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When Starscream woke his own berth covers attacked him.
Complete loss of coordination in all four of his limbs caused him to wrap the insulation sheets in a tight knot around his legs, a stray corner falling over his helm and obscuring his already fuzzy vision. He screeched, the sharp noise resonating around the room and ringing in oversensitive audials.
The berth disappeared out from under him.
He hit the floor with a clang, and realised what had happened.
Face hot and coloured with energon, he threw the covers away. The fabric ripped, he didn't care. It deserved it.
As he moved to haul himself off the dirty floor he realised that not all the aches and pains pinging error messages in his processor had been caused by his less than dignified awakening. He paused to do a full systems check.
Hypersensitivity, glitching gyros, and overworked fuel tanks all pointed towards a lingering overcharge, and he'd known he'd been drinking last night. He could taste it behind his denta.
What did not point towards a hard nights drinking were the other twelve error messages currently exacerbating his processor ache. Punctures, dents, strained joints, scuffed knees, and a very telling ache between his hips. All evidence of a good, rough frag.
Starscream climbed onto his berth and pulled the torn sheets over his helm, hoping they would suffocate him again.
Forty minutes under the solvent spray spent swearing, cleaning, and sulking gave Starscream plenty of time to observe the cosmetic damage. A succession of crescent shape dents lined his wing edge. Bites, from someone with a big mouth.
So the culprit was larger than he was. That was one clue.
Most of his swearing was done with the shower head between his legs, one thruster up and braced against the wall in the most undignified manner imaginable. He turned the temperature to it's max setting, all the better to blast away the remnants of his mystery lover, and then howled when all he did was burn his delicate components.
"Primus dammit!" He snarled, throwing down the shower head and letting the pressure throw it around the floor.
He stood there, staring at it for a while longer. He was in no rush to face the humiliation and ridicule that awaited him out there. Whichever lucky glitch had charmed their way into his berth was already undoubtably spreading the news.
Resigned, he bent to retrieve the shower head, glimpsing a paint transfer on his inner thigh.
It was faint and faded, but dark. Starscream brushed a digit over it, frowning. Black. It was black.
Not much help in this fraction. A lot of the base had black incorporated into their bodywork, but it was still a clue.
Big. Black paint. Had a penchant for biting.
"Did you 'face me last night?!" Starscream demanded, coming up behind Skywarp as his trine-mate unsubtly traded an energon ration for some of Swindle's suspect bright orange 'hangover cure'.
Skywarp jumped, dropping his contraband. Swindle made a strangled noise and was booking it down the corridor before the 'hangover cure' even hit the floor.
"Screamer!" wailed Skywarp, stepping over the mess. "You have no idea how badly I needed that."
"It's useless. It doesn't work," Starscream sneered at the orange mess. "You realise it's mostly waste oil, don't you? From Insecticons?"
"It's what?!" Skywarp turned green.
Starscream didn't feel guilty. He came forward and seized Skywarp by the shoulder vent.
"Answer the question."
"Frag you," Skywarp scowled and slapped him away. "What question?!"
"Did you 'face me?"
"I'd sooner face an organic!" Skywarp pulled a face, "Gross. Urgh. Why would- that's- ugh-"
He started making exaggerated gagging noises, bending at the waist as if overcome by his own disgust. And all this from a mech ready to drink Insecticon waste just to get rid of a processor ache.
"What were you doing last night?" Starscream wasn't going to be fooled so easily. "You were drinking too."
"Yeah, and I was having fun. Unlike you-" Skywarp looked him up and down. Starscream was thankful he'd had the foresight to rid himself of all evidence. "Spent all night sulking in the war room from what Dirge said."
"Dirge?" Starscream snapped. "What did he say?"
"I just said what he said, Screamer," Skywarp scoffed, being as uselessly idiotic as ever. "You bogarted half the high-grade and spent all evening crying under the conference table."
"Where is Dirge?!" Starscream demanded, because that was a lie if he ever heard one and the Conehead in question fitted his suspect's description well enough.
"I don't know, we ain't friends," Skywarp snarled, and as Starscream began to walk away, shouted, "And you owe me a hangover cure!"
Starscream would be only too happy to force feed his trine-mate something unpleasant should the need arise.
Dirge somehow managed to be the impossible combination of terrifyingly creepy and pathetically meek. It was mostly down to his habit of lurking silently in dark corners. Anyone brave enough to approach soon realised he was actually just socially inept rather than the omen of death as his name so implied.
Starscream had reminded his Air Force of this fact several times over the years, but his word clearly amounted to nothing.
The weirdo in question was down in medical. Starscream hoped he had been the cause of whatever damage Dirge was suffering.
Upon entering the med bay he was disappointed to realise that was doubtful. Dirge's usually cone shaped helm had inverted, as if he had flown full pelt into something very hard and very immovable. The top of his helm was now flat enough that Starscream could have levelled a shelving unit with it.
And just when Starscream hadn't thought these Coneheads could look any stupider.
Dirge's trine were with him, both wearing perplexed expressions like they too, were struggling to comprehend the nature of Dirge's injury. As Starscream approached he realised that may have had more to do with the glazed look to their optics.
They were still overcharged.
"Commander Screamer," Ramjet nodded, straight backed and stern faced and trying to very hard not to slur.
Starscream didn't particularly like Thundercracker or Skywarp but he thanked Primus every day that at least he hadn't been saddled with these idiots.
"Out." He ordered, "There's something I need to discuss with your underling."
He looked pointedly at Dirge when he spoke, so he had no idea why Ramjet shuffled his thrusters hesitantly and asked, "...Which one?" Completely ruining the dramatically menacing set up to Starscream's interrogation.
Starscream just shoved him and Thrust, trying to vent at least a little anger. They stumbled and, too uncoordinated to walk in a straight line, collided with one another. Ramjet tripped in the doorway and a crash sounded from outside in the corridor.
Starscream whirled on Dirge. "You spoke with Skywarp."
"Yeah," Dirge looked up at him pathetically, and it was just so stupid with his helm flattened like that. "He was asking me for a hangover cure."
"I don't care about that," Starscream snapped, seeing as Dirge wasn't going to make this easy. He jumped right in. "What were you doing last night?"
Dirge's face scrunched up like that was a trick question. "...Drinking high grade?"
"Is that a question?!"
"No." Dirge's optics brightened fearfully. "Look Commander, I'm sorry about the hanger, but it was Rumble who painted the bullseye on the bulkhead. I just flew into it."
"I don't care about property damage, I'm not a Constructicon!" Starscream snapped, "I want to know what happened in the meeting room."
Dirge stared at him blankly. "....When you were crying?"
"I've had enough of your lies, Dirge!" Starscream screeched, hoping to terrorise him into forgetting what he may or may not have seen the night before. "What did you do to me?"
Dirge's servos shot up pacifyingly, "Nothing! Nothing I swear. The others sent me to get some of the high-grade you took back! I left you under the table with Motormaster and I didn't even-"
"Motormaster?" Starscream breathed with mounting horror. "Motormaster was there?"
Dirge nodded, solemn, "He was trying to cheer you up."
Starscream saw red. "Was he now..."
He didn't have to say anything before Motormaster started guffawing with laughter. If that wasn't evidence enough, Starscream didn't know what was.
He was in the Mess, and that was too public a murder scene even for Starscream. He charged his null-ray and used it to gesture to the door.
"Move." He ordered, voice little more than a dangerous hiss. "Now."
Motormaster lifted his servos in defeat, bringing them down to slap against his knees before standing, "Alright, alright."
As soon as they were out in the corridor, away from curious audials, Starscream slammed Motormaster against the bulkhead, tucking the muzzle of this null-ray under his chin.
"The slag Screamer?!" Motormaster yelled, "This how you show gratitude?!"
"Gratitude?!" Starscream was going it ram his nullray into something far more unpleasant than just Motormaster's throat, see how he liked it. "What could I possibly have to be grateful for? Simpering fool, how dare you! Plying me with high grade to-!"
"Woah woah woah!" The humour was back on Motormaster's smug face. He brushed Starscream's weapon away with his knuckles, lips curving at the corner, "Only thing I did was take the high-grade away. You were hogging it. 'Sides, it wasn't doing you any good. Kept ranting about monogamous birds all night. Couldn't get you to shut up. What's a bird anyway?"
"I-" Starscream's frustration faltered. "...What's a bird?!"
Motormaster stared at him expectantly.
Starscream shoved him, "I don't have time for this, idiot. What did you do to me?!"
"Told ya," Motormaster shrugged. "Took the high-grade. And since you were both being real killjoys, I gave you to Megatron. Let you be his problem. He seemed to know what you were going on about anyway."
Something dropped to the bottom of Starscream's fuel tank that felt like ice, the chill spreading through his internals and stalling all vital components.
"Meh-" he restarted his vocaliser, but it was emitting this weird wheezing noise in lieu of his actual voice, "Megatron?"
Motormaster laughed again, low and soft. "Oh yeah, you were real chummy last night."
Starscream regretted not just accepting that it could have been Motormaster.
Megatron was in the throne room, on said throne.
In complete disregard for professionalism he was sat across it with his legs swung over the armrest. His helm was propped in his fist, positioned so someone entering the room couldn't tell that his optics were offline as he dozed. The datapad balanced against his other knee added to the ruse.
It was fairly convincing because Starscream might not have noticed he was asleep -had Megatron not been snoring like a chainsaw.
At least it made him easier to study.
Starscream crept as close as he dared, craning his neck, looking for anything on Megatron that might say it wasn't so, that by some miracle he hadn't actually been stupid enough to-
There was white scrape of paint on Megatron's outer thigh, the same colour as Starscream's leg. The image of their frames locked together rose uninhibited in Starscream's processor. Him on his back, legs curled around Megatron, pulling him closer-
Starscream didn't know if that was his imagination or his memory.
Megatron stirred, and Starscream couldn't flee fast enough before the datapad that had been balanced in his leader's lap clattered to the floor and roused him.
"Starscream?" a rough, hoarse voice called -and for some reason Starscream imagined that same voice whispering his name instead, breathless, desperate-
He experienced an uncontrollable full frame shudder before he managed to turn and face his leader again, repressing his cringe.
"What are you doing?' Megatron groused, pinching the bridge of his nose and squinting, clearly in a great deal of pain. "Because I assure you I don't have the patience for it today."
He looked even worse than Starscream felt. And if that was so, perhaps this memory lapse went both ways. He could always hope...
"What happened last night?" He ventured, half terrified that such an enquiry would open the floodgates to his leader's memory banks. Or his own, should he get an answer.
"How should I know?" Megatron snarled, and swung his legs down off the armrest to snatch up the datapad he'd dropped. "There are over a dozen damage reports, half of my mechs have incapacitated themselves, and their comrades. Soundwave is missing-"
Starscream nodded dutifully, because if those were the concerns dominating Megatron's thoughts it was very obvious that he really didn't know. Unless he was an incredibly gifted actor. And Starscream knew he wasn't. He wasn't gifted at anything.
Perhaps he could go about the rest of his life as if nothing had ever happened. A lucky escape.
Because Starscream was never touching high-grade again after this. Ever.
His uncharacteristic silence drew too much of his leader's attention because the throne creaked as Megatron leant forwards, optics deep and sharp, cutting straight though him.
"Why, Starscream? Is there something I should know?"
Starscream tried very hard not to look at the smear of contrasting white on Megatron's thigh, long and bright. Megatron would find it soon. And maybe he would go through the same process Starscream himself had to discover it's horrifying origin.
He wouldn't rob his leader of such an experience.
"Oh, nothing," Starscream bowed out, backing towards the door. "Nothing you won't solve for yourself, at least."
His leader's expression was quizzical when the doors whooshed shut. And it was odd, but Starscream felt so much better knowing Megatron was likely to be just as horrified -maybe more so- when he figured it out.
If he figured it out.
He did.
And two nights later Starscream opened the door to his room to be greeted by a couple of high-grades, an incalculable quantity of awkwardness, and... Megatron.
Starscream had sworn to himself that he would never drink again.
But he could always make an exception.