Over The Line
Pairings: Galvatron/Ultra Magnus, implied Galvatron/...pretty much everybody
Warnings: Dubious consent
Rating: PG-13, the really hardcore stuff happens offscreen
Disclaimer: Don't own nothin'.
It was classified as a desert world, though its surface was nearly covered in water; a single continent showed its face in the southern hemisphere for seven months of the year, blanketed in monsoons and life-killing saltwater floods the remaining two. A single city with its token spaceport huddled in what used to be the exact center of the continent, built before the surveyors found out that the western shore would degrade several paces every monsoon season until at last the dead seas claimed all.
It was on the outskirts of this doomed city that Rodimus Prime and Ultra Magnus dug their heels in and made their last stand against the hounds of Unicron that had chased them to this desolate little corner of hell.
Battlefield lesson number six hundred and twelve, Rodimus noted to himself: don't let the other guy get you with your back to the city. Ugly and ragged and poor as it was, the hamlet with the unlikely name of Clearhaven was no less deserving of the Autobots' protection than any other, and its presence at the Autobots' backs was felt as sharply as the line Rodimus had carved on the rocky ground in front of him with his laser rifle. This far and no farther, Galvatron.
That had been two days ago; and though Galvatron raged and roared and called down a thousand wretched fates upon his enemies' heads, he and his two closest lieutenants had not gained an inch of ground.
"This can't last, Rodimus," Magnus told him as the red sun melted at the end of the second day. "Stalemates never do, and especially not with Galvatron. He will break our defenses."
"Magnus, our defenses consist of a couple piles of rock, prayer, and the occasional invective. If Galvatron can't break through that, I'll be disappointed." Rodimus scowled at his collection of pebbles, which seemed bound and determined to foil his efforts to make a pyramid. "We'll deal with Galvatron storming the castle when it happens."
"We need a plan," Magnus persisted. "And we need it now. We can't wait to react to whatever Galvatron does!"
Rodimus glanced up at his second-in-command, tempted to pull rank just to get him to stop talking and let him think. Magnus wasn't telling him anything he didn't already know. Of course he knew that the balance of power would shift soon, of course, he didn't need anyone to tell him that - not Magnus, and not the Matrix, whose non-voices were growing more urgent by the microsecond. Did his former commander really think - ?
A nova-bright blast from a cannon, familiar to the Autobots as their own weapons, put the mercy stroke to that thought, and Rodimus scattered his half-pyramid of pebbles to face the triad of Decepticons storming their position. Dimly he heard Galvatron howling for Ultra Magnus's head, but Scourge was harrying him from the air, Cyclonus was coming around for another pass, and he couldn't flinch, couldn't flinch -
"Magnus!" he shouted, his weapon spitting fire at Cyclonus's arcing thrusters.
"They're over the line, Rodimus - we've got to drive them back!" Over the flash of laserfire in his optics Rodimus could see his second standing steady as stone, his very body streaming ammunition seemingly from every seam, every joint. Then a purple meteor slammed into him and he toppled.
"Ultra Magnus!" Rodimus screamed, even as the part of the Matrix that knew these things whispered too late, can't save him. Galvatron was smaller than Ultra Magnus, but his frame was much denser, as if Unicron had crammed as much as physics would allow of power and death and fire into his design; even considering that, the Herald was stronger than any creature his size had a right to be.
As Galvatron closed his right hand deliberately around Magnus's throat, Rodimus reflected that he hadn't needed the Matrix to tell him that, either. He lifted his rifle to his shoulder, sighting down the barrel to Galvatron's crown.
"Wait." Cyclonus's voice sounded in his audial, the distant thunder that only last night had heralded the start of another monsoon season on this world. Two sets of hands pulled him back, lowered his rifle, pinned him, and Rodimus broke his sniper's trance in time to hear Magnus speaking - one word, Galvatron's name, three times, in the kind of voice you reserved for someone you almost didn't want to kill.
"Yes," Galvatron responded with a wild laugh, and bent to whisper further in his captive's audial as Magnus thrashed weakly and mewled like a newborn.
"He said he would." Scourge's voice was grudgingly approving.
"Would what?" For once the Matrix wasn't telling Rodimus anything, seemingly struck dumb with horror, and for once its Bearer, quivering with disbelief, would have welcomed its guidance. Cyclonus sighed and pulled Rodimus away from the scene, back toward the city.
"Come on," he told the enemy commander. "The first round is on Scourge."
"Hey-!" Scourge protested, then shut up when Cyclonus shot him a glare.
Rodimus suffered himself to be led away. "I want something corrosive," he muttered hopefully.
"As if you could find anything else on this rock!" Scourge went ahead, still attempting to smooth his ruffled pride. "I know a likely place. Come on, Rodimus, we'll have your capacitators burnt out in short order."
Monsoon season came early that year, with unprecedented and unprovoked fury, lashing at the sandstone beneath the city. As all knew it must, the land finally gave way in the Clearhaven settlement's seventeenth standard year, sending city, spaceport, and all tumbling into the endless sea.