Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Megatron woke up with a jolt and looked around to find he was in a hospital room, more importantly, an Autobot one. He looked out the window with complete confusion until he began recalling what caused him to be here.

The other Megatron nearly offlined him and while he was passing out in Optimus arms, he heard him call him "friend" again for the first time in a long while. Megatron noticed the grief-stricken expression from his face as Optimus thought he witnessed his friend's death.

Megatron didn't want to linger on the topic of what happened if he died.

Something suddenly caught his attention in the corner of his optics. It was a single blue crystal flower on the nightstand next to the berth.

Someone left him that flower. Megatron had a small suspicion of who left him it, but there was also fear if it was too good to be true. It could have just been a friendly gesture.

He twirled the crystal flower slowly in sunlight and the reflections of it cast small rainbows on the walls. 

As Megatron stared at the flower, he thought to himself, "There isn't anything to run from now, no excuses to make." Who knew being confronted by himself can make him realize all his faults and what he truly was? Although he detested the other one, he played a role in reminding him why he cared about Optimus.

____

Megatron was captured by the Decepticon drones and was escorted by them to where his other self was. Although Astrotrain warned him about how dangerous this version was, he was curious to see how his path unfolded if fate went another direction.

"So you must be from the failed universe. I wonder why you haven't succeeded in those millions of cycles." The other one spoke, sitting on his throne with his legs crossed.

"My Optimus prime is a resilient fighter and leader, perhaps your Optimus is weaker in this universe," Megatron replied unafraid.

The other one let out a short "ha!" before he stood up and walked over to Megatron and towered over him with his high stature. "I knew Optimus Prime had the potential to become a larger problem, so I shot him through his spark as soon as he broke off ties with me. I took his matrix of leadership, secured my victory for stellar cycles, and built my Decepticon empire." 

The other one proudly boasted of his accomplishments while Megatron stared questioningly the drones standing in this distance, surrounding them, cheering "All hail Megatron!"

Megatron saw a smirk begin to rise in his alternate version of him. The more time he spends around the other one, the more Megatron was starting to get annoyed by his presence already. "Looks like I don't need to wonder anymore. You are the weak one." The other one said.

"I did not fight in the Kaon's arena and be hailed as the champion to be called weak!" Megatron shouted with his pride injured.

"That day where our alliance between Optimus first split, what did you do?" 

The hurt feelings Megatron felt that day returned to him in a flash. "What does that have to do with anything?" He said through his slight anger.

The other one didn't say anything and waited for an answer with a smile which annoyed Megatron and filled him with the urge to punch the other him.

"I let Optimus Prime leave," Megatron replied with his servos clenched. Before the other one could say anything insulting, Megatron spoke over him, "I assumed he'd come back. His Autobot army was inexperienced and small, my victory was almost certain."

"And so what happened after all those six million cycles?" The other one was definitely building up the conversation to something but Megatron didn't know what. Considering what kind of situation Megatron was in, being hasty would cost him his life and the only reason he was functioning was that he was entertainment for this sick version of himself.

"...We fought, had peace talks that fell through, Optimus threw the Allspark in an unknown corner of space, disappeared for millions of cycles, reappeared, fought traitorous Starscream together, and I tried to take control of Cybertron until the Quintession came."

"Traitor Starscream? It was a good idea to get rid of my former Decepticons. It also seems like you had many chances to kill Optimus or claim Cybertron, why didn't you? You did say he went missing."

"He was chasing the Allspark! I couldn't rule Cybertron with an easy processor until he was at my mercy!"

"So what's the true reason you spare his life that day?" The other Megatron said with a smile that said he already knew the answer.

Why didn't he kill him? Megatron didn't think about it much until he was asked. They had been through so much already at that point, Megatron truly subconsciously thought Optimus would come back, listen to him, understand his viewpoints, and rule Cybertron together because he missed him that much.

Megatron looked stern as he said, "Gladiator's honour."

The other one burst out laughing, knowing that the failed version of himself was trying too hard to stay in denial. His laugh echoed all around his throne room. "Hilarious. You're still pathetically in love with Optimus Prime!"  Suddenly all drones began laughing along too, although their voices were emotionless.

Megatron looked to the side in embarrassed disgust to the other one. He wasn't sure what he was disgusted with, the alternate version of himself or that Megatron wanted to or rather used to dream of an empire like this.

"He was our friend and trusted advisor." He tried to defend himself further.

"And look how that turned out. You're always running away with your excuses and weakness for the Prime. Sure, I used to have something back then before I killed him, but Optimus is only just a pretty face who was just too sensitive. The librarian should have stuck to his datapads, I couldn't stand to hear his voice complain to me every day." 

Megatron felt insulted for Optimus, he was more than just a pretty face. 

"Besides, you could have tossed away your idiotic romantic attraction and have the perfect Decepticon army but you settled for less."

Optimus was humble, hard-working, sweet, and a great enough leader to have held the Autobots forces together. Megatron was baffled on how could he not know this.

"Don't you respect Optimus combat tactics and strategy?! Our gladiator honour is-"

"-I know. But that is in the past, now that's not how life outside the arena works. It means nothing to me if I won in the end."

"You have no shame!"

"Says the mech who still makes excuses and is quite deeply attached to Optimus prime. We stopped following gladiator honour many long cycles ago."

Megatron didn't know what to say that couldn't be rebutted. Is this what he would become if he hadn't made an excuse to shoot Optimus that day or any other days where he could end his life? He felt truly disturbed as he realized that the dreams of his empire was a rather lonely one, a dream that could never be sated in its hunger for complete domination.

He needed to get back to his universe as quickly as possible. He knew Optimus, no matter what would eventually make a truce despite his recent abandonment, in which he now felt guilty.

He was going to make it all up for him someday.

"Even now, I still love Optimus after all these cycles," Megatron said what The other one wanted to hear. Strangely enough, Megatron felt stress inside his spark lighten up.

The other Megatron started chuckling, and the drones started their waves of laughter again.

"The only reason why your pathetic self hasn't won. If it's so difficult for you, let me rule your universe and I'll offline Optimus for you-"

Megatron's clenched servos swung and landed on the other one's face with a satisfying clunk noise. The drone's laughter stopped, Megatron hit hard enough to knock out the other one to fall flat on the ground. His servo recoiled in a dull pain from how hard he struck. Megatron looked around at the drones around him, all silent and awaiting their next command. His optics then focused back to his other self on the ground.

"Living isolated in this echo chamber, you are truly the most pathetic one." 

He had no time to waste, he ripped open his alternate self spark chamber and took the matrix of leadership.

____

Megatron got out of his hospital berth, cracked every joint that felt off, and checked his internal chronometer for how many cycles have since passed. Only a month, not too bad. His frame has been restored completely, although he wished they left his broken optic alone, he liked how he looked with it.

After rolling his shoulder once more, the door slide open to reveal Ratchet holding a datapad, Ratchet looked up from the datapad and had a brief moment of surprise before saying,
 "You're awake."

"Yes I am, where's Optimus? Stargazing again? Or bird-watching? I need to talk to him."

"He's reconstructing your side of Cybertron. I told him it was a waste of time since you weren't there to complain whether he did a non-accurate job knowing how Kaon structures looked like."

Megatron smiled slightly.
"Interesting."

Megatron took the crystal flower from the nightstand and began to walk out of the room before  Ratchet interrupted with, "I haven't done your check-up yet."

"Not important." Megatron quickly dismissed Ratchet and pushed him aside.

Ratchet was about to say something but Megatron wasn't his worry now, so he sighed and grumbled to himself, "I'll just send a message to Optimus instead."

____

A month was quite enough for Decepticon-Autobot relations to ease. Megatron kept count on every Decepticons he encountered on the Autobot side. The Decepticons did a double-take and stood in fear when they saw that Megatron was fully functional, walking to his part of Cybertron.

After the incident with alternate universe Megatron, the Decepticons often broke the rule of them not being allowed into Autobot territory. Since no one was enforcing that rule, every Autobots and Decepticons often went on friendly outings together.

Optimus held up a pillar and struggled to push part of the structure up, he thought it would be easier since there wasn't a long line of Autobots asking him about problems they were fully capable of solving. He thought the Decepticons would ignore him as he was trying to rebuild the Decepticons home.

They did leave him alone at first but it all started when Deadend walked up to him and asked Optimus a simple question, "How do you feel about a Decepticon dating an Autobot?"

Optimus thought about Megatron for a second before answering with, "I support it, why do you ask?"

"Just wondering how your side would react."

"I'm sure they are fine with it, who are you with?"

"I haven't asked Perceptor out yet. Not sure how it'll turn out since I basically abandoned him back then."

"Well Perceptor talks about you often, he holds no ill will against you."

"He doesn't? What did he say about me?"

"He said he finds you particularly relaxing to be around. I think you should confess and talk to him about this more,  but I'm not an expert at these kinds of advice. "

Deadend thought about it for a few conflicted seconds and gave a quick "Thanks." before transforming and driving off. 
 
If Optimus looked up at that moment he would have seen Laserbeak flying around and recording their conversation. Soundwave liked to spread gossip around and it sure travelled quickly.

Instead of a long line up to ask questions, the Decepticons swarmed around and bombarded him asking for advice on relationships as Optimus was holding up a pillar that could crush everyone around him if he wasn't being careful. He wondered why none of the Decepticons cared about their safety. 

"Does Hot Rod enjoy human EDM music or does he prefer rock? I'm making a mixtape."

"What kind of shooting range would Arcee enjoy the most? Which location would scream romantic?"

"I wrote a haiku to Jetfire and I need you to beta read this for me, since you were a librarian before or so I've heard."

"If I shot a mech like around twelve thousand times before but we ended up working together really well one time, is it okay to start flirting?"

So many questions flung around a busy Optimus at the same time and he didn't know which to answer first. He also had to deal with the pillar as well too. The voices soon started arguing with each other on why their questions were more important. 

"DECEPTICONS!" a familiar voice boomed out, silencing everyone and making their heads turn to Megatron in surprise. Optimus nearly lost his grip on the pillar in surprise but quickly caught it.

"You are able to solve your own problems. You are dismissed." Megatron spoke with a stern tone.

All the Decepticons walked away disappointed. 

"Sky-Byte, you can send the haiku to me to check later."

Except one.

Megatron walked up to a somewhat tense Optimus. Optimus didn't know what Megatron was going to say since he broke the rule even though he was rebuilding Megatron's territory. They both stared at each other in a tense moment before Megatron started speaking

"Optimus, it been a while since we last talked to each other, hasn't it?" 

"Is...there anything you require from me Megatron-" Optimus optics travelled down to Megatron servo which held a crystal blue flower.

Megatron took notice of how Optimus voice suddenly cut off and then stumbled slightly as he nervously spoke the words, "That wasn't me."

A slight smile rose on Megatron's face as he teased, "I didn't ask you if you gave this to me, but now I know for sure it was you, Optimus."

The nervousness Optimus felt turned to heavy blushing that was a very visible colour. His mask instinctively went up and suddenly he was losing grip on the pillar, but before the heavy pillar could do any harm an alarmed Megatron quickly helped and they both finally pushed up the pillar together in its place.

Optimus breathed a sigh of relief since the heaviness was starting to make his backache. He was tired physically and mentally.

"I wonder how you managed to rebuild most of the city," Megatron asked since it seemed like Optimus was the only Cybertronian working on this reconstruction project. 

Optimus fell to the floor sitting, exhausted from carrying around large construction supplies.
"With patience. Also, I am in charge of the groundworks of these things, your Decepticons are building the rest. I apologize that I broke part of our agreement that-"

"I believe you have already made up for it with your almost accurate recreation of parts of Kaon. Besides, it looks like my Decepticons have broken the rules too."

Optimus optics widened with worry,
"Almost accurate? I swore I studied and memorized kaon's architecture datapads many times, did I do something wrong?" 

"The graffiti, although that part is none of your responsibility." Megatron joked and laughed as Optimus breathed a sigh of relief.

Megatron was finished with his teasing and finally got on to what he planned to do when he got rid of the other Megatron. 

Optimus noticed the seriousness that came from the look in Megatron optics and started listening accordingly. He would be lying if he said he wasn't nervous, Optimus didn't know what Megatron was going to say. 

"So, Optimus. Does any of this is supposed to mean anything? The flower? Reconstruction of Kaon in my territory?"

Even though Optimus Prime mask was covering his blushing face, there was a clear inner confliction in his optics struggling on what would be the right thing to speak.

"I...missed-" Optimus spoke so quietly that Megatron almost didn't hear. "I didn't know when you were going to wake up...I needed some way to pay you back since you nearly died." 

"Optimus, I think this thing we are both trying to say is difficult," Megatron said, he noticed that Optimus is also one with excuses to say before getting to the point.

"...I travelled to many different dimensions and one made me realize how arrogant I was, it made me realize that I can't imagine- no, I can't live my life without you. I made so many excuses for you to be here and I didn't know why."

Megatron met Optimus optics with sincerity.

"Now there are no more excuses and I have to confront the truth. I came here today to ask you one thing. Despite everything, do you want...what we had millions of cycles ago? before the war?"

"...It's all because I still love you Optimus, I really do." Megatron finally said.

Optimus retreated his mask, fully revealing his blushing face. "I still love you too Megatron. I have always loved you somewhere deep down in my spark all those time, I'm...grateful I can finally communicate those feelings. " 

He hugged Megatron, in which Megatron hugged back tighter. They looked at each other for a moment and Megatron placed the crystal flower on Optimus helm before sealing the start of their new relationship with a simple kiss. 

Suddenly sounds of cheering put their attention away from each other and they saw the crowds of Autobots and Decepticons shouting out their support, standing away at a fair reasonable distance in case Megatron start blasting them out of embarrassment.

If both of them were to look up, Lazerbeak was still recording this whole time.

Optimus instinctively brought up his mask, then covered his optics with his servos, and buried his face in Megatron's shoulder. He could see the smoke coming out of Optimus smokestacks.

To everyone surprise, they were not blasted, but Megatron took one of Optimus servo on his face and then raised it to the air and shouted, "To our newly created alliance that will last forever!"

Everyone cheered louder, friends were giving each other high fives, and lovers were holding each other servos.

Megatron whispered to Optimus, "let's go somewhere more private." Since Optimus was getting uncomfortable with the sudden crowds and was starting to question if he had to also create an improv speech, and so Megatron led Optimus away, holding his servo tight. He hopes that from now on, there will only be happier times as his spark felt content and satisfied that he will continue spending his days ruling Cybertron with Optimus.  

Chapter Text

"I still can't believe you never played any attention to any of gladiator matches." Megatron said to Optimus, trying to dismantle the barrier wall.

"Megatron, that was a long time ago."
Optimus brushed off and continued unplugging wires.

"I gave you front row seats and you couldn't remember how giant Devastator was?!"

"I...was focused on another thing."

"I assume that it was a datapad, what story could have immersed you away from all the action?!"

Optimus finally took down the barrier between both of their territories which disappeared in a blink. He stood up and faced Megatron.

"Back then, I could only ever concentrate on you in all of your fights, I never learn any of your opponent's designations. Do you think I could have said that in front of Cheetor and you at that time?"

Megatron, now realizing that all of his matches had always had Optimus full attention on him that was so intense he couldn't process anything else that happened, made Megatron blush with flattery and a smirk on his face.

Megatron mumbled something out, with that goofy smile he had but Optimus couldn't hear. 

"Pardon?" He asked.

"All those times in archives, when I asked you to explain something was only because I loved hearing the sound of your voice. Never remembered what you said"

"O-oh."