Author: Koi Lungfish
Disclaimer: Based on characters and situations from The Transformers ((c) 1986 Hasbro, Ltd). Used without permission. Text (c) 2007, Koi Lung Fish (Mark of Lung. All Rights Reserved.)
Continuity: G1 cartoon, pre-Earth.
"Where is Starscream?" Megatron asked, shaking the red and yellow Seeker by the throat.
"ahugk!" he went.
Megatron shook him again and dumped him down on the deck. "Where is my Air Commander?"
"Hugk. He's ... err ... not here," the red Seeker rasped, sounding damaged and sheepish.
Megatron glared at the rest of the jets, the whole dozen of them standing as close to the walls of the room as they could. They were on the bridge of The Spearhead, Starscream's warship, and the room was too small for thirty terrified jets plus one terrifying warlord. "Where?"
"We came back for reinforcements -" the Seeker said, wobbling rather as he stood up.
"Who are you?" Megatron realized he'd forgotten to ask.
"Hot Glass, sir!" The cheeky wingnut had the gall to salute. "Commander of the Fire Divers."
"Since when?" Megatron snarled, not letting Hot Glass out of the railgun of his stare. He knew the commander of the Fire Divers, an old grey veteran who'd led Starscream's elite unit for hundreds vorns.
"Since three months ago." Hot Glass winced slightly. "Commander Charcore turned supremacist, sir. Starscream fired him."
"Out of what?" What is this idiot trying to distract me from?
"Orbital lance, sir." Hot Glass's mouth curled a little, his voice rose a little. "Gave him the thirty-second transfer."
Megatron did not smile. "Where is my Air Commander?" he roared.
Hot Glass jumped as if electrocuted. "Shawsheen, sir!" He was shaking, his wingtips quivering and his hands shivering loosely.
"Where?" Megatron never liked to check with a computer for information when he could rake it out of someone directly in front of him.
Hot Glass cringed, shifting from foot to foot as if the floor was roasting hot. "Planet of Shawsheen, Sargola system. Water planet, sir, we stopped there to refuel The Spearhead."
"And?" Megatron did not like the nervous pauses, the jittering, the scrambling-out-of-the-way quick-flash speech.
"Water pumping was due to take seven hours. The Air Commander decided to take a quick scouting flight over the north hemisphere, gathering exploitation data." Hot Glass squirmed, too afraid to look Megatron in the face. "We covered eighty-four percent of the northern hemisphere and found seventeen suitable landing sites and located -"
"Where is Starscream?" Megatron roared. Hot Glass jumped so high Megatron thought he trying to kick him in the face, but the Seeker landed on wobbly feet, shaking like a flag in a blizzard. You're not used to this job, Megatron thought darkly. You didn't kill him, and nobody else has claimed his title - so where is he?
"Sir, we were flying low over the sea surface, scanning an anomalous deposit in deep water, and Starscream stopped us on the hover so we could get fixed readings, and we were just about to turn back..." Hot Glass squirmed, ducking his head and dipping his wings. Megatron slapped him across the face as gently as he could, but the shaking jet still fell over backwards.
"Starscream. Where," he repeated. Is this jet a moron or does he just have problems with short, simple words?
Hot Glass staggered up to standing, pulled himself into a semblance of parade order, fixed his gaze on a spot on the floor and said in a loud, flat voice, "Sir I regret to inform you that Air Commander Starscream was lost at sea sir."
"What?" Megatron thundered. Every jet in the room jumped, clattering against the walls. Hot Glass jumped so high he almost bashed his knees on his chest, then fell back into a corner of the room. Megatron lunged, grabbed him by the throat and shook him. "Explain! Now! Quickly!"
"Sir, we were hovering and it was calm and quiet and there was nothing, and then this huge great enormous thing with teeth the size of my wing jumped out of the water and bit him in half and then he sank, and we ran because it was the size of a spaceship, and honestly sir that's what happened, please sir don't make us go back, we'll all be eaten sir!"
Megatron threw Hot Glass to the floor. "You're a Fire Diver! You're Starscream's elite guard! You're supposed to be the loyalest of the loyal!"
"Yes sir but sir it was huge and it had teeth-" Hot Glass babbled.
"I'll rip your throat out with my teeth in a second!" Megatron howled, voice reverberating off the wings of the jets. "Shut up! Stand up!" Shaking, Hot Glass stood to hapless attention. Megatron stood over him, laser-locking his targeting sights on the jet's head. "Where is Starscream?"
"Bottom of the ocean on Shawsheen, sir," Hot Glass said, voice throttled with fear and discipline. "Sank beyond sensor range."
"You used The Spearhead's sensors?" Megatron said, voice the low growl of a chainsaw cutting into sheet metal.
"Yes, sir! Recorded twenty miles of deep water without bottom. Also no sign of the Air Commander." A flicker of abject terror in his optics. "Also several hundred huge great horrible sea monsters."
"And the data on them is?"
Hot Glass looked even more frightened. "We - sir, we stopped at Shawsheen to refuel because it's a water planet so it was easy to get the nitrox, but we were low on fuel because we'd been chased by the Autobot Ninth Fleet, and they wouldn't follow us into orbit around Shawsheen because ... err..."
"Out with it!" Megatron shouted in the jet's face.
"There's an intelligent organic race on Shawsheen and they're very territorial, and the Autobots tried to set up base there a while back and the Shawsheen beat the boron out of them in four days."
"And the Shawsheen control these 'huge great horrible sea monsters'?" Megatron asked.
Hot Glass winced. "The Shawsheen are those sea monsters."
Megatron looked at Hot Glass, laser-locks scrawling red light on the jet's face. "You are the leader of the most loyal unit in the Air Wing, the highest of Starscream's elite, the Air Commander's own personal guard, and you ran from a fish?"
"It was huge, sir!" The jet at least looked embarrassed by his fear.
"Hot Glass, you will take all of the Fire Divers, and you are will re-embark on The Spearhead, and you will return to Shawsheen, and you will stay there until you get Starscream back!" Megatron lowered his voice from command roar. "And I do not care how."
Hot Glass looked at him with optics melting with fear. "But - but - but they're huge! Just one of them bit the boss in half!"
"Idiot!" Megatron shouted, cuffing the jet around the head again. "What faction do you belong to? The headlong suicides or the Decepticons?"
"Decepticons, sir!"
"Then deceive!"
Author's notes & addenda:
Feedback always welcomed.