Silas squatted to be eye to eye with the snoozing tiger-dragon. She was lying on her back so her deadly spikes and horns weren't visible. Her black lips were at peace so the normal thin line was now tumid though the line that ran from her lips to her jaw joint still had two fangs sticking out.
He remembered what the line was and it was remarkable how its anatomy worked. When she talked or growled, her mouth stayed the same, but when she grew angry and roared, the line split open and several rows of teeth were always seen ready to strike. The two fangs that stayed out moved when she talked but never moved up or down, almost as if they weren't connected to her at all.
Optimus and Megatron were both fascinating specimens and with Arcee as, or was, the last female of their kind, he could only study the males, for none would let him close to her. But when he heard of another, not from Cybertron but consisted of the same material as them, he grew curious.
The first time he saw her, he was amazed. Her raw strength rivaled that of both faction leaders and the ability to manipulate one's own body to look like something else was beyond human comprehension. How she did it was a mystery, but he admired her unruly, cruel, unpredictable, reasonable nature nonetheless.
Her killing made her ruthless, her history seemed ancient, and her presence was more than just intimidating. After listening to minor Metal Head communications about life before and their master, he learned she even destroyed planets after conquering the life that used to roam on each. Most were turned into the creatures she had now.
Why would she do this? He knew the answer: power. Once you've got a taste, it's hard to let go on your own. She held all those lives in the palm of her hand; she did what practically anyone would do.
The Metal Heads were interesting but they weren't natural and their creator was among them so he frankly didn't care. Her siblings were too bland for him though Demon showed promise, and the Captain of the Metal Heads, who held a similar name to him, was always protective of her and Silas knew why. Unfortunately, Tigressa never returned the feeling so cross-species mating wasn't going to happen. An organic breeding with a machine; there went an experiment that would change the scientific world forever.
Then again, the Transformers were a unknown modern miracle of epic scientific proportions. Their secrets alone would shake the entire Earth forever.
A low snarl startled him from his thoughts. Slowly, her optics opened revealing her blood-stained golden eyes peering up at the ceiling. They eventually turned to him but their owner did nothing at the sight before her. Did she not sense him as a threat?
Tigressa turned her head a little to get a better angle of who was before her. Her claws moved slightly but remained where they were. He noticed the slits of armor expanding on her face between her optics, hidden under the plating that resembled a nose, were rapidly moving up and down; she was sensing his emotions, as uninteresting as they seemed. She was checking for the most common emotion she received from her enemies: fear.
Fear strengthened and motivated her to strike at them. Perhaps sensing someone's fear startled her and she didn't know how to deal with the emotion except by killing the host? Perhaps fear had something to do with her past, and in order to keep bad memories from emerging, she murdered the origin of the scent? He wasn't afraid.
This unholy being had no power now. There wasn't an emotion strong enough to fuel anger and bloodlust she was so renowned for. Only greed and curiosity was faintly present.
Suddenly, she began twisting her form to lay on her belly, keeping all four limbs close to her body like a panther in a tree, waiting for its prey to move into sight. After bringing her tail to rest by her side, she lowered her helm to rest on the ground as if she knew he could do nothing against her so didn't care that she was playing vulnerable.
Silas finally moved towards her, steadily watching for any unfavorable movements. Still bent at the knees, he tried to prevent noise from his steps, for he figured she would become spooked and attack if enough sound gestured to her that he was determined to approach her. It would also give the bad message that he was planning something bad. In all honesty, he didn't want to harm her. Cybertronians were one thing, but these specific types of Transformers weren't manageable or clonable given that their CNA and DNA resisted being multiplied almost sentiently and the metal that made up the armor didn't exist on Earth.
How he knew this: he attempted from gathering metal broken off by Autobots against the Dracon brothers and the CNA and DNA taken from an unconscious Poltergeist. He then tried to create his own techno-organic warrior from it; the CNA backlashed by short-circuiting all the computers and the Dark Eco found with it, infected many of his soldiers. The armor reacted badly to other metals when combined with them to fill in missing sections of a second Transformer they wanted to build. It too sabotaged the human-made Transformer and the technology used to manage it.
When the golden orbs of her red sclera eyes were bigger than his head and chest combined, he was closer to her than anybody had ever been and lived. He could see now the intense detail of the yellow blending with gold and and faint orange ring lining the outside of the iris. He then noticed his reflection in the large black slit of the pupil, twitching as it tried to keep focus on the human in front of it but also probably keeping a good lookout for any other intruders.
With no thought, Silas lifted his hand and placed it on her cheek, observing her reaction as her pupils widened slightly. A deep growl rattled her throat but mellowed to an unknown sound that seemed similar to that of a whale call. She did nothing to stop him, but he could tell she wasn't sure about it either. His hand slid over the line where her jaws separated; he could feel the muscles pulsating, flexing like a human's would.
He always thought these machines couldn't be truly sentient like he was, emotional and all. For once, he admitted he was wrong. For once, he saw humans as inferior. One of many proofs lay right in front of him alive, looking back at him.
Her spinal spikes occasionally rattled, like she wanted to attack but something was preventing her or she was becoming irritated by him overstaying his lucky welcome. Suddenly, her head shot up, ears perked forward before she turned her head slightly to pinpoint what had alerted her. Silas stumbled back but didn't run away as she studied her surroundings carefully.
Then he heard it.
Little animal calls sounded faintly throughout the area, seemingly directed to Tigressa herself. With one massive bellow, the tiger-dragon responded; her throat and and cheeks rippled as the dark-toned roar escaped from her vocals, ending with a stressed mechanical noise he couldn't define.
Silas knew she had no children of her own so who's little one was calling to her? He smirked in awe when he realized who it was. Phantasmos and Eclipse, Tigressa's youngest siblings, probably wondering where their big, bad sister was. He remembered how he met them. One of them got caught in a trap meant for the Bot named Ratchet after luring the medic out from their hidden outpost,probably somewhere within military grounds. Peering into the blue optics of a youngling was marvelous, for he didn't know also that Transformers could reproduce. That fact alone changed his view.
He smiled as she opened her wings after opening slits within her back armor and expanded them. The white hue reflected the moonlight perfectly. He sat still on the rock as she suddenly climbed toward an opening in the cavern-covered mountain side and took off. The sound of her appendages moving the air around her echoed to him.
Smirking, he watched her leave. To him, all Transformers were Gods but he knew only one could be truly God in the deadly game of war. By why a God when there's also a Goddess in play? He didn't care who won, as long as he had what he wanted and that was a Transformer to reverse engineer when the time came.
Personally, he wouldn't mind sparing some of them the trouble of dissection but there were a few he wanted to keep around, not to harm or experiment, but to live among the humans as Gods. One he had in mind would be an excellent colleague, and all who went against him and M.E.C.H would be obliterated by her. He could even rule the world with her and her siblings.
He would own the Goddess of Darkness someday, he was sure of it.
AN: I guess this could be somewhat a Silas/OC (Tigressa) pairing, but he still wants to take Transformers and use them for science experiments. I wanted to make his nature toned down a bit as I've done with Tigressa's to put them on equal footing, so to speak.