"Master," Starscream hissed, his wings twitching as he bent down in an elaborate bow.
Megatron's lip plates curled back into a toothy smile. Starscream never used that word right away unless he wanted something. Still, that didn't make hearing it any less pleasant. "Come in."
The Seeker straightened up and walked inside. His optics flickered as he peered now at the walls, now at Megatron, now at the floor, studiously avoiding the center of the room.
Still grinning fiercely, Megatron turned, staring at the crystal floating suspended in the housing he had made for it. It glowed with its own light, phosphorescent purple and painfully bright.
And it was cold. It chilled the entire room, as if it drew any heat nearby into itself and held it, jealous, refusing to relinquish it.
Megatron twitched, feeling it. Cybertronians were built to be resistant to extremes of temperature, but dark energon affected anything that came close to it. Its cold locked cabling needed for movement and coated plating in unnatural, glowing rime.
Years ago, when Megatron had first been set adrift in those deep reaches of space, cut off from his army and even from his enemies, it might have unnerved him. There were powers in the void so great they cared nothing for Cybertron or for those forced by long years of war to abandon it.
Megatron cared as little for them as they did for him, but it was only prudent to give such things a wide berth. Proud as he was of his Decepticons' might, his army wasn't ready to take on gods, and he certainly wasn't ready to face such beings alone.
Or so he'd thought once. That was before he'd taken the dark energon into himself, piercing his very spark with its sharp energies.
Now, he wondered why he'd ever been so cautious. To defeat gods, it was necessary to become one.
He had never expected that to be so easy.
Starscream's wings fluttered again as he moved to stand beside his leader. Probably moving to shake off the chill, Megatron realized.
And Megatron himself was big, his plating the reinforced armor of a miner and former gladiator. Starscream, in contrast, was built for the sky and the science lab. He would feel its bite far worse.
"What is it you want, my Second?" Megatron asked, turning away from his prize.
Starscream skittered closer. "My Lord, I merely wished to check up on you after your little, er, experiment with the dark energon." He gave his leader a hollow smile. "My study of it has shown that it's quite volatile, and you did take it directly into your spark -"
"And I am fine, Starscream," Megatron snarled, his optics glowing purple as the new energy sped through him.
Starscream squealed in alarm and took a step back. But fast as he was built to be, the Chaos Bringer's own energy raced through Megatron's circuitry now. His arm shot out and wrapped effortlessly around the Seeker's back. Then he squeezed, metal creaking, buckling under his hands as he lifted the Seeker up.
Starscream had learned long ago when to stop struggling. "Of course, my Lord. I would never doubt you." He panted, air cycling hard through his intakes. "Your hand, it's -"
"- cold?" Megatron finished for him.
Starscream yelped again as Megatron's grip on his back tightened. He gave another forced smile. "I only wish to analyze your spark energy. To discover exactly what this 'blood of Unicron' has done to it."
Megatron laughed, his spark roiling as he stared at the Seeker he held. And another need seethed within him, darker and older, echoing his desire. Together they danced and spun, the chamber in his chest barely holding them in. The spaces between his chest plates glowed with blinding violet light.
"Analyze, my little scientist? What if I do better, and let you experience it for yourself?"
Starscream thrashed wildly, shocked into responding. "Megatron, no - no. That's insane!"
Megatron let go, tossing the Seeker to the ground. Starscream's thrusters fired and then sputtered out as he tried and failed to take to the air. Metal grated against metal as he skidded across the floor.
Lent speed by the dark energy, Megatron moved to stand over him. Seeing Starscream in a twisted heap below him, the tyrant's chest plates parted slightly, the red light of his spark shining in the gap. Purple lightning crackled from the breach as the dark energon's tendrils stretched toward their prey.
Megatron grinned again, all teeth, and held out his hand.
Starscream lifted his head. "Master -" he stammered, licking his lips, his optics not leaving the half-exposed maelstrom in front of them.
"You want to know." The tyrant flexed his claws.
"Yes," Starscream gasped, hanging his head, defeated. "I want to know."
He reached out a spindly hand. Megatron took it, clutching tightly enough to make Starscream cry out again, and pulled the Seeker to his feet.
Starscream lifted his head, his faceplates twisting into a devious grin. Megatron could see the seams in Starscream's chest plating glowing with the red heat of his spark, lines of molten fire between the sheets of metal.
Megatron's frame flared purple as the dark energy embedded in his spark coursed freely through his systems. Starscream's optics shone as he watched. Whether with hunger or fear or astonishment, Megatron couldn't tell.
"Open," he snarled as his own chest plates thudded apart, no longer able to hold back the maelstrom inside his chest, the red core of him circled and fed by the cold purple lightning of the dark energon. Starscream's optics were wide now, wide as they could expand, flickering as Megatron's light seared them.
The Seeker's whole frame shuddered. He cycled a long, loud intake of air through his vents and shook his wings. Then his chest plates flew apart, so rapidly he winced.
Megatron smiled as the energies whirling through his spark sped up, power racing from his circuits into his core and gathering there, the dark energon a web of freezing light, pricking and goading him.
In front of him, Starscream's spark was a tight orb of flame. It had always been smaller than Megatron's, given the difference in size between the two of them, a fistful of life raging inside its tiny casing. Starscream hid his need well enough, under webs of plots and twists of lies, but it was always there, burning at the center of him, a brilliant knot of ambition.
And in the end, it had always belonged to Megatron.
The tyrant roared, a bolt of red fire tearing itself free from his spark, purple lightning wreathing it as it drove into the small frame in front of him. Megatron watched Starscream stagger, his spark chamber glowing with heat as his spark struggled to hold the energy spearing it.
And, as the two sparks connected, Megatron could sense Starscream's response: Fear. Desire. Defiance. Pain. Submission. Pleasure.
And woven through it all, a fierce pride as Megatron's power tore through him, scouring him, burning and freezing him all at once.
Megatron could guess what that was about. He could have kept the dark energon to himself, not daring to let any other Decepticon partake of it. Especially once it had granted him its power.
Or he could have chosen anyone to receive its chilling boon. He could have given it to any number of his warriors, an eldritch fuel to drive his conquering army.
Instead, Megatron had chosen him. Only he would be marked by it, changed by it, altered as Megatron had been.
Starscream panted, his spark pulsing heavy and overfull, cold and heat warring inside him. "Master -"
Megatron heard the word twice, once in his audios and once in the connection between them. It rang through him, tearing another bolt of energy free from his spark, the dark energon speeding along with it, eager and hungry.
Starscream convulsed again, and Megatron felt it, a delicious heat prickling through his systems as his energy blasted through every part of the other. Claiming him. Marking him. Shivering him with the cold of the power he'd found.
No one else would bear that mark. The dark energon was only for Megatron and for the one who belonged to him.
"Mine," he growled, hurling more and more energy into the Seeker's frame as it twitched like a toy in front of him.
It would destroy anyone else to be taken like this, ravaged by the freezing heat of a half-god newly born.
But Starscream was like no one else he knew, the tiny spark he flooded burning with desire as endless as the power he had found.
A thin claw reached for him, shaking violently as it wrapped itself around his frame, digging into the metal of his plating. He let it.
It grabbed at him, deceptively strong, pulling him toward its owner. Was it Megatron's own strength he felt now, reflected back on himself through the connection? Or was this what Starscream became when dark energon fueled him?
Megatron didn't know. He had no time to find out, either. The suddenly-strong hand crushed them together and Starscream overloaded, the energy bursting free from the Seeker in a blaze of crimson light.
It raced through Megatron as well, a ring of frozen fire, and his systems locked in a flare of red and purple as he threw back his head and bellowed in triumph.
He had spark-merged with Starscream before. Many times.
But now Starscream was his forever.