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Chapter Text

The message had been sent from Shockwave’s tower, but it was Chromia who appeared on-screen. Her optics were bright with panic and behind her, a battle raged. But the fight wasn’t Autobot against Decepticon. It was Cybertronians against…

“Quintessons,” breathed Chromia before a bright beam of light hit her in the back. She gasped in pain and slumped forward. A moment later, the feed gave a static-filled hiss and cut out.

Prime had replayed the short message at least five times already but had yet to display any sort of reaction whatsoever. Ironhide had left the room on the third play-through.

“It appears that this message was sent to both the Ark and the Victory simultaneously,” said Red Alert. Countless hardline cables trailed from Teletraan-1’s systems to various parts of his frame. He could scarcely move without the risk of knocking one of them loose. Usually, Red Alert only interfaced with the ship’s computer in this way if he suspected a cassette was hiding in the vents, but this particular case was an exception. “The signature shows that either Chromia hacked the transmitter, or Shockwave gave her his personal access codes.”

“Both equally unlikely,” murmured Prowl as he flexed his servos on the armrests of his seat, clearly distraught at the sheer quantity of improbable events featured in a message three klicks long. “I believe this is a trap. It could only be a Decepticon plot. The Quintessons have not been seen since the days of Nova Prime.”

Jazz stabbed a digit at the corner of the screen. “Th’ frag does that look like to you, Prowler?”

“It looks like Elita wielding Shockwave in alt-mode,” said Prowl, his vocalizer strengthening alongside his grip. “And she may or may not be firing at something with tentacles. But the quality of this footage is very poor. It could have been manipulated.”

“Red Alert?” asked Prime.

“No signs of manipulation,” Red Alert confirmed after a moment, letting the glyphs tangle and merge with his processor. If the footage had been tampered with it would have been easy to tell—altered lines would leap out at him naturally. But the code was short and simple, as it should have been.

The sudden ping of an incoming message nearly jolted Red Alert from his connection. The Victory was requesting to connect and Red Alert felt the early ticks of a glitch coming on. Forcing down his automatic instinct to panic he reasoned that it was just a request for visual communication, something the Autobots received regularly.

Red Alert quietly withdrew from his immersion and began retracting the cables. “Incoming transmission from the Victory, sir,” he reported as the last of the hardlines coiled back into his frame. “Shall I…?”

“Answer it,” nodded Prime.

Red Alert leaned around him to press a button on the control panel and a moment later Megatron’s face appeared onscreen. His lip plates were set in a deep frown.

"Did you...?" both leaders began at the same time before lapsing into silence. Nobody seemed willing to continue. After a moment Optimus finally cleared his vocalizer.

“Did you just receive a transmission from Cybertron?”

“We did,” said Megatron with a quick nod. “I have tried to contact Shockwave, but it appears the tower has been deserted. I am assembling a team to investigate.”

Prime’s optics dimmed and gave the empty space just above the control panel a hard stare, betraying the fact that he was not entirely sure how to approach this situation. “May I suggest we unite our forces for the purpose of this investigation?”

By the way the gunmetal mech shifted uncomfortably on his pedes it was clear this was the reason Megatron had called in the first place, but the warlord did a remarkable job feigning indifference. “If you wish to send some soldiers, it makes no difference to me,” he replied with disinterest. “If Quintessons are waiting for us, perhaps you will make a good body shield.”

Teletraan’s screen finally flickered off, but the tension in the room did no such thing.

Prowl was quiet for a moment, then turned to Prime and said, “I would have advised against this, had you asked.”

“I know that,” said Prime. “But do we have a choice?”

Chapter Text

The team that departed for the spacebridge two cycles later was quite large. News of a potential Quintesson attack had spread like wildfire through the Ark and there had been no shortage of volunteers despite the fact that Prowl had stated again and again that there was no guarantee that the whole thing wasn’t a hoax.

The group had been delayed somewhat when Red Alert and Inferno had a screaming match over whether Inferno would go to Cybertron and try to find out what had happened to the femmes or stay with Red Alert to watch over the Ark. Inferno was clearly anxious for news of his sister, Firestar, and eager to sink his servos into a few Quintessons. Eventually, it was decided that Inferno would join the force on Cybertron while Prowl and Jazz remained behind.

Since then, it was difficult to find a willing mech to go to the security room.

Silverbolt, for his part, was still very unclear on what a Quintesson even was. Some mechs were claiming they had five faces, but honestly, that just sounded ridiculous. Others said they were green and partially organic with wriggly tentacles and Prowl mentioned that they floated on beams of energy. None of the descriptions really added up to anything he could visualize.

Nevertheless, excitement and euphoria flooded the gestalt link, and Silverbolt found it was contagious. He knew his brothers were looking forward to seeing Cybertron again, this time hopefully without any time-travel antics (that had been a very strange day). They were also eager for the opportunity to shoot at new enemies and gawk at Decepticon seekers, or, more likely, both at the same time.

[COULD THEY DRIVE ANY SLOWER?] Slingshot moaned over the gestalt comm line, casting a mournful optic down to the Autobots on the ground as they headed to the space bridge. The Aerialbot team was under strict orders to fly slowly enough for the ground-frames to keep up and while a hundred miles per hour was fast for a Cybertronian ground-frame, the Aerialbots might as well have been in recharge.

Apparently the Autobots had once had a transport-class shuttleformer, but he was gone now. Silverbolt personally felt that if there was ever a time to justify the resources to bring Omega Supreme online, this was it. But he’d said nothing, because who could honestly be expected to listen to a soldier barely even two stellar cycles online?

[I think I see it! We’re almost there!] cried Air Raid, doing a joyful aileron roll. And indeed, the purple metal ring of the space bridge was now just appearing on Silverbolt’s radar. [Finally! Let’s beat up some…uh…Kui…Kess…Qwatz…?]

[Quintessons,] said Silverbolt.

[Yeah!]

The Aerialbots landed and transformed, keeping to the back of the group as Prime approached Megatron. Both leaders were tense, and Silverbolt got the feeling that they’d rather be punching each other in the faceplates than negotiating a peaceful expedition.

Silverbolt risked a glance at the seekers. There was the Elite trine, and the Conehead trine as well. They looked bored, as seekers always did when there wasn’t a battle going on. Who else had the Decepticons brought? He looked around and immediately picked out the Combaticons and Constructicons. Astrotrain and Blitzwing were busy punching each other. No Soundwave, though. Well, it made sense that Megatron would want to leave someone loyal watching the base. The little part of Superion that never really went away noted with some disappointment that the Stunticons weren’t there either.

[All his most loyal troops stayed home,] said Skydive. [Do you think he’s hoping the un-loyal ones will get killed?]

[Primus, that’s creepy,] said Silverbolt. From the corner of his optic, he noticed that Fireflight was beginning to wander away from the group, so he reached out and caught his brother by the arm. Fireflight made a soft little sound of surprise as he was dragged back to the others. Satisfied for the time being, Silverbolt turned his attention back to Prime and Megatron.

“Anything could be on the other side of this bridge right now,” Prime was saying. “We need to be prepared for the worst. There could be an entire army of Quintessons waiting to open fire on us. I need volunteers—”

There was no shortage of raised servos before Prime even finished his sentence. Silverbolt grabbed Air Raid’s arm and forced it back down with a sharp look.

[What part of ‘an entire army of Quintessons waiting to open fire on us’ did you not understand, Air Raid?] asked Silverbolt.

[I thought it sounded fun,] muttered Air Raid, but he kept his servo down when Silverbolt finally let him go.

In the end, the first team consisted of Megatron, Prime, and as many front-line warriors from both factions that could fit inside the bridge. If there were indeed Quintessons waiting to attack, the mechs with the largest and strongest frames would stand the best chance against them. Aerial frames were lighter, and could not sustain the same degree as damage as the ground troops. The medics—Ratchet, First Aid, and the Constructicons—were also left behind.

Silverbolt knew that his brothers were pleased to be left behind if it meant they got to ogle the seekers. The Aerialbots worshipped the ground that the Decepticon seekers metaphorically walked on, war or not. Also, the young combiner team still had traces of their sparkling programming in their systems. This made it difficult for the team to view the seekers as anything other than parental figures.

“Hey. Hey TC. Hey, do you dare me to eat this sand?” asked Skywarp.

“No, Skywarp, I do not,” said Thundercracker.

The Aerialbots had been brought online in pre-built adult frames, but new sparks wrote their own programming. Wheeljack and Ratchet had deleted most of it, but some of it could not be touched, only allowed to slowly deactivate over time.

“I dare you to eat this sand,” said Skywarp, holding a servo just under his wingmate’s olfactory sensor.

The sparkling coding was annoying, but Silverbolt hardly noticed it most of the time. Maybe it was just wishful thinking, but it seemed to be getting weaker by the day.

“Does anyone dare me to eat this sand?” asked the third most powerful seeker in the Decepticon Empire with a distinct pleading note in his tone. The coneheads at least had the sense to look embarrassed.

“Skywarp,” said Starscream, not looking up from the space bridge controls, “I was unaware that you wanted me to tear out your vocalizer.”

“You’re a glitch.” Skywarp came around to look over Starscream’s shoulder-vent. “Did they get there okay?”

“It appears that they did, though I’m still awaiting verbal confirmation—”

“Can I press this button? This red one?”

The slap wasn’t particularly powerful, but it was enough to make Skywarp teleport back to Thundercracker’s side. Silverbolt looked at Ratchet for help, but the older mech was staring resolutely at the sky, as if it could grant him the patience he was seeking.

“They’re clear,” announced Starscream at last. “The base is apparently deserted. Our orders are to join the search.”

It was a little cramped inside the bridge, and Silverbolt was afraid that they might not all fit. There had been more mechs in the first wave of warriors, but they hadn’t had to worry about the careful geometry of wings.

The jolt of the space bridge journey was unpleasant, and Silverbolt was afraid he might purge. But the knowledge that he’d never be able to look any of the Decepticon aerials in the faceplates ever again if he did helped him keep his ration down.

Leg-struts still shaky, Silverbolt let the group half-push him out to the receiving area of Shockwave’s tower. He looked around, but saw nothing that indicated a battle had taken place.

Megatron and Prime were at a console, arguing over security footage, while other mechs wandered around looking puzzled about the lack of anything to punch.

“Someone’s standing on my pede,” complained Fireflight.

“Oh, sorry, kid,” mumbled Dirge.

[No bodies,] said Slingshot. [I was expecting bodies.]

Silverbolt gave his brother a nasty look. But he had to admit, Slingshot had a point. If Shockwave and Elita’s teams had been massacred, as the message had led everyone to believe, their frames should be somewhere nearby.

The soldiers were quickly divided into groups and given the order not to split up further. As always, the Aerialbots were told to stick together, and Silverbolt was happy for it. Sometimes constantly being assigned to the same tasks could be tiresome. But here and now, in the icy silence of Shockwave’s base, he wanted nothing more than to be surrounded on all sides by his brothers.

The seekers were given the far more desirable task of doing an aerial sweep of the city. This was, in the Aerialbots’ opinions, terrifically unfair. There was no small amount of muttering about the injustices of the universe as the team made their way down the eerily silent purple halls. Occasionally, they passed another group but there was little conversation. It seemed irreverent in the face of whatever had just happened.

After two uneventful breems, Silverbolt was about to suggest they go back to the atrium that held the space bridge and see if anyone had found anything interesting when a new mech came stumbling down the hallway towards them.

The mech was a seeker, but not one that Silverbolt was familiar with. He had a strange, monochrome blue paintjob marred by battle damage. He stared at the Aerialbots with a sort of forlorn acceptance, his optics thick with static and shoulders slumped.

“We found someone!” yelled Silverbolt, turning back to see if there was anyone else around. “Hey! Anyone! We found—”

The seeker stumbled forward, and Air Raid and Slingshot rushed forward to catch him. He mumbled something.

“What?” asked Slingshot, leaning in closer.

“Lancer,” said the blue seeker, weakly raising one hand to indicate the next room. “In there. Hurt worse than me.”

“Okay,” said Silverbolt. “We’ll find him. Don’t worry. It’s gonna be alright.” He realized he was using the same tone he used to talk to hurt or scared humans. But this was a Decepticon seeker, not a terrified organic. “What’s your designation?”

“Tempest. Rainmaker third.” He lifted his helm a little to look at the sigil branded onto Silverbolt’s chassis. “Wait…you’re Autobots? But you’re aerials.”

“Don’t worry about that,” said Silverbolt. “We’re here to help.”

“No. I’ve heard…of you. You’re the sparklings.” Tempest let his helm fall back and gave a soft laugh. “This is embarrassing.”

Silverbolt could tell that Slingshot was going to object to this, so he spoke before his brother could.

“Both armies are here,” said Silverbolt. “They’ve called a truce until we figure out what happened.”

“The Quintessons outnumbered us fifty to one, that’s what happened.” Tempest cast a wary optic around the room, as if expecting another attack.

“Okay,” said Silverbolt. “Skydive, ’flight, go find the other guy. Don’t move him if he’s hurt too bad. I’m gonna comm Ratchet.”

Tempest’s optics flared with unmistakable fear, but he said nothing. Silverbolt belatedly remembered the reputation his co-creator had with the Decepticons. Personally, Silverbolt felt that it was completely unwarranted but Ratchet didn’t exactly do anything to discourage the rumors either.

Ratchet arrived quickly with the entire Constructicon team. Silverbolt quickly explained that there was someone else in the next room. A moment later, Long Haul emerged carrying someone in his arms as Skydive and Fireflight trailed after him, looking uncertain. It took Silverbolt a moment to realize that the Constructicon was holding an orange Autobot femme, rather than another Decepticon seeker. But Tempest’s faceplates relaxed at the sight.

“You hid together?” asked Silverbolt.

“We were the only ones left,” said Tempest. “Lancer?”

Silverbolt had thought the femme was in stasis lock. But she made the softest noise at the sound of her designation and turned her helm to look at Tempest.

“Still alive,” she rasped.

“Put her down before you do even more damage!” yelled Ratchet. Long Haul looked like he wanted to retort, but he didn’t. Lancer was set down on the ground carefully, and Ratchet set to work.

“…Firestar and Greenlight should be safe, unless the Quintessons found our base,” mumbled Lancer, barely loud enough for Silverbolt’s audials to pick up. “They stayed behind with the…”

“Don’t worry about that,” said Ratchet firmly. “Why don’t you put yourself in stasis while I make these repairs?”

Lancer looked concerned. “You won’t hurt him, will you?”

“Hurt who? Nobody’s hurting anyone,” said Ratchet. “You mean the seeker?” He glanced over at Tempest, who was being scanned by Hook. “He’ll be fine.”

Prime, Ironhide, and Megatron arrived quickly at the news that survivors had been located. Lancer tried to give a feeble salute and failed miserably.

“What happened?” asked Prime.

“We were raiding Shockwave’s energon stores, but he caught us,” said Lancer, wincing in pain. “The plan was to fight our way out. We’ve done it before. But…suddenly…there were three sides of the battle, instead of two. Shockwave started yelling for his soldiers to attack the Quints instead. Elita asked what he thought he was doing. He said,” Lancer paused to regain her energy. “He said that if we lost to him, we'd be dead. But if we lost to the Quintessons, we’d be worse than dead.”

“Do you know what he meant by that?” asked Prime.

“No. No, sir. But there was something about the way he said it that made me believe he was telling the truth. Then he told 'Mia to go to the console, send out a distress call. He gave her his clearance and everything.”

Megatron made a distinctly displeased sound at this, and Silverbolt had to stop himself from taking a few rapid steps in the opposite direction. Lancer, fortunately, did not appear to register the warlord’s reaction.

“Do you remember anything else?” asked Prime.

Lancer shook her helm helplessly. “I’m sorry, sir. When I came back online, everyone was gone. Except Tempest.” She turned her him in the direction of the blue rainmaker, as if to assure herself that he was still there.

“Alright, that’s enough,” soothed Ratchet. “You did very well. Now power down.”

Lancer hesitated, but after a moment her frame went limp.

“What does this mean?” asked Ironhide.

“I don’t know,” admitted Prime. “Though I would be interested to see what information Shockwave might have had.”

“I will have Soundwave scan the database,” said Megatron, turning away. “If any of your mechs attempt to access my files, this truce will come to a rapid end.”

“What should we do?” Silverbolt asked, his optics turning to Prime.

“Nothing yet,” said Prime. “Go back to the atrium and wait. If we need you again, you’ll be commed.”

[This is lame,] grumbled Slingshot as they made their way back. [We found two survivors—which is two more than anyone else found—and they still tell us to go away.]

[We didn’t really find them. We just got lucky,] said Skydive reasonably.

[Yeah, but if we hadn’t been here, maybe nobody would have found them. Ever.]

Silverbolt was about to say that he found this highly unlikely. But he was cut off by the harsh, grating wail of an alarm system activating.

“What’s going on?” yelled Fireflight, slamming his hands over his audials. Silverbolt resisted the urge to do the same.

[I think we’re being attacked,] said Silverbolt, switching over to comms for the sake of being understood. [Come on, stick with me.]

They ran the last few thousand meters to the atrium. All around them, mechs were preparing for a battle. Silverbolt looked over at the security consoles. The screens were displaying footage from outside the tower. Something was approaching, fast, though it was too far away for Silverbolt to say what exactly it was. The radar was picking up multiple life-signs, though. He leaned in for a closer look at the screen.

Unknown Lifesigns Detected: 50
Analysis: Techno-organic, unknown

From the next room, Megatron was bellowing out orders, his Kaonite accent becoming more pronounced with every klick that passed. Someone grabbed Silverbolt by the arm. He looked down and saw Starscream.

“What’s going on?” yelled Silverbolt over the din.

Starscream shouted something up at Silverbolt, but it wasn’t in Standard Iaconian, or even English. The language—whatever it was—was gorgeous and melodic and sort of reminded Silverbolt of the language that Prowl sometimes used when he was particularly angry with the twins.

It also sounded important.

“What?” said Silverbolt, not moving.

Starscream repeated the statement. Then, before Silverbolt could respond, he released his arm and vanished into the growing crowd of mechs.

“Okay,” said Silverbolt. “Um. Great.”

“What should we do?” asked Fireflight.

“Who cares? I say we get out there and join the fight!” cried Air Raid.

“Yeah, no,” said Silverbolt. “Skydive?” He could always count on Skydive to come up with a decent idea.

“Perhaps he wanted us to combine?” suggested Skydive.

“Okay, yeah, maybe,” said Silverbolt. “That makes sense. Maybe it’ll scare them off.”

“Well, we can’t combine in here,” said Air Raid impatiently. “Come on, we’re wasting time!”

Outside, the Decepticon seekers were positively obliterating the opposition. And…Primus, surely the Elite trine had never used that formation before, had they? And had they always been so fast? No. Definitely not. Because if they had, the Aerialbots would have been dead before their first birthday.

“Uh, Bolt?” said Skydive. “Uh, they’re…”

“Yes,” said Silverbolt, unable to tear his optics away.

“They’re good!” cried Air Raid. “Like, they’ve always been good, but they’re good-er! Is it because we’re on Cybertron? Is it the atmosphere?”

“No,” said Skydive in the shocked tone of one who has just realized something life-changing. “It’s because they’re not fighting us.”

“You’re saying they’ve been going easy on us?” said Slingshot in alarm. “Being nice?”

“Yes,” said Silverbolt.

“Displaying unprecedented levels of nice,” said Skydive.

“I got that, yeah,” said Silverbolt.

“Like how sometimes Prowl lets Bluestreak win at Gridzones,” continued Skydive.

“Skydive?” said Silverbolt.

“Yes?”

“Please shut up.”

Skydive went mercifully silent. Silverbolt was aware that his brothers were all staring at him, waiting for the order.

“Alright,” said Silverbolt, forcing himself to put aside his mortally wounded pride for the time being, “Aerialbots, combine!”

Combining, unlike flying or fighting, came naturally to the Aerialbots. The leviathan mind of Superion was never far away, even when the team was separated. If Silverbolt had been asked to describe it, he would say that combining was like reaching into subspace. Which technically it was—all the extra bits of Superion that didn’t fit on their frames were stored away there until they were needed, like his helm and his servos and his mind.

Silverbolt gave in to the merge. He could feel his brothers easily, five and one and lost and found. They spoke as one, thought as one. There were no secrets here. Fears and insecurities were laid out for all to see. He could see his brother’s memories from the last few solar cycles as clearly as he could see his own. It wasn’t embarrassing, though, as it would have been for other mechs. It was just another aspect of existence.

Superion was confused. He saw Decepticons, but the five sparks that made up his consciousness were insisting that the seekers weren’t the enemy today. Superion had none of the admiration for the seekers that his components did, and so this was an entirely novel experience for him.

But confusion quickly turned to irritation when Superion realized he had no idea what to do. And an irritated combiner was an incredibly dangerous thing. Fortunately, tragedy was averted when Superion caught sight of the tiny green things on the ground, with their tiny weapons. Enemy! Yes! Not-Decepticons, but yes-enemies! He began to lumber towards the fray. Small and green was the enemy. Superion would smash it.

An enraged shriek came over the general comms, followed by a few lines in that beautiful but meaningless language. Superion ignored the noise. Noise was not important. Important was destroying not-Decepticon enemies and protecting the humans.

Superion hadn’t seen any humans, but that just meant he had to destroy twice as many not-Decepticons, now didn’t it?

More yelling in music-song-speak, and the Decepticon jets all scattered. Superion hardly noticed. The green things were shooting at him. Every time a hit landed, it made Superion’s armor feel strange and tingly and numb. But it didn’t hurt, and it didn’t pierce his armor. Curious, Superion bent down and picked up one of the green things. He held it up to optic level.

So this was a Quintesson. It had only one face, with tiny dark eyes and a long mouth. Its body was curiously cylindrical, and it had thick ropes of tentacles where limbs ought to be. This specific creature had apparently replaced a set of tentacle-arms with a strange weapon.

The Quintesson raised the aforementioned weapon and shot Superion between the optics. Superion opened his servo in shock, and the Quintesson warrior went tumbling to the distant ground. Once he’d recovered from the pain, Superion looked down. The Quintesson was now in four different pieces. And his companions were backing away quickly, wary of meeting the same end.

Superion’s servo shot out to grab another Quintesson, but the soldiers didn’t appear to be particularly brave. When they fled, Superion did not give chase.

Now that the threat was gone, Silverbolt felt himself return. His brothers were waking up as well. Simultaneously, they all released the link. Superion folded back into subspace as the five separated again.

Silverbolt took a moment to re-orient himself. The tiny splattered Quintesson was now a life-sized splattered Quintesson. He felt his tanks roll at the sight.

“My armor feels weird,” complained Fireflight, poking at a spot on his arm. “It feels…like it’s not there. Does that make sense?”

“No, I feel it too,” said Slingshot. “It’s here and there. In spots.”

Silverbolt looked at his brothers. Their plating was a little dented and scuffed from the battle, but he could see no serious injuries on them. He shook of the last of his revulsion for the sake of checking his own frame. Non-critical warnings were flashing in his HUD, things like “systems error, rebooting sensor net” and “error: unable to view hardware.” Silverbolt had never seen anything like it in his entire existence.

Sudden sharp pain bit through the tip of Silverbolt’s wing. He cried out in confusion and turned his helm to see an enraged seeker glaring up at him.

“Ow, ow, ow!” yelled Silverbolt as the claws dug into his wing. “Let me go!”

“Shut up,” snapped Starscream. He started moving quickly, and Silverbolt had to run to keep up for fear that his wing would be torn right off. His only comfort was that his brothers were close behind, yelling protests.

Silverbolt stumbled over his own pedes and almost fell more than once. But after a while, he found a sort of rhythm. To keep from having to look any amused onlookers in the faceplates, he locked his optics on the red stripes across Starscream’s wings. They had a thin, graceful pattern etched into them. It was, Silverbolt realized, the Cybertronian symbol for fire. He hadn’t recognized it at first because it was completely different from how the humans drew flames.

Suddenly, they came to a halt. Silverbolt looked up and realized that he’d been dragged before Prime and Megatron. They both looked equally shocked.

“Starscream, what is this?” asked Prime.

“This—this—sparkling sent his team blundering into the middle of my battlefield, after I specifically ordered him to stay back! We’re lucky someone wasn’t deactivated! I want an explanation!”

Prime looked down at Silverbolt. “Is this true?”

“I…I…guess…?” said Silverbolt. “But we—”

“You see? You see? These five have no business anywhere near a battle!”

“But—”

“Silverbolt,” said Prime, and the disappointment in his tone was physically painful to hear, “I understand that you’re used to giving the orders from your team. But when a more experienced—”

“—when a more experienced aerial gives you an order, you follow it!” finished Starscream.

“—especially if you’re in a combat situation,” said Prime.

“I know, but—”

“And when a superior officer is speaking, you do not interrupt!”

“Oh, that’s funny coming from you!” yelled Air Raid, shoving himself in front of Silverbolt protectively. Someone burst out laughing. Silverbolt turned his helm to see who it was. Skywarp, of course. Where had he even come from?

“Bitlet’s got you there, Screamer,” said the seeker.

“You shut up!” Starscream yelled to his wingmate. Then he turned back to Silverbolt. “Would you like to explain why you and your team disobeyed my commands?”

“Because…” Silverbolt’s vents were stuttering with fear, “because we can’t speak Vosian!”

The silence went on for far too long before Skywarp finally broke it with a ridiculous laugh.

Starscream just stared at the young combiner team, too enraged for words. Then he threw his arms in the air, turned around, and walked out of the room.

“Uh, are we in trouble?” asked Air Raid.

Chapter Text

Nobody went back to Earth that night. And honestly, Starscream didn’t bother troubling himself with the details of where the Autobots would all be recharging. They could power down on the floor for all he cared.

Starscream was pleased to find that the large suite that had belonged to him (and his wingmates) before they’d left for earth was relatively untouched. Clearly cleaning drones had come through regularly, but otherwise there were no signs that anyone had been inside.

There wasn’t anything particularly useful hidden away anywhere, as Starscream was not stupid enough to leave incriminating evidence behind on a base where Shockwave was in charge. But he was pleased to find that his collection of datapads was completely intact. Some of the texts were scientific, but most weren’t. There were also histories, military strategies, and even some classic Cybertronian literature.

He wondered if he should loan some of them to the Aerialbots because Primus knew they weren’t getting a proper education from the Autobots. His servo rested on a classic Iaconian drama that everyone had been forced to read in school. He had two copies, after all.

Well, he’d wait and see. There was no sense in rushing these things.

More Cybertronians had come through the space bridge shortly after the battle. The entire Autobot science team—or what was left of it—had arrived and immediately taken over Shockwave’s labs. Starscream allowed himself a little smirk at the thought of how Shockwave would react if he could see it. The Constructicons had brought in the remains of the shattered Quintesson and now the Autobots were dissecting it, relearning everything their race had worked so hard to forget.

Right about now, the Autobots were probably regretting the way they’d chased off the only xenobiologist in their miserable faction. The realization brought him no small amount of toxic delight. Starscream considered going down to the labs and making everyone uncomfortable, but eventually decided against it. If they wanted his help—and they inevitably would, how could they not?—they would have to ask him for it. Politely.

Starscream looked down at his servos. They were clenched so tightly that he was getting minor damage warnings. To distract himself, he began reorganizing the datapads.

“Hey! What are you doing in there?” called Skywarp, banging on the door that separated Starscream’s room from their common area. “Guess what? I found high-grade under the berth! Wanna see if it’s still good to drink?”

“Frag off!”

The door slid open and Skywarp poked his helm inside. “Why is your room so slagging big? It’s twice the size of ours. I forgot Megs used to actually like you.”

“Shut up.”

“What’s your malfunction?” demanded Skywarp, throwing himself down on Starscream’s berth. “Are you still mad at the babies? Because don’t be. They’re babies.”

“I’ve been thinking about that,” rumbled Thundercracker, following his wingmate in with absolutely no regard for the fact that he was desecrating Starscream’s quarters with his presence. “We’re going to have problems if they can’t understand orders. Should we give them language packs?”

“That probably won’t be necessary,” said Starscream, shoving Skywarp off the berth and onto the floor. “They won’t see another battle. I’ll let them fly patrols if they behave, but I don’t want them getting in the way of another fight.”

“Are you afraid that if they can understand us, they’ll understand us?” asked Skywarp.

Starscream looked at Thundercracker expectantly.

“If the Aerialbots learn Vosian from us now, they’ll still understand it after the truce ends,” translated Thundercracker. “There’s a chance that could work to our disadvantage in future battles.”

“’S what I said,” grumbled Skywarp as he pushed himself off the ground.

“If the Aerialbots express an interest in learning, I won’t deny them,” said Starscream slowly. “I’d rather them learn from us than Prowl. But I doubt they will ask.”

“This could be our chance, though,” said Thundercracker. “You know the Autobots will get sick of them in a few stellar cycles. Why not speed up the process? If we show them that they’re missing out on an entire culture—”

“Because that’s not the plan, Thundercracker!” he snapped. “We need them to come to the realization that they are not wanted on their own, or they’ll never trust us!”

“At what price?” retorted Thundercracker, frowning deeply. “What if the grounders destroy them first? Teach them to hate themselves, like they tried to do to all the war-builds during the Golden Age?”

“We survived it, didn’t we?”

“Because we had communities! We had cities and stories and languages and history. We knew who we were. They don’t. They have nothing!”

“It will make them stronger,” Starscream said dismissively. “Besides, they have each other.”

Thundercracker said something in reply, but Starscream ignored it in favor of a comm from Soundwave. The communications officer had arrived almost immediately after the battle (along with the remainder of the Autobot high command), and had quickly sent to work scouring Shockwave’s extensive database for any references to Quintessons. His cassettes were also running around, chasing each other and rediscovering old hiding spots and just generally getting underneath everyone’s pedes.

[Starscream: Report to conference room Beta immediately,] Soundwave's monotonous vocalizer was even worse over comm. lines.

“We need to go,” said Starscream. Technically the summons had been for him alone, but he wanted someone watching his wings in this base full of jittery Autobots. “They’ve called some sort of meeting. We’ll finish talking about this later.”

When the three arrived at the conference room about half a breem later, the Autobot Prowl was setting up some sort of presentation. Starscream slumped into a chair next to Megatron before carefully arranging a bored look on his faceplates. Prime and Ironhide sat across from them. Starscream didn’t mind this too much—Ironhide might have been a violent ground-kissing maniac, but he was always up for a face-making contest behind Prime and Megatron’s backs whenever the speeches dragged on for too long.

“Soundwave has provided us with the security footage from the attack,” said Prowl. “He’s not here right now because he did not wish to leave his work. But I’ve reviewed the feed, and I think you will all find this interesting.”

The security footage began playing on the viewscreen. The timestamp at the bottom was from about half a joor ago. It was rather low-quality, with snowy grains flicking across the image, and there was no sound, but it was easy enough to tell what was going on.

The frames of both factions’ soldiers were splayed out across the floor, and Starscream might have taken them for permanently deactivated if not for the bright colors still that marked them as alive. Green warrior Quintessons began collecting up the offlined mechs and femmes, carrying one Cybertronian between a pair. Then someone unfamiliar entered the camera’s line of vision.

This new Quintesson was twice the size of the warriors, and it had an unusual egg-shaped body. It held itself up on some sort of energy beam, and used tentacles to gesture for emphasis. As it spoke, its body spun, revealing a second face, and then a third.

Starscream felt a strange chill touch his spark chamber at the sight. Some ancient fear, inherited from ancestors long forgotten, was stirring. He could tell he wasn’t the only one affected. Behind him, he felt Skywarp tense. Ironhide rested one servo on his weapon, as if he thought the image might attack them, and even Prime was visibly uneasy.

The Quintesson’s face shifted twice more, revealing five faces in total. Starscream risked a glance at Megatron, who was now giving the footage the sort of glare he usually reserved for Starscream himself.

“I do not believe that Elita and Shockwave’s teams are dead,” said Prowl. “The Quintessons wanted them for something—though we cannot yet say what. And they may not be the only ones missing. Prime, we have yet to hear a response from Cosmos, which is very unlike him. I am afraid we must assume the worst.”

Cosmos was one of the minibots, if Starscream was remembering correctly. Minibots had small sparks, but they made up for their size with their fierce attitudes and highly diverse frame-types. They were usually grounders, but every so often you’d find one capable of flight. They were a bit of a medical mystery even now: nobody knew what subtle influence caused a mini-spark to write flight coding into its protoform.

“The Quintessons have probably been targeting lone Cybertronians for a while now,” continued Prowl. “Now they have turned their attention to larger groups. I believe it would be in our best interests to—Starscream? Your servo is raised. Did you…did you want to say something?”

“How did the Quintessons overpower both teams?” asked Starscream. “From what we saw today, they are not formidable warriors. And yet they managed to overpower every mech and femme in this base.”

“We’re not sure yet,” admitted Prowl. “We believe it may have something to do with the weapons they’re using. If we go back to the battle…” Here, the footage jumped to an earlier spot. Instead of unconscious Cybertronians, now the screen showed a battle. One of the femmes that Starscream did not recognize was directly in the foreground. Then something hit her in the chestplates, and she fell to the ground as if permanently deactivated.

“You see? She went down in one shot,” said Prowl. “And we can see more examples of this elsewhere. If I go back to—”

Starscream got up.

“Where do you think you’re going?” asked Megatron.

“I have an idea,” said Starscream, and he rushed out of the room without another word. Just before he was out of earshot, he heard Megatron assuring everyone that this was actually normal behavior.

Starscream burst into Shockwave’s lab a few klicks later. Four shocked Autobots raised their helms from their Quintesson test subject to stare at him. They all appeared to be at a loss for words. Starscream took advantage of this to do a quick sweep of the medbay. But the thing he was searching for was clearly not there.

“Constructicons?” Starscream asked at last.

“Uh. Medbay,” said Wheeljack, a slightly nervous edge to his voice.

Starscream gave him the slightest nod of acknowledgement before shutting the door again. It was a short trip to the medbay—it was located only a few rooms down from the labs for horrible Shockwave-related reasons. When he went in, he saw Tempest and Orange Female Autobot on medical berths, being attended to by Ratchet.

“What do you want, Starscream?” asked Ratchet gruffly.

“Scrapper!” yelled Starscream, ignoring the Autobot. “Get out here!”

“Whaddaya want, Screamer?” the Constructicon leader yelled back. Starscream pushed past Ratchet and went into the back. The Constructicons did not appear to be working very hard on anything in particular, but they all smartened up when they saw him.

“When you brought that Quintesson in, did he have a weapon?” asked Starscream, deciding to ignore their dereliction of duty for the time being.

The Constructicons appeared to have a rapid conversation over their private comms.

“Yeah, we think he did,” said Scrapper at last. “Why?”

“I need it. Where is it?”

Nobody said anything.

“Please don’t tell me you scrapped it,” said Starscream.

All the Constructicons looked distinctly uncomfortable—save for Scavenger, who suddenly brightened up.

“I got it here!” he said, unsubspacing a strange silver weapon with a long barrel. “See? I saved it!”

Starscream snatched it from his servos. “I’m glad to see your disturbing habits have finally come in handy,” he said.

“Hey, if you want to keep that, you owe me!” said Scavenger.

“Yeah, don’t push your luck,” muttered Starscream, running his digits over what he thought might be the controls.

“You done? You wanna get lost now?” asked Hook pointedly.

Starscream ignored the insult and left the medbay, more focused on the alien weapon in his servos than where he was going. He was therefore taken completely by surprise when Silverbolt accosted him in the hallway.

“St—er…Commander? Can I ask you about something?”

Starscream glanced down, and then up. The young aerial was holding his wings low, and his optics betrayed anxiety.

“Not now,” said Starscream absently. He was already trying to remember what supplies he had in his quarters, and what would have to be borrowed from Shockwave.

“Only I was looking at the duty rosters,” said Silverbolt, “and we…that is, my team…we were wondering why we haven’t been given any shifts?”

Starscream got the impression that Silverbolt wasn’t going to leave him alone if he didn’t get an answer, so he ripped his gaze away from the weapon and looked up at the leader of the Aerialbots.

“I don’t have the time to train your team,” said Starscream. “Currently, the five of you are more of a liability than an asset. I don’t want you endangering my soldiers. Besides, you are too young to be fighting.”

“What? That’s not fair!” said Silverbolt hotly. “We’re soldiers too!”

“You are not even one vorn old,” said Starscream. “This is not open for discussion.”

“The Stunticons are allowed to fight!”

“The Stunticons, fortunately, are not under my command,” retorted Starscream.

“But we need to fly!” The panic in Silverbolt’s voice caught Starscream off-guard.

“So fly,” said Starscream, wondering why on Cybertron this was an issue. “Primus knows you could use the practice. We’re done here. And try to stay out of my way, or I’ll do everything in my power to see that you are sent back to Earth.”

Silverbolt gaped at him, but Starscream ignored him. Perhaps if he had less pressing things to deal with, he would be interested in getting to know the combiner team. But right now, he was overcome with the familiar excitement of starting a new project.

“Hey! There you are,” said Skywarp as Starscream made his way across the atrium. “Where’d you run away to? The Autobots got all insulted. What’s that? What’ve you got? Is that a weapon? Where’d you get it? Can I try it out?”

“No!” said Starscream, turning his frame away from Skywarp protectively. “Go bother someone else. I need to work.”

“Knock it off, Warp,” said Thundercracker heavily.

The brewing fight was cut short by the arrival of some Autobots. A team had been sent out to search for the femmes who hadn’t been taken by the Quintessons. From the happy shouts and loud conversations, Starscream could tell that the mission had been a success.

Inferno was at the head of the group, and just behind him were two femmes. One had a red paint job, while the other was light green. But that what made Starscream’s systems freeze up.

Balanced on the red femme’s hips were two sparklings: a green one with the heavy frame of a triple-changer, and a much smaller femme. They looked like they were almost fifty thousand vorns old—larger than a cassette, but still small enough to be carried, and not far away from their adult upgrades.

“—visit her in the medbay,” the green femme was saying to Inferno. Beside her, holding her servo, was a third sparkling. He was red, with ridiculously tiny yellow wing-spoilers. But when he spotted the seekers, he immediately released his guardian’s servo and ran forward to inspect the unfamiliar mechs.

“Hot Rod, no—!” cried the red femme, genuine fear flashing in her optics. Starscream thought she might start screaming.

Starscream tilted his helm and looked down at the sparkling, aware that both femmes were prepared to spring at him. The little grounder giggled and raised his arms, indicating that he wanted to be picked up.

“Are they real?” asked Skywarp, awestruck.

“No, Skywarp, they’re imaginary,” said Starscream. Hot Rod (who was apparently fearless) tried to climb up Thundercracker’s leg-strut. Thundercracker carefully pried him off and set him back down on the ground, even helpfully turning the sparkling around so that he was facing the femmes. Hot Rod ran back to them, laughing about his adventure.

Starscream was a bit offended by the way the two femmes nearly collapsed with relief when Hot Rod returned unscathed, but he supposed they couldn’t help it. A femme had guardian programming like a seeker. The name of their frame-type was even a reference to the Quintesson gender associated with child-rearing, though anatomically they were no different from any other Cybertronian. The seekers were their war-build equivalent.

And that, unfortunately, was where Starscream’s knowledge of Quintesson culture ended. As he forced himself to ignore the femmes and their sparkling charges, he wondered if every frame-type had a little bit of Quintesson knowledge. If they put their information together, maybe they could come up with something useful.

Starscream’s optics went back to the femme sparkling, who was starting to fall into recharge against the red femme’s chassis. She was bright pink, a chilling and morbid color by anyone's standards. The fact that she'd been given those colors long before her first battle could only mean one thing. The little sparkling had been brought online with what was known colloquially as Sanguinary programming. The medical term was "Deep Combat Protocols," and it was caused by a spark mutation that uploaded powerful battle coding to the protoform.

Sanguinary programming had been seen as nothing but a curse in the days before the war. Once a Sanguinary mech or femme started fighting, it was difficult to stop. The programming did not automatically shut down after a battle; instead all the processes associated with it had to be forcibly ended. For most Sanguinaries, there was no compromise or strategy or retreat. There was only the slaughter. Elita-1 was famous for the way she had managed to overcome most of the darker aspects of her programming, but she was still a powerful warrior respected by both factions. If anything, her impressive self-control made her all the more fearsome.

Perhaps the little thing was lucky that she'd come online in the midst of an endless war. She'd be valued, at least. And when she was old enough to fight she would rise through the ranks quickly, there was no question about that. Even now, she was covered in the dents and scratches that were to be expected from a child with no pain receptors.

If she survived to adulthood, she would be a problem.

And two Sanguinaries in one base? That was quite a coincidence, wasn't it? Was it possible they'd found a way to induce the mutation? It seemed unlikely. He could not imagine the Autobots doing such a thing to one of their own offspring, especially when they were so rare.

That raised the more important question of where the three had come from. Who were their creators? Were they alive or dead? And which side of the war had they been on? He studied each of the sparklings for some sort of hint, looking for anything familiar in their frames.

Initiating Guardian Protocols.

Frag no! Starscream keyed in the medical hack that would keep the protocols dormant. He felt his systems protest, but he deleted all the warnings with gritted dentae. He’d endured cassettes and Aerialbots and Stunticons—this would be no different.

“Let’s go,” he said to his wingmates once he was certain the protocols had been sufficiently beaten down. “I have work to do, and we all have patrols in the morning.”

The walk back to their quarters was silent. Starscream was aware that his wingmates were still thinking about the sparklings, but he trusted them to keep their programming under control. Thundercracker and Skywarp could be idiotic and incompetent, but they would never compromise their status just to play with some babies that weren’t even from the right faction.

Back in his room, Starscream set the Quintesson weapon down on his workbench. He had no lab of his own in this base, but he had set up a sort of mini-lab in one corner for private projects. To be honest, he hadn’t really worked on many things before they’d left Cybertron. He’d occasionally play around with a design for a weapon, but his focus had usually been on planning and leading large-scale battles.

Skywarp was right, for once. This room really was ridiculously large (though not larger than Starscream deserved). After being crammed onto the Victory, it was a little unnerving. Starscream began taking out the tools he’d stored away. It was probably a bad idea to start working when he really needed to recharge, but his curiosity was just too powerful to overcome. He had to at least scan the weapon.

“Are you worried?” asked Skywarp from behind him. For some reason, he and Thundercracker had followed Starscream into his room and were hovering over his wings.

“Get out of here. Worried about what?” said Starscream without turning around.

“About what Prowl said. How the Quints were probably picking off anyone who was flying through space alone.”

Starscream’s servo froze halfway to a bolt remover. He’d been too busy thinking about the Quintesson weapons and the way Chromia had fallen forward onto the control panel after being hit in the back. He hadn’t even considered the deeper implication of Prowl’s words.

How could he have been so stupid?

“Diiiiiid I say the wrong thing?” asked Skywarp, edging backwards. “Only…I know that sometimes…sometimes you…”

Starscream kept his optics locked on his certainly-not-trembling servos. “Sometimes I what, Skywarp?”

“…Nothing,” mumbled Skywarp.

“You can tell us the truth,” said Thundercracker. “I know…I know we never talked about it. I know we don’t really talk about a lot of stuff. But—”

“I’m not worried,” spat Starscream. “I don’t care. Now both of you get out!”

Surprisingly, his wingmates left without a fight. And if at any point during the recharge cycle they heard quiet sobs coming from the opposite room, they never mentioned it.

Chapter Text

“It’s not like the human languages,” reported Skydive. “We can’t just install some programs and be able to speak it fluently. Prowl says Cybertronian languages are too complex.”

“Lame. Not doing it,” said Slingshot immediately.

“What are we talking about?” asked Silverbolt as he entered the too-small room that the Aerialbots had claimed for themselves.

“Prowl said he could get me some Vosian language introductory datapads, if I was serious about learning,” said Skydive, trying to get comfortable on the berth he was sharing with Slingshot. “Oh! He also said that the reason the Decepticon aerials all talk in Vosian during battles is because it’s got words for flying that don’t exist in other languages. It’s easier to give commands because the language is more precise.”

“Shut up, ‘dive, nobody cares about that,” sniped Slingshot. “Bolt, what did Starscream say?”

Silverbolt felt his wings droop. “Sorry guys. He said no patrols or duty shifts or anything for us.”

“What?” The dismay in Fireflight's tone was palpable.

“But…but we need to fly!” protested Air Raid.

“That’s the weird part,” said Silverbolt. “He said we’re allowed to fly.”

“You just said he said we can’t do patrols,” Slingshot said accusingly.

“He did! And then I said exactly what Air Raid just said, I said, ‘but we need to fly’, and he said, ‘so fly!’ like it was the most obvious thing in the world and then he ran away!”

The Aerialbots all swapped confused looks.

“I don’t get it,” said Slingshot at last.

“Yeah, I don’t either,” grumbled Silverbolt, sitting down on his berth. There were only three berths in the room, but he got his own since he was the largest of the five. “Maybe I’ll ask one of the other seekers. They sent Windsong’s trine over with Soundwave. They’d tell us.”

Windsong, Bladewing, and Moonrise were the three newest seeker cadets on Earth. They were young, not more than one hundred thousand vorns old, and had not yet earned their brands. They wore Decepticon insignias, but that was just purple paint. When they proved their worth in battle, then the marks would be seared onto their wings. This, according to them, was something to look forward to.

Silverbolt and his brothers were grateful that the Rite of the Autobrand did not really take place anymore. Unless a soldier specifically requested it, of course. Oh they’d all taken the oath: they’d read the words and said their names in the place where the script said (insert name here) and when Prime asked if they swore to uphold the Autobot code they’d said yes. But there had been no hot irons involved. The Aerialbots wouldn’t have agreed to it if there had been.

Anyway, Windsong’s trine were sort of idiots, but they were friendly enough when the commanders weren’t watching and never shot at the Aerialbots if they happened to pass each other on patrols. And Primus, could they fight! Even Moonrise (who was gorgeous enough to cause traffic collisions but, Primus bless, dimmer than the surface of Cybertron) had sent Sideswipe off the battlefield in three pieces after the Autobot made a grab at his wings. They fought like they’d been protoformed doing it.

So why couldn’t the Aerialbots do the same? Frametype wasn’t really important when you got down to it. Aerial sparks were all the same. Only a trained medic could tell the difference between a seeker spark versus a transport spark versus…whatever it was the Aerialbots were.

Come to think of it, what were the Aerialbots?

Silverbolt forced the thought out of his processor. That wasn’t the point.

“We should recharge,” said Silverbolt heavily. “Tomorrow’s going to be…”

His brothers all looked at him expectantly.

“…something,” said Silverbolt. “I don’t know, I’ll figure it out. Try not to worry. And if any Quintessons attack in the night, Superion has permission to eat them, no matter what Starscream says.”

But there was no nocturnal Quintessons attack, for better or for worse. And when Silverbolt came back online two joors later, he stared up at the purple ceiling and had just enough time to wonder where the frag he was when Skydive took a running leap landed on his chassis.

“Guess what?” Skydive yelled in his face as Silverbolt’s vents stuttered and heaved. “Inferno came back with the femmes who didn’t get taken away by the Quintessons! And guess what they had with them?”

“Huh?” asked Silverbolt.

“Sparklings! Real ones! There’s one, Springer, who’s gonna be a triple-changer when he gets his upgrade, you can tell. And there’s a femme, her name’s Arcee, and they painted her the same creepy pink color as Elita, and I don’t remember what the third one was called.”

“Oh,” said Silverbolt. “Uh. Okay.” It took a klick before his processor caught up with Skydive’s words. “Wait, what?”

“They’re bigger than a cassette, but smaller than a minibot and Firestar said we can play with them!”

Silverbolt considered this as he sat up and shook himself online. Slingshot, Fireflight and Air Raid were already regarding Skydive with some curiosity. And Silverbolt had to admit that he was pretty eager to meet the newest arrivals. However, being seen playing with a trio of sparklings probably wouldn’t be good for the team’s reputation.

“Everyone’s gone to look,” said Skydive, sensing his brother’s hesitation. “Even Soundwave stopped in.”

Soundwave? Well, then, it was probably fine for them, wasn’t it? If Soundwave saw no shame in playing with sparklings, surely the Aerialbots had nothing to fear?

“Okay, fine,” conceded Silverbolt. “But let’s not stay long.”

“Yeah, gotta hurry back here so we can sit around and do nothing,” said Slingshot darkly. Silverbolt opted to ignore this and turned back to Skydive, motioning for him to lead the way.

According to Skydive, the Autobots had turned one of the empty berthrooms into a sort of nursery. When they arrived, they found Bluestreak and Trailbreaker on the floor, letting the sparklings climb all over their frames while Firestar and Sideswipe watched.

“Does this count as your duty shift?” Silverbolt asked Bluestreak.

“No,” said Bluestreak gloomily. “I just wanted to come by and say hi before I had to leave, I’m going to be part of the team that’s going out today to search for any more Quintessons because Soundwave thinks they might have a base in the city somewhere and—”

“Got it,” said Silverbolt. “What about you, Trailbreaker?”

“Yep!” said Trailbreaker brightly. “We had to have a lottery. Me and Mirage won first shift, except he traded with Sideswipe here. Dunno why. Mirage is crazy.”

“My shift with the sparklings wasn’t until tomorrow. Fourth shift,” said Sideswipe. “I was supposed to be with Hound.”

“Ah, and suddenly it all makes sense,” said Trailbreaker.

“Did any Decepticons put their names in?” asked Skydive.

“None of them have been able to work up the nerve to ask,” said Firestar primly. “Trailbreaker and Sideswipe, I’m going to leave now. But I may come back. And if I do, I don’t want to hear any uncouth language or see any roughhousing. Understood?”

Both mechs nodded solemnly.

“I should go too,” said Bluestreak reluctantly, pulling Arcee off his doorwings. “Have fun, guys.”

“So, nobody’s worried about the Decepticons knowing we have sparklings?” asked Silverbolt. “I thought they’d want to keep it a secret.”

“They’re almost fifty thousand vorns,” said Sideswipe. “Due for their first adult upgrades any day. So it doesn’t exactly matter anymore.”

“Sort of strange, isn’t it?” asked Skydive, who’d taken Bluestreak’s spot on the floor. “They’re much older than us, and they're not even fully upgraded.”

“They're technically more qualified to fight than us, then,” said Slingshot.

Hot Rod chose that moment to run full-tilt into a wall. He looked shocked to find himself on the floor, but after thinking it over for a minute, burst out laughing.

“Don’t think about it that way,” consoled Trailbreaker. “The femmes had millions of years to raise the sparklings because they didn’t need more soldiers in a hurry. And these little guys use less energy than fully-grown mechs. But we needed you—and we needed Superion—right away. Vector Sigma gave you to us for a reason.”

Silverbolt knew that what he was saying made sense, but it didn’t actually make him feel any better. His brothers seemed to be having fun, though, so he left them in the nursery and went to explore the base some more.

Idleness was an alien concept to Silverbolt. Not having a duty shift, whether it was patrols or monitor duty or just playing with the humans, was sort of unnerving. He kept waiting for someone to stop him and ask why he wasn’t at his post. But of course nobody did. He supposed everyone was too busy worrying about the Quintessons.

Silverbolt eventually found his way to a large, open room that looked like it was meant for some sort of military training. Two seekers—Windsong and a red-and-orange seeker that he didn’t recognize—were sparring in the center of the room. A few mechs watched them from a safe distance, including Moonrise and Bladewing.

Windsong, Moonrise and Bladewing didn’t have F-15 altmodes. Instead, they’d scanned Russian Sukhoi Su-34’s, which were heavier and had larger wingspans. It actually made them look rather intimidating, which was probably their intention. The Aerialbots had been surprised to learn that not all seekers were F-15’s.

Bladewing spotted Silverbolt, and waved him over.

“What’s going on?” asked Silverbolt.

“Windsong challenged Firestorm,” explained Bladewing, nodding at the fight. Both seekers were too wrapped up in their match to realize that they were being discussed.

“He’s not going to win,” said Moonrise cheerfully.

“Yeah, he’s not,” agreed Bladewing.

“You guys could show a little faith in your leader,” said Silverbolt. He couldn’t imagine how devastated he would be if he found out that the other Aerialbots spoke about him that way behind his back.

“I have faith that he’s gonna get his aft handed to him,” said Bladewing. “Oh. Look, I was right. GET OFF THE GROUND YOU STUPID FRAGGER!”

Moonrise burst into infectious giggles.

“And if he wins, your trine outranks Firestorm’s, right?” asked Silverbolt. He wasn’t sure where he’d picked this information up, but it sounded right. It felt right.

“If he wins, we all get in trouble because we’re not supposed to challenge non-cadet trines. It messes up the hierarchy,” said Bladewing. “Maybe after this, I’ll challenge Windsong and take over the wing so he can't embarrass us anymore.”

“It looks painful,” said Silverbolt, watching as Firestorm delivered a particularly fearsome blow to Windsong’s jaw. “Air Raid would love it.”

“This is nothing,” said Bladewing. “This is just sparring. You’ve never seen a proper challenge, have you? Starscream and Ramjet tear each other to shreds every few stellar cycles.”

“It hurts to watch,” contributed Moonrise.

“And they fight on the ground?” Silverbolt asked.

“Not always. You can take it to the air if you want to. There’s no rule. Everyone prefers to fight in the air, of course, but there can be advantages…” Bladewing suddenly flinched. “Okay, I think it’s time to go rescue dumbaft. Or else Firestorm will keep hitting him in the face and he’ll be even uglier.”

Silverbolt watched the two seekers push their way between Firestorm and the fallen Windsong. Firestorm seemed to accept his victory with grace, and retreated back to his own trine. Moonrise and Bladewing helped their leader up, slinging his arms over each of their shoulders. They didn’t appear to be embarrassed or angry about the loss as they carried him back to Silverbolt.

“Heyyyy,” said Windsong, catching sight of Silverbolt and giving him an energon-splattered wave. “Wasn’t expecting to see you here. Where’s your team? Sleeping in?”

“Do you need a medic?” worried Silverbolt.

“I’m fine, I’m fine,” slurred Windsong, waving a hand. Moonrise began to rub a cleaning cloth across his bloody faceplates. “Hey, nice job yesterday. The commander screamed at you, didn’t he? That makes you guys official Decepticons.”

“If everyone Starscream ever yelled at became a Decepticon, the war would be over,” said Silverbolt solemnly, which prompted another melodious laugh from Moonrise. “Actually, I have a question. My team hasn’t been approved for any patrol flights. And I asked Starscream, and he basically told me to get lost. But we need to fly.”

All three seekers looked up at him in confusion. Eventually:

“I don’t get it,” said Moonrise with a faint whine in his voice.

“Yeah, that wasn’t a question,” said Bladewing.

“I mean, how are we supposed to fly when we won’t be given any patrols?” pressed Silverbolt.

Windsong wiped the last of the energon away and subspaced the dirty rag. He still looked confused.

“Are you saying your team isn’t allowed to fly on your off-shifts?” demanded Bladewing at last.

“Uh…” Silverbolt had never thought about it that way. “Maybe? I mean. It sounds bad when you say it like that.”

Moonrise chirred something. Silverbolt had no idea what he was saying, but it sounded pitying.

“Slagging Autobots,” said Bladewing with a hint of malice, but this didn’t appear to be directed at Silverbolt. “Should’ve guessed. Okay. You know what? Wait right here.”

“Did I do something wrong?” worried Silverbolt.

“Of course not,” said Moonrise, putting one golden hand on Silverbolt’s shoulder, which caused Silverbolt’s processor to go oddly fuzzy.

Bladewing returned very quickly, and to Silverbolt’s horror, he had Skywarp and Thundercracker with him. The two older seekers looked up at Silverbolt expectantly. They were taller than Starscream, but still not taller than Silverbolt. No seeker was taller than Silverbolt.

“Tell them what you told me, just now,” instructed Bladewing.

“It’s not a big deal…” said Silverbolt weakly.

“I’ll be the judge of that, I think,” said Thundercracker.

Bitterly regretting that he’d ever raised the subject, Silverbolt said, “Starscream’s refused to give us any patrol shifts. But my team needs to fly. So…I just wanted to know how we could get permission for that.”

“You see?” yelled Bladewing, morally outraged. “The ’bots keep them grounded unless they’re patrolling or fighting!”

Skywarp frowned, but Thundercracker did not react. He seemed to be studying Silverbolt’s faceplates. “Is this true, Silverbolt?”

“It’s not like that,” said Silverbolt desperately. “We’re the only real aerials in the faction. So we fly patrols regularly—sometimes twice a day. And there’s battles, too. We hardly ever get…get…” Silverbolt fell silent as he realized that he had no word for the uncomfortable, itchy-all-over sensation that struck at random and turned the entire team into complete maniacs.

“Hungry?” suggested Moonrise.

“No. Yes!” said Silverbolt. “Hungry…but not for energon. Is there a word for that?”

“Not in Iaconian,” said Thundercracker. He shifted his gaze to the seeker cadets. “Windsong, if I ask who you’ve been challenging, will you lie to me?”

“Yes, sir!” said Windsong cheerfully.

“Then get yourself to medbay, unless you want a crooked nasal ridge for the rest of your life,” ordered Thundercracker. “Silverbolt, come with me.”

“I’m not in trouble, am I?”

“Course not,” said Skywarp cheerfully, linking one of his elbows with Silverbolt’s. “We just wanna ask you some questions.”

That sounded a little bit shady, but Silverbolt supposed the seekers wouldn’t really try to hurt him. Not with the base full of Autobots. Prowl could be around any corner! And Jazz—who ever really knew where Jazz was?

“Aren’t your brothers around?” asked Thundercracker as they moved further away.

“They’re in the nursery, playing with the sparklings,” said Silverbolt. “We weren’t given any duty shifts.” Silverbolt thought that maybe if he repeated it often enough, he might come to terms with it.

“I wish I didn’t have any duty shifts,” said Skywarp wistfully. “I’d drink all night and sleep all day.”

“You do that anyway,” said Thundercracker. He turned to look back over his shoulder. “Alright, we’re clear.”

The blow came out of nowhere, catching Silverbolt right in the mouth-plates. His helm snapped back automatically, and he felt his own dentae cut into the soft, delicate metal of his glossa. He tasted processed energon.

A second punch caught his optic, cracking the glass. Silverbolt staggered back, struggling to keep his balance, until he hit a wall. Half-blind and too panicked to even think about calling his brothers, he curled up as tightly as he could to shield himself from more blows. But none came.

Silverbolt looked up, all too aware of the tears on his faceplates and the way his frame was trembling. Both seekers had stepped back, and now they were watching Silverbolt with a clinical sort of curiosity. He opened his mouth to scream for help, but stopped at the last moment.

New lines of code were coming online, slowly at first, but then in an avalanche. New data was streaming in about his surroundings. The mechs before him were now potential enemies, registering at a high threat level. When he focused on them, his processor suggested the most efficient way to defeat them in single combat. Objects were scanned and ranked for their probable effectiveness as improvised weapons. Even the height of the ceiling and the placement of the walls were suddenly significant.

And his frame felt different, too. He’d never been upgraded or reformatted before, but he imagined that it couldn’t be too dissimilar from what he was experiencing now. Silverbolt looked down at himself to see if something had changed. But his frame was the same as it had always been.

It was as if he’d been in recharge his entire life up until this moment. Now, awake at last, Silverbolt felt strong and powerful and ready to destroy someone.

Silverbolt lunged at Thundercracker, but the seeker caught him with both servos. Silverbolt’s face twisted in a snarl, and he moved to break free. It should have been easy; Thundercracker was smaller, and not nearly as strong as he was. But instead, Silverbolt felt his pedes leave the floor and had just enough time to register the ceiling flying past before he landed flat on his back.

“Good. It worked,” said Thundercracker, bending over to look down at him. Silverbolt’s optics zoomed in on the delicate silver cables in his neck.

“What did you do to me?” rasped Silverbolt.

“I hit you,” said Thundercracker. “And as a result, you are now feeling your battle programming come online for the first time.”

Silverbolt forced his vision to focus. The damage to his optic wasn’t serious enough to set off critical warnings, but it was still very painful. “My battle programming has always been online.”

“Yeah, okay,” said Skywarp with an obnoxious laugh.

“What did you do?” Silverbolt repeated. He held his servos up in front of his faceplates. It was as if he was seeing them for the first time in his life.

“The Autobots assume that all aerials come online with their battle programming active,” said Thundercracker. The two seekers leaned down and helped Silverbolt back to his feet.

“Because aerials are dumb and violent!” said Skywarp.

“You need to be in a fight before those protocols will activate, just the same as any other mech,” continued Thundercracker, as if Skywarp had not spoken.

“I’ve been in hundreds of fights!” objected Silverbolt. Well, maybe it hadn’t been hundreds. But still.

“You’ve never been hit,” said Skywarp. “We made sure of that. Your—the big one, the other guy—”

“Superion?” said Silverbolt.

“He’s got his battle programming online, there’s no question about that,” said Skywarp. “But you kids don’t. Or didn’t, in your case.”

Even with the new code swirling around in his processor, Silverbolt could still not quite accept that the seekers were telling the truth. Something wasn’t quite right. He tried to find the words. “Wouldn’t it be better for you if we stayed…how we were?” he managed at last.

“Some mechs think so. I don’t,” said Thundercracker. “You’re going to be up against enemies that actually want to hurt you in the near future. And besides, it’s unfair to you. Much of your adult coding is bundled in with your battle programming. You don’t want to be treated like sparklings. You don’t deserve to be treated like sparklings.”

“Are you gonna be in trouble?” asked Silverbolt.

Skywarp laughed. “TC’s a dead mech!”

“Skywarp is exaggerating,” said Thundercracker, “somewhat. Don’t worry about me. Worry about yourself, and your brothers.”

Silverbolt could feel his self-repair working on his optic already. “You’re nothing like Prowl,” he said.

“Thanks for the reminder,” said Skywarp. “TC, we gotta go yell at Prowl.”

Thundercracker nodded. “Yes, we do. Please try and stay out of trouble, Silverbolt. And tell your brothers that if they ever feel the need to fly, they may do so without fear of punishment.”

Silverbolt watched the seekers walk away together, wingtips touching and servos moving in a silent conversation, as if they hadn’t just irrevocably shattered everything he’d ever assumed about himself and his team. His brothers. Every battle, every victory—it was all a lie. A trick. A game. His processor pulled up memories of Bluestreak lying on the floor while Arcee climbed over his doorwings, giggling.

Silverbolt slowly raised his servos to his faceplates. Confusion was rapidly being replaced by a terrible, burning shame. The battle programming, sensing that there were no more enemies around, fell back offline like a song coming to an end. But it was still there, Silverbolt could feel it. He’d never be without it again.

Silverbolt became aware that he’d received a dozen query pings from his brothers in the last quarter-breem. He hadn’t felt them come in, but he must have been flooding their usually-peaceful gestalt link with emotions.

It took all his concentration to send a message over their link, but he managed a quick home-now-meet, with a pulse of urgent-worry for emphasis.

His brothers were all waiting for him when he got back to their quarters. When he walked in, they all began shouting questions at once. It didn’t take them long to spot the injury.

“What happened to your optic?” demanded Air Raid, pushing his way to the front of the group. “Did someone hit you?”

“Sort of,” said Silverbolt. “Listen, there’s—”

“What happened?” pressed Skydive. “Did you get in a fight?”

“You felt scared,” said Fireflight. “And it was scary.”

“Just listen,” said Silverbolt desperately. “I just—I just learned something important. I—” he looked at Air Raid. “There’s something I’ve got to do. Something I’ve got to show you. But you have to promise you won’t get mad.”

Air Raid shifted his stance and rested his servos on his hips. “What are you talking about?” he asked, his optics darkening with suspicion.

Silverbolt punched him in the face.

Chapter Text

“At various points during our four-million year stasis lock, Shockwave filed four separate incident reports in which alien spacecraft were detected just outside of Cybertron’s atmosphere,” reported Prowl from his spot at the front of the conference room. “No contact was made, and we found no further mentions of these sightings in his official files. However, it seems that he did some personal research and found old historical texts describing the Quintessons and their activities. These texts were written in a very strange form of proto-Iaconian that we have not yet been able to translate.”

Starscream drank his energon ration very slowly and did not put any particular degree of effort into making it look like he was paying attention to Prowl’s presentation. Starscream had been forced to leave his project behind to attend this meeting, but that didn’t mean he was about to stop working. Three different datapads and a holographic drafting screen were spread out in front of him, all displaying different designs and calculations.

“Fortunately, Shockwave kept personal notes,” continued Prowl in a monotone that could rival Soundwave’s. “On the subject of the alien ships, he writes,” the mech paused to reference a datapad, “‘I am certain that the intruding ships are Quintesson in origin, as they match the descriptions found in the ancient texts. I confess that I harbor some anxiety, as I do not know if my forces could adequately defend Cybertron from a full attack.’” Prowl looked back up. “But no attack ever came. And after a period of brief but intense research, it appears that he gave up on the subject altogether and moved on to new projects. I’m going to give the floor to Perceptor now. He would like to report on the science team’s findings.”

With the arrival of Greenlight, and Lancer’s release from the medbay, the Autobot scientists and engineers now outnumbered Starscream six to one. Starscream didn’t care, though. Let them go on poking at their corpse. He was the one with the actual solution to the crisis.

Or he would be, once he actually figured something out.

Starscream looked down and realized that he’d chewed the end of his stylus to pieces.

Perceptor took Prowl’s spot at the front of the room, and began loading a presentation of his own onto the viewscreens (the Autobots did seem to love viewscreen presentations). Of all the Autobot scientists, Starscream probably respected Perceptor the most. Perceptor had been famous all across Cybertron for his work long before the Great War broke out. But he had been one of the elite, so it wasn’t exactly a surprise when he’d sided with the Autobots.

“We have determined that the Quintessons are both mechanical and organic,” reported Perceptor. “Evidence—which I’ve highlighted on the viewscreen for you here—suggests that the race was once wholly organic, but they have come to rely on their technology. The subject that we dissected was unquestionably a member of the warrior caste.”

A new image flashed on the screen. It was a photograph of the dissected Quintesson, split open down the middle. It had soft pink and grey innards that reminded Starscream of the humans he’d dissected, but it also had clear mechanical components that looked like they’d grown alongside the organs, rather than having been implanted later. Starscream guessed that this was probably made possible by some form of nanotechnology.

“The data in Shockwave’s files states the Quintesson social hierarchy is made up of twenty-seven different castes,” continued Perceptor. “We can identify the members of each caste by their body-type, though I must warn you all that Quintesson society may have shifted since the writing of the reports that Shockwave unearthed. We have dated these proto-Iaconian files at fifteen million vorns, though they could easily be twice as old.”

Starscream glanced around at the other mechs in the room. Megatron’s optics were looking particularly glazed-over right now, and Starscream had a feeling that he was wishing he was with the troops, sweeping the streets of Tarn for any signs of the Quintessons.

And Soundwave was inscrutable, as always. Starscream knew that he had been working closely with Prowl and the scientists to learn more about the Quintessons. It had been Soundwave’s cassettes who had finally broken into Shockwave’s quarters to retrieve his personal files when the main systems scan had revealed nothing but some incredibly disturbing projects.

Shockwave’s room had been a veritable fortress, the door sealed behind four million years of codes and cyphers. But Rumble and Frenzy hadn’t used the door. Instead, they’d spent an entire afternoon becoming reacquainted with the tower’s ventilation systems and emerged, triumphant, with an entire storage crate of personal records. Naturally, they had been unbearable ever since.

Over on the Autobot side of the table, Prime was either more interested in xenobiology that previously assumed, or incredibly gifted at feigning attentiveness. Ironhide had gone with the soldiers, and so Jazz had taken his place at Prime’s side. His visor made it difficult to tell what he thought about the presentation, but every so often his lipplates quirked in a quickly-suppressed smile. Starscream suspected he might be playing a game on his HUD. On Prime’s other side, Prowl was watching Perceptor intently.

Perceptor finished speaking and changed the slide again. This time, it was a still capture from Shockwave’s security tapes. The image made everyone straighten up a little, for it was the five-faced Quintesson.

“According to Shockwave’s files, this is a Magistrate,” said Perceptor. “They are the most powerful figures in Quintesson society, serving as judges and leaders. And despite the fact that none of us have ever encountered one, the sight evokes an immediate emotional response from everyone in this room. I hypothesize that someone, long ago, altered Cybertronian core coding so that we would be inclined to distrust and avoid the entire Magistrate caste.”

Prime cleared his vocalizer. “If these Magistrates are the leaders of their people, then they were responsible for the decision to return to Cybertron. Can they be reasoned with?”

“They are intelligent enough to listen to us, though I doubt they would be inclined to,” said Ratchet gruffly. “We’re their slaves, remember?”

“Ah. Yes. I was getting to that,” said Perceptor. “Shockwave’s personal files go on to claim that the bulk of the proto-Iaconian text is actually a meticulously detailed guide to uninstalling all facets of Quintesson obedience programming.”

“Slave programming, you mean,” said Megatron. More than a few Decepticon soldiers had once been slaves. There were rumors that Megatron himself had been one, though Starscream’s own research had proven this to be almost certainly untrue (there was no point in installing slave programming in miners; their situation had been as binding as any coding). The warlord himself refused to give a straight answer to the question, and Starscream was of the opinion that Megatron rather enjoyed the gossip and speculation.

“Yes,” said Perceptor. “I believe it is common knowledge that the Quintessons created our race, though this was seldom discussed even during the Golden Age. But we must now look reality in the face. The Quintessons saw us as non-sentient drones and treated us accordingly, even when it became clear that we were not.”

There was a metaphor in there somewhere, but Starscream let it go.

“We require more time,” said Perceptor, indicating the group made up of Wheeljack, Hoist, Grapple, Lancer, and Greenlight. “We are only now turning our efforts to translating the proto-Iaconian texts. Shockwave was an intelligent and rational mech, but whatever he found caused him to fear the Quintessons. If Shockwave was nervous, we should all be nervous. I do not say this to incite panic, but for our own protection. I hope you all take this into consideration during our dealings with the Quintesson race in the future.” Perceptor looked up from his notes, blue optics sweeping the room. “Are there any questions?”

So that was what they’d been working on all this time? Translating old texts and cutting apart a techo-organic? These Autobots were six intelligent, highly-educated mechs—seven, if you counted Ratchet—and had not one superweapon to show for it. Perhaps it was time to put Wheeljack in charge of things.

(Starscream allowed himself a brief but absurd fantasy, in which the Dinobots single-handedly tore a Quintesson ship to shreds and then chewed on the pieces.)

“If that is all, perhaps we should hear from Starscream next?” suggested Perceptor. Starscream looked up sharply. He had not been informed that anyone was expecting him to present today. In fact, he hadn’t discussed the details of his project with anyone, not even Megatron. Starscream presented plans and weapons on his own timetable.

“What are you talking about?” asked Starscream at last, completely failing to keep the scorn out of his tone.

Perceptor gave the slightest flinch. “I apologize. I was led to believe that you were involved in a project of your own.”

“I don’t know why you would believe that,” said Starscream, his tone suddenly becoming overly-sweet as he leaned forward. “Everyone knows the aerial sparktype is ill-suited for scientific endeavors.”

Starscream knew that he would cherish the expression on Perceptor’s faceplates until the day his spark went offline. The quiet, well-spoken, and highly-respected scientist gaped at him like an organic fish, completely failed to say a few words, and then rushed back to the security blanket that was the company his fellow scientists.

“What—?” began Prime, very slowly, but Ratchet cut him off with a snarl.

“Cut the slag, Screamer.” The medic was three-quarters out of his seat, and looked ready to tackle someone. “Half the base saw you running around with that Quintesson weapon. What are you doing with it?”

“I am disassembling it for research,” snapped Starscream. “And I believe I may be able to create a program that will render our warriors immune to the blasts that it fires. As this is slightly more complex than digging through the archives, and I am also occupied with commanding our combined air force, I require more time before I can present my results. Is that satisfactory for all of you?”

He didn’t wait for a reply before he grabbed his materials, threw them into subspace, and rushed out of the conference room. Fortunately, nobody tried to stop him, or follow him out. Just to be safe, though, he ducked around the first corner he spotted.

Starscream pressed himself against the wall and cycled his vents deeply a few times to calm himself. Now that the fire of the moment had died down, he realized that he had been very stupid. No. Not stupid. He was never stupid, ever. Just…impulsive.

Light, irregular pedesteps signaled the arrival of someone new. Starscream turned his helm in time to see one of the Aerialbots (Starscream was in no state to recall his name) run right past him. Starscream automatically reached out and snagged him by the wing.

“Ow!” cried the Aerialbot in surprise.

“No running in the halls,” reprimanded Starscream. He released the Aerialbot, but the young jet continued to stare up at him. “That’s all. You can go.”

But instead of scampering off, the Aerialbot smiled. “Oh, wait! I need vocabulary packs.”

Starscream felt his optics flicker. “You—what?”

“I got some basic Vosian language packs from Prowl, but he said you’d have even more,” said the Aerialbot, very quickly. “Silverbolt said he wouldn’t mind learning either. But Slingshot’s not interested, and I’m not sure if Fireflight’s up to the challenge.”

Starscream couldn’t hide his surprise. “You have language packs? Have you installed them?” Language packs, while vital for learning a new language, only gave a database of new words. Things like syntax and grammar had to be learned manually.

“Yes. But—but don’t ask me to say anything. I’m not ready to practice on someone who could laugh at me.”

“You really want to learn, then?” Starscream felt his frame relax marginally.

“Yes! I mean…” Suddenly the Aerialbot looked anxious. “If that’s alright? With you?”

“I can hardly forbid you from learning a language,” said Starscream, acutely aware that he was perfectly capable of doing exactly that if he really put his processor to it. “I think I might have copies of what you’ll need. What’s your designation?”

The Aerialbot brightened up again, “I’m Skydive!”

“Come with me, then,” ordered Starscream, and he began the walk back to his quarters. “What files did Prowl give you?”

Skydive pinged Starscream with a list of everything he’d installed. It wasn’t a bad start, to be honest. Better than what he’d expected from an Autobot. Starscream browsed through the files as they walked. It appeared that Prowl understood more Vosian than he’d ever let on. Not exactly surprising—the Decepticons had long ago realized that the tactician feigned ignorance when it suited his purposes.

Starscream stopped just outside his quarters. “Now, don’t touch anything, I’m working on some projects,” he cautioned. “And if the common room’s a mess, that’s Skywarp’s fault.”

Skydive nodded eagerly, and Starscream keyed in the code. Skydive followed him inside, tiptoeing carefully around everything from furniture to empty energon cubes. He seemed to be taking the orders to not touch anything to the extreme. He was even standing on the tips of his pedes, as to minimize his own contact with the floor.

“This whole thing is your room?” gasped Skydive.

“No, I share this space. My room is through here. Again, don’t touch anything. But walk normally.” He slid his berthroom door open and went over to his collection of datapads. Behind him, Skydive gave a tiny gasp at the sight of the shelves that lined the entire wall.

Starscream had to ignite his thrusters to reach the top shelves, which was where he kept a very small storage crate. Inside the crate was a not-unimpressive collection of datapack sticks. Datapack sticks were tiny, but contained immense quantities of raw data meant to be uploaded directly to the processor. They could be very dangerous in the wrong servos, and it wasn’t hard for a careless mech to accidentally fry his processors. Back at the Academy, the fatality rate had been about one mech per stellar cycle. A death was inevitably followed by a very long, very boring, and very mandatory lecture on proper and improper study habits.

Starscream did not believe that Skydive was in any danger (language packs were virtually harmless; sparklings could have them installed as early as ten thousand vorns), but he decided that it probably wouldn’t hurt to warn the young Aerialbot about the perils of overdosing on knowledge.

Starscream turned around, only to see that Skydive was leaning over Starscream’s workbench, servos clasped safely behind his back to deflect accusations that he was touching anything.

“This is the thing that shot the EMP blasts, isn’t it?” asked Skydive, turning his helm to look at him.

Starscream said nothing, but the surprise must have shown on his faceplates.

“We all felt it,” explained Skydive. “Superion got shot, but I think the reason why it wasn’t effective was because the electro-magnetic charge shuts down systems one at a time and then spreads outward. But Superion is too big, and the charge wasn’t strong enough to jump across our individual systems before it just fizzled out. We all felt the aftereffects when we separated, but they went away before we even had time to mention it to anyone. Anyway, it matches what everyone’s saying—that the femmes all fell over in one hit. It sounds like the Quintessons found a way to force them into stasis lock so they could collect them up and take them to wherever. Er. I mean. Maybe?”

For the first time in a long time, Starscream actually looked at the little aerial. Skydive’s white faceplates showed the embarrassed pink tinges of energon, and he raised one servo to his mouth in a very human display of shyness. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said anything. I don’t know anything about engineering,” the little jet mumbled. And then he bit down on one of his knuckles to silence himself.

“What did you say your designation was?” Starscream asked at last.

“Uhum.” He removed his servo. “I’m Skydive.”

“Skydive,” repeated Starscream. “Do you do much reading?”

“Oh yes! There’s not much to read on the Ark, but the humans have some fascinating texts! During their battles, they pilot these—” And Skydive was off, his momentary embarrassment forgotten as he spoke enthusiastically about dead squishies and the lifeless machines they’d flown during times of war.

“Wouldn’t you prefer to read Cybertronian histories?” cut in Starscream.

“I wouldn’t mind,” said Skydive. “The humans are fascinating, but they’ve only been around for twenty-five hundred vorns. And most of that is undocumented. I’ve always wondered, though—are the humans really young, or are we just really old?”

“That depends on your point of view,” said Starscream, edging back towards his shelves. “But what was that about you having nothing to read? Unless I’m mistaken, you have all of Teletraan-1 at your disposal.”

“Oh, but those texts are too advanced for me,” said Skydive, losing none of his cheer. “Prowl says not to bother with those until I get a bit older.”

“Right,” said Starscream slowly. “What if I gave you some datapads? I have some old ones you might enjoy. Pre-war.”

Skydive seemed to falter. “Am I allowed?”

“Why wouldn’t you be?”

“I…I don’t know…” Skydive seemed to grow smaller as he glanced around the room and hugged his sides, the last traces of his confidence vanishing. “Maybe I shouldn’t. I don’t know.”

Primus. The mech was acting like Starscream had just proposed they murder Prime and start their own faction. “Are you afraid I’m going to give you propaganda? Because you do not need to worry about that. I’d never inflict Shockwave’s writings on anyone.”

That coaxed Skydive’s smile back out. “Okay.”

Starscream's servo went back to the shelves that housed his collection. “What are you interested in? Literature? Science?”

“Aerials don’t do science,” said Skydive immediately.

Slowly, as not to betray the rage that had just flared up in his spark, Starscream tilted his helm to one side. “Who told you that?” he asked, fighting to keep his tone casual. He knew that he shouldn’t have been surprised to learn that Skydive had internalized Functionist propaganda. The mech was living in an Autobot base, after all.

Skydive shrugged helplessly. “Nobody, exactly. It’s just one of those things that everyone knows.”

Thundercracker’s words were coming back to haunt him. We had cities and stories and languages and history. We knew who we were. They don’t. They have nothing.

If this was a ploy, it was an incredibly good one. Starscream made a split-second decision.

“Skydive, would you like to help me with this project?” he asked, indicating the Quintesson weapon.

Skydive’s mouth fell open a little bit, as if he could not believe his audials. “You—me? Really?”

“Only if you want to,” said Starscream. “I’m sure you have more interesting things to do.” Like turn your own battle programming on, he realized suddenly. How had he failed to notice it earlier? Yes, he’d been preoccupied. But Skydive’s energy field was alive with new coding. How—

Thundercracker.

Of course.

“I’d love to help!” shouted Skydive. “What can I do? What should I do?”

“Just—wait,” said Starscream. Primus, he hadn’t realized just how much training Skydive would require. The Aerialbot had nothing resembling a traditional education. He grabbed some of the very first scientific datapads he’d ever owned off the shelves. They were simple texts, meant to serve as an introduction to general scientific methods and practices. “Here. I want you to read these. You can skip the chapters about formatting your papers if you want. And these are the language sticks you wanted—you know not to install them all at once, right?”

Skydive nodded wordlessly.

“Good. When you’re finished with all that, you can comm me, and I’ll start finding things for you to do. And bring the datapads back, or I won’t give you any more. Is that enough for now?”

“Yeah.” Skydive looked down at his pedes suddenly. “But, uh. I had another question. Not about datapads. It’s…it’s probably going to sound weird. I mean…”

“What is it?” asked Starscream.

“The weapon,” Skydive nodded at Starscream’s workbench. “It’s from the Quintesson that Superion got? During the battle?” All that adorable enthusiasm had evaporated once more.

“Yes,” said Starscream slowly. He had a feeling he knew where this was going.

“I’ve been thinking about him. The Quintesson. And I know my brothers have, too, even though we don’t talk about it. We never—we never—we never killed anyone before.”

Starscream felt something in his spark soften at the words. “You did what you had to. It was him or you.”

“Yeah, I know.” Skydive hunched his shoulders. “Superion’s telling us the same thing. But Superion never feels guilty about anything. I don’t think he even understands what feeling guilty is. Lucky him, I guess.”

“Are you going to purge?” asked Starscream cautiously.

“No. I did after the battle. But it’s mostly okay now. Can we talk about something else? What are you gonna do with the gun?”

The change in subject was abrupt, but Starscream understood. It would probably be a little while before the entire team would be able to come to terms with the realities of war. “You were right about it being an EMP generator,” he said. “Once I’ve learned more about how it works, I am going to try and find a way to make our soldiers immune to its effects.”

“Why don’t you work with the Autobot scientists?” asked Skydive. “You’d get it done faster.”

“I cannot abide Autobot scientists,” muttered Starscream.

“Why not?”

“Because!”

“Bad reason,” said Skydive sagely. “Come on, what did they ever do to you?”

Starscream stared at Skydive, his lipplates moving but vocalizer silent. It took him a moment to realize that Skydive had only meant this as a rhetorical question.

“How old are you?” he asked suddenly.

“Two stellar cycles,” replied Skydive promptly. “We’ll be three soon. Same as the Stunticons. Why?”

“No reason.” Two stellar cycles. Too young to know, then. The incident would have been covered-up and forgotten long before they were brought online. “Tell me, does your team live in the Ark’s hangar?”

“Yeah, we do! Why?”

“No reason,” said Starscream again, and he put one arm across Skydive’s back as he led him to the door. “Is that enough information for now?”

“Yeah, I think so.” Skydive subspaced all the datapads and language sticks. Then, very slowly, he added, “I think maybe I shouldn’t mention any of this to the other Autobots.”

“Well, I wasn’t going to say it,” said Starscream, opening the door.

When Skydive had gone, Starscream opened up an internal comm line to his wingmates.

[Thundercracker!] he couldn’t exactly ‘scream’ over internal comms, but he felt his glyphs got the point across.

[Busted!] crowed Skywarp immediately.

[Yes, Air Commander?] said Thundercracker. Oh, the mech knew he was in trouble if he was using titles.

[Quarters, now! Both of you!]

[We’re searching for Quintessons!] objected Skywarp.

Starscream hadn’t been expecting a valid excuse. [We need to talk,] he said, somewhat subdued.

[You’re right, we do,] said Thundercracker. [Did you know the Aerialbots aren’t allowed to fly when they’re off-shift?]

[They…what?]

[I took the liberty of discussing it with Prowl,] said Thundercracker, [since you’ve been…occupied. According to him, none of the Aerialbots have ever complained. However, Silverbolt was able to describe the effects of sky-hunger to me without being prompted.]

[Why haven’t they said anything?] wondered Starscream.

[Silverbolt honestly didn’t seem to feel the policy was unreasonable,] said Thundercracker. [Now will you admit I was right?]

Starscream bit his lipplate. [Yes.]

[WOAH! I think I almost fell out of the sky!] shouted Skywarp. [Holy slag! Did I just hallucinate that? TC! Did he just—did I hear that right? Did Screamer just admit he was wrong about something?]

Thundercracker’s glyphs were cautious, bordering on incredulous, [You’re saying you agree with me, Starscream?]

[Yes.] He was never going to hear the end of this. [I’ll explain everything when you get back. We still need to be very careful. If we ruin the truce, we’re all slagged.]

[But we’re not going to let the Autobots have them, are we?] asked Skywarp.

[No,] said Starscream. [Not without a fight.]

Chapter Text

Silverbolt sat in front of the desk that Prowl had requisitioned for himself. The chair was a little too small for him, but he tried to hide his discomfort.

“Why didn’t you say something?” asked Prowl from the other side of the desk.

“I…I don’t know,” said Silverbolt. He tried to scrunch his frame inward, to make himself appear smaller. Unfortunately, as Silverbolt was the same approximate size as a Dinobot, this was proving difficult. “I…I’m sorry.”

Prowl’s doorwings twitched, and his optics dimmed just a little. “Would you like to explain why you took your complaint to the seekers, rather than to Jazz or myself?”

“I didn’t mean it as a complaint,” said Silverbolt. He felt his fists clench in worry. “I was just…confused.”

Prowl looked at Silverbolt for a painfully long moment. “You told Skywarp and Thundercracker that your team is not permitted to fly, save for during air patrols or battles.”

“I—yes—but—”

“But what you did not tell them, Silverbolt, was that your team has never requested extra flight time.” Prowl’s words were hard and stony. A metaphorical wall that Silverbolt did not have the skill to evade.

“I—I did try,” said Silverbolt, aware of how frail the excuse was. “I didn’t mean for it to sound like you were keeping us grounded! I’d never say that!”

“But you told them that you and your team experience the tzana cir.”

Silverbolt hesitated at the unexpected switch over to Vosian song-speak. “The—the what?”

Prowl looked faintly puzzled for a moment. But then his usual impassive mask snapped back into place. “My apologies. You told them that you and your team experience withdrawal symptoms as a result of not spending enough time in the air.”

“I—I didn’t know there was a word for it until they asked me,” said Silverbolt. “I thought—we all thought it was normal!”

“You thought episodes of destructive mania and obsessive anxiety were normal?” And it was the tranquil fury in the tactician’s tone that broke Silverbolt at last.

“I don’t know! Nobody ever told us they weren’t!” cried Silverbolt. As his vision went pink, he realized that tears were beginning to gather in his optics. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry!”

Prowl vented, very slowly. He waited a few klicks for Silverbolt to pull himself back together. Then he spoke again.

“Silverbolt, you are very young. It will be some time before you understand the subtle complexities of this war. Until then, I request that you bring all your concerns to me—or even Jazz, or Ratchet, or Wheeljack—rather than members of the Decepticon army. Is this reasonable?”

Silverbolt nodded vigorously.

“Then you may go,” said Prowl. Silverbolt practically leapt out of his chair before he even had a chance to complete the sentence. “And Silverbolt?”

Silverbolt froze, one servo to the door pad. “Yes?”

“You are an Autobot,” said Prowl. “Do not allow anyone to tell you otherwise.”

Silverbolt nodded and rushed out of the office, nearly shaking with relief and not exactly able to articulate why. It was just Prowl. Prowl wasn’t dangerous. Prowl would never hurt him. Prowl wanted what was best for everyone. It was Prowl’s battle computer that had won them countless battles. The only ones who had saved more lives than Prowl were Red Alert and Ratchet.

Silverbolt found his brothers lurking just around the corner. Air Raid, Slingshot, and Fireflight gathered around him immediately, all speaking at once. Only Skydive, immersed in yet another datapad, stayed where he was. Silverbolt offlined his optics and let the familiar voices wash over him for a few peaceful klicks.

“Come on, what did he say?” demanded Slingshot at last, jabbing Silverbolt in the shoulder a few times. Silverbolt onlined his optics again.

“We’re not in trouble,” said Silverbolt. “And I don’t think he knows about the war programming. He just…I think he’s just worried that we’re spending too much time around the seekers.”

“No we’re not!” objected Air Raid.

Silverbolt didn’t respond, but he allowed his optics to flick back to Skydive. Said mech had returned from Starscream’s private quarters with his subspace full of datapads and tiny sticks of compressed information. Through his excited giggles, Skydive had told the team that Starscream had given him permission to help with the weapon he was building to fight the Quintessons.

Or wait, maybe it wasn’t a weapon. Silverbolt couldn’t remember now.

“Let’s go get our rations,” said Silverbolt at last. Now that there was no limit on when they could fly, the Aerialbots were using up far more energy than they were accustomed to. Interestingly enough, the new war programming had done something to their aerial abilities. The team wasn’t any faster or more agile than they’d been before. But they had all found that they were capable of planning and executing more complex maneuvers, even coming up with new ones on the spot. Skydive was proving particularly adept at improvisation, even as he complained that he wanted to get back to his reading.

When the Aerialbots arrived in the rec room, they found it was already full of mechs who had just returned from the most recent sweep of the city. It was sort of nice to listen to the loud conversations, the teasing, and the laughter. Oh, the tables were still clearly divided between Autobots and Decepticons, but the atmosphere was considerable less tense he expected.

“So, what are we gonna do?” asked Air Raid asked as they all gathered around their usual table with their cubes. “I’m going to go insane if they don’t give us a patrol or something soon.”

Silverbolt knew Air Raid was right. They didn’t have infinite fuel, so they could only spend so much time in the air. His team was quickly growing bored. The sparklings were cute, but they didn’t exactly do much, and the Stunticons didn’t help, with their constant bragging about how they’d spent the entire planetary cycle with the real soldiers, almost-probably-kinda chasing down invisible Quintessons.

Silverbolt was just waiting for an excuse to hit Motormaster in his stupid faceplates.

“We need to figure something out, or we're gonna be stuck in the nursery with the real sparklets,” pressed Air Raid when Silverbolt didn’t respond right away.

“Starscream wouldn't do that, would he?” worried Fireflight.

“He might,” said Slingshot darkly, “if we torqued him off enough.”

“Why don’t we just tell someone?” demanded Air Raid, his optics boring straight into Silverbolt’s. “If we took it to Prime, I bet he’d make Starscream give us something to do. And now that we’ve got our programming, he can’t even use that as an excuse.”

“No!” cried Silverbolt. “That's what he wants! If we complain, it'll only prove he's right about us!”

“Then what are we supposed to do?” Air Raid shouted back.

“I don't know! Just deal with it!”

“That's not fair!”

“Life isn’t fair!” Silverbolt wasn’t sure if this was actually true or not, but everyone said it often enough that it might as well have been.

Air Raid slumped back in his seat, but there was no mistaking the resentment simmering in his optics. “You know what?” he asked at last. “Who put you in charge anyway?”

The room suddenly went deathly silent. Silverbolt had been unaware that anyone had even been paying attention to their fight. Now, all optics were on his team.

“Who put me—? What kind of a question is that? Prime put me in charge!” Silverbolt had to fight to keep the quaver from his voice. He did a quick assessment of the room. No Prowl. No Jazz. No Ratchet. No authority figures to appeal to. The highest ranking mech in the room was Ramjet. At that moment, Silverbolt would have even been glad for Soundwave’s presence.

“Well, maybe he shouldn't have,” continued Air Raid, his voice clear and cold. “Maybe he should have let us work it out for ourselves. Because you know what, Bolt? If he had, I don't know who would be in charge of this team. But it wouldn't be you.”

“You’re challenging me,” said Silverbolt flatly. “Is that it? Are you challenging me? You want to fight for it?”

Air Raid raised his wings as high as they’d go. “So what if I do?”

“We’re not Decepticons!” yelled Silverbolt. “Even if you beat me, it wouldn’t change anything!" But even as he said the words, Silverbolt knew they weren’t true. The war programming had changed them, changed the way they looked at the world. If Air Raid beat Silverbolt in a challenge, Air Raid would become the leader of the Aerialbots. Silverbolt knew this as surely as he knew his own designation.

His brothers were silent.

“Fine,” said Silverbolt, letting his servos land on the table. “You wanna fight for it? We'll fight for it. And if you win, I’ll follow you. We all will. But if you lose, you shut the frag up. Alright?”

Air Raid’s optics glittered with satisfaction. “Fine by me.”

“The training rooms, then,” said Silverbolt. “In half a cycle.”

“No,” said Air Raid. “Outside.”

Silverbolt said nothing. Outside. Outside, where there was no ceiling—and no limit to how high Air Raid could force him to fly.

“Raid, that’s not fair,” whispered Fireflight.

“Yes it is,” said Silverbolt. He stood at last. “Half a cycle. Outside.”

He finished his cube in one huge gulp and strode out of the room. Someone followed him out, but Silverbolt didn’t slow down or even turn his helm to see who it was. The mech ran to catch up, and a moment later, jumped in front of him. Silverbolt skidded to a halt to keep from running over Ramjet.

“Hey. Do you know what you’re doing?” asked the conehead.

“Nope,” said Silverbolt, darting around him.

“It wasn’t bad,” said Ramjet, running to keep up. “The way you handled it. You didn’t have to let him set the location, though.”

“I know,” said Silverbolt. And it was true—he had known, though he could not say how. “But I don’t want anyone saying I only won because he didn’t have enough room to fly.”

Ramjet didn’t reply, and Silverbolt ran on ahead, processor still spinning. It didn’t take him too long to find a dusty, unoccupied room where he could hyperventilate in the corner in relative peace.

Silverbolt watched the klicks tick by on his internal chronometer. Half a cycle wasn’t a very long time. He supposed he ought to formulate some sort of a strategy, but his processor wasn’t cooperating. What would Prowl say? What would Prime say?

“Get off the floor.”

Silverbolt turned his helm towards the voice. Starscream was leaning in the doorway, looking completely unimpressed.

“Go away,” said Silverbolt. “This is your fault.”

“Wrong. This is Thundercracker’s fault. If you want to blame someone else for your problems, at least pick the correct mech.”

Silverbolt turned back to look at the wall again.

“Why are you angry?" pressed Starscream. "Are you afraid he’ll beat you?”

“No!” yelled Silverbolt. “I’m angry because I don't want to fight my brother! Especially not over this!”

“Why not?”

“Because he's my brother!”

“I don’t follow.”

“I don't want to hurt him! And...and I don't want everyone to see us fighting and think we can't take care of ourselves.”

“You care too much about what others think,” said Starscream. “Besides, there's no dishonor in accepting a challenge.”

“Maybe not for you! Prowl's gonna kill us when he finds out we've been fighting.”

“Well then we won't tell him, now will we?” Starscream gave a little smirk.

Silverbolt went silent again.

“Maybe I should just let him win,” he said at last.

Starscream stared at him as if he’d just sprouted a second set of wings. “Why the Pit would you want to do an idiotic thing like that?”

“Because maybe he's right! Maybe I'm not a good leader. Maybe—”

“If he's right, you won't need to let him win! He can do it without your help! Right now, you have a responsibility to your team!” Silverbolt was shocked at how impassioned Starscream suddenly sounded. Starscream seemed to realize this as well, because his tone immediately became casual again. “Also, if you throw this match, I’ll have you all sent back to Earth. And don’t think I won't be able to tell. Understand?”

"Okay," mumbled Silverbolt miserably.

Starscream nodded and held one servo out. Silverbolt let him help him back to his pedes.

"Now listen,” said Starscream. “You're bigger than him, and you can use that to your advantage. He's careless, you're not. If you give him the slightest opening, he'll take it without stopping to consider if it's a good idea or not. You can set a trap for him that way."

Silverbolt looked down at him dubiously. "You want me to win?"

“I don't want you to win, I just don't want you to lose. It's embarrassing. Anyway, you can do whatever you want; it really makes no difference to me.”

“Thanks. I...thanks.”

“It's not as bad as that,” Starscream demurred. “It's your first challenge. You're just nervous. It's normal.”

“Have you ever lost a challenge?” asked Silverbolt.

“Of course. Not recently, but a long time ago. Lost them all the time, especially when I first joined.” Starscream lowered his voice a little. “I don't advertise it, but I never actually attended the War Academy.”

“You didn’t?” said Silverbolt in shock. “But—”

“Anything you’ve heard is an outright lie. I graduated from the Iacon Science Academy. Second in my class, believe it or not. But, as you can imagine, it did not have much in the way of combat training. It wasn't until the war broke out that I really learned how to fight.”

That was...unexpected. Silverbolt considered this new information in silence. He'd never really thought of Starscream as anything other than an incredibly skilled warrior. In retrospect, knowing what Skydive had told them, it shouldn't have been so shocking. But it was difficult to imagine the sleek air warrior bent over a quiet lab table. Was it possible for a mech to be a gifted warrior and also a scientist? It just didn't seem to add up.

Silverbolt allowed Starscream to lead him down the hallways and out towards the tower’s main courtyard, where he knew Air Raid would be waiting. He couldn’t say that he was eager for the fight, but he didn’t feel quite as terrible as he had a few breems ago.

Air Raid wasn’t the only one waiting. There were actually quite a few mechs, Autobot and Decepticon, who were hanging around and trying to look as though they were only in the courtyard by random chance. There was Windsong's trine, looking curious, and Firestorm's trine, too. Sunstreaker and Sideswipe were lounging by the east wall, feigning disinterest. Almost all of the minibots were scattered through the crowd as well—you could always count on a minibot to want to watch a fight. There were a few Combaticons, and of course, all five Stunticons. Silverbolt found himself wishing that the Protectobots hadn’t stayed behind on Earth with Red Alert—he wouldn't have minded their support.

Silverbolt realized that he hadn't seen Skywarp and Thundercracker anywhere, but he had a feeling they were watching. He raised his optics up to the roof, and might have seen a flash of violet. But maybe it was just his imagination.

There were so many mechs gathered that Silverbolt expected Prowl or someone to show up at any moment, but it appeared that nobody had snitched. Maybe they were more interested in the outcome of the fight than seeing Silverbolt get into trouble.

“You ready?” asked Air Raid with a wide grin.

“Yeah, I’m ready,” said Silverbolt, walking up to meet Air Raid in the center of the courtyard. He glanced around for Skydive, Fireflight, and Slingshot and saw that they were clustered together near the opposite wall, identical expressions of worry on their faceplates.

“No weapons fire,” said Starscream, drawing all optics to himself for a moment. “Other than that, anything goes. You may begin.”

Without warning, Air Raid hurled himself into the air, transforming as he went. Silverbolt tilted his helm up to watch his brother’s progress, but stayed planted on the ground, drawing a few murmurs from the gathered crowd. Silverbolt very pointedly ignored them.

[What’s the matter, Bolt? Scared of the sky?] taunted Air Raid over open comms. He was now circling far, far above Silverbolt’s helm. Silverbolt knew everyone was expecting something, anything, from him. If he hesitated much longer, they'd probably start jeering at him. Silverbolt wasn't sure if he could handle that.

Silverbolt hesitated a moment longer, just in case the Quintessons wanted to be useful and set off the alarms again. Then he ignited his thrusters and shot upwards into the sky after his brother.

[I was beginning to think you weren’t coming!] cried Air Raid as Silverbolt gained more altitude. Silverbolt ignored this as well. If Air Raid wanted to behave like a sparkling, that was his own business.

[Hey, what are you doing?] cried Air Raid when he realized Silverbolt wasn’t slowing in his ascent. A moment later, Silverbolt had shot past him. Air Raid transformed in the air and stared up at his brother, who was now about fifty meters above his helm. [Silverbolt! Knock if off! You’re gonna get stuck again.]

[Come get me then,] said Silverbolt very calmly, being careful to ignore the helpful little number flashing in his HUD that was currently flashing his exact altitude. Air Raid hesitated, but then he rose to the bait. When he was just a few meters below, Silverbolt shut off his own thrusters.

He might have screamed. Or maybe it was Air Raid who screamed. Nobody would have blamed Air Raid for it. After all, Silverbolt was twice his size and falling like a stone and steadfastly refusing to loosen his iron grip on Air Raid’s frame.

[Are you insane? Stop! STOP!] cried Air Raid, trying to wriggle free of Silverbolt's grasp. They were facing each other, Air Raid’s wings to the ground and Silverbolt’s to the distant sky. [How are you doing this? How are you doing this!? Primus, you are insane! Let me go! I’ll kill you, I’ll fragging kill you!]

It was Silverbolt’s worst fear. Falling. As far as irrational fears went, he felt it wasn’t actually that ridiculous. Even if he did have wings. Air Raid’s reaction was actually rather validating, especially considering he’d been taunting Silverbolt about it only a klick ago.

Air Raid was still fighting, but Silverbolt was stronger than all his brothers combined. There was no way Air Raid would be able to break free without weapons. Air Raid was nothing if not creative, though. He reignited his thrusters, only to cry out in rage when he realized that Silverbolt was so heavy that he might as well have not even bothered. Silverbolt tried to turn his thoughts to other things as the wind whistled past. Skydive with his datapads, painstakingly attempting to pronounce Vosian words. Slingshot, covering his insecurities with an acid tongue. Fireflight, with his wide-opticked innocence, laughing at every good thing the universe had to offer.

Pretty Moonrise, with his big crimson optics and inviting lipplates—no. Not that. Primus. Of all the things to think about. Better to think of what Windsong and Bladewing would do to him if they found out! That was a sobering thought.

Air Raid's frame jolted as he tried to transform, but Silverbolt held tight. He felt, rather than heard, the transformation gears cry out in complaint. There were tears in Air Raid’s optics now. They fell upwards and hit Silverbolt in the faceplates. They were not far from the ground now. Silverbolt finally allowed himself a glance at the altitude. Almost. Almost...

There.

At the last moment, Silverbolt released Air Raid, as to not crush him between the ground and Silverbolt’s own frame. It was too late for Air Raid to ignite his own thrusters, though, and he hit the surface—hard.

Silverbolt landed awkwardly, gracelessly, a klick later. He looked and saw Air Raid was still lying where he’d fallen, unmoving. Silverbolt’s vents caught, and he staggered over to his brother.

“Raid! Are you alright?” he fell to his knees and grabbed Air Raid’s shoulders. Blue optics flickered online at the touch. “Air Raid?”

Air Raid looked stunned. He glanced from side to side, taking in his surroundings and the fact that he was suddenly lying on the ground.

“Ow,” said Air Raid at last. Then he gave an insane little giggle. “Bolt. Bolt. Bolt. Hey Bolt.”

“Yeah?” gasped Silverbolt. He didn’t think he’d ever stop shaking.

“You are the biggest jerk I have ever met in my entire life,” whispered Air Raid.

Silverbolt laughed weakly, and so did Air Raid.

“Are we okay?” asked Silverbolt at last.

“Yeah,” said Air Raid, and Silverbolt slumped in relief.

“Here,” said Silverbolt, getting up. “Let me help you...”

He held one servo out, but that was when someone grabbed his other arm. Silverbolt turned around, and found himself staring straight down at his own reflection in Jazz’s visor.

* * *

Prowl yelled for a little while. Then he left, and Ratchet yelled for a little while. Prowl came back to yell some more. Wheeljack had stopped in to say a few quiet words. During a brief lull in the shouting, Skywarp had teleported in, punched them both, and then vanished just as quickly as he’d come, laughing like an idiot.

Silverbolt was actually surprised at how the words just washed over him. Had Prowl really reduced him to tears only two cycles ago? It was odd. Nothing Prowl was saying now seemed particularly meaningful.

Neither Silverbolt nor Air Raid had been seriously injured, despite the speed of their fall, and self-repair was taking care of most of the damage. But Ratchet wasn’t allowing them out of the medbay just yet. So they sat on their assigned medical cots in silent solidarity while Prowl came by and lectured them for the third time.

“I am very disappointed in the two of you,” said Prowl for what was probably the fifteenth time. “Especially you, Silverbolt.”

“It was my fault,” said Air Raid unexpectedly. “I made the challenge.”

Prowl’s optics darkened. “Yes. You did. Why?”

“Silverbolt was being a glitch,” said Air Raid. “I thought it would be better for the team if I was in charge. So I challenged him.”

“And who,” said Prowl in a voice that could have taken the purple off the walls, “told you that if you defeated Silverbolt, you would have the right to lead the gestalt?”

“Nobody,” said Air Raid. “We just…decided.”

“You decided,” repeated Prowl.

“I mean, we never talked about it,” said Air Raid. “But…we just knew. Right?”

Silverbolt nodded. He had a feeling that mentioning the match between Windsong and Firestorm would not help their case.

“That is ridiculous,” said Prowl at last. “We have raised the five of you to be intelligent and civilized. You know better. You are better!”

“Better than what?” asked Silverbolt before he could stop himself.

Prowl didn’t answer right away. Then: “I believe the five of you are…impressionable. For your own good, I am going to recommend to Prime that your team be transferred back to Earth.”

Silverbolt gasped. “You can’t!”

“I certainly can, and I will,” said Prowl, picking up a datapad. “In the meantime, I suggest you contemplate your actions—and the sort of mechs you hope to become in the future.”

Prowl left, and this time, he did not return. Sensing that the medbay was safe at last, Fireflight and Slingshot and Skydive tiptoed in with extra rations for their brothers. Then they pushed the two berths together and sat in a silent pile. Ratchet didn’t make them leave.

Less than a breem after Ratchet’s shift ended and he walked out the door (leaving the Aerialbots in Hook’s practically-capable servos), Starscream arrived.

“That wasn’t bad,” said Starscream at last when none of the Aerialbots said anything to him. “A little crude, but you’re still learning.”

“We’re going to get sent back to Earth,” said Skydive.

“Pfft. Nonsense. You just frightened them. They will recover.”

“Why are you doing this?” asked Silverbolt. “We're still your enemies. It's only gonna make things harder on you when we get back to earth.”

Starscream shifted his weight from one pede to the other. “Do you want the truth?”

“Yes!” scowled Silverbolt.

“Fine,” said Starscream. “Your faction is infamous for managing to alienate almost every aerial that has ever enlisted. You and your brothers are, by some miracle, not lacking in self-respect. So you will tolerate being treated like lesser beings for only a little while longer. And then, after the thousandth day of suspicious glares and security cameras following you down the hall and random searches of your quarters and stricter punishments for the same infractions that everyone else makes, you will be approached by someone you respect very highly and he will say to you, ‘Skydive, you are just so well-behaved and intelligent that I sometimes forget you're an aerial.’”

Skydive’s optics had gone white with shock.

“Or maybe you've already heard that one?” he continued smoothly. “What about this one? I don't like aerials, but I like you.”

Slingshot and Fireflight flinched visibly.

“We're done talking about this,” said Silverbolt.

“Wait. I'm not,” said Skydive. “I want—I want to talk about it. Because I think he might be right.”

“So what?” shouted Silverbolt. “We'll change their minds! If we're good enough, if we do everything right, then they'll see—”

“Better mechs than you have tried and failed,” drawled Starscream. “Better to come to terms with it now than keep yourself awake every night, wondering why nothing you do is ever good enough. Nothing short of a full reformat will ever make them accept you. I don't care if you don't believe me. You'll realize it sooner or later. And when you do, you know where to find us.”

And on that note, he left.

* * *

“I take it back,” said Air Raid. “I’d rather be bored.”

Silverbolt didn’t respond because he was busy devoting all his available processing power to removing a particularly stubborn scuff from the floor. Jazz had delivered the cleaning supplies to them early that morning, and left them with very simple orders. Scrub everything.

Silverbolt had seen the twins assigned this punishment before, so he had an idea of what to expect. He and Air Raid would clean every available surface until their servos fell off. There was really no point in complaining, or trying to guess when Prowl would finally relent and allow them to take a break.

A few cycles ago, Firestar had called them up to the nursery because apparently Blitzwing and Astrotrain had fed Springer ten rust sticks in a row and the little triple-changer had purged his tanks all over the floor. Silverbolt had spent half a cycle using one servo to scrub and the other servo to hold Arcee at arm’s length so she couldn’t chew on his wings. Returning to the drudgery of the hallways was actually a relief after that.

“I really hope Shockwave appreciates this!” yelled Air Raid, hurling his cloth at the wall.

Someone laughed at that. Silverbolt and Air Raid immediately turned to see who was coming—if it was Wildrider with his dirty pedes again, Silverbolt was going to set him straight. But it wasn’t Wildrider. It was Soundwave’s twins.

“Awesome fight yesterday,” said Rumble-or-Frenzy approvingly. “I guess this is your punishment, huh?”

“Yeah,” said Air Raid. “I think I’d rather have brig time.”

“We feel your pain,” said the other twin with a solemn nod. “No, but seriously. Not a bad fight.”

“And then Prowl and Starscream!” said the one who had spoken first. “Yesterday was a good day. Finally some interesting slag.”

“Prowl and Starscream fought?” said Silverbolt, alarmed.

“Not like you did! They just yelled. It was still good, though. If you see Lazerbeak, ask for a recording.”

They left, and the hallway was silent again for a while, broken only by the rhythmic sound of cleaning cloths on metal floors. Then:

“Don’t run into me! If any of this breaks, we’re going to have to reschedule the whole presentation.” That was Starscream’s voice. Just beside him was Skydive, with his arms full of datapads and charts and other stuff that Silverbolt honestly could not identify. In comparison Starscream only carried a single datapad.

When Skydive caught sight of his brothers, his faceplates lit up.

“Guess what? We’re presenting today!” he called. “You’ve got to come and watch!”

“We can’t,” said Silverbolt regretfully, because even a boring science presentation sounded better than cleaning the halls. “Prowl will murder us if we stop scrubbing.”

“So scrub the conference room,” suggested Skydive. That was actually a rather reasonable plan, and so Silverbolt and Air Raid collected up all their cleaning supplies and followed after the two—though not closely enough for someone to accuse them of not working.

Skydive chattered happily about their presentation the entire way up to the conference rooms, though honestly Silverbolt didn’t understand a word of it. That wasn’t important, though. What was important was the way Skydive’s faceplates were positively glowing with excitement.

Silverbolt wasn’t sure if he’d ever seen Skydive so happy in their entire existence.

Suddenly, without any sort of warning whatsoever, Starscream froze in the middle of the hallway. Silverbolt almost ran into him, but Air Raid managed to grab his arm in time and pull him back. For a moment, Silverbolt wondered if the seeker was glitching; his frame had gone completely still, and his optics were wide. Then Silverbolt looked to see what Starscream was staring at.

A new figure was standing just in front of the doors to the conference room, talking to Jazz and Prowl animatedly. Silverbolt knew immediately that he’d never seen this mech before in his entire life. The stranger was incredibly large, bigger than even Astrotrain or Blitzwing. He had broad white wings with red detailing, but he wore no insignia. Despite his size, he didn’t strike Silverbolt as particularly dangerous.

The mech seemed to sense he was being watched, and turned his helm in Silverbolt’s direction. Then he smiled.

There was something very kind about his blue optics.

The datapad fell out of Starscream’s servo and shattered on the ground.

Chapter Text

The klicks ticked by and Starscream remained frozen in the middle of the hallway, optics wide and mouth partway open. Behind his wings, he could hear Silverbolt and Air Raid whispering to each other in confusion.

“You dropped your datapad,” said Skyfire at last.

“I got it,” said Skydive brightly. The little Aerialbot bent down to retrieve the pieces, only to realize that he had no more room in his servos to hold anything else. “Wait. No I don’t.”

“Let me—” began Skyfire, taking a step forward. Starscream raised both arms, his null rays humming to life. Skydive made a sound of unmistakable fear, and Skyfire froze.

“Alright,” Skyfire said very quietly. “You’re still upset. I suppose that’s fair.”

Starscream didn’t move.

“I’m sorry,” whispered Skyfire.

“You’re sorry?” repeated Starscream. “Five stellar cycles—five fragging stellar cycles with no messages, no comm frequencies, no explanations, and you’re sorry?”

Skyfire’s optics dimmed with regret. “I know. I…if you put your weapons down, we can talk about it. Please.”

Starscream reached over and plucked a translucent design board out of Skydive’s arms. Then he smashed it across Skyfire’s chestplates. Skyfire gave a static-filled cry of shock.

“Star—” protested Skyfire. But Starscream wasn’t done. He grabbed the metal cleaning bucket out of Silverbolt’s servos and flung it at Skyfire’s helm. This time, the sound Skyfire made was one of legitimate pain.

“I have a presentation to make,” shrieked Starscream. “So get out of my way, you slagging moron!”

“I just want to talk,” pleaded Skyfire. A mix of dirty water and cleaning solvent was trickling down his frame.

“Why? What were you expecting?” asked Starscream, switching over to the relative privacy of their first language. “You slip away in the middle of the off-cycle without a word and when you finally deign to come back, you think everything will be fine?”

“…No.”

“You thought after five stellar cycles, I’d be so desperate for any sort of affection that I’d immediately forgive you for everything?”

“No!”

“Was that your plan all along!?”

“No! I’d never!” There was genuine hurt in the words. “Star, I didn’t leave because of you! You were the only thing that kept me on Earth for as long as I was.”

Starscream ignited his thrusters and lunged at Skyfire. Skyfire was too stunned to react, and so he did nothing when Starscream’s fist struck him directly in the faceplates with a satisfying clang. Skyfire raised his own arms in self-defense as Starscream pulled back for another blow, but before he could strike again, servos grabbed his frame and dragged him back.

Starscream looked around and was surprised to see that it was Prime who’d grabbed him. Where had the mech even come from? “Put me down!” he yelled.

“I apologize, but I cannot allow you to assault my soldiers,” said Prime evenly.

“He’s not your soldier! He’s never been anyone’s soldier!” snapped Starscream, trying to wriggle free. “Put me down!”

“Skyfire?” Now Perceptor was hurrying down the hall towards them, and Wheeljack wasn’t far behind. “It is you!”

Skyfire gave the two scientists a nod of acknowledgement. “Perceptor. Wheeljack.”

“You’re back,” said Wheeljack. “We thought—”

“Blaster sent a message into deep space a few solar cycles ago,” explained Skyfire. “I came back to see if my aid was required.”

Starscream gave Prime a good kick in the shins, and Prime set him back down at last. Starscream immediately spun around and nearly collided with Silverbolt. He shoved past the Aerialbot and started back down the hall in the direction he’d come from.

“Starscream, wait!” That was Skydive, his arms still full of materials and struggling to keep up. “What—where are you going?”

“Stop talking, will you?”

“We still have to give the presentation!”

“Shut up!”

Starscream finally arrived at his berthroom door. He punched in the code, but his servos were trembling, and it came out all wrong. He slammed his fist against the door in frustration. A few klicks later, the door slid open and Thundercracker looked down at him in confusion.

“What’s going on?” his wingmate asked. “Aren’t you supposed to be—?”

“Move,” snapped Starscream. Thundercracker did, and Starscream went inside.

“What happened?” asked Thundercracker as Starscream slumped onto the couch and rested his helm in his servos.

“Where should I put this stuff?” That was Skydive.

“Throw ’em on the floor,” advised Skywarp. When Starscream didn’t react, the black seeker frowned deeply. “Hey. I said—”

“I heard what you said,” snapped Starscream. “I don’t know what made you think I might want to hear it again.”

“What happened?” repeated Thundercracker.

Starscream said nothing. He didn’t think he was capable of explaining.

“There was a mech,” said Skydive uneasily. He looked at Starscream, as if expecting to be yelled at for sharing this information. “A new one. Transport-class. Name was...um...Sky-Set-Alight.”

Skywarp let out a string of curses that made Skydive squeak and cover his audials.

“Primus, not this again,” said Thundercracker.

“I’m gonna kill him. Where is he now?” demanded Skywarp. “I’m gonna kill him.”

“Who is he? What did he do?” asked Skydive.

“It’s a long story,” said Thundercracker.

“It’s a stupid story, is what it is,” spat Skywarp. “He’s the only mech to defect from both factions and live to tell about it. For now.”

Starscream looked up at his wingmate sharply. “He is not yours to kill.”

“I don’t care! I’m not going through this slag again!”

“Shut up!”

“Why should I?” demanded Skywarp, and Starscream found that he had no answer. He went back to staring at his servos. Why wouldn’t they stop trembling? He felt someone touch his arm comfortingly. Skydive was gazing up at him with worried blue optics.

“Did he hurt you?” asked Skydive. “I...I understood a little bit of what he said. I...he left you, didn’t he?”

Starscream turned away to stare at the wall. “It’s not important.”

“If it’s making you sad, then it is!” cried Skydive.

“I am second-in-command of the Decepticon army, commander of the air force and rightful leader of this faction!” yelled Starscream. “I do not...” his vocalizer faltered. “I don’t...”

“Seriously, let’s just kill him,” said Skywarp. “Problem solved.”

“I don’t think that’s a good way to solve problems,” said Skydive weakly.

“That’s because you don’t know any better,” explained Skywarp.

“Will you all just shut up?” demanded Starscream. “I need to go back out there and present this design.”

“You can put it off for another solar cycle, can’t you?” asked Thundercracker.

“Maybe,” said Starscream. But he wasn’t certain. What if the Quintessons attacked in the meantime? His invention could mean the difference between victory and defeat in the next battle. As tempting as it would be to lie in his berth and wait for Skyfire to turn up with a bag of energon sweets and ten thousand apologies...he had a responsibility to his soldiers.

Their lives were at stake.

Someone sent him a query ping. Megatron. Of course. If he and Skywarp got together, Skyfire would be utterly slagged.

[I’m on my way back,] said Starscream. Doubtless the other mech already knew what had happened. He’d be surprised if everyone in the base hadn’t already heard some version of the tale. [Tell everyone I...tell them I went to get something I’d forgotten.] They’d never believe it of course, but he had to at least try to save face somehow.

[Would you prefer it if my fusion cannon suddenly malfunctioned?] asked Megatron. [I can make it look accidental.]

Starscream gave a hint of a smile. [I...no. No.]

[If you’re certain.] He knew Megatron was disappointed.

[I’ll be there in a few klicks,] promised Starscream. [This changes nothing.]

He knew Megatron well enough to tell that his leader didn’t quite believe him. He’d been there when they’d unearthed Skyfire. And he’d been there the day the Victory had received a frantic call from the Ark because their best transport mech was gone, and he’d watched quietly as Starscream laughed in Prime’s faceplates because it had taken the Autobots three whole joors to realize he was missing.

And Megatron had been there in the rec room that night, sitting next to him and watching in a sort of horrified fascination as Starscream downed one cube of high-grade after another. Starscream didn’t actually remember much about that night, honestly. Except the fact that he’d alternated between hysterical laughter and hysterical crying for almost a joor until Megatron decided he’d had enough and dragged Starscream back to the room he shared with his wingmates to sleep the charge off.

They’d never talked about it. It was...weak. Un-Decepticon. Starscream had pulled himself together by the next morning, and the incident was forgotten. Mostly. Nobody said anything, but it wasn’t exactly a secret, was it? It never had been. Even Soundwave’s cassettes had been a little less annoying in the following days. He wasn’t sure if that had been out of sympathy or fear.

But he was still the SIC of the Decepticon army, and supreme commander of its’ air force. There was no time to let himself fall to pieces. Ramjet had challenged him immediately, hoping to take advantage of Starscream’s weakened state. Of course Starscream had defeated him as he had a thousand times before. And standing over Ramjet’s mangled frame, Starscream had felt immeasurably lighter. Skyfire was gone, but there was more to him than Skyfire. He’d survived nine million years without the mech. He could do it again.

Oh, there’d been whispers, as if they thought he couldn’t hear him. They said he’d gone insane, and maybe he had. A little. His memories of building the Combaticons were...fuzzy. Dreamlike. He’d readily admit he hadn’t been himself then. Megatron must have sensed it as well, to welcome him back after all the chaos had died down.

And eventually he’d returned to normal, because there was no room for nervous breakdowns in the Decepticon army. Military life had forced him to glue himself back together as quickly as possible because there were battles to plan and energon to refine and (according to Thundercracker) he was terrifying the cadets.

And now? Now there were Quintessons to worry about, as well as Autobots. In the grand scheme of things, Skyfire was not particularly important. Starscream tried to tell himself this, but he remembered the way his datapad had fallen from his servo at the sight of that familiar silhouette.

He must have looked ridiculous.

But it wasn’t Starscream’s fault. He’d endured five stellar cycles alone. Surely, surely he was entitled to a little bit of frustration? Not to mention a few punches to the faceplates? Skyfire had taken him by surprise, showing up unannounced like that. He could have at least sent a comm first.

He remembered the morning Skyfire had left. Starscream had awoken from his recharge and been surprised to find himself alone in the disused Decepticon base that had become their unofficial meeting spot. Starscream had chosen it for it’s difficult-to-find location and the fact that none of the other soldiers had the access codes. But he hadn’t been concerned by Skyfire's absence. Sometimes the Autobots needed transport at strange hours.

There’d been a datapad on the empty spot beside him on the berth, left behind by Skyfire. Starscream had reached for it, still slow and drowsy and not completely online yet...

Starscream offlined his optics to block out the memory, but it came anyway, unbidden.

Star,
You were right. I realize that now.
I'm going to spend a little bit of time off-planet. I need to think.
I love you.
I miss you already.

And Starscream, fighting down panic, had sent desperate query pings across all the old, familiar comm lines and received nothing but error messages in return.

Honestly, how could Skyfire have expected anything other than a punch in the faceplates after that?

Starscream pushed away the memory and forced himself to stand up. “I need to go back out there.”

“Are you sure?” asked Thundercracker.

“Yes,” he wasn’t. But nobody needed to know that. “Skydive, come on.”

It was a short trip back to the conference room. Too short, honestly. When Starscream arrived, everyone was already seated and Skyfire was speaking at the front of the room.

“The neutral settlements have been banding together in order to keep the invaders out of their space,” Skyfire was explaining to everyone. “So far, there have been no outright attacks, and the Quintessons allow themselves to be driven away without a fight. I believe they are simply scouting. However, their activity has set many neutral governments on edge. When I picked up Blaster’s transmission, I was surprised to hear how aggressive the Quintessons have been towards Cybertron. It does not match the reports of Quintesson activity in neutral space.”

“Have you seen the Quintesson ships?” asked Prime.

“Yes. But I believe they mistook me for non-sentient transport because they did not attack, even though I was alone. They might not have even recognized me as Cybertronian.” Skyfire seemed to sense another pair of optics watching him, and turned in Starscream’s direction. It was a little gratifying to see the surprise on his faceplates.

“I believe I have stolen the floor.” said Skyfire slowly, awkwardly. “I will file a full report as soon as I am able. In the meantime...” he stepped aside to allow Starscream and Skydive the front of the room. Skydive immediately began handing out diagrams so that Starscream wouldn't have to bother with the viewscreen. Starscream cycled his vents deeply and began speaking immediately, before he lost all control over himself again.

“As I explained earlier, the weapons that the Quintessons have been using were integral to their being able to take so many prisoners in one short attack. I believed--and I still believe--that if we were to rob them of this advantage, we would be able to defeat them with ease.”

Starscream paused for a klick. He was doing well so far. Maybe this wouldn’t be so horrible after all, if he just managed to keep himself together.

A large white blur in the back corner of the room told him that Skyfire had not left. But Starscream kept his optics locked on Soundwave. Good old emotionless Soundwave. He never reacted to anything, ever. Starscream didn’t like the mech, but right now his presence was...helpful. Stabilizing.

“Skydive has given you some diagrams that demonstrate how the Quintesson weapons interfere with our systems. Since my request for a live test subject was denied,” he shot a look at Prime, “this was artificially generated. But it should be accurate.”

He ripped his optics away from the unwavering security that was Soundwave’s visor and saw that his audience was indeed looking over the moving diagrams, which showed Cybertronian hardware systems shutting down one at a time.

“My solution,” continued Starscream, “would be to put another protective layer of armor between our outer plating and the secondary plating that protects our internals. If you go to the next screen, you can see the design I’ve drawn. If we used a material that does not conduct electricity, it could render the Quintesson weapons useless. Glass, perhaps. Or even ceramics.”

“Where would we get this material?” asked Prowl.

“I’m not sure,” admitted Starscream. “I don’t have the materials to synthesize such large quantities myself. Perhaps we could steal some from the humans.”

“Or perhaps we could purchase some from the humans,” said Prime reproachfully. Beside him, Megatron shook his head in exasperation.

“Whichever,” said Starscream. “Once I have the materials I need, I’d like to begin insulating our frontliners.”

“Can you guarantee that this won’t have a lasting effect on our systems?” Prowl sounded distrustful.

“It looks like it should be a simple process to remove it once it is no longer needed,” said Ratchet slowly. “But I would like to have a part in the installations. If you agree.”

Starscream really didn’t want to work with Autobot engineers. But he also didn’t want to have to single-handedly modify the systems of every soldier on the base. “Fine. If everyone approves, we will begin work as soon as we have the required materials.”

Sensing the questions were over, Starscream signaled for Skydive to start collecting the charts back up.

Then he all but ran back to the safety of his quarters.

Fortunately, Skywarp and Thundercracker weren’t in the common room. Starscream was grateful for that. He wasn’t sure if he was capable of handling anything they’d have to say to him. He locked himself in his room very quietly, just in case they were in their own quarters. About a breem later, there was a knock at the door to the main suite.

[It’s me,] called Skydive over the comms. [I’ve still got all the stuff.]

That was actually important, so Starscream let him in. Skydive was wisely silent as Starscream quickly shut the door behind him and then leaned up against it, wings drooping in relief.

“Um, can I do anything?” asked Skydive.

“Put those away,” directed Starscream. “We’ll begin integrating the protective measures into everyone’s frames tomorrow.” The work would be a very good distraction.

There was another knock at the door, heavier this time. Starscream froze.

“I can tell him you’re not here,” whispered Skydive.

Back in Kaon, Starscream’s suite had included a balcony for quick and easy getaways. Here, though, all he had was a window. If he folded his wings back, he might be able to squeeze through it and make his escape.

And then what?

He couldn’t run forever, Skyfire would catch up eventually. And the idea of sprinting all over Tarn just to avoid one mech while simultaneously trying to get work done was...incredibly unappealing.

Drawing in a deep vent, he opened the door.

Skyfire’s frame took up the entire doorway. Starscream forced himself to meet those familiar optics.

“Can I come in?” asked Skyfire quietly. Starscream offered a quick nod and stepped back. He noticed that Skyfire ducked his helm automatically as he passed through the doorway, even though this one—like all the doorways in Decepticon bases—actually was tall enough to accommodate him.

Starscream reached around Skyfire (it still felt so strange to be so close to him) and shut the door behind them. “This way,” he said, leading Skyfire through the messy common room and into his berthroom. Skydive was there, putting away all the charts and diagrams from the presentation. He very deliberately didn’t look at the two older aerials as he worked.

Starscream went over to his workbench. Skydive was meticulously organized, which had been nice at first, but now he had trouble finding the things that he needed. He sat down and began moving things around just to give his servos something to do, optics locked on the blank wall in front of him.

“Will you say something?” pleaded Skyfire.

Starscream tilted his helm to the side, not taking his optics off the wall. "Skydive, if I turn around and see you're climbing those shelves, we are going to have a problem."

From behind him, there was an awkward thump that was assuredly not caused by Skydive hastily jumping back down to the ground.

"And that's speaking from experience, isn't it?" asked Skyfire with a hint of a smile in his voice.

"I—" Starscream froze up. "That was different. That was your fault."

"Was it?" Skyfire was trying desperately to sound innocent.

"Yes it was and you know damn well—" Starscream got up and spun around, stopping only as he realized that he'd just given Skyfire exactly what he wanted: a genuine reaction. His vocalizer went silent again. “Just leave. Go find your Autobot friends. Maybe one of them will even remember your designation!”

“Stop,” said Skyfire.

“Make me!”

The two stared at each other for a long moment.

“Star, I—”

“Don’t.”

“I l—”

“Don’t!”

“We can’t spend the rest of the crisis like this,” said Skyfire.

“I can!”

“Alright, yes,” granted Skyfire. “You probably can. But I can’t, and neither can anyone else. Do you really want Prime and Megatron deciding they need to get involved?”

Starscream choked on a horrified laugh. Prime would probably order them to hug.

“I knew that I was wrong to leave without telling anyone,” said Skyfire. “Don’t think I thought what I was doing was justified. I didn’t. But I wanted to be selfish. I wanted to do something for myself. And…and I wanted to know if someone cared enough to come after me.”

“You’re an idiot,” said Starscream brokenly.

“But nobody did, of course.” Skyfire gave a humorless laugh. “And you know, most days, I actually preferred it that way? Oh, I had a very impressive speech prepared for the first mech who tracked me down. But honestly, after a few stellar cycles, I didn’t want to be found anymore.”

Starscream gave a bitter laugh. “How very nice for you.”

“Don’t think I didn’t miss you,” said Skyfire in a softer voice. “Don’t think I didn’t wish you were with me.”

“You didn’t ask me to come.”

“You never would have agreed,” said Skyfire.

“You don’t know that! You don’t know that because you never bothered to ask!”

Skyfire just gazed at him sadly.

"Uh, I can leave," said Skydive awkwardly. Starscream had almost forgotten the younger mech was even there. "Actually, you know what? I'm gonna leave. Because...because Bolt's calling me and I'm late for flight practice which I just remembered about now and I think I left the dispenser in my quarters turned on. No, wait, the washracks. So you just...yeah..." He ran out of the room, tripping over his own pedes and slamming into the doorframe for good measure.

"He's actually quite intelligent," said Starscream in a neutral tone.

"I don’t think you’d let him in here if he wasn’t," said Skyfire. He hesitated. “Are there any security cameras in here?”

“No.”

“Good.” Skyfire crossed the distance between them in two quick steps and wrapped his arms around Starscream. Starscream felt his own arms automatically moving to return the embrace.

“I missed you so much,” whispered Skyfire, drawing Starscream to his chassis. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

“Why can’t you ever just stay gone?” Starscream asked weakly.

Now Skyfire was stroking his helm, his faceplates. “I should never have left.”

“You’re right! You shouldn’t have!” Starscream yanked back, free of Skyfire’s arms. “But you did because the only one you really care about is yourself!”

“I love you.”

“Do you think that if you say that often enough, it will fix everything? You’re wrong. You keep—” Starscream punched him in the chassis with all his strength, “—hurting—me!”

Skyfire leaned down and kissed him. Starscream felt his arms go weak, felt his resistance drain away. It had been such a long time...

Skyfire broke the kiss after a long moment. “I missed you.”

“I thought they’d captured you,” Starscream managed to gasp out. “I was...I was so worried, I thought...”

“Missed you so much…” Skyfire whispered, one of his large servos going to the glass over Starscream’s spark plating, teasing the seams. “Love you.”

It was hard to stay angry when Skyfire was here, real and alive and pressed up against him, blocking out the rest of the universe and whispering things that Starscream hadn’t heard in so, so long...

His spark chamber slid open after only a few soft touches, reflecting blue light back onto Skyfire’s faceplates. Skyfire knelt down to caress the orb of light with gentle fingers, sending pulses of warmth and joy straight to Starscream’s processors.

Then suddenly, a new voice cut through the blissful haze:

“I’d hoped you had more self-respect than this,” said Thundercracker.

Starscream snapped his chestplates closed so quickly that Skyfire almost lost a digit.

Chapter Text

“I was there,” bragged Rumble, keeping his voice low, just in case. Silverbolt and the Aerialbots all leaned in closer to listen to the story. “Frenzy can tell you. I was there. It was me and Skywarp, digging through the ice.”

Silverbolt and Air Raid’s fight had apparently been forgotten in favor of Skyfire’s arrival and the news he carried. Though to be honest, Silverbolt was less interested in his report on Quintesson activity in Neutral space and far more curious about whatever it was that had prompted Starscream to throw things at his helm.

Fortunately, Rumble and Frenzy were happy to oblige. And so they sat in the nursery and, while Ravage was petted and cooed over by the sparklings, the twins relayed the tale.

Silverbolt hadn’t understood the Vosian words that Skyfire and Starscream had had traded in the hallway. While his language packs were installed, the two older mechs had been speaking too quickly for him to comprehend. But Skydive had understood. And when he finally returned from Starscream’s quarters (slightly traumatized), he shared what he knew with his brothers.

Sometimes Silverbolt had wondered about the mysterious shuttle that had inhabited the Aerialbots’ quarters before them. He’d never been curious enough to ask Ratchet or Wheeljack about him, and had sort of assumed the mech had been offlined in battle.

“—when we realized it was a mech! There was a mech frozen in the ice,” Rumble was saying. “We didn’t know what the frag to do. But that was when Screamer showed up to yell at us, ’cause he’s a glitch. I wish we’d gotten an image capture of the look on his faceplates when he realized…”

“So, how did Skyfire get in the ice?” asked Silverbolt.

“He’d been there for millions of years,” said Rumble. “He was pre-war. When we woke him up—he wasn’t dead, somehow—he was speaking in this weird old dialect and thought Sentinel was still Prime. And Starscream had this whole story about how they’d been out looking for energy sources and Skyfire had gotten lost in the storm and the Senate had refused to send a rescue mission.”

“Wasn’t our first time hearing the story, actually,” said Frenzy, nudging his twin. Silverbolt had always thought of the pair as interchangeably loud, obnoxious, and violent. But it turned out that Frenzy was a little quieter, and willing to let his brother speak for them both.

“That’s right! Back ages ago, when Starscream first joined the ’cons—wait, no. Let me start from the beginning.” Rumble frowned, trying to focus. “We were all in Kaon. Soundwave’s job was monitoring the city for any infiltrators, cuz sometimes the Senate would try to send mechs in. Then one day, all the alarms start going off at once. And so I looked at the viewscreens, and there was an unregistered seeker had just entered Kaon airspace. And behind him, heading for the city fast, were six Enforcers!”

Silverbolt knew that the Enforcers used to be the police force back on Cybertron before the war. They’d kept the peace, but also served the Senate. Prowl had been an Enforcer. But that was a long time ago.

“Our soldiers finished off the Enforcers alright. I think even mechs who weren’t on duty joined in to pound on them because nobody’d had a good fight in half a stellar cycle. And then, once that was over, everyone turned to look at the seeker who’d brought them. Everyone wanted to know what the slag. And so he started babbling out some story that nobody even heard because they were all too busy laughing about his voice.

“But Soundwave...he listens. And Megs was curious. So Soundwave got Starscream all calmed down, and Starscream told him that he was a recent Academy graduate from Iacon. We didn’t believe him, of course. But he had the glyphs on his arm to prove it. He said he’d just been accused of murdering his partner. He swore he was innocent. But to be honest, nobody really cared if he was or wasn’t. He seemed to realize it, too, because he never mentioned it again. And soon, the only thing anyone remembered was the six enforcers and the big old fight.”

“When did you realize he and Skyfire...had a thing?” asked Skydive.

Rumble gave an awkward laugh. “Not until after the the Arctic, when we got to Earth. We uncovered him, and he joined up with us. And I dunno what happened, exactly, but then he left and joined the Autodorks instead.”

“What did Starscream do when he found out?” asked Air Raid eagerly.

“Only tried to fragging offline him!” said Rumble, clearly pleased that Air Raid had asked. “They had it out, right there in front of both factions and the squishies, too. And it wasn’t like a challenge. I think they were actually trying to offline each other. That’s what it looked like from where we were standing, anyway. It was a great fight! In the end, they both grounded each other. Starscream was hurt pretty bad, but Skyfire wound up back in the ice. The Autobots dug him out a few days later, and he started doin’ science or whatever for them. And it was like that for a few stellar cycles. Normal. Or.” Rumble shrugged. “As normal as things have ever been since we woke up on that stupid mudball.”

“But then he left,” said Skydive. “He left Earth.”

“Yeah. Dunno what happened, Soundwave thinks it had something to do with the other Autobot scientists. But who knows, right? Anyway, Screamer sorta...”

“Fried his processer,” said Frenzy helpfully.

“Yeah,” said Rumble. “Sorta...felt bad for him. A little. Just ’cause he was such a mess. Like it was funny…except it wasn’t. Even Megs went easy on him for a while. And then after a while, stuff went back to normal. And we built the Stunties, and the Autodorks built you glitches, and now we’re all here. The end.”

Fireflight applauded.

“That’s insane,” said Silverbolt.

“Hey, you didn’t have to live through it,” said Rumble. Then he suddenly looked thoughtful, which was not something Silverbolt had realized that the little cassette was even capable of. “Don’t tell anyone it was us that told you, okay?”

“We won’t,” promised Silverbolt.

“I’m glad Skyfire’s here. Nobody remembers we’re supposed to be on punishment duty, because they’re all busy worrying about him,” opinioned Air Raid.

“We even got assigned to our first patrol!” said Slingshot eagerly. “It was on the roster this morning. We wouldn’t have known if Windsong hadn’t said something to us. We thought we weren’t allowed to do anything fun.”

“That’s cuz you had a challenge,” said Frenzy knowledgably. “You’re not bitlets anymore.”

“Why didn’t anyone tell us all we had to do was get in a fight, and we’d get an assignment?” demanded Air Raid. “We’ve been doing nothing for days!”

The cassette twins exchanged looks.

“Dunno,” said Rumble at last. “Just thought it was obvious.”

Silverbolt actually was looking forward to flying next shift. Playing in the skies with his brothers was nice, but he liked the feeling of responsibility that came with actually doing something important.

Air Raid did have a point though. It was slightly irritating to realize that all it would have taken to get the elder seekers to take them seriously was some infighting. It was a little ridiculous, honestly. And no matter how Prowl worried, Silverbolt didn’t think that part of himself would ever change.

Air partrol shifts were assigned in trines, and the assignment had originally been for only Silverbolt, Air Raid, and Fireflight. Skydive had no problem with being left out, because he was spending all his time helping Starscream with his weird internal armor project. But Slingshot had been upset. Luckily, Thundercracker had agreed to make an exception for the team.

The Aerialbots went to the rec room for their midday energon rations. Silverbolt had never really noticed it before, but his team never sat with any of the other Autobots. Even back on Earth, they’d sometimes mingled with the Protectobots, but otherwise kept to themselves. Part of the reason was, of course, the Aerialbot team took up a whole table by themselves.

But looking around the rec room now, Silverbolt wondered if that would have been true if the team had been brought online among the Decepticons instead. Okay, the Stunticons were stupid glitches, but they also seemed sort of fun. Slingshot had reportedly had a conversation with Dead End, and afterwards deemed the mech to be “alright.”

Maybe Silverbolt just needed to sit on Motormaster for a few breems and then they’d all be friends.

There were some Autobots that Silverbolt knew the team would never be friends with. Sunstreaker and Sideswipe, for example. Those two were sick, with their wing fixation. Some of the other frontliners weren’t too much better. The majority of the minibots were downright hostile, though Bumblebee and Beachcomber were always nice. And the Dinobots weren’t ones for conversation, and didn’t have much esteem for anyone who didn’t turn into a dinosaur, but they were still more tolerable than Powerglide.

But to the majority of the Ark, the Aerialbots were still sparklings. And maybe Silverbolt had forced a few perceptions to shift over the last few days, but that didn’t necessarily mean their situation was improving.

Secretly, he was afraid it might be getting worse.

Silverbolt knew he should probably apologize to Prowl for everything and start making an active effort to not appear to be allying his team with the Decepticon aerials. But now Windsong was waving the team over to his trine’s table. And Silverbolt found that he really wanted to sit with the seekers.

So they went over and sat down, nabbing chairs from other tables in the process. As usual, the topic of conversation was Skyfire. His sudden entrance had certainly left an impression, and all three seekers wanted to hear about how Starscream had wrenched the bucket of solvent out of Silverbolt’s hands and flung it at Skyfire’s helm at point-blank distance.

“It, uh, wasn’t the only thing he threw,” said Silverbolt. All the seekers nodded sagely.

“He’s a very throw-ey mech,” said Moonrise.

“Ranged attacks,” supplied Bladewing, which made Moonrise laugh.

“Were you guys there when they dug him out of the ice?” asked Air Raid. Windsong shook his helm.

“No, that was before we got assigned to Earth. We were all in deep stasis on Cybertron. I feel bad for Shockwave. He actually had to sit around doing nothing for four million years.”

“Shockwave did secret things,” said Moonrise. “It’s a secret that everyone knows.”

“But we were here when he left Earth,” continued Windsong. “The Commander took it pretty hard. I think they’d been meeting, or trading information, or something. If he was, there’s no way Soundwave and Lord Megatron didn’t know. But I don’t think anyone cared, because there was no way he’d actually give the Autobots anything useful. He might have been into Skyfire, but he hates Autobots.”

“We know,” said Skydive.

“Right?” agreed Windsong. “I mean, he backstabs Megatron a lot and makes a lot of noise about being the rightful leader of the Decepticons—”

“If you ever hear Starscream say the words ‘rightful leader of the Decepticons’, you have to take a shot,” interrupted Bladewing.

“—but I don’t think he really means it half the time. He cares about the faction. You can tell he does. I don’t think he’d betray us. Not to the Autobots.”

“To himself,” said Moonrise.

Silverbolt glanced at his chronometer. “It’s almost time for our patrol,” he said. “We’d better be going, or we’ll be late.”

“And then we’ll never get an assignment again,” grumbled Slingshot.

“Don’t get captured!” joked Bladewing. Silverbolt waved a servo at him in exasperation, and the team (sans Skydive) left.

The weather was good, and Cybertron’s atmosphere made for light, easy flying. The route was fairly simple, just a large loop around the boundaries of the city. It was the same circuit that all the air patrols were flying. Boring, but simple.

They flew at an unhurried pace. Silverbolt noticed that Fireflight was drifting out of formation yet again, but his mood was too good to correct his brother. Besides, Fireflight would always be…well, Fireflight.

Cybertron’s surface got darker as they moved further and further away from base, but Silverbolt’s sensors didn’t mind. He could still pick up movement—

Like that little one, down on the surface.

[Hey, did you—?] began Air Raid and Slingshot at the exact same moment.

[Yeah,] said Silverbolt, banking hard. [Let’s go check it out.]

They found a space on the ground clear of any wreckage to land. It was so dark that Silverbolt’s optics might as well have been offline. He tried very hard not to think of Quintessons towering in the darkness. Over the gestalt link, he could feel his brothers were equally nervous. He tried to send back a pulse of reassurance, but it was difficult to give something that he did not have.

Silverbolt reached out with his sensors again, expanding his field as far as it could go. Yes, there was something there. A tiny life sign, flashing fast. He wondered for a moment if it was a dying Cybertronian.

He took a few cautious pedesteps in the thing’s direction, acutely aware that if he’d just let Air Raid win the challenge, then it would be Air Raid who’d be standing here in his place. But he pushed the thought away as quickly as it had come. He didn’t regret winning. He didn’t regret the respect it had gained him, and the entire team.

There was a flash of movement, and Silverbolt’s spark nearly stopped beating. Slingshot gave a sharp yelp of surprise. They all saw something very small dart from the shadows for the briefest nanoklik before it vanished into the wreckage with a clatter. The way it moved reminded Silverbolt of Ravage.

“Turbofox,” said Air Raid in a quavering voice. “Mirage talks about them sometimes. They’re like…animals.”

Silverbolt waited for his sparkbeat to return to normal before responding. “Okay. I, uh. Okay. Learning experience for everyone. Let’s get back in the air. Fireflight, where—? Frag.”

“He’s gone again?” Slingshot sounded outraged.

“Keep your voice down,” said Silverbolt anxiously. [Hey, Flight? Where are you?]

There was no response from the comm. But over the bond, the three received simultaneous pulses of fear-worry-guilt-fear-fear-FEAR.

“Oh no,” whispered Silverbolt. He leapt into the air, transforming as he went and trusting that his brothers were close behind him. At the same time, he reached deeper into the bond, searching for the familiar spark that was Fireflight. As he flew onward, the pulse grew stronger. He cast his sensors in all directions, desperate.

[Bolt?] asked Air Raid anxiously. [What if…?]

[NO TALKING!] shrieked Silverbolt. He hadn’t meant for it to come out like that, but his nerves were finally getting the better of him.

[Nice Starscream impression,] sneered Slingshot. Silverbolt sent across a few short pulses of apology-guilt.

Maybe everyone had been right. Maybe the Aerialbots were just babies. Maybe they were…how had Starscream put it? ‘More of a liability than an asset.’ Maybe…

He was being irrational. Now was not the time for self-pity. Now was the time to rescue Fireflight. Hopefully from a petrorabbit. And then the team could say they’d seen a petrorabbit, as well as a turbofox. Wouldn’t Skydive be jealous?

Silverbolt was aware that his asinine thoughts were nothing more than a cover for his own growing fear, but he clung to them desperately. He could feel himself trembling.

When the familiar signature of his wayward brother finally, finally popped up on his sensors, Silverbolt could have cried with relief. But joy quickly turned to horror when Silverbolt transformed in the air and looked down at the ground below. The area was lit by an eerie purple-red light that was emanating from some unusual looking lantern-style things.

The first thing Silverbolt noticed was Fireflight, sprawled out on the ground. Unfortunately, he was not alone. Three green Quintesson warriors were gathered around his fallen frame. Then, as one, they turned their ugly helms to look up at the remaining Aerialbots.

[Oh no,] whimpered Air Raid.

Silverbolt opened a comm line to base quickly as he could. [We need help! We found Quintessons! Fireflight’s down!]

[Coordinates?] That was Soundwave’s monotone. Silverbolt sent them across in a quick databurst, then transformed back into altmode to blast out of the Quintesson’s shooting range.

[Remain calm,] advised Soundwave, and did his voice have a little bit less of a monotone to it than it had a moment ago? [Reinforcements have been dispatched.]

Silverbolt hadn’t given any orders, but Air Raid was starting to open fire on the ground.

[Stop that! You’ll hit Fireflight!] Silverbolt shouted. He was…he was really too high. Really. Too high. Why hadn’t he noticed before? He swooped down a bit lower, for safety.

[Bolt, what are you doing?] yelled Air Raid. [Frag it, you better not be having a panic attack.]

Panic attack? Psh. No. No. Nononono. What was there even to panic about? Just…just had to get a little closer to the ground. Safer. And nearer to Fireflight.

Fireflight.

Silverbolt switched off his thrusters and hit the surface hard. This time, he was prepared for the shock of pain through his pedes, and he didn’t lose his balance. Instead, he spun around with one servo already clenched into a fist and hit the nearest Quintesson in the face.

The others scrambled back, calling to each other in their harsh and ugly language. Silverbolt glanced down at Fireflight. His optics were offline, and he wasn’t moving.

“Can you hear me?” Silverbolt asked. A weak little pulse of guilt-fear-love was his only response. “Okay. That’s okay. We—”

A flash made Silverbolt look back up. He saw one of the Quintessons raise his silver weapon, the long barrel gleaming magenta in the strange light.

He saw the bolt of white, crackling energy hurtling towards him.

He felt—

Nothing.

* * *

Someone was speaking in a language he couldn’t understand. Silverbolt was faintly aware that the haze over his processor was beginning to dissipate. He sent the command to online his optics, and this time it actually worked.

His entire frame ached, and he couldn’t seem to move. His comm lines were gone. He wasn’t sure if he could transform. As his vision cleared, he realized he was in a very small room, standing upright, and shackled against a wall. He tried to turn his helm, but the commands seemed to get lost somewhere between his processor and his frame.

In front of him was a gigantic mech. No, not a mech! A Quintesson with five faces! Silverbolt couldn’t feel much, but there was no mistaking the chill that went through his spark.

He reached out for his brothers, and received faint echoes of acknowledgement from Air Raid, Slingshot, and Fireflight. Skydive was…too far away to reach? What?

They weren’t on Cybertron anymore.

The egg-shaped Quintesson stopped speaking, and Silverbolt tried to move again. This time, his helm turned. Chained to the grey wall beside him was Air Raid. And on his other side…

Thundercracker?

The Quintesson began to leave, but Silverbolt booted up his vocalizer and yelled, “Hey!”

The nearest face, which was ugly and wide, looked a little bit surprised. “You address me, slave?”

“Rude,” Silverbolt heard Fireflight say faintly from somewhere nearby.

“Where are we?” asked Silverbolt. “Where are you taking us?”

The Quintesson rotated on his beam of light so now a different face was looking at the young shuttle. This one was ugly, too, but skinny. And it sort of looked like it had facial hair, even though hair was a thing that only organics had.

“You are their guardian?” sneered one of the other faces. It was the one that was looking at Thundercracker. His tone made it clear that he knew that this would be interpreted as an insult.

“Where are you taking us?” responded Thundercracker, not showing any reaction.

“This ship is bound for Quintessa, where you will all be reeducated,” said the Quintesson. “You have all forgotten your intended function.”

“You mean looking after Quintesson newsparks and chasing down your enemies?” spat Thundercracker, surprising Silverbolt with his vehemence.

All five faces laughed in turn, which was something Silverbolt never wanted to experience again. Then the Quintesson left, sealing the door behind him.

“This is Silverbolt’s fault,” Air Raid announced to the tiny, featureless room.

“That’s enough,” said Thundercracker firmly.

“It really is, though,” continued Air Raid, as if Thundercracker hadn’t spoken. “He walked right up to them and—”

“Hey. Winglet. Shut the frag up. Grown-ups are trying to plan.” That was Skywarp’s voice! Was he here too? Who else had been captured?

“It’s just us,” said Thundercracker quietly, accurately interpreting the expression on Silverbolt’s faceplates. “You missed quite a battle. Unfortunately, they had backup. We didn’t realize it until…”

“I’m sorry,” said Silverbolt. He heard Air Raid mutter something that sounded a lot like “you oughta be.”

“What’s done is done,” said Thundercracker. “Now we need to figure out a way to get free. Be damned if I let them install slave programming in you bitlets. Skywarp, how many of them can you take with you?”

“I’m not leaving you,” Skywarp hissed immediately.

“Skywarp,” said Thundercracker heavily. “I’m serious.”

“So am I! You think I can’t be serious?” Skywarp sounded enraged. Thundercracker glanced away, and Skywarp added something in Vosian. Silverbolt caught the words ‘not leaving you with these monsters’ and Thundercracker replied with something that included ‘have to protect the winglets’ before Skywarp went quiet again.

“Just one,” said Skywarp at last. “I need to warp once just to get out of these chains. And then I don’t think I’ll be able to take more than one other with me. I’ll be drained enough as it is.”

“Take Fireflight, then,” said Silverbolt immediately. Fireflight was radiating fear across their shared bond. Of the four of them, he would be the least capable of handling whatever the Quintessons threw at them next.

“No! I don’t want to be alone!” cried Fireflight.

“Take Fireflight,” Air Raid agreed quietly.

“Don’t I get a say?” wailed Fireflight, only to be ignored by everyone.

“Do it now,” said Thundercracker quietly. “Before it’s too late.”

There was a popping sound, and out of the corner of his optic Silverbolt saw a flash of purple. A moment later, the black seeker moved into his line of vision.

“Look after Star,” said Thundercracker. “And…I love you.”

“Love you,” Skywarp echoed, pressing a quick kiss to Thundercracker’s cheek. Then ran past Silverbolt to gather Fireflight into his arms. Silverbolt heard Fireflight give a wail of protest, but then there was another flash of purple light, and the room was silent once more.

Silverbolt looked back at Thundercracker.

“I don’t suppose you can combine?” the elder seeker asked quietly.

“Not without Skydive,” said Silverbolt. “Even if we could raise Superion with just the three of us, he can’t stand on one leg.”

“Frag,” muttered Thundercracker. “Well, that’s—”

The Quintessons burst in a moment later, yelling to each other in their indecipherable language. There were some warriors, and the Magistrate was back, and there was also a new sort of Quintesson mixed in with the group. These ones were larger than the soldiers, with immense thick frames and olive-green skin. They wore heavy armor with shoulder spikes, and carried large hammer-like weapons. They sort of reminded Silverbolt of security guards. There was barely enough room for everyone in the tiny cell.

“Where did they go?” the Magistrate’s ugliest face bellowed at Thundercracker.

“Away,” said Thundercracker unhelpfully.

The Magistrate made a sound of rage, and a set of wiry tentacles emerged from his body. They wrapped themselves around Thundercracker’s neck. Thundercracker just bit his lower lipplate stubbornly. Then the tentacles unwound, only to reach for his wings. Silverbolt watched two of them wrap themselves around each of Thundercracker’s wing-tips and tighten.

A few klicks passed, and Thundercracker finally cried out in pain. The Magistrate was clearly pleased by this reaction, because he raised two more tentacles threateningly. Thundercracker made a choking sound.

“They’re gone, they’re gone!” snarled Thundercracker at last. “They teleported halfway to Cybertron, and you’ll never catch up with them, so don’t bother trying.”

The Quintesson made a sound of dark amusement, but he released his grip and drifted back. His faces rotated again, though Silverbolt was not certain why.

“The black seeker was an aberration,” the Magistrate said at last. “But one that can be made to serve the Quintesson empire. When he is recaptured, we will not be so lax.”

Thundercracker said nothing in reply, but Silverbolt admired the hardness in his optics.

Silverbolt reached out for Fireflight. He could just barely sense his brother, which meant that they were a significant distance away. Silverbolt hoped that the two were flying as fast as they could towards Cybertron.

::Please be safe,:: he thought at his brother as hard as he could. And he thought he sensed a little twinge of acknowledgement and love in response, but maybe that was just his imagination.

Chapter Text

“You are all the most pathetic excuse for soldiers I have ever seen in my entire military career!” Starscream screeched.

The assorted group of seekers all looked back up at their Air Commander in quiet misery. Not even Ramjet appeared to be able to work up the nerve to answer back. The battle had been a disaster, and the losses—Thundercracker, Skywarp, and the remainder of the Aerialbots—were devastating.

“Don’t yell at them, Star,” said Skyfire reproachfully. “They were fighting without any sort of protection against—”

“Shut up, Skyfire!” Starscream spun around to face his ex-partner, optics blazing with rage. It was only the fact that Skydive was sobbing against the comforting warmth of Skyfire’s huge chassis that saved him from a blow. “There is literally nothing in this universe that you could say that is of any interest to me at this moment! If you want to be useful, take Skydive to medbay!”

Skyfire didn’t argue, and Starscream was almost relieved to see him go. Later, they’d have to talk about Skyfire’s impulse to contradict Starscream in front of the troops.

“As of right now, nobody is to leave this base until they have been outfitted with the proper internal armor,” said Starscream. “Air patrols are cancelled, and I am going to advise the same for the grounders. Be ready to report to the labs. You’re all dismissed.”

The aerials all fled. Starscream raised both servos to his helm. Skywarp…he’d be back. There was no way the Quintessons could hold Skywarp. And then? Starscream wasn’t certain. But he’d come up with a plan; he always did.

They’d been in worse situations than this, after all.

[Got some bad news, folks,] that was Blaster, over the private comm lines to all the commanding officers on base. [Prime, you’re not gonna like this.]

[Formal response from the Galactic Council: Received,] explained Soundwave.

[What did they say?] that was Prime's voice.

[I explained the Quintesson situation to them in detail,] said Blaster. [The reply was…short. One word, actually. The Chair of the Galactic Peacekeeping Force says…are you ready for this? ‘Good.’]

The comm line was silent.

[I am very disappointed to hear that,] said Prime at last.

[The personal clerk to the Chair of the Galactic Peacekeeping Force added a—let’s call it a personal annotation to the message,] continued Blaster with a sort of morbid glee. [He says, ‘I sincerely hope they melt the lot of you down for scrap.’]

[Organics. I told you that contacting them would be a waste of time,] said Megatron in disgust.

[There’s more,] said Blaster. [The Council Spokesperson has expressed the sentiment that we’ve had this coming for ages, the Primary Aide to the First Councilmember would like to assure us that nobody will miss us when we’re gone, and the Third Councilmember has requested that we help her to identify the chief commander of all Quintesson military operations so that he or she may be awarded a medal of valor.]

Starscream disconnected from the line. He’d known appealing to the organics was a stupid idea, but the Autobots had loved the plan. Apparently the Autobots had been operating under the delusion that every other intelligent species in the galaxy didn’t hate Cybertronians, regardless of faction.

Starscream opened a channel to the Combaticons. [Swindle, tell me the materials are here,] he said. [I can’t take any more bad news.]

[We’re in the atrium!] came the overly-cheerful response. [You’re gonna love this, trust me, I—]

Starscream tried to push his worries and fears about the Aerialbots (and his trinemates, to a lesser degree) out of his processor as he hurried to see what Swindle had come up with. The entire Combaticon team was waiting for him at the entrance to the space bridge, and with them were countless gigantic wooden crates. Each was stamped with the familiar logo of a stylized image of the head of a venomous organic in red ink.

“You went to those lunatics?” demanded Starscream, pointing at the insignia on the nearest crate.

“Sorry Screamer, but when you give me six hours’ notice for five hundred pounds of rubber, there’s only so much I can do.” Swindle rubbed his servos together, “Now, I’ve got an invoice here for—”

“You’ll be paid after every crate has been delivered to Shockwave’s labs,” snapped Starscream. “I don’t know if you heard, but we’re in the middle of a crisis.”

“When are we not?” muttered Blast Off. Starscream ignored this and hurried in the direction of the labs. This project was too big for him to conduct in the privacy of his own quarters and, as much as he hated to admit it, he would need the help of the other Autobot scientists.

When he arrived in Shockwave’s lab, he found that the Autobot scientists were already assembled and ready to work. Gigantic shears rested on each table, along with holographic projections of the internals of different frame-types.

“Where do you want this slag?” asked Onslaught from behind him, transforming in order to deposit a pile of crates on the floor.

“Right there’s fine,” said Wheeljack, who apparently had no issue with a mountain of boxes blocking the only exit.

“What materials will we be utilizing?” asked Perceptor. “I have started work on the intergration codes, but I need to know the exact substances we will be placing in the frames.”

“It’s rubber,” said Starscream. “Ceramics turned out to be too expensive, and I think I was overcharged when I suggested glass.”

Wheeljack opened up one of the crates and withdrew a rolled-up bolt of rubber. “I hope this works. Who’s our first test subject?”

“I believe that Motormaster has volunteered,” said Perceptor. “And his systems are similar enough to Prime’s that we should be able to simply duplicate our results, should they be favorable.”

Hoist and Grapple laid out the sheet of rubber on one of the long lab tables, and Greenlight changed the projections to show the internal specs of a mech with a truck alt-mode. Then she turned the projector so that the image was cast upon the rubber instead.

Wheeljack unsubspaced a stylus and began marking the rubber sheet with thick black lines, using the projection to create a stencil of the most important components in the system. When he was done, Greenlight took the projector away and Wheeljack lifted up the enormous shears.

Starscream had to admit that he was a little impressed by how well the Autobots all worked together. Even the Constructicons tended to bicker over details, and they were a gestalt. But here, the peaceful silence was punctuated by only the occasional soft laugh.

Over at the computer terminal, Perceptor was working on the coding that would allow the Cybertronians to wear the internal armor without causing their processors to think their frames were suffering from some sort of critical meltdown. Starscream sat down in the empty chair beside him and watched Perceptor work.

Once, a very long time ago, Starscream would have been nearly incoherent with anxiety and glee to work alongside Perceptor. But now, as he offered quiet opinions and suggested modifications to the code he felt oddly serene. It had been too long since he’d been in a proper scientific environment.

Suddenly, Perceptor set his datapad down, though he did not avert his gaze from the console screen.

“I would like to apologize,” said Perceptor quietly.

Starscream looked at the little microscope, uncertain. On the other side of the room, the other Autobots were still laughing about something. Wheeljack was threatening Lancer with his ink-stylus.

“I am aware that I played a small part in driving Skyfire away from Earth,” continued Perceptor. “And, as you indicated to me a few solar cycles ago, I have been complicit in the dissemination of harmful pre-war stereotypes.”

“Is this a joke?” asked Starscream.

“I seldom joke.” Perceptor made optical contact with him at last. “Your efforts to educate Skydive have been…admirable. I honestly never considered him as a candidate for work in the labs.”

Starscream was saved from having to come up with a reply because Motormaster chose that moment to kick the doors open like the overexcited youngling that he was. After being sharply reprimanded, the Stunticon was ordered to sit on one of the tables and remove his outer armor.

The rubber cut-out was like a human-style poncho. It slipped over Motormaster’s helm and covered all his delicate internal wires and gears, as well as his spark casing.

“Hey, I don’t like this. It feels weird,” complained Motormaster as the Autobots helped him put his outer plating back on. “Everything’s all…fuzzy. Lumpy. Can’t I wear it over top, instead of underneath?”

“That would be giving away our only advantage,” said Starscream impatiently.

“Well, can I at least take it off now?” Motormaster’s tone made it clear that if the answer was no, he just might do it anyway. “Primus, this sucks.”

“You may remove it in just a moment,” said Starscream, unsubspacing the Quintesson weapon. Motormaster jumped back. “For now, please hold still.”

“Hey! No way! Forget this, I unvolunteer—”

Starscream fired. The shot went directly into Motormaster’s chestplate. Motormaster made a sound of rage, which weakened to an admittedly pathetic whine when he realized he was completely unharmed, save for a slightly-blackened spot on his chassis.

A hearty cheer went up around the lab, and Starscream allowed himself a little smile. He’d known the theory was sound, but the expression on Motormaster’s faceplates was satisfying as well.

Perceptor made up a list of mechs who would need the new internal armor, in order of rank and priority. Starscream was concerned about his aerial units. He wasn’t sure there was enough room under seeker wing-plating for a layer of rubber, no matter how thinly they sliced it. And even if there was, would his soldiers be able to fly? Transforming was out of the question even for the grounders…

Starscream grabbed a nearby drafting board and pulled up standard seeker schematics. His soldiers had an array of alt-modes, but their systems were all basically the same.

And what about Astrotrain and Blitzwing? And even Skyfire? They were more useful in their alt-modes. Should he design for that? Or was there a way to make the rubber armor work with the transformation sequence? Starscream was hesitant to even draw up a sketch. If something went wrong, if a loose piece got lost somewhere in somebody’s frame…

He was aware of the other scientists, one by one, bidding him goodnight. But it wasn’t until he felt a large, warm servo on his shoulder-vent and looked into familiar blue optics that he realized just how late it was.

“You need to recharge,” said Skyfire reproachfully. He had an energon cube in one servo. Starscream glanced around. The lab was utterly deserted.

“I lost six warriors today,” Starscream retorted. “What I need is to figure out this design.”

“Punishing yourself isn’t going to make anything any better,” said Skyfire, pushing the cube into Starscream's servos firmly. Starscream downed the entire thing in one gulp, just to silence the larger mech. He was aware of Skyfire pulling him into his arms, but was too tired to try to get away. “Come on. Everyone else is recharging. You can finish those tomorrow.”

“I—I should have been there!” But Skyfire’s arms felt nice around him.

“I’m still angry at you,” mumbled Starscream, in case the shuttle was getting the wrong idea.

“I know. I know.” Skyfire began walking him back towards his quarters. “And you deserve to be.”

“Fragging right I do. I…” Starscream stumbled in exhaustion, but Skyfire caught him. Starscream automatically pressed himself against Skyfire’s side. “I built a gestalt.”

“You—what?”

“I built a gestalt. By myself. On an island.”

Skyfire made a soft sound of disbelief.

“I did! You don’t believe me? I’ll introduce you in the morning…” Starscream went quiet again, savoring the warmth of Skyfire’s frame. “Just wait. You’ll see.”

They made it back to Starscream’s quarters without incident. It was disturbingly quiet without Skywarp and Thundercracker…but perhaps there could be advantages to that as well.

Starscream hadn’t lied when he’d said he was still angry at Skyfire. But that didn’t mean he hadn’t spent the entire previous night-cycle frustrated by Thundercracker’s impolite interruption, and it certainly didn’t mean that he didn’t plan to make up for it now.

As soon as the doors to the common room closed, Starscream pushed himself into Skyfire’s arms, his own servos going straight for Skyfire’s spark plating. Skyfire understood, and began pressing gentle kisses to Starscream’s helm and faceplates.

“I missed you,” breathed Skyfire between kisses.

“Never leave me again,” Starscream gasped back, knowing that in this moment, Skyfire might have promised him anything and he could use that to his advantage later…

But Skyfire’s words were interrupted by a knock at the door. The two looked up at each other helplessly for a long moment.

“Are you going to answer that?” asked Skyfire at last.

“Let’s pretend we’re not here,” Starscream whispered back, pulling Skyfire back towards him. And that might have been the end of it if there wasn't a second, more insistent knock, followed by a very soft sob. Skyfire shook Starscream off and went to the door. It slid open, and Skydive stood before them, optics bright with tears.

“Um…” said the little aerial. “Can I…can I maybe recharge in here? My quarters are…empty. And…” Fresh tears began pouring down his faceplates. Then, after a long moment, comprehension dawned, and Skydive's faceplates flushed pink. “Oh,” he said. “I…frag. I’m sorry. Frag. Frag.” It was the first time Starscream had ever heard Skydive swear. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t even think—I’ll go bother Windsong instead.”

“Nonsense,” said Skyfire warmly. “Come in. You shouldn’t have to be alone right now.”

[Skyfiiiiire…] whined Starscream over their personal frequency.

[I know. I know. I’ll make it up to you later.]

Fortunately, Skydive was too distraught to notice the two older aerials trying desperately to bring their frame temperatures back down to normal. And when Skydive, weeping softly, lay on the berth between Starscream and Skyfire with an arm wrapped around each, Starscream could not bring himself to resent him for it.

* * *

Starscream awoke to whispers. He onlined his optics just enough to be able to make out the blurry shapes beside him. Skyfire was still lying flat on the berth, but Skydive was sitting up.

“They’re pretty,” Skydive was saying. He was tracing the red stripe on Skyfire’s wing with a cautious digit. Starscream felt his spark flare possessively before he realized that Skydive wasn’t talking about Skyfire’s wings, but the engravings on them. “Stars, right?”

“That’s right,” said Skyfire.

“Did it hurt?”

“A little bit,” Skyfire admitted. “The ones on my arms hurt far less. See?” He held his wrists up. “They represent the Iacon Science Academy.”

“Oh! Wheeljack has the same one!” said Skydive. “But what’s the extra stuff underneath?”

“The embellishment means I graduated first in my class,” said Skyfire.

“Sometimes, humans draw on themselves with ink and needles,” said Skydive. “But it never comes off, unless you use lasers. Not the shooting kind, though…” Skydive’s vocalizer suddenly trailed off, and he gave a sharp gasp.

“Skydive? What’s wrong?” Skyfire sounded alarmed, and Starscream onlined his optics at last. Skydive was staring blankly at nothing, but his servos were trembling and a faint whine was coming from his vocalizer.

“Skydive, what’s the matter?” repeated Skyfire. But Skydive pushed himself off the berth without a word and ran out of the room. Skyfire and Starscream caught up with him at last in the atrium, where they found him surrounded by a large circle of mechs. And he wasn’t alone.

Wrapped in Skydive’s arms was a sobbing Fireflight. Starscream froze at the sight. Fireflight had been captured. How…?

He tore his optics away from the embracing Aerialbots and found himself staring directly at Skywarp. The teleporter didn’t look as smug as he usually did after breaking out of an enemy brig.

“What’s the damage?” asked Starscream in a low voice.

“I could only rescue one. They made me take Fireflight.” Skywarp shot a glance at the two Aerialbots, who were still holding each other and shaking like frightened newsparks. “I teleported off their ship, and we flew back here. They burned out our comms, so we couldn’t call for help. We’re lucky we were able to transform once whatever slag they shot us with wore off.”

“Can you give me the coordinates of the spot you teleported to from the Quintesson ship?” asked Skyfire. Skywarp sneered up at him in reply.

“Skywarp,” said Starscream impatiently.

“I could use the information,” said Skyfire. “I think—”

“Nobody cares what you think, traitor! You’ve been here what, a whole joor? I think that means it’s time for you to leave again!” snarled Skywarp.

“Stop that,” ordered Starscream. “This isn’t—this isn’t helping. This isn’t going to bring them back. Skywarp, I know you’re upset—”

“And I know you’re not!” retorted Skywarp. “TC’s alone on that ship with three sparklets to look after and for all we know they’ve already installed slave programming in him, and you couldn’t care less!”

“That’s not true,” said Starscream. “I just don’t think having a breakdown will fix anything.”

“That’s never stopped you, has it?” yelled Skywarp.

“At least I am able to channel my energies into something constructive!” Starscream shouted back.

“Sorry, I didn’t realize that crying yourself into recharge over a civilian counted as ‘something constructive!’”

Clearly, Skywarp wanted to be punched in the faceplates, and Starscream was happy to oblige. But there were too many spectators, and he felt strange servos pulling them away from each other before he even had a chance to land a second blow.

Starscream looked up. It was Megatron that had pulled him away. He shook the warlord off and gave him a nasty look for interfering in his fight.

“The ship Skywarp escaped from would be headed to Quintessa,” said Skyfire. “I need those coordinates, Skywarp.”

Skywarp looked at him with malicious optics. “Fine, take ’em. You’re going after them, aren’t you?”

“Going where!?” shrilled Starscream. Skyfire grasped his shoulder-vents firmly.

“I’m going to try to catch up with the Quintesson ship.”

“No!” said Starscream immediately.

“Listen to me! I'm fast enough to catch up with them, and I want to see if I can calculate where they’re headed. If we can determine Quintessa’s coordinates, we could take the battle to them.”

Starscream shook his helm wordlessly.

“I’m the only one who has a chance of catching up with them,” said Skyfire. “But I need to leave now. Please don't make this difficult.”

“And if they capture you?” demanded Starscream.

“Then good riddance,” muttered Skywarp.

“I won’t allow you to take such a risk. I forbid you to go.”

Skyfire looked at Starscream sadly. “Civilian, remember? I won’t be long. I promise.”

There was nothing he could do. And nothing he could say, with so many onlookers. Starscream bit back a piercing scream of rage and stormed out of the atrium.

He wasn’t exactly sure where he was going. He knew he had to get to the labs, to finish his work, but he couldn’t seem to focus long enough to get himself there. Instead, he shut himself in the first empty room he could find and sat down in the nearest chair.

Or…maybe the room wasn’t empty. There was a faint scuttling sound from behind some of the furniture. Cassettes? He was not feeling charitable towards any of Soundwave’s brats today…

But instead, something tiny and pink crawled out from behind a stack of crates.

“Oh, you,” muttered Starscream.

“Beep!” said Arcee. She climbed up the back of the chair, grabbed onto one of Starscream’s shoulder-vents with a tiny servo, and tried to scale his wings. He reached back and set her down on his lap.

Arcee gave a delightful little sparkling-giggle and reached for Starscream’s faceplates. She carefully pressed her servo to just beneath his optics.

“You’re crying,” she chittered. “Why?”

“Not crying,” muttered Starscream.

“You are!” insisted Arcee. “Look!” She held up her servo. There were droplets of pale pink optical fluid on her digits.

Starscream picked up the morbid-looking little sparkling and hugged her to his cockpit. Arcee laughed and hugged him back, not understanding but happy that someone was giving her attention.

“I cried today,” said Arcee matter-of-factly. “I miss Imi.” That was Iaconian for carrier-creator. “She’s fighting the bad guys.”

“Right,” said Starscream slowly. “What color is Imi?”

Arcee grinned. “She’s pink! Just like me! We’re both special. Pink means we’re special.”

Interesting.

“What about Ato?” asked Starscream. “Is Ato a mech? Or a femme?”

“Ato is a big mech! Big!” Arcee stretched her servos out wide. “Red and blue!”

Soundwave would be furious that Starscream had beaten him to this information. “And what about your friends? Hot Rod and Springer? Who are their creators?”

“I ’unno.” Now Arcee had found an interesting tile, and was trying to remove it from the floor. “Springer’s from somewhere. He’s special because he’s gonna be a helicopter and a car when he gets his upgrades. I’m gonna be a hovercycle. Or! Oh! Or a car! Moonracer’s gonna teach me how to shoot. She made me a gun, see?” A metal toy in the approximate shape of a laser pistol was removed from a tiny subspace pocket and placed in Arcee’s mouth. “She’s fighting the bad guys, too. Firestar says.”

“What about your other friend?” asked Starscream.

“Hot Rod? He’s from somewhere else. A city. City went bang. Ato found him and brought him to Imi. He’s special, too.”

“Hot Rod?” Starscream recalled seeing the mechling run headlong into a wall. “Yes, I suppose you could say he’s quite special.”

“He’s special ’cause he hears the song,” said Arcee cryptically. “He sings it for us! It’s pretty!”

“I see,” said Starscream, even though he did not. But he was hardly going to trouble himself over the babblings of a sparkling.

There were far more important things to be worrying about, after all.

* * *

Fortunately, Starscream had never had any difficulty losing himself in his work. Perceptor liked his idea for modifying the internal armor to allow for transformation sequences, and he even looked over Starscream’s designs and deemed them “not completely outside the realm of possibility.”

So, with the teasing of the Autobots and the noise of Wheeljack’s immense rubber-cutting shears fading into background noise, Starscream continued his work. It was good not to have to think about anything…especially Skyfire. Megatron had sent him a few query pings, but Starscream didn’t want to talk about it. He didn’t want to talk about anything.

He just wanted to work, and forget.

He was good at that.

It was getting late when Starscream got the comm from Skyfire. He looked up to find that the lab was deserted once more, exactly as it had been the previous night. At least this time, they all had something to show for it. All the grounders had been fitted with (admittedly uncomfortable) internal armor. Tomorrow, if there was enough time, Perceptor wanted to start work on the aerial units.

[Skyfire?] asked Starscream. [Where are you? Are you alright?]

[I’m fine!] Skyfire’s datastream indicated that he was located somewhere very nearby. [I just got back, I’m in the atrium—]

Starscream immediately dropped all his tools and ran out of the lab, shaking with relief and not caring if he accidentally slammed some passing mechs into the walls in his haste. When he reached the atrium, there was a large white mech standing in the middle of the room…but the mech was not Skyfire.

Or at least, not Skyfire as Starscream knew him.

“What happened—what happened to you?” cried Starscream, skidding to a sudden halt. All his fantasies of throwing himself into Skyfire’s arms and crying that he’d kept his promise and returned to Starscream evaporated on the spot.

“Oh!” Skyfire looked down at his frame. Those bright blue optics, at least, were familiar. “I scanned the Quintesson ship.”

“You’re hideous,” said Starscream. “What possessed you to do such a thing? No, don’t touch me. Don’t touch me. Primus, you’re asymmetrical.”

“I also managed to extrapolate the ship’s course. I think I have the location of Quintessa, or at least one of their major bases,” explained Skyfire. “I need to report to Soundwave and Blaster immediately—they’re waiting for me. I might be able to sneak some soldiers in for a rescue mission. This could change everything!”

It was late, and Starscream’s processer needed a good defrag cycle. “That’s wonderful, Skyfire,” he said, barely aware of the words until they’d come out of his mouth. “When you’re finished with that, you can recharge on the couch.”

Chapter Text

If Thundercracker was frightened, he did a good job of not showing it. Silverbolt could still see the raw, painful-looking injuries on his wingtips from where the Quintesson had grabbed him, but the mech was stoic. In contrast, Air Raid was sending painful little pulses of anger across the gestalt-bond in Silverbolt’s direction.

After a few breems of this, Silverbolt finally lost his patience and lashed out at Air Raid with a sharp whip of irritation-impatience-rage. Air Raid, who had not been expecting any sort of retaliation, yelped in surprise.

“Whatever it is you’re doing, stop,” ordered Thundercracker, turning to look at them with optics full of disapproval. The trip was quiet after that.

Silverbolt might have fallen into recharge out of boredom. But eventually, the larger guard-type Quintessons returned, signaled by their heavy footsteps.

“No matter what happens, don’t antagonize them,” said Thundercracker in a low voice.

“But—” protested Air Raid.

“I’m serious!” Thundercracker strained in his bonds to get a clear look at Air Raid just as the doors slid open. “Do as they say but be ready to run.”

Two of the big guards stood, slightly cramped, in the doorway. They went over and unchained Thundercracker from the wall, clipping his arms behind him with things that strongly resembled stasis cuffs. Then they left, taking the seeker with them.

“What was that last thing he said?” asked Slingshot. “I never installed any language packs.”

“I dunno, something about...being ready?” guessed Air Raid.

::Prepared escape/flee/fly:: sent Silverbolt over the bond. ::Language/words/meaning secret/safe.:: Bond talk was clumsy and vague, but it got the point across.

“I hope he’s not dead. He’s the only one who knows what the frag he’s doing,” mumbled Slingshot.

“They wouldn’t kill him,” said Silverbolt uneasily. “He’s...he’s no good to them dead. None of us are.”

Two more guards entered the brig, this time for Silverbolt. Silverbolt wanted very much to see how quickly a punch in the faceplates would fell one of them, but he followed Thundercracker’s advice and passively allowed them to cuff his servos behind his wings.

The guards led him out into hallway. Silverbolt’s secondary sensors were offline with his comms, so he couldn’t do a sweep of the place, but he got the feeling that they were in the lower levels of the ship. The lighting was very dim, and the hallways were painted an ugly greenish-grey color. There were a few signs here and there, but they were all written in an alien script.

At the end of the hallway was a lift, which they took up to a large bay where various different types of Quintessons were attending to all sorts of matters in their language. Silverbolt could see a ramp leading off the ship and onto a highly polished silvery-blue surface that looked like metal. The guards pushed him in that direction, and Silverbolt stepped off the ship and onto this new world.

The sky was a beautiful, bright golden color, overcast by heavy purple-grey clouds. He was also surprised to see that the planet had a single ring. It was jagged and irregular looking, almost as if it had been smashed by something—not at all like the beautiful planetary rings from the other worlds in Earth’s solar system. One of the guards gave him a push, and he started walking.

The buildings were thick but elegant, in pristine condition (especially compared to Cybertron) and all made of the same shining silver-blue material that reflected back the colors of the sky. Spikes and archways jutted up from the land, as if they had grown there, as well as strange towers with large spherical domes.

Where there weren’t roads or pathways, the world was covered in clear water that reflected back the colors of the sky. Silverbolt didn’t have long to take it all in, though, because the guards seemed to be in a hurry. They led him into one of the nearest buildings.

Inside, the building was a somewhat subdued shade of silver-blue. It was brightly lit, almost blindingly so. Every few meters there were large desks equipped with large, translucent computer screens every few meters. Smaller Quintessons with bright blue skin scuttled around on their tentacles or worked at the terminals.

Across the room, he could see one of the small Quintesson at a desk. This new frametype (for lack of anything better to call it) was only half the size of the soldiers and a quarter of the size of the Magistrates. On the opposite side of the desk, sitting on a too-small stool was Thundercracker, his servos still cuffed behind him.

“Any health issues?” Silverbolt heard the little Quintesson ask.

“Yes. Some maniac sliced my wings about a joor ago,” said Thundercracker. The Quintesson appeared unimpressed.

“Sparkbonds?” he asked.

“No,” said Thundercracker firmly.

“Trine bond?”

Thundercracker almost choked on his laughter.

Well, that solved that mystery. Silverbolt was not completely surprised to hear the elite trine wasn’t bonded, even though they flew like they were. With the way they treated each other—especially the way Starscream treated Thundercracker and Skywarp, and was treated in return—a bond was out of the question.

But Skywarp had kissed Thundercracker. And Starscream had thrown a bucket at Skyfire’s helm, which for Starscream was sort of the same thing.

“Education?” continued the clerk.

“War Acadamy at Vos,” said Thundercracker. “I’ll show you the glyphs if you free my arms.”

“That won’t be necessary,” said the Quintesson flatly. “Special abilities?”

“I pass out after one cube,” replied Thundercracker. “Does that count?”

If the Quintesson sensed deception, he didn’t show it. It was a little bit odd, Silverbolt thought, that they expected full and honest reports from their captives.

Eventually Thundercracker was led away and Silverbolt was half-pushed onto the newly-vacated stool in front of the desk. The blue Quintesson clerk gave him a once-over while Silverbolt craned his neck and tried to see where they were taking Thundercracker.

“You speak Iaconian?” asked the Quintesson. Through the translucent screen, Silverbolt saw him pull up a new blank document.

“Um. Yeah,” said Silverbolt. It looked like they were bringing Thundercracker into a smaller adjoining room, and he was pretty sure he could see a medical berth within. “I—Iaconian’s fine?” He hadn’t meant for it to be a question. “Sorry, I’m confused, what’s going on?”

“Designation?” interrupted the Quintesson. He was already using a bundle of tentacles to enter new data onto his screen.

“Uh. Silverbolt. Listen, is there someone I could maybe talk to about—?”

“Frame type: Shuttle, Standard. Spark type: Aerial,” continued the Quintesson, going on with his notes as if Silverbolt had not spoken. “Age?”

“Um. Two stellar cycles.”

The Quintesson looked up. Through the transparent screen, Silverbolt could see an expression of disbelief on his face.

“Two and three-quarters stellar cycles,” amended Silverbolt, as if that might help.

“You’re war-built, then.” The Quintesson was scribbling away on his screen. “Any health issues?”

“Um…no?”

“Sparkbonds?”

“No. Um. I mean. Sort of? With my brothers?”

The Quintesson’s face shifted into what was unquestionably a frown. “Explain.”

“My brothers, there’s five of us and we can—” too late, Silverbolt realized that maybe he shouldn’t be giving this information to the people who had taken him prisoner.

“Continue,” ordered the Quintesson impatiently, his tentacles running over his screen.

“We’re a team, is all,” mumbled Silverbolt at last, staring down at his knees.

“You have a spark-twin? Multiple spark-twins?” the Quintesson sounded disbelieving again.

“No.”

“Explain,” repeated the Quintesson in a firmer tone.

“I’m hungry,” Silverbolt tried to sound as sparkling-like as possible.

“You will receive fuel at the conclusion of your medical examination,” said the Quintesson. Silverbolt glanced back in the direction of the room that Thundercracker had been brought to. When one of the guards stepped out of the way, he could see Thundercracker was strapped down to a medical berth. Another new type of Quintesson, this one with pale green skin, a very long head and extra thin tentacles, was examining him.

Silverbolt saw Thundercracker snarl something, and the doctor made a hand gesture. The guards each grabbed Thundercracker and slammed his frame down onto the berth. Silverbolt immediately jumped up out of his seat, only to have his own guards grab his arm-struts.

“We’re not finished here!” said the clerk sharply.

“What’s the point of asking me all these questions if you’re just going to do an exam in two klicks?” demanded Silverbolt.

“I am assessing your temperament,” said the clerk. “You may want to sit back down before I just decide to slate you for deep stasis instead.”

Silverbolt could see the doctor was forcing a cable into the medical access port on Thundercracker’s neck. He realized he’d been stupid to think the Quintessons would just take his word on everything, to believe that this was anything other than a test. Reluctantly, he sat, though he didn’t take his optics off Thundercracker.

“If anything you say during this interview is found to be false during your medical examination, it will affect your temperament score. If your score is too low, you will be placed in deep stasis,” confirmed the Quintesson. “For your own sake, I suggest we continue.”

“What happened to slave programming?” blurted Silverbolt before he was able to stop himself.

“The other two seekers in the brig of the ship are your brothers?” asked the clerk, ignoring the question in favor of making a few more notes on his screen.

“Yeah that’s ri—wait, what?” Silverbolt tore his optics away from Thundercracker to look back at the clerk. “Seekers?”

“Are they or are they not your brothers?”

“M-m-my brothers are not seekers,” stammered Silverbolt. “I mean, they’re in the brig, but they’re not…they’re not…”

“Oh? What are they, then?” asked the Quintesson.

“They’re just...aerials,” said Silverbolt. “Decepticons are seekers. Seekers are Decepticons. We’re Autobots. We—”

“Aerial is a spark-type, not a frame-type,” said the clerk impatiently. “Do you truly know so little about your own kind? Those with aerial sparks can take either a shuttle or a seeker frame. Your brothers are the two seekers in the brig, or am I incorrect?”

“Seekers are Decepticons,” repeated Silverbolt, helpless before this new life-altering information. “We’re Autobots.”

“Intelligence: below-average,” muttered the Quintesson, making another mark on his screen. “Typical shuttle.”

“Didn’t you see my brothers? They’re not seekers! They’re completely different from—from him!” Silverbolt jerked his helm in Thundercracker’s direction. “I mean, Air Raid looks a little bit like a seeker, and he’s got the right alt, but he’s different! They’re different! We’re all different!”

“Cosmetic differences,” said the Quintesson. “Please do not shout, or you will be sedated. You said that you had four brothers? Are you the only shuttleformer among them?”

“I...yeah.” Finally, something he was sure of.

“And you have a remarkably strong sibling bond,” continued the Quintesson.

“I guess?” No way was he getting into that subject again.

“I suppose I can skip the pre-war section, if you truly are as young as you say,” said the clerk, skimming past a list of data. “Education? Unlikely. Special abilities?”

Silverbolt could still feel Superion even now. He never went away. And now he was angry, impatient, and…a little bit afraid. His components were scattered, and he didn’t like that. Not at all.

“Nope,” said Silverbolt. “Sorry.”

* * *

They’d cuffed him to the medical berth and forced his spark chamber open. That had been embarrassing enough on its own. But then the doctor had looked down and frowned and called over one of his colleagues.

Suddenly, Silverbolt had two aliens staring down at his spark in mild confusion. Then three. Then four.

Clearly, none of them had ever seen a gestalt-bond before. They muttered to each other (though Primus only knew what they were saying) and pointed at Silverbolt’s spark, and the multiple rings of light that surrounded it.

Ratchet and Wheeljack had explained to the Aerialbots about sparkbonds. Ratchet had even shown them a recorded feed of what two traditionally bonded sparks looked like. The sparks themselves were two pulsing orbs of light, one deep blue and the other purple. The blue spark had two purple rings of light encircling it, running perpendicular to each other. The purple spark had the same, except his rings were the same blue color as his partner’s spark. Both sparks beat in perfect time with each other, and the rings pulsated with identical energies.

Ratchet had said that a mech could also have two bonded mates, which would create a second pair of rings in the color of the third mech’s spark. But he hadn’t had any pictures of that. He had shown them what twinned sparks looked like, though. That had been sort of interesting. Instead of orbs, the twinned sparks had half-moon shapes, and one bond-ring apiece, all in the same yellow-gold color. Ratchet had then grimly explained that the death of one twin meant the death of the other would follow shortly.

Silverbolt was somewhat familiar with his own spark, though he’d never merged with anyone, not even his brothers. His spark was silver-white, and had no less than eight rings. Though it was normal to him, he imagined it must be overwhelming and alien (ha!) to the Quintessons.

An explosion rocked the entire medical bay, shattering terminal screens and sending furniture flying. The Quintesson doctors all ducked for cover, and Silverbolt snapped his chestplates closed. The two big guards ran off in the direction of the noise.

Silverbolt tried his bonds. They were pretty strong, but he was stronger, and the war coding had made him stronger still. After taking a moment to prepare himself mentally, he wrenched his hands upwards, taking the cuffs with him. He heard the doctors make sounds of fright.

That only left his pedes. As he struggled to break the metal cuffs, he glanced at the doctors. They were still cowering together in the corner, watching Silverbolt as if he was potentially dangerous. He waited for one of them to pull a weapon on him, but they never did. So he curled his digits around the metal cuffs that held his pedes to the berth and ripped them free.

As Silverbolt moved to stand, one of the Quintessons made a sound of horror. He turned on them, and they shrank back further, if that was even possible. Silverbolt wasn’t sure if he was physically capable of killing them (or morally capable, if it came down to that). He had no weapons. But neither did they. It seemed that the guards had been meant as their protection in the event that he tried to escape.

Silverbolt decided to leave the doctors behind him and stepped back out into the bright main room. At the same time, an unfamiliar mech emerged from one of the other side rooms.

This new mech had the large and powerful frame of a war build. And he still had faint, scuffed Decepticon brands on his arms, though there was no more color to them. In fact, his plating was almost entirely grey, with only patches of purple here and there to prove he’d once had a paint job. Most notably, his entire frame was covered with welds that suggested recent medical procedures.

“That was Thundercracker, I think,” asked the strange mech. He had a pleasant voice that was oddly familiar, though Silverbolt could not place it. “The resonance was highly reminiscent of a sonic boom, wouldn’t you say?”

“I…yeah,” said Silverbolt.

“I saw them bring him in. I thought he might try something like that.” The mech looked back at Silverbolt. “They’ll all be distracted with catching him. They might even send in some Allicons. You should run while you still can.”

“What about you?” asked Silverbolt.

“Pacification programming keeps me from going any faster than a quick walk, unless specifically ordered to run,” said the mech. “It would be illogical for me to accompany you. I would only impede your progress.”

“Then walk fast,” said Silverbolt. He got the feeling that this mech knew his way around the Quintesson base, and a small part of him really didn’t want to be wandering around alone. He grabbed the mech by the wrist (his servo had been recently replaced! Silverbolt could tell from the weld marks!) and began to hurry across the room in the direction of the exit.

“Don’t leave the building!” ordered the mystery mech. “And don’t use the lift either, it’s monitored! Take the stairs. They’re back this way.”

“Up or down?” asked Silverbolt, releasing the mech’s servo. He was a little annoyed at being ordered around—he wanted to go back for his brothers—but the Decepticon seemed to know what he was doing. And Silverbolt was clueless.

“Down. Elita-1 has been placed in deep stasis, and she is being kept in this building. I can understand a fair bit of the Quintesson language—”

“How?” interrupted Silverbolt.

“—and I know for a fact that they never bothered to install pacification programming in her before they shut her down,” the mech continued, pushing Silverbolt towards the stairwell. “The logical course of action is to reactivate her. She is a formidable warrior, and her assistance could be vital to our success.”

There were a lot of stories about Elita-1, and not just the ones about her programming. Silverbolt had never met her in person (well, except that one time, but that had been a weird day and she hadn’t exactly been Elita yet, had she?). He had no idea what he’d say to her if he did.

“You’re part of the Superion gestalt, aren’t you?” asked the mech suddenly. Silverbolt glanced back over his shoulder to look at the Decepticon. True to his word, the mech was moving down the stairs at an excruciating pace.

“Yeah, that’s right,” said Silverbolt. “Two of my brothers are here. It’s not enough to combine, though, so sorry if I got your hopes up. Do I know you?”

The mech appeared to have been startled by the question. His yellow optics widened. Then, unexpectedly, he smiled. Silverbolt actually had enough time to think to himself that it was actually a rather handsome smile before—

“It’s Shockwave,” said the mech.

Silverbolt nearly fell down the stairs. “You’re—what?”

Shockwave—and now he recognized that chassis—continued his painstaking process down the steps, his optics locked on his pedes. “It’s a rather long story. But it appears the Quintessons have managed to undo a great deal of processor damage that our Decepticon medics refused to touch for millions of years. I will readily admit that I am impressed by their prowess.”

“But you have a face now,” said Silverbolt. He was far enough down the stairs to take a break and look back up at Shockwave. If the mech was offended by Silverbolt’s words, he didn’t show it. “How’d you get processor damage?”

“I believe, given enough time, I can undo the effects of some of the pacification programming,” said Shockwave, sidestepping the question. “I haven’t tampered with it yet, because I’d rather not be placed in stasis.”

“Where are the femmes? And the other soldiers that were captured?” asked Silverbolt.

“The Quintessons have put them to work. Drone work.” Shockwave’s tone became resentful. “I have seen them laboring. Cleaning, guard duty, and so on. The pacification programming is enforced with physical pain.”

Something about that seemed off to Silverbolt. “They went through all that trouble of capturing us to make us do drone work?”

“It’s temporary,” explained Shockwave. “As I said, I can understand much of their language. I believe they intend to use us to wage war on another race.”

“They’re terrible soldiers on their own,” recalled Silverbolt. “No wonder they need us.”

“Yes. Not even those of the Warrior caste—those are the green ones, with the built-in weaponry—appear to have the temperament for combat. Those larger ones upstairs are of the Guardian caste. They look intimidating, but they have no more courage than any other member of their species. The Allicons are vicious, but they are like mechanimals. They’re not even a part of the caste system, from what I can tell.”

Silverbolt wasn’t sure why Shockwave was so interested in Quintesson castes, but the mech was weird. Everyone knew that. Four million years of solitude would do that to you. “I wonder who they want to fight, though?” asked Silverbolt. They were coming to the end of the staircase, the bottom floor.

“I have not been able to determine that,” said Shockwave. “When they realized I could understand them, they became more careful with their words.”

Silverbolt pushed the door open, revealing a long but dimly-lit hallway. Lights flickered on as they sensed motion.

“That one,” ordered Shockwave, pointing to a heavy-looking door. “I don’t have the security codes. You’re going to have to break it down.”

Silverbolt gaped, “What do I look like to you?”

“You look like a shuttleformer to me,” said Shockwave. “I’d help if I could. Now I am eighty-seven percent positive that Elita is in that chamber. If we haven’t been detected, we will be in a few klicks. I recommend you act quickly.” That pleasant voice had suddenly become sharp.

Silverbolt eyed up the door for a moment. Well, the humans did it often enough, didn’t they? In movies? If the humans could do it, it couldn’t be that hard, could it?

He threw himself at the door, trying to put all of his strength into his shoulder. Surprisingly, that didn’t work as well as he’d imagined it would.

“Can’t we just blast the control pad?” gasped Silverbolt, nursing his dented shoulder.

“No. If they have installed the proper security measures, that could result in the room sealing itself against us,” said Shockwave. “Try again.”

Silverbolt offlined his optics and booted up his war programming. Immediately, he realized something was wrong. The coding was there, but it was weak, dampened. The Quintessons had somehow inhibited it, along with his comms and transformation system.

But there was still enough of it left to guide Silverbolt through this small thing. He shifted all his weight to one foot and kicked the doorframe with all his strength. It made a thunderous clang, and Silverbolt was certain the Quintessons would come running at any moment.

“Again,” said Shockwave. “I think you dented it.”

It was three more kicks before the door was distorted enough for Silverbolt to pry it open. Then he went inside the chamber and looked around.

The room was lined with horizontal pods. Most of them were empty, but one was not. Silverbolt hurried over to it. Behind a thick layer of transparent material lay an offlined pink frame.

“Should I break it open?” called Silverbolt.

“No!” said Shockwave. “The stasis must be brought to a natural end. Don’t touch a thing!” Shockwave seemed to be trying to move faster now, which resulted in his limbs giving a few odd spasms. Eventually, he made his way over to the computer terminal and began writing commands in the Quintesson language.

Silverbolt gazed down at Elita. Some Autobots insisted that femmes were the most beautiful frametype, but Silverbolt wasn’t entirely convinced of that. As for Elita herself, any natural beauty was distorted by that horrifying pink paintjob.

Shockwave made a sound of triumph, and the panels over Elita’s frame retracted. Immediately, bright blue optics snapped online and both her servos shot out simultaneously to grip Silverbolt around the neck. Silverbolt gasped in pain and tried to pull away, but she was unnaturally strong.

Fortunately, Elita regained control of herself quickly and her servos opened, allowing Silverbolt to stagger back. She sat up quickly, looking around at the unfamiliar surroundings.

“What happened?” she demanded. “Where are my soldiers?”

“They are all online,” said Shockwave, “though the Quintessons have installed pacification programming in them—in all of us. Only you and Silverbolt have been unaltered.”

Elita frowned and tilted her head to one side. “Shockwave?” she asked hesitantly.

“Correct,” said Shockwave with a winning smile.

“And…Silverbolt?” she turned to look at Silverbolt. “We’ve met.” Then her optics went dim with confusion. “Or…no. I must be thinking of someone else.”

“It’s a weird story,” said Silverbolt. “Don’t worry about it now. We’ve got to figure something out. The Quintessons are gonna be down here soon.”

“I need a weapon,” said Elita, looking around the room. “Shockwave?”

“I am afraid our transformation sequences have all been inhibited,” said Shockwave.

“Can you override it?”

“Possibly, if given enough time. But my frame has been drastically altered since my arrival here.” Shockwave spread his arms to indicate his new body. “I am no longer compatible with my alt-mode. However, if we can get to one of the control rooms, I may be able to send a message to Cybertron.”

“They say you can stop time,” said Silverbolt. Honestly, the words felt stupid the moment they left his mouth. But Elita just gazed down at him.

“They say a lot of things, don’t they?” replied Elita after a pause that lasted just a few klicks longer than it should have. “But right now, stories won’t help us. We need to move.”

“We don’t have any weapons,” Silverbolt reminded her.

“You’re a warrior, are you not?” asked Elita. Now there was a stunning intensity in her optics.

“Yeah,” said Silverbolt. “I guess—yeah.”

“And Vector Sigma gave you two fists, didn’t he?” asked Elita, raising her own to optic-level.

“We’re going to punch our way out of here?” asked Silverbolt in faint disbelief.

“Well, you may kick, if you prefer,” said Elita demurely. “Really, it’s your choice.”

Chapter Text

[You should try and recharge,] advised Skyfire.

In the darkness of Skyfire’s hold, Starscream onlined his optics. He was lying on one of the pull-out berths, but had been unable to initiate a recharge sequence.

It had been so long, he’d forgotten that Skyfire’s sensors could tell if a mech in his hold was online or recharging. He’d forgotten that just lying there with his optics offlined wouldn’t fool the shuttleformer.

Starscream reached out so that his servo touched the nearest wall. With one digit, he traced the glyphs for don’t worry about me.

But Skyfire was always protective of the mechs he transported; it was a core part of his programming. Starscream felt Skyfire’s energy field wrap around him like a blanket, or an embrace.

[You still feel guilty,] observed Skyfire. [But none of it was your fault.]

I should have been there, he wrote. It had been a long time since they’d communicated in this way. It had taken Skyfire a little while to learn to translate the light strokes and touches back into language. But the long, boring stretches of travel between planets had left them plenty of time to master it.

Starscream honestly hadn’t been expecting Skyfire to still be able to interpret his glyphs after all this time. But then, it hadn’t been very long for Skyfire, had it?

[If you’d gone, then who would have designed and constructed the internal armor for our soldiers?] asked Skyfire.

Anyone else. Wheeljack, Perceptor… There was no shortage of scientists from the Autobot faction, after all. You.

[I’d be too busy worrying about you.]

Maybe you deserve to worry.

Skyfire said nothing, but his field retracted a little.

Did you miss me? wrote Starscream.

[Every moment.]

Starscream’s servo trembled. Did you ever worry that I might be dead?

Skyfire said nothing.

You worried enough while you were on earth, wrote Starscream. That was your favorite argument—that I’d get myself killed someday. While you were out exploring new worlds, didn’t you ever stop to wonder if I’d finally pushed Megatron too far?

[Star,] pleaded Skyfire.

Did you ever wonder if I’d fallen in battle, shot out of the sky and left to rust? Did it ever occur to you that I might be injured and trying to reach you over our distress frequency? Didn’t you ever wonder if I’d died screaming for help over the connections that you broke?

Skyfire shuddered, and his interior shook like he’d just been struck by an asteroid. Starscream felt a nasty little thrill of satisfaction even as a few of the other mechs were wrenched from their recharge cycles. There was a bit of grumbling, but it died down quickly enough once it became apparent that Skyfire was not under attack.

Wide awake and altogether dissatisfied, Starscream got up and made his way to Skyfire’s central control room. He moved carefully in the darkness, not wanting to wake anyone else and answer their awkward questions.

Skyfire’s floorplan was very similiar to the way it had always been, even with the new alt-mode. It took only a few klicks to reach Skyfire’s control room. Skyfire opened the doors for him, and Starscream threw himself down into the chair at the control panel and stared out the glass at the inky darkness of space.

“It must have been boring,” Starscream murmured at last, allowing one servo to stroke the keyboard.

[It was, at times,] said Skyfire. [But I saw some amazing things. I…I’d forgotten how much I missed all of it.]

“And me?”

[Oh, I never forgot that,] said Skyfire. [Not for a moment.]

“Then why did you leave?”

[It was selfish. I was selfish. Like I said, I wanted to do something for myself. I wanted to show them all that I didn’t need them.]

“I needed you,” whispered Starscream.

Skyfire was quiet for a long moment, [I wasn’t sure.]

“What do you mean, you weren’t sure?” demanded Starscream, sitting bolt upright.

[You’re so strong. You’ve been so strong. I thought…I didn’t think it would affect you the way it did.]

“You’re such an idiot,” whispered Starscream. He withdrew his servo and made himself comfortable in the chair. Skyfire’s energy field embraced him again, and eventually Starscream dropped into recharge.

Eventually, he was awoken by a gentle ping from Skyfire. He onlined his optics and was immediately greeted by the sight of the ugliest celestial body he had ever seen in his entire existence. Starscream leaned forward and squinted through the glass. “What the frag is that?”

[I…believe that’s it,] said Skyfire. [That’s Quintessa.]

“What happened to it?” Quintessa—if this was truly it—looked as though it had suffered some sort of severe trauma that had shattered through the planet’s core. It was amazing that it was even still holding together.

[I have no idea,] said Skyfire. [I’m sending a wake-up pulse to all passengers. There’s a chance we’ll be hailed as soon as we get close enough for short-range transmissions. If that’s the case, we may need to fight our way down there.]

Starscream examined the data that Skyfire was sending back about the planet’s surface. There were numerous large cities, intricately constructed, all spread out across the world and separated by swampland. The majority of the planet was covered in shallow water. And all of it was teeming with life.

The doors to the control room slid open, and Starscream pushed himself out of the chair in time to see Prime and Megatron both enter.

“What are we dealing with?” asked Prime.

[I’m going to take us in,] said Skyfire. [There’s some uninhabited areas where I think I could make a safe landing. So far, none of the Quintessons have attempted to communicate with me.]

“I’ll ready my troops,” said Starscream. “If they send out fighters, we’ll be prepared to meet them.”

He left the control room and went out to Skyfire’s main hold, where everyone had been recharging on portable berths. The berths were stowed away, and in their place stood the warriors of both factions.

“Aerial units, with me,” ordered Starscream. “Be prepared to launch if necessary.”

This included Skydive and Fireflight. Starscream hadn’t wanted to bring the two remaining Aerialbots along to Quintessa, especially considering the emotional states they’d been in since the loss of their brothers. But they’d begged and pleaded and eventually worn him down. Besides, having Superion on the battlefield would be a great asset if they had to fight their way off-planet.

Starscream felt the not-unfamiliar jolt that meant they were entering Quintessa’s atmosphere.

Anything? he scrawled on Skyfire’s nearest wall.

[No,] Skyfire sent back. Starscream was impressed. He hadn’t been expecting an answer. He’d been expecting Skyfire to be too focused on not crashing into the surface to even notice the minute sensations. He withdrew his servo and allowed Skyfire to work.

The landing was smooth, and without incident. The ground warriors disembarked first with Prime and Megatron. Starscream led the aerial troops after them.

Stepping out into the surprisingly colorful planet (it had looked like something dead from orbit), Starscream noted that Skyfire had indeed set them down in one of the swamps. It wasn’t like the horrible organic sludge pits of Earth, though. This swamp was actually relatively clean, with clear water and bright metal structures rising up to the horizon.

If they did something about the water, the planet might not actually be that bad.

“What’s that?” cried one of the grounders. Bluestreak. He was pointing at one of the deeper bodies of water, which was now beginning to ripple. A moment later a helm broke the surface. Starscream felt his nasal ridge wrinkle in an automatic sneer at the sight of the ugly mechanoid.

It was bipedal, with hulking green arms and an unsightly oval helm that was split horizontally by an overly-large lip plate. Overlarge red optics stared at the group.

“Can I shoot it?” asked Sunstreaker.

“No, that’s not—” began Prime, but now more creatures were rising up from the surface of the water. Starscream edged back towards Skyfire’s ramp a little bit, knocking into Skywarp in the process.

There were at least thirty of the creatures, all identical in form. Starscream wondered if they were wildlife, or something more sinister. Prime held up one hand, and the creatures all looked at him.

“We come in peace,” he said. Behind him, Megatron looked thoroughly exasperated. The creatures muttered to each other in their own language and then seemed to come to a common consensus. As one, they transformed, revealing their horrific alt-modes: gigantic reptilian bodies with immense, jagged dentae.

Megatron was the first to react, blasting one of the creatures to pieces with a well-aimed shot. The battle that followed was quick and decisive as the warriors of both factions released a deca-cycle’s worth of frustration. It was over before Menasor even had a chance to combine.

“‘We come in peace’?” Megatron asked Prime in a mocking tone.

“There’s no shame in being reasonable, Megatron,” replied Prime evenly.

[I’m sorry to interrupt, but I am receiving a transmission from the Quintessons,] reported Skyfire. [I do not know what they’re saying, but they sound very cross.]

There was a general ripple of amusement at that.

[They keep sending me the coordinates of one of their major cities,] continued Skyfire. [I believe that is where they wish me to go.]

“Then let’s not disappoint them,” said Megatron. He shot Prime a look. “Unless, of course, that isn’t reasonable enough for some of us.”

The fight had been good for morale, but the flight across the planet’s surface was still tense. Starscream risked a glance over at Fireflight and Skydive. They’d been utterly silent the entire trip. But it looked like Windsong’s trine was keeping an eye on them. Starscream was glad about that. It gave him more time to focus on the more immediate problems that had popped up over the last deca-cycle. Skyfire. The Quintessons.

And of course, fragging Ramjet, who’d been giving him that look (the one that meant that a challenge would be issued the moment the present crisis was over) every time he turned around. He’d been like that since Skyfire had returned. Starscream gnashed his dentae at the thought. Was a little bit of solidarity too much to ask for? Ramjet challenged him almost regularly. And while Starscream did not believe he had any chance of losing the fight, and therefore his rank, it was still very irritating to be constantly undermined.

[We’re coming up on the city,] said Skyfire. There was a distinct nervous edge in his glyphs. [They are very angry with me. I sincerely hope they don’t have any anti-aircraft weapons.]

“They won’t shoot you. You’re one of theirs,” Starscream muttered. “You’ve even got a terrible paintjob to prove it.” And it really was terrible, solid green in the front and solid grey in the back. Every time Starscream looked at it, he died a little inside.

At least Skyfire’s helm was still recognizable, and his faceplates were just as they’d always been. There was no reason for a mech’s helm to change, after all. It would be tucked away during transformation, no matter what his alt-form was.

Skyfire landed alongside two identical shuttles. [The Quintessons are already gathering,] he reported. [I believe they will attempt to board when I lower my ramp.]

“Battle formations,” ordered Megatron. The soldiers surged forward, ready to go charging into the fray the moment the order was given. Starscream heard the familiar sound of Skyfire’s ramp unfolding and clicking into place against the cool metal surface of the planet.

After that, there was only the roar of enraged Cybertronians, punctuated occasionally by the shriek of a startled Quintesson.

“After me,” Starscream ordered his troops. “But hold your fire. Survivors could be anywhere.”

They took to the air, though Starscream was uncomfortable with the large gap at second point. Skywarp flew up close enough to tap Starscream’s wing.

[What is it, Skywarp?] asked Starscream.

[What’d you write on Skyfire’s wall? Just before we left?]

[I hardly see how that is relevant to the task at hand,] said Starscream, resolutely going back to his scans.

[Aw, come on, Screamer…]

Suddenly, from one of the larger buildings, there was a modest explosion which blew out the entirety of the front wall. Starscream transformed in midair for a better look. “Those idiots, if they destroy the place we’re never going to find…”

His voice trailed off as he caught sight of the tiny pink silhouette emerging from the smoke. And behind him…

[Silverbolt!] screamed Fireflight.

“Maintain formation,” said Starscream, only to be ignored as the two young jets went hurtling towards their lost brother. The ensuing tackle knocked the shuttle off his pedes.

Starscream gave up and went down for a landing (though he was careful to leave a safe amount of space between himself and Elita-1, who had splashes of strangely-colored liquid on her plating and was carrying a metal pipe.

“You’re here!” said Silverbolt, getting back up. “We thought we were gonna have to steal a ship and—”

“I did tell you a shuttlecraft had been reported to be flying suspiciously,” said a new voice. Starscream glanced past Elita and spotted a new mech. Starscream didn’t recognize him, and so he subsequently dismissed him as unimportant. “It was not illogical for me to believe that it was our rescue.”

“All I said was, let’s not get our hopes up,” said Elita. She was bouncing from pede to pede, as if trying to burn off energy. “Starscream, right? Can I hit you? I’m all out of Quintessons and my programming’s getting itchy.”

Starscream sincerely hoped the expression on his faceplates was answer enough, because his vocalizer wasn’t cooperating. Instead, he opened up a comm line.

[Starscream to Megatron. We’ve found some prisoners.]

[Where are you?] demanded Megatron immediately.

Starscream sent a databurst of their coordinates.

“You escaped all on your own?” Skywarp was asking the group.

“Well, they did most of the work,” said Silverbolt, nodding at Elita and the other mech. “And Thundercracker started it—”

“He’s here?” Skywarp’s tone was suddenly urgent.

“I mean, I don’t know,” said Silverbolt, swaying a little under the weight of his brothers. “But the last time I saw him, it was in here—”

Skywarp bolted past them and vanished into the partially-destroyed building before Silverbolt could finish his sentence.

“Skywarp, get back here, you’re not protected!” yelled Starscream. The aerial units had internal armor, but only in spots. It was decided that their abilities to transform must not be hindered, unlike the grounders, who were completely safe from the paralyzing shots at the temporary cost of their vehicle modes.

Skyfire’s armor had been applied while he was in his shuttle form, which also meant that he was unable to transform until it was removed. Starscream had refused anything less than full protection for the mech. And if being locked in alt-mode kept him away from the battles, that was even better.

Starscream gave up on his errant wingmate and turned his attention back to Elita, who was now punching the air. “Where are the rest of the prisoners?”

“I believe I can answer that,” said the other mech. His voice was familiar. Starscream wondered if they’d met before. “They are serving as manual labor for the Quintesson magistrates.”

“Manual labor?” spat Starscream. “Is that a joke?”

“It is a temporary arrangement. Where is Lord Megatron? I have crucial information for him.”

Starscream sneered. “And who are you to demand an audience with Lord Megatron?”

“Um,” said Silverbolt.

“I am his loyal general, and the guardian of Cybertron!” retorted the mech. “And you, Starscream, are a traitorous, incompetent disgrace to our glorious Empire!”

Starscream just stared. One optic flickered a little. “Shockwave?” he said at last.

“He’s got a face now,” explained Silverbolt, for the benefit of any seekers who might have had their optics offline. “And hands.”

“And your processor?” asked Starscream, his optics narrowed in suspicion. “Did they—?”

“It appears the damage has been undone, though I cannot say how they accomplished it,” said Shockwave. “Which is why I must request to Lord Megatron that we attempt to recover as much information from the Quintessons as—”

“Elita!” That was Prime’s voice. Starscream turned around and saw Prime was hurrying towards them. Elita gave a wide smile, handed her pipe to Silverbolt, and ran to meet him. As soon as they were close enough, she threw her arms around his neck and embraced him, her pedes dangling off the ground.

A few steps behind Prime was Megatron, who didn’t seem to know how to react to the open display of affection. He was leading the grounders, who looked no worse for the wear.

“Did you face much opposition?” asked Starscream. Out of the corner of his optic, he saw Prime set Elita back on the ground.

“No,” said Megatron, sounding frustrated. The troops didn’t look very happy, either. “They run before we can engage them. And your forces?”

“We’ve hardly even seen anyone. They seem to be hiding.”

“Terrible cowards, the entire race,” said Shockwave. Megatron looked at him in mild confusion. “My lord.”

“Shockwave?” said Megatron in disbelief.

“Unfortunately,” muttered Starscream.

“I have amassed a good deal of information that I believe you both—” Shockwave looked from Megatron to Prime, “—should find interesting. However, if your first priority is rescuing the other prisoners, then I direct you to the Central Magisterium. It should be the largest building in this city.”

Starscream had noticed the elaborate building during their fly-over of the city, and had marked it in his databanks as potentially important. Now He calculated the coordinates and passed them on to Prime and Megatron.

“The Magisterium is to Quintessa as the Senatorial Palace was to Cybertron,” said Shockwave. “I would like to accompany you, but slave programming keeps me from walking very quickly. And if I was ordered to fight you, I would not be able to resist.”

“The other prisoners will have this programming as well?” asked Prime.

“Without a doubt, if they are employed in the Magisterium. It might be stronger than my own. They may even actively resist you.”

“I’ll set them straight if they do,” said Elita.

“I believe I can break the slave programming, but the documents I require are on Cybertron,” explained Shockwave.

“Then Silverbolt and his brothers will escort you back to Skyfire,” said Starscream. He glanced around. “Where…where did they go?”

There was a moment of silent confusion. The three Aerialbots had vanished—gone, no doubt, in search of the remainder of their team.

“Of course,” muttered Starscream. “I don’t have time for this. Windsong! Escort Shockwave back.”

The trine of cadets stepped forward, and Starscream turned his attention back to Megatron. “To this…Magisterium, then?”

“Try not to destroy anything,” said Shockwave, as he was led away. “The Quintessons have vast quantities of knowledge. I do not want any of it lost.”

“We will see to it,” promised Prowl.

Shockwave looked relieved (that new faceplate of his was very expressive) and as he turned away, Starscream heard Moonrise ask, “Can’t you walk any faster?” Shockwave’s response was too faint to make out.

“Our forces will convene on the steps of the Magisterium,” announced Prime. “I look forward to having a word with whoever is in charge here.”

“Finally, a real fight,” muttered Cliffjumper. “The day’s been a joke so far.”

Satisfied that there was nothing left to accomplish in this particular area of the city, Starscream transformed and shot off into to the sky.

Chapter Text

Superion’s mood was improving. He could sense the remainder of his components were close, and was urging Silverbolt onwards towards them with no care for their surroundings. Fireflight and Skydive were close behind him, making up for the fact that they couldn’t communicate with Silverbolt over comms by flooding the gestalt-link with affection.

Shockwave had been responsible for the wall blowing up, though he’d sat back uselessly (“it’s not my fault, it’s the slave programming!”) while Silverbolt and Elita ran around trying to gather up everything he’d needed to make it happen.

Silverbolt had been only a little surprised to find himself venturing back into the building after that. He’d been reluctant to leave his brothers to begin with. Of course he was going to go back for them as soon as nobody was paying any attention to him anymore.

And now he had a weapon. Well, he had Elita’s pipe. And watching her fight with it had been an education. The way she’d leapt and spun as she beat her foes into submission had made his dampened battle coding sing. Silverbolt had even saved video logs, to go over again later and possibly design new exercises around.

“Where’s all the…everyone?” asked Fireflight, looking around at the abandoned rooms. And indeed, the base was quiet as they made their way across it.

“They all started running when Elita showed up,” said Silverbolt. And they probably hadn’t stopped running yet, if they were smart.

“Air Raid and Slingshot are nearby, though,” murmured Skydive, cupping one hand over his spark.

“Yeah,” said Silverbolt. “Just follow the pull.”

If there were any Quintessons still around, they stayed hidden and allowed Silverbolt and his brothers to move freely through the base. The place didn’t seem quite so scary anymore, now that he’d seen the way that even the Quintesson warriors ran from Elita.

Still, some signs in a language he could read wouldn’t have been entirely unwelcome. He could say, for example, that Air Raid and Slingshot were located directly north-west of his present location, but he had no idea which doorway would lead them through the maze of rooms to that exact spot.

But Air Raid and Slingshot were moving, too. They’d somehow gotten themselves free, and Silverbolt could feel their excitement-anxiety as they drew nearer. It was contagious, and made Silverbolt pick up his own pace.

And now he could hear the sound of pedesteps through the wall. Silverbolt came skidding to a halt and tried to pinpoint the sound. “Air Raid?” he shouted.

“’BOLT!” Air Raid’s voice was muffled, but not very far away. “WHERE THE FRAG ARE YOU?”

Silverbolt ran into the next room, searching desperately for a doorway. He spotted it a moment before he spotted his missing brothers, both looking a little scratched and dented but otherwise alright. Joy flooded through his circuits, and Silverbolt broke into a run with the intention of gathering them both into his arms. Unfortunately, this plan was foiled when he smashed his helm on the low-hanging doorframe and went crashing to the floor.

“Uh. Are you okay?” Fireflight was giggling down at him.

“Wow,” said Skydive. “You ran right into that.”

“I’m fine,” muttered Silverbolt, shaking the lines of zeroes and ones out of his vision. Air Raid and Slingshot weren’t bothering to hide their laughter, either. “I’m fine.”

Four sets of servos helped him back to his pedes.

“Okay,” said Silverbolt, trying to cover his embarrassment. “Let’s get out of here.”

But the Aerialbots had only made it halfway back through the base when they encountered Windsong’s trine. The seekers were apparently having a lovely time trashing every room they entered before moving on to the next. When the three seekers realized the Aerialbots were there, they brightened up immediately.

“The commander told us to bring Shockwave to Skyfire,” explained Windsong. “But he didn’t say what to do after that. So we figured we’d find out what you were up to.”

“We were afraid you might have gotten into trouble,” explained Moonrise.

“Oh,” said Silverbolt. He glanced back at his brothers. “No, we’re actually…okay. Thanks, though.”

“We should probably get back to the others, then,” advised Windsong. “Don’t want to miss the fight.”

“Is there going to be a fight?” asked Silverbolt. Almost every Quintesson he’d encountered today had tried to run. Initially, he’d thought it was just because of Elita’s overwhelming Elita-ness, but now he was beginning to wonder if it wasn’t part of a larger plan.

“I hope so, or there’s gonna be a lot of disappointed mechs walking around!” said Bladewing. “Personally, I’d love to get my servos on one of those five-faced creeps.” But his wings, raised up as high as they could go, betrayed little tremors of anxiety. Silverbolt politely refrained from mentioning it.

“I did have a question, though,” said Silverbolt as they made their way back outside. “When the Quintessons were talking to me, one of them said something weird.”

Silverbolt felt his brothers looking at him curiously.

“What did he say?” asked Windsong.

“He said that Air Raid and Slingshot were seekers. He said that every aerial who isn’t a shuttle is a seeker.”

“What? I’m not a seeker!” objected Fireflight, elbowing in front of Silverbolt. “I—look at me. Look at me. I’m not a seeker. Seekers are—” he flailed a little bit in Windsong’s direction. “Right?”

The pale blue seeker said nothing, and neither did Moonrise or Bladewing. But their wings shifted nervously, and the three seemed to pull a little closer together.

“Right?” repeated Fireflight, a little note of desperation coloring his tone.

“I—I dunno,” mumbled Windsong, looking down at his pedes.

“That’s a lie,” said Silverbolt, moving so that he stood in front of the young trineleader. “You do know. You just don’t want to tell us.”

Windsong would not meet his optics.

“Look, that’s not important right now,” said Bladewing. “When we get back home, the Commander can explain—”

“Or you could explain, right now,” said Silverbolt, turning his gaze to the silver-and-grey seeker.

“It doesn’t matter,” said Windsong. “It—it doesn’t matter.”

“Moonrise?” The white-and-gold seeker had been silent this entire time. He looked up at Silverbolt unhappily at the sound of his designation. “Come on. What’s going on?”

“They’re not even nice to you,” said Moonrise. “The Autobots.”

“Moonrise!” snapped Windsong. “Shut up!”

“No! It’s not fair! You know I’m right! And it’s not fair we have to pretend like everything is fine and it’s not—”

“You don’t understand, okay?” Windsong was saying, trying to speak over his trinemate. “It’s more complicated than that and we have to—”

“We could be friends, couldn’t we?” asked Moonrise, looking up at Silverbolt. “You don’t belong with Autobots. They hurt you. They’re going to ruin you.”

“Ruin us how?” demanded Air Raid.

“You hate what you are,” said Moonrise. “They taught you that! They did! And they’ll go on doing it—”

“I don’t hate what I am,” said Air Raid. “I’m just not—I just know I’m not a seeker. I’m just not.”

“Why not?” asked Windsong quietly.

“Because seekers are—” Air Raid stopped, unable to find the words. “Look, I just know, okay? So no more slag about the Autobots making us hate ourselves. They can be glitches sometimes, but it’s not as bad as it looks.”

“It was bad enough to make Skyfire leave,” said Skydive faintly.

“Who says it wasn’t Starscream’s fault that Skyfire left?” retorted Air Raid, turning on him. “Rumble and Frenzy told us that Starscream once tried to offline Skyfire! And then, when he came back, Starscream threw slag at his helm! Maybe the reason Skyfire left Earth was just to get away from Starscream!”

“No. They’re not like that,” said Skydive. “They have each other’s designations engraved on their wings. And…don’t you remember? Rumble and Frenzy also said that Soundwave thought the reason Skyfire left was because of something the Autobot scientists did.”

“A Decepticon would want us to think that!” Air Raid yelled. “Primus, ’dive, you’re supposed to be the smart one!”

“Because I’m saying things you don’t want to hear, that makes me stupid?” asked Skydive. “Windsong! Are we seekers?”

Windsong was still looking at his pedes. “Yes.”

“You can’t prove that,” said Air Raid.

“I can,” said Skydive. “Don’t you remember what Ratchet told us? About interfacing?”

“Yeah, he told us not to,” said Air Raid.

“Can we hold on for just a klick—” began Silverbolt, suddenly deeply uncomfortable with the direction this conversation was going in.

“Just listen, Silverbolt!” Skydive’s optics were shining. “Ratchet said that if one of us ever wanted to uplink with a grounder, to come and talk to him because our hardware isn’t compatible with most Autobots. And if we tried to force the connection, we could get hurt. Remember?”

“Yeah. So?” Air Raid sounded suspicious.

“He also said that we’re all compatible with each other, but Silverbolt’s hardware looks a little different because he’s a shuttle. But the four of us, whatever we are, we have the same frame-type. And we have the same uplink ports and cables. If—if we really are seekers, then our hardware should be identical to theirs.” He looked at Windsong’s trine.

“You’re not gonna plug into one of them, are you?” asked Air Raid in horror.

“I don’t even have to,” said Skydive. “I just need to see.”

“There’s a time and a place!” pleaded Silverbolt helplessly. But Skydive was already retracting the cover of one of his interface arrays, the one on the left side of his hip.

Silverbolt knew what Skydive’s ports and connectors would look like. They were only a little bit different from his own. None of the Aerialbots had ever used any of their before, but Ratchet had been detailed enough in his explanations that the team had been curious enough to investigate what was hidden beneath the innocuous-looking panels on their hips and shoulders.

There were two access ports in the center of the panel, spaced evenly apart from each other. Each would receive a triple-pronged connector cable. Coiled up on either side of the ports were Skydive’s own cables, still sealed in their transparent packaging.

“Come on, I don’t have all day!” cried Skydive, making all three seekers jump. They looked around at each other, then seemed to come to a private agreement. Moonrise stepped forward, tilted his hips to one side, and palmed his own panel open.

Silverbolt could feel his cooling fans struggling to come online. He very quickly suppressed them (even though he was pretty sure his brothers could sense his rising interest) and forced himself to focus on what was in front of his optics.

Moonrise’s panel was identical to Skydive’s, though his cables were no longer wrapped in their original protective packaging and his ports showed slight signs of wear.

“That’s doesn’t prove anything,” said Air Raid at last. “So we’ve got the same hardware. So what? Could be a coincidence. Could be…anything. It doesn’t mean we’re seekers! And I won’t believe it until I hear it from Ratchet! So you can wave your panel in my face all you want, it won’t change anything because—”

“What the frag are you doing?”

Everyone turned, as one, to face Skywarp. He’d just staggered in to the room with a badly-damaged Thundercracker leaning on one shoulder. In the ensuing awkward silence, Moonrise shut his panel again with an audible klick.

“Kids today, I tell you,” uttered Thundercracker faintly.

Silverbolt buried his faceplates in his servos.

“I actually have a really good explanation,” said Skydive, closing his panel as well.

“And I’m really looking forward to hearing it,” said Skywarp, “after we escape from the hostile alien slavery planet, if you don’t mind?”

Too embarrassed for words (though really, Skydive should have been the embarrassed party here), Silverbolt went over to give Skywarp some help with Thundercracker.

“It’s fine. Don’t worry about it,” said Skywarp, through gritted dentae. “I’ve dragged his aft off more battlefields than I could count.”

“I’m the strongest one here, just let me help,” replied Silverbolt. Thundercracker really was badly damaged. The lesions on his wings had multiplied, and the glass of his cockpit had been cracked. One of his optics was shattered and leaking energon down his faceplates. “What happened? We heard the sonic boom…”

“They wanted to install slave programming,” said Thundercracker. His voice was still faint. “Hacked into my systems. Didn’t want to let them…not without a fight. But there were too many of them…”

“Shockwave can fix it,” said Silverbolt confidently. He was more carrying Thundercracker than supporting him—the mech could barely move his legs. Whether it was due to the programming or the damage, Silverbolt wasn’t sure. “He promised he can undo it all.”

“About time Cyclops did something useful,” snapped Skywarp. All his usual cheer was gone in the face of his wingmate’s injuries.

“Let’s get him to Skyfire,” suggested Skydive. “He’ll be able to lie down, and I know Skyfire carries a lot of medical supplies.”

“That traitor?” Despite his injuries, Thundercracker managed to muster up a bit of scorn.

“Well, he’s not that bad,” said Silverbolt lamely.

“Don’t pretend like you know what you’re talking about,” retorted Skywarp, and started moving again. He was surprisingly fast, considering the fact he was practically carrying his wingmate.

“Do you know why he left Earth, then?” asked Skydive, moving a little faster to keep up.

“There wasn’t a reason,” said Skywarp bitterly. He was staring straight ahead as he walked, faceplates not betraying any sympathy. “He just decided to go one day. Didn’t warn anyone. Just…left.”

“That’s not true,” objected Thundercracker. He sounded strained. “It was after…the thing with the Constructicons. And the tower.”

“What was this?” asked Silverbolt.

“It was stellar cycles ago. I don’t even remember,” said Skywarp.

“I do,” said Thundercracker heavily. “Two of the Autobot engineers…Hoist and Grapple…designed this…”

“Tower thingy,” provided Skywarp, who didn’t remember anything.

“Something about collecting energy from Earth’s sun. I don’t know. But Prime told them…he told them they couldn’t build it. So…” Thundercracker paused to recover his energy. “They…two of them…found the Constructicons. And they all built it together.”

“Did it work?” asked Silverbolt.

“It did,” said Thundercracker. “So naturally…Megatron wanted it all for himself. And there was a battle, and the tower was destroyed. And that was the end of it.”

“Hoist and Grapple must have been in a lot of trouble,” said Silverbolt.

“You’d think so, wouldn’t you?” asked Thundercracker. His good optic flickered a little.

“So where’s Skyfire come in to all this?” asked Skydive.

“I’m not sure,” admitted Thundercracker. “But the whole thing…from what I could tell…it started a fight in the Autobot science and engineering department. And at the end of it, Skyfire left and we didn’t see him again for five stellar cycles.”

“I don’t get it,” said Air Raid.

“You’ll have to ask Skyfire, then,” said Thundercracker. “Or Starscream, though I doubt he’d tell you anything.”

The conversation died down after that. Once they made it outside, Skywarp turned to look at Silverbolt again.

“I can carry him the rest of the way,” said Skywarp. “The rest of you need to go meet up with the rest of the troops. See if they need your help. Hit a Quintesson for me.”

Windsong’s trine didn’t need to be told twice before shooting off into the sky. But Silverbolt hesitated, and his brothers followed his example.

“You sure you’re alright?” Silverbolt asked Skywarp.

“We’ll be fine. We’ve been through worse,” Skywarp assured him. “Now go. Or you’ll miss the fun part.”

“I don’t know if I’d call it that,” said Silverbolt.

“Psh. Autobots,” said Skywarp.

Silverbolt wasn’t offended. And as his team raced to catch up with Windsong, he reflected that maybe there were good parts to being an Autobot, and good parts to being a Decepticon, and what he really wanted to be—the sort of mech he wanted to be—was a mixture of the two. Neither, and also both.

Silverbolt was jolted out of his thoughts by a new comm. According to the signature, it was from Moonrise. He opened the new channel without really thinking about it.

[So, you’ve never uplinked before?] asked Moonrise.

And in that moment, Silverbolt sincerely contemplated pointing his nosecone at the ground and igniting his thrusters to full power.

Chapter Text

Under normal circumstances, Starscream would not have been anxious about storming an enemy citadel. He was a seasoned warrior, and flying into warzones no longer troubled him the way it once had a long time ago.

But this? This was too simple. The combined Autobot-Decepticon army had faced virtually no opposition since they’d arrived in the city. And now the streets were eerily silent as he and what remained of his seekers flew overhead.

And then of course there was the issue of Skyfire, still hidden in plain sight amongst the Quintesson ships. He was probably in no danger—even if the Quintessons identified him, and then worked up the courage to attack, he was safe from the paralyzing weapons that would allow them to take him captive. Still, Starscream could not shake his anxiety. He should have demanded Astrotrain or Blitzwing serve as their transport instead. Skyfire could have sent them his scans of the Quintesson ship and then remained safe on Cybertron.

But Starscream had not been thinking about that at the time. In fact, he’d been almost glad that Skyfire would be part of the rescue mission. Skyfire was dependable—well, except for when he was switching factions or flying off to uncharted space for five stellar cycles. But something about his presence made Starscream feel a little bit calmer.

Besides, they’d had a good talk on the flight over. Skyfire wasn’t trying to deny that he’d been in the wrong. And knowing he’d been missed soothed Starscream’s spark a little bit, too.

Starscream realized he’d forgotten to mention his brief conversation with Perceptor to Skyfire. Perceptor had actually apologized. That had been…legitimately shocking, if not long overdue. But honestly, the mech who really deserved the apologies was Skyfire.

There had been an official inquiry after Skyfire’s disappearance, but apparently the Autobot scientists had managed to keep their actions a secret from Prowl and Prime. But Skyfire had told Starscream exactly what had happened in the days following the solar tower incident.

To the Decepticons, the loss of the solar tower hadn’t been anything special. Honestly, Starscream hadn’t even thought twice about the incident until Skyfire had commed him to complain that Hoist and Grapple had received no punishment for allying themselves with the Constructicons.

Until that day, Skyfire had kept his contact with Starscream to a minimum. Starscream had understood why, and left his ex-partner in peace lest he compromise Skyfire’s position with the Autobots. But now that Skyfire was actively seeking him out, Starscream wouldn’t have dreamed of turning him away.

As it turned out, it wasn’t Hoist and Grapple’s betrayal that had offended Skyfire. It was the fact that the other Autobots had not seen the incident as particularly noteworthy. Meanwhile, Skyfire had served brig time for dissecting some domesticated earth animals, and he’d confided to Starscream that he didn’t think the other scientists were being monitored nearly as closely as he was.

Starscream could not imagine how life on the Ark must have been for Skyfire. He was the only true aerial living on a base full of grounders who viewed him as little more than a convenient means of transportation despite the glyphs on his wrists. For things to have reached a point where Skyfire—gentle, patient, frustratingly tolerant Skyfire—had actually complained meant that the situation must have been unbearable.

At the Academy, Starscream had always been the first to complain when he sensed injustice. But Skyfire had remained silent through all but the very worst of it. At the time, Starscream had been infuriated, and viewed Skyfire’s calm demeanor as a minor betrayal. As the only aerials on campus, they had to stick together, after all.

But eventually Starscream had come to understand the power in Skyfire’s silence. On the rare occasion when Skyfire did complain about something, mechs tended to actually listen to him.

And so, with Starscream’s encouragement, Skyfire had taken his concerns to the other Autobot scientists. Starscream had honestly been expecting Perceptor and Wheeljack to outright deny that Skyfire was being treated differently from any other mech on the Ark.

What he hadn’t been expecting was for the two to calmly and casually explain to that it was only natural that, as an aerial, Skyfire would be held to stricter standards because he was more likely to engage in treasonous behavior. Skyfire had objected, naturally, but none of the scientists had been particularly interested in what he had to say.

Perceptor, according to Skyfire’s account, had tried to console him by stating that Skyfire was far more sophisticated in manner and processing power than ordinary aerials. Nobody seemed to understand why Skyfire had taken offense to this, but the fight had escalated from there.

Starscream had shamelessly encouraged Skyfire’s outrage, hoping to turn it to his own advantage. That had backfired, spectacularly. Sometimes it seemed like half the things Starscream attempted nowadays backfired. He blamed Earth. Nothing had been normal ever since they woke up on Earth…

Starscream forced his attentions back to current events. Just to be safe, he was keeping a channel open to Skyfire. When he spotted the large building down on the ground, he signaled to his seekers to land.

The building that Shockwave had identified as the Magisterium was easily the largest structure in the city, with an immense dome-shaped roof. But even this important building was still and silent.

On the steps, Starscream could see the grounders were approaching, with Prime and Megatron trying to make it look like they weren’t trying to shove past each other. Elita slipped between the two and ran on ahead, a distinct bounce in her step.

[I don’t like this,] Starscream told Megatron as he walked nearer. Long experience had taught him that Megatron responded better to private comms than public declarations—not that he wouldn’t loudly decry Megatron and his strategies if he felt the situation called for it.

But contrary to popular belief, Starscream was capable of having a normal, borderline-respectful conversation with Megatron. He’d never fawn and simper like Soundwave did, but they could still communicate.

[The alternative is standing out here until we rust,] said Megatron.

His leader did have a point. Still, something obviously wasn’t right here, everything felt wrong and he hadn’t survived the war for this long by being careless.

The entryway was a large, open arch, but inside was too dark to see. Elita disappeared through it and, after a moment of hesitation, Prime and Megatron followed her. Starscream let the ground troops file past as well, signaling with his wings for the aerials to wait. He didn’t care if some called him a coward. He was getting out of this alive.

Only when the last of the grounders had gone inside did Starscream follow after his leader. He wished he had Thundercracker and Skywarp here to guard his wings, even if they were useless slaggers. But Thundercracker was a prisoner, and Skywarp had undoubtedly run off to look for him. So he was on his own. As usual.

Once inside, he adjusted his optics to the dim lighting and extended his sensors. They were in a large room with a high, domed ceiling. The architecture was austere, with no decoration of any kind, though it was all highly polished and very clean.

In front of them was another, smaller doorway. Elita was the first to step through, followed by Prime and Megatron again. Starscream felt his unease grow. His processor was telling him to forget both factions and fly back to Skyfire, where it was safe.

Starscream glanced back at the seekers who followed him. No. He would not abandon his soldiers, no matter how strong his sense of self-preservation. He steeled himself and followed the grounders into the next room.

This room was brighter, lit from orbs of light that floated above optic-level. And it was larger, too. Clearly they were now under the main dome of the Magisterium. Across the open floor was a raised platform, where six Quintessons had gathered, all floating on white beams of energy.

Before them, like a living barrier, were the captured Cybertronians. Starscream’s optics immediately went to the two missing Rainmakers, then over to Cosmos. Beside him was Chromia, then Moonracer, and then all three of Reflector’s components.

All the Cybertronian prisoners were wearing silver collars around their necks, and watched their rescuers with the same forlorn optics.

“Run,” whispered Chromia.

“Mia!” Ironhide rushed forward. Chromia responded by shaking her helm and raising her arms up to keep him from coming too close. Ironhide reached for the collar around her neck, but she smacked him away.

“Run!” she cried, and now there was real emotion in her vocalizer. “They’ve already called—” She struggled to speak, but it appeared that she was incapable of saying anything more. Then the collar around her neck sparked with electricity, and she screamed in pain.

At the same time, Tempest had run to his missing trinemates, but they both pushed him away in the same manner. The shock and hurt on Tempest’s faceplates was physically painful to look at.

Prime looked up at the Quintessons. “Greetings,” he said in a calm, measured voice. “My name is Optimus Prime, and I have come here on behalf of the soldiers you have taken from my army.”

One of the Quintessons laughed with all five of his faces. The others all joined in after a moment. Prime just looked startled. When the eerie laughter had finally died away, the largest Quintesson spoke.

“I am Magistrate Zykkon,” he said. “First of the Quintesson Magistrate. And it appears you fail to understand the situation that you and your…soldiers…are in.”

“Run, run, run,” whispered Chromia.

“I do not understand,” said Prime, very carefully. “Perhaps you can explain?”

“Slaves require no explanations from their masters,” said Zykkon. “Now, I generously give you the opportunity to surrender now and ensure your own survival.”

Megatron gave a harsh laugh, “You think you can subdue us all? Every one of your soldiers fled at the mere sight of us. Come and fight me, if you dare!”

Starscream continued to very slowly edge backwards towards the exit.

“I will not trouble myself with an unruly slave,” said Zykkon. “Nor do I need to. The Galactic Council has already received footage of your unprompted attack on our peaceful homeworld, and they have kindly agreed to come to our aid.”

“Run, run, run, run,” Chromia was still chanting softly.

“With their help, you will be subdued,” continued Zykkon. “You will return to your intended functions, and the natural order will be restored.”

“Magistrate, we are sentient beings!” protested Prime.

“Are you?” Zykkon asked. “Your civil war has lasted for millions of stellar cycles and devastated countless worlds. Your race is a pestilence upon the galaxy.”

“You cannot honestly expect to succeed,” said Prime. “The Galactic Council may dislike Cybertronians, but they would never condone slavery.”

“Slavery? You misunderstand me. The Quintessons are merely reclaiming lost drones who, without the guiding hand of their masters, have reverted to mindless violence.”

“I understand that our war must appear endless to the short-lived races that make up the Galactic Council,” said Prime. “But it is not all that we are capable of. We fight now so that one day we can rebuild—”

“Enough, Prime,” snapped Megatron. “I’ll just shoot them, and we can go—” And he lifted his cannon. The reaction was instantaneous. Moonracer leapt in front of Zykkon, ready to take the shot for him, and the other captured Cybertronians moved closer to the group of Quintessons, effectively blocking any chance the warriors had at a clear shot.

“I feel it is only fair to mention that if you attack us, your comrades will defend us to the death,” said Zykkon casually.

“Acceptable losses,” said Megatron, still not lowering his cannon.

“Excuse me,” said Elita sharply, turning to the warlord. “If you harm my femmes, I will destroy you.”

“Yes, fight amongst yourselves until the Council Peacekeepers arrive,” said Zykkon gleefully. “You should be adept at that.”

Starscream decided that he had seen enough. Without a word, he slipped out the door. Once he was sure that nobody had noticed him leave, he broke into a run and emerged back out into Quintessa’s gleaming daylight.

He heard the roar of jet engines, and looked up. A trine—probably Windsong’s—was heading towards him, followed by a group that could have only been the Aerialbots. Starscream transformed and shot up into the sky to meet them.

[Commander!] cried Windsong. [What’s—?]

[It was a trap,] said Starscream. [They Quintessons have called the Galactic Council on us. No doubt they have been planning this from the beginning. They knew we would eventually launch a rescue mission, and have manipulated it to look like an unprovoked attack.]

[That explains why all the Quintessons ran away,] said Skydive. [They knew someone else was going to be doing all the fighting for them. Right?]

[Yes. The council is sending Peacekeepers to aid the Quintessons. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Quintesson civilians constructed hiding places in anticipation of our arrival.]

[Oh Primus,] said Silverbolt faintly.

[We need to get out of here now,] continued Starscream. [We can’t overpower a full Peacekeeping force. The best we can hope for is our own freedom.]

[Starscream,] began Silverbolt, [I think I know what’s—]

[Not now! We need to get off this planet immediately, did you hear me?]

[No! I’ve—I’ve figured it out! Listen to me!] cried Silverbolt, his glyphs shaking with fear and anxiety. [I know what I’m talking about! The Quintessons want us to fight aliens for them! They’re going to start a war!]

Starscream felt his engines stall.

Intended functions, the Quintesson had said.

According to a Quintesson, what was a Cybertronian’s intended function? That, Starscream supposed, depended upon sparktype and frametype. But in the end, the Cybertronians did what the Quintessons could not, or would not, whether it was manual labor or…

…combat.

[Tell me everything you know,] ordered Starscream. [Who are the Quintessons going to attack?]

[I—I don’t know,] said Silverbolt helplessly. [Shockwave—he can translate the language, maybe…]

[Is he with Skyfire?] interrupted Starscream.

[Yeah. I mean…he should be.]

Starscream accelerated. [Follow me, then!]

[But—what about the others?] cried Silverbolt.

[No. You will help me find concrete proof that the Quintessons are planning on using us to attack another race. That’s what I need from you right now. Understood?]

Silverbolt hesitated for a moment longer. Then he said, [Alright.]

[What’s the Galactic Council?] asked Fireflight as Starscream led the formation back to the place where Skyfire had landed.

[The Galactic Council is a federation of thousands of alien planets,] explained Starscream. [Most of them are organic species, and all of them abhor Cybertronians. But most importantly, they boast a powerful peacekeeping force.]

[Did you ever fight against them?] asked Silverbolt.

[No. They are pacifists, and only fight to defend their space or prevent further violence. They have made it clear they disapprove of us, and our war, but they leave us in peace as long as we stay out of their territory.]

They reached Skyfire not too long after that. When the shuttle sensed their approach, his doors opened to let them embark.

[Is everything alright?] asked Skyfire as they stepped onboard.

“No, it’s not,” said Starscream. He saw that Thundercracker was lying on a berth, while Skywarp tended to his injuries. “Take us into orbit, now. Where is Shockwave?”

[What happened?] asked Skyfire.

“The Galactic Council is on its way to finish us off,” said Starscream. “The whole set-up was a trap. They wanted us all to invade their planet so they could send out a distress call and enslave fifty of us at once, instead of picking us off one by one. Shockwave!”

“I can only move so quickly,” complained Shockwave, appearing in the doorway at last. In the confusion, Starscream had forgotten that Shockwave’s entire helm had been reverted back to the way it had been before he’d been mutilated by the old Senate, and seeing him again was a small surprise.

“You said you can translate the Quintesson languages,” said Starscream.

“I can, though my grasp of the written word is stronger than the spoken—”

“Fine. I believe the Quintessons are planning to attack Council-protected planets once they have enslaved all of us, but I need proof. Your job is to find it. And if you can’t, fabricate it.”

“I cannot hack into their restricted databases from this distance,” objected Shockwave. “I am not Soundwave.”

Soundwave had been left behind to watch over the handful of soldiers remaining on Cybertron, and he had point-blank refused to send any of his cassettes on the mission to Quintessa alone. If only he was here…but he wasn’t.

“Silverbolt,” said Starscream, turning to the young shuttle. “Take your team back to the Magisterium and try to find their central database.”

“But we won’t be able to read any of it!” protested Silverbolt.

“I know that! Download everything you can…here…” Starscream unsubspaced a blank datastick and handed it to Silverbolt. “Put it on this, and then bring it back to us.”

[Is that a good idea?] asked Skyfire.

“I believe they can handle it,” said Starscream. “Quickly, now, before it’s too late.”

“We’ll go with them!” cried Windsong. Starscream looked at him. “Sir.”

Starscream examined the young trine for a few klicks. Over the last few solar cycles, the cadets had become ridiculously close to the Aerialbots, but he hadn’t really stopped to reflect on it. “Fine. Come back alive, and I’ll consider giving you your brands.”

All three seekers stood a little straighter at that. Windsong saluted.

[Starscream, do you have a moment?] asked Skyfire over a private line.

[No, I really don’t, Skyfire,] said Starscream as he watched the Aerialbots leave with Windsong’s trine. “Are they clear? Take us up, now.”

“Up?” asked Shockwave in alarm. His new fists clenched in rage. “Why are we going—Starscream, I will offline you!”

[We are not abandoning the others,] said Skyfire soothingly, interrupting Starscream’s retort that he’d love to see Shockwave try anything with slave coding in his helm. [I’m just moving into orbit. We’ll be safer there than on the ground.]

Shockwave looked distinctly unhappy, but he didn’t object. “Fine. As my comms are still disabled, I ask to utilize your communications system to keep an open line to the Aerialbots during their mission.”

[Of course,] said Skyfire kindly. [Come to my control room, both of you.]

It was a little bit annoying to see someone else working at one of Skyfire’s terminals, but Starscream said nothing. Skyfire lifted off and, as they left the atmosphere, Starscream glanced down at the hideous planet below.

“Well, I understand why the Quintessons want to colonize elsewhere,” muttered Starscream, sitting down in the chair before the viewscreen.

[That’s what I wanted to tell you,] said Skyfire. [While you were away, I did some exploratory scans. The sort we…used to do.]

“Really?" asked Starscream, his interest flaring. "Did you find out what caused the core to come apart like that?”

[I believe it was due to extensive mining for resources, rather than any natural phenomenon,] said Skyfire. [Of course, I would have to fly over to verify, but I trust my hypothesis.]

“They must have been very desperate, to go so far down,” murmured Starscream, one idle hand stroking Skyfire’s keyboard.

[That’s what I was trying to say before. This planet has no more resources,] said Skyfire. [Every scan I perform only confirms it. Quintessa is dying.]

“So the Quintessons must colonize new worlds if they wish to survive,” said Starscream, sitting back in his chair. “But why should they have to build a new civilization from nothing when they can steal the work of others? Of course. Skyfire, can you put everything you found into a report for me?”

Skyfire didn’t ask any questions, but simply lapsed into that comfortable silence that meant he was compiling data. Starscream tapped his fingers impatiently against the chair, wishing there was something he could do to help. Maybe…maybe he should make sure Thundercracker was alright?

No, he mused. His presence could very well make Thundercracker feel even worse.

On the viewscreen, something caught his eye. Starscream looked up.

New ships were approaching fast. Starscream glanced at Skyfire’s readout and saw there were fifteen ships total, and the largest one was carrying fifteen single-pilot fighters inside. They weren’t Cybertronian, but they weren’t Quintesson either. They were of a design that Starscream had only seen a few times, but he recognized them nonetheless.

The Galactic Council was here.

Chapter Text

Silverbolt stared at the terminal screen, and the alien glyphs displayed upon it. The aerials had made it to the Central Archive Tower with Shockwave’s guidance, and were now standing in front of a computer even larger than Teletraan-1.

Unfortunately, Silverbolt had no idea how to access it.

[Insert the datastick now,] said Shockwave. [You do not have much time.]

They were communicating through Skyfire’s systems, because Shockwave’s comms had been disabled by the slave programming. It felt weird, taking orders from Shockwave, and weirder still that Shockwave was being friendly.

But Superion was in a very good mood now that his components were all together again, and it was difficult for Silverbolt to resist the simple, child-like joy that flowed through the gestalt-link. To Superion, the team came first. Everyone’s impending doom, courtesy of the Quintessons via the Galactic Council, was secondary.

Silverbolt clutched the datastick in his servo and looked over the supercomputer. “Is this even compatible?” he worried.

“I think so. Look,” said Skydive, leaning over to indicate a panel on the far side of the terminal. Silverbolt looked, and was thrilled to see a familiar-looking slot alongside all the strange alien ports.

“Oh, good,” mumbled Silverbolt, inserting the datastick. Immediately, the terminal screen changed and more strange glyphs began to flash across it.

“Uh, is it supposed to do that?” asked Air Raid.

“Silverbolt broke it!” cried Moonrise happily from somewhere behind him.

[Um, I think it’s downloading,] said Skydive.

[A blank datastick will automatically withdraw information from whatever source it is linked to,] explained Shockwave. [Unless yours was somehow faulty—]

[There was nothing wrong with that datastick!] Starscream snarled over him.

[—you should have to do nothing more than wait for the data to be compressed.]

Silverbolt shifted on his pedes anxiously as he watched the alien gylphs continue to scroll past. They had not encountered any Quintessons on the way here, not even guards, but he was still uneasy about being in the heart of a huge Quintesson city.

Strangely enough, Windsong had been happy to let Silverbolt lead them all through the skies. At the time Silverbolt hadn’t really been thinking about it, but now that he had nothing to do except think, it stuck out to him as a little odd. As the leader of the more experienced group, Windsong had every right to assume command.

But it appeared that the seekers were happy to poke around the room and occasionally make jokes about the strange architecture, as if they weren’t all in mortal danger. Bladewing and Windsong had found some sort of orb, and were now throwing it back and forth to each other like a ball while Moonrise leapt between them, trying to intercept it.

“Guys, no,” said Silverbolt when it began to look like the seekers were about to take their game to the air.

“Oh, you’re no fun!” complained Moonrise with the same pout that had once sent Tracks skidding into a telephone pole.

“He’s really not,” agreed Slingshot, who had managed to turn some sort of decorative statue into a chair. Or at least, Silverbolt hoped it was decoration, and not something important. “Actually, wanna hear a funny story about Silverbolt? There was this one time when—”

“OKAY, IT’S FINISHED DOWNLOADING!” yelled Silverbolt in a tone that was significantly louder than he’d intended. He reached down and yanked the datastick out of the alien computer. “Let’s go! Everyone out! Now!” He raised his arms and began to herd the other aerials out of the room, to continued protests that he really was no fun at all.

The Central Archive Tower wasn’t far from the Magisterium, but Silverbolt had no intention of going anywhere near that building. Instead, he led their formation directly upwards, into Quintessa’s atmosphere. All Cybertronian aerials could fly through space to some degree, though only shuttles could manage it for extended distances without risking severe damages to their frames and processors.

With this in mind, Silverbolt slowed his pace so that the others could keep up. It would be harder for them to reach escape velocity, and he didn’t want to make anyone feel bad. Slingshot was particularly sensitive about his speed.

But when they broke through Quintessa’s atmosphere, Silverbolt was horrified to realize that he was now picking up an array of new alien signatures. A fleet of ships stretched for as far as his sensors could reach, none of them even remotely familiar.

[Are you fragging kidding me—] began Slingshot.

[Oh, this is bad,] said Windsong. [There’s no way Moonrise can seduce all of them.]

[I could if I wanted to!] Moonrise sounded offended. Then he seemed to consider the armada before them. [I just don’t want to.]

[They’re not ships,] said Silverbolt. [The ships are drones. There’s a whole bunch of organics inside them.]

[Now I really don’t want to.]

[Superion can take them,] said Slingshot.

[No!] cried Silverbolt as he felt his brothers all reaching for their shared mind. [These are the good guys! We can’t attack them!]

But now Silverbolt’s sensors were picking up another ship, approaching from the opposite direction. It was Skyfire, in his horrific new alt-mode! Silverbolt felt his spark lighten with relief.

[Get in here now,] ordered Starscream over Skyfire’s internal comms. [And you’d better have that datastick, or I’ll toss you right back out.]

[I’ve got it,] promised Silverbolt.

[Unidentified Cybertronians!] came a public transmission from the largest of the alien ships. [You are under arrest for the invasion of a peaceful Class Fourteen world! Surrender immediately!]

Silverbolt picked up a burst of speed as he saw Skyfire’s airlock slide open. He didn’t catch what Starscream said in response to the organics, but as soon as he was safely inside Skyfire’s hold, he transformed and unsubspaced the datastick. Then he all but ran for Skyfire’s control room.

Shockwave snatched the datastick from Silverbolt’s servo the moment he came through the door, but Silverbolt hardly noticed. Instead, his attention was immediately captured by Skyfire’s main viewscreen. It was not displaying a view of Quintessa or the blackness of outer space, but rather the interior of an alien ship, presumably the same one that had just threatened them.

The bridge of this ship was filled with all sorts of different creatures. They all looked organic to Silverbolt’s untrained optic, though none of them were anywhere near as small as a human. All of the aliens, regardless of species, were wearing the same blue uniform. Amazement and fascination radiated from his brothers, and they all gathered around for a closer look.

The alien that spoke first was an interesting looking creature, with two legs and two arms and bluish-green flesh. Instead of hair, two strange horns curled back over his head.

“Cybertronians,” he sneered, revealing square dentae. “Surrender now or you will be destroyed,”

“And you are…?” asked Starscream.

“Admiral Sahn of the Galactic Peacekeepers,” said the organic. “And this is your only warning. Surrender.”

“You don’t want to do this,” said Starscream. “It’s a trap.”

The admiral looked annoyed, but then he hesitated.

“I can prove it,” continued Starscream, speaking quickly so that none of the organics could interrupt. “The Quintessons are using you because they don’t have the power to defeat us on their own. But once they’ve enslaved us all again, they’re going to use us to attack and colonize your planets.”

“And I should believe you?” asked Admiral Sahn. “I know who you are. I know what you’ve done.”

“I have proof,” said Starscream quickly. “I can send a long-term analysis of the planet that shows it cannot sustain life for much longer. I will also be able to send you more information from the Quintesson’s own database if you grant us another cycle to compile it.”

“And why should we believe anything you say?” asked the Admiral again, somewhat impatiently.

“Make the Quintessons hand over their data,” suggested Shockwave, turning away from his own work to approach the viewscreen. “You will see their plans for yourself.”

The Admiral turned to glance at another officer on his ship, this one a strange translucent organic with enormous green eyes. It looked as though it would feel especially squishy if Silverbolt touched it.

“That would be a violation of their rights,” said the organic in a strange, wobbly voice. “We would need a warrant from the council to seize such information.”

“What about our rights?” asked Shockwave. “We are sentient creatures, and slavery is illegal under your laws.”

“The Quintessons are lobbying for you to be taken off the list of sentient races,” said the Admiral. “They are making the argument that you are pre-programmed drones.”

“Oh, that is such slag!” yelled Starscream, his composure snapping at last. “By your own laws, claiming sentience is all that is required for me to be granted sentient status!”

“I don’t know, you look rather non-sentient and violent to me,” deadpanned another alien, this one red-skinned and quadrupedal.

“That’s enough, Captain,” said Admiral Sahn sharply. Then he turned his attention back to Starscream. “Even if what you claim is true, you have attacked a peaceful planet. We cannot allow that.”

“We are only here to rescue our own,” said Starscream. “Three of the mechs taken in the last attack were children.”

A few of the aliens seemed to hesitate, and Silverbolt saw a couple muttering to each other in the background.

“That vehicle is stolen?” suggested the Captain hopefully.

Starscream actually laughed at that. “I assure you, he is not. Now, I would like to speak with a Councilmember. Otherwise the Quintessons are going to thank you very politely for rounding us all up, and then force us to slaughter all of you so that they can take your planets.”

The aliens looked around at each other.

“Hold, please,” said the Admiral, and the screen went blank.

Starscream let out a stream of curses and then slumped against Skyfire’s control panel, apparently defeated.

“Now what should we do?” asked Silverbolt.

“There is nothing more you can do at this point,” said Shockwave, and quietly returned to his translations.

Air Raid gave Silverbolt a little nudge. Silverbolt glanced over at him questioningly.

“Ask him,” whispered Air Raid.

“Ask who what? ” Silverbolt whispered back.

Air Raid jerked his helm in Starscream’s direction. Starscream was now reading something on one of Skyfire’s smaller display screens and tapping his digits impatiently.

“Not now,” said Silverbolt. “There’s important stuff happening.”

“If you’re not gonna ask, I will!” hissed Slingshot impatiently.

“We should really wait until we get back to Cybertron—” Silverbolt pleaded.

“I can hear you, you know,” snapped Starscream. The Aerialbots fell silent as the Air Commander turned to face them.

“’s not important,” mumbled Silverbolt.

Starscream looked at him suspiciously. One of his servos was tracing strange patterns on Skyfire’s console. “Either spit it out, or go somewhere else so I can work in peace.”

“We wanna know if we’re really seekers,” blurted Fireflight.

Starscream looked legitimately surprised. “Who told you that?” he asked sharply.

“The Quintessons,” said Silverbolt, being very careful not to look in the direction of Windsong’s trine, who were loitering in the corner. “Is it true?”

“Does it matter?” Starscream turned back to Skyfire.

“Yes!” said Air Raid and Slingshot in unison.

“It would be nice to know,” added Skydive.

Starscream’s wings swept downwards in dismay, and he seemed to pull himself closer to Skyfire’s systems. “It’s complicated.”

“We’re not dumb!” said Slingshot hotly. “Just tell us the truth!”

“Fine. There is no such thing as a seeker spark,” said Starscream, turning back to around to face them. “We’re all aerials. A ‘seeker’ is simply a catch-all term for any aerial mech who is not a shuttle or rotary. However, over the course of the war, the word has become synonymous with Decepticon air warriors. Does that answer your question?”

“Sort of,” said Air Raid, but he still looked uncertain, and Silverbolt could sense all of his brothers were dissatisfied.

“A protoform can take any type of spark,” said Starscream. “And it will modify itself to reflect the nature of the spark that has been placed inside it. That is how traditional sparklings, like the ones on Cybertron, are made. But you were placed in pre-built frames. Vector Sigma granted the Autobots your sparks—aerial sparks—because grounder sparks would have rejected the air frames that had been built for you. If the Autobots had brought blank protoforms instead, you would have been grounders.”

[Vector Sigma would not have granted aerial sparks to grounders unless the only frames available were air frames,] explained Skyfire.

“It was the same with the Stunticons. They’d have been war-builds if Megatron had brought blank protoforms to Vector Sigma. He prefers to grant sparklings that match their would-be creators. Are you happy now?”

“I guess,” said Air Raid, not sounding very happy at all.

“As I said, it’s not important,” Starscream waved one servo dismissively. “You are Autobots, even if you are too young to understand the oath you took.”

“And what if we didn’t want to be Autobots anymore?” demanded Slingshot.

For once, Starscream seemed to be at a loss for words.

“What? That’s what you wanted, isn’t it?” yelled Air Raid. “That’s what you said in the medbay! You said when we get sick of the way the Autobots treat us, we could—”

“I didn’t mean now!” cried Starscream. “I meant in a few vorns! You’re far too young—you don’t even understand what you’re asking!”

“We’d have to leave the Ark,” realized Silverbolt. “Leave Ratchet and Wheeljack, and the Protectobots—and fight them, too.” Even though Ratchet and Wheeljack hadn’t exactly been the most attentive creators, Silverbolt could not fathom facing them in battle. And the Protectobots were like their little brothers. “Superion would never understand.”

“Yeah, but—” began Slingshot.

“You don’t want to live on an underwater base,” continued Starscream. “It’s awful. And—and we’re on reduced rations.”

“But—” Slingshot tried again, only to be interrupted by an insistent beep from Skyfire’s viewscreen.

[I’m receiving another call,] said Skyfire. [I’ll put it onscreen.]

Starscream immediately turned his attention away from the still-protesting Aerialbots. Then the screen came online to reveal an organic female with brightly-colored fur sitting at a desk.

“I am Third Councilmember Ija Ara’si,” said the organic, her pointed ears tilting forward. It appeared they could swivel around to any angle. “I am told you are drafting an appeal?”

“We need you to call off the attack on Quintessa,” said Starscream. “Your forces are being led into a trap. I already explained the situation to the Admiral.”

Like the Admiral, Councilmember Ara’si did not look particularly impressed. “And why should I believe the words of any member of your race?”

“I have compiled proof,” said Starscream. “I can send you the data, if you read it you will see—”

“I have no interest in your games,” said Councilmember Ara’si, her ears going all the way back. “I see your deception for what it is. You want our forces to withdraw from Quintessa so you can destroy the only race who could possibly keep you under control.”

“Is that what they told you?” demanded Starscream. “That they are reclaiming us to protect the rest of you? That’s a lie, and not even a very particularly convincing one.”

“I’m sure yours is much better,” said Ara’si dryly.

To Silverbolt’s great surprise, Starscream actually ignored the jibe. “The Quintessons are gathering up their old weapons in preparation for an attack on your worlds because their own planet is dying. Your scientists will be able to confirm this!”

[If the Quintessons truly cared for the safety of the universe, they would not have taken so long to reclaim us,] added Skyfire. [Perhaps you should ask them why they did not begin their work shortly after the Great War broke out, instead of waiting millions of years.]

Ara’si looked vaguely puzzled, as if trying to determine who had just spoken. “Perhaps. But I suggest you surrender, and allow us to determine whether your claims are true.”

“I have children on this ship, I will not surrender so you can hand us over to the Quintessons!” snapped Starscream.

Ara’si leaned back in her chair. She appeared to be thinking this over.

“I will call for an emergency meeting of the Galactic Council for the purpose of resolving this issue,” she said at last. “But do not think I am doing it for you. I merely acknowledge that, if you somehow are telling the truth, the fate of all my constituents could hang in the balance.”

Starscream gave the slightest nod, but he appeared oddly distant. Silverbolt watched as he unsubspaced a datapad. Then the screen went black as Ara’si cut the call, but Starscream did not appear to notice—now he was writing something down very quickly.

“Um—” began Silverbolt.

“Not now,” snapped Starscream without looking up. “Go play. I need to make about ten calls and Ramjet keeps screaming at me for leaving him—”

[We can talk later,] Skyfire promised him. [Try and get some rest.]

Followed by his brothers, and then Windsong’s trine, Silverbolt trudged out of the control room. Out in the main area of Skyfire’s hold, Skywarp was still tending to Thundercracker. Thundercracker looked significantly better already, with all his wounds bandaged and his self-repair in the process of dealing with the cosmetic damages. When he saw the Aerialbots approach, he even managed a weak smile.

“I want to go home,” said Skydive at last. Fireflight made a sound of agreement. Silverbolt had to admit, he missed the Ark terribly. Cybertron was dark and cold compared to Earth, and Quintessa was an unspeakable nightmare.

Silverbolt wondered what the Protectobots were doing. He wished they were here with him. Then Silverbolt realized that he was actually very glad that the Protectobots were still on Earth, happy and safe.

“Hey. It’s not that bad. It’ll be over soon,” said Thundercracker. He tried to move to sit up, but Skywarp put one firm servo on his cockpit, keeping him pinned down to the berth.

“What if we don’t win?” worried Fireflight. “What if they—?”

“Don’t say that,” said Silverbolt hastily. “We’ll…we’ll be fine. The good guys always win, remember?”

Fireflight didn’t reply. He merely sank to the ground and pushed himself into a corner. “This is my fault,” he mumbled at last.

“Your fault?” repeated Silverbolt incredulously. “How is this your fault?”

“Because I was the one who got caught by the Quintessons when we were patrolling!” said Fireflight with surprising ferocity. Guilt and self-loathing were coming off Silverbolt’s usually carefree brother in waves. “If I hadn’t wandered away, I wouldn’t have got caught, and then you guys wouldn’t have got caught, and Thundercracker and Skywarp wouldn’t have gotten caught, and then Skyfire wouldn’t have had to make himself ugly and bring everyone to rescue us and Quintessa wouldn’t have been a trap and nobody would be here right now!”

“That’s absurd,” said Thundercracker. “Fireflight—you know that’s not true, don’t you?”

“Yeah, that’s crazy,” agreed Windsong.

“Guilt is a fundamental aspect of Autobot psychology,” said Bladewing wisely.

“Yeah, what he said, with the big words,” said Moonrise.

“Listen,” said Thundercracker. “This was going to happen sooner or later, no matter what we did. The Quintessons didn’t attack you because you wandered away from your patrol. The Quintessons attacked you because they have chosen to view our entire race as slaves. That’s on them, not you.”

Fireflight said nothing, even as the rest of his brothers moved to curl up with him. It was instinctive, Superion’s only solution to any problem that he could not step on, and Silverbolt could not have resisted even if he’d wanted to.

[I have pull-out berths, you know,] said Skyfire unexpectedly. [You don’t have to sleep on the floor.]

“We’re fine,” said Silverbolt, and he meant it.

Chapter Text

[Ramjet, report.]

[Oh, there you are, Commander,] sneered the conehead. [Having a nice time away from the mechs who are actually risking their lives? I should have known you’d run off the first chance you got.]

[Ramjet,] said Starscream impatiently. But Ramjet would not be deterred.

[Some Air Commander you are, abandoning your forces to alien slavers! No wonder your wingmates hate you. And furthermore, I think it’s—]

[RAMJET!] yelled Starscream, mustering up the energy to interrupt the other seeker at last. [I am literally moments away from a hearing with the Galactic Council, and I do not have time for your whining!]

[That’s funny, because we’re all supposed to have time for yours.]

Starscream let his helm slump into his servo. [What’s the status of the troops down there?]

[We’re at a stalemate,] said Ramjet. [Prime tried talking ’em to death, and Megatron threatened to attack, but we couldn’t—not without risking the captured mechs and femmes jumping in the way, and the Autobots said they’d attack us if we attacked the prisoners. When the Quintessons realized we weren’t gonna kill each other, they ordered the slaves—the prisoners to attack. Megatron and Prime called a retreat. They’ve got the grounders building barricades.]

[Did you recapture any of the prisoners?]

[We tried, but whenever we grabbed one, they would start hurting themselves trying to break free. That’s when the retreat was called.]

It wasn’t ideal news, but Starscream supposed it would have to do.

[Alright. Notify me if anything important happens. Otherwise, I would prefer not to be interrupted.]

[Fine,] snapped Ramjet. [Oh, and when we get home? Your pet Autobot had better not get in the way of my challenge.]

[He won’t,] said Starscream impatiently.

[You’re right,] agreed Ramjet. [He’ll probably have already left by then.]

Starscream cut the connection.

[What did he say?] asked Skyfire.

“Nothing important,” snapped Starscream, rather more harshly than he’d intended. “Primus, what’s taking so long?”

On one of Skyfire’s smaller screens, Shockwave was talking to Soundwave. Soundwave, for reasons known only to himself, was typing with one servo and using the other to hold a recharging Hot Rod against his chassis. On the floor behind him, Arcee and Springer were playing with a cassetticon that Starscream did not recognize. It took him a moment to realize that this must be Soundwave’s sixth and newest symbiote, little whatever-his-name-was.

Usually when Soundwave and Shockwave teamed up, it meant bad news for Starscream. But in this case, he knew Shockwave was trying to gather up all the information he’d found on the subject of uninstalling Quintesson slave programming.

Starscream’s thoughts drifted to the Aerialbots for a moment, and he glanced around the room. But the young combiner team was gone, along with Windsong’s trine. Had he ordered them to leave? He honestly couldn’t remember.

Either way, it was better that they weren’t here. He needed to focus.

[Incoming transmission,] said Skyfire urgently. [Are you ready?]

“Yes.”

Skyfire’s main screen came online again, prompting Shockwave to hurry to his side. This time, the screen displayed a large room that resembled an amphitheater. Gathered within was an array of organics, each from a different alien race. Ara’si was there as well, standing in front of a slightly elevated platform at the front of the room, upon which were seven rather ornate chairs.

“Are you receiving?” Her fuzzy face filled the screen as she leaned in towards whatever device was recording and sending out the transmission.

“We are,” confirmed Starscream.

“Good.” Ara’si pulled back a little. “Please stand by, we’re going to patch in a line from Quintessa as well.”

“Wonderful,” muttered Starscream. A moment later, a smaller box appeared in the corner of Skyfire’s screen, and two Quintesson Magistrates sneered at him. Starscream was more than happy to sneer back.

“We apologize, but Second Councilmember Citayiva is offworld, and could not be reached on such short notice,” said Ara’si. “Eighth Councilmember Zara will be substituting for her, in accordance with our laws. He’s just arrived now—” And she turned away to look at the slender grey-skinned organic who had just walked in. This alien was gangly, with almost comically long limbs, but each of his fingers ended in a terrible-looking claw. Unfortunately, this was less intimidating than it should have been, because Zara was carrying a half-eaten fruit of some sort in one hand and a transparent cylinder of water in the other. But, most interestingly, folded behind Zara’s back were a pair of leathery purple-grey wings.

At the sound of his name, Zara cast a curious glance at the screen, and Starscream’s own wings dipped and rose in an automatic greeting. He knew that the first seven councilmembers made up what was known as the Major Council, who always supervised any Galactic Council meetings. Their votes were not weighted any more heavily than the votes of their lower-ranking colleagues, who sat behind them in the Minor Council. But at the same time, it would be difficult to win without their approval.

“We are also missing chairs ten, twelve, eighteen, and…” Ara’si craned her neck, trying to catch a glimpse of which seats at the back of the amphitheater were still empty, “Well, it doesn’t matter. As long as we have a majority in attendance, we should be able to come to a decision today.”

“Are we ready to begin?” asked someone else on the main screen. Starscream turned his attention to the alien who had spoken, and recognized him as First Chairman Ryhes, a Kitachi male and one of the most influential organics to ever hold a seat. The Kitachi were medium-sized bipedal organics, spindly and delicate-looking, though not particularly colorful. Ryhes was very much the face of the Galactic Council, and one of the only organics that any Cybertronians knew by name.

There was a murmur of general assent from the other Councilmembers, who had finished taking their seats. Ara’si turned and hurried to her own place, the third chair on the raised platform. But Ryhes remained standing.

“With us today are the Magistrates Zykkon and Oresa of Quintessa, as well as Starscream of Vos and Shockwave of Tarn,” announced Ryhes. A few of the aliens murmured to each other, and Starscream very clearly heard someone say, “That’s not Shockwave.”

“We are here because the Magistrates of Quintessa have been tirelessly petitioning for the Cybertronians to no longer be recognized by the Council as a sentient race,” continued Ryhes, as if he had not heard this. “The Cybertronians are objecting to this, and have also come forward with the accusation that, once pacified, they will be used as weapons against the Council.”

“A desperate and underhanded lie,” said Zykkon immediately. “But, sadly, this is what we have come to expect from our creations. Councilmembers, if I may make a suggestion? My planet is being attacked, as we speak, by some of the most infamous criminals on both sides of the Cybertronian civil war. I propose we postpone this hearing until after Quintessa is safe again.”

“I am afraid that is not possible,” said Ara’si, her golden eyes narrowing as she leaned back in her seat. “The charges that have been brought against you are…troubling.”

“You take a Cybertronian’s word over mine?” Zykkon’s faces rotated a few times before settling on an insulted expression.

“When it could mean the difference between life and death for our people? Yes,” said Ara’si, rather coldly. “I mean no offense, Magistrate, but you surely you understand why we must take these accusations seriously.”

Zykkon did not look pleased, but he said nothing.

“I would like to begin by discussing the planetary analysis that was just sent to us by the Cybertronians,” said Ara’si. “Magistrates, have you reviewed the file?”

“We have,” said the other Quintesson, the one named Oresa. “It is nothing but speculation, exaggeration, and outright lies.” He paused long enough to switch over to another face. “Where did this data even come from?”

“It was collected by one of our scientists,” said Starscream. “He specializes in xenobiology, and I trust his analysis.”

In truth, Skyfire had always been better at writing the reports. Starscream simply didn’t have the patience, while Skyfire seemed to have nothing but. After the initial thrill of discovery had worn off, Starscream was always ready to move on to something new. Fortunately, in the Decepticon army, Megatron cared more for results than anything else. And after Skywarp’s reports, which consisted almost exclusively of colorful hand-drawn illustrations, Megatron’s standards were not particularly high. As a result, Starscream’s writing style had become more and more minimalistic and vague as the vorns passed. It wasn’t his fault, though. It was everyone else’s fault—especially Megatron’s—for being too stupid to understand his brilliance. Proper reports would have been wasted on them.

“Cybertronians know nothing of the sciences!” cried Zykkon. “They were created for conquest and labor!”

Starscream tried to gauge how this was being received, but it was difficult—he was not familiar with the body language of the species that made up the Council representatives. But Ara’si’s ears were now flat against her head, and Zara’s wings were flaring slightly. Neither looked like good signs for the Quintessons.

“Conquest, you say?” asked the alien seated in the fourth chair, just beside Ara’si, his violet head-tentacles shifting uncomfortably.

“Millions of years ago, Councilmember Visara, the Quintessons had many enemies,” responded Zykkon smoothly. “That was in the brutal days long before any form of interspecies government had been established. We had to protect ourselves in order to survive. We had no way of knowing we had unleashed a pestilence upon the galaxy.”

Ryhes tilted his head in Zykkon’s direction. “Understood. However, just to be clear—you are asserting that there is no truth to the planetary report submitted by the Cybertronians?”

“Our planet is not young,” said Zykkon. “And my predecessors were foolish in their mining operations, I will not deny that. But that does not mean our world is dying—quite the opposite. We have always taken pride in our technology, and I believe Quintessa can sustain us for a good while longer, if not indefinitely.”

The seventh Councilmember, at the very end of the table, tilted his head to one side, as if listening to an internal comm. Then he spoke.

“We have a request from Twenty-Ninth Councilmember Rella-Ai, backed by a majority of the Minor Council,” he reported. “An exploratory team must be sent to assess the Quintesson planet on behalf of the Galactic Council before further action is taken.”

Zykkon drew himself up to his full, terrible height. “I must refuse! Our planet is in turmoil, we cannot waste time with such—”

“You refuse?” repeated Ryhes flatly. “Magistrate, I don’t think you understand. That was not a suggestion. If you wish for our aid, you must allow us to verify your claims. Now, you have already claimed that the war plans that the Cybertronians allegedly stole from your own Archives are fabricated, but will not allow our technicians to verify. You must realize how this looks.”

Zykkon said nothing. He looked stunned. Starscream wondered if Ryhes, who had once been so openly on the side of the Quintessons, was starting to change his mind.

“Regardless of the state of the Quintesson homeworld,” said Shockwave, “Our sentience has been called into question. By their own admission, the Quintessons use slave programming.”

“Pacification programming,” the Magistrate cut in smoothly. “It curbs their more…violent tendencies. We have found it to be an unfortunate necessity.”

“If I was not sentient, I would not require such programming!” said Shockwave sharply, and launched into a rather long-winded rebuttal. Starscream was distracted by an incoming comm on his private line.

[Not now, Ramjet,] he said.

[Frag you, this is serious!] Ramjet snarled, stunning Starscream into rare silence. [We found one of the Quintesson hideouts. They’ve got these underground bunker things. That’s where all the civilians went. That’s where everyone went.]

[Yes, Ramjet, I’d worked that out on my own,] said Starscream.

[Shut up, I’m not done! It’s not just Quintessons we found. It’s other aliens, too. Organics.]

[Organics?] Starscream repeated blankly. [What do you mean?]

[Two Chijan, one Xhona, and at least eight others I can’t identify,] said Ramjet. [The Quintessons had them locked up. It looks like we’re not the only ones the Quints have been bothering.]

Starscream knew that both the Chijan and Xhona planets were members of the Galactic Council. He cut the connection with Ramjet immediately and opened a new frequency to Megatron.

[Ramjet says you found alien prisoners from Council planets?] said Starscream, without preamble.

[We did,] confirmed Megatron. [The Autobots are questioning them now.]

[Can you get me a video file of them?] asked Starscream. [I’m talking to the Council now, and I don’t think they’ll be pleased to hear the Quintessons have been holding some of their own prisoner.]

Megatron was silent, but then a short video file was transferred over. Starscream played it twice, just to be sure, and had to fight down his triumphant grin. Then he passed the file on to Skyfire, who responded with a databurst of shock once he realized exactly what he was looking at.

“—and any one of us could easily pass any test of sentience that the Council might choose to conduct!” Shockwave was very near to shouting.

“That is because of superior Quintesson programming and engineering!” Zykkon snarled back. “The same programming and engineering, I might add, that restored you to full functionality after you were mutilated by your own kind!”

Shockwave recoiled as if he had been struck, and First Councilmember Ryhes lifted his hands in a gesture of peace.

“That’s enough,” said Ryhes. “I propose a short break, after which we’ll take a look at the programming arguments. Unless there are any objections?”

“Yes!” yelled Starscream. Shockwave turned to look at him in confusion. “I have one more file to submit. Skyfire, play it.”

Skyfire’s screen did not change, but the expressions on the faces of the Councilmembers did, and Starscream knew exactly what their own viewscreen was showing them. The video was standard quality for an optical capture, though rather poorly lit, and the focal point the back of Jazz’s frame. Then Megatron’s servo entered the shot, and he gently pushed the Autobot out of the way so that he could get a clear shot of the smaller organics who had been speaking to him.

One was the Xhona that Ramjet had mentioned, and the other was a creature from a species that Starscream didn’t recognize. They both recoiled and screamed at the sight of Megatron, causing the warlord to put up his hands and take several rapid steps backwards.

“Mech, what’s the matter with you?” Jazz asked, exasperated. “Stop scaring the squishies.”

Megatron did not respond. Instead, the image blurred as he focused on something else. Prime and Prowl were speaking to a few more organics, who were huddled together in a group.

“How long have you been down here?” asked Prowl. The group all exchanged looks.

“They brought us underground a few hours ago,” said one of the aliens at last. “I...I don’t know how long I’ve been on this planet, though.”

“Myri and I have been here the longest,” said another, indicating the alien just beside him. “They boarded our ship...we had no weapons. We’re civilians. They asked us questions about our planet, and our race, and we told them what they wanted. We thought they’d let us go, but they didn’t.”

The video came to an abrupt end, and Starscream looked at the two Quintesson Magistrates. They were muttering to each other in their own language, too quietly for the microphones to pick up. Then he glanced back at the Council just in time to see Ryhes snap his pen in half.

“Surely you haven’t fallen for this deception!” cried Zykkon.

“This meeting is over,” said Ryhes flatly.

The Quintessons looked enraged, but their screen flicked to black, leaving only the image of the Council.

[You might have a problem,] said Starscream, reopening his line to Megatron. [I just upset two of the Magistrates. I’m not sure how they’ll retaliate.]

[You did what?]

[There is good news, though,] said Starscream. [I think the Galactic Council is on our side. Or at least, more on our side than the Quintessons’ side.]

Onscreen, Ryhes was arguing with the Sixth Councilmember.

Shockwave turned to Starscream. “Why didn’t you tell me?” he demanded.

“Have you figured out what to do about the slave coding?” asked Starscream, ignoring the question.

“You!” yelled Ryhes, pointing at the Cybertronians and making them both jump. “Tell us everything you know about the Quintessons.”

“We just did,” said Starscream, irate. “And then they denied it all.”

“How many of our citizens are they holding hostage?” asked Ara’si.

“I don’t know. At least ten, but there could easily be more. You are welcome to send your forces down to retrieve them." Starscream flared his wings. "Now, if you don’t mind, I have my own mechs to rescue.”

The screen went black. Starscream lowered his wings marginally and leaned forward onto the console. “Skyfire, take us back down to the surface. Shockwave, please tell me you have something useful.”

They touched down behind the new barricades that had been constructed a few streets away from the Magisterium. Starscream reflected with some amusement that neither faction had built barricades in countless vorns.

After ordering both the Aerialbots and Windsong’s trine to stay put, and checking to make sure Thundercracker wasn’t dead (he wasn’t), Starscream stepped out onto Quintessa’s surface for the second time that day. Shockwave was not far behind him.

The rescued organics were all sticking together, as far away from the Cybertronians as they could get without actually leaving the dubious protection of the barricades. Starscream ignored them in favor of Elita, who was now yelling at both Prime and Megatron.

“We are wasting time!” the femme was saying. “The Quintessons will make their move soon, and I refuse to condemn any of my soldiers to a lifetime of slavery!”

“We can’t recapture the prisoners without running the risk of them killing themselves,” said Prime. “I don’t like this any more than you do, but...”

“The Council is on their way to recover the organics,” reported Shockwave, cutting the argument short. “And I do not believe they will be aiding the Quintessons at any point in the future. As for the slave programming, I may have a way around that. Soundwave was kind enough to send me all my files from Cybertron, and I was able to write a code that would disable the most powerful aspects of the programming.”

“And how will we install it? We can hardly hold them down,” said Elita.

“I am not sure,” admitted Shockwave.

“If I put my weapons to low power, it could have a similar effect to the Quintesson EMP blasts,” said Starscream. “They can’t hurt themselves if they’re offline.”

“No,” snapped Elita. “Your weapons cause severe damage, even on their ‘stun’ setting. I would like to avoid that.”

“Do you still have the Quintesson weapon?” Megatron asked him.

“I left it on Cybertron,” said Starscream. “I didn’t think we’d need it. Maybe we can steal another one—”

[Commander, we have a problem,] said Ramjet suddenly. [The Quintesson soldiers are mobilizing, and they’re converging on your position.]

“Frag,” muttered Starscream. He could tell from the expressions on everyone else’s faceplates that they’d just received similar messages.

“Alright,” said Prime. “Let’s try—”

An explosion rocked the street, sending everyone scrambling for cover. It appeared the Quintessons had brought something a little stronger than stunners this time. Starscream staggered back to his pedes, helped up by Megatron.

The entire area was now in chaos, with Autobots and Decepticons alike running to defend the perimeter. Starscream forced himself to think.

[Silverbolt!] he said at last.

[What is it? What’s happening?] asked the Aerialbot leader.

[Get out here, I need your team.]

[But you said—]

[Just get out here!]

Fortunately, the five Aerialbots did not take long to come running out of Skyfire’s hold. Starscream looked them over.

“Can you combine?” he asked.

“Yeah,” said Silverbolt. “What do you need us to do? Hold off the Quintessons?”

“No. The Quintessons have brought the captured mechs and femmes with them. Can Superion retrieve them in a way that they won’t be able to harm themselves?”

“He should be able to,” said Silverbolt. “If he holds them in his fist...”

“Carefully,” added Skydive, sounding a little bit nervous.

“Good. That’s your assignment. Shockwave?”

“I have the code here,” said Shockwave, promptly unsubspacing a very small data drive. “All you need to do is insert it into a medical port, and the worst of the coding should deactivate.”

Starscream took it. “Understood. Are you ready?”

“Hey!” Everyone turned at the outraged shout. Motormaster was stomping towards them, the rest of his team not far behind. “Why do they get to go on a mission?”

“Get lost, Motormaster!” snapped Silverbolt.

“Yeah, go jump in front of the Quintessons like a good groundpounder,” snarled Slingshot.

“We’re two joors older than you!” retorted Motormaster. “If anyone gets the assignment, it should be us!”

“Motormaster, your team is wearing full internal armor,” said Megatron. “Can you even combine?”

Suddenly, all the Stunticons looked guilty.

“You took it out, didn’t you?” Starscream asked, putting his servos on his hips.

“It was itchy!” complained Wildrider.

“We’re immune to their stupid weapons when we’re combined,” said Motormaster. Now he appealed directly to Megatron. The oversized brat knew he could get whatever he wanted from their leader; he was as bad as a cassette in that regard. “Menasor can get the mission done, and faster than Superion could.”

“Send both teams,” suggested Elita. “They won’t engage each other once they’re combined, will they?”

“Not if we don’t want them to,” said Silverbolt. “I mean…if we really don’t want them to.”

“Fine!” snapped Starscream. “Go! Just be quick about it!”

Motormaster and Silverbolt traded looks, but seemed to come to a silent agreement. Both teams ran off in opposite directions, giving each other enough space to combine. When the other soldiers realized what was going on, they all scattered.

The Quintessons were drawing nearer, and Megatron readied his cannon. Starscream knew from long experience that the first fusion blast would send the enemies scrambling, but it wouldn’t last. Megatron could only fire about five times in a row without risking overheating the weapon.

Starscream leapt into the air, transforming as he went. Ramjet had been right, the Quintessons were converging from all directions. After making sure there were no Cybertronains in the way, he opened fire on the ground below. Some of the Quintesson warriors fired back, but Starscream dodged the shots expertly. Who needed wingmates, anyway?

As if he had tempted fate with that errant thought, a beam of red light scorched the surface of his wing. Starscream transformed in the air and snarled in rage just as three seekers shot past him. Windsong’s trine.

[I told you to stay with—] began Starscream. A moment later, Skyfire’s energy field brushed up against his own.

[Are you alright?] the shuttle asked.

“What are you doing here?” shrilled Starscream over the roar of the wind, and the battle below. “You’re going to get yourself killed!”

[I was just—]

“Go!”

[But—]

“GO!”

[Do you need a medic?]

“I’m fine!” Starscream cried. “Now go!”

Fortunately, Skyfire didn’t put up too much of a fight, and turned back in the direction of the barricades. Starscream turned his attention to Menasor and Superion, who were now wading through the Quintessons, searching for captured mechs. Windsong's trine was circling Superion's helm and firing at any Quintessons who came too close.

A query ping from Megatron broke his concentration. No doubt the warlord had been watching his interactions with Skyfire.

[I don’t want to hear it,] replied Starscream.

[You’ve been avoiding me,] Megatron said.

[Because I don’t want to hear it!] snapped Starscream. [I know what you’re going to say, and I already know, alright? I know.]

Megatron was quiet for a moment. Then at last he said, [I suppose he will be returning to his exploration missions?]

[I haven’t asked,] said Starscream tersely.

Megatron did not reply, but Starscream could sense his disapproval. In the distance, he saw Superion lean down and grab something. When the combiner stood back up, there was something tiny and blue clutched in his servo. Starscream transformed back into his jet mode and shot off in Superion’s direction.

[I could have a word with him on your behalf...] began Megatron. On the ground, there was a flash of violet light that signaled another shot from the fusion cannon. Starscream was not sure if that had been intentional or not.

[No!] snapped Starscream. As he drew nearer to Superion, he transformed and landed on the giant’s fist. Chromia was clutched in Superion’s digits, struggling to break free, her optics bright with panic and fear. But Superion’s grip was strong, and did not allow her to move very much. Starscream unsubspaced the data drive that Soundwave had given him and tried to move in close enough to plug it into her neck.

[Nobody in this army wants to endure a repeat of what happened five stellar cycles ago,] began Megatron.

[You got a new combiner out of it, didn’t you?] retorted Starscream, grabbing Chromia’s helm and forcing it to one side. She tried to bite his digits off, but Starscream avoided her dentae and slid the data drive into her medical access port. Immediately, the Autobot stopped struggling.

Megatron seemed as though he was struggling to say something, but could not for the life of him figure out the words.

[Do you think I’m a sparkling? You don’t have to protect me,] said Starscream. He was pleased to see Chromia’s optics were returning to their usual blue, and withdrew the datastick. The Autobot was no longer struggling. [No—you can’t protect me. If he goes, then he goes.]

Megatron still did not seem entirely convinced. [Then it is your responsibility to find out what his plans are. I don’t want any more surprises.]

[I will. Can we stop talking about this?] Starscream glanced in Menasor’s direction, and was rather surprised to see that he was holding both captured Rainmakers, one in each servo. Starscream glanced up at Superion.

“You’d better pick up the pace,” he told the Autobot combiner. “Menasor is beating you.”

Starscream wasn't sure what he'd been expecting from Superion in response, but it certainly wasn't a spark-breaking pout.

Chapter Text

Skyfire wasn’t pleased that Starscream had ordered him back to safety, but he went back to the barricades without a fight. If the situation had been less dangerous, perhaps he would have tried to reason with Starscream, but right now he would not take up any more of the seeker’s attention than he needed to.

In the distance, Skyfire could tell that Superion and Menasor were doing their best to gather up the enslaved Cybertronians. Upon first returning to Cybertron, Skyfire had been stunned to learn that both factions had each been granted a set of newsparks from Vector Sigma, and even more stunned when he heard that the young combiner teams were already regular fixtures on the battlefield. To say he disapproved would be an understatement. Skyfire had also been puzzled when he learned that the aerial team had been granted to the Autobots and the ground-based vehicles to the Decepticons, but one did not question Vector Sigma.

Starscream had made it very clear that he wanted nothing to do with the Stunticons, describing the five as ‘Megatron’s brats.’ But over the past few solar cycles, Skyfire had found that both teams would happily answer any questions he asked simply because they were too young and inexperienced to know not to. It made catching up on recent events rather simple—though they could not give him firsthand accounts of anything older than the past two-and-a-half stellar cycles.

“Hey, taxi!” Skywarp snapped. “Where’s your extra medkits?”

Skyfire turned his attentions to Thundercracker and Skywarp, who were still in his hold. Starscream’s wingmates made no secret of the fact that they wanted Skyfire dead, but Skyfire wasn’t particularly worried about that at the moment. For one thing, Thundercracker was heavily damaged and occupying all of Skywarp’s attentions. Besides, if they killed Skyfire now, the combined Autobot-Decepticon forces would have no way to get home.

[You have five medkits right there, Skywarp,] said Skyfire calmly.

“Well, now I need six,” retorted Skywarp, “because I’m out of bandages.”

Skyfire knew that eventually he would have to do something to appease Thundercracker and Skywarp. Even though they were Starscream’s trinemates in name only, those two were in a position to make Skyfire’s life extremely difficult. This was terribly unfair because, in Skyfire’s opinion, Skywarp and Thundercracker did not even bother to look after Starscream properly. They’d made it abundantly clear that they cared about each other more than their wingleader.

Back when Skyfire had been a Decepticon (for approximately two solar cycles), he’d seen firsthand the way that Starscream and his wingmates treated each other. The fact that Starscream had what appeared to be an openly hostile relationship with the two mechs that were responsible for watching his back in battle caused Skyfire no end of anxiety, but Starscream had waved off his concerns.

[I think I have an extra roll of bandages in my subspace,] said Skyfire. [If you really need it—]

Before he could finish his sentence, there was the sudden, chilling feeling of another mech’s servo in his subspace pocket. Skyfire gave a small cry of surprise. Reaching into another mech’s subspace without permission was considered incredibly rude by Cybertronians, and Skyfire wondered if Skywarp was hoping to start a fight.

“Why is your subspace pocket so big? What is this, a table?” asked Skywarp, still rooting around with no regard for social convention. “It totally is! TC, he’s got a whole table in here. Why do you have a table?”

[Well, you never know,] said Skyfire vaguely. In fact, the table in question had been stolen from the Iacon Academy labs countless vorns ago at Starscream’s behest. Starscream claimed he needed it for conducting experiments when they were off-world, but Skyfire was pretty sure Starscream just wanted to see how much Skyfire could fit in his subspace.

When Skywarp did not reply, Skyfire did another quick scan of Thundercracker. The mech was actually in rather good condition, considering how badly damaged he’d been when Skywarp first carried him in, and Skyfire really didn’t think Thundercracker’s wings needed another layer of bandages. But it was keeping Skywarp quiet, so Skyfire said nothing.

To be honest, Skyfire didn’t know what he was going to do about Skywarp and Thundercracker, not to mention Megatron. Skyfire cast his sensors outward and ‘saw’ that the warlord in question was busy fighting six Quintesson warriors at once. Prime jumped in to help a few klicks later.

“’hide, put me down, I’m fine!” protested a new voice. Ironhide was approaching with a blue femme in his arms. She looked rather exasperated, and very badly in need of some polish, but was unharmed save for some scratches and dents.

[Do you need to come aboard?] asked Skyfire.

“Yes,” said Ironhide.

“No,” said Chromia simultaneously. The two glared at each other, but Skyfire was especially sensitive to energy fields when he was in altmode—sensitive enough to know that the irritation was simply a façade for much gentler emotions.

“Mia, yeh know yeh can’t fight with that programming in yer helm,” said Ironhide reproachfully.

[I have some medkits on board,] said Skyfire. [You’re welcome to them, if Skywarp hasn’t eaten them all.]

“Frag you, I heard that!” Skywarp shouted at Skyfire’s ceiling.

Chromia’s reply was cut off when Superion’s immense servo reached down from the heavens and very, very gently placed Moonracer on the ground beside them. Moonracer looked rightfully dazed. But Skyfire's attention was elsewhere. There was a new ship appearing on the horizon—a Council ship. Skyfire was a little surprised to see that it was not a warship—though there were certainly no shortage of those in Quintessa’s orbit. Instead, it was a very small and very fast (and rather cute) scout-class cruiser. It landed a few hundred meters away from Skyfire, and a handful of aliens swarmed out.

[Skyfire, I’m receiving reports that we’ve recovered all the captured soldiers,] said Prime. [Are you prepared to withdraw?]

[I am,] said Skyfire.

[Good. Once the Council has recovered the kidnapped organics, I’m going to send out an order for all our soldiers to fall back. Be prepared to lift off the moment the last mech is on board. Understood?]

[I understand,] said Skyfire. Unlike the Decepticons, Prime had yet to express an opinion on Skyfire’s departure. Prowl had promised (or maybe threatened, Skyfire was never sure with Prowl) that there would be an official inquiry once the Quintesson crisis was over. So perhaps he was waiting for his tactician’s analysis.

[We’re retreating? Why?] demanded Megatron.

[Because we are outnumbered a thousand to one,] said Prime.

[But we’re winning!]

[We are not here for a slaughter,] said Prime. [We are here to rescue our soldiers.]

[We should at least level the Magisterium before we go!] Megatron snarled at Prime.

[No. Violence for the sake of violence will make a very poor impression on the Council,] retorted Prime.

[What do I care for the Council?] retorted Megatron. [Some help they turned out to be—MENASOR, STOP HITTING SUPERION! YES, I SAW THAT. DISASSEMBLE IMMEDIATELY!]

Skyfire sensed the enormous combiner slumping his shoulders and stomping one pede like a petulant sparkling.

[Superion, that goes for you as well,] called Starscream. [No, don’t try to hit him back—I said do not—oh, you think you’re going to disobey me to my face, do you? That’s right, I thought not.]

Both gestalts separated into their original components, and Skyfire turned his attentions to the organics that were now escorting their newly-freed brothers to the scouting ship. They worked very quickly, and it was only about a quarter-breem before the ship lifted off and vanished into the atmosphere once more.

Now the Cybertronian warriors were pouring back towards the barricade, and Skyfire. Megatron and Prime were at the edges, holding off the surge of Quintesson warriors who had followed the Cybertronians in their retreat. The Quintessons weren’t particularly formidable soldiers, but Prime was right in his assessment of their numbers. Skyfire felt a little bubble of anxiety in his tanks at the sight of them all.

Skyfire did a quick headcount of the mechs in his hold, only to realize he didn’t know how many Cybertronians had been rescued. Chromia and Moonracer meant two, and Cosmos…then there was Silverbolt and Slingshot and Air Raid, of course…and two of the Rainmakers…? Who else?

And Starscream was still out there, raining fire down on the Quintesson warriors. Skyfire sent him a query ping, but Starscream ignored it. Not to be dissuaded, Skyfire sent another.

[Will you stop that?] demanded Starscream.

[I’ll stop when you get over here,] retorted Skyfire.

Starscream sent back a databurst of irritation, but wheeled around in the sky after the retreating soldiers. Once he was satisfied that everyone (save for Prime and Megatron, who were apparently having a wonderful time holding off the entire Quintesson army by themselves) was aboard, Starscream transformed back into root mode and landed on Skyfire’s ramp.

“Let’s leave without them,” Starscream suggested as he stepped onboard. Shockwave gave a sound of protest.

[I don’t think so,] said Skyfire, using the public network for the benefit of any who might be worried that he’d take Starscream’s suggestion seriously. Then he did a quick scan to make sure Starscream hadn’t been injured too badly.

Fortunately both leaders seemed to realize that the battle was coming to an end, and both broke into a run in Skyfire’s direction. But then Prime came to an abrupt stop.

“Wait!” he said. “Where is Elita?”

As if in response to his question, a tiny pink Cybertronian car came hurtling over one of the barricade walls, transformed in midair, and skidded to a halt only a few meters from Skyfire. Prime leaned over to pull her to her pedes and half-dragged her aboard. The moment they were safely inside, Skyfire withdrew his ramp and slammed the doors shut.

Burning pain shot through his hull as the Quintessons, now lacking any other targets, concentrated their fire on him. Skyfire gave a little shudder of pain. Even though he was completely immune to the paralyzing weapons (and consequently locked in altmode until Star removed the internal armor), he had no such immunity to traditional lasers.

Are you alright? That was Starscream, scribbling another message on his wall. Skyfire was aware that the seeker was moving towards his control room, but focused all his attentions on lifting off as quickly as possible. Only when they were safely in the sky, and out of range, did Skyfire relax.

[Are the passengers all safe?] he asked.

“I’m sure they’re fine,” said Starscream dismissively, arriving in Skyfire’s control room at last. “Let me see your damage reports.”

[I’m fine,] said Skyfire. He had already picked up enough speed that he knew he would be able to escape Quintessa’s orbit without any problems. In fact, he’d already overtaken the Galactic Council scout ship, despite its significant head start.

Starscream sat down in his usual chair, and Skyfire automatically began sending him little pulses of reassurance. But, to his surprise, Starscream merely scowled and smacked his keyboard.

[What’s wrong?] asked Skyfire, taken aback.

“Nothing,” muttered Starscream.

[Staaaaar…]

“You’ll be leaving after this, won’t you?” said Starscream abruptly.

[I…what?]

“Now that the crisis is over, you’ll be leaving,” Starscream’s voice was even sharper than usual. “You returned to help, didn’t you? And now…”

[I…is that what you think?] asked Skyfire. But in truth, he knew Starscream had every right to believe that. He’d certainly done nothing to indicate he intended to stay. In truth…

In truth, Skyfire had no idea what he was going to do.

“When you go,” said Starscream tersely. “I would…appreciate it…if you did so quietly.”

[Star…]

“I need to go check on the Aerialbots,” snapped Starscream, getting up.

[I…I can stay,] said Skyfire. [If…if that’s what you want, I’ll stay for as long as you want me to, I—]

“Nonsense. I’d only be keeping you from your work,” said Starscream in that same brittle tone. “Besides, you’re terribly unsuited for combat. It’s probably for the best, isn’t it? I’ll send you a comm if the war ends. And then you can come back.”

[I’ll stay,] pleaded Skyfire. [I love you.]

“Regardless of what you might believe, what you are doing right now is not helping,” snapped Starscream. “You are, in fact, making things worse.”

[I’m telling the truth!]

“Yes,” said Starscream quietly. “I suppose you think that you are.”

[I am,] insisted Skyfire. Starscream did not respond, but he did sit back down.

[Incoming call from Councilmember Ara’si,] reported Skyfire after an awkward breem.

“Let’s see what she has to say, then,” said Starscream.

Skyfire accepted the transmission. Though he could not view the call as it appeared on his screen, he could still see it perfectly due to the fact that his processor was the one streaming it.

“I hope you’re not expecting a thank you,” said Ara’si immediately. She was back in her office, but she wasn’t alone. A few other organics were running around in the background, shouting to one another.

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” drawled Starscream. To Skyfire’s surprise, Ara’si gave a tight little smile.

“The Council would like to make a suggestion,” said Ara’si. “If I may speak to your leaders?”

Starscream drew himself up to his full height, indignant. “Do you know who I—”

[I will call them in,] interrupted Skyfire. [One moment, please.]

Fortunately, Starscream did not say anything more. Prime and Megatron arrived a few klicks later, with Elita and Shockwave not far behind.

“Councilmember,” said Prime respectfully. “We hope that the rescued organics are safely on their way home?”

“Yes,” said Ara’si. “But that is not why I am calling. Your forces cooperated admirably to thwart the Quintessons, but they have not been defeated. If…if you chose to focus your energies on continuing to defend the galaxy against this threat, rather than your civil war, the Council might be able to drop some of the charges against your race.”

Neither Prime nor Megatron said anything. They just stared at the viewscreen as if they were only just seeing it for the first time.

“It is still unknown how many other prisoners the Quintessons might be hiding away in their underground shelters,” continued Ara’si, when it became clear none of the Cybertronians knew what to say. “If you chose to conduct regular searches of Quintessa’s cities, the Galactic Council would view it as an official assignment. I may even be able to arrange for you to receive compensation.”

“Is this a joke?” demanded Megatron.

“It is not,” said Ara’si coolly. “The Council will await your response. In the meantime, I wish you all a good day.”

Ara’si ended the call, leaving Skyfire’s control room in stunned silence.

[I think it’s a good idea,] ventured Skyfire at last.

“You would,” sneered Megatron.

“Did she say compensation? What sort of compensation?” asked Shockwave.

“Galactic Credits, probably,” mused Elita. “Shockwave—we could finally repair the generators in sector twenty-three.”

“Excuse me?” interrupted Megatron.

“You didn’t think Tarn has been kept running by magic, did you?” retorted Elita.

“I was going to mention it eventually, Lord Megatron,” mumbled Shockwave.

The commanders all spent the rest of the journey arguing in Skyfire’s control room. Skyfire was not adept enough in the art of politics to determine what the outcome might be, but it did not escape his notice that a tiny smile had replaced Starscream’s anxious pout. And when Skyfire sent over another little pulse of comfort, this time Starscream did not rebuff him.

* * *

“Hold still!” ordered Starscream, yanking on Skyfire’s wing. “I’m not redoing this if you make me mess up.”

Skyfire had reverted back to his old, symmetrical altmode, and his frame had been restored to its usual white. Now they sat on Starscream’s berth together as Starscream very, very carefully repainted the red stripes on his wings with a tiny detailing brush.

“I’m sure it’s fine, Star,” said Skyfire mildly.

“I will be the judge of that,” muttered Starscream. After so much time alone in space, Skyfire had fallen into the habit of letting his detailing fade—something that Starscream had never allowed, even when Skyfire had been living amongst the Autobots.

[Um, Starscream?] That was Silverbolt. [Ramjet’s looking for you. He says you’re not answering his pings.]

Starscream made an exasperated sound. [Tell him I’m busy. I’ll deal with him later.]

There was a short silence, and Skyfire hoped that might be the end of it. Starscream clearly did as well, because he raised one servo to lightly stroke Skyfire’s chest plating. Skyfire responded by pulling Starscream into his lap for a kiss.

“Don’t you dare ruin your paint!” threatened Starscream, pulling his helm back after a very long klick.

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” said Skyfire. Now both his servos were caressing Starscream’s wings, slowly at first but then desperately. After a moment, the paintbrush fell out of Starscream's servo and rolled across the ground.

But before Starscream could complain about this, there was an insistent pounding at the main door of the suite.

“COMMANDER, I KNOW YOU’RE IN THERE!” bellowed Ramjet.

Skyfire looked down at the seeker in his arms, somewhat disappointed. “Are you going to answer that?” he asked.

But to Skyfire's surprise, Starscream smiled up at him. It had really been too long since Skyfire had last seen that smile.

“Let’s pretend we’re not here,” he replied.

Chapter Text

“You’re not nervous, are you?” asked Skyfire. He was sitting on the berth watching as Starscream paced around the room, his wings flicking in moderate irritation.

“Of course not,” scoffed Starscream. In response, Skyfire got up and hugged Starscream to his chassis.

“Stop it. Stop it!” protested Starscream, trying to wriggle free. “Skyfire!”

Skyfire silenced him with a kiss.

In truth, Starscream was never so overconfident that he didn’t think he could lose a challenge (though it would never do to let anyone else know it). Today he was no more or less anxious than he ever was before a fight with Ramjet.

It was incredibly bad form to issue a challenge more than once a stellar cycle, and even that was a little bit too frequent to be considered polite. During the most brutal days of the war, Megatron had actually been forced to issue an order limiting challenges to once every vorn.

Starscream was also fairly certain that Megatron had pulled Ramjet aside and had a few words with him after their last challenge five stellar cycles ago, after Skyfire’s sudden departure from Earth. None of the Decepticon soldiers had been particularly impressed by the opportunistic approach that Ramjet had taken towards Starscream’s nervous breakdown—though Starscream had been surprised to learn this. After all, he was not the most popular mech, and the Decepticons had always admired traits like cunning and ambition.

But, despite everything, the general consensus seemed to be that Ramjet had managed to cross a line.

Funnily enough, Starscream had very few memories that last fight. It was all a bit of a blur. But he did remember Megatron and Thundercracker and Soundwave all dragging him away from Ramjet’s frame. And if he really strained, he could remember Thrust and Dirge and Skywarp pulling Ramjet to safety.

Anyway, that wasn’t important. The fight today would be viewed by Autobots and Decepticons alike, and he did not plan on losing—or even taking very much damage. He had to set a good example for the Aerialbots, after all. And he especially didn’t want Skyfire to be forced to watch as he was injured.

No matter what Ramjet claimed, Starscream knew that Skyfire wouldn’t interfere in the fight, even if Starscream was clearly losing. Even in city-states populated by war-builds, challenges for leadership positions only happened during wartime. During times of peace, they were quite illegal—which was almost certainly why Ramjet didn’t trust Skyfire to stay out of it. When they’d been growing up in Vos, the only challenges that were considered ‘legal’ were those made within a single trine to establish the flight order.

And honestly, most seekers didn’t even have trines during peacetime. There was no need to fly in a protective formation if you weren’t on a battlefield, and it was hard enough to find one bondmate, let alone two. The very concept of being bonded to one’s wingmates had been considered antiquated and overly-romantic even before the war broke out.

That wasn’t to say bonded trines didn’t exist anymore. But they were rare, and for good reason. There wasn’t a single Decepticon on Earth who didn’t know Nightfall, who drifted through the halls of the Victory like a ghost. He was a living cautionary tale and irrefutable proof that Primus was cruel.

Starscream had fought Ramjet so many times that he’d lost count. But even with all that experience behind him, his victories were never effortless. Ramjet could be an idiot sometimes, but he led the second most powerful trine in the Decepticon Empire for a reason. And frankly Starscream would have been disappointed if Ramjet wasn’t a legitimate threat.

Skyfire released Starscream at last, but continued to gaze down at him with those infuriatingly gentle optics. Starscream knew he was nervous, and perhaps for good reason. Ramjet had several advantages when it came to a challenge, where no weapons of any sort were allowed. He had the heaviest plating Starscream that had ever seen on a seeker, and made up for his complete lack of speed, grace, and intelligence by being strong, resilient, and brutal instead.

“I’ll be fine,” Starscream assured him. “I’ve beaten him a thousand times already. Now you can finally see it for yourself.”

“You know I can’t stand to watch you get hurt,” said Skyfire.

“So don’t come,” said Starscream blithely, as if he was unaware of how bad it would look if Skyfire wasn’t there. The only thing more embarrassing would be if Skywarp or Thundercracker didn’t show up. “I’ll tell you all about it later.”

“Star,” said Skyfire reproachfully. “That’s not what I meant. I only—”

“Stop apologizing! I’m hungry.”

Skyfire leaned down and kissed Starscream’s lipplates one last time, knowing that he wouldn’t be allowed to once they were out in public. None of the Autobots were adverse to public displays of affection (and how could they be, with Prime and Elita fawning over each other?) but that just proved that Autobots were glitched.

When they arrived in the rec room, Starscream went to sit with his wingmates while Skyfire fetched cubes for both of them. Thundercracker was now in perfect health, despite the fact that the circulation to his wings had recently been cut off due to an overabundance of bandages.

“Challenge today,” said Skywarp, as if Starscream might have somehow forgotten. “You’re ready, right?”

“Of course I am,” snapped Starscream.

“Get enough recharge?” Skywarp elbowed him meaningfully.

“Skywarp, I will beat you senseless, I don’t know why you think I won’t.”

“You don’t have to be so defensive! I’m just asking!”

Thundercracker stepped in to change the subject. “Ramjet’s been bragging. As usual.”

“I assumed he would be. Is he saying anything new?” asked Starscream.

“Nope, just the usual!” said Skywarp brightly. “He’s gonna win and it’s gonna be awesome and he’ll become Air Commander and lead us all to victory over the Autobots and nobody even cares. He sounds just like you.”

“How are the Autobots taking it?” Starscream asked Thundercracker, choosing to ignore his other wingmate for the time being.

“They’re about as confused as you’d expect,” said Thundercracker. “Some of them might be taking Ramjet’s claims a little too seriously, but only because they’ve never heard them before. How is he handling it?”

He was Skyfire, and this was by far the kindest of the nicknames his wingmates had for the shuttle. Starscream glanced across the room at the mech in question. He now had two cubes in one large servo but had stopped at the Aerialbots’ table to talk to them.

“He’s fine,” said Starscream at last. “He’s not thrilled, but he isn’t going to try to stop me.”

“I didn’t expect him to stick around this long,” said Thundercracker bluntly.

“He said he’d stay,” retorted Starscream with more than a hint of sharpness in his tone. Skywarp laughed and Starscream kicked him under the table. But before a real fight could break out, Skyfire returned at last with their cubes.

“What did Silverbolt want?” Starscream asked, snatching one of the cubes from Skyfire.

“Apparently the Aerialbots and the Stunticons have been watching old Cybetronian films together,” reported Skyfire, taking the seat next to Starscream. “And they wanted to know if I had any they could borrow.”

“Why are they hanging around with the Stunticons?” demanded Skywarp.

“Probably because they’re the same age, and have many of the same experiences,” said Skyfire mildly.

“Yeah, but they’re grounders—”

“Here’s Ramjet,” interrupted Thundercracker, and indeed the conehead had just entered the rec room, flanked by his wingmates. Ramjet’s optics scanned the room, and when he saw Starscream he gave a little smirk. He looked like he was about to come over and say something, but Skyfire flared his wings a little and the conehead seemed to change his mind.

Having Skyfire at his back again left Starscream feeling more secure than he had in vorns. There wasn’t a mech stationed on Earth who hadn’t been impressed by the way Skyfire had fought Megatron and Starscream in rapid succession with no military training whatsoever. Even though he refused to participate in battles as a soldier, everyone respected his size and strength. A mech would have to be a fool not to.

Glad for the peace, Starscream turned all his attention to the cube in front of him. The rec room was still rather quiet, though that would certainly change in a few breems, when the first patrol returned.

There was a sudden commotion as the Aerialbots got up to leave. But on their way out, the team stopped by to talk to the seekers.

“You’re fighting today, right?” asked Silverbolt.

“Yes, that’s right,” said Starscream, fighting back an indulgent smile.

“Ramjet says he’s gonna win,” worried Skydive. “And Windsong says he always says that—”

“He does.”

“—but we weren’t sure.”

“I have spent more time in combat with Ramjet than you have just being online,” said Starscream. “It might be a little more violent than what you’re used to seeing, but we’ll both be fine. Don’t worry about me.”

Silverbolt gave a little smile. “Okay.”

“And stop hanging around with the Stunticons,” added Skywarp as the team began to walk away. “They’ll corrupt you.”

“We’re already corrupted,” Skydive assured him.

* * *

By the time they arrived outside in the courtyard, a very large crowd had gathered. Ramjet was already waiting in the same place where Silverbolt and Air Raid had held their challenge, and Starscream walked out to meet him.

Ramjet bristled a little, but Thundercracker stepped between them. As the highest-ranking seeker who wasn’t fighting today, he would be in charge of overseeing the challenge.

“You know the rules,” he said. Then for the benefit of the Autobots, he added, “No weapons. Fight until someone surrenders or falls into stasis. Don’t give me a reason to interfere. You may begin.”

Then he backed out of the way, leaving Ramjet and Starscream to circle each other slowly.

Starscream ignited his thrusters partway, allowing himself to hover a few meters above the ground. His wings flicked upward, signaling his desire to take the fight to the air, but Ramjet just shook his helm. The conehead had once tried to fight Starscream in the sky. Once. Starscream gave a little smirk at the memory. To this day, it remained his shortest challenge of all time.

Starscream could try to force the fight into the air, but it would require a lot of energy—more than he was willing to expend right now.

“I see your pet Autobot is still hanging around,” Ramjet said in a voice low enough for only Starscream to hear, “so I guess you were pitiful enough that he felt guilty—”

Starscream drew his arm back and cracked Ramjet across the jaw, drawing shocked gasps from some of the Autobots. But instead of falling back, Ramjet lunged forward for a headbutt—his favorite move by far. Starscream only barely evaded it, and Ramjet’s nosecone struck his canopy instead of his faceplates. Starscream felt the glass shatter, but the spark plating beneath was made of far sturdier material, and Starscream knew he was not in any danger yet.

Ramjet was always at his most vulnerable just after he performed a headbutt attack, and Starscream did not waste the opportunity. He moved in close and drove his elbow joint into Ramjet’s nasal ridge. Ramjet went stumbling back, but he did not fall. Instead, he ignited his thrusters and threw himself at Starscream.

Starscream caught Ramjet by the shoulders and spun on one thruster heel, using the conehead’s own momentum against him. The bystanders that had been positioned behind Starscream all scattered. A moment later, Ramjet went flying through the space where they’d stood and then slammed into the wall.

But Ramjet had customized himself for collisions, and he staggered back to his pedes with minimal damage to his frame. He shook his helm a little to clear it, and then wasted absolutely no time in jumping right back into the fight.

Ramjet caught Starscream by the wing, twisting it. Starscream ignited his thrusters and shot upwards into the air to break free, and Ramjet let him go. The conehead remained firmly on the ground, his entire frame tensed and waiting.

Knowing he couldn’t stay in the sky forever, Starscream very slowly began to decrease his altitude. Once he was within range, Ramjet lunged, clearly aiming to knock Starscream out of the air. But Starscream was faster, and kicked his thrusters up to their full power. Ramjet howled in pain as he was burned in the faceplates. He faltered, raising his arms up protectively—and then he lunged again.

This time it worked, and Ramjet caught Starscream around the knees. In one brutally powerful movement, he slammed Starscream to the ground. The back of Starscream’s helm struck the cold metal of Cybertron’s surface, and his vision blurred for a moment. When he could see again, Ramjet was standing over him and grinning.

“Ramjet, be careful!” warned Dirge from the sidelines. “You’re getting overconfi—”

Ramjet drew one leg back and kicked Starscream in the helm. Starscream felt his shoulder-vent crack as the crowd made sympathetic noises. Then Ramjet leaned down, grinning as though he had already won.

“Do you give up yet?” he asked, raising one pede and bringing it down on Starscream’s shattered canopy. His thruster-heel dug painfully into armor over Starscream’s spark plating. “Tell you what, I’ll make you a deal. Surrender now, and I’ll consider not kicking your precious transport drone out of the base once I’m Air Commander.”

Starscream did not respond, but Ramjet’s grin only widened.

“That’s alright,” he said when it became clear that Starscream had no intention of answering. “I think I’d rather do this anyway.” And Ramjet lifted his pede up off Starscream’s chassis in preparation for another kick. But just as he did, Starscream sat bolt upright and plowed his shoulder vent into Ramjet’s torso. Ramjet, who was already had one pede off the ground, went sprawling.

This time, Starscream did not hold back. Ramjet’s heavy armor was hindering him as much as it had helped him before—he could barely get back up again. Starscream’s servos dug into the seams of Ramjet’s armor and tore at it, wrenching a large section free.

Someone—it could only have been an Autobot—was calling for him to hit Ramjet with his own armor. Unfortunately, doing so would be a technical violation of the no-weapons rule, so Starscream tossed the plating in Thundercracker’s direction instead.

Ramjet forced himself back up and struck Starscream in the faceplates, but the damage was done. Starscream ignored the ringing in his audials and grabbed a handful of exposed wires in Ramjet’s chest. Then he ripped them out to a shower of white sparks. Ramjet’s entire frame went tense, and then he fell to his knees. Starscream leaned down and grabbed him by the throat.

“Do you give up yet?” asked Starscream, digging his digits in to the delicate wires and cables. Ramjet’s optics went to his very worried looking trinemates, who both nodded hopefully—clearly they wanted this to end.

But Ramjet did not surrender. Instead, his optics darkened and he somehow mustered up enough strength to strike Starscream directly in the forehelm with his nosecone.

Taken completely by surprise, Starscream released Ramjet’s throat and took a few steps back to regain his balance. One of his optics had cracked, and it was now leaking fluid down his faceplates. He looked back to Ramjet, who was still kneeling on the ground and leaking from his gaping chest wound. It did not look as though he intended to get up again, but Starscream moved forward for another attack—

And that was when Thrust and Dirge intercepted him, stepping in front of their injured leader.

“He surrenders,” said Dirge.

“Like frag I do—” spat Ramjet, who had apparently forgotten that he was currently on his hands and knees.

“He surrenders,” snapped Dirge. “Right?”

Ramjet said nothing, but he did allow Thrust to help him back up. Technically Starscream could have stopped them, since Ramjet had not officially surrendered, but he let it go.

The Constructicons had been on standby from the start (they were used to this sort of thing), and they swarmed around the conehead trine the moment they were out of the ring. Starscream allowed his frame to relax at last, wiped the optical fluid away from his face and turned his attention to the spectators.

The Aerialbots were all standing at the front of the crowd, open-mouthed and apparently stunned speechless. Beside them were the Stunticons, who were clearly trying very hard to look like they didn’t care one way or the other. Some of the Autobots looked downright traumatized, but that wasn’t Starscream’s problem. The femmes all appeared quite impressed.

Skywarp came over, yelling excitedly over the noise, and pounded on Starscream’s arm a few times. Thundercracker pulled him away and leaned in to speak into Starscream’s audial.

“Any serious damage?” he asked.

“I’m fine,” said Starscream, and continued to scan the crowd. Megatron gave him a slight nod and then departed, Soundwave at his heels. He knew Megatron would tell him he’d done well later—not that Starscream needed validation, especially from Megatron—but the warlord preferred to keep such conversations private.

Then Starscream let his optics go to the immense white frame at the very back of the crowd—the one he had not let himself so much as glance at during the entire duration of the fight. Skyfire gave him a warm smile, and Starscream could tell that Skyfire was proud of his victory, rather than repulsed by it.

Starscream pulled out of Skywarp and Thundercracker’s servos and made his way through the quickly-thinning crowd. When he reached Skyfire, Starscream did not embrace him—that would not have been appropriate—but he did allow the other mech to check his injuries. He would have been lying if he’d claimed he didn’t enjoy the soft, affectionate touches.

“I suppose it could be worse,” sighed Skyfire at last. “Still, I’d like to get you to Ratchet sooner rather than later—some of the worst of the damage was to your helm.”

“Not that anyone would know the difference,” said Skywarp, coming up behind Starscream. Starscream gave him a good shove in retaliation. His spark was still beating wildly in exhilaration, and he probably wouldn’t have turned down a second chance for a fight.

Fortunately, Skyfire seemed to sense this, and pulled the two apart easily.

“He’s right, though. We should get you to medbay,” said Thundercracker. “That optic looks bad.”

“His whole face looks bad, honestly,” Skywarp contributed. “But I don’t think modern science can do anything about that yet.”

This time, Skyfire let Starscream get a few good hits in before he separated them both again.

Chapter Text

The Victory had grown remarkably quiet for the past deca-cycle. Almost everyone of any importance had gone to Cybertron, leaving only a few mechs behind to guard the base. After Soundwave and the second wave of Decepticons had been called to Cybertron, the Combaticons had been sent back to Earth to assume command of the few mechs who were left.

Alone in the washracks, a faded-looking indigo-and-black seeker knelt down in front of the mirror and opened up his chestplates. His spark cast a faint blue light as it pulsed weakly. To Nightfall’s optics, it looked like it might simply sputter out at any moment.

But it never did.

Nightfall raised one servo to his spark and slipped his digits around it. It would be so easy to just crush it. All he had to do was offline his optics and close his fist.

Nightfall gave a little sigh, withdrew his servo, and snapped his chestplates shut again.

Maybe tomorrow.

* * *

“NIGHTFALL!” yelled Moonrise happily, throwing his arms around Nightfall’s shoulders and pressing his face into Nightfall’s neck. “I haven’t seen you in forever!”

“Yeah,” said Nightfall, dialing down his audials a little bit. He glanced over at the tower elevator—Windsong and Bladewing were still inside, carrying crates full of newly-synthesized energon. Deliveries were being made to and from Cybertron regularly, and the cadets were the preferred choice for these assignments.

Moonrise could be annoying sometimes, and he never did any work, but he was also the only mech who didn’t treat Nightfall like he was made of crystal, and so Nightfall tolerated him.

“How are things up on Cybertron?” asked Nightfall. Windsong opened his mouth to reply, but Moonrise interrupted.

“They’re amazing! We had so much fun this week! I wish you could have been there!”

Nightfall highly doubted that, but he said nothing. “Are the Quintessons gone?”

“It looks like it,” said Windsong. “If they’re not, they’re staying far away from our patrols.”

“We had a battle!” explained Moonrise happily. “We went to Quintessa! It was terrible!”

“Yeah, I heard,” said Nightfall.

“You should come back to Cybertron with us!” yelled Moonrise, wrapping himself around Nightfall’s arm. “There’s like a peace treaty or something I dunno it’s crazy! Oh and guess what?!”

“Moonrise,” said Nightfall wearily. “I’m right here. You don’t have to yell.”

“BUT IT’S EXCITING! Ramjet challenged the commander again!”

“Really?” Nightfall supposed they had been overdue for it. “How did it go?”

“It was great! I thought Ramjet might actually win—” began Moonrise.

“Yeah, right, as if that would happen,” interrupted Windsong. “I bet Starscream just let him get those hits in so he’d get overconfident and then—”

“Thrust and Dirge had to surrender for him,” Bladewing explained to Nightfall.

“But that’s not even the best part!” cried Moonrise. “We’re getting our brands! The commander announced it yesterday! For example-ary service during the Quintesson crisis—”

“Exemplary,” corrected Bladewing.

“—we will henceforth be recognized as full members of the Decepticon Air Force!”

Nightfall felt his spark twist a little at the words. “Oh. That’s—that’s great. Congratulations.”

Moonrise beamed, but behind him, Windsong and Bladewing exchanged concerned looks—the sort of looks that seemed to get thrown around a lot whenever Nightfall went somewhere.

“That’s why you should come back with us,” said Moonrise. “Oh! And you can meet the Aerialbots! They’re adorable!”

“I can’t go anywhere. I’m taking care of Thundercracker’s fish.” Thundercracker had a rather impressive collection of very colorful and very delicate tropical Earth fish that required a surprising amount of care. Thundercracker had charged Nightfall with the task of looking after them while he was gone, saying Nightfall was the only mech he trusted not to stick his servo in one of the tanks. Then he’d glared pointedly at Skywarp.

Nightfall actually enjoyed caring for the fish. They were tiny, but very beautiful. Watching them was peaceful. And they were good listeners, too.

“Get someone else to do it,” said Moonrise. “Come on! Come back to Cybertron with us! Please? Your detailing is so faded. You’ll feel better if you let us fix it. When was the last time anyone polished your wings? When was the last time you flew? Is Silvermist’s trine not looking after you? I’ll kill them if they’re not.”

“It’s fine,” said Nightfall. “Honestly.”

“I get to decide whether it’s fine or not,” proclaimed Moonrise, releasing Nightfall’s arm only to grab him by the wrist. “Oh! And guess what else happened? You’ll never guess. Guess who came back?”

“I, uh, I don’t know,” said Nightfall, allowing Moonrise to pull him down the hallway in the direction of the rec room. “Who?”

“The Commander’s frozen shuttle guy! Whatsisname. Skyfire! He came back!”

Nightfall felt himself sneer a little at the name. “That traitor?”

“Don’t make that face! He’s actually really nice! He scanned a Quintesson ship and he was so ugly that I got tears in my optics whenever I looked at him. It was so emotionally draining for me. Silvermist!“

This last comment was delivered as they entered the rec room together. Most of the occupants were seekers, but there were a few of Megatron’s soldiers as well. At the center of the room a silver seeker with white detailing looked up from his energon cube at the sound of his designation, but didn’t get off the couch where he was reclining with Starflare.

“The frag do you want, Moonrise?” asked Silvermist, sounding bored.

“You haven’t been looking after Nightfall. You’re not even polishing him.” Moonrise scowled. “When was the last time you took him flying?”

“He didn’t want to fly. That’s not our fragging fault,” said Cometflight, coming away from his spot at one of the tables to move protectively in front of his trineleader.

Moonrise huffed. “You’re all worthless,” he proclaimed to the entire room. “Silvermist, Nightfall’s coming back to Cybertron with us, so you have to feed Thundercracker’s fishes and make sure they don’t die or if they do die you have to buy new ones that look exactly the same. Okay?”

Silvermist frowned a little, “Does he have permission to leave the base?”

“Who cares? Shut up.” Moonrise’s wings were twitching in agitation. “He’s coming with us because I said so. How d’you expect him to get any better if he just stays at the bottom of the ocean?”

“He’s not going to get better!” snapped Silvermist, rising to his pedes at last and shoving past his wingmates. “I knew you were an idiot, but Primus! His bondmates are dead! Nightfall is dead! He’s just still walking around! Anyone with half a processor can see it!”

Moonrise responded by punching Silvermist in the jaw.

Nightfall didn’t stick around to watch the rest of the fight. He slipped through the crowd that had rapidly gathered around the two seekers and hurried back to his room.

* * *

Airstream had gone first. He’d been shot through the spark during a battle with the Autobots. He hadn’t even had time to scream.

Nightfall rummaged through his storage crates, servos shaking. Buried at the very bottom, safe from the prying optics of his superior officers, was a tiny almost-empty cube of blue liquid. He set it down on the floor and unsubspaced a small medical syringe.

He filled the syringe with the remainder of the liquid and then brought the needle up to the main energon line in his throat. When he was finished, Nightfall rubbed his forehelm a little. The last thing he wanted to do was leave the Victory, but it looked like he might not have a choice after all. Mixmaster certainly wasn’t going to come to him.

The numbing waves were already starting to hit him. Nightfall staggered over to his berth and stared up at the ceiling. Sometimes—usually when he was very tired—he could almost feel their servos on his frame, stroking his wings and tracing patterns across his legs, or their soft lipplates on his neck-cables…

“I miss you,” he whispered to the memories.

Nightfall had felt the bond break, had felt the entire universe slip away from him, had felt himself fall out of the sky and strike the ground. In that moment, stasis lock had been a gift.

“We miss you too,” said Stormcloud, drawing Nightfall into his arms and resting his chin on Nightfall’s shoulder. “Why didn’t you come with us?”

“I wanted to,” said Nightfall. “I—I wanted to—more than anything…”

Stormcloud had died two cycles later, his spark flickering out as he and Nightfall lay together on a single medical cot, arms around each other.

“Please don’t cry,” said Airstream, leaning forward to touch his forehelm to Nightfall’s. “Please. Please don’t cry. For me, okay?”

“I love you,” whispered Nightfall brokenly. “I love you, I…”

Airstream reached up to cup Nightfall’s faceplates in his servos. “I know. We know.” And he leaned forward to kiss Nightfall’s lipplates. “You’ll be with us soon. And then we’ll fly together again.”

Nightfall offlined his optics and allowed the emptiness to fill his frame.

* * *

When Moonrise finally came banging on his door, the effects of the circuit booster was fading from Nightfall’s systems. And even if it hadn’t been, Nightfall was very good at faking sobriety—he’d even flown a few patrols while completely slagged. He was pretty sure nobody suspected anything out of the ordinary as he got into the lift with Windsong’s trine and began the trip to the space bridge. His flight pattern might have been a little wobbly, but over time he had come to realize that most mechs expected that from him.

The jolt of the spacebridge as they arrived on Cybertron almost made him purge, but he managed to control himself. As they stepped into Shockwave’s atrium, Moonrise turned to Nightfall and said, “We need to go report in. Wait here for me, okay?”

“Alright,” said Nightfall, who had no intention of doing any such thing. The moment Windsong’s trine was out of sight, he started off down the hallways in the direction of the medbay, dodging the gazes of Autobots and Decepticons alike as he went.

When he arrived in the medbay, he was relieved to see that there were no patients on any of the berths, and none of the Autobot medics or scientists appeared to be around, either. It was just the Constructicons, working quietly, as usual. Nightfall knocked on the doorframe to get their attention. It was Mixmaster who reacted first.

“The frag are you doing here?” he asked, stepping around his mixing drums to approach the seeker.

“I just thought I’d stop in to say hello to my best friend in the universe,” said Nightfall, reaching out to spin the wheels on Mixmaster’s upper arm, acutely aware that all the other Constructicons were still watching. “Nothing wrong with that, now is there?”

“Yeah, right,” scoffed Mixmaster, pulling his arm away. “Who let you off the Victory?”

“What? Why shouldn’t I be allowed to spend a little time back home?” retorted Nightfall. And now Hook was giving him that infuriating pitying look. Nightfall resolutely ignored it.

Mixmaster frowned a little. “You can’t keep burning through my supply like this—”

“Mind your own fragging business!” snarled Nightfall, the false sweetness in his tone evaporating on the spot.

“It’s my business because when you finally fry your processors, they’re gonna investigate me! I’m barely keeping Soundwave off my tailpipe as it is!”

“Do you have anything or not?” asked Nightfall, crossing his arms impatiently. “I don’t have all fragging day.”

“Come back at the end of the solar cycle,” said Mixmaster. Nightfall gnashed his dentae. “I’m serious. I’m not giving you anything right now.”

Nightfall opened his mouth to retort, but that was when Moonrise arrived, vents heaving a little. “Nightfall! Why did you run off?” he cried.

“Sorry,” said Nightfall, spinning around on one thruster-heel to face the other seeker. “Got distracted.”

Moonrise looked around the medbay in confusion, clearly wondering why Nightfall was even here. “Well, un-distract yourself. We’re going to see the babies.”

Nightfall had assumed he was going to be taken to meet the famous Aerialbots, but it turned out that he was incorrect. Instead, Moonrise brought him to a little room that had been converted into a nursery. Toys were strewn around the floor, and two Autobot femmes, one green and one orange, were overseeing three tiny sparklings as they played together.

Nightfall was a bit uncomfortable about having Autobot soldiers so close, but it was immediately forgotten as he laid optics on the sparklings. He felt something inside himself soften at the very sight, and dropped to his knees automatically for a closer look. The sparklings all turned to examine him with bright blue optics and enormous smiles.

“Moonrise!” squeaked the femme, the creepy-looking pink one. “Brought friend!”

“Yes. This is Nightfall,” said Moonrise. The red mechling ran over to examine the newest addition to his small world, gripping Nightfall’s faceplates between his tiny servos and studying his face. Then, after a moment of contemplation, he released Nightfall’s helm and instead hugged him around the chassis.

“They’re amazing,” said Nightfall, awed.

“Right?” agreed Moonrise. “I knew you’d like them. That’s Hot Rod you’ve got there, by the way.”

“Hi,” said Hot Rod, taking a step back. “I’m Hot Rod.”

“Yeah, I, uh, I heard,” said Nightfall with a very small smile.

“And that’s Arcee, and Springer,” added Moonrise. “If you feel your guardian program kick on, you’ve got the deactivation key, right?”

“Yeah,” said Nightfall, only half-listening. The Autobots had sparklings. Real sparklings, not like the Stunticons, but honest-to-Primus sparklings. Nobody had seen real sparklings in vorns. Stormcloud and Airstream would have loved—

Nightfall flinched at the errant thought. “No,” he whispered to himself.

“What no?” asked Arcee, tilting her little helm curiously.

Moonrise had noticed as well, and he didn’t seem very pleased. “Nightfall, are you okay?”

“Um. Fine.” Nightfall disentangled himself from the red sparkling and got back to his pedes. “Hold on a klick, okay? I’ll be right back…right back.”

Without waiting for a response, Nightfall rushed out of the room and back into the hallway—only to realize that a pair of Autobots were walking in his direction. They both looked up at him curiously, and Nightfall didn’t stop to think. He turned and ran as fast as his pedes could carry him back in the direction of medbay.

What was he thinking, agreeing to come visit a base full of Autobots? He was going to kill Moonrise for suggesting it. Nightfall had never been able to find out which of the Autobots had been responsible for Airstream’s death, so as far as he was concerned, it could be any of them.

The trip to the medbay took far too long, and by the time Nightfall burst through the doors, he was barely capable of speech. The Constructicons all looked at him in alarm. Nightfall took a moment to compose himself before saying, “Eight cubes.” It was double what he usually paid Mixmaster for a tiny cube of circuit booster, but desperate times called for desperate measures. Besides, he actually had a good little stockpile of cubes—he’d recently taken up the habit of selling things he’d ‘found’ to Swindle.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” said Hook. “Nightfall, come here and let me examine you—”

“You’ve examined me a thousand times!” snarled Nightfall. “I know what you’re going to tell me, it’s the same thing every time!”

Hook looked like he wanted to argue, but in the end he just shrugged. “Fine. Do what you want. If he dies, it’s on you, Mix.”

Nightfall followed Mixmaster into the back of the medbay, where there were no security cameras. He unsubspaced the promised cubes and thrust them into Mixmaster’s arms unceremoniously. The Constructicon placed them in his own subspace pocket, and then pulled out another tiny cube, this one filled to the brim with blue liquid.

“Was that so hard?” demanded Nightfall, snatching the cube from Mixmaster’s servo.

“Yeah, you’re welcome,” muttered Mixmaster. Nightfall didn’t reply—he turned away and grabbed another medical syringe from one of the counters.

“Hey! Not in here!” cried Mixmaster, but Nightfall ignored him and filled the syringe. Within moments of the booster hitting his systems, he felt himself relax. His servos were barely trembling at all as he stumbled from the medbay without another word.

The hallways weren’t nearly as intimidating now, and Nightfall leaned his wings against a wall. He was going to find somewhere safe to pass out, and then he was going straight home, all hopefully without being spotted by one of his commanding officers. Moonrise could go frag himself if he didn’t like it. At least the day hadn’t been a total waste of time—he wouldn’t have to worry about his supply running out for another deca-cycle or so. Mixmaster was stingy with his brews, but they were potent.

Once he was a safe distance away from medbay, Nightfall began searching for an empty room. He was not familiar enough with Shockwave’s base to know where the storage closets were, so he had to check every door. A few of them had surprised-looking mechs inside, but whenever that happened, Nightfall just slammed the door shut again before they could say anything.

Two new mechs were coming down the hall, and at first Nightfall thought they were Decepticons. But then he realized he was wrong. Though they were aerials, they had red Autobrands on their frames. The larger one was a shuttle, white with yellow and red detailing, and the smaller one was dark, with copper faceplates and a grey paintjob.

Nightfall actually wasn’t as anxious of the Aerialbots as he was other Autobots. For one thing, their childlike innocence was thoroughly disarming. And, most importantly, they hadn’t even been online yet when Airstream was killed, so they couldn’t have been the ones who did it.

“Hi there!” said the smaller of the Aerialbots as they approached. “I’ve never seen you before. Did you just come from Earth?”

“Um.” Nightfall tested his mouth out. It seemed to be sticking. “Ack. Bleh. Yeah.”

The baby Autobot frowned. “Hey, are you okay?”

Nightfall laughed a little, “No!”

This, apparently, was the wrong answer. The jet leaned forward with worry plastered all over his faceplates. “Do you need to go to medbay?”

“I was just there,” said Nightfall.

“Well, you need to go back.” The baby Autobot looked deeply concerned. “You’re sick.”

“I’m fine,” said Nightfall. “I mean, I’m not fine, but it’s fine. Primus, are you still here?”

“You need help,” said the Aerialbot. “What’s your designation?”

“The-Approach-Of-Darkness.”

“I’m Joy-of-Free-Falling. My brother is Glimpse-of-Speeding-Light. Where is your trine?”

“I fly alone.”

“Oh!” The Aerialbot looked legitimately stunned. “Silverbolt…”

“What did he say?” asked the shuttle.

“He said, ‘I fly alone’,” translated Skydive, frowning deeply. “I mean, that’s the literal translation. But the implication is...”

Nightfall offlined his optics and let the wall support him. The booster was really starting to kick in now, locking up his limbs. He’d really wanted to find a berth or something to crash on before this happened.

“Woah! What are you doing?” cried Silverbolt.

“Just takin’ a nap,” mumbled Nightfall. There was a muffled thud, and Nightfall onlined his optics again. He was on the floor. Weird. When had that happened?

“I’m calling Ratchet,” said Silverbolt. There was the sound of rapidly approaching pedes, then—

“Nightfall!” That was Moonrise’s voice. “There you are—what happened?”

“He just fell over!” cried Skydive. “I was just talking to him and he—”

“Frag.” That was Windsong—was he here too? “Okay, uh…”

“Did you call for a medic?” Bladewing’s voice, collected and calm, cut through Windsong’s panic.

“Yeah, Silverbolt did,” said Skydive.

“The commander is going to murder us,” observed Windsong. “Moonrise, this was a terrible idea.”

Nightfall felt soft servos on his shoulders. “Like letting him stay on the Victory was any better!” cried Moonrise from somewhere very near to Nightfall’s audials. “At least I’m trying to help! At least I want him to get better!”

“Moonrise—” Windsong sounded weary.

“Don’t you start, too!”

“Alright, everyone step back!” declared a new voice, this one gruff and authoritative. “What happened here?”

Nightfall onlined his optics and looked up at the Autobot medic. Moonrise reluctantly moved away to let Ratchet examine him. His optics immediately went to Nightfall’s neck.

“Alright, kid. What are you on?”

“Nightfall!” wailed Moonrise. “You told me you stopped! You promised!”

Nightfall snarled up at Ratchet. “That’s none of your fragging business, Autobot.”

“When you decide to start harassing my creations then yes, it actually is my business,” snapped Ratchet.

Nightfall saw no point in arguing with the famous Autobot medic. He merely offlined his optics and said nothing.

“Is he dead?” wailed one of the jets.

“Yeah,” mumbled Nightfall. “Only I’m still walking around.”

* * *

When Nightfall came back to himself, he was in the medbay. He had just enough time to take in his surroundings before he felt the eerie chill of another’s servo in his subspace. He looked up, and saw that Mixmaster’s cube was now in Starscream’s servo.

“C-c-commander—” began Nightfall.

“What’s this?” asked Starscream, waving the cube in the air.

“Nothing—painkillers—nothing.”

“Are you sure about that?” asked Starscream. Nightfall glanced away. “Nightfall?”

“Can I go?”

Starscream bristled. “No, you may not. I asked you a question.”

“And I answered it,” spat Nightfall. Starscream had clearly not been expecting this from a mech who was barely more than a cadet, a mech who had been given his brands out of pity. For a moment, the Commander actually seemed uncertain what to say. But that didn’t last long—it never did, with Starscream.

“Nightfall—” began Starscream in a significantly gentler tone.

“Don’t,” said Nightfall. “Please. Yell at me if you want but don’t be—don’t be sorry for me. Okay?”

The commander appeared to relent. He gave a slight nod. “We will discuss this later, then,” he said. “Don’t think you’re going to get away with coming to this base without permission in the middle of a very fragile truce and…”

“I know,” mumbled Nightfall, suddenly deeply ashamed.

Starscream seemed to deflate a little. “Just get some rest,” he said. Then he subspaced the cube and started for the door.

“Why didn’t I die?” whispered Nightfall. “Why can’t I just die?”

Starscream froze, one blue servo resting on the doorframe.

“Maybe it’s because I didn’t love them enough,” Nightfall continued. “Maybe that’s why my spark didn’t just burn out like Stormcloud’s did.”

“Nightfall, no.”

“Don’t tell me no! You don’t know! You don’t know! You have no idea! Two broken bonds, but I’m still alive! Why can’t I just die?!”

Starscream came back over and sat down on the berth. Then he hugged Nightfall’s helm to his chassis.

“I’m glad they’re not here to see this,” said Nightfall, slightly muffled. “Primus—what would they say? They’d be so angry at me…Moonrise is already angry at me.”

“Not that angry,” said Starscream. “He was waiting outside to see you when I came in.” Starscream released Nightfall’s helm and got up again. “Should I send him in?”

“If he wants,” mumbled Nightfall.

Starscream left the room quietly. A few klicks later, Moonrise was standing in the doorway with a sparkbreaking expression on his faceplates. Nightfall just looked up at him helplessly. Neither of the seekers seemed to have any idea what to say.

Finally, Moonrise came over to Nightfall and hugged him.

“When was the last time anyone polished your wings?” he asked.

Chapter Text

As a rule, Motormaster didn’t pay too much attention to what the Autobots did. He had enough to worry about, with keeping his brothers out of trouble so they wouldn’t embarrass Megatron. The last thing he wanted to do was get caught up in dumb Autobot problems. But in this case, it was sort of inevitable.

It had started with Sunstreaker, oddly enough. Motormaster had only been paying attention because there wasn’t anything else going on in the rec room. Drag Strip was ranting about all the football games he’d missed since they came to Cybertron—something about cups and Liverpool and Arsenal and Motormaster had no idea what any of it meant but he had to admit Arsenal sounded like a good name for a team.

Otherwise, the room was more or less empty, save for Sunstreaker, the shiny and pompous Autobot that Motormaster knew was universally loathed by the Decepticon seekers. He standing in front of the table that Moonrise was sharing with Nightfall, colloquially known as “that one crazy seeker.” It was clear from Sunstreaker’s pose—he was leaning forward, almost leering, with both servos on the table to support his weight—that he was trying to get Moonrise to engage in some sort of conversation. Nightfall looked as blank and inexpressive as ever, but Moonrise was scowling.

Megatron would be mad if anyone got into a fight with the Autobots (he’d made an announcement about it and everything), so Motormaster decided to pay attention to what was happening, just in case.

“I’m just being friendly,” Sunstreaker was saying. “All in the name of…inter-faction understanding, right?”

“Leave. Now.” Motormaster had never heard Moonrise use that tone before.

“What, I’m not allowed to stand here?” asked Sunstreaker, with the sort of smile that made Motormaster want to punch him in the faceplates. “Come on. I’m giving you a compliment—”

“Hey. He told you to leave him alone,” said a new voice. Motormaster looked around to see Silverbolt standing in the doorway. The Aerialbot’s servos were clenched, his wings trembled a little, and his lips—those lips!—were pressed together in annoyance, which only made them look even fuller.

Sunstreaker straightened up and turned around, but when he saw who it was that had come to Moonrise’s rescue, he sneered. “Standing up for your boyfriend? Cute.”

“What the frag?” Moonrise shook his helm. “Primus, you really are an idiot.”

Only Motormaster noticed the stricken expression on Silverbolt’s faceplates—though it was gone a moment later.

“Whatever,” Sunstreaker said dismissively. “Hey Bolt, when is your team gonna enlist with the Decepticons, anyway?”

“You need to leave now,” said Moonrise, getting up from his seat at last.

“I’m not talking to you, I’m talking to Silverbolt,” retorted Sunstreaker. “Come on, Bolt, don’t deny it. You like the seekers better than us, don’t you?”

“Better than you, specifically? Yeah,” said Silverbolt. “But I also like things like maintenance checks, empty energon cubes, and rocks better than you. So that’s not really anything special.”

That was one thing Motormaster did like about Silverbolt (aside from the lips, and those powerful downswept wings, which were sort of cute, too). Despite being raised by Autobots, Silverbolt—and all his teammates, really—had the same biting wit that Motormaster secretly envied. Being strong and powerful was great, and Motormaster wouldn’t have traded it for anything, but sometimes he wished his processor worked fast enough to come up with insults when he really needed them.

“Should’ve known you’d stab us in the back eventually,” Sunstreaker went on conversationally, as if Silverbolt had not spoken. “I mean, I dunno what Prime expected when he asked Vector Sigma for aerials.”

During the crisis, Motormaster had actually spent quite a bit of time with the grounders, which naturally meant he’d spent a lot of time with the Autobots. They weren’t exactly inclusive or trusting, but he overheard plenty of gossip while they did their patrols and searches. The fact that the Aerialbots had been more or less adopted by the Decepticon seekers had not gone over well with many of them. But this was the first time Motormaster had actually seen anyone say something to Silverbolt’s faceplates.

“What happened to…what did you call it? Inter-faction understanding? You seemed fine with it half a breem ago.” Silverbolt sounded calm enough, but his wings were still shaking. He was trying to put on a brave face, but it was clear he wasn’t comfortable with confronting Sunstreaker. But oddly enough, Sunstreaker didn’t seem to notice. Maybe the other Decepticons were right. Maybe Autobots really didn’t know how to read wings.

For Motormaster, who had spent his entire life among aerials, interpreting wing-movement was as natural to him as…well…something that came naturally to him. Something other than metaphors.

Sunstreaker laughed and rested his servos on his hips. “Yeah, right. Come on, you’re half-Decepticon as it is. Why not make it official? Or did Megatron reject you for being too pathetic?”

Motormaster frowned a little bit. He wouldn’t exactly say that Silverbolt was his friend, but their teams had watched a lot of movies together over the last few solar cycles. And he didn’t like the way Sunstreaker was talking. And he really didn’t like the way Sunstreaker’s words were making Silverbolt’s not-as-magnificent-as-a-seeker’s-but-still-pretty-nice wings tremble with anxiety.

[You’re gonna get us in trouble,] said Breakdown, who had apparently picked up on his brother’s intentions.

[Shut up,] retorted Motormaster. This was his automatic response to pretty much everything Breakdown ever had to say. [And no I’m not.]

[Are we gonna fight? I wanna fight!] That was Wildrider.

[We are not gonna fight! Primus!] Motormaster shook his helm. [You guys are idiots. Megatron said no fighting. It could ruin the treaty.]

[So Hot Wings over there is allowed to show up on Cybertron without permission and shoot up in a public hallway, but us putting Sunshine in his place is what’s gonna wreck the treaty?] demanded Drag Strip. [Typical.]

Motormaster ignored this. It was easy; he ignored pretty much everything his brothers ever said. He got up out of his chair, glanced around to make sure there wasn’t anyone else in the room, and took a few purposeful steps forward.

“They told you to get lost, Autobot,” said Motormaster. “So go. Nobody wants you here.”

“And you’ve even made friends with the monosyllabic thugs,” Sunstreaker said to Silverbolt in mock-surprise. “You’re just so popular, aren’t you?”

Motormaster said nothing, but he did shift his weight in a way that made it clear that he would have no qualms about punching Sunstreaker in the face. He knew it would work—he’d learned it from Megatron. Sure enough, Sunstreaker gave him a disdainful look and flounced out of the room, shoving past Silverbolt and slamming the larger mech into the doorframe as he went.

Once the Autobot was gone, Silverbolt just shook his helm in mild disgust.

“What an idiot,” said Moonrise. “I can’t believe you have to share a base with him.”

“Are you okay?” asked Silverbolt. “He didn’t do anything to you, did he?”

“We’re fine!” Moonrise assured him with a big smile. “Right, Nightfall? Nightfall?”

“Mm,” said the other seeker, his digits twitching irregularly.

“I’m taking Nightfall to the crypts today,” explained Moonrise. The dark blue seeker continued to say nothing. “He wanted to visit before he gets sent back to Earth.”

“The crypts?” repeated Silverbolt. “How far away are they?”

“Oh, not too far at all,” said Moonrise. “I mean, we’ve got crypts in every Decepticon-held city, but the only one that they’ve been using recently is the one right here in Tarn. If it’s too dusty, we might do some cleaning, too.”

“Cleaning? You?” asked Motormaster skeptically. On the Nemesis, Moonrise was sort of famous for never doing any work ever.

“Shut up,” said Moonrise, not sounding particularly offended. “Anyway, we’ve got to go now, but we’ll probably be back around the end of the solar cycle.” He got up, pulling Nightfall along by the wrist. “We’ll see you later, okay?”

The two seekers disappeared into the hallway, and Silverbolt turned his attention to the Stunticons. He wasn’t smiling anymore.

“You should have stayed out of it,” he said to Motormaster, slipping into English. This was something that both teams were prone to do when nobody else was around—English was their first language, after all. Besides, human curse words were just better.

“What? Me?” asked Motormaster, legitimately surprised. “Why should I? Fuck him!”

“Aw, don’t take it personal,” said Wildrider, grinning his usual lunatic grin. “Bolt’s just pissy because he finally got shot down.”

Silverbolt looked like he’d been slapped. “Shut the hell up!”

“You wanna go?” asked Wildrider eagerly, rising up from his seat. Motormaster reached out and struck him on the back of the helm.

“Lay off him, ’Rider,” grunted Motormaster.

Wildrider scooted his chair back, just out of Motormaster’s reach. “Why? It’s hilarious!”

Silverbolt didn’t say anything, even though he looked like he really wanted to. Instead, he just turned away and left.

* * *

That wasn’t the last Motormaster saw of Silverbolt that day, though. A few cycles later, Air Raid secured a copy of an old pre-war Polyhexian film from Jazz and so both teams gathered in their usual spot, one of the less-frequented rec rooms with a really big display screen. Over the last few solar cycles, they’d gradually filled it with enough furniture to accommodate them all.

“This had better be more interesting than yesterday’s movie,” grumbled Slingshot, claiming the most comfortable chair for himself. Wildrider came and sat on his knees.

“Earth movies are better!” shouted Drag Strip, cramming himself onto the biggest couch between Skydive and Fireflight. “Nothing ever blows up in these stupid old films!”

“I miss home,” sighed Fireflight for the thousandth time. “It’s so cold here.”

“The roads suck, too,” Wildrider agreed, waving his arms around for emphasis. “They’re like…metal! How the fuck am I supposed to drive on metal!?”

“You’re not,” said Dead End, who was sitting on the floor with Breakdown. “Cybertronian vehicles hovered. Rubber tires are no good here. One of these days we’re going to go spinning out of control and fly right off a cliff. And die. If we’re lucky.”

“That’s awful!” cried Fireflight.

“That’s what I’m trying to say! This is the worst vacation ever!” yelled Wildrider, grabbing his own faceplates in despair.

“That’s because this isn’t a vacation,” said Silverbolt patiently. He was sitting on the smaller couch, and Motormaster was trying to figure out a way to maneuver his way into the seat next to him without seeming weird. “It’s a galactic crisis.”

“Will you all shut up?” bellowed Air Raid, sliding the movie chip into the receiver.

“If there’s any kissing in this movie, I’m out of here!” threatened Wildrider. Yesterday’s movie had been a classical Iaconian romance, apparently. Motormaster wasn’t sure. He’d fallen into recharge a quarter of the way through, which was much longer than it sounded like because the average length of a Cybertronian movie was a joor and a half—or nine hours, in Earth time.

“You know what I miss?” asked Breakdown out of nowhere. “Polishing cloths. Say what you like about humans, they know how to make a good—”

With a sudden swell of orchestral music, the film began. Motormaster quickly grabbed the seat next to Silverbolt, and all was well for a few klicks. Then…

“Reading! I hate reading!” yelled Wildrider. “Why are there words?”

“The film’s Polyhexian,” said Air Raid. “So the film’s also in Polyhexian. So we’ve got subtitles. Get it?”

“Can we just watch Die Hard?”

“No!” yelled Motormaster. “We’re getting some culture! Now shut up and watch the movie!”

This movie wasn’t quite as boring as yesterday’s, and Motormaster only fell into recharge once, for about half a cycle. When he woke up, all the characters were shouting at each other about some sort of power outage and missing energon cubes and someone had changed his paintjob and gotten locked up by the enforcers. Motormaster supposed it would have been interesting if he’d actually been awake for the build-up.

He reached out for his brothers across the bond, just to make sure they were all still alive. Breakdown and Dead End were soundly in recharge, pressed up against each other. Drag Strip was more asleep than awake, though still conscious, and Wildrider and Slingshot were actually watching the fight with interest. Apparently they’d settled on a more comfortable position at some point, because Motormaster’s brother was no longer crushing Slingshot’s legs.

Motormaster glanced over at the center couch that held Skydive (who was also watching avidly), Drag Strip and…not Fireflight, apparently. The Aerialbot in question was nowhere to be seen.

Motormaster looked at Silverbolt to see if the shuttle was concerned by this, but it did not appear that he was. Silverbolt seemed to sense Motormaster’s optics on him, and turned away from the screen to face him.

[What?] asked Silverbolt over private comms.

[Nothing,] said Motormaster quickly. [Just…one of your brothers is missing.]

Silverbolt vented in mild exasperation. [Yeah, I know. He does that. Wanders off. I wish he wouldn’t.]

Motormaster was at a loss. Everyone was always bitching about what wonderful teamwork the Aerialbots had, how damn interdependent they were and wasn’t Superion so sophisticated and Motormaster didn’t give a fuck because he knew that the Stunticons were just as good, no matter how fucking cohesive the Aerialbots were.

And yet…Motormaster’s brothers knew better than to go wandering off. They wouldn’t dare.

But Silverbolt is such an efficient leader, right Soundwave? he thought resentfully. Fucking Soundwave and his fucking lectures about teamwork and manners, as if politeness mattered in the middle of a war!

[Should we go look for him?] asked Motormaster, being careful not to let any of his annoyance slip through the connection.

[Yeah, I guess. Not like we’ll be missing much,] agreed Silverbolt.

The two got up as quietly as two mechs of their size could and slipped out into the hallway. Silverbolt looked around helplessly, shoulders slumped.

“Any idea where he went?” asked Motormaster.

“No idea,” said Silverbolt. “Could be anywhere, knowing Fireflight. I just hope he’s still on-base. Let me ping him.”

Motormaster waited. He tried not to stare at Silverbolt’s lips, but that was too difficult. He looked at his pedes instead.

“He’s in the labs,” sighed Silverbolt, rubbing his faceplates with one servo. “Got distracted by something Skyfire was doing. I guess I better go get him, or he’ll never find his way back. You don’t have to come.”

“Don’t mind,” said Motormaster gruffly. “Better than being in there.”

Silverbolt shrugged. “Okay,” he said, lightly. Motormaster was a little surprised; he’d sort of expected Silverbolt to refuse his company. But instead, Silverbolt went on walking like there was nothing unusual about the two of them hanging out at all.

“You know, I am sorry about this morning,” said Silverbolt. “When I snapped at you. That was wrong of me.”

“Oh,” said Motormaster. “Uh…” What would Soundwave tell him to do in this situation? “It’s…fine. Uh. You’re welcome?”

That was probably wrong, but Silverbolt didn’t seem to notice. He was still talking.

“It wasn’t your fault. I wasn’t even mad at you,” Silverbolt was talking very quickly now. “I never had a chance. I knew that. I was just being stupid.”

“You’re not stupid,” said Motormaster. He crossed his arms defensively at the surprised expression on Silverbolt’s faceplates. “You’re…you’re just not, okay? Anyway, he’s not that cute.”

Silverbolt shot him an incredulous look.

“Ok, so maybe he is,” granted the Stunticon. “But who cares? He’s an idiot. You should see the slag he gets up to at home. One time, he tried to hit on Megatron.”

Silverbolt burst out laughing. It was nice to see him smile. “You’re making that up!”

“I’m not! Ask anyone!”

“But Megatron’s so scary,” said Silverbolt. “I mean—no offense—”

“No, he is,” said Motormaster with a great deal of pride. “But he pretty much lets us do whatever we want. Soundwave’s the strict one.”

“Soundwave is terrifying!” exclaimed Silverbolt.

“Soundwave? Nah. Soundwave’s like…” Motormaster cast around for a good comparison. “He’s like the moms on those human TV shows about the families.”

Silverbolt looked highly doubtful, but he didn’t say anything, and they walked along in silence for a little bit.

“Nobody treats you guys like Autobots just because you’re cars, right?” asked Silverbolt suddenly. He didn’t stop walking, but he was looking at Motormaster again.

“They better not!” said Motormaster, offended by the very idea.

“Right. I thought so.” Silverbolt nodded at Motormaster, then lowered his sapphire gaze back down to the ground. “With Autobots, it’s like…it’s like your frame and spark are more important than your brand. Or at least, that’s how it feels, sometimes. And…and I know what it looks like. I know we’ve been hanging around with the seekers ever since we got here, but…” Silverbolt shrugged helplessly, unable to articulate whatever it was he’d hoped to say. “It doesn’t mean we’re gonna switch factions. We just…we just feel less alone when…”

“You could, though,” said Motormaster. “Switch factions, I mean.”

“We couldn’t,” said Silverbolt, sounding a little bit sad. “We talked about it a little. We’d have to fight our own creators.”

Motormaster tried to imagine fighting against Megatron and Soundwave, only to find that he could not.

“Okay,” said Motormaster. “Well…fuck the Autobots, then. Especially Sunstreaker. And anyone else who says the stuff he does. Fuck them.”

Silverbolt giggled a little and glanced back up at him. “Yeah. But not…not literally, right?”

“Well, I dunno,” said Motormaster. “Maybe it’ll make them like you better.”

Silverbolt covered his mouth with both his servos to muffle his delighted laughter. Motormaster felt his spark give a little spin of happiness, followed by a few very puzzled query pings from his brothers.

“Well, I don’t want my first time to be with Sunstreaker,” said Silverbolt. “But I’ll keep it in mind, in case I ever get really desperate. Like, really desperate.”

“You’ve never interfaced?” asked Motormaster.

“No,” said Silverbolt. “Not yet. Have you?”

“I could if I wanted to,” said Motormaster defensively. “I just don’t want to. Got better stuff to do, right? Like…” He hesitated for a few klicks longer than he’d intended to, “…got to take care of my brothers. Slagging morons. They don’t even listen to me.”

“Well, you do yell a lot,” Silverbolt said, clasping his servos behind his back.

“Yeah?" Motormaster glanced at him sideways, "So? You would too, if you had the four of them to deal with.”

“I’ve got just as many brothers as you do,” Silverbolt reasoned.

“Yeah, but they’re not like mine,” explained Motormaster. “You don’t have to beat the slag out of yours to get them to follow simple instructions.”

Silverbolt’s optics went almost white with shock, “You beat them?”

“…only sometimes,” said Motormaster, taken aback.

“That’s terrible!” cried Silverbolt, spinning around on one heel and backing into the wall. “Why would you do that?”

“Well, because they’re being idiots, usually,” explained Motormaster, trying to figure out why this was suddenly happening. He’d thought things were going well. Maybe Soundwave was right after all. Maybe his lack of manners would ruin all his future relationships.

“But how does that help anything?” insisted Silverbolt.

“Well, it makes them listen to me,” said Motormaster, still very unsure as to why this was a problem. “Why aren’t you getting this?”

Silverbolt shook his helm vigorously. “But they obviously don’t listen to you!”

“Are you saying I’m a bad leader?” Motormaster demanded.

“You’re a bad brother!”

Motormaster stared at Silverbolt in open-mouthed shock.

“They're your brothers and your gestalt! You're their leader, you're supposed to protect them, not beat them up when they don't listen to you! That's horrible. When you combine don't you realize how beating your brothers makes them feel?”

Motormaster gnashed his dentae together, “Shut up, Autobot! You don't know anything!”

“No, you shut up!” retorted Silverbolt, taking a few steps forward so that the two were chassis-to-chassis. “You’re stupid and your ideas of leadership are stupid!”

“Well what the frag am I supposed to do?” bellowed Motormaster, so loudly that Silverbolt actually flinched. The Aerialbot took so long to formulate a response that Motormaster thought that he wasn’t going to say anything at all, and began to walk away.

“Wait!” cried Silverbolt, grabbing him by the wrist.

“Let go of me!” Motormaster turned back to him, violet optics flaring in rage.

“I’m talking to you—”

“We’re done talking!” Motormaster wrenched himself free. “Primus, I can’t believe I actually thought you were cute.”

“I—what?” squeaked Silverbolt. He bit his lower lip and covered his face with his servos, “You thought I was…but I’m not!”

“Doesn’t matter,” grunted Motormaster, crossing his arms. “Who cares? I’m leaving.”

Silverbolt looked up, and Motormaster could see his white faceplates were tinged pink. He might have even had tears in his optics. “Wait! Wait!”

“What?” snapped Motormaster, who had not actually gone anywhere.

“I know what it’s like,” said Silverbolt. “Having a team. Having to take care of them. Trying to get everyone to not treat you like sparklings. But my brothers respond better when they know I’m trying to understand where they’re coming from. That’s what makes us a good team.”

“Yeah, well, good for you,” said Motormaster sardonically.

“I--I think I know how we can work this out,” continued Silverbolt. “Next time you feel like hitting one of them, comm me and we can go to the sparring rings. We’re the same size—you won’t hurt me. We can fight it out until you feel better.”

Motormaster felt his shoulders relax a little. “Are you serious?”

Silverbolt nodded, his pretty blue optics meeting Motormaster's evenly. “I am! I mean it. Just try it for a deca-cycles. See it if makes a difference. I think it will. Okay?”

“Okay,” said Motormaster, suddenly deeply and inexplicably ashamed. “I…I’ll try. Okay?”

Silverbolt gave a slight nod, and then leaned in to touch his nasal ridge to Motormaster’s in a quiet gesture of affection. Motormaster said nothing, but he did stare back at Silverbolt, at a complete and utter loss for words.

Motormaster swallowed. “Uh. Can I—?”

“Yeah,” Silverbolt whispered.

Motormaster kissed him.

Chapter Text

Silverbolt was quickly coming to realize that Decepticon branding ceremonies were far more significant than their Autobot counterparts. Admittedly, Silverbolt had only ever seen his own, but he still felt that this observation held true. Perhaps hot irons applied directly to a mech’s wings automatically added a sense of gravity to any situation.

Silverbolt had thought it was unfair that the aerials had to endure two brands, while other soldiers, including Megatron himself, only had one. But when he brought it up, Firestorm had explained that the two brands were applied simultaneously, which Silverbolt supposed was not quite as bad.

Anyway, none of the Decepticon aerials seemed to mind at all. The upcoming branding ceremony was just about the only thing Windsong or his wingmates would talk about. It was actually getting a little bit tiresome.

Silverbolt confided this to Motormaster once they were alone in the room that the teams usually watched movies in at night.

“What d’you expect from seekers?” Motormaster asked. “No offense, I mean. Uh…”

“How’d your team get your brands?” asked Silverbolt. The brand on Motormaster’s left shoulder was real, Silverbolt knew. Motormaster had let him touch it.

“Punched out Bruticus,” said Motormaster, his tone carefully casual. “You know. Regular stuff. No big deal.”

Silverbolt laughed at the rather pitiful attempt at false modesty and Motormaster gave a small embarrassed smile before turning his violet gaze back down to his own pedes.

“Will you go to the ceremony?” asked Silverbolt.

“I dunno. Maybe,” said Motormaster. “Nothing else to do around here, is there?”

Silverbolt shifted so that his frame was pressed against Motormaster’s. He could hear the gentle purring of the other mech’s engines against his audial.

Motormaster absently reached out to stroke one of Silverbolt’s wings. That was nice and relaxing, and so Silverbolt felt his optics dim a little bit as Motormaster’s servos trailed across his wing, sending little waves of pleasure to his processor. Motormaster smelled of diesel fuel, mixed with faint tinges of Earth car polish. He could easily fall into recharge like this...

A very strange sound escaped Silverbolt's vocalizer—not quite a chirp but not quite a sigh. Motormaster pulled his servo away immediately, and something within Silverbolt whined in protest. He wanted more. He needed more.

“You okay?” the Stunticon asked.

Silverbolt was finding it very difficult to think straight. His entire processor felt hazy, and it was a struggle just to put a coherent thought together. “Mm…fine,” gasped Silverbolt at last. His vents were whirling louder and faster than they ever had in his entire life. He felt like he was burning up from the inside as he pushed himself back upright. “Fine. Fine. Everything’s fine. Primus.”

Motormaster did not look particularly convinced. “Did I hurt you?”

Silverbolt shook his helm. Speaking was too difficult. And even if it wasn't, he had no idea how to explain.

“What the frag happened?” Motormaster was starting to get a little agitated. If Silverbolt didn’t calm him down fast, he might just punch through a wall for lack of a better outlet.

“I…I honestly don’t know,” said Silverbolt, and that was when the panels on either side of his hips decided to retract, revealing his interface ports and still mint-in-original-packaging cables.

“Uhhh…” said Motormaster, looking even more alarmed. He might have even edged away a little. “You wanna…here? Now? Our hardware isn’t even—we don’t even have adaptors!”

“It’s not me! I swear!” cried Silverbolt, manually forcing the panels closed. He knew his confusion and embarrassment was starting to leak over the gestalt-bond, and tried his best to calm himself before his brothers got curious. “Oh Primus, why is this happening?”

A comm line from Skydive opened up, and Silverbolt felt his spark sink. But, by some miracle, Skydive did not ask about the strange feelings that were probably trickling across the bond. He didn’t even mention them.

[Air Raid and Wildrider are about to do something stupid,] reported Skydive. [Thought you ought to know.]

[Ah…okay. Thanks. Where are they?]

Skydive pinged him with some coordinates, not too far from where Silverbolt was currently. Silverbolt stood up and tried to shake the rest of the hazy sensations from his frame. Eventually his cooling fans returned to their normal speed.

“We need to go check on our brothers,” Silverbolt informed Motormaster. Once they were out of the room, Silverbolt sent another comm to Skydive.

[What exactly are they doing?] he asked, moving as quickly as he possibly could without outright running (and risking a scolding from Prowl or one of the other commanders).

[Apparently they’re having a race,] Skydive’s glyphs were unimpressed, and a bit exasperated.

[A race?] repeated Silverbolt. [How can they have a race, Air Raid is a jet and Wildrider—]

At that moment, Silverbolt turned the corner and saw exactly why Skydive had commed him.

Two brightly-colored disembodied legs stood side-by-side, somehow keeping their balance. In the middle of the hallway was Fireflight, his arms in the air.

“On your mark,” Fireflight began. “Get set—”

“Oh Primus, no,” said Silverbolt.

“Go!” yelled Fireflight, lowering his arms, and Silverbolt could do nothing but stand back and watch in paralyzed horror as the two legs bent at their knees and attempted to propel themselves forward down the hall to the best of their abilities.

“That’s kinda freaky looking,” commented Slingshot, over the incredible din of metal crashing against metal. It was only a few klicks before doors started opening to see what was causing all the noise. Silverbolt covered his face.

“What the frag are you doing!?” That was Ironhide’s voice.

“What’s going on? Are we under attack?” Silverbolt uncovered his optics to see Firestar brandishing a weapon—and she wasn’t the only one. Greenlight and Lancer (one was seldom seen without the other), the entire Rainmaker trine, Jazz and Inferno, Soundwave, a bunch of Combaticons, and some other mechs too far back for Silverbolt to identify had poured out of the adjacent rooms, all clearly ready for a fight.

Wildrider and Air Raid seemed to come to their senses and transformed back into their root modes. They looked around at the amassed crowd, and then each other.

“What the Pit do you think you’re doing?” shouted Chromia.

“Dunno,” said Air Raid.

“Racing!” exclaimed Wildrider cheerfully. “It’s a foot race—get it? A foot race? Get it? Because we’re both—”

“Vector Sigma.” Chromia covered her optics with one servo. “I’m not dealing with this.” And she went back into the room she’d come from, sliding the door shut behind her.

“Look—” began Jazz, after a short pause in which it became abundantly clear that none of the older mechs were sure who should speak first. “We got some important operations goin’ down in here, alright? You can’t be crashin’ around like—”

“Sorry,” said Air Raid, not sounding particularly sorry at all.

“Yeh little punks,” growled Ironhide. “I oughta—what’s the matter with yeh? Are yeh glitched?”

“No,” said Air Raid.

“Maybe,” said Wildrider simultaneously.

* * *

Silverbolt stood at the back of the room, to keep from blocking anyone’s view of the proceedings. Next to him was the even-more-massive Skyfire, who was somehow larger than even the triple-changers. On his other side was Motormaster, who was apparently more interested in the ceremony than he’d previously let on. Their brothers, who were a bit smaller, had gone to stand closer to the front.

The Aerialbots weren’t the only Autobots in attendance. In fact, quite a large crowd had turned up to watch, including Prime and Elita. Arcee was there, too, and wearing a harness attached to a leash. Said leash was wrapped very tightly around Elita’s servo. Ironhide was standing in front of them, his arms crossed defensively.

At the front of the room stood Megatron, as well as Starscream and his wingmates. Before them knelt Windsong, Bladewing, and Moonrise, their wings held high and quivering a little bit with anticipation. Off to the side was a large, curved slab of metal that contained an open flame. Within it were two long metal rods. Silverbolt couldn’t see the ends, but he knew the Decepticon insignia was there.

Starscream leaned in and said something to Windsong, too softly for Silverbolt to catch. Windsong nodded confidently in reply. Megatron glanced over at Silverbolt and his optics seemed to harden. Silverbolt felt his spark freeze. Did the Decepticon leader know about him and Motormaster? Already?

Then Silverbolt realized that Megatron was not looking at him, but at Skyfire. Silverbolt nearly slumped in relief. Megatron and Skyfire glaring at each other was normal, according to Skydive. Skydive actually seemed to know quite a bit about Skyfire and Starscream, though he seemed reluctant to talk about it. The only exception was when Skydive had accidentally walked in on the two kissing in their shared lab. Skydive had been mortified, causing his brothers to badger him for details until he gave in. They’d been openly disappointed to hear it was only a kiss.

Silverbolt thought it a little strange that Skydive had once casually shown off his interface panel in a semi-public place but was embarrassed by a little kissing.

“Are you prepared?” Megatron asked Windsong, and all side conversations immediately died down.

“I am,” said Windsong. He cleared his vocalizer a little bit and began to recite. “I, Windsong, pledge my undying loyalty to the Decepticon cause. I devote my spark to the eradication of corruption, the destruction of our enemies, and the protection of our home.”

[Wow, they have to memorize it?] commented Fireflight. [At least it’s short.]

Silverbolt felt a thrill of horror as Thundercracker and Skywarp each removed one of the metal rods from the flames. Moving in unison, they each took one of Windsong’s wings in their free servos and held them still.

Silverbolt couldn’t see Windsong’s face, since he was turned away from the audience, but he could hear the hiss of the branding irons even from where he was standing.

After a few painful moments, Skywarp and Thundercracker removed the irons. Windsong made a faint gasping sound, but was otherwise silent. The branding irons were returned to the flames, and Megatron turned to Bladewing.

“Are you prepared?” he asked again.

The pledge was repeated without hesitation, and the irons were applied to Bladewing’s wings in the same way they’d been to Windsong’s. Silverbolt counted the klicks until they were removed and placed back on the flame once more. Bladewing looked like he was leaning in towards Windsong for support.

Then it was Moonrise’s turn. He recited the oath quickly, as though he was afraid he’d forget the words at any moment. When Skywarp and Thundercracker took his wings in their servos, Silverbolt had to force himself to not look away. Fortunately, it was over quickly, and Starscream stepped forward again to address Windsong.

“As the leader of your trine, you are sworn to protect your brothers,” said Starscream. “Their safety supersedes your own. If you fail in this, you will no longer be worthy of leading your wing. Do you accept this?”

“I do,” said Windsong.

“Then rise,” said Megatron, “and—”

But Moonrise was already moving, running over to the crowd of spectators and throwing his arms around another seeker. Windsong and Bladewing turned around, identical expressions of disbelief on their faceplates. Skywarp was laughing openly, and Thundercracker had very carefully turned away so that his faceplates could not be seen, though his shoulders betrayed his laughter.

Moonrise stepped back, and Silverbolt realized that the mech who was being embraced was Nightfall. After some initial laughter, the group of amassed Cybertronians began to break into conversation.

“I thought crazy seeker guy was supposed to get sent back to Earth,” commented Air Raid in a low voice.

“He was,” said Skyfire quietly. “But Moonrise begged Starscream to let him stay just until the ceremony was over.”

“And Starscream agreed?” asked Silverbolt in surprise.

“He lay down in front of our door and refused to move,” said Skyfire. “I was afraid I’d step on him, so I convinced Starscream to let him have his way.”

“Is crazy dude gonna flip out again?” asked Slingshot, rising up on the tips of his pedes to stare at Nightfall, who had retreated into a corner. “I wanna see that. Kidding,” he added hastily, after Skyfire gave him a disapproving look that could have rivaled Prime’s.

Windsong and Bladewing were moving through the crowd, smiling and laughing and accepting congratulations as they went.

“Did it hurt?” asked Skydive, once they came nearer. “It looked like it hurt.”

“Nah! It was fine!” But Windsong was still grimacing a little. “Totally worth it. Do I look awesome?” He turned his helm in an attempt to see one of his own wings, which was not an easy task. “Yeah, I look awesome.”

Moonrise came barreling through, knocking a few mechs into each other in his haste to be near his wingmates again. “I want to paint them! Let’s paint them right now!”

“No, we have to wait until they cool down,” Bladewing admonished. Moonrise pouted.

“Is there gonna be food now?” asked Slingshot hopefully.

“No, that’s a human thing,” said Skydive.

“Then why are we here?” demanded Slingshot. Air Raid punched him in the arm.

“Pretty impressive turnout,” said Silverbolt.

“I know!” cried Windsong. “We had the Prime at our branding ceremony. That’s like—I don’t even know what that is!”

“Sort of weird, actually,” said Bladewing.

“I bet everyone’s so jealous already.” Windsong rubbed his servos together. “We got to have our brands done on Cybertron instead of under some stupid ocean, and there were a billion mechs watching, Autobots and Decepticons and everyone. It’s awesome. We’re awesome. I’m so pumped, I’m gonna go punch Firestorm in the face.”

“Uh…should we stop him?” asked Silverbolt as Windsong vanished into the crowd.

“Don’t worry about it,” said Bladewing. “It’s not a proper ceremony until someone gets in a fight, right? Hey, don’t touch—” Bladewing reached out and slapped Moonrise’s servo, which was feeling one of his own brands. Moonrise gave a faint whine of protest. “You’re gonna mess it up!”

“I have a question,” said Skydive. “Isn’t it a little weird that you got your brands in the middle of a truce?”

“Maybe,” admitted Bladewing. “But we’re still Decepticons, it’s who we are. We meant the oath that we took, and a truce isn’t going to change that.”

“So you don’t think it will last?” asked Silverbolt.

“I don’t know. Nobody does.” Bladewing shrugged. “So let’s just enjoy it while we can, okay?”

Over on the other side of the room, mechs were starting to yell. Silverbolt could not see what was going on, but the semi-circle that had formed suggested to Silverbolt that Windsong had indeed punched Firestorm in the faceplates.

“Sweet, a fight!” yelled Slingshot, and immediately ran to join the crowd. Wildrider and Air Raid were not far behind him.

Bladewing shook his helm. “We’d better go too,” he said. “He’s going to need rescuing sooner or later. Come on, Moonrise.” And the two seekers pushed their way into the crowd, hitting mechs with their wings, until Silverbolt could only see the tops of their helms.

Down by his side, Silverbolt felt someone’s servo brush his own. He turned to look at Motormaster, who was staring resolutely ahead, as though nothing was happening. Silverbolt smiled and pressed his own servo against Motormaster’s.

Across the gestalt bond, he could feel his brothers’ sparks pulsing. Air Raid and Slingshot were the easiest to sense, with their excitement and euphoria coming across in waves. Fireflight had wandered off, and was now talking to Jazz and Prowl. Skydive was gone, probably halfway to the labs already to watch the scientists do whatever it was they were doing. And beneath it all was Superion, slow and peaceful and, for the moment, content.