, and, unfortunately, his comparison was accurate.
“Inappropriate, Knockout,” said Ultra Magnus, who, apparently, was also in the room.
Starscream shouted at the sudden voice and trembled, moving his helm around to pointlessly search for others. His wings, sore, but whole, tilted without his permission as he searched, as if attempting to catch the sounds as they traveled.
“W-Where am I!? Who else is here!?” Starscream shouted, having finally found his voice again.
“Easy, Screamer. It’s just me, Ratchet, and Ultra Mag now, everyone else left already. You’re back home on the Nemesis, isn’t that nice?” Knockout laid his servo on Starscream’s shoulder, but quickly took it away when Starscream nearly jumped out of his restraints.
“That’s Ultra Magnus, soldier.”
“And this is Knockout, coming to you live with a brief reminder that the war is over, and the moniker of “solider” is now, officially, out of style,” Knockout said with an audible smirk. After a short, scolding silence, Knockout said “sorry, sir,” and shifted his pedes on the floor.
Ultra Magnus cleared his intake and took a few heavy steps towards Starscream’s berth. He looked down at the trembling mech with a restrained amount of pity in his optics; pity that did not infect his tone.
“Starscream, I’m not certain how much you remember of what happened before, or during your arrival on the Nemesis, so I will briefly summarize: Smokescreen rescued you after you crawled through a groundbridge, one that was opened randomly due to a technical error. You were rushed to the med bay, and, while you were unconscious, we discussed what to do with you once you had made a full recovery. I’m sure that you’ve noticed that your optics have...not been restored. Unfortunately, at this time we do not have any functioning optics on board, nor the resources to repair any of what we have.”
“What!?” Starscream shouted, suddenly sitting up. A sharp pain ripped through his frame, and he choked on a shriek. Ratchet placed his servos onto Starscream’s chassis and gently pressed him back down.
“No sudden movements! You’ve sustained extensive internal damages. You need to rest. But yes, Ultra Magnus is right,” Ratchet said, with a twinge of misplaced guilt in his voice. “When the Nemesis crashed, the spare optics were thrown from their storage containers, leaving the least damaged sets with only some of their internal mechanisms intact, if anything was left intact at all. Until we can find the materials to reconstruct their casings, you will have to remain without sight.”
This had to be a nightmare, it had to be. He was still dreaming; any moment now, he would wake up in his safe, warm berth. The lights would slowly turn on, and with that his day would begin. Megatron would chastise him for recharging too late, despite giving him a massive dent in the helm the day before. There was no Unicron, there was no Predaking, no Dark Mount...How could there possibly not be a single optic on board!?
“No...I-I don’t believe you!” Starscream went to move again, but Ratchet pressed him down before he could. “Every optic, destroyed!? Not even one is intact!? I’d sooner believe you intend to keep me blind for your own sick amusement, Autobot!”
“Enough!” Ultra Magnus boomed, silencing Starscream as quickly as he would be silenced by a blaster shot to his forehelm. “We’re telling the truth. Now, that being said, we cannot turn you away in this state, and we cannot, in good conscience, hold you in a prison. So, we have decided as a group to allow you to stay with us while you heal and wait for your vision to be restored. Once you’re able to see again, it will be your choice whether or not you stay. If you choose to stay, you will help us rebuild Cybertron. If you choose to leave, we will not follow you. However…”
Ultra Magnus took another step forward, and Starscream felt the chill of his shadow over his frame, like something had crawled from the Pit to drag him down. “Now that the war is over, our top priorites are to rebuild, and to maintain peace. If you should decide to threaten that peace...we will retaliate. Have I made myself clear?”
Starscream could hardly believe it. Blind, surrounded by the enemy on all sides, bound to the Nemesis because the only alternative to it would be the cruel, untamed wasteland of Cybertron, and they dare delude themselves into believing he wasn’t their prisoner? How long would they take to restore his vision? A few days? A millennia? They could put it off for as long as they wanted and Starscream would be none the wiser! And, that being said...he had no means of fighting back. Even if they made the foolish choice not to disable his weapons, which they surely have already, what good are they to him now?
Starscream was a mech who always had a trick up his sleeve, a lie on the tip of his silver glossa, a knife itching to nestle itself in the spinal assembly of whoever dared stand in his way. But now? Blinded, without an army, without flight, missle, or claw? Without even a polite acquaintance on his side? Now, for the first time since Megatron ground him under ped for his disloyalty…
He was completely helpless.
“...Yes, sir.” He said, his voice barely above a whisper. His newly repaired wings drooped low on his back, almost threatening to fall off entirely.
Knockout’s optics reset themselves in surprise at the sight of Starscream’s paltry posture. Starscream looking pathetic wasn’t an uncommon occurrence, nor was him acting pathetic to get his way, but this...This was different. This was surrender.
Ratchet was just as surprised, but his took the form of a scowl and an incredulous ‘hmph.’ He had been summoned to repair Starscream too many times to believe he would give up so easily.
Ultra Magnus narrowed his optics in suspicion. Even he had expected far more of a fight to come from the Seeker, after knowing of his exploits throughout the war. Perhaps this submission was a ploy of some kind? He had been known to forgo his dignity to get his way in the past. Something about this felt off, and he took in every detail of Starscream’s posture, looking for a tell. But he found none. Perhaps a small interrogation would reveal what lies beneath?
“...I’m sure that you went through something traumatic to sustain such grievous injuries. I apologize for prying into it so soon, but I will need a full report. We have to keep tabs on all potential threats.”
“Predaking,” Starscream said, immediately, with his empty gaze locked to the ceiling above him. “He wanted to...”settle scores.”
Ultra Magnus nodded and hummed, grimly. “I see...Did Predaking-?”
“He made no mention of the Autobots, nor did his compatriots. I wasn’t sent as a warning; I was not meant to survive. And I do not know who opened the ground bridge. May I be left alone, now?”
Ultra Magnus was taken aback by the quick response, but it lacked any bite, so he simply nodded. “...Very well.”
Ultra Magnus looked to the medics, who both nodded and silently began walking out of the med bay. “Get some rest, Starscream,” he said, as he followed the medics outside.
Starscream did not reply, he only listened to them walk, while his wings directed the sounds up into his waiting audials. The med bay doors shut behind the three bots, and their pedes made their path down the hallway easy to follow; they took a right, likely heading towards the lounge. Eventually, Starscream could no longer hear their pedfalls...but something wasn’t right. Did all three of them truly leave the room? They must have; Ultra Magnus and Knockout had very distinct strides, and Ratchet walked just enough out of rhythm to stand out from the two. Why, then, did he still feel as though he was being watched? Had Knockout lied to him before, when he said it was only them in the room with him? It didn’t seem out of the realm of possibility, neither the lie nor the concept of him being secretly kept on ‘round the clock surveillance. He could swear he could feel someone else in the room, lingering, waiting…
Starscream swallowed and shifted, attempting to gain some courage. “I know you’re in here.”
The silence had returned, only punctured by the sound of medical equipment softly beeping. But Starscream didn’t trust it, raising his hackles in an attempt to look more ferocious.
“If you really must keep me under such a tight watch, I want to know who is doing the watching. You Autobots owe me that comfort, at least…! Don’t you?”
Nothing replied, but Starscream took no comfort. He knew the feeling of the air when he was alone very intimately, and this air was occupied. The beeping quickened, in time with his spark.
“I know you’re there! Show yourself, damn you!” Starscream shouted, no longer able to contain his paranoia.
Suddenly, all the medic equipment shut off with a loud, droning, mechanical sigh. Starscream froze, knowing that he must now be sitting in complete darkness. After several seconds, he opened his intake to speak, when suddenly, a loud siren began to blare from the computer beside him, bathing the room in red. Starscream shouted in surprise, looking around the room, unable to hear his own panicked vocalizations above the blaring trumpets.
Starscream pushed past the searing pain that wracked his frame to sit up and began attempting to free himself from his restraints. But it was no use, they were too tight. He was completely vulnerable to whoever, or whatever had tripped the alarm, and he couldn’t even hear them to see where his demise was coming from. As his last resort, Starscream began to cry out, pushing his vocalizer to its limit in an attempt to overcome the volume of the alarm.
“HELP! SOMEONE, ANYONE, PLEASE, HELP ME!”
Meanwhile, Ultra Magnus led Ratchet and Knockout into the lounge area of the Nemesis, where the rest of the Autobots had been waiting to hear of Starscream’s reaction. Ultra Magnus scanned the room as the medics took to their own seats. Knockout took his favorite seat, which looked like every other in the room, this one just offered ‘the most complimentary light for his finish,’ in his own words.
Ratchet took his seat at an empty table across from the two Wreckers, Bulkhead and Wheeljack. Bulkhead was picking debris from his digits and sprinkling it onto the table, while Wheeljack reclined in his seat, resting his pedes atop of the table. He winked at Ratchet when they locked optics, and Ratchet immediately rolled his to sever the link.
Bumblebee sat with Arcee and Smokescreen. Bumblebee straightened as Ultra Magnus entered, and Smokescreen followed suit, though he overcompensated his posture. Arcee, on the other hand, was hunched over, resting her chassis on her crossed arms. She looked at Ultra Magnus with only her optics as he walked in, and looked down at the table again with a scowl when his optics landed on her.
Before Ultra Magnus could speak, Wheeljack broke the silence.
“So, how did it go with Stilettos? Is he gonna behave?” Bulkhead elbowed his friend with a stern scowl, and Ultra Magnus opted to ignore him entirely.
“Starscream has agreed to our terms. He is to remain on the Nemesis until he’s made a full recovery. If he acts out of line, we are free to react as we see fit...And that’s only if he acts out of line,” he finished, looking at Arcee.
Arcee scowled and stood, her chair squealing against the floor as she did so. “This is complete scrap. First we let Megatron get away, now we’re playing house with Starscream? As soon as he gets what he wants from us, the first thing he’s going to do is turn around and stab us in the back,” she announced, raising her voice, but not her tone. It was taking everything in her not to step completely out of line.
“I am not going to sit here and pretend that everything he did never happened,” She continued. “I am not going to just conveniently forget what he did to Cliffjumper for the sake of peace. The way I see it, Starscream forfeited his peace the moment he snuffed his spark, and we should have never taken him anywhere near that med bay.”
Wheeljack raised his fist with a rebellious smirk. “Preach, sister.”
Ultra Magnus shook his helm with a sigh. “Arcee, I’m not asking you to pretend, or to forget. I’m not asking that of anyone. I’m asking you what Optimus would have done, if he were here.”
Arcee turned her eyes down and clenched her servos into fists. The room fell silent, but Bumblebee didn’t allow it to last.
“He would have wanted us to help him, Arcee. Optimus believed that every spark is precious, even one like Starscream’s. He would have wanted us to push past our feelings and give him the chance to earn his place back on Cybertron.”
“And how many chances is he going to get!?” Arcee snapped, her eyes burning with fury. “He’s gotten tens, if not hundreds of chances to change, and what do we have to show for it!? Bots like him don’t change!”
“Megatron changed,” Smokescreen added. Arcee looked at him, but Smokescreen turned his head down to avoid her gaze, feeling, correctly, that it would put two burning holes into his helm.
“Yeah, after Unicron kicked his tail pipe for a few days,” Wheeljack added. “Maybe that’s just the thing old Screamer needs, eh, Bulk?” Wheeljack smirked and punctuated the sentence by pounding his fist into his palm. Bulkhead slowly looked to Wheeljack with wide optics, like an Easter Island head that saw a bomb go off in its peripheral vision.
“...Jackie...We’re not beating up a blind mech.”
Wheeljack froze, then promptly pulled his pedes off the table. “Just kiddin’.”
Knockout laughed, sharply, seeing right through Wheeljack’s hastily reformed facade. “Ha! Really!? How could you possibly forget that? By the Pit, the mech’s face looks like an overhead view of the grand canyon!” Knockout shook his helm and leaned back in his seat, now adopting Wheeljack’s forsaken posture.
“Look, I’m about as happy as Arcee is to have Screamer on board. I think we can all agree that this is the worst mech to have possibly fallen through that Pit-forsaken groundbridge, but we need to look at the big picture: Starscream is one of, if not the best Seeker on all of Cybertron...Well, by default, now, but you get the idea. If we can get him up and running, he’ll be a major asset to our little renovation project. Of course, getting him back in working condition is one thing, but getting him to want to cooperate…”
“Impossible,” Ratchet grumbled. Knockout held up a finger to pin the phrase in the air.
“Actually, it might be plausible.”
Ultra Magnus raised a brow, but allowed Knockout to continue.
“After Ultra Magnus relayed our terms to Screamer, he didn’t huff, or growl, or spit like he normally would. He just hung his head low and agreed like a sad little puppy dog. Starscream is a fool, but he’s not an idiot. He knows that he can’t get out of this without our assistance, so he’s got no choice but to play nice. And we have the power to keep him nice for as long as we think necessary for a bit of...character growth.”
Ratchet straightened with horror on his face. “Knockout, you aren’t actually suggesting that we withhold Starscream’s optics for our own personal gain?”
“What’s there to gain from a blind Seeker? I’m just saying, once we have them, maybe we should consider holding onto them until we think he’s ready to play nice for good?”
Bulkhead shook his helm in disgust. “Spoken like a real ‘Con, Knock…”
“Takes one to know one, big lug. I’m not saying we do it, I’m just saying that if we don’t think he’s ready, when the time comes, we have insurance.”
Arcee shifted from one ped to another, looking at a corner of the room. The thought made her as uncomfortable as it eased her previous nerves, leaving her at a stalemate. But, it didn’t last. As if haunting her processor, she could see Optimus and Cliffjumper looking at her with disgust for even considering such a cruel, decepticon-esque idea.
“No.”
The room turned to look at Arcee, who uncrossed her arms and stood tall, filling her chest with a steady intake.
“As much as I hate Starscream...I won’t stoop to his level, and neither should you, Knockout.”
Knockout simply shrugged. “Fair enough, it was only a suggestion, after all.”
“Remind me not to get on his bad side,” Wheeljack whispered to Bulkhead, only half-joking.
“Just watch the paint and you’ll be fine,” Bulkhead replied with a playful smirk.
“I still don’t like this arrangement, but...I’ll go along with it. Still, if Starscream steps out of line, I’ll react accordingly, sir,” Arcee finished.
Ultra Magnus nodded, a hint of a relieved smile on his face.
“Good. Now then, let’s go back over the agenda for tom—”
It was then that the loud, buzzing alarm went off in the med bay. The entire Nemesis became bathed in flashing red lights, and a nearby monitor that had gone into sleep mode flashed to life. Everyone in the lounge stood and readied their weapons, but it was Ratchet who made the first move when his optics caught a glimpse of the pinged location of the alarm on the monitor.
“The med bay! It’s coming from the med bay!”
“Arcee, Ratchet, Bumblebee, with me! Bulkhead, Wheeljack, you take up the rear! Move!” Ultra Magnus called out. Immediately, everyone fell into position and dashed down the halls of the Nemesis to investigate the alarm.
Ultra Magnus skidded on his pedes to a stop in front of the med bay doors and moved to kick them down, only for the door to open just before he could make impact. He gasped as his balance systems rapidly re-calibrated to compensate for the excess force in his step, and his ped hit the ground with a loud ‘gong.’ And that ‘gong’ cut the alarm short. The lights had returned to normal, the medical equipment was rebooting; as if flipping a switch, all was quiet again. Except for Starscream, who was currently living up to his namesake. As Ultra Magnus and the rest of the group stood in stunned silence, Ratchet immediately came to Starscream’s side, taking the hysterical mech by the shoulders to hold him in place.
“Starscream, Starscream! Calm down, everything is alright!” Despite his efforts, Starscream continued to thrash and call out for help, though it came out only as incomprehensible gibberish. Ratchet turned to Bulkhead with a determined scowl. “Bulkhead, help me apply pressure!”
“Wh-Okay!?” Bulkhead squeezed through the door and came to the opposite side of the berth. “Uh, how do you want me to do this?”
“Just lay your arms across his chassis and press down! Hold him still, but don’t restrain him!”
Bulkhead complied, resting his large, heavy arms across the small, fragile body beneath him. He pressed down, leaning a small amount of his body weight onto the Seeker. Starscream’s violent convulsions reached their peak at the initial contact, but as Bulkhead pressed down, they were forcibly stifled. Starscream’s swirling processor began to unwind as the weight introduced calming signals to his sensors, forcing his cache begin clearing itself. His intakes steadied, quieted, and his hydraulics began to depressurize.
Surprising everyone but Ratchet, it was working. Starscream’s sparkbeat slowed to a normal reading. “Good, keep him steady while I look at the crash log.”
As Starscream continued to calm down, Bulkhead smiled. “Hey, it worked.”
Smokescreen stepped in, transforming his weapon and looking over Bulkhead’s shoulder at the once-terrified mech. Starscream looked almost as if he was in a trance, staring up at the ceiling with his intake slightly agape, taking long, steady vents of air. “What was that?”
Ratchet grumbled. “I don’t know, there’s no crash log! All the computer says is that there was a manual shut down event a few seconds ago, but that-”
“No, I meant that,” Smokescreen clarified, gesturing to Starscream. Ratchet looked over his shoulder, briefly.
“Oh, it’s called deep pressure therapy. It’s very effective with flight frames, particularly Seekers. I don’t know why it works, exactly, but I assume that since Seeker frames were designed to be extremely lightweight, the pressure gives the illusion of being more armored. And their heightened senses make them...responsive.”
“Humans like it, too. They make blankets full of beads to press them down while they sleep,” Knockout added. “Who would have guessed that squishies like being squished?”
Bulkhead looked over at Starscream and whispered, unable to hide the concern in his voice. “Hey, Starscream, uh...You alright?”
Starscream continued to vent for a minute, then moved his helm towards Bulkhead. A bit of static crackled out of his vocal component before he spoke. “What...took you so long...?”
Bulkhead grimaced. “Sheesh, you sound like scrap.”
Ultra Magnus hovered over Ratchet’s shoulder. “Is there really nothing out of the ordinary? A manual shut down wouldn’t have caused that alarm to sound, would it?”
“No,” Ratchet replied. “At least, it wouldn’t in the state we left it. That sort of alarm is only meant to sound when life support systems are beginning to fail. No, that wouldn’t have made any sense...Combined with the manual shutdown, it’s almost as if-”
“Someone...was in here,” Starscream said.