Author's Notes- Hi, for those of you who have read Old Patterns this is the story I was referring to.

Bold- Comm link.

Italics- Thoughts/memories/link speak.

Pairing- Megatron and Starscream.

Warnings- Rated M- future chapters likely to be censored. Slash (spark-rape included in future chapters) and violence.

Disclaimer- I do not own Transformers or its characters.

Verse- Movie-verse.

Units of Time: Astrosecond- 1 second, Klik- 1 minute, Cycle- 1 hour, Orn- 1 day, Decacycle- 1 week, Meta-cycle- 1 month, Solar cycle- 1 year, Vorn- 1 million years.

Unbetaed.

All mistakes are my own.

Hope you all enjoy it.


My Second

Chapter One- Found

'What do you mean he's down there?'

Prowl glared up at Megatron, glad Jazz was resting a servo on his back to support him, 'as I have just informed you, our scanners have picked up Starscream's signature about a mile beneath our pedes and the only entrance to such a place would be there. Ratchet has gone to retrieve him for you.'

The tyrant stared at the unassuming water merely steps from him then back up at the Autobots, flickers of distaste burning in their optics, with unhidden resentment. Engines growling in displeasure he walked to the edge of the water with clenched fists and scanned the area himself. Sure enough, just on the edge of his sensors, he could see his SIC's mark.

And if he searched for him hard enough in their link he could feel him, but painfully weakly.

Turning to the gaggle of Autobots behind him, the Warlord bit back a snarl and then withdrew in on himself.

When Starscream had vanished, simply disappeared from the Decepticon's radar completely, Megatron tore the Nemesis apart looking for him then dropped down to Earth when even Soundwave couldn't detect his Seeker.

Eventually, shamefully, when all his mechs on Earth failed to locate his bonded, the Decepticon Lord was driven to asking his brother for assistance.

When he told Starscream to leave his presence, he had not meant for his lover to flee the ship. Perhaps he was a little harsh with the smaller mech but it was for the younger's own good! He was only trying to keep his little mate safe, out of dangerous situations.

Starscream running from him was never intended…

A pulley system, chain stabbing through the centre of the pool to travel into the depths, perched beside the water. The Seeker, in selecting the almost perfect place to hide from Autobots and Decepticons alike, had entombed himself in what Megatron believed to be a situation straight out of the flier's nightmares.

Impenetrable darkness, not even a view of the sky…

Was Starscream punishing himself?

The tyrant was drawn out of his thoughts as the chain began to shift, clunking as it protested the movement, being forced to free the weight of two mechs from the pool.

Ratchet's luminous frame was clearly visible first cradling a slighter creature to his chassis carefully. The Autobot stood on the thin, but reinforced, platform, optics weary and form hunched. As soon as the metal slab met the grass, the medic was in action, leaping off to lay his charge gently on the ground before sliding a digit in-between Starscream's panelling searching for the catch.

It clicked open pliantly and the medic plugged himself into the access port, using his medical codes to try and force the Seeker's systems to reboot. Cursing, he crooked his digit at Jolt, calling for his assistance.

Megatron watched frozen, optics tracing over Starscream's frame. In the gloom of the Nemesis mech's figures were obscured and sometimes warped but in the harsh, unforgiving Earth sunlight Starscream's emaciation was cruelly highlighted. Unnaturally thin, the presence of the two Autobots crouching over him dwarfed him completely.

Bumblebee whirred quietly nearby, approaching slowly so as not to disturb the medics at work. Azure orbs scanned over the Decepticon SIC's frame, he turned suddenly on the Warlord with an accusing glare. Megatron remained stubbornly mute, ignoring the scout's silent condemnation as well as the sad, unsettled look that creased his brother's faceplates.

The Autobot CMO hissed in displeasure, 'we cannot repair him here, his shutdown is too advanced. He will have to come back to base with us.'

'Shutdown?' Megatron's voice disrupted the flurry of activity Ratchet's words provoked and the Autobots froze, staring collectively at their enemy.

The medic barely graced him with a look and notified the Decepticon harshly, 'he activated certain protocols with the intention of deactivating himself. His systems are shutting down at an alarming rate so, if you wish him to remain functioning with his processor intact, let us take him back to base so I may work on him with properly functioning tools.'

'The Nemesis-'

'Clearly from the condition of your mechs is completely inadequate to combat any form of damage above a scratch,' Ratchet interrupted with a dismissive wave of his servo.

'We'll give him back brother,' Optimus attempted to assure as the medics and Ironhide sped off with the flier in tow.

Their brotherly bond reconnected momentarily before the Decepticon slammed it shut, grabbing Bumblebee by the scruff as he did so. 'We will exchange them when you bring me back my second,' red orbs swirling in a rage that Optimus recognised as truly being helpless frustration.

His older brother had always hated feeling powerless…

The yellow mech managed to catch his leader's optic and gave a discreet nod. The Prime held his young friend's gaze for a klik to make certain Bumblebee was sure, then looked to Megatron warningly.

'Autobots, roll out,' Optimus ordered, speeding off after his other soldiers. Prowl and Jazz lingered for a few moments, the SIC squeezing the younger Autobot's shoulder while the saboteur flashed his visor encouragingly at his pupil.

Megatron dropped the smaller mech as they drove away, crossing the clearing to sit against a tree unsubspacing his fusion cannon as his frame slid down the thick, crackly surface. One servo held the weapon resting on his knee, aiming it roughly at the scout, as he held his chin with his spare appendage.

Starscream tried to kill himself…?

If he was hungry why didn't he say?

M-Master may I… have a sip of your energon…?

The pitiable tone needled him and his optics dimmed. He did cut his second's energon rations but only to stop him flying away as often as he did to Primus knew where!

Shoulders slumping as the sky dyed itself a deep amber, late afternoon and evening quickly approaching, Megatron's engines rolled in discontent. The feeling was exacerbated when his optics caught the sitting Autobot's reproachful side glances.

The peaceful atmosphere the clearing provided, reminiscent of a human graveyard, failed to touch the Warlord as he glared hatefully at his captive.

The young Autobot scowled back with a reprimanding series of beeps.

'How is it that you are still so insolent?' Megatron growled, fangs bared.

'Everybody tries to break me. Say they love me when they hate me. Baby you just can't bring me down.

Check on the rep, second to none.

Hot stuff baby.'

'Enough!' Megatron snapped, firing a warning shot into the water which blasted into the air before cascading down, glittering from the fading sunlight reflected off of it.

Bumblebee cycled his optics, unimpressed. If the tyrant wanted Starscream back unharmed, and if he was telling the truth about the Seeker being his bondmate he was sure to, he wouldn't lay a servo on the younger bot's plating.

Optimus would not be pleased.

Turning to face the tyrant, having sat cross-legged sideways on to him, the bright yellow mech pointed at the Decepticon Lord and gestured with his servos in a wave-like downwards motion to indicate Starscream's loss of weight.

'None of your business mechling,' the Decepticon Lord bit out, engines revving in warning.

'Do you feel like a man, when you push her around? Do you feel better now as she falls to the ground?'

Megatron stared at the Bot incomprehensibly for a moment before something clicked in his processor. 'What… exactly are you accusing me of youngling? He belongs to me I can do as I wish with him.'

'One day she will tell you that she has had enough.' Bumblebee answered him simply, ominously, before falling silent.

The tyrant bashed his helm back into the tree and closed his optics, faceplates pointed to the sky.

Soon afterwards night fell, both figures remaining stationary, still and silent as statues.


At the Autobot base, Ratchet worked diligently on Starscream, trying to recall him out of his self-induced stasis. The only systems to be responding to him in any manner were the Seeker's spark itself and the flier's memory core.

It appeared Starscream had programmed his processor to play certain memories back to himself as his systems gradually powered down.

Why? Only the Un-maker knew.

'Starscream, you glitch, why would you do this to yourself? Megatron's a fragger but you've put up with him for vorns, what could he possibly have done to drive you to this?'

As he worked increasing amounts of physical damage became apparent beneath the flier's thin armour, some vorns old, other blemishes very recently made.

Easily the most shocking, however, were the scars within the spark chamber, the walls scratched and gouged, stained and blackened by incredibly powerful bursts of unnatural energy. Disturbingly, the crimson colour of the spark itself was tainted with its own mutilations, a sharp purple cycling around with and piercing the life energy in such a way that had to be incredibly painful for the Seeker.

Decepticons truly were baffling creatures.

Ratchet assumed the permanent damage must have been inflicted by Starscream's leader over a long period of time. Megatron might be an abusive slagger, but he was also extremely possessive of his second, always had been, even to the point of separating his SIC from his beloved trine on more than one occasion.

An unspeakably cruel thing to do to one of Starscream's kind.

Staring with a renewed sympathy at the younger mech, the CMO continued his attempts to bring the Seeker online or… at least to make Starscream's passing as painless as possible. For an astrosecond the thought occurred to him that the option of deactivation may be the more merciful one because, even if he succeeded in reviving the Decepticon, he would be forced to hand him back over to his leader; and even though Megatron claimed they were bonded it still seemed all but a death sentence. This thought was quickly and guiltily squashed by the core of his programming to do no harm, especially to someone so clearly vulnerable in his care.

Equipment whirred and beeped around him in various states of distress and the medic's ministrations became more rushed, but no less skilled. Jolt stood opposite him, work too delicate for him to offer much assistance, but there if his mentor required him.

Cycles later, Starscream was still not online but was stable, shutdown processes slowly beginning to reverse despite some resistance. Ratchet was connected to several of the Seeker's access ports, overriding the internal orders the Decepticon initiated shortly after leaving his faction.

If Megatron truly wanted Starscream back after all of this, he better not frag it up.

Or Ratchet would murder him.


Thanks for reading and please review.

Songs used:

Poison's Can't Bring Me Down.

Styles Of Beyond featuring Mike Shinoda's Second to None.

Donna Summer's Hot Stuff.

Red Jumpsuit Apparatus's Face down.