Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Existence was loud. Existence was loud and chaotic and frightening, existence was short and abrupt, being told that he was too dangerous to keep around for longer than he was needed.

But how was he supposed to be any other way? All he’d known was violence and chaos since the first time he was called together. He was aware that he wasn’t always him, that sometimes he was just components, and he lingered in the back of each of their minds, a fractured existence that he never quite understood.

He was there, and then he wasn’t. Then he was trapped in a frame too small with one of his components as they slept it was too quiet in that recharging mind, he screamed and he begged and then the owner of that frame would wake up and he would lose time again, suddenly becoming aware orns later with fear coursing through his lines and the directive to go, go, go, go, fight, kill, rip them apart and - he was gone again.

He screamed, without words. He didn't know if anyone could hear him.

He was so miserable. He was so afraid.

He didn’t want to be torn apart again.

Menasor was a product of war, and when the war ended, he wasn’t needed anymore. The Stunticons were well aware of this, and frankly, they didn’t care. Being Menasor wasn’t fun. Though they were unaware of what he did — outside of occasional chaotic recharge fluxes — they always came back to themselves exhausted and sore. Breakdown felt more nervous for some time after, Wildrider was spotted staring off at nothing with greater frequency. The effects of Menasor traveled through their fuel lines, and none of them liked it.

Some gestalt teams chose to live their peacetime existences semi-permanently combined. The Stunticons were informed shortly after that they were not allowed this option, and that Menasor would only be called on in the most dire of circumstances. That was fine too. Hell, Motormaster told Lord Megatron that he’d be fine if they were never called upon to combine again, none of them would be mad about it. Breakdown enthusiastically nodded from behind him.

And that was that.

“I h-hear him in my recharge sometimes, you know,” Breakdown muttered into his mug of energon.

Motormaster paused, brow knitting as he turned away from the counter. “Who?”

“Menasor,” The nervous stunticon mumbled, shrinking in on himself.

“Hmm. Your processor must be finally dealing with what he did during the war,” Motormaster replied, shrugging a shoulder as he picked up his datapad again.

“No, Motormaster, h-he talks to me. He’s begging to be let out.”

Motormaster turned fully this time, scowling.

“Breakdown…” He paused, visibly running through his anger reduction exercises as his scowl softened. “Look,” He said with a sigh, walking over and clapping his gestalt-mate on the shoulder. “I don’t think you’re actually talking to Menasor. He can’t exist without us being combined. I think your processor is just working through some slag. That’s what Rong said, right? You’d be experiencing some weird slag before you got better.”

“It’s Rung,” Breakdown murmured absentmindedly. “Yeah...I s-suppose.” He didn’t look convinced, and Motormaster gave his shoulder one last pat before moving away.

“Don’t worry, blue. I’m sure it’ll be okay.”

“You ever feel like someone’s watchin’ you from the inside?” Wildrider asked, kicking his peds against the beam he and Drag Strip were sitting on.

“Huh?” Drag Strip scoffed, elbowing his gestaltmate in the side. “The pit does that even mean?”

“Y’know, like, someone else is watchin’ you from inside you and they ain't happy? That’s how I feel, y’know. He comments on slag sometimes.”

“‘Rider, you feel, like, a lot of things other people don’t. Have you been skipping your lessons with Rung?”

“It ain’t lessons, numbskull,” Wildrider elbowed Drag Strip back. “It’s therapy. Yeah, I’m goin’. That’s why I’m sayin’ somethin’ like this, he says uh, if I need help tellin’ reality apart or whatever I can always ask one of you what’s actually goin’ on. So, you ever feel like that?”

“Nope,” Drag Strip shook his head. “Never. It’s okay, ‘Rider.” He leaned over, helm resting on Wildrider’s shoulder. “It’s just us right now. I promise.”

Wildrider nodded. Despite his flippant exterior, the tension he’d been holding in his frame slowly leaked out and he relaxed against Drag Strip, looking out over the city.

“Thanks, Strip.”

“I really t-think Menasor is angry with us,” Breakdown murmured, running the polishing cloth across Dead End’s shoulder-plates. “Because we haven’t let him out in vorns.”

“Breakdown,” Dead End intoned, peering out of the corners of his optics. “I’m not trying to say you’re wrong, but have you even had any recharge fluxes about him since that one time?”

“No,” Breakdown muttered, slumping forward. “I haven’t. But that doesn’t m-mean he’s gone.”

“He might not be,” Dead End said with a nod, facing forward again. “But that doesn’t mean it’s your fault.”

“No,” Breakdown muttered again, covering his face with one hand. “But I f-feel so bad. Imagine being trapped in...wherever they go when we aren’t combined. It’s probably h-horrible. Imagine if he can see us, imagine if he’s w-watching us and h-he’s angry, and-”

Dead End rotated Breakdown around, wrapping his arms around the other mech.

“It’s okay,” He murmured, running his servo over his gestaltmate’s helm. “It’s okay. Do you want me to call Rung?”

Breakdown nodded against his chest.

Chapter Text

Life went on and Cybertron rebuilt, Kaon turning from a run-down collection of old factories and arenas to a fully livable city-state, a place without classes or castes to hold anyone back. Metatron's dream, finally realized.

Motormaster had even gotten a job at a café of all places, serving dainty little energon mixes. It was still surreal to him, to be such a large mech with a history of anger problems now working in one of the most breakable-item-filled shops in new Kaon.

But he liked it. He liked talking with the people who came in, and he liked it even more when he got to bring home extra energon and metal treats to his gestaltmates. Though his impulsivity and anger had been very much corralled, he was still terrible at picking the right words, and even worse at expressing his affection. When he brought items home from work every day, the others understood all the things he was never able to say aloud.

He entered their housing block with a box in servo and a shine in his optics. They’d made some new iron-ore gels today, and he was eager to see what the others thought of them. But as soon as he saw the other members of his gestalt clustered around a datapad and Breakdown shivering in Dead End’s hold, his mood immediately fell.

“What?” He asked, nudging the door closed and setting the box up on the counter. “What is it?”

“Luna II is under attack,” Dead End intoned. “The Velorans overwhelmed the defense force, and Lord Megatron and Optimus Prime are calling upon combiner teams. They already dismantled Bruticus and forced the combaticons into stasis. They want Superion, Devastator, and Menasor.”

Motormaster sighed, shaking his helm.

“Of course they do,” he muttered, squeezing his fists tight for just a moment before letting go. “Well, we can’t let Megatron down,” he replied, gesturing to the box. He was the team leader. The others counted on him, and he would put on a comfortable face for them, even though he, too, was rather upset about this news. Menasor didn’t bother him anymore. He knew, however, how much of a setback this would cause for certain other teammates. “Eat some energon gels, and get a full night’s recharge - y’know, you can all pile in my berth if you want. We’ll ship out tomorrow.”

The rest of his team murmured various words of assent,  dispersing into their hab suite. Only once they were out of the room did Motormaster allow himself to slump against the table, grinding his dentae together as he tried to hold back that tense feeling of anger, to not let it take over him again. 

“It’s going to be fine,” He murmured to himself. “Hold it together.”

Straightening, Motormaster busied himself. He cleaned the kitchen. He filed reports long overdue. He organized his musical data-stick collection. He organized Dead End’s paints. He organized Breakdown’s crystal flowers, he picked Drag Strip’s datapads off the floor, he put Wildrider’s mail in a stack of boxes outside his berthroom door.

Then Dead End came in, pressing a hand against Motormaster’s arm.

“You can’t tell us to recharge and not go yourself,” He spoke, his monotone coming out slightly judgmental.

“I have to keep busy,” Motormaster replied, resting a hand over Dead End’s. “If I think about this too hard, I’m not going to react well.”

“Recharge will help,” Dead End insisted. “The others are waiting for us.”

“When did you become the voice of reason?” Motormaster said with a half-smirk.

“A few vorns ago,” Dead End replied, but his lips twitched in a slight smile. “Come on, boss.”

Motormaster gave in, heading towards his bedroom. He had the largest berth, he was always the one that the others came to when they had troubles in the night. It had been a while since the entire team was there, though. Three pairs of optics glowed up at him from the already-darkened room as he entered, Dead End behind him.

“You really did wait, huh,” He grunted, settling down on the berth. “Come on then,” He added, gesturing for the others to come along.

It only took a moment for him to be practically covered in his gestaltmates, Breakdown and Dead End tucked against one side, Drag Strip sprawled across his legs, and Wildrider flat on his front on his opposite side.

“Try not to worry too much,” Motormaster spoke up softly. “I mean it. We’re going to be alright, because we have each other.”

And sometimes these days, he actually believed it.

The dawn of the new light cycle brought with it nothing but a sense of dread falling over the Stunticons’ hab block. Motormaster was up first, as he often was, though he cared little to prepare much for the day. The thought of being called away to form Menasor made it all too easy for him to fall back into old habits of lethargy and uncaring. He was going to be stuck with those idiots all day, what would make him want to spend any time with them in the morning?

He kicked those thoughts away as best as he could, setting out four cubes of energon as he usually would before taking his own and stepping outside. It was still dim and he turned to look up in the direction of Luna II.

He couldn’t see the attack from here, but he knew they were out there. No new messages had come in through the night, the datapad still sitting on the counter, silent ever since the original summons had come through.

He sighed, leaning back against the wall outside their hab block and extracting a cy-gar from his subspace to put between his lips.

“We’re going to die up there, aren’t we,” Dead End’s monotone came from somewhere by his left, and Motormaster just barely held back from twitching in surprise. “Left to rust on an old moon.”

“We’re not going to die,” Motormaster rumbled in response, rolling his optics before he looked down to meet Dead Ends’ visored gaze. “The other combiners will be there. We’re going to kick alien tail, and be back home by evening.”

“Or the aliens will overwhelm us and we’ll fall to pieces.”

“Dead End,” Motormaster grumbled, putting a large hand atop the speedster’s helm. “I understand you can’t help it, but I can’t offer you anything right now. I need you to keep those thoughts to yourself.”

“Very well,” Dead End replied with a sigh, gazing up at Motormaster with a surprisingly knowing look. “I didn’t wake the others up. But it’ll be soon,” he added. “Unless they send us another message and tell us to stay home.”

“That’s not going to happen. Go get the others, End. Make sure they drink their energon.”

“Very well,” The other stunticon responded, and Motormaster waited for the sound of the door closing behind him to let out a heavy vent, his shoulders slumping.

He wasn’t so certain that things would be alright. 

Chapter Text

Hey all, just wanted to post a quick update.

I wasn't feeling quite right about the way I'd written some of the stunticons here, so I'm going to be archiving this version of the story, and rewriting it. I still care about this storyline, but I wasn't pleased with the way I depicted some of the Stunticons, since I was rushing through setup to arrive at the Menasor part, which I shouldn't have done.

Please do expect a new fic to be going up at some point with the rewritten version! Thanks to anybody who subbed.